I’d better take advantage of the current cessation of hostilitiesedition of Furtive Glances before the whole house of cards falls apart. One of the more thorough and thoughtful bloggers around, Rick Moran of the Right Wing Nut House, will be

If we are going to defeat them, then it seems it needs to cost more to the people who are supporting them than the benefits they are getting from supporting them. Right now it has cost Syria and Iran little, if anything, to support the insurgency and the militias in Iraq and it has cost them very little to have Hezbollah fight in Israel. When it begins to cost the Shias of Lebanon and the Shias in Iran more than they are getting in benefits, we may be able to get somewhere with diplomacy. It is a dificult balance to be sure. Deciding how to allocate resources between diplomacy and military actions.

As long as Hezbollah thinks the goal of destroying Israel is achievable, they will contine the fight. Iraq’s old regime desired regional hegemony. As long as the insurgency believes re establishing the old regime is achieveable, the fighting will continue. If all they wanted was for the US to withdraw, this would be easy. All they have to do is stop shooting and stop planting IEDs. They could still keep all of their weapons. No one will pressure them to get rid of them. Then they could demand that we leave. Even if we wanted to stay, in such a situation, the world pressure on us to withdraw from Iraq would be tremendous.

The mistakes that have been made in the past are failing to completely defeat the enemy. This allows it to live on to fight another day. Had Israel been allowed to fully defeat the enemy either now or in 1982 the situation would be better. As it is the enemy lives on to fight another day. Diplomacy has a chance, when the enemy understands their goals are not going to be achievable. The concept of compromise seems to be missing from the terrorist lingo. In any event, a compromise with them means they take a portion now and get the rest later. Their goals are first and foremost the destruction of Israel then the establishment of a world wide caliphate. I suggest a greater focus on the military aspect and less focus on diplomacy. Right now diplomacy with them is fruitless.

Efforts at diplomacy should be directed to Russia and China. If we can get them to withdraw support from the Islamic extremists, they become much easier to neutralize.

Thankfully we are not yet at the point where a Dresden response in necessary. This is why I suggest more troops for Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere in the GWOT. Former 911 commissioners have said we have not allocated the necessary resources to Iraq, Afghanistan, or the broader GWOT. Get this done now before more drastic measures become necessary.

Israel and probably the US made a mistake, if they assumed that Hezbollah could be degraeded enough to make a difference in only one month of fighting. Short of completely destroying Lebanon and assuming every thing went perfectly, Israel would have needed at least three months and probably longer. If there is a silver lining, this is only one round in a long struggle. We need to learn from our mistakes and do better in the next round. Israel’s military was clearly winning the round before the politicians caved. The Arab league and others would not have been trying to get a cease fire, if Hezbollah was winning. During cease fires, this enemy rearms and comes back stronger. The definition of insanity is to continue doing the same thing over and over agains expecting to get a different result. Eventually the gloves come off and we fight to win. I just hope and pray the gloves come off in time to prevent another major terrorist attack.

While targeted attacks may not completely work, I can guarantee that a “total war” approach will fail. Lebanon is a complex, multi-ethnic country. It is not in our strategic interest to wipe Lebanon clean in order to get Hezbollah. Are we to punish the Christians and Druze because the Shiites elected a bunch of thugs? Even if it were possible, even if was a morally acceptable course of action, even if we could minimize the tremendous negative consequences of such an action, it still would not achieve the desired result. We are not Stalinist Russia where we purge not only our enemies, but any potential enemies as well, to ensure compliance. History has shown, with few exceptions, that such tactics do not work unless you’re willing to use the power of the State as Stalin did.

But let’s not assume that the solution to this problem only lies in the military realm. Ultimately, defeating an insurgency or an established terrorist organization requires more than force, and often force is a small part of the overall strategy. I won’t go into specifics here, but if you google the Army Field Manual on Counterinsurgency and read it, it will give you a good overview of sucessful tactics to defeat these kinds of forces.

In the case of Hizbollah, they are directly supported by the local Shiite population as well as Syria and Iran. Until that support can be minimized or ended, Hezbollah will not be defeated, plain and simple. Drastic military measures will likely result in strengthening those ties and entrenching Hezbollah further. If Hezbollah suffers a significant military defeat, they will do what all guerilla groups do and disperse and hide in the local population that supports them. Just look at Iraq to see what a difficult nut to crack that would be. Israel has already been down that road in Lebanon and Hezbollah’s creation was a direct result of Israel’s invasion and some of the huge mistakes it made there. Similar to Hezbollah, the IRA also had a political wing. The IRA was never defeated militarily despite many decades of counter-insurgency operations - it finally made the conscious decision to end its terrorist methods for a variety of reasons - not because it was on the ropes militarily.

Ultimately, the Shiite population in Lebanon must make the conscious decision that supporting Hezbollah is not in their best interest, and the same is true with regard to Iran and Syria. This will be a “long war” and we should not delude ourselves by thinking that short-term military solutions will work. Again, as we can see in Iraq, they don’t work. It took some time, but even our conventional military forces and leadership now realize what must be done to defeat the Iraqi insurgency. We can’t afford to make the same mistakes in dealing with Hezbollah.

Seems to me I heard that in 1969, when we’d ‘only’ lost 40,000 men in Vietnam. We went on to ‘donate’ another 18,000 bodies to honor that memory.
Shameful.

I might add that some new strategy must be employed in today’s terrorist world. I’m still not sure what will work, but I know that targeted attacks at groups within a state does not work… so what is the plan?

I believe that President Bush’s idea that terrorist States must be defeated along with the terrorist cells is the only plan that might work. At least you take away the state support (both monetary and militarily).

The defeat of this enemy requires both defeat of the States sponsering them and the terrorist cells themselves. Just what is your plan to confront this enemy?

While I understand your constraint, there is no other way in this type of war. Either you take out the coutry supporting terrorist groups, or you do what Israel did and try to target the bad guys. Does not work when half the country supports the non-government entity.

Those bad guys will continue to praise Allah and declare victory. The rest of the world will stand by and wonder what is happening.

Your simply have to take out whoever the enemy is (supporters and all) or face defeat in todays battles. I am not necessarily talking about nukes, but overwhelming force against the country supporting the terrorists.

As sorry as I am that the Lebonese government is destroyed, they brought this upon themselves by their support of the Hezbolloh. They are therefore subject to the results of war just as those that started the conflict. To do otherwise creates the situation that we currently have - Terrorists controlling a State with no consequences.

The idea that Hezbollah is a political group partially in control of Lebonan means that the whole country suffers. To pretend otherwise defies the idea of a countries actions defines the resultant actions. If it is such a political group, then it is acting with the country’s (State) permission and the resultant reaction is warranted and just regardless of status of other citizens.

Although those kinds of tactics have a certain allure, they typically fail. Take a look at Chechnya or the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. Nukes weren’t used of course, but both were left in total ruin and the Russians/Soviets still lost. Even the Dresden bombings in WWII did not have any effect on the outcome of the war. The nukes on Japan only hastened the surrender of an already beaten enemy. Such a course of action against Hizbollah would only lead to disaster.

Unfortunately, your are too right! I also believe that it will take a major city destroyed before we become serious about eliminating this threat. We are just in a waiting game it seems….