WarSclerotic

US shifts in the wind, again, on arming Syrian rebels, The Long War Journal, Lisa Lundquist, June 26, 2014

(On June 21st, President Obama “dismissed the idea that supplying US arms to Syrian rebels would have toppled President Assad, calling it a ‘fantasy’. . . . He said there was no ‘ready-made moderate Syrian force that was able to defeat Assad.'”  — DM)

Five days after dismissing as a “fantasy” the notion that supplying arms to the moderate Syrian opposition would have toppled the Assad regime, President Obama is now asking Congress to approve $500 million to fund and equip “moderate” Syrian rebels, the BBC reports.

“This funding request would build on the administration’s longstanding efforts to empower the moderate Syrian opposition, both civilian and armed, and will enable the Department of Defense to increase our support to vetted elements of the armed opposition,” the White House claimed.

At this point, it is not entirely clear which vetted elements of the Syrian opposition can be relied upon to keep the arms out of the hands of the jihadists groups who dominate the battlefield, including the Islamic State of Iraq and the Sham (ISIS), and al Qaeda’s branch in Syria, the Al Nusrah Front.

As The Long War Journal has documented over the past year at least, in numerous instances previous US efforts to equip ‘moderate’ Syrian rebels have been compromised by the frequent partnering of ‘moderate’ and Islamist forces, as well as by the sheer power of the Islamist forces themselves. [See Threat Matrix report, Arming the ‘moderate’ rebels in the Syrian south.]

It is difficult to see how throwing another $500 million into the Syrian morass will effect a positive outcome. Jihadist forces currently control virtually all of the border crossings into Syria from Turkey and Jordan (not to mention Iraq) through which Western aid would flow. It is a well-known fact that these jihadists determine the distribution of such supplies once they come into Syria.

While the goal of halting the Islamists’ advance in Syria and now Iraq is a worthy one, the means put forth so far by the Obama administration have fallen far short. And ironically, it is now the warplanes of the Assad regime that are trying to defend US ally Iraq from the latest incursions of the ISIS.

Mortar from Gaza lands in open area; sirens heard in Eshkol Regional Council… – Israel News, Ynetnews.

( Since this report there have been 5 more rocket volleys.  Game on? – JW )

A mortar round fired from the Gaza strip landed in an open area near the border fence with Israel Friday. No injuries were reported.Meanwhile sirens were heard in the area of the Eshkol Regional Council suggesting that rockets were being fired from Gaza as well. (Yoav Zitun)

Peres’ nauseating performance, Israel Hayom, Ruthie Blum, June 27, 2014

“America and Israel should continue to work together to advance peace. Wars can be waged alone. Peace calls for a collective effort. … I hope that we will be able to renew peace talks with the Palestinians soon. … President Abbas is clearly a partner for peace. …”

One old reality that the parents of Naftali, Gil-ad and Eyal are not permitted to forget is that whenever Peres and his ilk express their dreams of peace, the rest of us in Israel should grab our children and run for cover.

On Thursday, when Israeli military sources revealed the names of two key suspects in the June 12 abduction of Israeli teenagers Naftali Frenkel, Gil-ad Shaer and Eyal Yifrach, outgoing President Shimon Peres was in Washington receiving the Congressional Gold Medal.

It turns out that Israel’s Shin Bet security agency has been investigating the disappearance of Hamas terrorists Marwan Qawasmeh and Amer Abu Aisheh from their homes near Hebron since the night of the kidnapping, and interrogating many other Palestinians believed to be involved in the abduction plot. It has also emerged that the parents of the captives have been kept in the loop all along.

This puts in context Tuesday’s cabinet decision to scale back the search for the boys — a move that initially aroused outrage among those of us who feared it indicated the government’s weakening resolve in the face of international condemnations over mass arrests of Palestinians. The reason for the curtailing of activity, in fact, was that the large net cast over the West Bank hotbeds of terrorism could now be narrowed down and given focus where it would be most effective.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reiterated his appeal to Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to rescind his recently forged treaty with Hamas, the organization behind the kidnapping. Though the PA also promotes violence against Jews and Israel — and its press has been lauding the abductions through mockery — Netanyahu must figure that he has a better chance of being heard when fingering Hamas, which is more widely recognized as a full-fledged terrorist group.

Netanyahu’s tactics are understandable. The media and education system that Abbas controls may be filled with anti-Semitic vitriol, but the PA president himself is still viewed by Western liberals as a potential partner for peace with Israel.

Nevertheless, it is a grave mistake for Netanyahu to assist in the perpetuation of this myth. Nor has his willingness to play along with the charade of a hostile U.S. administration ever gained him any brownie points, not even in the joint interest of staving off a nuclear Iran.

No, the Israeli figure who has been honored on Capitol Hill for “strengthening U.S.-Israel ties” since both Barack Obama and Netanyahu took office in 2009 is Peres. Indeed, the elder statesman, who used to be ridiculed for losing every election and for asserting that a “new Middle East” was just around the corner, is the type of leader to whom liberals can relate — especially foreign liberals, who can appreciate a leftist with a taste for the finer things in life.

Treated like royalty by Hollywood, the Vatican and Silicon Valley for his panache and political correctness, is it any wonder that the former hawk and proud socialist, who sings the “Internationale” every May Day while praising entrepreneurship, relishes his many trips abroad?

Yes, the celebrity politician, whose self-organized 90th birthday party last summer included being serenaded by Barbara Streisand and toasted (for the small fee of $500,000) by Bill Clinton, keeps raking in the prizes for his dreams of peace.

The fact that only war has ever ensued is beside the point.

Take the 1994 Nobel Peace Prize he won, together with subsequently slain Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and since defunct Palestinian Liberation Organization chief Yasser Arafat. This he was granted for the signing of the Oslo Accords — a deal resulting in a suicide-bombing onslaught by the Palestinians against Israeli civilians.

Then there’s the honorary knighthood he received in 2008 from Queen Elizabeth at Buckingham Palace. This preceded Israel’s Operation Cast Lead in Gaza, in response to years of incessant missile fire into southern Israel. It followed the 2006 Second War in Lebanon, necessitated by Hezbollah rockets raining down on Israel’s northern cities.

In 2012, while Obama was constantly snubbing Netanyahu, the U.S. president awarded Peres the Presidential Medal of Freedom, one of the two highest civil honors. The second was that which he received on Thursday, while Netanyahu was busy searching for the abducted teens and fending off missile attacks from Gaza and verbal assaults from around the globe for using “excessive force.”

If this travesty were not sufficient to induce nausea, Peres’ acceptance speech before members of Congress, Jewish leaders and diplomats did the trick.

“Many people call me a dreamer,” he said. “I suppose that’s why I have always felt at home here in America. America that was given the privilege to carry the dreams of humanity. My own first dream was to be a shepherd on a kibbutz. This dream came true. At dawn, I watched the sheep in order not to lose one. At night, I watched the stars in order not to miss one. …”

Gag.

“I want to thank my friend and Israel’s friend, President Barack Obama, for standing by our side with an unshakable commitment to Israel’s security. … Like President Obama, Israel hopes that the issue of Iran will be resolved peacefully. And like President Obama, we believe that Iran should be judged by actions not words. …”

Cough.

“Israel did and will do everything in our power to bring home our three kidnapped boys [whose parents] asked me to speak here on their behalf. To make your voices heard all over the world to help bring our boys home. To sound a call across the world against terror. Let’s raise our voices together against terrorism. …”

Swallow.

“America and Israel should continue to work together to advance peace. Wars can be waged alone. Peace calls for a collective effort. … I hope that we will be able to renew peace talks with the Palestinians soon. … President Abbas is clearly a partner for peace. …”

Choke.

“So I ask only one thing of you, the United States of America, this mighty nation of dreamers. Don’t dream small. … Dream big. And work to will those dreams into a new reality. For you and all humanity. …”

Hurl.

One old reality that the parents of Naftali, Gil-ad and Eyal are not permitted to forget is that whenever Peres and his ilk express their dreams of peace, the rest of us in Israel should grab our children and run for cover.

Power Precedes Politics, Washington Free Beacon, Matthew Continetti, June 27, 2014

An ISIL image shows the country’s largest oil refinery under ISIL control / AP

 Raised in material abundance, groomed in institutions of higher education, living and working in safe city precincts, liberals are susceptible to the mirror-image fallacy: the belief that, at the end of the day, all human beings are basically alike, basically good, and basically want the same things liberals want—autonomy, diversity, peace, H&M, inexpensive yoga classes, outdoor brunch.

Which leads them to suppose that international politics operates in the same way as domestic politics, through consultation, debate, negotiation, pleading, trading, log-rolling, and compromise.

If only it were so. The affluent societies of the West may be at peace, but the rest of the world remains a Hobbesian environment where there is no monopoly on violence, no global Leviathan. And where there is no overwhelming and dominant power, where there is no deterring balance among equals, there is war.

The situation on the ground: Iraq in flames. The black flag of al Qaeda over Sunni-majority cities, Shiite militias cleansing Baghdad neighborhoods of other sects and ethnicities, car and suicide bombs exploding daily, the government of Nouri al-Maliki looking insolent and ineffective, the Kurds hinting at independence. Civil war. Iranian meddling. American defeat.

I’m not talking about today. I’m talking about 2006. Then, too, liberal internationalists had the following prescription: America can’t solve Iraq’s problems. A major diplomatic initiative, involving the entire region, might persuade Maliki to be inclusive. There is no military solution in Iraq—just a political one.

“We cannot save the Iraqis from themselves,” Carl Levin said in November 2006. “We’ve been told repeatedly by our top uniformed military leaders that there is no purely military solution in Iraq; there is only a political solution in Iraq.” The Baker-Hamilton Commission, in its December 2006 report, agreed. As America withdrew, it said, “The United States should immediately launch a new diplomatic offensive to build an international consensus for stability in Iraq and the region.”

But President Bush dissented. He understood that the advocates for American withdrawal had reversed the equation. Political settlements are not the cause of peace. They are the result of peace brought about by military means. So Bush ordered a surge of troops, and a shift to counterinsurgency, to defeat al Qaeda in Iraq and bring security to Baghdad.

After a year of tough fighting, al Qaeda was on the run, the Iraqi capital was pacified, and American and Iraqi casualties began a long decline, giving Maliki the freedom to take on Shiite militias in the battle of Basra in the spring of 2008, and allowing U.S. forces to draw down from post-surge highs.

It is one of the oldest tenets of modernity: The state must establish a monopoly on violence before civil society can develop and politics can thrive. Read your Hobbes: “And covenants, without the sword, are but words and of no strength to secure a man at all.” Or read the Founders, who, in both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, argued that rights had to be secured before they could be exercised. Power precedes politics.

Something liberals too easily forget. Raised in material abundance, groomed in institutions of higher education, living and working in safe city precincts, liberals are susceptible to the mirror-image fallacy: the belief that, at the end of the day, all human beings are basically alike, basically good, and basically want the same things liberals want—autonomy, diversity, peace, H&M, inexpensive yoga classes, outdoor brunch.

Which leads them to suppose that international politics operates in the same way as domestic politics, through consultation, debate, negotiation, pleading, trading, log-rolling, and compromise.

If only it were so. The affluent societies of the West may be at peace, but the rest of the world remains a Hobbesian environment where there is no monopoly on violence, no global Leviathan. And where there is no overwhelming and dominant power, where there is no deterring balance among equals, there is war.

Consider:

‣     Colonel Muammar Qaddafi ruled Libya for 42 years. NATO and the United States removed him from power in 2011, and played no role in the reconstitution of the Libyan government or the reconstruction of Libyan society. The result: Libya became a state of nature, a war of all against all between clashing militias, Islamic armies, and rogue generals.

‣     For decades, the Assad family used repression, terror, fear, and Iranian financial and military aid to govern Syria. When peaceful protests against the regime began in the spring of 2011, Bashar al-Assad turned to violence. The protestors responded in kind, with Sunni states funding an insurgency, and jihadists swarming into Syria from the Greater Middle East, from Asia, and from the West.

Syria ceased to be a nation. It became a gallows. Assad, backed by Iran, Hezbollah, and Russia, fought rebels backed by Saudi Arabia, the Gulf States, Turkey, and (nominally) the United States. Hundreds of thousands dead and more than a million refugees later, the conflict is a stalemate because no one side can totally defeat the other. The monopoly on violence has not been reestablished.

Our response? “We’re constantly searching how to be smarter in how we do this,” Chuck Hagel said in February of this year. “It’s going to have to be some kind of political solution some way. And that’s—that’s what we’re about.” He was echoing his boss, who told the nation last September, “We cannot solve someone else’s civil war through force.” Tell that to Assad.

President Obama supports the Geneva II peace process. The process is happening, but there is no peace. And there won’t be, until someone wins the war.

‣     Earlier this year, when Russia annexed Crimea, fomented secessionist movements in eastern Ukraine, and built up its forces along the Ukrainian border, the Obama administration was caught by surprise. But its response was not surprising at all. Sanctioning members of the Vladimir Putin’s inner circle, the president said, “There’s still a path to resolve this situation diplomatically in a way that addresses the interest of both Russia and Ukraine.”

Last month, in his speech at West Point, Obama bragged that the “mobilization of world opinion and international institutions served as a counterweight to Russian propaganda and Russian troops on the border and armed militias in ski masks.”

A counterweight? Please. While America has been mobilizing “world opinion,” Russia has been mobilizing military, financial, and intelligence assets in support of the Ukrainian separatists, while the Kremlin’s global propaganda machine delegitimizes the central government and liberal democracy in general. Putin may not have invaded eastern Ukraine outright—he doesn’t need to. He sends his support to the rebels. We send MREs to Kiev.

And the insurgency continues, and will continue. Until one side is victorious.

‣      Iraq was at peace—a peace maintained by America’s presence—when U.S. forces completed their withdrawal in December 2011. The monopoly on violence broken, Iraq reverted to its pre-surge state: the Sunni minority in a violent revolt against the Shiite majority, and the Kurds angling for the exits. With America gone, and Maliki’s government increasingly authoritarian, al Qaeda—already strengthened and operating from a base in neighboring Syria—returned to the Sunni Triangle.

Iraq is disintegrating. Aided by Iran, the Maliki government should be able to keep al Qaeda from marching on Shiite-dominated Baghdad. But the weakness of the Iraqi military, and the effectiveness of the Qaeda forces, suggests that there is nothing to stop this war, like the adjacent conflict in Syria, from raging indefinitely. Neither side has an overwhelming advantage over the other. That won’t change unless the United States reenters the conflict.

Which is unlikely to happen. Not because it’s in our interest to watch Iran suffer from the “imperial overstretch” said to afflict the United States. Not because we have no interest in partnering with Iran and Syria to uphold Maliki’s rule. No, America won’t intervene because the Obama administration is committed, yet again, to a political solution.

“Iraqi leaders must rise above their differences and come together around a political plan for Iraq’s future,” Obama said last week. “Shia, Sunni, Kurds—all Iraqis—must have confidence that they can advance their interests and aspirations through the political process rather than through violence.”

Rising above, coming together, earning confidence, making plans, aligning interests, voicing aspirations, participating in processes—this isn’t an off-site team-building exercise. It’s the Middle East. Next to oil, violence is their biggest export. Why should the Iraqis listen to Obama, when he has no soldiers in Baghdad to put the fear of Allah into Maliki? Why should anyone?

To have successful politics, you need to secure the peace. You need to monopolize violence through the application of power, the deployment of force. The world today is replete with spaces where power is in retreat, leaving violence in its wake, and the liberal internationalists who run our foreign policy are committed to covenants without the sword. They think politics precedes power, and the result is weakness and war.

Iranian threats | JPost | Israel News.

By JPOST EDITORIAL

 06/26/2014 20:37

As the Islamic Republic becomes over-extended in Syria and Iraq, and continues to face sanctions, it might be more willing to make concessions on its nuclear program.

US President Barack Obama assured outgoing President Shimon Peres, who was at the White House for a farewell visit this week, that the United States will not allow Iran to develop a nuclear weapon, and will continue to remain steadfast on topics central to Israel’s security in the nuclear negotiations.

This is a reassuring message as representatives of the P5+1 (the US, Russia, China, France and Britain plus Germany) get set to sit down with their Iranian counterparts in Vienna this coming Wednesday for the sixth round of talks on stopping the Islamic Republic’s nuclear weapons program.

Besides Obama’s promises, however, there are very few reassuring signs that Iran is willing to comply with even the most basic demands made by the US and other members of the P5+1.

The two sides have reached tentative understandings on reducing the amount of plutonium – a second route to fuel for a bomb besides enriched uranium – that will be produced by a heavy-water reactor under construction near the town of Arak. And there are reports of a possible compromise that would turn a deep underground facility called Fordow, where there are 3,000 centrifuges, into a “research facility.”

But there is no agreement on almost every other relevant issue. While the US and other P5+1 members want to reduce the number of centrifuges Iranians currently have to enrich uranium, the Iranians want to actually increase the number of centrifuges by over 10,000 from the current number of 19,000. Even if the number of centrifuges remain unchanged, Iran would be able to make a “dash” for a bomb in a few months, as US Secretary of State John Kerry noted in comments made to the Senate in April.

There are other unresolved disputes, including whether Iran would have to reveal to international inspectors work that it is suspected of doing on weapons design in the absence of conclusive proof.

Senior American negotiator Wendy R. Sherman, undersecretary of state for policy, was diplomatic yet clearly pessimistic when she said she doubted whether “Iran is really ready and willing to take all the steps necessary to assure the world” it has no desire or ability to produce a nuclear weapon.

Iranian duplicity regarding its nuclear arms program is nothing new. But perhaps never before have the potential dangers of an Islamic Republic with nuclear capabilities been so evident. The Islamic Republic’s aspirations to expand its influence throughout the region are not just hypothetical. Iran is capitalizing on the dissolution of old national borders. The Iranians are providing troops, weapons and advice to Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Syria and expanding their influence in Lebanon via their proxy, Hezbollah.

In Iraq there are reports that Iranian drones are being used against Al Qaeda-affiliated, Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) forces. And if it has not already begun to send troops into Iraq to carve out territory for a Shia state, Iran might begin to do so soon. There are reports that Shia forces fighting in Syria against Sunni opposition groups are now heading to Iraq. Hezbollah, meanwhile, may be sending more militants to Syria to replace them.

The US and Israel actually have an interest in seeing Iranian- backed militants battle it out against ISIS forces and weaken one another. In fact, as the Islamic Republic increasingly becomes over-extended in Syria and Iraq, and as sanctions continue to take a toll on the Iranian economy, Iran might be more willing to make concessions on its nuclear program.

At the same time, however, the Iranians are even more desperate than ever to attain nuclear weapons capability.

They realize that having a nuclear bomb would be a game changer in the Sunni-Shia clash. They already have the missile capability to hit almost every capital in the Middle East, but the Iranians would not have to actually use their nuclear weapons. The very fact that they have them would provide the Islamic Republic and their proxies in Syria, Lebanon, Iraq and the Gaza Strip ‘a nuclear umbrella.’ Any group or state attacked by Iran or one of its proxies would think twice before striking back against so powerful an enemy.

That’s why it is imperative for the P5+1, who convene in Vienna next week for the sixth round of negotiations with the Islamic Republic, to keep in mind precisely what is at stake.

The world’s greatest power | Jerusalem Post – Blogs.

(  “America’s status as the greatest power means that the rest of us ought to rely primarily on ourselves. ” Superb, if painful piece… – JW )

Ira Sharkansky

This has not been a good time for those who would rely on the power and wisdom of the United States. It has not been any better for Americans who may think of their country is better than others, and a world leader.

Calls for decency, accommodation and/or reform by Barack Obama are being ignored or rejected by Vladimir Putin, Nouri al-Maliki, and Abdel Fattah el-Sisi. They’re the rulers of three important countries, as measured by size, population, natural resources or military potential. Putin is doing whatever he does for his own reasons in Ukraine. al-Maliki is not about to include a full range of Iraq’s ethnic and religious sectors in his government, and el-Sisi will not comply with American advice about the Muslim Brotherhood or extending American styles of freedom to journalists.

Only recently did the American President, coupled with his sonorous Secretary of State, receive similar treatment from Benyamin Netanyahu and Mahmoud Abbas.

Current betting is that we can forget about American commitments to keep Iran from being able to create nuclear weapons and the means of delivering them.

The Assad regime may have rid itself of “poison gas,” as demanded by the United States and others, but is still dumping chlorine on opponents.

America’s European allies are not being as nasty as Putin, al-Maliki el-Sisi, or Assad, but they are not lining up with American preferences about sanctioning Russia. There is too much business to be done there, and who really views the Ukraine as an enlightened place that must be preserved in one or another set of boundaries? Russia, Poland, Germany, and Austria have taken and given up pieces of that place over the course of centuries. Western European populations are tired of migrants from Poland, Romania, and Bulgaria, and are not inclined to welcome job and welfare seekers from Ukraine.

All told, it doesn’t look good for the world’s greatest power.

No doubt that the US is unmatched in economic wealth and military power. However, it hasn’t had even a half-way decent war since Korea, and that ended in a tied score, with the miserable North subsequently able to slip through sanctions to reach nuclear capacity.

We can overlook those who tout America’s success in Grenada or Panama.

The nasties may say that the US gets what it deserves from a political process that rests on presidential primaries, and allows the choice of the prettiest, best speaking candidate with mass appeal, despite a lack of governmental experience.

Barack Obama’s CV features schooling and growing up in places far from the American cultural main stream, in Hawaii, Indonesia, and whatever he acquired from visits with his Kenyan family. Yet he has shown little sense of what moves people who have been at the center of world problems for several decades. We can argue if the Islamic threat began with the Iranian revolution, American support of Muslims from all over to battle Russians in Afghanistan, or migrations of North Africans to Europe. 9-11 ratcheted things upward, and now we are seeing the output of Arab Spring.

The earliest sign of Obama’s naivete was dumping the man who was arguably the most moderate and pro-western of any ruler of a major Muslim country on the claim that he was not sufficiently democratic. Mubarak’s Egypt did not fall all that far from Chicago’s standards of political purity or the opportunities available to all its people.

One of Israel’s left-wig commentators led off a discussion on a prime time TV program with the speculation that the US national government has the service of at least 200,000 specialists in the Middle East, most of Arab extraction. So what happened? Then came an academic who specializes in American politics, who usually finds something positive to say about the country he has spent his career studying. He shared the wonder of the program’s moderator, and could offer no explanation other than American self-centered ignorance of others.

The current worry is Iraq, and the possibility of its loss either to Sunni fanatics from all over, or the Shiite fanatics of Iran. Next in line may be Jordan, with an always problematic population propped up initially by Britain and then by the United States. Given Jordan’s vulnerability to Syrian chaos on one border and Iraqi chaos on another, with the United States proving to be a  unreliable source of support, some are looking at Israel for help. They include Israelis who worry about the fall of Jordan, and Islamic fanaticism coming to their own eastern border  to join the worries about Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in Gaza, and the ever present  floundering of whoever is running the West Bank.

Those wanting Israel to save Jordan overlook the disinclination of Jordanians for its help. No self-respecting Arab or Muslim can admit dependence on the Jews. Maybe the IDF can do the work in its Arab dress and beards, used for dealing with the bad guys in the West Bank and the Arab villages of Israel. If the job falls to the Israeli Air Force, they might overpaint the Stars of David with an Arab crescent, and claim to be Syrian.

Barring those possibilities, we will have to rely on a disciplined Jordanian army and a savvy king to deal effectively with the rag tag gangs operating in Iraq and Syria.

Despite the problems emanating from the top, there is no doubt about the power of the United States. Its industry, science, and technology created major portions of what we have learned to use and value. The citizens and governments of other countries line up for access to the goodies on offer.

Future historians will quarrel if the aggression of George W. Bush or the bluster then timidity of Barack Obama did more harm or good for the Middle East, the world, and the United States. Some will conclude that all would have been better off if others had been chosen to lead the greatest power in the elections from 2000 through 2012.

Growing up in Fall River, I liked the place and didn’t realize how much it reflected the downside of the US. Once I acquired familiarity with social indicators I learned that I came from a town where the average adult had not gotten half-way through high school, and close to a third of young people do not finish high school. The data has not changed much in the half century since I left. Reports that Boston ships some of its homeless to the cheap housing of Fall River do not portend a better future.

The whole of the US is only somewhat less problematic. Lots of readers will protest that they are living well, and they are. But the bottom 25% or so isn’t much better off–or even worse–than the average Mexican. Data showing two-thirds of African American males with police records, and being the world leader for incarcerations are as damning as American life expectancy that puts the US securely in the Third World.

America’ status as the greatest power means that the rest of us ought to rely primarily on ourselves.