The Real War ...

National Review On Line ^ | 08-14-06 | By Michael Ledeen

[MNJohnnie]

Watching the war in Lebanon and listening to the debate about it, is just like watching the war in Iraq and Afghanistan, and its attendant debate. Israelis are demanding the resignation of Olmert, just as Americans are demanding the head of Bush. Israeli military experts, real and self-proclaimed, are explaining how the Lebanon war could have been won, if only the ground campaign had started earlier, or had been more ambitious. American strategists of varying competence are explaining how the Iraq war could have been won, if only there were more boots on the ground, or if only a different strategy had been employed, or if only the Baathist army had been kept intact. I think it’s nonsense. Both campaigns and both debates suffer from the same narrow focus, the same failure of strategic vision, the same obsession with a single campaign in a single place, when the war itself — the real war — is far wider. Our leaders and our pundits are fighting single battles, and, since their strategies are not designed to win the real war, they are doomed to fail. The failure of strategic vision is not unique to politicians, or pundits, or military strategists; it seems common to them all. It is extremely rare to hear an authoritative voice addressing the real war.

The terror masters in Syria and Iran are waging a regional war against us, running from Afghanistan and Iraq to, Gaza, Israel, and Lebanon. Alongside the ground war in the Middle East, they are conducting fifth-column operations against us from Europe to India and on to Indonesia, Australia, and the United States; the plot just dismantled in Great Britain provides the latest evidence.

Israel cannot destroy Hezbollah by fighting in Lebanon alone, just as we cannot provide Iraq and Afghanistan with decent security by fighting only there. The destruction of Hezbollah requires regime change in Damascus. Security in Iraq and Afghanistan requires regime change in Damascus and Tehran. Lebanon, Gaza, Iraq, and Afghanistan are not separate conflicts. They are battlefields in a regional war.

Even if the Israelis had conducted a brilliant campaign that killed every single Hezbollah terrorist in Lebanon, it would only have bought time. The Syrians and Iranians would have restocked, rearmed and resupplied the Hezbollahis, and prepared for the next battle. But if the Assad regime were replaced with a government opposed to terrorism and committed to freedom, Hezbollah would die of logistical starvation, cut off from money, weapons, training facilities, and the crucial support of Syrian and Iranian military and intelligence organizations.

In like manner, even if we continue to win every battle in every region of Iraq and Afghanistan, we will only prolong the fighting. The Iranians and their various allies inside Iraq, from the Baathist remnant to the Sadrists to Hezbollah, Iranian Revolutionary Guards, and other foreign terrorists, would continue to infiltrate the country, buy agents within Iraq, develop new generations of IEDs and smuggle ever more accurate rockets and missiles to use against us and the Iraqi forces of order. They will do the same in Afghanistan. But if the mullahcracy is replaced by a government empowered by the tens of millions of pro-American and pro-democracy people now oppressed by the evil terror masters in Tehran, the fight in Iraq and Afghanistan would be quickly transformed into a manageable operation with the balance of power overwhelmingly on the side of the governments.

The longer we wait, the larger the real war becomes. Iran has been at war with us for 27 years and we have yet to respond. As time passes, and our fecklessness is confirmed, the mullahs’ confidence grows. Surely they must believe that their moment has come, that we will never respond, that they can bloody us and force us to retreat. That is the clear lesson of Lebanon, and they are undoubtedly raising the stakes for the next round. The Iranian missiles used against Israeli warships off the coast of Lebanon are now pouring into Somalia, and will be used against our ships in one of the most strategically sensitive areas of the world economy. The clandestine network rolled up in London surely extends to this country, and it is only a matter of time until they get lucky. Just a few weeks ago, the Germans fortunately discovered powerful bombs on their railroads. The French found similar weapons a couple of years ago. The Italians have arrested 40 people, are expelling many others, and have more than a thousand under surveillance.

These are the outlines of future events in the real war. We have a president who, despite his many weaknesses, speaks as if he understands it. But we have a secretary of state who speaks and acts as if she did not, a secretary of defense who has manifestly failed to grasp the true strategic dimensions of our peril, and an intelligence community that is still obsessed with the failed theories of the recent past, notably the nonsense about the unbridgeable Sunni-Shiite conflict. The president has finally begun to speak the truth about Islamic fascists, but he has yet to level with the American people about the magnitude of the real war, and ask them to support a strategy for victory.

That strategy does not, even today, require greatly expanded military action against the terror masters. Our most potent weapon against them remains the rage and courage of their own peoples. We must support those people, we must openly call and work for regime change in Syria and Iran. Heartbreakingly and foolishly, our failure to support revolution makes military action more and more likely. If we do not do the logical and sensible things, if we do not deploy the massive political weapons at our disposal, we will end by doing terrible things. Or, shrinking from the consequences of such action, we will suffer defeat, and the world will be plunged into a darkness the likes of which any civilized person must dread.

Faster, please.

[MNJohnnie]

I am not a Ledeen fan. I think he is dead wrong on both Iraq and Iran. I also disagree with his overwhelming faith in the ability of oppressed people to throw off rulers who are willing to stop at nothing to hold onto power. However, his basic point here is right on the mark. This is ONE war and this fixation by the Junk Media on each individual campaign or battle as a separate from the whole is dangerous nonsense

[Alberta's Child]

He's a delusional, big-government globalist.

His assertion that Iran has been at war with the U.S. for 27 years conveniently ignores the events that occurred 26 years before that -- when the Eisenhower administration made the decision to support the British government's overthrow of the duly-elected Mossadegh government in Iran.

[Vn_survivor_67-68]

melting mecca and medina down with the cameras rolling is the definitive fix......

[ClaireSolt]

If ever I saq an example of "peeling an onion" it is this one step at a time approach to getting Lebanon back for the Lebanese. bush may not be perfect, but he sure has a better idea of the complexities than Clinton. Now, who could argue with a straight face that the Middle East conflict could be solved by inviting two men to Camp David? There are too many other players.

[ClaireSolt]

If ever I saq an example of "peeling an onion" it is this one step at a time approach to getting Lebanon back for the Lebanese. Bush may not be perfect, but he sure has a better idea of the complexities than Clinton. Now, who could argue with a straight face that the Middle East conflict could be solved by inviting two men to Camp David? There are too many other players.

[kabar]

Our most potent weapon against them remains the rage and courage of their own peoples. We must support those people, we must openly call and work for regime change in Syria and Iran.

Ladeen is right about this as well. The first thing we must do is identify our enemy and publicly call for regime change. Just as Regan's evil empire resonated in Eastern Europe, Bush has set the stage with his axis of evil. However, he has not gone far enough in calling for regime change in Iran and Syria [not part of the axis of evil].

There is sizeable domestic opposition to the corrupt rule of the mullahs in Iran, who hijacked the Iranian Revolution and spawned militant Islamic fundamentalism. Under the Shah, Iran had more women in their parliament than we had in Congress.

In his 2005 STOU address, Bush said,

"To promote peace in the broader Middle East, we must confront regimes that continue to harbor terrorists and pursue weapons of mass murder. Syria still allows its territory, and parts of Lebanon, to be used by terrorists who seek to destroy every chance of peace in the region. You have passed, and we are applying, the Syrian Accountability Act -- and we expect the Syrian government to end all support for terror and open the door to freedom. (Applause.) Today, Iran remains the world's primary state sponsor of terror -- pursuing nuclear weapons while depriving its people of the freedom they seek and deserve. We are working with European allies to make clear to the Iranian regime that it must give up its uranium enrichment program and any plutonium reprocessing, and end its support for terror. And to the Iranian people, I say tonight: As you stand for your own liberty, America stands with you. (Applause.)"

Bush and Congress need to follow this up with a resolution for regime change in both countries. In addition, we need to aid covertly domestic opposition groups.

[MNJohnnie]

You do realize that is an utter falsehood? Your duly elected Government was a KGB managed front group.

[GeorgefromGeorgia]

I don't agree with all of his comments, but I do agree that we could do more to affect regime change. Why don't we help the anti-government forces in Iran like we did against the Soviet Union in the 80s?

[knews_hound]

A day of reckoning is fast approaching.

The Iranians are feeling good right about now.  Their proxy in Lebanon has achieved a "victory" against Israel, their nuclear program is proceeding apace and their paid killers in Iraq are spreading mayhem and murder.

The MSM has made each of these battles as discreet, to better obscure the real issue at hand.

Islam is about to strike the West and the media sleeps.

Dec 7, 1942 was a wake up call for the US, I fear we are about to get a nuclear alarm clock via Iran.

I pray I am wrong.

But I doubt it.

Cheers,

knewshound

Latest Column  The Last Normal Day 21 Aug 2006

[MNJohnnie]

Without a credible outside military threat, the regimes would not of collapsed. The Soviets were forced to make political concessions at home in the hopes of modernizing their military to compete with the Reagan buildup. Without the external threat, nothing would of happened in the Soviet Union. Without the change in the SU, none of the Eastern European captive states would of been allowed the to break free. East Germany in 1949, Hungary in 1956, Checkoslovakia in 1968 and Poland in 1980 are all proof of that fact.

This Neo-Isolationist dogma of war on the cheap by giving verbal support to domestic foes of rouge regimes is nonsense. It has never, and will never, work against regimes willing to fill mass graves with the bodies of their opposition. Iraq all thru the 1990s shows that fact.

[NutCrackerBoy]

Even if the Israelis had conducted a brilliant campaign that killed every single Hezbollah terrorist in Lebanon, it would only have bought time. The Syrians and Iranians would have restocked, rearmed and resupplied the Hezbollahis, and prepared for the next battle...In like manner, even if we continue to win every battle in every region of Iraq and Afghanistan, we will only prolong the fighting. The Iranians and their various allies inside Iraq, from the Baathist remnant to the Sadrists to Hezbollah, Iranian Revolutionary Guards, and other foreign terrorists, would continue to infiltrate the country, buy agents within Iraq, develop new generations of IEDs and smuggle ever more accurate rockets and missiles to use against us and the Iraqi forces of order. They will do the same in Afghanistan. -Michael Ledeen

This is a key question if one hopes to make progress, given the infeasibility of sudden regime change by pro-democracy elements within those countries. Can the enemy keep doing this ad infinitum? Can we wear them down? How long can they keep sending volunteers into the meat grinder? With international condemnation raining down on them?

[Rummyfan]

Dec 7, 1942 was a wake up call for the US, I fear we are about to get a nuclear alarm clock via Iran.

I agree with you but don't you mean December 7, 1941?

[kabar]

His assertion that Iran has been at war with the U.S. for 27 years conveniently ignores the events that occurred 26 years before that -- when the Eisenhower administration made the decision to support the British government's overthrow of the duly-elected Mossadegh government in Iran

No, it goes back to the Shah's father who set up the Pahlavi Dynasty in the 1920's and then stripped the mullahs of their land. He also grew too close to the Germans and that led to a joint invasion of Iran in 1941 by the British and Russians who sent the Shah into exile and installed the son, Reza, as the king.

Initially, Reza gave back most of the lands to the mullahs and granted amnesty to all political prisoners. Eventually, the Shah turned to the right and cracked down on dissidents, especially the Tudeh Party [Communists] and the leftist National Front Party [Mossadegh]. When Mossadegh was elected to PM and nationalized the oil industry, the British and the CIA helped organize a coup [Opreration AJAX] that was supported by the monarchists and the clergy. The great fear in case of failure was that the Tudeh party would use its influence with the rank and file of the National Front and seize power. The coup was successful in 1953 and the Tudeh party outlawed. Iran was an early battleground in the Cold War.

The Shah maintained a good relationship with the mullahs until the White Revolution, a series of social reforms instigated by the Kennedy administration and implemented by the Shah. It included women suffrage and land redistribution, which took lands away from the mullahs and their allies. Khomeini led some of the dissident mullahs against these actions. He was jailed and exiled only to return in Feb 1979 to hijack the Iranian Revolution.

Today, most Iranians, if given the stark choice, would rather have the Shah than the mullahs.

[knews_hound]

Stupid keyboard !

I blame it on Bush.

[pppp]

I know little about sentiments in Russia in 80's. But I remember clearly, that in Poland every one [I mean everyone including communist apparatchiks] wanted to have a piece of western paradise. I strongly believe, that communism collapsed because even high-ranking communists were fed up with that system. By the way the latter benefited from the change most [were properly positioned to take advantage]. I don't see mullahs to be in the similar mood now. So I won't hold my breath waiting for a regime change in Iran.
Maybe I'm crazy, but I find it hard to believe that Iran, even with current oil prices, is able on its own to finance such extensive war. I mean not only military operation in Lebanon and Iraq, but also the propaganda warfare.

[Jim Verdolini]

"His assertion that Iran has been at war with the U.S. for 27 years conveniently ignores the events that occurred 26 years before that -- when the Eisenhower administration made the decision to support the British government's overthrow of the duly-elected Mossadegh government in Iran."

Duely elected?

http://www.iranchamber.com/history/mmosaddeq/mohammad_mosaddeq.php

[Candor7]

Johnie, I agree with your comments.

From the article:

"The failure of strategic vision is not unique to politicians, or pundits, or military strategists; it seems common to them all. It is extremely rare to hear an authoritative voice addressing the real war.>>>>>>

The US voice occasionally is accurate, but events, not policy, drive the exposure of our population to the term" Islamofascism." Really , if one is to criticize the Bush administration, one can say it is weak on educating the public on just what fascism is, and what the lessons of history are in relation to it.

Only until fascism is re-understood widely, will it become possible for a unified strategic vision, even within our own nation, not to mention in other nations.

Certainly Blair rests his strategy on some of the pronouncements of Winston Churchill.

Islamofascism is the modern peril of the World. Is it evil? Well if we can better understand it in terms of having a justified strategy, it can and should be called evil. One only has to publish what the Islamofascist definition of what a human being is, and unapologetically proclaim it to the world. Until then, there will be no chance of a uniform strategy which is functional.

The authoritative voices which address the real war are from those who are no longer with us, people like Churchill, Eisenhower, and even Patton. And it is past time when someone should open their coffins and relearn the lessons that their very lives represented.

This is the modern battle, and forecast by men of letters like Tolkien. The lords of Mordor are upon us, and we need to destroy them and Mount Doom.

Who will bear the ring?

One laughs at people like Hillery Clinton, John Kerry, John McCain, And Howard Dean ( Vermont's Village Idiot), who presume they have what it takes to bear the ring.They are aligned with the forces of Mordor, and are weak in spirit.They tremble in the shadows of the Nazgul.

No, we need leaders LIKE Tom DeLay, leaders who have the courage and tenacity to unite the nation in what is obvious to anyone who has read the history of fascism and how it functions to seize national power. We need a modern anti-fascist movement.

People might laugh at the Lord of the Rings trilogy as an analogy, but in truth, Tolkien left us with a spiritual/cultural message about fascism, and Churchill leaves us with an example of the politics and strategy necessary to awaken the electorate, and move generals to form the seeds of fascist destruction in their gardens of evil.

Who will side with Sauron, and who will side with Gandalf?

This is the momentous question of our times.In saying this, perhaps I am putting it in the only way that America as a whole might understand, for few would wade through the historical texts on fascism and its rise in Europe, as I have been privileged to do in my college years under a professor named Gilbert Allardyce, one of the great historian voices on Fascism.

Tolkein, such is the culture of the West, and we ignore him at our peril. Who would have thought that our nation's salvation might rest with the message that such literature has given us. We are living his trilogy at this time. One might now regard Tolkien as prescient, and his work far beyond just an expression of an amalgamation of mythology. He might be our salvation.

I have spent a lot of effort as a teacher, trying to evolve a way to inform my high school students of what we face as a culture standing in the way of Islamofascism, I have settled on Tolkein as an analogy, a work written out of the soul twisting of WWI and WWII suffered by it's author at the hand of fascism, and I mean to drive it home.

[kabar]

Pathetic over there, I was holding out hope still on Friday, but like all girly men, he caved. LOL and looked like such a punk little woman doing it,

It is easy to be an archair general or chickenhawk when your life is not on the line. Israel is a small country that cannot fight a protracted guerrilla war with a large call up of reserves without drastically damaging its economy. Israel wanted this ceasefire as well.

Israel is still better off now than it was before the war began. If the robust international force can maintain the neutral zone, including on the border of Syria, then Israel will be safer than it has been since it left Lebanon in 2000. Hezbollah's military capability has seriously damaged no matter how much they proclaim a victory. In the long run, Israel and the US could benefit from the increased Western influence in the region and a more independent Lebanese government. Let's see what the 2nd UN resolution says before making any judgments.

[jd777]

Their forgiven. The CIA/MI-6 used revolution to acheive their goal, and at this point that looks like a brilliant idea. Sadly, there's hardly a word about suppporting a revolution in IRAN. People like Ledeen are the obstacle, not the Mullahs. They thought about it and said it's impossible. We did it in 1954, but now it's impossible. The neocons want regime change, but they want it to be done with Bunker busters and Daisy Cutters. The Bush administration will offer 20 million for a revolution in IRAN, but they will spend 10 Billion a month tearing Iraq a new one.

Iran has a large pro-democracy movement. Does Pakistan? Of course not, and the Paks already have the nukes. The universities in Iran are full of pro-western students and professors who actually take to the streets in protest of their government. There had protests again just this winter. Don't bother looking for any mention of that in Commentary and the Weekly Standard. They could care less.

Ledeen wants to turn Tehran into another Baghdad, a no-electricty, no sewers, bomb blasted wasteland.

Hey what do they care? It's your money.