This weekend, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert arrived in Washington, no doubt to ascertain how the political changes in Washington will affect strategic changes in the Middle East and how those changes will affect Israel. The foray into Iraq has not produced the results hoped for by the Bush Administration. The diminished expectations and goals have been joined by an emboldened Iran and an undiminished Islamist threat. It is a mess. It is such a mess that it is time to expect and demand that such nations as Russia, China, the hopeless and feckless EU, and the Gulf States join with the US in a grand last attempt to affect a regional peace. The conference should be prefaced with an assurance that all options are open, with the exception of absolute guaranteed security of all states in the region. That is the velvet glove. The iron fist should be a private assurance to the major players, that despite the setbacks in the US election, Israel and the US will not tolerate a nuclear Iran. Bush should demand the Democrats sign on to the proposition or publicly expose them for not doing so. China, Russia and the EU should be encouraged to provide active positive and constructive cooperation. If they choose not to do so, it is time to contemplate putting together US demands and requirements for continued access to US markets and protection. If it is going to cost the US, it is going to cost them.Olmert brings Israel's Iran agenda to Washington
Updated Sun. Nov. 12 2006 10:55 AM ET
CTV.ca News Staff
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert arrived in Washington Sunday for a five-day trip that will focus largely on Iran's nuclear program and Israel's volatile relations with the Palestinians.
The visit comes one day after the U.S. vetoed a Security Council resolution that would have condemned Israel's military campaign in the Gaza Strip and demand Israel withdraw from the territory.
John Bolton, the U.S. ambassador to the UN, described the draft as biased and politically motivated.
During the flight to Washington, Olmert used strong language when referring to Iran, warning the nation will not reign in its nuclear program unless it fears repercussions.
"They have to be afraid of the consequences if there isn't a compromise," spokeswoman Miri Eisin cited Olmert as telling journalists on the flight.
However, Olmert seemed to play down comments made by Deputy Defense Minister Ephraim Sneh, who said Israel was preparing a pre-emptive strike against Iran's nuclear program.
Olmert said "we have to be very careful about what we say," according to Eisin.
Israel maintains that Iran is developing nuclear weapons, a charge Tehran denies.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has repeatedly called for Israel's destruction, but maintains the nuclear program is meant solely to produce energy.
The war of words between the two nations appears to be ramping up recently. On Sunday, Iran's foreign ministry pledged Iran would respond to Israeli military action with "swift, strong and crushing" action.
The increasing tensions were to be the main item on Olmert's Washington agenda, he said ahead of the meetings.
The schedule has Olmert meeting with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Sunday and President Bush on Monday.
Analysts believe Israel is worried that the Americans' traditionally tough stance against Iran could weaken with the Democratic election victory last week. With U.S. public opinion turning against the Iraq war, the worry is that Bush would be less inclined to take military or diplomatic action against Iran.
Some also worry Bush might be willing to end the policy of isolating Iran in return for a compromise with the armed groups in Iraq that Iran has influence over.
Olmert is also expected to spend some time discussing the Palestinian conflict. However, he was quoted as saying "this isn't a dramatic visit" and major changes were unlikely to take place.
Olmert is also expected to spend some time discussing the Palestinian conflict. However, he was quoted as saying "this isn't a dramatic visit" and major changes were unlikely to take place.
ReplyDeleteOlmert's trip to post-11/7 America is sort of like the one you make after your favorite kosher deli is sold to new management and becomes an outlet for halal meat and money remittances to Pakistan. You want to see if you can still get in the door.
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ReplyDeleteBritain has sent more troops to Iraq than any nation besides the U.S., and rising violence there _ and a British death toll that on Sunday reached 125 _ have heightened calls for a change of strategy.
ReplyDeleteBritain's Ministry of Defense said Sunday that four British servicemen were killed in an attack on a patrol boat in Basra's Shatt al-Arab waterway in southern Iraq. Three servicemen were wounded, the ministry said.
Britain's Troops
i get the feeling this is all a show...
ReplyDeletelet's show how uncommitted the USA is, let's put out rumors that israel is defeated and beaten..
all that will allow hamas/palestinians, syria, hezbollah & iran to do something stupid.
this will give israel the CLEAR right to clean clocks, i am not fooled by this dog and pony show. However I do believe iran, syria, hezbollah & the palestinians think they have beaten the usa and israel
It is going to be a war, but israel will not hold back this time, in the last skirmish in lebanon it was reported that the IDF used about 4% of it's ability. I predict a several pronged situation all at once..
Syrian will do something on the Golan
Palestinians are and will step up rocket attacks
Hezbollah will try to topple lebanon's government
Iran will and is going full bore to screw with iraq
I think the preplan is to get the islamonuts to DO something stupid, and I can hardly wait...
all that will allow hamas/palestinians, syria, hezbollah & iran to do something stupid.
ReplyDeleteI love it when people spout rope-a-dope theories. They said "rope-a-dope" on the Belmont Club all through the recent Israeli-Lebanon conflict, right up to the end when the IDF turned tail and made a hole for the blue helmets to come in.
Trish,
ReplyDeleteI understand your point - its been an ambiguity in the "cleansing flame" backlash mythos that has been a recent theme in BC & EB discourse.
But, I've come to think that ambiguity is the lack of imagination in the audience hearing the promise of the backlash. Which cities, you ask? Why, whichever cities are most important, most functional. If we can't persuade their intent, then go after their capabilities, whether those capabilities are weapons manufacturing or healthcare that sustains that intent. That is, its war.
There is no moral framework to apply to destruction of a threat. Only natural law. The biographies cut-short by whatever munitions we throw there way will not move Americans, as we have our own biographies we'd like to see written, and we were tending to them long before the Jihad sought to play a new script.
Trish,
ReplyDeleteStart with Damascus.
We should have done it to Baghdad, now it's too late.
Add Tehran...definitely Tehran. In fact move it to the top of the list.
That should help you get started with a response. Try hard not to repeat ludicrous. Ludicrous is the way we've been prosecuting these engagements.
We have some psychological dissonance about being big and powerful but not using it when it most assuredly should be used.
You must believe that Islamists can be reasoned with in our Western notion of reasoning. If that is true you need to keep applying yourself to the study of Islam for very very few true Islamic experts agree with that.
I never said setpiece wars were gone forever either. I said they were on the wane.
You appear most vexed when the thought of wiping out entire cities comes into the mix. Well, all I can say is history is way on my side on that one. In fact it's not even debateable by historians of any note.
Tell you what. You cite for me in either world war where the total destruction of a city didn't alter the equation to the better for the bomb droppers?
So pass my list around. It's a proven recipe for winning. Pick any war in history for that matter and tell me that wiping out your foes major cities didn't defeat him. This should be good.
The thought may be repugnant to you but war is repugnant and the sooner over the better.
And the population. Well, they usually starve to death, many go mad, and many many more, do, just sit on there hands in a state of torpor.
BTW this annihilating of entire cities goes like way way back in history..I mean why abandon a winning formula?
Pause here.
One rarely reads of a general commanding his army to take a cow pasture.
I posted this over at the BC - I'm not sure it means much, but if I'm not an outlier, then it may mean some Americans are beginning to sicken of old objectives, understanding that we want victory, and we have to ask ourselves what that is. Hopefully, after coming to a suitable definition, such as Pierre L reminder - "the destruction of your enemy" - we'll start to consider what to do to get there. "Rules" will apply to what we fund, not what we engage. Or they will apply to "Habu's List"
ReplyDeletePerhaps there is a convergence going around this season. Speaking only for myself, I'm beginning to understand a new definition of "victory."
It began a few days ago when Michael Totten had that post about the argument with the Hezbollah member. The Hezbollah member set a compelling notion for victory: victory for Israel is taking away HB's rockets and any other strategic capability they have
It really struck me - as for awhile I've considered "victory" as a nation like Germany and Japan, only called Iraq. Victory was some Iraqi economic niche and a reputation in one or more industries. But I was naive. Victory is, as you say, the destruction of your enemy and this is where the Air Power of nation building exercises fails. Precision guided munitions are not destructive enough.
Surgical, sure, but could there be a time when the "surgica" is no longer required, when man must face the barbarian, in their manifest hordes, and do away with the etiquette and niceties he'd wish to cover the globe with?
This "cleansing flame" backlash that's become a mainstay theme in BC and EB discourse does suffer from this ambiguity in what exactly your putting the flame to, so to speak.
But after watchig events unfold, I've come to think that ambiguity is the lack of imagination in the audience hearing the promise of the backlash. Which cities, someone asks? Why, whichever cities are most important, most functional, most cherished and loved by the enemy. If we can't persuade their intent, then go after their capabilities, whether those capabilities are weapons manufacturing or healthcare that sustains that intent. That is, its war. If they don't like their doctors and sickwards being turned into meat and cinders, they should try to learn english and do something productive. Quran verses will not help them in the 21st Century.
Aristides says we should own the context. Indeed, the context should be fear, the more superstitious the better, that Americans are terrible and merciless.
You can only be pissed off at the blown up hospital if you aren't running for your life, if you aren't utterly convinced that unless you get the hell out, and never participate in the cultural, social and political machinations that lead to this point up to now, the point where you and your jihadi brother are fleeing the artillery of a Spectre, and both of you fork in your flight, and before your turn a corner you see that he is cleaved in two by a round from the darkness above you, you begin to understand the error of your ways, and hope and swear that the beast grinding up your cities will stop.
Where the carrots have failed, Wretchard's Keyser Soze comes on stage. We wish to be noble, when it is only demanded that we be natural. The biographies cut-short by whatever munitions we throw there way will not move Americans, as we have our own biographies we'd like to see written, and we were tending to them long before the Jihad sought to play a new script.
Night. God help us all.
ReplyDelete"Start with Damascus.
ReplyDeleteWe should have done it to Baghdad, now it's too late.
Add Tehran...definitely Tehran. In fact move it to the top of the list.
That should help you get started with a response."
Help us get started? You did say flatten a few cities and this'll be over with quick, quick, quick, not flatten a few cities and that'll help get us started.
Flattening Baghdad would have helped us how, exactly? What particular challenge of this war hinges on the removal of that city? Or Damascus? These are centers of government, but it is not those who identify with or are controlled and directed by those governments that we are up against. You wanna massacre millions of Damascus residents because the regime that you will destroy in the process cannot effectively police its Sunni tribes? Collapse another state so that in the chaos that ensues, collective reason and blithe accomodation prevail among the how many fucking millions of Sunnis remain in the ME? Or Teheran...Obliterate it because the regime is cashing in on the Shiite rump-state we've created for it in Iraq? That gets us...where?
Three cities, tens of millions dead, and it's not even a walk-away, but a "start."
It's not an improvement upon the current ludicrousness. It's just ludicrousness taken to an exceptional height.
You can be bloody-minded and smart. Or you can be bloody-minded and senile.