On the Ground
A number of bloggers are complaining about the Bush Administration’s reaction to the current Israeli situation. Phrases like “poor planning” and “lack of preparation” are being tossed around.
One of the Dean’s World crew writes:
It is reacting, not acting, and that is not leadership. Considering how the Administration’s entire Mideast policy is at stake, it’s inexcusable.
Cobb believes our lack of “planning” has made us the apologists for the IDF.
The disgusting Christopher Hitchens opines:
It is only when one has reviewed these interlocking elements that one fully appreciates the extreme unwisdom of the Bush administration in having allowed if not encouraged the Olmert government to pursue a policy of wide retaliation across Lebanon. Much criticism has been focused on the second-order question of whether there was an Israeli (and American) “intelligence failure” which both over- and underestimated Hezbollah, and which therefore allowed a military and a moral trap to be sprung. But this is describable as “second order” only because it raises the question of whether Israel’s campaign — no doubt useful for the internal requirements of the untried Kadima coalition — meshes with America’s responsibility for taking all the above points into account.
This is a war that has gone on since 1948. Just what would you have the Bush Administration do that all of the many other American administrations of all flavors have not?
The only place we have any leverage is with Israel. None of the other players in this drama care a whit for what we may think or demand. We have given Israel a free hand and are providing supplies. That is what we should do. We cannot, however, give their government a stiffer backbone or a pair of bigger balls, which may in fact be the real problem here.
The meme seems to be that we should have laid down the law to Iran and Syria, drawn the “line in the sand”. The implicit assumption is that our threats have any meaning to those governments, or to the terrorists that Israel is fighting. The criticism continues that we should have, well before this, backed up our threats with force. In plainer words, we should be at war with Syria and Iran, and fighting alongside the Israelis agains Hizbullah.
This is the same sort of thinking that would have had us push Patton’s Third Army into the teeth of the Russian armies after the German surrender. The proponents see a war that we could win. They fail to see the costs, and cannot predict the results. They are strong on tactics but weak on strategy.
Implicit in the criticism is the notion that Israel is failing badly in its push against Hizbullah. That is a conclusion we cannot make, as yet. Their military history suggests that we should not draw that conclusion at all. Pending some sort of internal weakness in their government, we should anticipate a good outcome to this fight for the Israelis and for the friends of freedom in the region.
Does anyone think that the American people have the stomach to attack Syria and Iran? A sound strategy dictates that we fight the battles when and where we choose, and those we believe we can win. The American people, including many on the right, did not embrace the War on Terror to enter into a protracted ground war in the Middle East. We may, one day, strike Syria or Iran, but it will be when we can fight, sustain and win a war.
For now, Israel has our support to wipe out as much of the terrorist infrastructure that threatens them as they can. They need our support and supplies, but not our military.
America’s foreign policy should take the position that war is generally bad. It should also take the position that sometimes it is the only solution. Our strategy seems to be to engage in war at our own choice of time and place, a sound strategy. This is not 1968. Israel is not at the brink of destruction. Our strategy should be support and observation of the situation. If our intervention is called for, it should be a surprise to the other side and one that advances our long term goals.
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