By Ted Belman
This is the big issue of the day. The Iranian discusses the arguments for and against and highlights the following:
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Lastly, but most importantly, the Israeli leadership faces serious problems, domestically.According to the Yediot Ahronoth’s report [8], “not a single state official or military official or even the president – supports an Israeli attack in Iran.” The realities inside Israel inform us of an unprecedented debate [9] about war against Iran. “This unprecedented debate more than anything else reflects profound distrust of the leadership of Benjamin Netanyahu by the Israeli military and defense establishment,” according to Yaron Ezrahi [10], a political scientist and former analyst in the Israeli military. There is a political crisis within Israel. When Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu formed a coalition government with the centrist Kadima Party, many experts saw it as a sign of unity within Israel’s political system and reasoned that Kadima was joining Likud out of support for an attack on Iran. They were wrong. Due to sharp differences on issues unrelated to Iran, the coalition did not last more than two months. It fell apart in July. More than anything else, the root of Israel’s indecision regarding war with Iran rests within its own political system. As long as the issue of unity in that country is not addressed, Israel will not be in a position to attack Iran.
Do you agree?
@ Mary Anne Letourneau:
I remember a line from an old movie from the 70s: “If you’re in for a licking, you might as well get in the first lick”.
I was in a number of fights growing up. I won some and I lost some. I did best when my adversary was pushing me around, trying to provoke me…and they succeeded in provoking me. As long as they made the mistake of starting in with me when there was no adult supervision around, I’d make sure I got the first good crack in. That usually ended the fight then and there, sent them running away with a bloody nose or a black eye.
Israel has no strategic depth. She cannot go and hide in the mountains like the Swiss can, and she doesn’t have a bunch of sparsely populated land to fall back behind, like the Finns or the Swedes. Her major population and industrial centers are relatively small and concentrated. Her enemies have made their intentions crystal clear.
She has got to hit first in this case.
Actually they did listen, but a threatened Putsch by Sharon along with other generals, and the pressure from the Israeli Street reflected in political pressure from Begin, pushed Eshkol to act against His own personal reservations of crossing Johnson.
@ LT COL HOWARD:
It succeeded because it came in all probability at the behest of Bush himself. His policies of obstructing Israel from attacking Iran before the release of the report only intensified after the report, (continued by Obama) indicating embeded policy.
I do not recall any heads rolling in the NSA or any of the formulators and those who made the report public.
Bush had his fig leaf cover for inaction and the media who became supra-negative over Israeli saber-rattling in -light of the report. A win for Bush (allowing Iran to get nukes and pushing any actionable decision onto Obama (then, who ever would become the next president), just not Bush….
@ LT COL HOWARD:
Let me correct the record: I said”In the past I was intimately involved with all back channel communication with Iran.” This is incorrect. I was supposed to know about all such communications. However, multiple communications occurred which we knew nothing about. This is one of the problems. Some of this communication is rogue. Some of this communication is authorized by the White House by -passing the State Department, the Defense Department, etc. Some of this communication is official. Some of this communication is vague feelers being placed.
When preparing intelligence estimates, there is a sequential formation of drafts. Gen. Dempsey now indicates that 2007 was the dividing point for obliterating the Iranian nuclear capability and that in the current situation (since 2007) an attack could only set it back. Remember, the national intelligence summary of 2007— the 1st several drafts indicated the belief that Iran was continuing. The final draft said it had discontinued its efforts. This was based on a report from somewhere in intelligence that we had high-level intercepts that we had a great deal of confidence in indicating that Iran had discontinued its development program. In a situation like this, someone with a hidden agenda and political clout can make a case that no one else can verify or refute. Our on- the- ground information indicated that the program was actually expanding.
Many of us believed that this NIS finding was intended to cut the legs out from under George W. Bush. And this isucceeded. IS THIS SITUATION ANY DIFFERENT FROM THE CURRENT SITUATION IN ISRAEL WHERE VERY LIBERAL MEDIA ARE ATTEMPTING TO UNDERCUT PRIME MINISTER NETANYAHU? Every former high-ranking official has channels through which he/she can make their objections and or information known. For them to join in a crusade to prevent what they consider ill-conceived action ,is a chutzpah that is unimaginable. If they are wrong, Israel has no suicide ritual of atonement as the Japanese had. Israel and the Prime Minister have no room to be wrong. The journalists and the politicians of the left not only can be wrong without recourse, but when they have been wrong like Yossi Beilen they still arrogantly collect speaking fees, write op-ed’s and give each other awards which they then cite as proof of their wisdom. I
Mary Anne Letourneau Said:
Baruch Hashem that Israel had the brains not to listen to such advice in June 1967.
Unfortunately, Israel has followed such follies in numerous occurrences ever since then.
It’s good to be a failure. /sarc
@Mary Anne Letourneau. When I was a kid we had another kid in the neighborhood nicknamed “Crazy Eddie”. He would sneak up behind someone and bash them over the head with a rock. We soon learned that the best defense was an offense… when Eddie came close we would warn him…. and if he came closer we would bash him. Needless to say this strategy was a winning one and the idea of absorbing his hit and then fighting back, no matter how prepared we were, was insane.
In the last several days I was asked point blank whether I would recommend an Israeli or US attack on Iran. I said “no”. And before I can be misquoted by the US or the Israeli left-wing press let me explain our further conversation. Gen. Dempsey has made it clear that he is willing to gamble Israel because he’s not involved. He, and the CIA, etc., etc. have talked about the US intelligence estimates on the Iranian program. I raised at the table the question: “have we ever gotten it right when we estimated foreign nuclear capabilities?” We underestimated the Soviet’s ability to develop atomic and hydrogen bombs. We completely missed the Indian and Pakistani programs. We completely missed the North Korean program. We only learned of the Iranian program from Iranian defectors and internal opponents of the regime. We missed the Iraqi program before Gulf War 1. we refused to accept the Israeli estimates of the Syrian nuclear reactor development and continued our denials until the facts on the ground was so overwhelming that we had to accept them. These are just a few of the examples.
In all my involvements with Israel, I emphasize that my role is to protect the United States and implement US policy as I am directed by my chain of command. I have the obligation to either perform faithfully or if I’m opposed to resign. Israel is responsible for protecting Israel.
In the past I was intimately involved with all back channel communication with Iran. Recently there was an article in foreign affairs magazine which emphasize that Saddam Hussein was rational, given the facts as he understood them which were far from correct. The current emphasis by the US is that the supreme leader is rational. I would agree that given his goals and his “information” he will make rational decisions. However, the Unabomber, given his “facts” and “assumptions” which were a twisted reality also made within that context rational decisions.
I am appalled at the former intelligence and defense officials who are “leaking” information and publicly stating their position against attacking Iran. I can guarantee you that their efforts have convinced Iran that they should continue with the nuclear developments since Israel and the US will be paper tigers. If these public pronouncements which undercut Israel’s deterrence isn’t treason, I don’t know what is.
When I was a child I was taught, “Don’t hit first, but hit back as hard as you can.”
Not hitting first kept me out of a tremendous amount of fights, but when I did get into one, I usually won. Be well prepared to counter attack. The best offence is a good defence, and who knows, maybe the enemy will decide that it’s best not to attack at all.
I’ve seen elsewhere that recent polls in Israel indicate that the majority of the Israeli public is opposed to a unilateral – i.e., without the backing of the U.S. – Israeli strike on Iran.
I’ve also heard from Israelis that it is an Israeli habit to lie to pollsters.
I have read that prior to the ’67 war, there was not perfect unity among Israeli leaders. Though in retirement by that time, it has been reported the Ben Gurion, for example, opposed a pre-emptive strike by Israel. He believed that it would not be decisive enough in its effects to prevent Israel from facing the serious prospect of being overrun by far more numerous Arab armies.
Today’s situation mirros that of May 1967 in many ways. There was great provocation with the clear intent to present an existential threat to Israel on the part of the Arabs. There was great pressure from Israel’s “allies” not to strike first. There were grave threats made by the backers of Israel’s enemies – in the form of the USSR – that action by Israel would “not be tolerated”. Today, we see Russia making similar noises about backing Iran, and downplaying the threat they represent to Israel.
The main differences today are both positive and negative in nature.
On the positive side, Israel is much richer and a more integrated and important player in the world economy than was the case in ’67. Also, unlike in ’67, she has a huge technological advanatage over her enemies.
On the negative side, she has to face to prospect of having to act in the near future with no real allies. At least in ’67, even as she knew she could lose France as a patron state, she was courting the U.S. as a “back-up”, successfully, as it turned out. Today, the U.S. under Obama is poised to play the role of France under DeGaulle in ’67…but who will play the role that the U.S. did back then?
Also, the ‘correlation of forces’ on the media/PR front is much worse than in ’67. At that time, Israel still had much of the Western world’s putative, public sympathy as a beleagured state threatened by despotic and bloody-minded enemies. While this is still largely true in objective terms, in terms of perceptions, the UN, etc., the Arab/Moslem petrodollar prostitution machine has turned this situation completely against Israel As reported on Israpundit elsewhere, PR firms are now REFUSING to even do business with Israel!!! In the eyes of much of the world, Israel is no longer the heroic David facing the big bad bully Goliath; she is now a bothersome fossil of rich white guy colonialism that would be best to leave to a terminal fate so that the Moslems would stop whining at the rest of the world. It doesn’t help when the leader of what is still the world’s most powerful country – and Israel’s erstwhile sole major-power ally – clearly buys into this latter narrative with every fiber of his being.
If Israel really has the means to stop Iran in a decisive way, and if the window for using such means threatens to close in the near future, then I’d expect and hope that Netanyahu will show the leadership and resolve to do what needs to be done.
It should be remembered that in modern democracies facing the near-term prospect of war, debate and hand-wringing is the normal state of affairs if there is perceeved to be an element of “choice” as to the use of force. U.S.public opinion was very divided just prior to the start of Gulf War One, but quickly solidified in support of the war once the shooting started.
A formula for a Mideast arms race
By Jennifer Rubin
Whatever other political disputes are going on, I believe Israelis are united on the issue of stopping Iran’s nuclear weapons with military force if necessary. How can they not be.