Billmon agrees with me:
Whether the failure to bomb Lebanon back into the Paleolithic, as opposed to the Neolithic, Stone Age was due to some residual shreds of humanity on the part of Israel’s military and political elites, or simply because Hizbollah retained the deterrent capability to lob a few missiles into downtown Tel Aviv is not clear — or particularly relevant. The former constraint certainly doesn’t apply to Dick Cheney (the man who has defied medical science and proven that a human being does not in fact need a functioning heart in order to survive.) The latter — the ability to lob a missile into downtown Washington — isn’t a credible deterrent — not unless Iran has developed ICBM capabilities.
Still, the fact that everthing has not gone to plan in their splendid little war in Lebanon must have had some impact on the gang’s thinking. The vulnerability of our army in Iraq does appear to have registered on Field Marshal von Rumsfeld’s consciousness, at least according to Sy:
At a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on August 3rd, Rumsfeld was less than enthusiastic about the war’s implications for the American troops in Iraq. Asked whether the Administration was mindful of the war’s impact on Iraq, he testified that, in his meetings with Bush and Condoleezza Rice, “there is a sensitivity to the desire to not have our country or our interests or our forces put at greater risk as a result of what’s taking place between Israel and Hezbollah. . . . There are a variety of risks that we face in that region, and it’s a difficult and delicate situation.â€
Yes, a difficult and delicate situation. Which is why I wouldn’t be surprised if we see the nuclear option put back on table very shortly.
Whith right-wingers, there is no sense that they were wrong about anything - setbacks only means they were not tough enough.
They are like a bunch of compulsive gamblers - “double down” is now the operative foreign policy.
See Juan Cole’s piece on attacking Iran from his yesterday’s blog. He references a piece that predicts extreme vulnerability of our troops in Iraq if it happens.