Baalbec!
It appears Israel has decided to fight, is fighting. Baalbec is gutsy.
I presume this to be a "no turning back" moment. No weak-kneed leadership will be able to call off the war. This is now to be fought by the generals, the troops and the public. This is the nation, and it will be the sense of the nation that will determine the extent of the conflict. I presume that the troops will be well led, that they will fight with courage, and that the public will groan and suffer and triumph right beside them.
The fighting in Baalbec is an insertion of commandos, an insertion right into the heart of the Hizbollah home. This is going to hurt. I don't yet know the intent, I don't know the force structure, I don't yet trust reports I've heard, but it's gutsy and it's going to mean something.
I note Condi is being strong, GW has never wavered, Israel is speaking of weeks, and nobody is doing much anyway to stop the fight. Things look good for freedom.
So far I've only read about the increased effort, I don't yet know about Israeli success. I expect success will become apparent, then I wonder how opinion will change? The "strong horse" argument is not a small argument; the strong horse in this war is the side that can kill the most warriors.
It's an odd calculus. For Israel, no amount of fire power is positive. It's "disproportionate". For Hizbollah, any projection of power, any destruction, is a triumph. Wow! Look what they can do to the Israelis! This is asymmetric warfare at its most extreme, where the little guy always wins --at least during the course of engagement. There is one area of judgment though where things are always even and it's understood by everybody though it's never discussed and not admitted, and that's in the comparative number of military dead. This is an I-win-you-lose scorecard. This is not a pure symmetry but it's very close.
Hizbollah's moral strength is a peculiar sort of manliness, the Mujahadeen. This is a concept, but it also means an individual. Concepts vary. Israel in mourning the loss of a warrior also mourns the loss of a citizen; Hizbollah celebrates the death of a martyr. But each is an individual. It's one-to-one. What if it's ten to one? If it's ten to one, or twenty or thirty to one, then that's not victory. Even an Arab can understand that. The moral force of the Mujahadeen is lost when they end up dead in greatly disproportionate numbers. It doesn't matter by what manner they are killed, the army that can take out the most fighters is the stronger horse.
This, incidentally, is why Hizbollah lies about its number of dead, and hides many among the supposedly civilian casualties. It's not simply to inflate the appearance of Israeli brutality, it's to diminish the sense Israeli power. There are no strictly military objectives in this conflict. This is a conflict to establish will, a moral force, and the calculus by which this is judged is deep and instinctive and understood by all; that army which can kill the most of the other, especially if it is truly disproportionate, is the more powerful force, and whether it is judged good or bad, it is the more powerful moral force. It's that force that will change opinion.
Something of a corollary in this odd calculus has to do with where the battle is waged. If Hizbollah can fight near the border, that in itself is considered a kind of victory because it's assumed by everybody that this is an area controlled defacto by Israel. But what if Israel can fight effectively in Baalbec? This is the heart and the home of Hizbollah. An Israeli soldier has set foot within the hearth. What if he does damage, and then leaves. How secure then does that home remain, and what does that say about the Mujahadeen?
I presume this to be a "no turning back" moment. No weak-kneed leadership will be able to call off the war. This is now to be fought by the generals, the troops and the public. This is the nation, and it will be the sense of the nation that will determine the extent of the conflict. I presume that the troops will be well led, that they will fight with courage, and that the public will groan and suffer and triumph right beside them.
The fighting in Baalbec is an insertion of commandos, an insertion right into the heart of the Hizbollah home. This is going to hurt. I don't yet know the intent, I don't know the force structure, I don't yet trust reports I've heard, but it's gutsy and it's going to mean something.
I note Condi is being strong, GW has never wavered, Israel is speaking of weeks, and nobody is doing much anyway to stop the fight. Things look good for freedom.
So far I've only read about the increased effort, I don't yet know about Israeli success. I expect success will become apparent, then I wonder how opinion will change? The "strong horse" argument is not a small argument; the strong horse in this war is the side that can kill the most warriors.
It's an odd calculus. For Israel, no amount of fire power is positive. It's "disproportionate". For Hizbollah, any projection of power, any destruction, is a triumph. Wow! Look what they can do to the Israelis! This is asymmetric warfare at its most extreme, where the little guy always wins --at least during the course of engagement. There is one area of judgment though where things are always even and it's understood by everybody though it's never discussed and not admitted, and that's in the comparative number of military dead. This is an I-win-you-lose scorecard. This is not a pure symmetry but it's very close.
Hizbollah's moral strength is a peculiar sort of manliness, the Mujahadeen. This is a concept, but it also means an individual. Concepts vary. Israel in mourning the loss of a warrior also mourns the loss of a citizen; Hizbollah celebrates the death of a martyr. But each is an individual. It's one-to-one. What if it's ten to one? If it's ten to one, or twenty or thirty to one, then that's not victory. Even an Arab can understand that. The moral force of the Mujahadeen is lost when they end up dead in greatly disproportionate numbers. It doesn't matter by what manner they are killed, the army that can take out the most fighters is the stronger horse.
This, incidentally, is why Hizbollah lies about its number of dead, and hides many among the supposedly civilian casualties. It's not simply to inflate the appearance of Israeli brutality, it's to diminish the sense Israeli power. There are no strictly military objectives in this conflict. This is a conflict to establish will, a moral force, and the calculus by which this is judged is deep and instinctive and understood by all; that army which can kill the most of the other, especially if it is truly disproportionate, is the more powerful force, and whether it is judged good or bad, it is the more powerful moral force. It's that force that will change opinion.
Something of a corollary in this odd calculus has to do with where the battle is waged. If Hizbollah can fight near the border, that in itself is considered a kind of victory because it's assumed by everybody that this is an area controlled defacto by Israel. But what if Israel can fight effectively in Baalbec? This is the heart and the home of Hizbollah. An Israeli soldier has set foot within the hearth. What if he does damage, and then leaves. How secure then does that home remain, and what does that say about the Mujahadeen?
posted by mouse at 11:06 PM
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