Day By Day

Tuesday, June 01, 2010

Uh, Oh!

This is scary, kids -- really scary!

CNN reports:
Turkey recalled its ambassador to Israel and warned of unprecedented and incalculable reprisals.

Two Turkish activists were reported to be among those killed in the flotilla. Ankara warned that further supply vessels will be sent to Gaza, escorted by the Turkish Navy, a development with unpredictable consequences.

Israel has sounded an alert throughout the country fearing rocket attacks by Hezbollah in Lebanon.

The Arab League has called an urgent meeting on Tuesday to decide on a common response.
Read it here.

Ian Welsh fears that Israel could not survive a full-scale war with Turkey [here].

It is said that amateurs talk about strategy and tactics, but professional soldiers talk about logistics. Responding to Welsh's comments, Dave Anderson points out that the logistics of the situation vastly favor Israel [here]. Of course, Anderson assumes that the United States will supply logistical support to Israel while denying it to NATO ally, Turkey. With Obama calling the shots, that is uncertain. The one thing that military buffs and professionals usually overlook is the politics of decision making, but in this case the political leadership makes all the difference.

UPDATE:

This is a disturbing reaction from a guy whose opinion I usually respect and who is very much plugged in to the prevailing climate opinion in the foreign policy establishment.

Dan Drezner writes in Foreign Policy:

[T]he parallels between Israel and -- gulp -- North Korea are becoming pretty eerie. True, Israel's economy is thriving and North Korea's is not. That said, both countries are diplomatically isolated except for their ties to a great power benefactor. Both countries are pursuing autarkic policies that immiserate millions of people. The majority of the populaion in both countries seem blithely unaware of what the rest of the world thinks. Both countries face hostile regional environments. Both countries keep getting referred to the United Nations. And, in the past month, the great power benefactor is finding it more and more difficult to defend their behavior to the rest of the world.
Read it here.

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