Redbrickbear said:
nein51 said:
I sure have my doubts that Israel can fight Hamas and Hezbollah simultaneously.
They are both just militant organizations and not Nation States.
Israel is a rich country (also welfare queen of the USA) and can easily crush both in a war.
But can they endlessly occupy Gaza and Southern Lebanon?
That is the real question.
Israel can defeat all its enemies on the battlefield…but can it win long term-expensive occupations?
They don't need to occupy either one. And they won't.
Hamas has been effectively destroyed. The remnants will have a hard time rebuilding military power, given that Gaza now has been effectively destroyed. a couple decades of tunnels have been destroyed. all water and power infrastructure has been destroyed. No hospitals. No food in stores, or warehouses. Etc.... The pre-war population of Gaza will not be able to return for years. That drains the swamp. Fewer people from which to draw soldiers. Fewer people among which to hide.
Have long advocated a military strategy of 'big raid." Isolate your target. Land in overwhelming force. Turn your target to rubble. Leave. Make the people in the rubble fix it all at their own expense. It will teach Pavlovian lessons about the price of poking the USA. (or in this case, Israel).
The Marshall Plan and all the globalism that followed was what we needed at the time. It rebuilt Western Civilization and defended most of the world from communism. But that is not a model for every time and every place. Every once in a while, stomping a mudhole just to show that you can stomp a mudhole anywhere you want is good policy. It makes your adversaries look long & hard and risk/return.
Understand what you are witnessing with Israel/Hamas/Hizballah - a peripheral theater in WWIII. Iran is trying to drag the US into conflicts peripheral to Ukraine/Taiwan by attacking a US ally. Unless attacked directly, we should stand back, and hand Israel the ordnance to destroy Hizballah, which is the crown Jewel of Iranian foreign policy. Israel is perfectly capable of dealing with it. All we have to do is sign purchase orders to increase production capacity on ammo. (i.e. pretty much do what we've been doing.)
Hizballah has killed hundreds and hundreds of American citizens. It's always open season on Hizballah. Anywhere, anytime. You can't kill 'em for being in Lebanon. They're Lebanese. But when they step outside of their little bubble, with so much as a toe or a TOW.....fire for effect. 100x effect.