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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Nadine Carroll who wrote (197359)	8/14/2006 6:42:38 PM
From: jttmab	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

But that is never enough for Israel because Nasrallah can claim "victory" because he's still alive and fighting. All Olmert it claiming is that Hezbollah's capability has been signficantly reduced, but the details haven't been released. Since Olmert hasn't released the details, how are you in any position to claim a successful operation? Israelis are looking at ~250 rockets launched by Hezbollah in the last hours before the truce [or whatever the proper word is]. You can claim that Israel destroyed the long or medium range missiles; Olmert can claim it, but no one [the public] has seen any long or medium range missiles destroyed. All they know is that Hezbollah launched more missiles on the last day than on any other day during the conflict. That's not good. From the spin side, you can't possibly think that Olmert would stand up and say, "Sorry folks, things didn't work out this time. Hezbollah is still there, they'll re-arm and we'll have to do this all over again. But it seemed like a good idea at the time." Of course he'll say that Hezbollah's capabilities were trashed. He's not completely stupid. One thing we are fairly certain of is that Israeli intellligence failed to correctly assess what Hezbollah had. Did that assessment get better during the conflict? Highly unlikely. They most certainly bombed places where they thought there were missiles, maybe they were there, maybe not. jttmab

To: Nadine Carroll who wrote (197359)	8/14/2006 8:09:40 PM
From: SARMAN	Respond to of 281500

Blah blah blah. 33 day missiles rained on Israel. Count them 33 days. No soldiers returned and Hezbo is still fighting. How did Israel win? They got to the Litani? That is a jock, right? They got to the Litani through empty land. The Israeli operation was a failure from the get go. 33 days Nadine, what the heck happened? Usually you can stop watch the Israeli wars. And please do not tell us it was high/low expectation. Why don’t you, for a change, admit that Israel screwed up/miscalculated. Olmert is going to lose his job because of his miscalculation. Message 22717639

To: Nadine Carroll who wrote (197359)	8/14/2006 8:27:21 PM
From: Katelew	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

The Arabs suffer such an achievement gap that their standards for victory are pathetically low. Israel's standards are exceptionally high. OMG, Nadine.....what an idiotic and smug distortion of fact!!!! Let's give Israel's military aid to Hezbollah for a few years and watch Arabs achievement standards rise.

To: Nadine Carroll who wrote (197359)	8/14/2006 9:12:20 PM
From: Bilow	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 281500

Hi Nadine Carroll; Re: "The Arabs suffer such an achievement gap that their standards for victory are pathetically low. Israel's standards are exceptionally high." Not at all. Wars are always fought with expectations, and when the participants fail to achieve their expectations, the weaker participant always declares victory. For example, the US treats the war of 1812 as a victory despite the fact that the US didn't win anything and had the Presidential Palace burned so badly that its brick sides had to be repainted white. Israel has never had anyone unconditionally surrender to them and yet they go on and on about their long string of military victories. As far as victories, the IDF failed to reach the Litani river along its whole length and consequently failed to encircle Tyre. Israeli losses were fairly high and their government is in danger of falling. Israeli newspapers say that the war was Israel's least successful ever and many people say that the political party that led them into it will soon disappear completely. Some victory. Israeli newspapers quote returning soldiers giving respect to the abilities of their enemy. Israel took its highest military casualty total one day before the cease fire. Israel not only failed to stop Hezbollah rockets, but the largest number fired were on the day before the cease fire. Some victory. Now Lebanese civilians (and Hezbollah) are returning to their villages. Israel will either be forced to go through the whole exercise again, (and why, to prove that they can't solve the rocket problem again? To prove that their tanks can be destroyed by Hezbollah's anti tank missiles again? To prove that they can absorb losses of something like 10 senior officers again?) or retreat back behind the lines and negotiate. Oh, and if I recall, there was something going on about how Israel wasn't going to forget those captured soldiers. Since the war is over with a glorious victory, the Israeli soldiers have presumably returned to a ticker-tape parade down main street. Or have they? Like I told you a couple weeks ago, eventually Israel will be facing cruise missiles. I asked you which buildings in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem Hezbollah would target but you never told me. Do you mean to tell me that Israel is too soft to fight a war where their infrastructure would come under attack? It's easy enough for me to tell you what buildings Hezbollah would send cruise missiles to in this country. Let's see, the White House, the House and Senate office buildings, the Pentagon, the Smithsonian museum, the Empire State Building, the World Trade Center. Whoops, they already got that one. What's wrong with ya? Unable to face the crap you put the United States through? You can dish it out but you can't take it? Willing to have the US fight Islam to the last building for ya, but unable to imagine Jerusalem in flames? -- Carl