Netanyahu and Iraq War déjà vu
‘Red line’ folly
By Fareed Zakaria, WashPost, Published: September 12
Underneath the headlines of the presidential campaign, there are growing signs that we are moving toward another war in the Middle East. This week Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu publicly scolded the United States for refusing to draw a “red line” on Iran’s nuclear program that, if crossed, would commit Washington to military strikes. He added that he would not accept a “red light” placed in front of Israel. Unless something dramatic changes its course, Israel is on a path to strike Iran’s nuclear facilities in the next six to nine months.
Israel’s rhetoric over the past year had seemed, to me, designed to force the international community into action and the United States into hyper-action. It worked in the sense that international sanctions and isolation of Iran are at their highest point ever. But Iran has not surrendered, and Israel seems to view any other scenario as unacceptable. Last month, an Israeli “decision maker” — widely reported to be Defense Minister Ehud Barak — gave a revealing interview to the newspaper Haaretz in which he implied that Israel could not wait for the United States to act and might not be able to wait until next spring before taking matters into its own hands.
The “decision maker” made the point that Israel might find itself more hamstrung if Mitt Romney were elected in November. “[H]istory shows that presidents do not undertake dramatic operations in their first year in office unless forced to,” he said. This strikes me as an accurate reading of the likely scenario that a Romney administration would view economic policy as its urgent preoccupation upon taking office.
The Obama administration has brought together a global coalition, put into place the toughest sanctions ever, worked with Israel on a series of covert programs and given Israel military hardware it has long wanted. In addition, the Obama administration has strongly implied that it would be willing to use force as a final resort. But to go further and define a red line in advance would commit the United States to waging a war; no country would make such a commitment.
(More here.)
Underneath the headlines of the presidential campaign, there are growing signs that we are moving toward another war in the Middle East. This week Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu publicly scolded the United States for refusing to draw a “red line” on Iran’s nuclear program that, if crossed, would commit Washington to military strikes. He added that he would not accept a “red light” placed in front of Israel. Unless something dramatic changes its course, Israel is on a path to strike Iran’s nuclear facilities in the next six to nine months.
Israel’s rhetoric over the past year had seemed, to me, designed to force the international community into action and the United States into hyper-action. It worked in the sense that international sanctions and isolation of Iran are at their highest point ever. But Iran has not surrendered, and Israel seems to view any other scenario as unacceptable. Last month, an Israeli “decision maker” — widely reported to be Defense Minister Ehud Barak — gave a revealing interview to the newspaper Haaretz in which he implied that Israel could not wait for the United States to act and might not be able to wait until next spring before taking matters into its own hands.
The “decision maker” made the point that Israel might find itself more hamstrung if Mitt Romney were elected in November. “[H]istory shows that presidents do not undertake dramatic operations in their first year in office unless forced to,” he said. This strikes me as an accurate reading of the likely scenario that a Romney administration would view economic policy as its urgent preoccupation upon taking office.
The Obama administration has brought together a global coalition, put into place the toughest sanctions ever, worked with Israel on a series of covert programs and given Israel military hardware it has long wanted. In addition, the Obama administration has strongly implied that it would be willing to use force as a final resort. But to go further and define a red line in advance would commit the United States to waging a war; no country would make such a commitment.
(More here.)
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