Paul Rogers, a professor of peace studies at Bradford University, northern England commented on the recent Israeli military performance in Lebanon and its impact on US strategic thinking in Washington.
He said that US neo-conservatives and other pro-Israeli groups in Washington are deeply concerned that Israel failed to use the political and military support offered by the United States (delaying an internationally proposed ceasefire; arms, munition, aviation fuel, etc) to decisively defeat Hezbollah.
Political-military observers knows that the Bush regime had actually pre-planned the campaign with Israel, and encouraged and abetted the vicious Israeli strikes on Lebanon - with the planning done even prior to the capture of the two Israeli soldiers. The capture provided the convenient excuse for invading Lebanon.
Professor Rogers believed that the Israeli action against Hezbollah was not far short of a joint operation, meaning the US military had been involved all the way, though not necessarily in physical presence.
He said that the US air force (USAF), in particular, has been deeply interested in how the Israeli air force handled the issue of targeting the numerous Hezbollah bunkers, some of them buried forty metres or more underground. He reckoned that Hezbollah used Iranian and even North Korean technology and experience in constructing these facilities. The USAF wanted useful information that it could use in planning operations against Iran.
But the Israeli lack of success has now backfired on those in Washington, people like Vice President Dick Cheney and defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld who advocated strikes against Iran. If Israel had succeeded in its aerial ‘shock and awe’ campaign against Hezbollah, an air doctrine shared by Rumsfeld, that would have threatened Iranian leaders more convincingly.
Professor Rogers said:
[…] … instead, the opposite has happened and Israel's failure to disarm Hezbollah is in consequence also a failure of United States policy towards Iran. If the Israeli military, with all its air power, modern equipment and weaponry and direct experience of warfare cannot defeat a guerrilla force of a few thousand in a small country, what is the chance of an Israeli or American attack on Iran avoiding an Iranian-inspired response that makes the continued US occupation of Iraq unsustainable?
The implication is that US or Israeli action against Iran's nuclear facilities becomes much more problematic at precisely the time when Iran's standing in the region has been much improved by the war in Lebanon. Yet Iran still remains the real enemy for the Bush administration, with the need to confront Tehran's nuclear ambitions being as strong as ever.
As a result of the Lebanon war, the recently increased insecurity in Iraq, and the continuing troubles in Afghanistan, there will be those in Washington who will urge immediate action against Iran. From such a perspective, the Israeli failure in Lebanon will result in a steady increase in Iranian influence across the region and a likely acceleration in its nuclear programme.
Any such development remains utterly unacceptable to the Bush administration as well as Israel, so it may be better to contemplate military action against those nuclear facilities now rather than later. Moreover, such action would be a powerful diversion in the run-up to the mid-term elections to Congress in November 2006. The guns of August might yet become the bombs of October.
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