Scuds in Lebanon: Israel’s Déjà Vu, Again and Again
Denial of the deployment of missiles is an old American tactic in the Middle East. After negotiating a cease-fire along the Suez Canal between Israel and Egypt in 1970, American officials rejected Israeli claims that Egypt was moving anti-aircraft missile batteries to the Canal. This was in violation of the agreement that forbade either side from “changing the military status quo within zones extending 50 kilometers to the east and west of the cease-fire line.” Within weeks, however, Egypt had deployed more than 100 batteries along the Canal, anti-aircraft weaponry that would provide cover for the Egyptian attack on Israeli lines during the October 1973 Yom Kippur War.
Israel was furious about the Egyptian violation. Henry Kissinger reported (The White House Years, Volume 1, page 587) that Israel’s Prime Minister Golda Meir sent a demarche via Ambassador Yitzhak Rabin with evidence of Egypt’s violations and deployment of missile batteries. Rabin was brought into President Nixon to show him the evidence and to “complain bitterly about the reluctance of our intelligence community to accept Israeli evidence.”
Kissinger continued with words that echo true 40 years later whether applied to the Iranian, Syrian, or Palestinian front:
“There was some merit,” Kissinger wrote, “in Rabin’s complaint of the reluctance of the U.S. intelligence community to find violations. As I explained to the president:
‘Israel, with her survival at stake, cannot afford to take chances. … The nature of the Israelis’ situation is bound to influence their interpretation of ambiguous events. We, on the other hand, have an incentive to minimize such evidence, since the consequences of finding violations are so unpleasant. Violations force us to choose between doing something about them and thus risk the blowup of our initiative; or doing nothing and thus renege on our promises to Israel, posing the threat of her taking military action. Accordingly, we tend to lean over backwards to avoid the conclusion that the Arabs are violating the ceasefire unless the evidence is unambiguous.’”
A recommendation to Israel: Don’t trust U.S. assurances. Take the threat seriously.
Déjà vu, once again
Despite the failure to destroy Iraq’s Scuds in 1991, “the United States was very eager that Israel not intervene in any way.” Moshe Arens recently related. He continued:
So, despite the previous U.S. assurance that Israel would be free to take action if the missile threat could not be eliminated within 48 hours, after 72 hours President Bush called Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir and Jim Baker called me, insisting that we not take any action, that we not in any way “spoil” the operation that was underway.
“Keeping Israel out of the conflict [was] a central strategic concern of our diplomacy,” says Secretary of State James Baker, according to a 1999 study on U.S.-Israel relations during the Gulf War. The study continued:
The prevailing conventional wisdom among American policymakers was that any direct Israeli action against Iraq or indirect participation with U.S.-led forces would likely fray the multinational coalition. If Israel took military action against Iraq, Arab members of the coalition … would withdraw. This would have both strategic political and military implications for the United States, and also hinder Washington’s operational capabilities in the Gulf.
Compare American policy under Baker 20 years ago with the present, with the American reaction to the looming threats to Israel of a nuclear Iran and Scuds in Lebanon. The U.S. administration is again warning Israel — perhaps even threatening — against undermining their fantasy policy world. Like James Baker, they fear that Israeli actions such as building in a Jewish neighborhood of Jerusalem, attacking Hizbullah Scuds, or taking action against Iran’s nuclear threat will have strategic political implications for the United States.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said on April 15:
The Israeli-Palestinian conflict has assumed a role in the global geostrategic environment that carries great weight. … Comprehensive peace is critical, not just to Israel and not just to the Palestinians and not just to the United States, but to the future of this world we share.
President Obama expressed a similar theme at the Nuclear Security Summit on April 14:
I think that the need for peace between Israelis and Palestinians and the Arab states remains as critical as ever. … It is a vital national security interest of the United States to reduce these conflicts because whether we like it or not, we remain a dominant military superpower, and when conflicts break out, one way or another we get pulled into them. And that ends up costing us significantly in terms of both blood and treasure.
Years ago, a New York senator complained about a president’s “even-handed” policy in the Middle East. “Even-handedness,” he complained, “means the palm of the hand to the Arabs and the back of the hand to the Israelis.”
It appears that for now the U.S. administration recognizes that it went too far with the back of its hand and has publicly rolled back some of the pressure on Israel. Speakers from the president on down have recently praised U.S.-Israeli strategic cooperation. But the harm has been done. Confidence in the relationship has been shaken, and the Arabs and Iranians probably believe that United States support for Israel has lessened.
Here’s a recommendation to Israel. Déjà vu is not only hindsight. Use it for 20-20 foresight. Take all threats seriously.
Everything you say is an accurate assessment of the situation but you don’t really think that Netanyahu & his side-kick, Ehud Barak, have the balls to do anything about it? The minute I learned that Netanyahu had brought Labour into the coalition & Ehud Barak would be Minister of Defense, I knew Israel was just going to continue the disasterous,dangerous, stupid, unsuccessful path that started with Oslo.
Netanyahu is not a leader, he’s just another of our crap politicians.
A great many Israelis, helped along by a Left-leaning media, are in a state of denial as to the threats that face us.
100% in agreement. Israel has became the commonwhealth of Israel and Netanyahu its Governor. Already in the past Netanyahu has proven incapable of whitstanding the pressures from Israel’s “ally”. The internal front isn’t strong enough either. In a recent poll 60% of israelis responded that they favored a land for peace agreement.
Carlos.
Most of the polls are total BS, concocted by Left-wing think tanks, the questions are designed to elicit the desired response. As in most things, the devil is in the details. If you ask about specifics, for example, to divide Jerusalem, you get 80% against. Another example, to cede the Golan to Syria as part of a larger ”peace” plan, again, 80% of Israelis are against. Virtually no one is for a return to the pre-1967 border. The vast majority are also against a land-link between Gaza & Judea & Samaria. Also, the vast majority want Israeli control of the Jordan Valey. Similarly, 99% of Israelis would not accept ANY phoney Arab refugees to ”return” to Israel.
What I am saying is that the differences between Israel & the Palestinians are irreconcilable.
The way it looks to me is that Obama & the Quartet will try to impose a solution & create a Palestinian state. Our concerns will be totally ignored.
TERRY: THANKS FOR YOUR CLARIFICATION REGARDING POLLS. IN THE MEANTIME NETANYAHU IS THE GOVERNOR OF THE COMMONWEALTH OF ISRAEL. WHATEVER HAPPENED TO AVIGDOR LIEBERMANN THAT SAID: TO MY RIGHT IS THE WALL?
CARLOS.
”Whatever happened to Avigdor Leiberman?” That’s very funny. A great many people here ask the same question. Leiberman says the right things, publically, at least, but ……???? In circumstances that are normally the job of the Foreign Minister, we see instead Pres. Shimon Peres or Ehud Barak or someone else, Leiberman being side-lined.
During World War II, the Germans fired hundreds of V-2 rockets at Great Britain, especially London. They were the first generation of ballistic missiles, certainly “unsophisticated” by today’s standards, and they killed thousands of British citizens. Granted, we may have more sophisticated radar today, but that will only tell you that a missile is heading your way. We also have some anti-ballistic missile batteries in Israel, but nothing is 100% foolproof, especially when dealing with the smaller Katyusha rockets, for which there is really no defense.
It is not inconceivable that Hezbollah could fire a large number of Scuds just to keep the Israeli anti-ballistic missile batteries busy and then, at the same time, fire hundreds of Katyusha or, worse, cruise missiles (which fly below radar), at Israel. And we have not even considered what would happen if Syria and Iran fired their own missiles in a coordinated attack with Hezbollah. You could potentially have hundreds of missiles being fired at Israel at the same time, an attack even the best defenses could not withstand.
But I’m sure the Obama administration isn’t worried about that. The Muslims LOVE him, don’t ya know. They would never “dream” of offending Obama in this way, by attacking one of our allies, especially Israel. And we all know that Iran has been nothing but “upfront” and “honest” about their nuclear program, so their assurances that they would not attack Israel is as good as gold, right? Oh, I’m sorry, I was wrong. Wasn’t Iran the country that said they wanted to wipe Israel off the map? And we all know how much Hezbollah and Hamas “love” Israel, right? And Syria, especially, is just “itching” for better relations with Israel too, correct? Yes, Israel certainly has nothing to worry about.
The Obama regime is no more capable of protesting Syrian violations of the UN’s Hizbullah arms embargo than it is protesting Iran’s membership in the UN’s Commission on the Status of Women. Obama can only protest and criticize the United States’ allies. That’s because the United States’ allies are not Obama’s allies and its enemies are not Obama’s enemies.
Whenever it comes to Jewish human rights, especially the right to life, few give a damn. In fact, the encircling jackals who threaten to annihilate the Jewish State barely receive a rap on their knuckles for their genocidal threats.Ho hum….
With this in mind, it is a legal, moral and human imperative for Israel’s leaders to annihilate the threats on their borders. In fact, it is the wonder of all wonders that the vaunted IAF has not destroyed Hizbullahs cache, regardless of the screaming and encircling hyenas. To be sure, Israel’s military intelligence knows exactly where they are located, all that is missing are the orders to destroy them, and the will to ignore global condemnation-for trying to survive.
In tandem, Israel’s security services know the locations of Hamas terror heads, capable of dispatching them to their Allah in warp speed. The reasons they have not done so are varied and despicable, but it is what it is.
Currently, the test of all tests will come when, not if, Israeli forces (navy, air, ground) get the orders to decimate the Iranian WMD sites, as well as their leadership, and our leadership stand upright in the faces of our haters, wherever they may be.
GO IDF!!
Anat Kam is under house arrest. The orange protesters went to jail. There is pretty much the explanation for our collective frustration.
I think you’re right on all counts Adina. Furthermore, I like that, unlike many super-ardent Israel-supports (although that’s what I consider myself), you don’t try and second-guess the Israeli IDF high-level echelon and their political counterparts. They, like you say, are *well* aware of all the threats being mounted against them and they will pick the time and place of THEIR choosing as to when to strike. I support that it’s THEIR decision to do so 100%.
Since Israel will be portrayed as over-reacting and using inappropriate levels of force no matter what the provocation and if Israelis do even the slightest thing in their own defence, I say turn the IDF loose. Maybe if they actually acted like the arrogant aggressors the lefties say they are, they’d get more respect, if nothing else. Strong horse and all that.
I feel like the man portayed in the painting the SCREAM. Is anyone going to listen and will anyone hear?
Israel’s attitude toward the coming war is akin to America’s attitude toward our unsustainable debt. It is human nature to push off any hard decision into the future. Israel’s political chiefs reflect the popular will, because they follow, they do not lead. For Israel the moment of decision will most likely be forced upon Israel by the Iranians and their partners at a time of their choosing. And here in America that same decision will be made by Chinese and Arab investors, who will decide when its time to take it all down.
What can Isreal actually do about it? Short of starting a war it may lose? I think the Israeli military leadership understands much better than most and that is why there has been no action.
M Mir.
Are you joking or just being naive? Preemptive action to destroy Scud missiles is a political decision or, in this case, a political indecision. While it might or might not start a war with Syria, a debatable point (depends on Iran’s wishes actually), the IDF would smash both Hezbollah & Syria, prvided, of course, that there is no political interference in the conduct of the war. Yes, we would sustain damage in an all-out conflict but nothing compared to what we would do to Lebanon & Syria.
There will be no preemptive action, however, due to American pressure, the incompetence of our Defense Minister, Ehud Barak, & Netanyahu’s lack of real leadership.
Hezbollah handled Israel quite easily 4 years ago. I think Israelis and their supporters don’t really understand the military dimensions of a full out war with the newly configured Syrian military and a Hezbollah force several times stronger than it was in 2006. It is actually quite obvious that Israel is deterred militarily from interdicting the arms flow.
Mr Mir,
I think you are VASTLY underestimating the might of the IDF. They have come a LONG WAY since the 2006 skirmish. This time they will unleash hell on earth.
Unlike US forces fighting in a distant land, the Israelis have their backs to a wall (the ocean). They have nowhere to go. And it’s wholly unclear whether Obama (unlike Nixon in ’73) will resupply weaponry during a war. All that tends to… focus the mind as they say.
Also, while I understand Terry’s frustration with Israeli politicians, I’d say, “be patient Terry — while they may be inept at certain internal political moves, both Netanyahu AND Barak have Israel’s best interest at heart when it comes to saving the skin of the country as a whole! To think otherwise implies that they are actual traitors — which I simply do not believe. You may disagree with this or that decision, but I am SURE they are taking ALL threats VERY seriously (as is the IDF).”
During the first gulf war, the US was successful in locating and knocking out stationary Scud launchers. They were totally unable to locate and knock out any of the mobile launchers. A 2000 lb warhead is equivalent to the 2000 lb bombs used by the US during WWII. These were better known as block busters because of the extensive damage they would inflict. The prospect of somebody lobbing block busters at populated centers such as Tel Aviv or Haifa is chilling. Should Hezzbolah do such a thing, they will get the war they’ve wanted being that Israel would probably respond on a level undreamed of.
Seeing the Obama administration cuddle up to the Syrians makes me nauseous. It speaks volumes as to what Obama really is.
Osama Bin Laden and Ayeman Alzawahiri died in Afghanistan when a female detonated a bomb at 04:42 pm Nigeria time which is convertable to Aghapak time 25th Ekeh/11th Orie-2001 Afor, November Nkwor.
#8 -I hate to burst your superiority complex but Israel had no problem blowing Syrias nuclear reactor to smithereens.They had no problem blowing up Iraqs reactor back in ’81.Hezbollah and Syria are not major players since they are both being controlled/supplied by Iran.Iran only exists because of oil and no other reason.(well maybe heroin too).I know quite a few folks from Iran and they tell a very different story and actually support the Israelis.Youll never get them to admit it openly though.They arent stupid.