June 28, 1914. Probably the saddest anniversary for the human race.

[starroute]

13. Don't leave out the way Versailles messed up the Middle East

We wouldn't have this whole ISIS mess on our hands today if not for what happened at the end of World War I.

http://www.historyfiles.co.uk/FeaturesEurope/WWI/1918_Conclusions01.htm

The Allies lost no time in betraying the Arabs who had been promised independence in return for rebelling against the Turks, and colonised them instead in order to exploit their oil reserves. The artificial nation of Kuwait was carved out of Iraq under a puppet emir so that its considerable oil reserves could be preserved for western exploitation. That would have its own blowback in 1990 when Saddam Hussein decided to re-take the territory for Iraq (the First Gulf War). And that would lead to the 2003 Iraq invasion (the Second Gulf War) and the ongoing war, which has its own part to play in the economic collapse the world over today.


http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/explainer/2001/10/whats_osama_talking_about.html

In his videotape broadcast, Osama Bin Laden made two references to "80 years." The first: "What America is tasting now is only a copy of what we have tasted. Our Islamic nation has been tasting the same for more than 80 years, of humiliation and disgrace, its sons killed and their blood spilled, its sanctities desecrated." Later, Osama repeated the temporal reference, saying "the sword fell upon America after 80 years." What's he talking about? What happened around 80 years ago?

It's impossible to be certain from such an oblique reference, but here's a plausible (albeit speculative) theory: Bin Laden is referring to the Sykes-Picot agreement, which divided the Arab provinces of the Ottoman Empire between the British and the French after World War I. Osama's prime goal is said to be the restoration of the Islamic caliphate, and the Sykes-Picot agreement may signal, to Bin Laden, the collapse of Muslim political and military power.