Obama and the Middle East Dilemma

While everyone stares at the ever shifting, ever blurring Syrian Chemical Weapons red line which is now befuddling the White House, the Syrian civil war continues to wind on and on eventually to determine who will prove supreme, bad or worse. There is no good side to choose in this fight. It now comes down to Assad backed by Iran and Hezballah, the Syrian Free Army which is backed largely by the Muslim Brotherhood, and the al Nusra Front which represents al-Qaeda and even should Bashar Assad be toppled there will still be Hezballah allied with the IRGC guerilla forces attempting to preserve the influence of their Iranian masters. As far as the United States is concerned there is no actual good guy for them to back though President Obama has appeared to have a soft spot for the Muslim Brotherhood in the past.

 

The one democratic country which is very concerned over the eventual results and intermediate activities in Syria is, of course, Israel. While the Israelis are not particularly fond of any of the players, their previous knowledge of Assad may make him the least troublesome of the evils for Israel. Do not misunderstand that Assad would make Israeli leaders overjoyed as they have fought three conflicts against his forces; one in the Six Day War in 1967, once again when both Syria and Egypt launched the Yom Kippur War in 1973, and their final conflict was an air war over the Bekaa Valley in 1982 where the Israelis knocked sixty Syrian fighters from the skies in two days of dog fights losing absolutely no planes themselves. For the memory of these defeats Bashar al-Assad might be sufficiently gun shy that would make his remaining in power preferable to having to teach a new leader the perils of engaging the IDF from scratch.

 

Whatever the eventual result of the civil war in Syria the one thing Israel absolutely cannot allow is for Iran or anybody else to funnel new and more dangerous weapon systems to Hezballah in Lebanon. This is what spurred the recent air raids by the Israelis on Damascus and along the Syrian-Lebanon border over the past week. The Israelis were removing transports carrying new weapon systems which would have posed a serious increase in the threat potential of Hezballah. One can only imagine what such systems might have entailed as Hezballah already possesses at a minimum sixty-thousand rockets of various ranges with which to threaten Israel. Despite such a seemingly overwhelming threat potential, Iran has still decided it is worth the possible losses to attempt to further arm Hezballah in order to turn their threat into a certainty that Tel Aviv would be decimated in return for any actions taken against the Iranian nuclear program. Iran has made it very certain that it matters not who attacks their nuclear program, Israel will receive the brunt of the Iranian response through Hezballah and Hamas and Syria providing Syria is still a part of the Iranian Shiite Crescent across the Middle East.

 

Meanwhile, back in Washington DC President Obama is doing a number of pirouettes on the head of a pin trying to avoid being pinned down to his red line should Syria use chemical weapons threat. Syria has, according to Israeli, French, British and even most United States sources, already deployed Sarin nerve agent against the rebel forces and civilians. There have been reports of multiple usages yet President Obama continues to squirm and wrestle with these facts attempting to twist them into a cloud of doubts in order to back away from the precipice and avoid actually being forced to act. The problem President Obama is facing is that he really miscalculated when making a threat he never expected to have to ever face. Now that reality has not only caught up but has swept past his threat of action crossing over his red line, President Obama must now fudge the facts and blow enough smoke that he can claim that his red line was more flexible and has remained inviolate, but with his red line not only crossed but rather obliterated, President Obama has been left appearing completely toothless in all ways concerning Syrian use of chemical weapons.

 

There is one huge problem beyond the simple fact that President Obama has been rendered impotent concerning events in Syria; all of his threats and posturing over the Iranian nuclear program are now mute and meaningless. This can only serve to make the Iranian nuclear weapons threat even more potent as it is now obvious that President Obama never actually intended to ever take action in order to prevent the Iranians from acquiring nuclear weapons. This leaves all of Europe as well as Israel, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the other nations within the GCC, and anyone else who Iran may see as an opponent directly in the crosshairs of a potential nuclear Iran. What makes things even more clouded is that now all of the intelligence information which originated with the United States or was heavily influenced by the United States now cannot be considered to be anything other than a ruse to prevent the appearance of a need to act. This is very likely to cause a complete reevaluation of the entire Iranian situation by Israel at the very least. The backing away from his red line by President Obama has resulted in the entire world now realizing that they are on their own when it comes to the Iranian threats. This can only lead to a more dangerous Middle East, like anybody thought such was even possible.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

How North Korea with Nukes Defines Iran with Nukes

A good number of world leaders are currently sweating nervously while hanging on every threat that the new North Korean Dear Leader Kim Jong-Un utters with their nerves fraying even more each time the satellites or other intelligence sources report any activities taking place anywhere near missile sites or nuclear instillations. Even China, the one who usually is called upon to calm situations emanating from North Korea, has placed additional troops on their border with North Korea and appears to be just as concerned as anybody else. Russia has made statements which could be seen as indicating that they are also in the dark as to what this new, young and untested North Korean leader is likely to do. The concerns are spread throughout the whole gambit of possibilities. Will he launch a middle-range missile or two or many more? Will he launch the reported untested long-range missile? Will the missiles be armed with active warheads? Would he honestly choose to place a nuclear weapon atop one of the missiles and if so where the nuclear warhead would be aimed? Everything is very much unknown largely due to no clear intelligence on North Korea and absolutely no history or even inklings of information about the new leader of North Korea. The entire world is in the dark forced to take guesses and attempt to be ready for any and every possibility. And as unclear everything is concerning this confrontation that has thus far been simply words and false moves without any actual belligerent acts, the world does have the one calming hope that all of this will result in simply meeting some demands for easing sanctions and some other mostly political compromises and food aid or other trade items as this has been the scenario in the past when his predecessors, his father and grandfather, had taken similar actions of saber rattling and boisterous threats. The level of trepidation which seems to have gripped our leaders where they have taken precautionary measures but at the same time are tip-toeing so carefully around the problem refusing to stand up against the threats coming from North Korea as if they are quiet enough things will calm down on their own. Such a timid approach only emboldens Kim Jong-Un and allows him to appear far more powerful than he actually is which is exactly what he desires. Where part of this strutting and bellowing out threats is done for intimidation and effect in order to have his demands met once they are stated, the other part is for propaganda on the home front where Kim Jong-Un will have reports for the foreseeable future regaling how the world was hanging on his every word and willing to grant him whatever he demanded and their sacrifices have not been in vain as North Korea is so powerful they can virtually stop the world from spinning. Maybe things would end quicker and Kim Jong-Un could be denied the endless ranting under the spotlight if he was confronted and somebody demanded him to simply state what this was all about and after he makes some demands instruct Kim Jong-Un that he will accept exactly what the rest of the world is willing to give him until he compromises and allows some freedoms and begins to serve his people instead of his ego. But the world does not seem to work like that which is why people like Kim Jong-Un and his fathers before him can get away with such antics.

Now look down the road about three or four years, or maybe by the end of this year depending on which report is correct on the Iranian nuclear weapons program and imagine how the world will react to the Iranian President, whomever wins the election this June to replace Ahmadinejad, along with whatever supporting role the Supreme Leader Grand Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Hosseini Khamenei decides to play making demands of the world. Imagine, if you can, Iran and the IRGC (Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps) along with their terrorist branches the world over, like Hezballah, threatening to detonate nuclear devices in multiple capital cities around the globe if their demands are not met. How would the world react if Iran decided to annex Iraq claiming they were simply reforming their rightful lands as the inheritors of the lands that belonged to Persia? They could then annex Syria, Lebanon, and Jordan all with the same claim. At what point would the world leaders decide it was too much and take a hard stand? Would it take having them attack a NATO country such as Turkey? Would the Europeans even flinch if they attacked Greece or would the Europeans see that as good a way as any to rid themselves of a problem? What if Iraq, Syria and Lebanon simply announced that they desired to form a confederation under Iranian rule with their retaining some amount of autonomy but falling under the protection of the Iranian nuclear umbrella? If the world is apoplectically paralyzed by North Korea when they presumably do not possess ballistic missiles capable of striking anywhere on the globe, what would be the reaction to Iran who by then will almost certainly possess such missiles? Would the United States go to war over Israel or would Israel become literally the Czechoslovakia of World War III? How about over Kuwait or Saudi Arabia? Would the world rise up to protect any of the Sunni Islamic countries if they began to fall under Shiite Iranian hegemony? After Iran crept across North Africa, would we then rise if they laid claim to Andalusia which is what the Islamic powers called Spain when they held much of it until 1492 when King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella marshaled the Spanish people and threw off the Islamic rulers. What if there were to be a modern battle of Tours in southern France. Iran is not a poor and economically desperate nation despite the effects that the sanctions have had on them. The Iranians are still managing to trade some of their oil and other goods and as the Western nations fall deeper into their own economic troubles we might very well see a resurgent Iran with many Asian and other nations discarding the sanctions and resuming trade with what would appear to be an Iran with a brighter future than the debt ridden Western nations. We need to remember that North Korea has a controlling power on its northern border and China would not allow the situation over North Korea threaten to bring a nuclear exchange to her southeastern border. Russia also would have something to say about such a possibility. North Korea also is far smaller and does not possess the natural resources that Iran does. Iran with nuclear weapons is a completely different and extremely dangerous threat which really cannot be compared to North Korea. If the nations of the world are unable to squelch the protestations and threats of Kim Jong-Un out of North Korea, then we will be in even worse position should Iran start to make similar noises backed by nuclear weapons. That is something to consider but not too close to bedtime if one wishes to sleep free of nightmares.

Beyond the Cusp

An Attempt to Explain the Israeli Problems About Iran

There are two sides of the Israeli problems concerning Iran which I want to try to address with this editorial. The first is the apparent perception by much of the countries in the world and their call on Israel to answer for their rhetoric over Iran, but so few countries have any comment about Iranian statements of intents towards Israel. The second is to present what may in the end be the only promise of retaliation to any Iranian or Iranian supported terror entity launched attack upon Israel with nuclear or other weapons of mass destruction that might have any hope of being a proper and workable deterrent and the problems which would ensue immediately should Israel make such an announcement. Through both of these discussions it should become evident that Israel is in an unenviable and untenable position where every choice and every situation appears to present to Israel choices between two evils, both of which have undesirable implications and results of approximately equal though different consequences. The one thing that should be obvious but has not appeared to have broken through to many is that Israel is honestly facing once again an existential threat which threatens Israel’s very being on this Earth. This current threat is very likely the most serious threat to her existence that Israel has ever faced. It is more of a threat than the overwhelming attack by over half a dozen Arab countries’ armies on the first day after the declaration of statehood on May 15, 1948. It is also comparable to the massing of troops on either end of the country with the large, well equipped Egyptian Army on her southern border and the equally well equipped but slightly lesser rated proficiency Syrian Army on her northern border with Jordan joining the assault the next day despite Israeli pleadings for them to not attack and informing King Hussein that the reports of Egyptian and Syrian victories were a fabrication in early June of 1967. It even surpasses the threat posed by the Egyptian assault on Yom Kippur of 1973 which found Israel totally unprepared as their unimpeachable intelligence had completely failed to predict the attack which left Israel with her reserves and many of her regular IDF troops in services at Synagogues throughout the country and unable to be contacted for call up except by actually going to each and every Synagogue making announcements informing of the attack with resultant call-up. And lastly it exceeds any other threat from Hamas, Hezballah, Islamic Jihad, Egypt, Syria, or any other combination of terror groups or national armies that have threatened Israel during her short history. This is the seriousness of the threat Iran poses once they attain nuclear weapons, and it is a threat that also applies to the rest of the world and not just Israel.

On Sunday Brazilian Foreign Minister Antonio Patriota met with Israeli President Shimon Peres and expressed concern over Israel’s threats to launch a military strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities. Foreign Minister Patriota was reported to have told President Peres, “We see with great concern the State of Israel’s threats to launch a military attack against Iran. These threats and future actions that may arise from them are extremely dangerous to the stability of the Middle East.” Referring to Brazilian president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva’s meeting with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in 2010 where the former Brazilian President was quoted as saying that he wished to “made it unequivocally clear that he was against Holocaust denial and that he in favor of peace and nuclear disarmament in the Middle East. This perception is still valid.” This is not the first high government official who has either made statements to the press or directed speeches or queries about the perceived danger and threat posed by Israel towards Iran. These statements and comments always ask why Israel is threatening to take preemptive actions against Iran and what the Israeli intent concerning Iran is. Many have demanded that Israel unequivocally guarantee they will take no preemptive actions against Iran and disavow any intent to take any actions using the Iranian nuclear program as an excuse for intervention. It seems like at least once every week somebody from some government comes forth with a comment about Israeli belligerence and threats vis-à-vis Iran and that Israel is the main threat to world and Middle East peace. Despite all the calls by Iranian President Ahmadinejad and Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei for the total destruction of the Zionist State, Israel, and of all the Jews everywhere, there are few countries outside of the Western nations who have shown even the slightest concern about these threats. Especially among the developing nations of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) there is a strong presupposition that Israeli threats against Iran are the highest threat to peace and have the potential of causing the next great war which would be started by an Israeli use of nuclear weapons while they see absolutely no threat coming from Iran and dismiss even the possibility that Iran would use WMDs such as nuclear weapons in a first strike against Israel. This is what Israel faces as the prevailing current of world opinion that Iran bluster and threats against Israel are of no consequence yet Israeli alarms about these threats against Israel emanating from Iran are an imminent threat to world peace. It is as if Iran attacking Israel would have minimal consequences but if Israel were to preemptively attack Iran it would cause an international reaction and drag the entire world into a great conflagration. I guess this prediction is likely a self-fulfilling prophesy. If every country basically stands aside should Iran attack Israel then such an attack would have a minimal consequence and even should the United States respond as they are committed by treaty, then the United States response would be the full extent of anything beyond the Israeli second strike capabilities. On the other hand, should all the countries that disregard any threat from Iran but promise world destruction would result from an Israel attack and after such they all actually went to war against Israel, and any country which sided with the Jewish State, then an Israeli attack would result in a worldwide conflagration. It does boggle the mind that Israel warning and pleading for assistance in preventing Iran attaining nuclear weapons ability is considered the preeminent threat in the world but the Iranian calls of, “Death to Israel; Death to America,” is considered simply a natural and expected action which would have no real world implications. Some things just make little if any sense.

The other problem has been described as the Netanyahu preemption conundrum. Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu along with the Israeli Prime Minister’s Cabinet with advice from the Israeli’s top military planners and tacticians must discern what exactly the Iranian intents are. Beyond the obvious and very public calls by many of Iran’s highest placed spokespeople for an end to the Zionist entity and other threats calling for the death of all of Israel, Israeli intelligence analysts and leadership must discern exactly what the Iranian threat concerning Israel actually boils down to once all the bluster and hyperventilation are filtered out. Are the Iranian claims that Israel is but a one nuclear weapon strike away from extinction an actual call for making such an attack a reality as soon as the Iranian nuclear program develops a nuclear device and a method of delivery. If Iran is intending to try and bring about an Israeli apocalypse, what would they utilize as a delivery method? Would they use a ballistic missile, a bombing with aircraft, a ship with a registry which would not cause suspicion pulling into Haifa or Tel Aviv marinas, or a cement truck or other land vehicle capable of carrying the device infiltrating through the West Bank, or any other conceivable method. Israel cannot afford to plan for only one or two of the most obvious delivery methods as the 911 attack on the United States proved. Some have come up with a description of the problem simplifying it down to figuring out the psychological mindset of the Iranian leadership by choosing one of three categories, are they rational, irrational or simply insane. Supposedly each of these states of mind requires a different set of actions and determines what is needed to prevent Iran from an attack with WMDs on Israel, whether it will require preemption or is there a set of defined actions that would make a sufficient deterrent. The problem with this approach is that it allows for a mistake in judgment making all the planning and reliance uncertain with a high probability of error. What Israel needs to do is first decide whether preemption is viable and what would be the results of a preemptive attack and what would be required to implement a successful preemption and what determines a successful preemption. Then, if preemption is determined to either not be required, too risky to be attempted, too expensive in either treasure or casualties, ineffective requiring a frequency of preemption making it unfeasible, or too much risk of world condemnation and resultant reaction and punishments placed upon Israel, then some appropriate and sufficient deterrence must be determined and established as policy and communicated to Iran and the World.

An estimation of preemption would eventually lead to the conclusion that no attack could undo the amount of enriched uranium already held by Iran and since whatever destruction was dealt to the Iranian nuclear program would be able to be reconstituted or rebuilt and would only serve to delay the inevitable. Even if preemption appears to be feasible at this time and would result in at least a five year and as much as more than a dozen year setback of the Iranian nuclear program, there is one other problem which must be considered. Even if everything else made a current preemption viable and would not result in any permanent harm to Israel and would be sufficiently precise so as not to cause unacceptable collateral casualties and damage, the fact that it would not be a permanent solution must be brought into the discussion. Once that is realized, then it becomes evident that preemption would eventually lead to a situation where preemption would no longer be effective and therefore preemption becomes an nonviable solution. Israel must find a solution that once put in place makes the likelihood of an Iranian attack with the intent of annihilation of the Jewish State as its purpose becomes no longer acceptable to the Iranian leadership. One cannot even be guaranteed that bringing down the governance of Iran by the Ayatollahs and having a ruling theocracy would also actualize an end to the Iranian nuclear ambitions. It is likely that any government chosen by the Iranians may decide to continue the drive for nuclear weaponry and nuclear mastery. So, the only true solution would be to find some threat that would function as a proper and viable deterrence completely independent of any discernment about the mental state of those governing in Iran now or in the future.

Deterrence is the sole solution to the Iranian nuclear threat that can be considered and implemented which would be sane, rational, workable, and have any chance of effectiveness. The one thing that must be kept in mind is that the deterrence must be effective no matter whether the leadership of Iran is rational, irrational or simply insane. The only workable deterrence must be effective against all states of mind, political realities, religious considerations, and virtually any conditions which could possibly exist, whether likely or beyond belief. Unlike the Cold War where MAD, Mutually Assured Destruction, was sufficient as both the Soviet Union and the United States, and later China, were all sane actors and were checked simply by the guarantee of mutual destruction. Unfortunately, one of the conditions that must be satisfied when deterring Iran is that the leadership is now or may in the future be suicidally inclined. So, we can rule out mutually assured destruction as a viable deterrence. It is at this point that most of the appraisals I have read simply gives up and makes the call for a preemptive strike, which we have already ruled out as an inoperable and untenable approach to the problem. That leaves us in search of the necessary qualities and quantities that must be put under threat as a response to an Iranian attack such that Iran would be deterred from ever even considering such a move. There is but one thing which would satisfy these requirements and it would be applicable not only to Iran, but would also apply to the rest of the Muslim world. Israel must make it known that should they face annihilation from a nuclear or other overwhelming attack, especially one using Weapons of Mass Destruction, that Israel would launch a massive retaliatory strike. The initial targets would be the major cities of the attacking nation or nations. This would not serve as sufficient deterrence should Iranian leadership be either irrational or simply insane. To make the deterrence actually workable, it needs to have a secondary set of targets. These secondary targets must be the same regardless of who from the Muslim World would be the originating attackers. Israel needs to identify particular targets that are of such value to Muslims that to even consider testing Israeli resolve on such a threat would be unthinkable. This is why among these secondary targets there would be a select group of critical structures in each Muslim country which would be targeted for destruction either by nuclear weapons or conventional weapons, as required. For example, in Egypt the Aswan Dam would be destroyed which would cause irreversible damage to the entire Nile Valley and Nile Delta. The final sets of targets that Israel would include are targets that are universal in their value throughout the Muslim World. These would include but not be limited to Mecca; Medina; Qom, Iran; Mashhad, Iran; Najaf, Iraq; Karbala, Iraq; all Muslim Holy Sites upon the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, Israel; and other selected locations which house other equally important sites important to all of Islam and to each of Islam’s major factions, Sunni, Shiite, and Sufi. By making the retaliatory attack diverse in order that all sects of Islam pay a price and also choosing those sites which are particular to each sect of Islam, this would cause every sect of Islam and Muslims everywhere to have a stake in preventing any such attack upon Israel. So, even if the leadership of Iran would, as has been stated, “not care if Iran is burnt to the ground as long as Israel was wiped from the Earth,” one needs to make the price beyond just Iran, make the price a concern for all of Islam and invoke every Muslim to have an interest in keeping the peace so it is in their interest to contain Iran as they too will be made to pay and not just Iran. Granted, should Israel make such a threat they would come under crushing criticism, but when you are considering national survival and the survival of the Jewish people in many ways, criticism is something one should accept. Israel can make it known that they do not relish or even anticipate with anything short of dread ever having to make good on this threat and retaliation, but it is a retaliation and as such cannot occur without an outside trigger, an attack from Iran or any other Muslim nation. Islam itself gives the world the concept that Muslims everywhere are really one nation despite false borders the world has imposed upon them and Israel is simply honoring that all of Islam is one and therefore all of Islam would be responsible for an attack by any Islamic force. It may not be very politically acceptable, but neither should the complete and total destruction of the Jewish State, Israel, be acceptable. All this would amount to is if the first unacceptable event should be initiated, the destruction of Israel and almost all Jewish Holy Sites with WMDs, then a second unacceptable event will be the response, the destruction of numerous Muslim cities and Islamic Holy Places.

Beyond the Cusp