God grants liberty only to those who love it, and are always ready to guard and defend it.
– Daniel Webster
Over the weekend Iran launched a massive drone, cruise and ballistic missile attack against Israel. Political and pundit reactions and hot takes on Israeli and world responses started pouring out before we even knew much in the way of details as the strike was ongoing.
We also had Biden White House murmurings being reported that President Biden was warning Israel not to retaliate.
There’s a segment of the American right that has become hardcore isolationist and won’t support US military action anywhere or for any reason and they sound, to me, the same as the segment of the American left that reacts the same way – no war under any circumstances. I’ve always felt that isolationists have the luxury of being isolationists in America, because we have a strong military, prepared to defend our nation.
So, then we get to speaking truth about Iran – Iran declared war on America decades ago. Their official policy has been “Death to America” since 1979. When they declare Death to America and rant about defeating the Great Satan (America) as their top tier foreign policy objective, we should believe them.
This truth about Iran should guide American foreign policy decisions, but it doesn’t.
Democrats believe the Obama Iran deaI would change Iran’s foreign policy toward the US and deter Iran’s belligerent actions in the Middle East. The Democrat position that’s high on Obama Iran deal pipedreams seems delusional in light of Iran’s continued attacks against America and American allies. The reality is Iran has been attacking American military assets and personnel continually, especially via Iranian-backed proxies and Shia militias in Iraq, rebels in Yemen and Hezbollah in Lebanon. Since Hamas attacked Israel on October 7th last year, Iranian-backed groups have attacked US military interests over 170 times and three US servicemembers were killed in an Iranian-backed attack in January.
It’s myopic to pretend that we’re not involved in the ongoing war that Israel is engaged in. For all of Biden’s telling Netanyahu not to retaliate, he ordered the US military to help defend Israel during that weekend Iranian attack. The Biden policy remains convoluted and incoherent toward achieving any real strategic aims. Biden officials continually talk out of both sides of their mouths and pretend that words can gloss over deeds – so, yes, they keep saying we support Israel, but at the same time they’re undercutting Israel at every turn. They are also still committed to Obama’s Iran deal and believe that the Iranian government, which proclaims “Death to America,” can be trusted to act in good faith.
Biden’s public lecturing Israel about a ceasefire in Gaza and now urging Israel not to retaliate against Iran is read by America’s enemies the same way they read the American political right urging no aid to Ukraine and urging Ukraine to stop fighting – our enemies read that as American weakness and appeasement. History clearly shows that this will lead to our enemies being emboldened to more aggressive actions. In the most simplistic terms, I think, Iran wants to be the dominate power in the Middle East, Russia wants to retake former Soviet territories, China wants to take Taiwan and replace the United States as the world’s #1 superpower. The foreign policy expert class remains widely divided on how to contend with our adversaries’ aspirations
There are silly and simplistic reactions calling for a too forceful response and some calling for a too weak response, however after over 170 Iranian-backed attacks against US military interests in six months, three dead US servicemembers and now this attack on Israel, it seems like the no retaliation response would be suicidal for Israel and pretending the US isn’t involved in this war is likewise delusional.
There’s an argument about the monetary cost of military action being too high with the state of our economy, but I would argue the economic costs, if we allow Iran, Russia and China to disrupt more global shipping, (hint, that’s a large part of what Iran, Russia and China have been doing), and if they take more aggressive actions to expand their power beyond their borders will be even more costly.
There are various levels of military responses the US could take to make sure Iran gets the message. Even US missile strikes can send a strong message or a weak message, as we learned during the Clinton administration and which the Obama and Biden administration are now following suit. If the US targets Iranian interests or assets that are not high-value (the Biden approach), the message is we aren’t serious. Those are signals of weakness – just going through the motions of a response and that’s really just more appeasement. Of course, there can be over-the-top responses, like the people who rant about nuking adversaries. The better response for America is likely somewhere in the middle or supporting Israel responding as it sees fit (which will be a strong response) and then getting more aid to Israel quickly.
Appeasement and not responding to aggression are actions. That is choosing not to defend your country or interests. History shows that not responding to military aggression can result in a heavy cost, including emboldening adversaries to make more aggressive military moves and leading to wider conflicts. Deterrents can work, but the Biden administration so far has offered only muddled word salad responses and missile strikes against low-value targets.
The reality is America does have direct interests with what happens in Ukraine and what happens in Israel.
We aren’t an island unto ourselves.
Weighing what we know vs. the unknowns, brought me back to thinking about a 2015 piece, Thucydides Was Right: Defining the Future Threat, written by Dr. Colin S. Gray and published at the US Army War College. I’m going to be rereading this piece. I talked to one of my sisters on the phone yesterday and we were talking about leaders who react to crises emotionally. My sister is retired from the Air Force and has a lot of experience handling crisis communications. She echoed my belief that emotional responses are terrible leadership in a crisis and will lead to bad decisions. In fact, making decisions based on emotion and fear will lead to bad decisions for anyone. We definitely need calmer heads, but too many of our elected leaders and most of the news media now seem to spend more time on their social media hot take drama than they do in calmly and carefully reading and analyzing information. Instead, they rush out with emotionally-charged statements to try to garner news media attention.
libertybelle diaries 