An interesting article popped up over the weekend of the 12-13th where Saudia Arabia has made secret agreements with Israel to “stand down” and allow Israeli F-16 bombing configuration planes to pass over and bomb Iranian nuclear facilities.
Click here to see Times Online article
This makes sense since the Sunni run empire has no love for the Shiia regime to its east and has no real qualms with the Jews to its north. Saudi Arabia is currently involved in a secret war in Iraq, financing the sectarian violence against the Shiite government. Saudi Arabia has never moved militarily against Israel in the 60 years of Israeli existence and along with Isreal and Turkey is one of the greatest recipients of American and British weapons systems. Both countries were set up through agreements with the former British empire and are “owers” of the most religious sites in all of the middle east including Christianity. The Sauds have systematically refused Palestinians the option to repatriate or resettle in the kingdom keeping now perhaps three generations of Palestinians as refugees.
Tellingly, Jordan, Turkey and Kurdistani Iraq have not allowed overflight status to the Israelis and will not be allowing Jews to bomb their fellow Muslims. Early today the Saudi Press Agency categorically denied the story calling it “lies” and “slanderous”. It reminds me of the old German Propoganda about the times that when you turn “TIMES” in reverse you read “SEMIT”. Was this planted by the British Intelligence establishment to rattle Iran’s cage? Was it a shot by Mossad?
The Gulf States are known for letting the Israelis have their way. At the beginning of 2010 around 26 suspected Mossad agents, some of them British passport holders, entered the United Arab Emirates and assassinated Hamas leader Mahmoud al-Mabhouh. 26 Jews turn up in Dubai and not an eyelash batted? They are even rumoured to have been assisted by the Palestinian Authority. Jordan, Egypt and Turkey have been more than chummy with Israel and even Israel’s interference in Beirut was on behalf of a Lebanese faction (albeit a catholic one).
Would Saudi Arabia go as far as to directly aid Israel’s attack on Iran? I don’t think so. Not as it stands. The war is too cold for such a tactic, Muslims would probably not take what is essentially al-Saud’s decision very well.
However, Iran is as much if not even more of a threat to the Sunni kingdom as it is to the Jewish State. Iran’s hidden conflict in Iraq spreads south west into Saudi Arabia’s borders and down into Oman and Yemen. As broke as Iran is, it manages to fund Shiite/resistance movements and revolutionary ideologies. Iran’s hegemony while contained does threaten the gulf region. Hamas, Hezbollah and the North Yemeni Houthi rebels are sources of instability used as proxies by Iran. If times were to get desperate, if Iran gets too close to weaponizing or making its nuclear material ballistic, Saudi Arabia would not only use its Eurofighters and F-15s but allow Israel to fly their F-15’s and F-16’s overhead as well.
On the 31st of May 2010 Israeli soldiers boarded a blockade running ship carrying supplies to Gaza. As they were boarding, the soldiers were attacked with knives and clubs, one soldier had his gun snatched away, the others either returned or opened fire. 9 people died many on both sides were wounded.
Israel was lured into a trap. The organizers of the flotilla knew Isreals first response (boarding the ship) and it’s second response (defending themselves). Dozens of volunteers were placed on board not to help unload the cargo but to serve as cannon fodder for the IDF and news media. Soon after the tenuous relationship between Israel and Turkey was set back by years, another ship was intercepted peacefully. Moderate Muslim states rushed to prove how harshly they could condemn these “Zionist” actions.
The creation of the two states of Israel and Palestine has to become a global agenda in order for the Levant to experience peace. Israel and it’s Arab neighbors have to be forced to draw lines once and for all because it is obvious that the parties are happy to bicker and the world is happy to tut and cast empty condemnations.
The Gaza is routinely used as a hot button issue in political wrangling. The actual people who suffer or become violent are secondary to the points scored from being seen as having concern for the suffering and violence.
The West is perhaps happy to let the fight continue. As long as Arab resources are turned towards aiding Palestinians and threatening Israel and as long as Israeli attention is turned towards defending Israel and counteracting threats, the middle east will remain a trouble spot with little to offer except oil and war. While the enormous territory stretching from the Mediterranean to the Indian ocean remains a barely controllable security threat, the Muslin lands are not a threat to America leadership. The united territories of India, China, Russia, Brazil and hopefully soon, Europe are threats to American hegemony purely on the back of thier size and ability to form consensus. The middle east, Africa, the rest of South America, and central Asia will not develop a consensus and therefore cannot attain sufficient size to ever be a challenge to Europe much less the United States. Israel is contentious and ephermal but it guarantees that America and the west will never have an Ottoman-like caliphate to deal with again.
A great part of counterinsurgency nowadays involves using the action and psychology in very precise and effects based ways. An innocent law abiding man can pick up a weapon and become an insurgent, kill soldiers and innocents alike and then return to being an innocent man by simply putting the weapon down again. Its even worse when the perfectly innocent civilian wires together explosives, places it in the road and then either waits to make an important phonecall or goes away and allows gravity and mass to take its deadly toll. The only actions that work in these situations are actions that make friends even when your agenda has nothing to do with friendship or even giving much of a shit about parochial agendas.
This means we don’t do things for the sake of doing them, we don’t do it because we feel or even think; we don’t even do things because we decide or plan. We do something because that is what is the next step towards fulfilling our overarching goal. We do things because it is part of the logistics of getting from point A to point B.
In late May of 2010 the British MOD published that their southern Afghanistan command was to be divided into two commands, splitting the Helmand/ Kandahar killbox into two killboxes. The newly formed South Western regional command will include the fertile Helmand province and accompanying Nimruz while Kamdahar, Zabul, Uruzgan and Daykundi will keep the name Southern Regional command. This makes room for what this weeks FT reports as a “restructuring” where US commanders will be rotated in periodically and taking control of British forces.
Is this a reflection of Nick Carter and his predecessors’ strategy thus far? Not necessarily. British military capacity has been for a long while the weakest point in the stabilization campaign. While the tactics themselves were, at times, woefully unfocused and helter skelter; British forces has suffered mostly due to lack of equipment and reinforcements. With the American troop surge, unmatched by any of its allies, more Yanks are in these problem provinces and those back home in the States will raise questions as to why the smaller English forces are commanding American troops when the English have been thus far been ineffective at commanding their own. It is after all, American General Stanley McCrystal that has made significant headway when British Generals have had to settle with uncomfortable standoffs and strategic impasses.
The war needs to end soon, for political and economic reasons. Afghanistan is being shouldered by the last active military power and therefore even though the British have done an admirable job in a tough situation the surge must continue through the capacity and command of those that are physically able. The Brits have done some great things but they haven’t been doing the things needed to win the war.
The reduction of responsibility that is inevitably a consequence of this move will sting proud British cheeks. But this is not about medals and who gets to write on the the chalkboard, this is about achieving goals using the best equipment and best men at ones disposal. A job needs to get done and this is how we are doing it.
