"After the Damascus Attack: 10 Points to Consider" Topic

Interesting analysis: link

The Editor:
Point 5: Since when is the US's and Saudi Arabia's position "world opinion"? Far more countries have condemned the attack. Do Arab nations which have been struck in such a way have the right to make preventative strikes against Israel, the USA or Saudi Arabia in order to prevent further attacks? Were the bombings in Turkey a legitimate response by the Assad regime to the Turk's support of the FSA given that the Syrian Air Force would trigger a NATO response in the event of an overt attack? The answer to all of these questions is No. Israel was able to get away with the attack because it is a regional mini-superpower and can act with impunity. But such impunity only drives Arab and Persian nations to develop a deterrent to such action as fast as possible. In the long run it does more harm than good and sets the stage for a nuclear day of reckoning soon.
Rod Robertson.

Far more countries have condemned the attack.

True enough, but Israel has never placed the opinions of its Arab neighbors above what it considers necessary for its own security.

Fact is, Israel struck at an opportunistic time when it believed the political fallout would be minimal.

The Editor:

I think that article is pretty one sided and self serving. That doesn't mean that it's wrong – just not entirely right. I think that a more accurate assessment of the current situation can be found here link

cheers

If Russia did decide to fly S-300s in directly, using Russian Air Force assets to do so, what would Israel do then?

Stu, I would bet that the Israelis would deal with the S-300s the same way that they deal with rockets getting shipped to Hezbollah.

Kill them on the ground, in transit. This may well result in Israeli bombers hitting the airport while Russian aircraft are on the tarmac.

Rod I Robertson wrote:

Do Arab nations which have been struck in such a way have the right to make preventative strikes against Israel, the USA or Saudi Arabia in order to prevent further attacks?

I would hope that any country making such an obviously fatuous elision of "preventative" and "retaliatory" would be subject to immediate and massive attack from the International Logic Police.

All the best,

John.

"Do Arab nations which have been struck in such a way have the right to make preventative strikes against Israel, the USA or Saudi Arabia in order to prevent further attacks?"

err… Yes, of course. I don't think this is the question. The question is whether they have the will, capability and can handle the consequences.

Joe Collins

It boils down to this. An attack of mammoth nature against Israel or something (for lack of a better term) "more" than a typical terrorist bomb would illicit the US somehow getting involved.

Arab nations/groups know this. They aren't fighting Israel as much as they are afraid of being pounded by the US or US-backed weaponry, etc..

The connection, IMHO, to Israel and the Israeli habit of not doing what we tell them to do but depending on us to show up/back up should the situation escalate, is caustic where international relations are concerned.

I imagine every administration is sick and tired of dealing with the entire region and the backward arguments.

The minute some nut group gets a nuke and will to use it, it is all she wrote for this region.

What weapons do the International Logic Police use? Would they have time, given the mass outbreaks of illogicality that seem to be breaking out, on a weekly basis?

As for the article, nothing really new. The IAF took out Hezbollah's long range missiles, in the first few minutes of 2006, due to an extensive penetration of their internal security network. The Israelis act in their nations best interest, only surprising if you think nations don't do so, or worse shouldn't do so.

A powerful Israel is the root of Israeli impunity when it come to military strikes on foreign nations. The Arabs and Persian could make preventive attacks on Israel with sustained and rotating cyber attacks to weaken the Israeli infrastructure and economy. They could open news/ propaganda outlets throughout the world and broadcast the carnage caused by such attacks. They could arm every Palestinian family with a digital cell phone to record Israeli actions in the occupied territories and broadcast it to the world. They could hire very powerful, non-American public relations firms to drag Israel through the mud and to foster global boycott campaigns to weaken Israel. They could tie up Israeli funds and Israeli politicians in international courts and legal proceedings. They could use soft power to encircle Israel politically and morally.
The Arabs and Persian could campaign to convince the non-pro-Israeli world to avoid buying Saudi crude oil whenever and wherever possible. Similar boycotts against American products could be launched. They could support and foment Shi'ite uprisings in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States and then push the world to condemn these Sunni states when such uprising are put down violently (as they were in Bahrain). Boycotts and the seizing of funds could be done and this would be more and more feasible as the US becomes less and less the nexus of international banking.
The Arab and Persian world could threaten American interests in so many places and with such regularity that the cost of protecting American lives, property and interests would become prohibitive. Just like they bankrupted Ottoman and British imperial interests they could make American support for Israel so expensive that the American people might balk at bearing such expenses.
Arab and Persian attacks do not have to be conventional, they could be creative and still do a good deal of damage to those who launch attacks against the Arab or Persian world or support such attacks.
Finally the Arabs and Persians could adopt dreaded inverse-anti-logic to befuddle and neutralize the much vaunted International Logic Police by reading poetry laced with sarcasm and ricin while spinning like Dervishes to pro-Islamic punk rock all the while whacking beavers on their hips dressed in lederhosen and sombreros. This of course would be accompanied by an orchestra of anorexic narwhals in armchairs singing Italian arias while knitting pasta into nets of adverbs to catch hostility and redirect it towards the essence of logic.
You have heard of organized crime, well what about disorganized crime!
Rod Robertson

The Arabs quite like the Israelis as they keep in check the more 'extreme' factions that dot the landscape, and they are a bulwark against the feared Persian drive for regional supremacy.

As for the rest of your soft-power, strategic initiatives, you've been toking on your Hookah pipe too long! If these countries could even remotely manage such a coordinated and sophisticated strategy, they'd be defeating Israel in the marketplace, outnumbering her in new patents and not whinging about how their trillions of petro-dollars buys them less influence, than a shadowy Zionist cabal!!

The connection, IMHO, to Israel and the Israeli habit of not doing what we tell them to do but depending on us to show up/back up should the situation escalate, is caustic where international relations are concerned.

What do you expect when the US is requesting actions that are not in Israel's best interests?

Milites asked:

What weapons do the International Logic Police use?

Our chief weapon is surprise…
surprise and fear…
fear and surprise….
Our two weapons are fear and surprise…and ruthless efficiency….
Our *three* weapons are fear, surprise, and ruthless efficiency…and an almost fanatical devotion to the Pope….
Our *four*…no…
*Amongst* our weapons…. Amongst our weaponry…are such elements as fear, surprise…

I'll come in again.

John.

I really need to button up that pair of SLR kits.

Who knows, the Church is set to canonize 800 Italians martyred by Islam.

Yes, the Syrian regime should bombard Israel with the newly developed CC-104 intercontinental ballistic comfy chairs.
Rod Robertson.