A New Thread fot the Current Israel/Palestine/Lebanon mess

The whole WWI parallel doesn't fly with me, frankly. This is a newer form of idiocy all its own.

Now, if, say, Israel attacked Lebanon and Iran/Syria IMMEDIATELY came to their aid, dragging in the US and Russia and then... that would be a lot closer to WWI.

I would actually just like to see them have a conversation. Putin seems so much more knowledgable on foreign policy lingo, etc. Also I bet Bush would slip up and call him "comrade".

In the 1980s, what Hezbollah did was take Western hostages. The United States is enormously sensitive to hostage situations. It led Ronald Reagan to Iran-Contra. Politically, the United States has trouble handling hostages. This is the one thing Hezbollah learned in the 1980s that the leaders remember. A portfolio of hostages is life insurance. Hezbollah could go back to its old habits. It makes sense to do so.

It will not do this while there is a chance of averting an invasion. But once it is crystal clear it is coming, grabbing hostages makes sense. Assuming the invasion is going to occur early next week -- or a political settlement is going to take place -- Western powers now have no more than 72 hours to get their nationals out of Beirut or into places of safety. That probably cannot be done. There are thousands of Westerners in Beirut. But the next few days will focus on ascertaining Israeli intensions and timelines, and executing plans to withdraw citizens. The Israelis might well shift their timeline to facilitate this. But all things considered, if Hezbollah returns to its roots, it should return to its first operational model: hostages.

Syria has no roof. It's air force would be gone in a day, or a night, if it chose to engage. So Syria is in a poor position if things escalate conventionally. It could stand to be greatly embarrassed if Israel chose to launch a variety of demonstration strikes.

As for attacking Iran, it would be easier for the US to apply a beatdown. Iran has a lot to lose in a conventional military engagement. Like it's entire air force, it's navy, all of it's air defense network, and whatever is above ground worth hitting. Behind the scenes, no one has any idea what is being said to Iranian leaders by diplomats. But in the past, it has been said, that walking diplomats up to the brink and telling them what will occur has been effective, maybe once.

So hostages -- that's an alternative. But it only works if the opposition hasn't passed a certain point of resolve and is determined to have its way with you. And since the crisis is already past the point of proportionate response and escalation, it might be argued logically that hostages -- since hostage-taking started this -- well, taking more of them isn't going to slow it down or give an advantage to the militarily weaker side.

Sure, but what is going to help Hezbollah? How did any of this help Hezbollah in the first place? Doesn't mean they won't get desperate.

And so it was and is logical to compare forces.

And in this case, if there is an engagement, Syria will come out a loser militarily in any force-on-force action with the IDF.

Iranian threats of force, on the other hand, aren't immediately relevant to IDF action in Lebanon. Iran has no way to project power other than through arms shipments and irregulars, the interdiction of which is one of the current action's goals. So while one can take whatever the crazy Iranian leader says seriously about "crushing" Israel, the IDF doesn't have to launch any immediate sally at Iran.

What I did reference above was the outcome of a potential Iranian beatdown administered by US forces, for any number of reasons.

Now their are plenty of people in leadership within the US, probably in government and the military, who think Iran has a beatdown coming. And they have thorough plans ready to go relatively quickly to apply it. But it's across the theatre, in a manner of speaking.

Whether or not this would happen and when, and under what conditions, is still wide open.

Coincidentally, and I really didn't know, like you, that it would escalate so quickly -- from my blog entry re Ultimatum, the game, yesterday, this excerpt:
====
Under "Uncontrollable Crisis Area Events," Ultimatum provides a deck of shuffle cards with various unpleasant and strongly negative outcomes. "At the beginning of each game turn, the American player should role the die. If a six results, the top card on the deck should be turned over and its instructions [applied]." Example: Israel invades Lebanon, bombs Beirut and . . . "
=====

Gallow's humor.

Fact: Iran funds and arms Hezbollah. It doesn't get more direct than that.

I'll go out on a limb and say that we've already seen the worst ... it looks like Hezbollah can't re-arm any time soon, so if they're dumb enough to keep launching 100's of rockets/day then they'll run out of firepower in a couple of weeks. Their Beirut headquarters have been destroyed, so hopefully Israel has no more plans to attack there. I think these "open war" declarations by Hezbollah are a sign of desperation -- they're in no way prepared (or were expecting) an extended conflict and are resorting to scare tactics to mask the fact that they can't keep up the intensity of their attacks for much longer. At that point, cooler heads will prevail, although I can't see Israel leaving south Lebanon any time soon -- as in, not any time in the next year or two.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060715/ap_on_re_mi_ea/israel_attacked_ship_8;_ylt=AnRcUif6o_bCiI3jncsFVcoUvioA;_ylu=X3oDMTBiMW04NW9mBHNlYwMlJVRPUCUl

Another explicit Iran link (if proven true...)

Ok, so that implicates the U.S. directly in about half the wars of the last few decades.

Stratfor is in overdrive. Excerpted from their latest:

The Israeli strategy appears to be designed to do two things. First, the Israelis are trying to prevent any supplies from entering Lebanon, including reinforcements. That is why they are attacking all coastal maritime facilities. Second, they are degrading the roads in Lebanon. That will keep reinforcements from reaching Hezbollah fighters engaged in the south. As important, it will prevent the withdrawal and redeployment of heavy equipment deployed by Hezbollah in the south, particularly their rockets, missiles and launchers. The Israelis are preparing the battlefield to prevent a Hezbollah retreat or maneuver.

Hezbollah's strategy has been imposed on it. It seems committed to standing and fighting. The rate of fire they are maintaining into Israel is clearly based on an expectation that Israel will be attacking. The rocketry guarantees the Israelis will attack. Hezbollah has been reported to have anti-tank and anti-air weapons. The Israelis will use airmobile tactics to surround and isolate Hezbollah concentrations, but in the end, they will have to go in, engage and defeat Hezbollah tactically. Hezbollah obviously knows this, but there is no sign of disintegration on its part. At the very least, Hezbollah is projecting an appetite for combat. Sources in Beirut, who have been reliable to this point, say Hezbollah has weapons that have not yet been seen, such as anti-aircraft missiles, and that these will be used shortly. Whatever the truth of this, Hezbollah does not seem to think its situation is hopeless.

The uncertain question is Syria. No matter how effectively Israel seals the Lebanese coast, so long as the Syrian frontier is open, Hezbollah might get supplies from there, and might be able to retreat there.

---

We are in a relatively quiet spell (emphasis on quiet). Both sides have made their strategic decisions. Both know how the war will be fought. Hezbollah thinks it can give as good as it will get for a while, and will ultimately be able to regroup for a guerrilla war against the Israelis. Israel thinks it can immobilize and crush Hezbollah quickly and decisively and will be able to withdraw. Both sides know Syria is the wild card, and neither is quite sure how it will play its hand. One side is wrong in its expectations about the outcome. That's the nature of war.

I don't see how it can result in a WWIII 10-countries vs. 10-other countries kinda thing

That's a pretty specific definition of World War III. I think many of us use that phrase to mean simply a non-localized war, or one with a different level of destructiveness. If Israel strikes Syria, or Iran, both of which seem reasonable possibilities, does the rest of the world stay on the sidelines? Do we see stepped-up attacks on US targets? If so, do we see a "moderate" US reaction? As has been noted above, I think most of us believe that the US has already decided it wants to strike against Iran, the question is just when. "Now" is both the best and the worst time. And what happens then?

https://www.stratfor.com/reports/podcasts.php?

Dude, Iran is fucked. I don't know if they started it, I certainly believe they're up to doing so. However I think you've got Israel's objectives dead wrong.

I normally don't consider myself a leading conspiracy nut, so, I can't be the only one thinking this way. The only way these events make sense, in terms of the expenditure of arms and lives, and the increase of risk, is that someone needs a justification to end Iran's nuclear development programs. Someone. Some mystery party. Who could it be? (NB I'm NOT saying knocking out Iran's nuclear development isn't a worthwhile goal).

But then, I always thought Iraq was primarily about securing energy resources. Boy, was I glad to be proved wrong.

Somewhere, Dick Cheney is trying to link Hezbollah to N. Korea.

Neither the US nor Israel have the resources to invade Iran. It's gotta be airstrikes or back to the bargaining table.

-- Ned Raggett (ne...), July 14th, 2006.

Well, their meeting has provided one of the stupidest quips Bush has ever uttered. Another one for the record books:

"I talked about my desire to promote institutional change in parts of the world, like Iraq where there's a free press and free religion, and I told him that a lot of people in our country would hope that Russia would do the same," Bush said.

Putin's droll response: "We certainly would not want to have the same kind of democracy that they have in Iraq, quite honestly."

Mitya OTM re: WWIII similarity is meant broadly as a larger conflict escalatingly out of a (seemingly) localized incident.

anyone who directly instigates a conflict involving both the US and the Israeli military is gonna get there asses handed to them on a silver (probably highly irradiated) platter...

Like Saddam got his ass handed to him? There's a lot of comparison between Israeli/US vs. Iranian/Syrian military power in this thread, and, sure, we can handily crush nearly any country we like in the region, but can we manage the fallout? I don't feel comforted anymore by the "If all else fails we can bomb/invade them" shibboleth. And do we really want to drop a fucking atom bomb on Iran? That will really dissuade N Korea from pursuing nuclear arms (axis of evil, two down, one to go!).

New question: What are the chances that insurgents in Iraq are headed West to join Hezzbolah in fighting? Cause those guys get wet at night dreaming about engaging Israel in armed conflict.

Israel has issued its demands for ceasefire, but it doesn't sound like Hezzbolah's biting.

Cover story on this week's Time: The End of Cowboy Diplomacy.

We should be so lucky. We're still going to have cowboy diplomacy, except instead of John Wayne it's more like Joe Buck.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/738739.html

Part of me sees this cross-border fighting continuing on for a few days. Lebanon is thrown back 30 years, Israel decides it's taught someone a lesson and stops the attacks, whatever, and we're just back in a stalemate with more bad blood on both sides. At least let someone come out of this with a different perspective.