Thanks to MarZutra for this thread.
The article following, "Israeli Strategy After the Russo-Georgian War", was forwarded to me by a Lubavitcher friend who is an attorney for the State of New York - someone I do respect. I was surprised when I read the article. The author is George Friedman of "Stratfor". The term "pundit", as mentioned above in Prof. Paul Eidelberg's article, would not do George Friedman justice. He must be "Super Pundit". This article about Israel's political involvement in the Georgia situation seems very speculative.
I have read some speculation in the Israeli press that the uranium the Iranians are using is not even weapons-grade. I've also read that the earliest that they could have nuclear capability (chalila/G-d forbid) would be 2009 or even 2010. However, the IAF has been running long-range sorties (to Crete from what I've heard) since summer 2007, with helicopters for pilot rescue. According to a friend I went to shul with who worked in technology for the IAF, the images of Stealth jets and "Ahhh, ma dinna jacket" being consumed by a fireball are well within Israel's capability.
I watched the video of Friedman speaking about his philosophy of "Geopolitics". Forgive me, but his bobbing and weaving speaking style reminds me of Redd Foxx (Fred Sandford). Hey, maybe this article really IS junk! OK, I get it: "Geopolitics" is short for "George's politics"!
This article really seems "off the deep end". Egypt is the real threat?!?!? Also, I thought the Israeli jets that struck the nuclear facility in Syria DID leave through Turkish airspace. If you wade through this article, let me know your opinion. [Sorry, you'll need to copy-paste for the links in the article.]
>>> Shoshanna Walker <
[email protected]> 9/11/2008 11:04 PM >>>
<http://www.stratfor.com/>
<http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/israeli_strategy_after_russo_georgian_war>
Israeli Strategy After the Russo-Georgian War
September 8, 2008
<http://www.stratfor.com>
By George Friedman
The Russo-Georgian war continues to resonate, and it is time to
expand our view of it. The primary players in Georgia, apart from the
Georgians, were the Russians and Americans. On the margins were the
Europeans, providing advice and admonitions but carrying little
weight. Another player, carrying out a murkier role, was Israel.
Israeli advisers were present in Georgia alongside American advisers,
and Israeli businessmen were doing business there. The Israelis had a
degree of influence but were minor players compared to the Americans.
More interesting, perhaps, was the decision, publicly announced by
the Israelis, to
<http://www.stratfor.com/analysis/israel_syria_middle_east_and_conflic
t_georgia>end weapons sales to Georgia the week before the Georgians
attacked South Ossetia. Clearly the Israelis knew what was coming and
wanted no part of it. Afterward, unlike the Americans, the Israelis
did everything they could to placate the Russians, including having
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert travel to Moscow to offer
reassurances. Whatever the Israelis were doing in Georgia, they did
not want a confrontation with the Russians.
It is impossible to explain the Israeli reasoning for being in
Georgia outside the context of a careful review of Israeli strategy
in general. From that, we can begin to understand why the Israelis
are involved in affairs far outside their immediate area of
responsibility, and why they responded the way they did in Georgia.
We need to divide Israeli strategic interests into four separate but
interacting pieces:
1.The
<http://www.stratfor.com/geopolitics_palestinians>Palestinians living
inside Israel's post-1967 borders.
2.The so-called "confrontation states" that border Israel,
including Lebanon, Syria, Jordan and especially Egypt.
3.The Muslim world beyond this region.
4.The great powers able to influence and project power into
these first three regions.
The Palestinian Issue
The most important thing to understand about the first interest, the
Palestinian issue, is that the
<http://www.stratfor.com/gaza_withdrawal_and_israels_permanent_dilemma
>Palestinians do not represent a strategic threat to the Israelis.
Their ability to inflict casualties is an irritant to the Israelis
(if a tragedy to the victims and their families), but they cannot
threaten the existence of the Israeli state. The Palestinians can
impose a level of irritation that can affect Israeli morale, inducing
the Israelis to make concessions based on the realistic assessment
that the Palestinians by themselves cannot in any conceivable time
frame threaten Israel's core interests, regardless of political
arrangements. At the same time, the argument goes, given that the
Palestinians cannot threaten Israeli interests, what is the value of
making concessions that will not change the threat of terrorist
attacks? Given the structure of Israeli politics, this matter is both
substrategic and gridlocked.
The matter is compounded by the fact that the
<http://www.stratfor.com/pna_israelis_exercise_long_division>Palestini
ans are deeply divided among themselves. For Israel, this is a
benefit, as it creates a de facto civil war among Palestinians and
reduces the threat from them. But it also reduces pressure and
opportunities to negotiate. There is no one on the Palestinian side
who speaks authoritatively for all Palestinians. Any agreement
reached with the Palestinians would, from the Israeli point of view,
have to include guarantees on the cessation of terrorism. No one has
ever been in a position to guarantee that - and certainly Fatah does
not today speak for Hamas. Therefore, a settlement on a Palestinian
state remains gridlocked because it does not deliver any meaningful
advantages to the Israelis.
The Confrontation States
The second area involves the confrontation states. Israel has formal
peace treaties with Egypt and Jordan. It has had informal
understandings with Damascus on things like Lebanon, but
<http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/shift_toward_israeli_syrian_agreement>
Israel has no permanent understanding with Syria. The Lebanese are
too deeply divided to allow state-to-state understandings, but
<http://www.stratfor.com/analysis/israel_lebanon_and_geopolitics_matur
ity>Israel has had understandings with different Lebanese factions at
different times (and particularly close relations with some of the
Christian factions).
<http://www.stratfor.com/analysis/jordan_strengthened_ties_israel_weak
ened_ties_syria>Jordan is effectively an ally of Israel. It has been
hostile to the Palestinians at least since 1970, when the Palestine
Liberation Organization attempted to overthrow the Hashemite regime,
and the Jordanians regard the Israelis and Americans as guarantors of
their national security.
<http://www.stratfor.com/analysis/egypt_israel_new_pipeline_and_instit
utionalizing_camp_david>Israel's relationship with Egypt is publicly
cooler but quite cooperative. The only group that poses any serious
challenge to the Egyptian state is The Muslim Brotherhood, and hence
Cairo views Hamas - a derivative of that organization - as a
potential threat. The Egyptians and Israelis have maintained peaceful
relations for more than 30 years, regardless of the state of
Israeli-Palestinian relations. The Syrians by themselves cannot go to
war with Israel and survive. Their primary interest lies in Lebanon,
and when they work against Israel, they work with surrogates like
Hezbollah. But their own view on an independent Palestinian state is
murky, since they claim all of Palestine as part of a greater Syria -
a view not particularly relevant at the moment. Therefore, Israel's
only threat on its border comes from Syria via surrogates in Lebanon
and the possibility of Syria's acquiring weaponry that would threaten
Israel, such as chemical or nuclear weapons.
The Wider Muslim World
As to the third area, Israel's position in the Muslim world beyond
the confrontation states is much more secure than either it or its
enemies would like to admit. Israel has close, formal strategic
relations with
<http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/turkey_regional_power>Turkey as well
as with Morocco. Turkey and Egypt are the giants of the region, and
being aligned with them provides Israel with the foundations of
regional security. But Israel also has excellent relations with
countries where formal relations do not exist, particularly in the
Arabian Peninsula.
The conservative monarchies of the region deeply distrust the
Palestinians, particularly Fatah. As part of the Nasserite Pan-Arab
socialist movement, Fatah on several occasions directly threatened
these monarchies. Several times in the 1970s and 1980s, Israeli
intelligence provided these monarchies with information that
prevented assassinations or uprisings.
Saudi Arabia, for one, has never engaged in anti-Israeli activities
beyond rhetoric. In the aftermath of the 2006 Israeli-Hezbollah
conflict, Saudi Arabia and Israel forged close behind-the-scenes
relations, especially because of an assertive Iran - a common foe of
both the Saudis and the Israelis.
<http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/oil_and_saudi_peace_offensive>Saudi
Arabia has close relations with Hamas, but these have as much to do
with maintaining a defensive position - keeping Hamas and its Saudi
backers off Riyadh's back - as they do with government policy. The
Saudis are cautious regarding Hamas, and the other monarchies are
even more so.
More to the point, Israel does extensive business with these regimes,
particularly in the defense area. Israeli companies, working formally
through American or European subsidiaries, carry out extensive
business throughout the Arabian Peninsula. The nature of these
subsidiaries is well-known on all sides, though no one is eager to
trumpet this. The governments of both Israel and the Arabian
Peninsula would have internal political problems if they publicized
it, but a visit to Dubai, the business capital of the region, would
find many Israelis doing extensive business under third-party
passports. Add to this that the states of the Arabian Peninsula are
afraid of Iran, and the relationship becomes even more important to
all sides.
There is an interesting idea that if
<http://www.stratfor.com/analysis/geopolitics_israel_biblical_and_mode
rn>Israel were to withdraw from the occupied territories and create
an independent Palestinian state, then perceptions of Israel in the
Islamic world would shift. This is a commonplace view in Europe. The
fact is that we can divide the Muslim world into three groups.
First, there are those countries that already have formal ties to
Israel. Second are those that have close working relations with
Israel and where formal ties would complicate rather than deepen
relations. Pakistan and Indonesia, among others, fit into this class.
Third are those that are absolutely hostile to Israel, such as Iran.
It is very difficult to identify a state that has no informal or
formal relations with Israel but would adopt these relations if there
were a Palestinian state. Those states that are hostile to Israel
would remain hostile after a withdrawal from the Palestinian
territories, since their issue is with the existence of Israel, not
its borders.
The point of all this is that Israeli security is much better than it
might appear if one listened only to the rhetoric. The Palestinians
are divided and at war with each other. Under the best of
circumstances, they cannot threaten Israel's survival. The only
bordering countries with which the Israelis have no formal agreements
are Syria and Lebanon, and neither can threaten Israel's security.
Israel has close ties to Turkey, the most powerful Muslim country in
the region. It also has much closer commercial and intelligence ties
with the Arabian Peninsula than is generally acknowledged, although
the degree of cooperation is well-known in the region. From a
security standpoint, Israel is doing well.
The Broader World
Israel is also doing extremely well in the broader world, the fourth
and final area. Israel always has needed a foreign source of weapons
and technology, since its national security needs outstrip its
domestic industrial capacity. Its first patron was the Soviet Union,
which hoped to gain a foothold in the Middle East. This was quickly
followed by France, which saw Israel as an ally in Algeria and
against Egypt. Finally, after 1967, the United States came to support
Israel. Washington saw Israel as a threat to Syria, which could
threaten Turkey from the rear at a time when the Soviets were
threatening Turkey from the north. Turkey was the doorway to the
Mediterranean, and Syria was a threat to Turkey. Egypt was also
aligned with the Soviets from 1956 onward, long before the United
States had developed a close working relationship with Israel.
That relationship has declined in importance for the Israelis. Over
the years the amount of U.S. aid - roughly $2.5 billion annually -
has remained relatively constant. It was never adjusted upward for
inflation, and so shrunk as a percentage of Israeli gross domestic
product from roughly 20 percent in 1974 to under 2 percent today.
Israel's dependence on the United States has plummeted. The
dependence that once existed has become a marginal convenience.
Israel holds onto the aid less for economic reasons than to maintain
the concept in the United States of Israeli dependence and U.S.
responsibility for Israeli security. In other words, it is more
psychological and political from Israel's point of view than an
economic or security requirement.
Israel therefore has no threats or serious dependencies, save two.
The first is the acquisition of nuclear weapons by a power that
cannot be deterred - in other words, a nation prepared to commit
suicide to destroy Israel. Given Iranian rhetoric, Iran would appear
at times to be such a nation. But given that the
<http://www.stratfor.com/analysis/nuclear_weapons_devices_and_delivera
ble_warheads>Iranians are far from having a deliverable weapon, and
that in the Middle East no one's rhetoric should be taken all that
seriously, the Iranian threat is not one the Israelis are compelled
to deal with right now.
The second threat would come from the emergence of a major power
prepared to intervene overtly or covertly in the region for its own
interests, and in the course of doing so, redefine the regional
threat to Israel. The major candidate for this role is Russia.
During the Cold War, the Soviets pursued a strategy to undermine
American interests in the region. In the course of this, the Soviets
activated states and groups that could directly threaten Israel.
There is no significant conventional military threat to Israel on its
borders unless Egypt is willing and well-armed. Since the mid-1970s,
Egypt has been neither. Even if Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak were
to die and be replaced by a regime hostile to Israel, Cairo could do
nothing unless it had a patron capable of training and arming its
military. The same is true of Syria and Iran to a great extent.
Without access to outside military technology, Iran is a nation
merely of frightening press conferences. With access, the entire
regional equation shifts.
After the fall of the Soviet Union, no one was prepared to intervene
in the Middle East the way the Soviets had. The Chinese have
absolutely no interest in struggling with the United States in the
Middle East, which accounts for a similar percentage of Chinese and
U.S. oil consumption. It is far cheaper to buy oil in the Middle East
than to engage in a geopolitical struggle with China's major trade
partner, the United States. Even if there was interest, no European
powers can play this role given their individual military weakness,
and Europe as a whole is a geopolitical myth. The only country that
can threaten the balance of power in the Israeli geopolitical
firmament is <http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/real_world_order>Russia.
Israel fears that if Russia gets involved in a struggle with the
United States, Moscow will aid Middle Eastern regimes that are
hostile to the United States as one of its levers, beginning with
<http://www.stratfor.com/geopolitical_diary/geopolitical_diary_implica
tions_russo_syrian_partnership>Syria and Iran. Far more frightening
to the Israelis is the idea of the Russians once again playing a
covert role in Egypt, toppling the tired Mubarak regime, installing
one friendlier to their own interests, and arming it. Israel's
fundamental fear is not Iran. It is a rearmed, motivated and hostile
Egypt backed by a great power.
The Russians are not after Israel, which is a sideshow for them. But
in the course of finding ways to threaten American interests in the
Middle East - seeking to force the Americans out of their desired
sphere of influence in the former Soviet region - the Russians could
undermine what at the moment is a quite secure position in the Middle
East for the United States.
This brings us back to what the Israelis were doing in Georgia. They
were not trying to acquire airbases from which to bomb Iran. That
would take thousands of Israeli personnel in Georgia for maintenance,
munitions management, air traffic control and so on. And it would
take Ankara allowing the use of Turkish airspace, which isn't very
likely. Plus, if that were the plan, then stopping the Georgians from
attacking South Ossetia would have been a logical move.
The Israelis were in Georgia in an attempt, in parallel with the
United States, to prevent Russia's re-emergence as a great power. The
nuts and bolts of that effort involves shoring up states in the
<http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/medvedev_doctrine_and_american_strateg
y>former Soviet region that are hostile to Russia, as well as
supporting individuals in Russia who oppose Prime Minister Vladimir
Putin's direction. The Israeli presence in Georgia, like the American
one, was designed to block the re-emergence of Russia.
As soon as the Israelis got wind of a coming clash in South Ossetia,
they - unlike the United States - switched policies dramatically.
Where the United States increased its hostility toward Russia, the
Israelis ended weapons sales to Georgia before the war. After the
war, the Israelis initiated diplomacy designed to calm Russian fears.
Indeed, at the moment the Israelis have a greater interest in keeping
the Russians from seeing Israel as an enemy than they have in keeping
the Americans happy. U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney may be uttering
vague threats to the Russians. But Olmert was reassuring Moscow it
has nothing to fear from Israel, and therefore should not sell
weapons to Syria, Iran, Hezbollah or anyone else hostile to Israel.
Interestingly, the Americans have started pumping out information
that the Russians are selling weapons to Hezbollah and Syria. The
Israelis have avoided that issue carefully. They can live with some
weapons in Hezbollah's hands a lot more easily than they can live
with a coup in Egypt followed by the introduction of Russian military
advisers. One is a nuisance; the other is an existential threat.
Russia may not be in a position to act yet, but the Israelis aren't
waiting for the situation to get out of hand.
Israel is in control of the Palestinian situation and relations with
the countries along its borders. Its position in the wider Muslim
world is much better than it might appear. Its only enemy there is
Iran, and that threat is much less clear than the Israelis say
publicly. But the threat of Russia intervening in the Muslim world -
particularly in Syria and Egypt - is terrifying to the Israelis. It
is a risk they won't live with if they don't have to. So the Israelis
switched their policy in Georgia with lightning speed. This could
create frictions with the United States, but the Israeli-American
relationship isn't what it used to be.
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