Here’s another item from the Strategy Page: “Hamas Feels The Wrath Of Iran”. The basic story goes like this, while Israel is being exhorted to “end the cycle of violence”, Hamas has been going after Shi’ites after Iran stopped paying them money. That money bought Shi’ites protection from Sunni Islamic radical groups, who were willing to leave their sectarian rivals alone “in return for cash and weapons”.
But now that the money has dried up, so has the affection between the two groups. The Telegraph explains how it works: no money, no lovey-dovey.
According to Haaretz, the Israeli newspaper, a group of armed Hamas fighters “brutally attacked” Shi’ite worshippers in the Gaza Strip last Friday, in part of a crackdown on Shi’ite groups that was sparked “by Hamas’ fear of growing Iranian influence in Gaza.” This is what happens with the Ayatollah stops paying the bills: up until a few months ago, “Iranian influence” was the sole reason for Hamas’ existence.
Not too long ago both groups presented a united front against the hated Jew. “The two men most responsible in the last decade for ensuring that the Palestinian party of jihad was kept thoroughly flush with arms and cash were Qassam Suleimani, head of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, and Mouhsen Hussein Azahi, Iran’s intelligence minister.”
Since its 2007 seizure of Gaza, Hamas has been on the receiving end of Persian largesse that includes 120mm Grad rockets, Raa’d anti-tank missiles (Iranian knock-offs of the Russian-made Sagger variety), explosively formed penetrators (EFPs) which can cut through eight inches of steels, and the tech savvy to construct and place a host of improvised explosive devices (IEDs). Hamas operatives used to spend anywhere between a month and six months training in Iranian camps learning how to fire guns, as well as drinking deep of the Khomeinist-flavoured ideology – without quite making the full leap to Shia Islam. So strong was the nexus between the Sunni terrorist organisation and the Shi’ite theocracy that, a senior agent of the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades – the military wing of Hamas – told The Sunday Times in March 2008 that “Anything [the Iranians] think will be useful, our guys there email it to us right away.”
But that was then. This is now. When Hamas decamped from Damascus in response to President Assad’s current troubles the Iranians were not amused. “As punishment for going wobbly on a regional ally, Iran has reportedly cut some or all of its funding to Hamas, forcing the group into a budgetary shortfall that’s been somewhat compensated by Turkish and Qatari funds.”
Meanwhile, the mullahs’ new favourite proxy in Palestine is now Islamic Jihad, which will try to curry support by saying that Hamas has gone soft. These chaps are converting to Shia Islam in a bid to reclaim Iranian hegemony in Gaza. And Hezbollah, which is more a puppet of Iran than a mere proxy, has cast its sectarian lot with Assad by helping him kill Syrian protestors and thereby earning it the enmity of the entire Sunni Arab world.
This suggests that ‘freedom-fighter’ politics in the region is less dependent on high minded principles than the Left would everyone believe. Perhaps the controlling dictum is “if you want a friend, buy a dog.” That in turn, makes one wonder how durable a peace treaty between Palestine and Israel might be unless it is founded on the more permanent basis of protection payments. Love and notions of human brotherhood seem to count for very little in the political calculus of the area.
What the Arab Spring has demonstrated is that the problems in the region go far deeper than the Arab-Israeli conflict. That may be part of the picture, but it is certainly not the whole of it. It is the lack of civil society, the widespread corruption and the cynical politics of the gun which are the true roots of instability.
Sometimes I am tempted to believe the way the world actually works is that the masses are motivated by ideas — like nationalism, religion or ideology — but leadership in every organization — the inner core of initiates — do things for money. Napoleon once said he could make men die for bits of colored ribbon. But when princes confer by themselves the currency is fear, power or money.
Every militant organization has its gallery of revolutionary saints. But you begin to notice that their martyrdom was in fact the whole point of their recruitment. Martyrdom was their vocation. They were never suited for power. The moment when a young man comes to see the world as played in this manner represents at one the same time the birth of a leader and the demise of an idealist. The New York Times described the moment when Barack Obama rejected community organizing as an effective means of change.
Later that night, Mr. Obama called Johnnie Owens, whom he would hire as a community organizer. Never had Mr. Obama sounded so downcast or frustrated, Mr. Owens said.
“Barack basically talked about how tough it was to generate real results through organizing and that it was embarrassing to him to have the residents out of control,” he recounted.
“He wondered if he had done a good enough job preparing them for the meeting,” Mr. Owens said. “He sounded angry at himself. He was questioning the whole methodology.”
Mr. Obama had risen to executive director of the Developing Communities group, but the demanding hours, small victories and low pay took a toll on him, and he decided to leave.
“ ‘We are not making large-scale change, and I want to be involved in doing that,’ ” Mr. Kellman said Mr. Obama had told him.
Kellman, his organizing mentor, amplified on the moment when Obama made the jump from ‘organizer’ to leader in an interview with PBS .
One of the things that I think it’s important to understand about Barack’s organizing career is that he was sort of a hybrid organizer. He was [a Saul] Alinsky organizer, … but he also was a civil rights organizer. The difference is that the civil rights organizer organizes a movement based on idealism, and the Alinsky organizer talks about self-interest. … And what you would learn from that is that: Don’t pretend the world as it is is the world as you would like it to be. Get realistic …
I don’t really know he’s going to go there [electoral politics] until he tells me he’s leaving organizing; he’s going to go to law school. But when he tells me that, he tells me why, and it makes sense: what he wanted to see was large-scale change, and community organizing changes small issues in people’s lives, and we transform people’s lives in terms of teaching them skills and giving them hope they didn’t have before. But it structurally was not going to change racial discrimination; it was not going to change poverty in the United States. There simply would not be enough power there. That [change] would only come through electoral politics.
To anyone who has been an Alinsky organizer, the moment Kellman describes was not just a change of emphasis but an act of leaving one faith for another. For nothing keeps organizers working for the low pay and long hours described as much as the belief that they — more than the leaders whose ranks Obama was hoping to join — were the motive wheels of history. For Obama to declare that community organizing was futile and the rise to the leadership was the true path, was nothing less than losing his religion.
And what of his new one? Perhaps more than the public realizes, Obama may have come believe that horsetrading is in fact how the world works. That ideology, though deeply held, is less important than money and power; and therefore there is no Islamic militant or enemy of America — certainly at the leadership level — who cannot in the long run be bought off. He would get that impression in Chicago, wouldn’t he? And it would go a long way to explaining his obsession with making a deal.
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I see Newt is magically rocketing up in the polls as this week’s non-Romney, non-Paul candidate designated to win by the GOP Establishment. Or maybe not.
it’s a regular gordian knot, huh.
With people as evil as this, why complain about corruption? Better they use the money to enrich themselves than to advance their genocidal ideologies.
Hamas is the Gazan wing of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, and as such should be sent packing back to Egypt. The Egyptians should view the possible collapse of Gaza, if Hamas attempts a Götterdämmerung attack on Israel, conceivably resulting in the expulsion of the population of 1.3 million, much the same way that South Koreans view the prospect of having 24 million Nork cousins come to visit.
The analogy I confess really is not apt. Gazans while resource poor have significant wealth and good infrastructure at their disposal. If they wished to they could generate significant wealth in peace. Their problems are ideological but that ideology is while brutally and many would say badly interpreted not alien to their culture. North Korea is, while originally resource rich, seriously drained of wealth and lacking modern infrastructure but their problems also are ideological. In the case of the DPRK though that impoverishment is not native to their culture but is the result of an alien imposition. So while the situation in North Korea may be even more dire at present it may over time prove easier to reform than the conduct of the Gazans.
There may be reason to hope, granting that hope is not a plan. While the vices of Hamas may be rooted in Arabic culture and Islam they are not so essential to the practice of the Sunni community that they could not be rejected allowing some functional relation to normality to be reestablished. It is to soon to predict how the Sunni majority will respond to the conflicting pressures of fatalism and reason. The Turkish nation appears to be on a knife edge.
Hezbollah also is but the latest example of suicidal messianic fantasy cults that have plagued the region, especially but not exclusively the Shi’a influenced regions. the old Assassin cults and the Alawites were similar movements. These could be seen as the dark mirror images of the theoretically clean and simple face of Islam. Whether it is possible to sustain a reality based society in the Shia dominated areas is unclear. The Shah attempted to and failed. Other traditions have produced cults of irrationality also, for example the Thugee of India and the Sabbatai Zevi, or to be cruel Obama, cult among Jews. If Iran crumbles then the high tide of this irrational wave may pass. The transformation is certain to be painful. The forces of the irrational are sustained by their representatives and allies in the West, Greenies and Socialists and Antisemites, and outside cynical manipulators such as the KGB/SCR and the Chinese. If America rejects Obama then the tide may turn.
This “Wrath Of Iran” is uncontrollable by us Westerners.
By chance, I was just looking at a few Wikipedia sites regarding ‘nebulae’, ‘nebulous’, that iconic “Pillars of Creation” picture, ‘Big Bang’ theory (excellent punning potential) ….prior to clicking over here at PJMedia and our Islamic Problem….you’re getting an idea of where I’m going; so my point is that for us Westerners to try to anticipate and decipher and devine (pun intended) the direction and inter-actions of Islamic factions and dis-united Arab rumblings and frictions with Persian counter-rumblings……”The Wrath Of Iran”…. is only a part of our massive problem, and then….for us Americans with “allies” to try to formulate a military/diplomatic whack-a-mole offensive appropraiate to fight against this roiling mass… is absolutely futile and a waste of expensive energy.
This is why I keep advocating a tight financial and militarily backed up cordon around that impossibly complex mass and let them kill each other as much as they’re able. The trick here is to prevent this unrest infiltrating and subverting America in particular-and the English Speaking Union in general.
We must look to Europe as our example of exactly what to avoid at all costs for our survival.
Forget “Democracy” actually maturing and working inside Islam.
That’s one mega-oxymoron.
Chaos pays and Hamas, the PLO and Fatah have long resembled the Mafia more than freedom fighters. If that is true then they don’t want peace.
One rumor has it that the same thing is happening in Iraq by the no longer paid off Shia blowing up Sunnis to get the money flowing again.
Before 1967 the Palestinians were among the most westernized, educated groups in the Arab world. Under Arafat’s leadership both before and after exile, they first stood apart from Israel, and then in 2000 refused Ehud Barak’s insanely generous offer. After that came Intifada, and since then Jihad of both Sunni and Shia flavors.
In other words, they have been running downhill steadily for forty years. Since 2000 Israel has simply held them at arm’s length, not even fighting them seriously. So of COURSE now they have to fight internally instead. Go figure.
When reading about Hamas, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad, I’m thinking: Bloods, Crips, MS-13, the Asian Boyz….
This “Wrath Of Iran” is uncontrollable by us Westerners.
By chance, I was just looking at a few Wikipedia sites regarding ‘nebulae’, ‘nebulous’, that iconic “Pillars of Creation” picture, ‘Big Bang’ theory (another punning potential) ….prior to clicking over here at PJMedia and our Islamic Problem….you’re getting an idea of where I’m going; so my point is that for us Westerners to try to anticipate and decipher and devine (pun intended) the direction and inter-actions of Islamic factions and dis-united Arab rumblings and frictions with Persian counter-rumblings……”The Wrath Of Iran”…. is only a part of our massive problem, and then try to formulate a military/diplomatic whack-a-mole offensive appropriate to fight against this roiling mass… is absolutely futile and a waste of energy.
This is why I keep advocating a tight financial and militarily backed up cordon around that impossibly complex mass and let them kill each other as much as they’re able. The trick here is to prevent this unrest infiltrating and subverting America in particular-and the English speaking Union in general.
We must look to Europe as our example of exactly what to avoid at all costs for our survival.
Forget “Democracy in Islam. That’s one mega-oxymoron.
“Sometimes I am tempted to believe the way the world actually works is that the masses are motivated by ideas — like nationalism, religion or ideology — but leadership in every organization — the inner core of initiates — do things for money”
I would say that the careers of V.I. Lenin, Ralph Nader, A. Hitler, etc., argue against this being a rule. They were dedicated leaders of movemenst who apparently led ascetic lives. As a commenter indicated above, the ones who can be bribed are sometimes easier to deal with for a time than the fanatics.
I gave a bit of thought to this puzzle a few years ago when I was studying the Iraqi insurgency. A biography of Herman Goering shed a bit of light on the subject. He seemed to be equal parts Nazi fanatic and treasure-grubbing gangster.
“Sometimes I am tempted to believe the way the world actually works is that the masses are motivated by ideas — like nationalism, religion or ideology — but leadership in every organization — the inner core of initiates — do things for money”
I would say that the careers of V.I. Lenin, Ralph Nader, A. Hitler, etc., argue against this. They were dedicated leaders of movement who apparently led ascetic lives. As a commenter indicated above, the ones who can be bribed are sometimes easier to deal with for a time than the fanatics.
I gave a bit of thought to this puzzle a few years ago when I was studying the Iraqi insurgency. A biography of Herman Goering shed a bit of light on the subject. He seemed to be equal parts Nazi fanatic and treasure-grubbing gangster.
“He would get that impression in Chicago, wouldn’t he? And it would go a long way to explaining his obsession with making a deal.”
In Chicago the Mob, disguised as businessmen, very nearly took over, but were defeated. Then the New Mob took over, disguised as politicans, and remain in power to this day. Obama has learned that a Mob is always gonna take over eventually, so you either join them or beat them and become them. Or cut a deal and give them a piece of the action. That viewpoint would explain quite a lot.
Shows that cash may be a bit tight as well. If we could marshall the resources to substitute natural gas for oil-based fuels ( even for just 10-20 per cent of demand)’, we could drive the price of oil down significantly ($70 Brent?)’, we could help drain this swamp. Substituting LNG for diesel for long haul rail and truck routes should become a national energy priority here.
It’s not an either-or thing. Broad swaths of society appear to be motivated generally by ideology, because only ideology as a broad, unifying idea aggregates their efforts enough to be apparent in its effect the broader world. On a smaller scale, their top priorities actually tend to be what’s for dinner, how to pay the rent, and who’s in bed with who.
As an individual gains power, ideology might very well retain the same level of influence in their lives as before–meaning, not much. Except as a job description.
Good title. Wrath of Khan and W. of Iran – how much of Middle East history does that sum up?
As for Obama, given the reports that he is using the psychopath al-Quradawi as a mediator with the Taleban – http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Columnists/Article.aspx?id=254223 – one hopes Wretchard is right to think this is fundamentally horse trading. But the analyst’s choice is not just ideology vs. horse trading. Resentments (e.g. of the invisible hand) survive the revelations the young organizer might have had into the nature of the game. And it is the erosion of reality that our many resentments create that allows ideology, or more precisely the building blocks of a new ideology, to return to the stage.
“no money, no lovey-dovey” Isn’t there a technical term for that? Whore, trollop,trull, floozy,slut, prostitute.
“I would say that the careers of V.I. Lenin, Ralph Nader, A. Hitler, etc., argue against this.”
Why? They were all wealthy. Mien Kampf was the #1 best seller in Europe for ages. Hitler was a millionaire back when a million was more then a down payment on a house.
Living an ascetic life is often a matter of choice. People that see money as a tool for power seldom spend it.
Trying to place Persia/Iran in the big picture of the Muddled East marks them as unique. Persia/Iran has rung some religious changes over the past two millennia. Throughout these changes a strong Persian identity and culture survived. My hazy understanding of this goes as follows. They followed the Lord of Light (Ahura Mazda) from around the fifth or fourth century BC until the seventh century AD. When the Sassanid Empire was conquered by Sunni Arabs in mid seventh century, Persia converted to Sunni Islam and lived under Umayyad rule. The Abbasids, who overthrew the Umayyads in 750 enjoyed the support of both Sunni and Shia. It was not until the 16th century that the majority of Persians became Shia. Persia became part of the Ottoman Empire some time in the 11th century and became independent from the Ottomans around 1500 (I think).
Non-Arab Persia seems to have a long tradition of independence and a rivalry with Arab culture. Even when Arabic replaced Persian as the official court language a strong Persian indentity and culture survived. They also seem to have been stirring the pot and throwing monkey wrenches for a long time. The current wrath of Iran seems to be just a continuation of a long standing national irritability.
I get the impression that all their skulduggery is driven by a “Persia/Iran first” mentality rather than a “Shia first” mentality. It seems they are good at leveraging the Shia identity to benefit the Persian/Iranian identity.
#4:”If they wished to they could generate significant wealth in peace.”
Doing what exactly? The blogger Spengler posed the question, what do these people have to offer the world economy? Remember the destruction of the settler’s vegetable greenhouses by the rampaging Gaza Arabs. Compared to the hardworking workforce in Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, coastal China, parts of India, etc … What exactly are these Gaza Arabs going to build and sell to world assuming they ever did decide to try and join the civilized world? What about Agriculture? (No) What about Tourism? (HA!) The simple fact is that these Palestinians are foaming at the mouth savages who consider memorizing as much of the Koran as the greatest and only intellectual achievement possible. To Israel they offer: kidnappings, bombs in pizza parlors and buses, and the occasional stray rocket killing some civilian out of the blue. To the developed world, in particular the USA, they offer nothing we could possible want. The best course (actually for relations with the entire Muslim world as well) for the USA is to regard them as the savages they are, achieve true energy independence (drill baby drill), and DO NOT let them immigrate into our country.
bell curve 18,
You are not contradicting me. Destroying the vegetable gardens was a choice. They could have a nation as successful as Singapore or Hong Kong. The modern Philistines could be as successful as the modern Phoenicians of old Lebanon were in the 1950s-60s. The implosion of Lebanon was in part exacerbated by the arrival of Palestinians expelled from Jordan after Black September. Gaza could have agriculture, shipping, light manufacturing, finance, and yes tourism. They have, or had before they destroyed the greenhouses, the physical capital. The Arabs and Europeans and Americans have given them the financial capital many times over. They have the human capital. Despite the efforts of UNRWA they are relatively well educated compared to other Arab communities.
Do not disparage their potential. What makes them interesting is how close they can come to success and then blow it. Remember that the Palestinians were the migrants who did much of the work, and not just physical labor, in the Gulf states including Kuwait before the first Gulf War. They got kicked out for siding with Saddam. Other Arabs often despise the Palestinians for their ingratitude and failure to take advantage of opportunities. These are the people of whom Abba Eban said they “never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity.”
Most of the self identified Palestinians are descended from surplus Sunni fedayeen who were encouraged to migrate largely from the Levant into the lands being developed by the Zionists in the late 19th to early 20th centuries. They have largely expelled the native Christian population of the West Bank. Most of the Gazans are descended from Egyptians, as was Arafat’s mother. The pattern of arrival, development of industry with external resources, and then destruction has been repeated by this group in different times and locations.
Your point regarding the need to increase energy production outside of OPEC is well taken. Nuclear should be part of that effort and the innovation and efficiency that would follow from a reduction in regulation and taxation could be viewed as the strategic equivalent of energy independence.
Iran has invested heavily in its proxies. Now they are finding that is a risky venture. Hamas will take cash and weapons but they have their own agenda. Reports are that Tehran has cut payments to Hezbolla as well.
We assume that in an Israel-Iran conflict the Hezzies will send showers of missiles into Northern Israel. They might but then again they might not. Why should they really?
The issue is one of control. Hamas is now seeing Islamic Jihad as a rival for power. They are happy to have the weapons and fighters but those cannot be used as part of its own strategy for destroying Israel unless they can be controlled. Hezbolla may not feel to crazy about getting pounded for the sake of Persian pride. Iran has trained and equipped its foreign proxies yet may find them scattered when push comes to shove.
Psalm 144
A psalm of David
1 Praise be to the LORD my Rock,
who trains my hands for war,
my fingers for battle.
2 He is my loving God and my fortress,
my stronghold and my deliverer,
my shield, in whom I take refuge,
who subdues peoples[a] under me.
3 LORD, what are human beings that you care for them,
mere mortals that you think of them?
4 They are like a breath;
their days are like a fleeting shadow.
5 Part your heavens, LORD, and come down;
touch the mountains, so that they smoke.
6 Send forth lightning and scatter the enemy;
shoot your arrows and rout them.
7 Reach down your hand from on high;
deliver me and rescue me
from the mighty waters,
from the hands of foreigners
8 whose mouths are full of lies,
whose right hands are deceitful.
Remember, Islam ‘s early appeal was as a legitimizer of a robbing , raping, thieving, plundering and murdering way of life. Mohammad only grew in popularity when he became a warlord of a pack of thieves. The Islam’s preferred economic organizing principle is to steal. When there is no outsider to invade, plunder and steal from those in power will and must turn on their Islamic brothers to steal from. It is the only thing they know.
The Chicago Machine and Muslims of the Middle East and alike in that way. The only thing they know is how to extort and steal. They do not know how to build a civil society or create prosperity for all.
Many years ago either the Palestinian Authority or the UN published the equivalent of a police blotter for Gaza. I made reading it a part of my daily routine.
The most common story was that three members of X clan were killed in retaliation for the killing of two members of Y clan. Flip around the numbers and the Xs and Ys and you end up with a picture of a what daily life was like in Gaza. Some version of Hobbes’ brutal and short.
The relativist would argue that every culture has its mob violence, and that is true. The Gaza police blotter told a different story, however, because the Xs and Ys were the people who governed, or ran, Gaza and not some criminal undercurrent running amock.
Occasional follow-on stories described how X clan controlled the cement business and was centered in a guarded enclave in one part of Gaza while Y clan controlled the UN jobs business or some such and was located in a guarded enclave in some other part of Gaza.
When Hamas replaced Fatah it changed the relative position of the Xs and Ys, and probably redifined them as well, but the absence of civil society is still the dominant theme of Gaza, and almost every part of Arab World too. Scale it up or down to fit the situation.
Islam, culture, geography – take your pick – we end up at the same place. The worldview that determines how people interact with each other, individually and in groups, is completely alien to the Western worldview, and never the twain shall meet.
“Sometimes I am tempted to believe the way the world actually works is that the masses are motivated by ideas — like nationalism, religion or ideology — but leadership in every organization — the inner core of initiates — do things for money”
I think for the most part this is true, but not always. The real problems seem to arise when the amoral leaders come into conflict with someone who truly is motivated by ideology or religion. The deal makers project their own mindset onto the other-they simply cannot imagine that no compromise is possible. And everything they hear to the contrary they interpret as merely bargaining tactics. And things eventually blow up.
23. Tcobb, Compromise means you lose. You give up some of the spoils of victory to avoid conflict and the effort required to win it all. It is a cowards way of getting at least half a loaf.
Some people don’t fear losing. Those people are willing to put the issue to the test of war. To win all or lose all in the most Darwin manner possible. No holds barred, No rules except win baby win.
s @ 24: Tcobb, Compromise means you lose. You give up some of the spoils of victory to avoid conflict and the effort required to win it all. It is a cowards way of getting at least half a loaf.
Not necessarily. You and Tcobb look at situations where you don’t *want* to compromise, the opponent is untrustworthy, has nothing left of value, would be a burden going forward, etc. In other situations maybe you do *want* to compromise, for your own enlightened self-interest. The Israeli compromise with Egypt giving back the Sinai and not destroying the Egyptian army in the first place were overall good moves, bought peace for a generation and set a good precedent, bought brownie points with the US and Europe, anyway they could hardly have held the territory politically or militarily. In general compromise can be a way of incorporating and consolidating gains with an opponent who need not really be an enemy, rather than salting the Earth. The Roman empire grew and thrived on compromise, appointing local governors. Arguably so did the Islamic, though in the end it was the loser’s compromising that was fatal, not the winner’s. Just goes to show the flexibility in the concept.
Israel offers way too much compromise to the Palestinians, and they reject it or fail at it. So much for that.
Peter Boston @ 22 said:
“Islam, culture, geography – take your pick – we end up at the same place. The worldview that determines how people interact with each other, individually and in groups, is completely alien to the Western worldview, and never the twain shall meet.”
This raises the question of whether MENA is a mess because Islam is a crappy religion or Islam is a crappy religion because MENA is a mess? The evidence is ambiguous. For example, Indonesia is mostly Islamic and has a large population. Obviously the Indonesians are not Arabs. Indonesia is a rough place but about par for the developing world, i.e. Indonesia is functional without obvious social pathology. Despite being Islamic, is the fact that Indonesia is not seriously messed up due to some intrinsic virtue of Indonesian culture? The Arab world more-of-less inherited Hellenic culture which was a very high culture. On top of Hellenic culture they layered Christian values (Coptic Egyptians) and finally layered Islamic values. One could argue that the Arab/Egyptians were doing better prior to the invention of Islam. However one could counter-argue that the Arabs were dealing with the lingering effects of the Roman Empire’s collapse followed by the decay and collapse of the Byzantine Empire. The Turkish invasion followed by the Mongols and the rise of the Ottomans also makes it hard to argue what really messed up MENA. The picture is not clear except for the obvious fact that MENA is seriously messed up.
It’s ironic that most of the world’s energy supply is located in MENA. However, come to think of it, the situation would have been worse if most of the world’s energy supply was located in sub-Sahara Africa. Then again, given that situation, the Europeans probably would have merely exterminated the native African population. The Arab world had enough intrinsic virtue that the Europeans allowed them to go on living.
Josh @ 25 said:
“The Israeli compromise with Egypt giving back the Sinai and not destroying the Egyptian army in the first place were overall good moves, bought peace for a generation and set a good precedent, bought brownie points with the US and Europe, anyway they could hardly have held the territory politically or militarily.”
I agree with Josh but his last point is the most important one. Egypt’s population was too large to pacify. Simply conquering Egypt was not an option for Israel. Not coming to some sort of peace agreement with Egypt would have meant continual low level warfare such as has occurred with the Palestinians. Israel’s only practical option was to make some sort of peace agreement with the Egyptians. This was not an option while Nasser was alive and also not an option with Sadat until he had consolidated his political position. Egypt’s partial victory after the Yom Kippur War gave Sadat the necessary fig life to enable him to negotiate peace with Israel.
W.’s point is, I think, that the NCA’s assumption is that the Enemy (encapsulated as Iran, at present) can be persuaded (by cash, trade, recognition, whatever) to change their course (world domination, eradication of the Great Satan, nuclear weapons, endless donuts, whatever).
This presupposes that said enemy is oriented toward a materialist view of the world. Pardon me, Barry, but all indications are to the contrary. But, in Barry’s defense, he has no grounding in an attempt to understand a Power Greater than himself.
Well, as that great analyst of human nature, Harry Callahan, said “a man has to know his limitations”. But in that episode the consequences were immediate.
Robert Heinlein”s definition of an honest politician comes to mind, they stay bought.
Re: horse-trading.
LBJ believed the same – he knew with absolute certainty that a deal could always be struck given “reasoning together” and enough lubrication, most often money or its near equivalent (land, licenses, appointments, elections…).
Then he discovered the North Vietnamese.
It is realignment: Iran-Turkey-Russia-Syria v Wahabis and Ikhwans, and their White House dhimmi.
Ikhwans (Muslim Brotherhood) want to restore Calipha, based in Alexandra, pending a return to al-Haramain (Mecca-Medina).
Regardless of what you think of the GOP candidates, ANYONE is better than BHO.