The Guardian says President Obama is attempting to set up a missile defense ring around Iran to 1) protect the Sunni allies from possible attack and 2) to disincentivize Israel from attacking Iran.
The US is dispatching Patriot defensive missiles to four countries – Qatar, United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Kuwait – and keeping two ships in the Gulf capable of shooting down Iranian missiles. Washington is also helping Saudi Arabia develop a force to protect its oil installations.
American officials said the move is aimed at deterring an attack by Iran and reassuring Gulf states fearful that Tehran might react to sanctions by striking at US allies in the region. Washington is also seeking to discourage Israel from a strike against Iran by demonstrating that the US is prepared to contain any threat. …
An unnamed senior administration official told the New York Times: “Our first goal is to deter the Iranians. A second is to reassure the Arab states, so they don’t feel they have to go nuclear themselves. But there is certainly an element of calming the Israelis as well.”
This would be the threat that didn’t exist, according to those who accused the last administration of scaremongering about Iran. The very same New York Times to whom a senior official is now the latest defensive measures wrote in 2007 that:
A new assessment by American intelligence agencies concludes that Iran halted its nuclear weapons program in 2003 and that the program remains frozen, contradicting judgment two years ago that Tehran was working relentlessly toward building a nuclear bomb. …
Rather than painting Iran as a rogue, irrational nation determined to join the club of nations with the bomb, the estimate states Iran’s “decisions are guided by a cost-benefit approach rather than a rush to a weapon irrespective of the political, economic and military costs.”
The immediate reason for Washington’s deployment were Iranian missile tests. The Wall Street Journal describes the shift in the President’s policy towards Iran as “after months of attempting to engage Iran in nuclear diplomacy, the administration has been working in recent weeks to win an international consensus for a new round of sanctions against Iran.” Far from having abandoned the policy of engagement in favor of containment, the Obama administration is actually using the missile deployment as one more tool in its arsenal to entice Iran to the bargaining table. A few more missiles and few more sanctions and Ayatollahs will as it were, have their “come to Jesus” moment.
But not everyone is buying it. One subtle sign of how the region is responding to Washington’s policies is examined by Lee Smith who notes that several Sunni majority countries are refurbishing synagoguges as cultural symbols and as messages that the Jew is no longer the enemy it once was. He writes:
And yet if you listen closely there is a deeper and more important subtext to the Arabs’ strange and sudden fascination with the remains of the vanished Jewish communities of the Middle East. These restorations of Hebraic antiquity are not simply a safe way of acknowledging the longevity, and thus legitimacy, of the Middle East’s oldest surviving religious community. They are also the means by which Arab governments have begun to recognize that community’s influence and power over their fates. For it is Jewish warplanes, not Jewish remains, that have Arab princes and presidents captivated. Nowhere has this been made more explicit than in the recent valentine to Mossad chief Meir Dagan published in Egypt’s semi-official daily newspaper Al-Ahram, calling him “the Superman of the Jewish state.” Dagan is worthy of Cairo’s love insofar as he “has dealt painful blows to the Iranian nuclear program.” Thus the only question Egyptians ask a visitor from Washington: When will the Israelis finally bomb the Iranian nuclear program?
Egypt and its Arab allies believe that Obama’s engagement with the Iranians will fail, that the Russians and Chinese will not join a sanctions regime, and that the Americans will eventually move to a policy of cold war-style containment and nuclear deterrence. The American president and his Middle East adviser, Dennis Ross, intimated that the Israelis might take dramatic action against Iran’s nuclear program, confirmation for many Arab observers that the United States has taken its own military options off the table. This is not the case, these same observers believe, for the Israelis, who have acted against Iran’s eastern Mediterranean allies—Hezbollah and Hamas—and will, with luck, take action against Iran itself.
Israeli strength and Arab weakness are therefore seen as part of a common pattern that will yet bring about the defeat of a common enemy: Iran. Here in Beirut there’s talk that Prime Minister Hariri’s recent trip to Syria, where he was coerced into humbling himself before the regime that allegedly assassinated his father, was merely a maneuver in a holding pattern until the Israelis strike. Sources close to Hariri explained to me that Saudi Arabia, the young prime minister’s patron, believes an attack is imminent and that there is still time to wrest Syria away from the Iranians. Hariri’s visit was seen as a down payment on an expected Syrian realignment.
Of course the touching Sunni belief that the Jewish state will save them from Iran — something that must rank as among the most astounding ironies of history — may prove to be completely unfounded. But it is indicative of the degree to which the administration has abandoned the traditional American role of hegemon that the Arab states are clutching at such straws. The President campaigned on the promise that he would restore America’s stature in the world. What he has actually transformed America’s stature into will presently be shown.
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It would not be the first time the Israelis have saved an Arab nation from external enemies.
The Syrians once sent an large armored force south to capture Jordan. The Israeli Air Force, flying F-4 Phantoms loaded with Napalm, overflew the armored force several times at low altitude.
The Syrians withdrew.
These same Sunni governments have already written the editorials and sermons condemning the Israelis in the event that they do what they are being begged to do.
Are the American weapons there to protect the Arabs and Israelis from the Iranians or to protect the Iranians from the Israelis?
Washington is also helping Saudi Arabia develop a force to protect its oil installations.
Why are they “its” oil installations? The Sunni Saudi regime conquered the native Shia Eastern Province. They have no more legitimacy there then Saddam had over the oil fields of Southern Iraq. The Iranians have no natural right to the oil fields of South-west Iranian Arabistan. The Left screamed in 2003 “No war for oil.” If only it was. We should have seized the oil fields and run things right at $25/bbl.
The player not mentioned to watch in all this is Turkey. The current regime in Ankara has flirted with Iran, Syria and Russia against Israel and the Americans. The Turkish Army may be getting them to walk back from that.
What’s next? An Israeli-Egyptian-Jordanian alliance against Iran and Shia fundamentalism? I think this has been speculated.
Well, there are nine kinds of absurdities in all of this, but we are living in an absurd age.
Of course, it would be RATIONAL for the Sauds to find a way to make friends with Israel – Israeli pilots in American planes on Saudi soil. Saudi money funding Israeli industries to expand into Egypt. Lebanon restored to the Paris of the Middle East, with bus trips from Beirut to Tel Aviv.
Until the Iranian ayotollahs fall, too, and we start getting triangle tours from Los Angeles to Tehran to Jerusalem, and we can keep our shoes on the whole way.
But rationality hasn’t mattered much in the history of the middle east since about Alexander’s time.
Still, even with oil at $80/barrel, the Saudi economy is pretty dicey. Maybe … just, maybe.
Maybe throw a few churches in with those synogogues, while they’re at it. And some kosher delis.
The article mentions the construction of one “Jewish house of worship” in Lebanon and the restoration of one synagogue in Cairo. Those two projects comprise the entire foundation of this silly article.
What rational country would trust their defense to the Americans?
I guess low birthrate socialized countries in Europe, but they lost touch a long while back.
At best you can trust the Americans for one election cycle, two at best.
Oh yes, I forgot, the Americans are headed toward backrupty imitating the same policies as those low birthrate socialized countries in Europe.
Whoa, like the process is circular!
This is a short-sighted policy that speaks to Obama’s naive and narrow view of the world- let Iran get nukes and then try to build a ring of defenses around Iran? The missile defense shield is not 100%, and its funding has been considerably slashed by Obama. And if Iran can’t conventionally attack its allies due to the missile defense shield, it will have to unconventionally attack them, by selling or giving away nukes to terrorist groups, who will then sneak them into the USA and murder millions of people at once. That is what Obama’s policies are setting up- a future nuclear holocaust.
Re: #5
I meant Lee Smith’s silly article.
Last spring I predicted in a comment here that President Obama would bomb Iran in the summer of 2010. I reasoned that Obama was trying to buy an interval of “peace” with Iran during the summer of 2009 while he passed his domestic agenda — in time to take his bows at the UN in the fall (for Cap and Trade especially). At the UN he may have planned to “turn” on Iran. I did not think that would work. He would not pass the bills in that time frame because when people encountered the specifics of his plans it would displease some and outrage more. So, no Obamacare signing on Labor day. This would cause him to “postpone” the planned sanctions since he would still want to pass the bills without the distraction of a foreign confrontation. I did think that he would pass Obamacare (or something like it) by now, though.
At the same time the “uncertainty” caused by his legislative agenda would slow the recovery and cause a high rate of unemployment. This would make him look vulnerable and further encourage the Iranians to be confrontational.
At some point the Israelis would decide to act. Politically weak, Obama would be in no position to stop them. At the same time it would offer an opportunity to change his fortunes politically — all he would have to do is join the Israelis in the attack.
Iran should open discussions with the EU before summer. It will be hard for Obama to bomb while they are talking to the EU.
Why do I share LOM’s doubts:
“Are the American weapons there to protect the Arabs and Israelis from the Iranians or to protect the Iranians from the Israelis?”
Has OB become enamored with Israel or does he wants to make darn sure nothing will spoil his appeasement policy?
Don’t get your hopes up to fast about the Arab world
Read this recent article about Israel in Al Ahram (governmental mouthpiece of the Egyptian government)
The
grand Zionist façade
Ultimately Obama’s fantasies are not sustainable. There is no real missile defense, Obama having killed the program. What we have is Patriot missiles which cannot really hit the ICBMs that Iran has. They are certainly useless against Missiles fired from Lebanon and Gaza and Syria. Flight time of less than a minute to hit major Israeli population centers, with nukes.
So, no, Israel will have to decide: kill half the Iranian population to survive, or die itself “morally.” Ghandi’s urging of Jews to simply be killed by the Nazis, to be the morally correct ones, or survival which means killing millions of Iranians through their own nukes first.
Lets be honest, most of the Gentry Liberals in the US, including most Jews, would prefer the former. Israelis are disquieting, Jews who mostly reject the Gentry Liberal assumptions of PC and Multiculturalism in favor of ardent, Jewish-based nationalism. Zionism being an uncomfortable reminder of ethnic nationalism, as unwanted in SWPL circles as the Marine Corps Hymn.
My guess is that Israel will wait until the last moment in the hope that the Green Revolution will succeed (what a joke!)
Nevertheless, in one way or another, US hegemony over the Gulf is ended. Among the casualties is the ability to lean on the Saudis as their protectors to keep oil cheap. Get ready for oil at $150-250 a barrel. At least. Lets not kid ourselves either. Both Russia and Iran need really expensive oil to survive, so they can pay their thugs. Men with guns don’t come cheap.
All this suits Obama just fine. He views himself as the occupier of nasty, horrible people, who have the original sin of being both White and American. He’s there to bring them to justice. Most Gentry Liberals and SWPL share these beliefs too, so it’s not just that man.
President Obama has placed Aegis missile cruisers in the Gulf to prevent the Israelis from attacking Iran. Are they also in place to prevent a retaliatory Israeli strike after an Iranian attack?
The day has come, the old man said
Allah has shown his hand
By now the Jewish scum are dead
The birds have left the land
Shahabs have flown, we’ve seen the trails
They headed west at dawn
With shuttered eyes one hears the wails
Of Israeli gone
No more will we be called a wog
No more the monstrous sneer
Today my son it is Der Tag
The final time is here
The Jewish entity no more
The cancer is erased
By Shahab missiles by the score
And all supremely placed
Will not the Jews return the blow
His little son replied
His father smiled and answered No
Obama’s on our side
Whiskey said: My guess is that Israel will wait until the last moment in the hope that the Green Revolution will succeed (what a joke!)
They will wait until the last moment before Iran goes hot.. Nothing to do with the so called revolution, the revolution is pro Iranian-nuke, Totten has a great interview with Lee Smith that is worth a read michaeltotten/ But I think Israel will wait until the last moment to allow Iran to invest as much as possible so that Israel can do maximum damage.
I advocate that Israel takes out the obvious targets, such as command and control and hot targets, but I think Israel should take out Iran’s oil refineries as well… Any attack on Iran needs to cripple her…
I think we will see an lebanon flair up before Israel takes on Iran… Hezbollah needs to be squared as well as Syria.. (syria has at least 3 sites its still not talking public about that are hot targets)
I dont see this as being a clean strike, Israel is already prepping with nationwide bio/chem attack drills and the leadership in Jerusalem are quite aware of the LACK of American support by the current admin. Weapons once promised to Israel are delays (bunker busters, aircraft and more)
Israel now feels it’s back is up against the wall and the recent Gaza operation proved that they will never get a fair shake in the UN or with the world’s opinion, couple that with hamas and hezbollah getting respect via europe and britain and russia, germany, italy and china all feeding at iran’s petro tit, Israel is looking to it’sself…
France is to take over the UNSC tomorrow and that may be what is needed for once last non-military attempt to halt Iran. But i think it’s crap….
If i was a betting guy?
I’d be looking at something popping in the next 10 weeks, but I am always wrong on timing….
Poole: The Syrians once sent an large armored force south to capture Jordan. The Israeli Air Force, flying F-4 Phantoms loaded with Napalm, overflew the armored force several times at low altitude.
Thanks for that bit, I never knew.
American forces in Kuwait and Iraq, as well as the carrier battle groups we can bring to bear, effectively block Iran from sending armor to capture Saudi Arabia and thence the Gulf states of Bahrain, Qatar, UAE. Iran, naturally, can always start lobbing nukes around when they get them, but that’s suicide. Even if B. Hussein Obama is reluctant to nuke his brothers in Allah in retaliation for first use by Iran, Israel will certainly step up to the plate. So we can afford to wait.
I’m calling BS on this political stunt. Just Obowma posturing as a populist president. This American regime has zero credibility either at home or abroad. We’re gone from the ME and SW Asia. Chairman Obowma already said so. The kabuki dance will go along but serious men have sized up America and will do what they have to do.
Even the Japanese want US troops out. They see a weak, ineffectual president who would never stand against any thug. American troops have become an unbearable burden, even in Japan.
There will be ramifications.
Where does China fit into all of this? They are the ones who are most exposed to any disruption to Arabian Gulf oil flows or the price spike that comes with it. They don’t have all of the same motivations that the Russians do (as both aim to destablize us strategically), but they clearly are complicit in Iran’s ability to misbehave.
I really wonder what China’s strategic aims are over the next 10-20 years. It’s one thing to sling mud in the eye of the current acknowledged leader, but what do they aspire to be?
Look forward to your thoughts, fellow BCers.
Nukes don’t kill people. People kill people.
If Israel does decide to move against Iran, it won’t be hard-to-execute strikes against deep-bunkered nuclear processing facilities. It will be surprise strikes against the Iranian leadership; maybe on a Friday; at a mosque.
Presumably, the Israelis will try to have tacit agreement from the Saudis before they move against the Iranian leadership.
Of course, success would leave a power vacuum in Iran, and nature abhors a vacuum. Russia would try to fill it. So might Saudi, or even China. Eliminating the current Iranian leadership may get the monkey off Israel’s back for a while, but it would likely not lead to peace in the Middle East. Disruptions there could plunge the world into an oil-starved depression which could make our current economic situation seem like the Good Old Days.
Obama may end up making Chamberlain look good.
How about freeing the Kurds to make their own nation
that would solve alot of the middle east’s issue…
iran, iraq, syria, turkey all occupy kurdish lands and it accounts for 1/6th of the world’s oil
maybe by destroying iran, syria and iraq’s grip on lands that are not theirs this wold be the best solution..
turkey needs a good kick in it’s ass too.. and watching the kurds form their own nation would be a wonderful thing to watch…
More little dots to connect.
Israel, next to the U.S., provided the most help to Haitians, establishing field hospitals performing surgery and saving lives.
Yet, when Obama listed individually the several nations that pitched in after the United States, Israel was not mentioned — or rather, was in the “among others” category. How clearly contemptuous and nasty was that?
Considering the timing, there can be little doubt that the main purpose of the missiles Obama has just sent to the M.E. is to deter Israel from bombing Iran. No doubt, this message will leak out soon.
Although, Obama would never recover politically here in the U.S. from shooting down Israeli jets, I don’t think he would care at that point. (His chances of a 2nd term are looking more grim every day, anyway.) And then, he would truly and forever become the ultimate hero of the Left and the Islamic world.
If the Israeli’s cave to his threats, and Iran bombs Israel, so much the better for Obama. He will have “solved” the Middle East (Jewish) problem — and will be able to “retire” with all the glory and riches that will bring him everywhere else but here.
In private negotiations with Iran, he’s probably using this pre-emptive “protection” as another one of his engagement points.
Yes, I believe he’s that evil.
Yesterday 85 year old GHW Bush ’41 visited the White with son Jeb, the former Florida Governor, and spent maybe 35 minutes there. Was it just a perfunctory courtesy call or was a message delivered?
what is “occupation”,
The Kurds have been treated shabbily for decades and they often stand out against their unlovely neighbors.
The problems are;
1. infighting and terrorist elements although that is sometimes outside provoked.
2. they are not a majority in almost all parts of Kurdistan but one large minority among many.
Aqua,
Axelrod, Emanuel and the Jewish team from Goldman-Sachs will have much to answer for if things go as badly as some of us fear.
problems are as well that turkey, iran, iraq and syria dont want to give up those lands..
but if iran was hit with a major punch, thrown in syria too, the iraqi kurds might just annex some more Kurdish lands and drive out the non-kurds..
after all squatting arabs have no complaints if they are tossed out of lands they do not belong in…
i’d love to see the litani’s illegal water diversion bombed, not to mention syria’s presidential palace…
maybe if the saudi’s were knocked off king hussein of jordan could return to mecca and medina?
sometimes a major out of control war is a good thing…
what would be so terrible to have 40-100 million arabs & persians homeless and starving?
I’d donate a few stale bagels and some pork rinds for them…
The Guardian says President Obama is attempting to set up a missile defense ring around Iran to 1) protect the Sunni allies from possible attack and 2) to disincentivize Israel from attacking Iran.
Granting that it is the Al Guardian, but I note what seems to be a careful omission. There is no mention of any intention that our additional PATRIOTS or AEGIS cruisers will protect Israel from an Iranian attack, and as #10 marek says, or to protect the Iranians from the Israelis?
I see, and I rather suspect that at least part of the Israeli planning staff will be willing to factor in the high probability; that the purpose of the American deployment is to make sure that Israel can be targeted safely, and that Iran will pay no penalty for attacking Israel. If Israel has half a lick of sense, they have to assume that the US and the UN [and EU] are Iranian allies.
And the ironic thing is, if Iran succeeds and Israel is destroyed by Iranian nukes and enough of Iran survives with a nuclear capability remaining [do not forget the Israeli POPEYE TURBO cruise missiles on their DOLPHIN class submarines]; Europe is surely also on the Iranian SIOP. And they have no intrinsic defenses, the US will have proved that it is useless as an ally, and any theoretical retaliation by Europe [read France and Britain] will be met by Russia which stands behind Iran and indeed created the Iranian nuclear weapons program. Europe will fold when faced with Iranian threats and/or Muslim internal unrest coordinated with the threat of Iran.
Incidentally, I note that the AEGIS cruisers specially modified to take the SM-3 ABM and the similarly modified AEGIS destroyers that are necessary for the system to track hostile missiles are in … limited … supply. We have been deploying those we have along the major threat axis for a missile attack against the United States; i.e. North Korea. I am not aware of any sudden augmentation of our SM-3 capable systems. Have we left our country vulnerable in order to protect parts of the Ummah as Iran strikes Israel?
A secondary thought. It is mentioned that the cruisers are deployed in the “Gulf”. I assume that they mean the Persian Gulf, and not the Gulf of Oman, as a Gulf of Oman deployment would not be ideal for covering any Iranian launch. The Persian Gulf is very restricted. The purpose of the AEGIS destroyers is to be forward deployed so as to establish a track as soon as possible. Forward deployment in the Persian Gulf places you at risk of Iranian cruise missiles. That can be defended against, but a lucky strike would prevent the cruiser from taking down Iranian ballistic missiles.
Our defense against that would be a belief that such a strike would involve United States retaliation. Such deterrence rests on two things. One, both sides are rational in terms they both understand. Two, each side has to believe that any attack by themselves WILL trigger a retaliatory response. As for the first, the rationality and meeting of minds required does not seem to have been achieved. As far as the second; Ahmadinejad and every hostile strong man in the world has taken the measure of Buraq Hussein. “Gormless” and “Goolie-less” seem to be two of the operative adjectives.
Interesting times indeed. And noteworthy that TWANLOC’s political base rests largely in urban areas most likely to subjected to nuclear attack/terrorism.
Subotai Bahadur
First, I thought China and Pakistan were tight not China and Iran. Russian influence on the Mullahs is perhaps overblown, but how to profit from the circumstance is the question.
China’s threats to act against US companies arms sales to Taiwan is chilling, especially after having sold equipment to Iran, and still allows Norkor to ship nuke related stuff.
At this point any action that Israel makes against Iran helps Russia in that it doesn’t hurt them, but such action would harm China and the US.
It is by now a no brainer on symbiotic relationship between Arab nations and Israel. I read the article less as an Egyptian government mouthpiece and more as placation to the masses. I don’t think they’ve quite figured out how to tell them that Israel is their new best buddy absent overt subversion of their government by Iran and or Syrian agents.
Poole,
What was the date of that Syrian move?
I recall being at Ft. Bragg in the summer of 70, on hearts&minds business prior to deploying, and getting drafted, so to speak, to the 82d for the Jordan alert.
That is to say, enterprising 82d company commanders sent their lieutenants out to find jump-qualified friends who might be on base for one reason or another and offer them a for-real combat jump with for-real paratroopers. Not enough platoon leaders in the 82d’s alert brigade at the time, they being chewed up in the division’s other brigade in VN.
The reason for the whole thing was that the terrs had three airliners down in the desert east of Amman. And the Syrians were sending an armored force, rumor had it, built around five hundred tanks, to help with the luggage or something.
And it was too far for tac air from the Sixth Fleet.
Since the terrs had dispersed the hostages, we didn’t go.
Unlike Entebbe. How come the Jews get the good ops? Hell, they even upstaged our bicentennial.
“Recalling Iran’s persistent refusal to end its illicit nuclear program – and President Obama’s repeated pledges to do something about it – nine senators on Wednesday urged the president to “put into action [his] pledge of increased, meaningful pressure against the Iranian regime”
http://www.aipac.org/130.asp
So these missiles deployments, is it the late spectacular response to Iran from Obama, who was postponing the pressures last year ? seems that a few senators pressed on his decision.
Well, even if it is a measure to intimidate Iran, it will be good for your arms manufactures jobs, I expect that this supply of missiles isn’t gratuitous.
It’s the same by us, in money crisis moment, arms manufactures are considered as jobs supplier
BTW, Toque is working on window vista now !
Heads I win, tails you lose.
If Israel does not attack, BHO will congratulate himself as the bringer of peace to the ME.
If Israel does attack, BHO will be relieved that Iran’s capability has been reduced, while at the same time he will be able to get the UN to stop the Israelis before they finish the job. In that scenario BHO will get to “justify” his (Ig)Nobel prize by “saving” the Muslim world from Israel. At the same time, Israel will be weakened economically and will be subject to severe boycotts and diplomatic sanctions.
In both cases Israel will be the loser, though the dimensions of the two different losses are hard now to measure.
Entropy — it takes a long time to build and a short time to destroy. We are squandering the legacy of America more quickly than I could ever have imagined.
PS. The speculation @14 about the next 10 weeks sounds reasonable. I figure the month of April — whenever the moon and the tides are optimal. Expect the main thrust to come from the sea. And keep track of where US ships are deployed over the next few months.
“President Obama is attempting to set up a missile defense ring around Iran”
Wait one second. Haven’t the Democrats been saying since President Reagan first proposed “Star Wars” that it would never work and that it was a waste of time, money and resources that would be better spent elsewhere? And yet, when the Norks threaten to launch a couple of missiles Hawaii’s way, why suddenly the media and the Democrats were championing that we move MD (missile defense) assets to the Islands proto. Iran threatens its neighbors and suddenly President Obama is moving the “It will be neve work” MD assets again. Maybe someone should ask Barbara “Dumber than a box of rocks” Boxer about this during the debate leading up to November’s election given her position on MD. Oh, and climategate too.
Tarnsman, the tech deployed today is much more modest than Star Wars. It’s much less expensive, and perhaps a little more proven.
Dear professor, dear minister, please tell me, as i watch five million Israelis get attacked by five hundred million arabs and persians and all the oil gold in the world, where is that all-powerful world puppetmaster you’ve been slandering all these years?
What? “oops” you say, “nevermind”? Oh, dear, that may not cut it this time around, you may have to answer for your words.
http://www.brahmand.com/news/US-interceptor-missile-fails-to-hit-target/3055/1/10.html
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/31/AR2010013103244.html
Radar problems blamed for failed ABM test.
It would appear that both the Big Zero and Ahmadinejad are both saber rattling. I find it difficult imagine that a few more batteries of Patriot missiles will prevent an barrage of Iranian missiles from hitting and damaging of any number of targets with in their range. Even if Iran could sink one oil tanker it would send shock waves through the international economy.
But, maybe the US has a trick or two up its sleeve – a new laser weapon – or some senors to properly target real missiles instead of decoys – who knows. Ahmadinejad reacted as usual:
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad says the nation will deliver a harsh blow to the “global arrogance” on this year’s anniversary of the Islamic Revolution.
http://tinyurl.com/yecqqdl
Here is Debka take on the situation (Debka has about the same credibility as the NYT):
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has promised to announce Iran’s attainment of a 20 percent uranium enrichment capability, a short step to weapons grade material.
Some high-ranking Revolutionary Guards officers have also said that Iran will parade a new type of surface missile during the celebrations, without revealing its features, while Iranian space scientists predicted the launch of a new spy satellite of the Toloo series. All this was taken in Washington as a challenge that could not be left without an appropriate response. Administration officials also feared that Israel might be goaded into going forward with a military operation against Iran’s nuclear facilities. The Gulf Arab states were in need of reassurance…
The White House’s decision to deploy additional defenses in the Gulf came only a day after National Security Adviser James Jones warned that Iran was liable to react to pressure by having its proxies Hizballah and Hamas attack Israel. The abruptness of this step pointed to the administration having woken up to the realization that its diplomatic and military position in the region was in grave jeopardy and in dire need of shoring up without delay. US military sources confirm that Washington plans to treble the 10,000-strong US troop contingent, already present in Saudi Arabia for guarding its oil fields and port facilities against medium or short-range Iranian missile attack, or sabotage by Hizballah marine units trained for their mission by Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps. Additional US Aegis missile interceptor cruisers with advanced radar and anti-missile systems were also reported to be heading for round-the-clock patrol around Iranian shores, with more Patriot anti-missile missiles to reinforce the eight batteries already deployed in the four emirates.
Here is the debka link:
http://www.debka.com/article/8573/
This does nothing to protect Israel. It protects Sunni Arabs from Iranian attacks. The idea that protecting Qatar somehow benefits Israel is a lie. What it does do is give the gulf states an alternative to allowing an Israeli strike. So, this is just bad for Israel if that’s how it plays out.
“Obama” is just a re-branded version of the same old America. Nothing substantial has changed since the Bush Administration except the marketing emphasis. The “diplomacy” with Iran was, after all, started by Condi Rice. Any US “weakness” is just part of the Obama marketing campaign for a his New-America product that is so popular with the rest of the world.
America’s mission is to become the Hobbesian global sovereign through the combination of its overwelming military supremacy and its domination of global financial capitalism. And it is amazingly close to achieving this goal. Disregarding Russia which is a debatable case, most other countries on earth are US client states. Iran and North Korea are the only regional level powers left outside the US orbit. Venezuela, Cuba, and Syria and a few others are minor states that will soon fall. Iran will either be attacked or it will change regimes by internal pressure; most likely the former. By 2020, all global pockets of resistance will be wiped up and the US will reign as the global monarch.
Seen in this light, the decline in US economic output is understandable. Sovereigns are not judged by how much they produce; they are judged by how well they keep the peace and administer justice. Sovereigns are parasitical in the sense that their subjects must support them. When America achieves official sovereign status the rest of the world will be expected to pay tribute (like many already do through treasury purchases) so that the sovereign’s “court” (US citizens) will not have to worry about producing wealth but can concentrate full time on setting cultural and artistic fashions for the rest of the world.
John Lynch, I think you have it right. This looks more like some kind of offering to the Arabs to contend with the aftermath of an Israeli strike. I think this silly paean to love overflowing between our bruthaz in Abraham is poisonous bunk. It’s crafted by lying Leftists to remake Arabs as warm and fuzzy sentimentalists. Wuzzy fuzzy? Hardly. Wuzza Muzza.
Kevin’s NYT subscription ran out so he keeps reading his last issue, from 1962.
LifeofMind #21: I would guess they were measuring for new curtains.
John Bolton says that setting up the missiles is bad news, since it indicates that the Obama Admin has accepted the Iranian bomb and missile capabilities.
But another assessment I heard is that all of these prepartions were made by Pres Bush and are simply proceeding on schedule.
The Patriots likely will not be able to stop an attack by Iranian IRBMs but will, at best, be able to disable the incoming warhead so that it just makes a nasty mess at the impact rather than a big boom.
Typically excellent article today by Fouad Ajami in WSJ:
The Obama Spell Is Broken
This may be a bit optimistic. What Ajami might mean is that the majority that elected Obama, is broken, but that’s just a shift of a few points, actually. Chrissy Mathews is still a zombie. Keith Olberdouche is unchanged. The NYTimes is now more extreme than Obambus his own self.
But it was fun to read anyway.
Please note that I am not a licensed attorney. The following commentary is a political opinion based upon a lay reading of the law and does not constitute a legal opinion.
Are we at war?
In terms of congressional authorization, the United States is not at war. Instead, Congress passed House Resolution 64 saying, “the President is authorized to use all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, or harbored such organizations or persons, in order to prevent any further acts of international terrorism against the United States by nations, organizations or persons.”
This is an indefinite authorization under the War Power Resolution of 1973, but it is not specifically a declaration of war. The President has far ranging power to use force against our enemies, but Congress decided for strategic and cultural reasons to refrain from calling this fight a “war”. I suspect that the main reason is that Congress did not want to treat our enemies as formal belligerents but instead as unlawful combatants.
President Obama’s area of expertise is constitutional law. I am sure he is fully aware of the constitutional differences among peace, a state of emergency, and a state of war. The present condition is none of these, but a condition where the President is authorized to use “all necessary and appropriate force” against our enemies but cannot mobilize our economy to fight a “people’s war” precisely because we are not technically at war. After the September 11 attacks, Congress did not bestow upon the President the vast powers of economic mobilization that the term “war” would have given him, but instead authorized “use of force” to the President to ensure future congressional oversight.
The Constitution gives Congress the power to declare war. Yet, if the Supreme Court of the United States claims that the United States is actually in a state of war that Congress did not authorize, we have a constitutional crisis. It would appear that, by applying the Geneva Conventions to enemy prisoners as required in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, the Supreme Court of the United States usurped the power to declare war from Congress. On the other hand, since it appears that the American judiciary presently exercises the power to declare war on behalf of the United States of America, or at least reserves its power to declare that a “use of force resolution” constitutes a “declaration of war” under our Constitution, we may very well be in an official state of war.
The United States of America has entered a legal twilight zone. Are we at war or not? I don’t know.
This is a Congressionally mandated review, released today.
The The Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) is a study by the United States Department of Defense that analyzes strategic objectives and potential military threats. The Quadrennial Defense Review Report is the main public document describing the United States’s military doctrine.
It is in this iteration identifying a newer threat, one that one of your more keen writers identified weeks ago
Identifying and reorganizing for a new threat is not something done as a simple matter of course .
The great danger when assessing the motivations of the Obama administration is ignoring what is right in front of us because there ‘must be’ some deeper motivation at work.
“Our first goal is to deter the Iranians. A second is to reassure the Arab states, so they don’t feel they have to go nuclear themselves. But there is certainly an element of calming the Israelis as well.”
We know and many within the administration know, that Iran will not be deterred.
Bolton is right, this action clearly signals that the administration has accepted that Iran will get the bomb and have settled upon a defensive posture of containment.
There are two great dangers from Iran getting the bomb; nuclear terrorism and nuclear proliferation. Proliferation is the most immediate threat. The administration is hoping that the patriot batteries will reassure arab nations that there is no need to go nuclear.
They also hope to ‘reassure’ Israeli as well but the patriot batteries provide a secondary benefit, if Israel attacks Iran, the administration can now claim that it was an unnecessary attack and impose sanctions upon Israel.
Iran wants nuclear missiles for intimidation, regional influence and as a defense against the US military.
Aggressive elements within the Iranian power structure may wish to use Iran’s future nuclear capabilities as insurance in a future seizure of the Strait of Hormuz. That possibility would trigger major military confrontation between the US and Iran because it would be an act of war. For that possibility to manifest, there would have to be a major miscalculation by the Iranian leadership but miscalculations do occasionally happen…
Ahdaminejad certainly heads a faction who would welcome nuclear war as a impetus toward the return of the 12th Imam. But that faction does not rule Iran. The Grand Ayatollah Khamieni rules Iran. Reportedly, he enjoys his luxuries, such a man does not commit suicide and directly attacking Israel would be suicide.
The Patriot batteries are too little to prevent an nuclear arms race from erupting in the M.E. Nuclear proliferation will greatly increase. Nuclear terrorist attacks will follow. Not tomorrow or even next year. It is the seeds for those future events that are being planted as we speak.
China, Iran Spur U.S. to Develop Air-Sea Battle Plan
The QRD was released today and outlined a new direction for US Defense Planning, something one of your writers identified weeks ago.
The battle plans for the US are not changed capriciously.
http://tinyurl.com/y986sfe
Sheiks,Rattle and Roll Baby!!!! This is going down in April. Hope you guys and gals are prepped and ready.
40 Alexis:
With the same caveats as you ["I am not an attorney (which is good for whatever status of that which passes for my soul is in) nor do I play one on TV."], here is how I see it.
1) Article I section 8 says that Congress has the power: “To declare War, grand Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water.” At no point there, or in fact anywhere in Article I section 8 is there any specific format as to how Congress shall exercise and express any of those powers granted to it.
2) Therefore, Congress can set up whatever format it wants, subject to the Constitution and international treaties to which we are parties, to initiate hostilities. Given that international law now de facto recognizes and extends the laws of war to non-state actors so long as they fulfill certain very minimum requirements [which those we hold in Guantanamo did not fulfill, but that is another thread], international treaties are not a factor.
3) Therefore, when Congress prescribed the terms and format of the War Powers Act of 1973 as the way we go to war, it was on fairly solid ground, at least for the initiation of hostilities. The Supreme Court seems to have recognized this; thus the various rulings supporting this.
4) Where there may be a problem is the as yet unused and untested part of the War Powers Act that functionally gives Congress the right to “undeclare” war. Both parties, regardless of whether they held the White House or not, have been very careful to avoid bringing the War Powers Act directly before the Court because of the fear of the political mayhem that would ensue if it was tossed out in whole or in part.
5) The Constitution says Congress can declare war, but Article II section 2 gives the President the power to make treaties; and that includes peace treaties ending wars. That is where the War Powers Act fails the Constitutional test, in my view.
I am, constitutionally, a strict constructionist; so I tend to go with a more severe view of the separation of powers. I think that if the War Powers Act ever does come up for review as a whole before the Court, that something akin to United States v. Curtiss-Wright Export Corp., 299 U.S. 304 (1936) would hold. In an 8-1 decision the Supreme Court ruled amongst other things:
Not only, as we have shown, is the federal power over external affairs in origin and essential character different from that over internal affairs, but participation in the exercise of the power is significantly limited. In this vast external realm, with its important, complicated, delicate and manifold problems, the President alone has the power to speak or listen as a representative of the nation. He makes treaties with the advice and consent of the Senate; but he alone negotiates. Into the field of negotiation the Senate cannot intrude, and Congress itself is powerless to invade it. As Marshall said in his great argument of March 7, 1800, in the House of Representatives, “The President is the sole organ of the nation in its external relations, and its sole representative with foreign nations.” Annals, 6th Cong., col. 613. The Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, at a very early day in our history (February 15, 1816), reported to the Senate, among other things, as follows:
“The President is the constitutional representative of the United States with regard to foreign nations. He manages our concerns with foreign nations, and must necessarily be most competent to determine when, how, and upon what subjects negotiation may be urged with the greatest prospect of success. For his conduct, he is responsible to the Constitution. The committee consider this responsibility the surest pledge for the faithful discharge of his duty. They think the interference of the Senate in the direction of foreign negotiations calculated to diminish that responsibility, and thereby to impair the best security for the national safety. The nature of transactions with foreign nations, moreover, requires caution and unity of design, and their success frequently depends on secrecy and dispatch.”
U.S. Senate, Reports, Committee on Foreign Relations, vol. 8, p 24.
I would recommend reading the whole decision as it introduces the worldview of the Left to the back of the Constitution’s hand.
In 1973, the Democrats running both Houses of Congress stepped way over the line.
So, yes we are at war, legally so. And we have, because of a failure of national will, not been prosecuting it with the seriousness the situation deserves. It has not been a matter of guns -v- butter, but rather a matter of guns -v- panem et circensis, with an overlay of political and economic war on our own productive classes.
If we took the war seriously, it would detract from the real desires of TWANLOC.
Of course, YMMV.
Subotai Bahadur
re: #45
It will not let me edit my typos. *sigh*
It should be “grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal”
and
“and international treaties to which we are party”
As you get older, thinking and typing can become mutually exclusive.
Subotai Bahadur
SB @ 45: Very interesting citation.
But, I don’t really buy it. It’s like this deal where a bill is advanced, and must be voted up/down. Giving the president full control over negotiations and then having the Congress forced to ratify it up or down without change, is perhaps fine as statutory law, but does not represent a realistic or workable real-world process.
If a treaty is not negotiated without extensive involvement of both parties, it would not seem worthy of ratification. But then, our communications today are much, much better than in 1800. Too good, perhaps, sometimes.
Just thinking out loud.
Apropos of nothing:
http://conferences.ted.com/TED2010/program/speakers.php
How many on this list would you want to listen to?
I dunno. Seems to me the beefed up deployment in the Gulf is more of a tripwire than solid defense. Interesting coincidence with Ahmadinejad’s latest saber rattling. Also interesting that both Ahmadinejad and Obama face growing opposition at home.
Thwarted in his Great Society redux, Obama could be angling for an Iranian provocation to bolster his popularity. (Here’s where the question whether BHO is “sincere” in his progressivism really comes to bear. We’ve watched for a move to the center, but a “third way” of military adventure might be a temptation.)
Ledger/32; But, maybe the US has a trick or two up its sleeve – a new laser weapon – or some senors to properly target real missiles instead of decoys – who knows. –and after the senors complete that mission, we can say “Gracias!”
He might be tempted but the problem for Obama in using ‘military adventures’ as a means to boost his popularity is the inevitable loss of support from his base that it would incur. And as far left liberal reaction to the Mass. election demonstrated, many in his base are already not happy with him. The majority of his base are, at heart, pacifists and appeasers and such do not make war upon others no matter what the provocation. For every independent he gained, he would lose two liberals.
He would also have to boost war spending beyond the raised levels he’s already supporting and his base would be outraged.
And none of that even considers Obama’s personal inclination to react to provocation with appeasement.
Geoffrey Britain@51
Obama’s problem isn’t with his exaggerated, I believe, base. He’s loosing the squishy center. It seems to my simple mind that National Security is the worst problem for him. Scott Brown certainly opposed Health Care, but the applause line was “buy weapons to fight terrorists, not lawyers to defend them.”
Of course my suggestion is facile, even Howard Zinn like, if you will. Comforting the Saudis and the Gulf sheikhdoms, and enhancing defense of the oil transit corridor is rational and expected. The deployment could very well be an extension of Bush era planning with some spin to the cover story.
Subotai Bahadur,
Concur with your excellent survey of the War Power with a few addenda.
The War power has both international and domestic ramifications. War and Peace are contractual relations between nation states, like marriage is in personal domestic relationships. A Declaration by Congress recognizing that a State of War exists has both international and domestic effects. Internationally these include authorizing the use of force, warning other nations that a State of Belligerency exists, triggering certain provisions in the Geneva Conventions or other treaties and voiding almost all contracts and treaties between the two parties. Domestically there are provisions in the US Code, such as the Trading With the Enemy Act and clauses within military regulations including the UCMJ, that only come into force under very specific circumstances, that have not been held to exist since 1946.
Alexis was correct in noting that the resolution Authorizing Use of Military Force in 2003 did not have these domestic effects. Senator Byrd pressed for an old fashioned Declaration of War but found little support on either side of the aisle. The War Powers Act, which is a separate topic from the 2003 resolution, is a bad law from a bad time.
The position of the Europeans and the Democratic Party Left that the United Nations has superseded the legality of any State of War separate from that authorized under Chapter V of the UN Charter is ridiculous on its face. That position is reflected in the often unreliable wiki, which should nevertheless be reviewed albeit with caution. The powers to make a binding treaty and declare war or peace are attributes of sovereignty. The UN is a creature subordinate to the Powers that created it. That is why the veto exists. The position of the French and British in the Security Council however is unclear following their submission to the newly sovereign EU. The British have renounced their right to use force absent the approval of a higher authority. That probably renders the Nato Treaty void.
To be blogged under the title “War Powers.”
Obama came to office doing a trick riding stunt. He managed to ride across the finish line with one foot on each of two very different horses.
He could turn a phrase and somehow mesmerize (1) the old line labor, noblesse oblige, and national security Democrats and (2) the Moveon.org above-nationalism America-is-evil Democrats. These two very different groups should not get along. I was amazed they held together during the elections. Zero slate Obama was perhaps the only one who could do it.
For him, itt was easy to do. He had no record and spoke well in grand generalities.
Now he has to address real issues and speaking well without content won’t cut it anymore. His speaches on healthcare are disingenuous that he is undermining his whole image.
What he’s trying to do is put his weight on one horse for a few moments and then on the other.
This time it is the defensive shield and that tough posturing is to paliate horse number #1.
Eventually, if not already, the trick is going to stop working.
(By the way, this analogy owes absolutely nothing to Bin Laden’s strong horse analogy.)
When all else fails in the face of a problem that you cannot solve the proper course is to ignore it and hope that it just goes away.
That, I submit, is Obama’s philosophy in regard to foreign affairs. He has no foreign policy experience whatsoever. In my own opinion all he is trying to do is the minimum he thinks he can do to keep the situation from blowing up in his face, in which case he would be totally lost and, probably, paralyzed.
Attributing some strategy to him is a mistake. I don’t think he has one.
God save us all.
# 47 Josh
It is not an all or nothing, because in the ratification process there is public and private negotiation between the Senate [and indirectly sometimes the House] and the White House. Most international negotiations are not life and death. Trade, banking, etc. constitute most of our foreign relations. If the president negotiates a treaty that has provision ‘x’ that infuriates enough Senators, or an individual influential Senator either it will be changed, the US will carve out an exception in renegotiation, or it simply will not pass. The ratification of treaties is not done in a vacuum. If say you micturate in the Wheaties of the chairman of the Appropriations Committee, he has plenty of leverage to use on the White House. There is give and take. And party membership does not mean that the president gets his way. As an example, the Kyoto Treaty was DOA, even with the president’s own party.
For matters of foreign affairs where war,peace, life, and death are at play; the lack of a single voice for this country cannot be said to have helped the national interest.
Since the late 1960′s, a significant portion of the Democrats have viewed ANY defeat of the United States as being to their benefit. Since the mid-1990′s, pretty much all of the Democrats in Congress have, for pecuniary or ideological reasons, desired the defeat of American foreign policy, viewing any American loss as being a victory for themselves.
During the closing stages of the Vietnam War, the Democrats and their supporters regularly went to Paris, to Russia, and sometimes to North Vietnam itself to meet with the enemy government and functionally offer them a better deal. As Gen. Vo Nguyen Giap [North Vietnamese Defense Minister] wrote in his autobiography; militarily they had lost the war in Vietnam. They won it politically in the United States.
During the crisis in Grenada that led to our invasion and rescue of the hundreds of American students held there; Representative Ron Dellums D-CA [Chairman, House Armed Services Committee] wrote to the leaders of the governing Grenadan New Jewel Movement on behalf of the Democrat leadership offering to protect them as they allied with Cuba and the Soviets … and directly asking them for guidance as to what line the NJM wanted the Democrats in Congress to take. The letter was debated by the NJM Party Central Committee and the requested information was sent to Dellums, which happened to match later Democrat debating points.
We know this because when we invaded Grenada, we captured the letter and the minutes of the Central Committee meeting.
Nicaragua 1985. Daniel Ortega and the Sandinistas -v- the US. Speaker of the House Tip O’Neill, Senator Kerry, and Senator Harkin visited Ortega in Managua in April 1985, and they offered to protect him from President Reagan and the United States. And were promptly embarrassed when Ortega flew to Moscow, declared that he and the Sandinista movement were Marxist-Leninists, and signed a military treaty of alliance with the Soviets. The embarrassment did not deter the Democrats from continuing to support Ortega against the official foreign policy of the United States.
During lead up to BOTH Gulf Wars, Democrat members of Congress went to Bagdhad to meet with Saddam Hussein and lent their support to him and against US policy.
Shortly after she had been installed as the Speaker of the House [April 2007], Nancy Pelosi went on her own shuttle diplomacy trip throughout the Middle East, including Syria which was listed as a terrorist supporting state and which sponsored the Hezbollah attacks on Israel. This visit was over the strenuous objections of the State Department. And while in Syria she both embarrassed herself by dressing in submissive Muslim garb, and embarrassed the country by making offers of negotiations and concessions on the part of Israel and the United States that had not been made by either.
Any enemy of the United States knows that they will always have a strong voice on their side in the United States Congress, regardless of the harm to the US and its interests.
The Founding Fathers were right. We have to have one voice in dealing with foreign countries. If Congress is unhappy with what is happening overseas, it is Congress that has to appropriate the funds for everything. If they want to fight with the President, they have the ultimate lever going back to the supremacy of Parliament over the King in England. But it means that they actually have to stand up in the open and vote on the record. Rather than settling our differences amongst ourselves openly and at home and facing the world with a united front; they would rather align themselves with our country’s enemies as a matter of course and deny responsibility for what they do.
It is said that politics used to stop at the water’s edge. No more. Half [or more] of our polity is willing to act as agents of foreign powers [I would dearly like to see transparency in campaign contributions, however routed.]
There are plenty of examples in history; Greece, Rome, Medieval Europe, and of course Asia where factions in one country have turned to outsiders for assistance in taking over their own country. They have not ended well for the countries involved.
I may have named our contemporary version as TWANLOC, but I did not invent them. The Genus and Species has arisen repeatedly throughout human history, to the detriment of their own societies.
Subotai Bahadur
Can we publicly execute the traitors who twisted the CIA 2007 report yet, or do we have to wait for Israel to be wiped from the map first?
I volunteer to be part of the firing squad, hanging party, or axeman for that treasonous scum…
When will any high FedGov official ever be held accountable for anything?
When will any high FedGov official ever be held accountable for anything?
When the present political class is thrown down. Corruption exists in both parties to an incredible extent. He who throws the first stone may break down the pane of glass that separates the High and Wonderful from the ugly little rats that could come through and eat all of the High and Wonderful. The first rule of Political Class–don’t throw any stones at anyone else who is a member of Political Class–throw a nerf ball and proclaim it was a stone. The one who was hit will verify that it was indeed a stone.
The collective illusion of the High and Wonderful is to project to the rats that what they’re doing to the rats is in the rats best interests.
You can only fool the rats so long. Only members of the political class are so stupid as to think you can keep on doing it forever.
But perhaps the most basic mistake is this: we, the grubby little citizens who are not part of your social circles, are not rats. We are human beings. Inversions occur. What seems to be happening now in the US is that the rats are beginning to realize that they are humans, and that the members of the political class are rats, and richly deserve to be treated as such. Send out the cats. There are rats to be eaten.
57. Armageddon Rex
I’m with you — Personally, though, I’d prefer boiling them in oil instead.
These treasonous villains are protected — as compared to the attack made on John Yoo.
The Intelligence community as well as the State Department need to be fumigated to rid our country of these diseased minds — Rudy Giuliani had a plan to do that, although he probably wouldn’t have gone along with the oil part –
I like it.
error
to 21.LifeoftheMind
“Axelrod, Emanuel and the Jewish team from Goldman-Sachs will have much to answer for if things go as badly as some of us fear.”
I wouldn’t be so naive as to count on them or what they’d have to answer for, dear. They’ll just disappear into the woodwork, or join Obama on his Island Kingdom … somewhere in the vast tropical oceans of the UN “Law of the Sea.”
The BMD-capable ships should be up to 18 now (fifteen destroyers, 3 cruisers), I doubt we’re particularly vulnerable with two or three of them in the Gulf. Of the antimissile arrows in the quiver, the SM-3 is the most reliable and the most advanced, as well as the longest-ranged. The SM-3 Block II missile should have even longer range, and there are plans to put up to 3 interception vehicles in the final stage, though that is several years off.
The Patriot PAC-3 is strictly point-defense, with a piddling range of 20km compared to the up to 500km range of the SM-3. The intermediate between the two is the THAAD, with a stated 200km range. THAAD is barely deployed, they’re still working the kinks out of that one. Quite frankly, the Israelis have the best intermediate-range system for BMD with the Arrow.
The Saudis need point defense of several targets, and whatever their provenance from past generations the fact remains that a small nuke over Abqaiq or Ras Tanura would have a devastating effect on the world economy. Those are the kinds of targets with which Iran can threaten the rest of the world indirectly. I’m not at all surprised that the UAE has put in an offer to buy THAAD units, even a quality conventional attack on their sole economic support line is a major existential threat for the UAE.
I really question what would happen if Israel loaded up a strike package and flew it across KSA toward Iran. I think the Saudis would let it pass (assuming they knew what it was), so the question becomes does the US let it pass if the Saudis do not engage? A couple of Aegis-class destroyers could ruin the day of F-16Is and F-15Is already at their maximum engagement distances.
I don’t see GWB as firing on Israeli planes going to do what needs to be done (conventional not nuclear), but I think BHO might be inclined to put a coat of polish on his Nobel Peace Prize and stand for international order and justice. This would be a big mistake. Even lighting up the jets with tracking radar would be a problem, one the Israeli Dolphin-class subs might have to deal with. It would seem foolish to have Israeli planes in the air without some of their sub force available for counter-counter-strike purposes if the Iranians launch on warning, not to mention giving Israeli pilots ditching in the Gulf a way to get home. Were I mission commander, my subs would have firing solutions on any floating ships with significant AA capability in the Gulf when my planes were in range, nothing like active homing sonar in the water to distract a crew trying to get IFF and lock missiles on your planes. But who knows, that’s just me.
Brilliant Spears. Google it.
I’ve long ago lost any hope that such a concept would be employed in this mess, especially now with Lord Zero at the levers of power.
It could have been such an elegant, low-cost solution when compared to the potential costs of continued inaction.
May it please God to be merciful to us.
never ever forget these names John Mearsheimer, Stephen Walt, Thomas Fingar, Vann Van Diepen. wolves in sheeps clothing.
Difficult game. More poker than chess.
The Iranians cannot hope to outspend or beat the US and Israel in military technology.
They can hope to beat us by political manuevers at which they are adept. They can hope to split us, yet while political issues remain the miltary/intellegence alliance is formidable. Furthermore Israel has broadened its level of covert and overt cooperation with Egypt and Jordon and we can guess, others in the gulf as well.
See the news about what just happened in Dubai. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/02/01/world/main6162947.shtml
Pure top level stuff and arrests have occured since in Israel, and certainly much else we will never see as a result. The spies and assasins are very busy now and I think the Persians are losing that war.
They cannot win on economics and are in political turmoil greater than we can imagine here.
Good idea to call out the missile destroyers and sell what we have in missile defense to the gulf states. Even a 50% threat reduction by defense costs the Iranians where it hurts.
We could win on that if we had the right direction.
Spindok
63. Triton’sPolarTiger:
Brilliant Spears. Google it.
do u mean brilliant pebbles?
From the article above:
Hamas quickly pointed the finger at Israel.
“We in Hamas hold the Zionist enemy responsible for the criminal assassination of our brother, and we pledge to God and to the blood of the martyrs and to our people to continue his path of jihad and martyrdom,”
I cant help but support this goal. The sooner the better.
Spindok
Subotai — an add to your #56 comment:
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=19472
***
AR/52; me too –i want me a couple o American Arafatist perfessers to horse-whip
@66 f47: No – brilliant pebbles was one of several avenues considered under the broad umbrella of SDI.
Brilliant Spears was a kinetic energy weapon for use against ground targets. I haven’t checked wikipedia (why bother these days), but Google only returns something I posted at Adventures Of Chester several years ago.
Here’s the link – sorry, I’m a bit long-winded (my post is in the comments about halfway down):
http://www.theadventuresofchester.com/archives/2006/01/state_of_the_un.html
Darren/62 believes the Saudis will let Israeli planes use their airspace, but wonders if Obama will do the same. Darren is correct as to Saudi intentions. Last summer Saudi Arabia gave the okay for Israeli planes to fly over Saudi airspace to bomb the Iranian nuclear facilities at Natanz and elsewhere. For the Saudis, this is a no-brainer. It is difficult for us, living in what we think of as a secular age, to believe people of differing religions cannot all get along, but such is the case. The Saudis are Sunni Muslim, and the Iranians are Shi’ite Muslims, and they do not particularly like each other. The Saudis, and all the Sunni Arab states, know that if the Shi’ite Persians get the bomb, the Persian Shi’ites rule the Middle East, which up to now has been a Sunni province. And since the Israelis are the only ones capable of stopping the Persians from getting nuclear weapons, the Saudis are perfectly willing to let the Israelis take care of it for them. Darren is right to wonder if Obama is of the same mind. In any event, Obama or no, Aegis or no, Israel will strike when the Mossad says it’s time to go.
The Saudis say
That on the day
Israelis strike Iran
They might say hey
Or by the way
But never warn Teheran
The Saudis know
That when winds blow
From Persia to the west
It’s time to show
The Persian foe
Israeli planes are best
The Saudis think
That if they blink
A Persian nuke will land
And thereby sink
The Saudi kink
And all his merry band
So they’re content
To sit their tent
And watch Israelis fly
With their consent
To kill the gent
Who said the Jews must die
#62 Darren
Those numbers match what I know, granting readily that I do not know everything. The problem with those numbers is that it takes 2-3 [preferably 3] vessels to keep one on station. One on station, one en-route to or from, on in resupply. You can surge and get it down to 2, but that wears out equipment and crews right smartly. Here is the problem.
3 cruisers: They are the shooters. They are the ones with the specially modified launchers that can take the larger SM-3′s. And of course the specially modified AN-SPY-1 AEGIS radars to handle the tracking solutions.
The AEGIS destroyers [DDG-51 ARLEIGH BURKE class] do not, as far as I know, yet have the specially modified launchers, but they have the modified radars/software to detect, track, and help generate the solution to pass to the shooter. You want two DDG’s per CG if possible to extend your coverage area, and I suspect help generate the detailed 3D solution in enough detail. You can do with one.
Shooters are what is in shortest supply. If two of the three [LAKE ERIE, SHILOH, PORT ROYAL] shooter CG’s are in the Persian Gulf and that becomes a permanent station to maintain, we are in a world of hurt. [UPDATE -We do have one of the DDG's at least, the DECATUR, that has the modified launchers.] It is planned that all the AEGIS CG’s and DDG’s that can [the early versions of AN-SPY-1 can't handle it] will have their launchers and radars modified, but that is going to take a while. For that while, we are going to be stretched to the limit to cover both the Persian Gulf and North Korea.
There is another problem. Our fleet still needs escorts for normal operations. We have decommissioned and scrapped the last of the SPRUANCE class destroyers, and pretty much the ARLEIGH BURKE class DDG’s are all the escorts we have left. All of 60 ships [when they are all finished], plus the 3 extra they just ordered after they cancelled most of the new ZUMWALT class. Keep in mind the 3 for one deployment ratio. It is estimated that the DDG’s we have now are mission-committed 160% before adding the BMD role.
There is a lot of ocean to cover. You cannot send a carrier battle group out without escorts, at least if you want to keep it.
You can have the most capable ships in the world. But if you have so few that they are in the wrong ocean at the critical moment, you lose the battle. Do that often enough and you lose the war.
Which possibility may not bother some of the inhabitants of DC in the slightest.
As far as the AEGIS ships being used to protect Iran from an Israeli strike; yeah that is a strong possibility, and one that Israeli planners probably are now factoring in as we write. My guess is that if we intervene and protect Iran, the follow up [in a matter of minutes] will be an Israeli missile launch. And that will include the cruise missiles on the DOLPHIN class subs. An Iranian nuclear strike capability is an existential threat to Israel. If they are blocked from protecting themselves with conventional weapons, they will resort to nuclear weapons rather than be wiped out. And if they are going to have to go nuclear, there is very little incentive to restrict their strikes to only Iran when they are surrounded by enemies. Strategic strike missions have a higher priority than search and rescue. But you want to bet that if Israel survives, they will remember who forced them into it.
#69 Triton’sPolarTiger
I have heard them refered to as “Rods from God”.
Subotai Bahadur
Subotai’s right –USN has incredible weapons but not anywhere near enough of them. Have to remember we have the expeditionary forces in Iraq and Afghanistan which start looking kinda stranded if USN has to fight for control of the sea lanes. Human cognitive error very widespread, we look back at history as if because it happened it was determined –we look at the last World War and think we won because we were fated to, or supposed to, and that it could not have happened in any way but what it did. Cognitive error, tilt.
It is likely that the ruling Muslims in several countries would sooner self-circumcise with bacon-smeared butter knives than risk a sunburn from Iranian Nukes.
Survival is rational.
Jihad? Hey, we can resume Jihad once those fatuous Ayutollahs have been dealt with…
Israel has to few submarines. They need at least two in or near the Persian Gulf and at least two in the Mediterranean. The five Dolphin class boats that they have are simply not enough for the demands that they face. Their doctrine on the IDF Navy website gives them the following tasks;
Let us assume that they have already communicated to Putin that in the event that they strike Iran if there is any sign of Russian interference the new Russian base in Syria will be destroyed and any Russian ships between Malta and the Dardanelles will be sunk.
To be blogged under the title “Kosher Commandos.”
The SM-3 fits in a standard Mk 41 VLS, from what I can find. Any ship with a SPY-1B and the software can be a launch platform, in fact 12 more Ticonderoga-class ships will be fitted this year, bringing the total to 27 by the end of 2010. The rate-limiting step is more likely missile production.
The Navy has begun moving personnel to ships rather than ships to home ports, they can maintain ships on-station better than in the past. BMD-capable ships have been in the Gulf before, one of them was involved in a minor incident last year. This really isn’t news.
Aubrey:
IIRC, the Jordanians had cracked down on the Palestinians which angered the Syrians. The Syrians ordered its tanks to immediately head for Amman to depose King Hussein.
The armor was caught in the open desert without air defense or air support when the tank commanders saw F-4s with Napalm and the Star of David fly across their formation. I imagine they went to burner over the tanks just to get their attention.
Probably the most successful mission flown by Phantoms.
Afterwards, all three nations preferred that the incident not become too well known.
This discussion of Arab attitudes toward a possible strike by Israel against Iranian nuclear weapons facilities brings to mind the strike against the North Korean designed Syrian facility in the fall of 2007.
In September 2007 when Israeli fighter-bombers destroyed the reactor facility at Al-Kibar near the city of Deir el-Zor, Syria had been separating fissionable uranium from its vast deposits of phosphates for over a decade, with the knowledge and published acknowledgment of the International Atomic Energy Agency.
Of course, we have nothing to worry about, since we in the USA have wisely turned our backs on the evil of nuclear power. Presumably we are hurtling toward a future of hot showers and re-runs of Jay Leno powered by the Sun’s balmy rays in the visible and infrared regions. “So [reasons O] screw Israel. We don’t have a dog in this fight.”
Quoting from a paper dated 3/15/2008 by Dr. Magdi Ragheb, Associate Professor in the Nuclear, Plasma, and Radiological Engineering section of the University of Illinois (Urbana Campus) Engineering Department:
“There are reports that Syria has conducted significant work to examine the feasibility of exploiting phosphate rock to recover uranium.
The country is rich in phosphate sediments deposits and produces around one fifth of the phosphate rock mined in the entire Middle East.
According to statistics, in 2001, Syria mined over 2.04 million tons [my bolding] of phosphate. A food grade phosphoric acid micro-pilot plant is already operating at the city of Homs under IAEA safeguard provisions.”
- page 12, “Uranimum Resources in Phosphate Rocks” (evidently published under the auspices of University of Illinois Urbana Campus Engineering Department) [I notice that the document at this site is dated 1-23-2010; I have an earlier version, little changed, dated 3/15/2008. Presumably the author has revised and extended his earlier paper. This quote is found on page 21 of the later version. Believe it or not, it's actually a pretty interesting read.]
It’s good to remember that Doctor Ragheb’s theme in this document is the point that phosphate deposits are likely to become the next hotly-contested source of fuel for nuclear reactors.
Morocco’s deserts seem to comprise 45 percent of known reserves in the world. He mentions on the first page of his article that Moroccan phosphate contains about twice the world’s established reserves of uranium in ore deposits.
Things could get interesting in this arena.
For those pathetic fools still dumb enough to be interested in nookear fishin’.
Oh, yeah, and it’s mighty interesting that the IAEA was fully aware in 2001 that Syria had been processing fissionable uranium from its phosphate deposits, but everyone was SO-o-o-o-o-oo-o Surprised that there might be a weapons-grade processing plant…
“I’m shocked – SHOCKED – to find that there is GAMBLING going on in this casino.”
- Louis, captain of the Casablanca gendarmerie, from the film “Casablanca.”
Terresita,
The Syrians invaded Jordan during what has come to be known as Black September. They invaded ostensibly to aid the Palestinians who were fighting with the govt of Jordan. The Jordanians felt pressed and asked the US for help but were willing to accept any help, including from Israel. Remember this is long before the Jordanian-Israel peace agreement and only a few years after the six day war.
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_September_in_Jordan
Regarding the current business, the last thing Israel wants to do is cross the US. The two countries have been in constant discussions that I’m sure include this topic. The CIA chief was in Israel a few days ago. etc.
OTOH, when push comes to shove Israel will do what it believes is in its best interest.
Everyone here seems to be talking about an out of the blue attack by Israel. While that might have some military benefits it may not happen that way. Obviously there is no love lost between the two sides. One provocation can lead to another and to real escalation. Each side, if they choose, can turn up the heat and provoke the other side in ways that make it less clear who started it and also make it impossible for them to back down. I always expected the Iranians would go down this road once they were ready but maybe the Israelis would be smarter to hit the Iranians before they’re ready.
Yes, Israel can sneak in the back door at night and attack or it can provoke a fight that’s on the front page of every newspaper and then attack. I doubt that O would be able to stop an attack in the later case.
The US armed forces are now more pared back then they have been since Korea. They simply lack the numbers to respond to real threats that can be expected to arise in widely dispersed locations. No matter how good a warrior is or how sophisticated their equipment is they can not be in two places at the same time.
The USMC is 3/4 the size it should be, needs 4 active Divisions.
The USAF is 1/2 the size it should be, needs 600 F-22 and 3,000 F-35.
The USA is 1/3 the size it should be, needs at least 60 active Brigades.
The USN is 1/3 the size it should be, with 1/2 the CVNs SSNs and amphibs, 1/3 the CG/DDGs, and new conventional SS, LCS, and support ships are needed.
It really is that bad. The US should normally have 1% of its adult population in uniform on active duty with 6-7% GDP devoted to National Defense.
To be blogged under the title “Defense Review.”
The passage of more than four decades gives some distance and perspective on the incident of the Israeli attack on the US Naval vessel “USS Liberty” which took place in international waters in broad daylight, 08 June 1967, during the so-called “Six Day War.”
The Liberty was a WWII-era Victory ship converted to do duty as a broad-band communications & sigint monitoring station.
Fog of War or the calculated attack on an ally’s vessel that was judged capable of compromising Israel’s order of battle and disposition of forces in a lop-sided contest against numerically superior adversaries…
Either way, it tells us something of Israeli will to do what they think is needed.
#75 Darren
I could be wrong, but I was given to understand that due to the added 3rd stage on the SM-3, and differences in the diameter and length with the SM-2ER VLS capable; that the Mk. 41 VLS has to be modified internally. The modifications will be such, however, that the new version will also be able to handle the Block II and IIA which will each have different dimensions than the Block IB’s that are now our standard BMD version.
Production of the missiles is a bottleneck too. We were supposed to have an inventory of 147 by the end of next year. They have ordered another couple of hundred, but there is no estimate out there as to when those will actually be in inventory. I suspect it will be a while, because we really don’t have the aerospace industrial base to ramp up. And no defense contractor is going to add production capacity unless they have one bugger of a contract in hand with some really big penalty clauses if the government backs out. Especially this government.
I would like to be wrong about the launchers, but I don’t think I am. The early Flight of Ticonderoga’s have the AN-SPY-1A’s so they can’t take the upgrade. The software upgrade also involves some hardware installation too I believe; so some yard time is involved. It all can be done at the same time as the VLS I’m pretty sure. As they do more, they will get better at it too.
But as I said before, we will be stretched pretty thin until they come on line. We well may not have until the end of the year. Or for that matter till the end of the month. Interesting times, indeed.
Subotai Bahadur
@ Mad Fiddler
Yes and it is now eight years since an American F-16 dropped a precision laser guided 225 Kg bomb on the Canadian Light Infantry near Kandahar, killing four and wounding eight.
The Canadian position was well known and behind battle lines. Unlike the Israelis in 1967, the US plane had the very best communications and target designation systems ever invented. Clearly the Canucks were coming close to something we didnt want them to know about as we strafed them again in 2006 from two A-10s killing one and wounding 30. Tell me how not one, but two pilots operating in ideal conditions and swooping low could have done that by “accident”.
We are up to our ears in the dirty war over there and the last thing we need is a bunch of snooty socialists finding out about stuff we are up to. Who invited the Canadians to a war anyway Eh?
Spindok
Spindok. Sometimes stuff just happens. Early in the Astan war, some Spec Ops guys got bombed by our side because they forgot that, when batteries are changed, the GPS locator defaults to its own position.
There were some Brits hit in Iraq when the guys on the ground couldn’t communicate clearly or didn’t know who was where. The latter is the most common reason for blue on blue.
They used to tell us that the most dangerous part of a patrol is coming back to your own lines. See Stonewall Jackson.
well of course. Point being that in all cases except the Liberty we all accept that. The ridiculous idea that Israel would deliberatly attack a US navy ship, while it was fighting for its life against the arab armies, is just another blood libel
Spindok
Spindok, Tou-shay!
Your point is well made. Friendly Fire is such a commonplace throughout history that any single instance is statistically likely to be accidental. Doesn’t mean allies don’t occasionally decide to kill each other’s people to protect or advance their own plans and purposes.
Considering that the USS Liberty was converted from an old “Victory” ship hull, which could have been purchased by any nation, it seems fair to allow that the Israeli’s could have assumed it was Egyptian, or from some other Arab hostile country. Evidently, the torpedo boat commander on-the-scene checked the configuration of the boat against their charts and identified the vessel as the Egyptian ship El Quseir.
Meanwhile, the attack was briefly suspended when IDF chief of staff Rabin pondered the possibility that the vessel might be a Soviet ship…
So, forty years later, you will find people on both sides of the issue arguing vehemently that it was (a) intentionally done to prevent US from sharing observations of Israeli preparations to attack the Golan Heights, or (b) completely accidental misidentification of an ally’s vessel for a hostile.
Personally, I can’t sort it out, but I want Israel to survive & thrive on general principles.
If this were being done by Bush, I would suspect that the official reasons were just a cover, and that the real reason for the missile defense was to mitigate the Iranian response to a green-lighted Israeli or American strike.
Since this is Obama… well, I’d love for him to prove me wrong, but the problem with his behavior until now is that the Israelis have no confidence in him, which means that this move could actually be destabilizing.
“occupation” (#14): “I’d be looking at something popping in the next 10 weeks”
Hmm… Let’s all look for a Jewish calendar and search for “Purim.”
Richard (#25): Yep, that was indeed around September 1970
Spindok (#82): Heh.
Bob.
Thanks for the date. I was interested in those Syrian tanks on account of the Airborne company antitank section consisted of 106mm RR mounted on Mechanical Mules, a sort of large, motorized coffee table. You could roll one of those puppies going over a bigggish ant.
We probably would have had thirty-two of them, which would mean roughly sixteen tank kills apiece. I don’t know if we had that many main rounds.
I have always looked at Entebbe with a kind of envy.
Richard (#87): “I have always looked at Entebbe with a kind of envy.”
As do many of today’s Israelis, given that their current governments seriously consider releasing roughly 1,000 terrorists in exchange for 1 soldier held within miles of their border.
I don’t know what’s more amazing, Entebbe’s unbelievable success, or the daring of Israel’s leaders at the time.
Then again, Israel’s back hasn’t truly been against the wall for quite a while. Its enemies might want to heed the old Incredible Hulk tagline.
Bob.
If the hostages in the next situation are stored all together in a room at the end of an unobstructed runway, I could find six guys and a Cessna to take care of business.
Given a bit of maintenance on the knees and such.
Any half-way decent military in the world could do it.
Problem, as you point out, is the leadership.
Which is why I’ve taken to cheap port.
“occupation” (#11):
I just got around to reading your link. Did you notice that this oh-so-intellectually rigorous individual is a prof at Northeastern?
My favorite line in the article was probably: “In true Orientalist style, blame Arab failures on Arab culture.” Ah yes, those evil Occidentals, insisting on accountability.
But it’s not our fault that we try to impose our Judeo-Christian standards on others. Its merely a response to our formative cultures of ancient Israel and Greece having lived under constant threat from incomparably larger Oriental empires! We’re victims, we can’t be blamed!
Richard (#89):
Eh. I think you’re selling the Israelis a little short. We’re talking about rescuing some 100 hostages, held by multiple hijackers protected by the host country’s military, in a booby-trapped facility. To even get there, you need to fly by multiple enemy countries, and accomplish everything using 70′s technology. Had I been one of the hostages, I would consider my successful rescue an absolute miracle.
(Contrast: Operation Eagle Claw.)
But we are agreed that the bottleneck is the leadership. Maybe the so-called leadership in many Western countries could use some of that port. Or more a-propos, some stout.
http://toyoufromfailinghands.blogspot.com/2010/01/yet-more-us-army-troops-for-cfs-task.html
Bob. I was being kind of facetious about the Entebbe raid. The point stands, however, that the unobstructed runway and the non-dispersion of the hostages were GIFTS nobody before or after could possibly have hoped for.
It’s why I didn’t get a combat jump in the summer of 1970, too. No way to assemble the hostages from the three airliners down in the desert. The “Jordan Alert” stood down.
Entebbe is still quite current in the person of Defense Minister Ehud Barak. Read the wiki on him and consider what Iran is up against.
Richard (#93): Roger.
Buddy (#94): Then again, that was highly decorated soldier Barak. Today’s politico Barak makes statements like “The lack of defined boundaries within Israel, and not an Iranian bomb, is the greatest threat to our future.”
Which should not be considered good news by Iran. As has been discussed here several times over the years, the more feckless a power is as a threat builds, the more dangerous its reaction when the threat comes to fruition and it finds itself with its back against the wall.
But hey, here’s hoping for a happy resolution.
And now to pool my money with Richard’s and try to scrounge up some semi-decent port.
Supposin’ just for supposin’s sake: American conservatives favor Israel and Israel’s survival and any strong action it takes in defense.
The US military is more conservative than the US population in general.
The US military respects the IDF.
There have been many contacts, from soopersekrit to port calls by the Navy. Joint training exercises.
The US military is concerned about Iran. Iran has killed our brothers and sisters. We will have to clean up after the Iranians do whatever Obama lets them do, which means from a position of inconvenience or even weakness.
Now, let’s presume that the Navy and other American forces are in the area with orders to interfere with, or possibly attack, an Israeli strike in Iran.
(I didn’t bring it up.)
What if those orders are ignored? Might those orders be ignored?
that would be Mutiny, would it not? your real question is, when is mutiny justified? well, since you asked for opinions, mine is that at crazy splits in the continuity stream, there are the heros of the new and there are the obedients to the old.
“John Brown’s body lies a-molderin’ in the grave”
Well, Mr. Aubrey, after the Vincennes incident, were I a US ship commander in the Persian Gulf the idea of firing at an airborne target of unknown provenance would seem to be a bad idea. It might behoove me & my crew to triple check everything up and down the chain of command before firing anything.
Just so we don’t cause an international incident, mind you.
Darren,
Yeah, like the Navy had to do wrt the SEAL snipers and the Maersk pirates.
Can’t be too careful.
I don’t know much about the Aegis system, but considering that some of the first targets could well be missiles, it occurs to me that the ship’s FDC might be told to shoot first and wake up the crew later.
Not sure how you’d finesse that.
Darren (#98): Heh.
Should the orders be to interfere with Israel, I really don’t know what the uniforms in the field should do. I most certainly do know what should be done to the order-giver back home.
In real life, the trouble is that Israel doesn’t trust the C-in-C. We don’t know whether he’s warned Israel of interference or not, but in either case, it just can’t be sure of what American armed forces will do. Which helps explains Israel delaying action. The downside is that when they do take action, it might be (i) going in as stealthily as possible , with greatly reduced chances of success, or (ii) going in with overwhelming force. Literally overkill.
I’m not exactly performing interpretive dances of joy about this whole situation.
Bob.
Ref overkill. I’d presume Israel would use everything they had in the first effort. No surplus, in other words, for a contingency. If everything they plan to use isn’t enough, then they don’t have enough.
Exception, of course, is nukes.
A low altitude fly over of F-4 Phantoms would scare the hell out of just about anybody. D models especially made a noise like Godzilla. A fly by in Manila stopped a coup one time. They were loud, smoky, and scary looking as demons.