Quote:Original post by Lessbread

Quote:Original post by Diodor

Quote:How is it that Hezbollah participated in Lebanese democracy prior to the onset of current hostilities?

Why wouldn't they. Getting voted in obliges one not at all to having any allegiance to the system.

They wouldn't because participation would mean bringing a gradual end to their armed wing. Prior to the onset of these hostilities, Hezbollah gained support by providing social services. Their armed wing was more of a hindrance than a help in that regard. If they had no allegiance to the system, then why didn't they make a grab for power back when the Syrian army left Lebanon? Why were they content to hold rallies instead?

Only the actions of the armed wing matter. Let's focus on them and ignore the socialist wing and the political wing as the mildly useful auxiliaries that they are. What the armed wing says goes - what they want is, to quote Darth Vader, power. There is little power in being voted in and out by poor Shia slums, or in providing social services more effectively. Power comes from Tehran in the form of munitions, cash and training. Some of that cash gets invested in social services, some in offering fortification building jobs. Without the external help they sell their country for they'd decay into a mob of sorts just as you say and only the pothole fixing wings would remain. With it, they can hit the big time.

If one believes Tehran is using Hizballah as a threat against US intervention, it follows they are convinced Hizballah would betray Lebanon, ignore the parliament and launch a war on Israel. They bet all those munitions on it. And if anyone should know, it's them.

Let me end by observing how far fetched this terrorist fading out act appears at a time when everybody is surprised by Hizballah's unexpected strength.

Quote:Original post by Diodor

Quote:Original post by Lessbread

Quote:Original post by Diodor

Quote:How is it that Hezbollah participated in Lebanese democracy prior to the onset of current hostilities?

Why wouldn't they. Getting voted in obliges one not at all to having any allegiance to the system.

They wouldn't because participation would mean bringing a gradual end to their armed wing. Prior to the onset of these hostilities, Hezbollah gained support by providing social services. Their armed wing was more of a hindrance than a help in that regard. If they had no allegiance to the system, then why didn't they make a grab for power back when the Syrian army left Lebanon? Why were they content to hold rallies instead?

Only the actions of the armed wing matter. Let's focus on them and ignore the socialist wing and the political wing as the mildly useful auxiliaries that they are. What the armed wing says goes - what they want is, to quote Darth Vader, power. There is little power in being voted in and out by poor Shia slums, or in providing social services more effectively. Power comes from Tehran in the form of munitions, cash and training. Some of that cash gets invested in social services, some in offering fortification building jobs. Without the external help they sell their country for they'd decay into a mob of sorts just as you say and only the pothole fixing wings would remain. With it, they can hit the big time.

I think you are too quick to dismiss the social services. Absent external threats, that's what legitimizes them and gets them followers. That is the foundation of their power. The money from Iran simply builds on that.

Quote:Original post by Diodor
If one believes Tehran is using Hizballah as a threat against US intervention, it follows they are convinced Hizballah would betray Lebanon, ignore the parliament and launch a war on Israel. They bet all those munitions on it. And if anyone should know, it's them.

That smacks of mind reading.

Quote:Original post by Diodor
Let me end by observing how far fetched this terrorist fading out act appears at a time when everybody is surprised by Hizballah's unexpected strength.

That surprise melts away in light of stories about dischord between the IAF and the IDF. And then there's this: Israel allowing civilian deaths on purpose?

Quote:
On his CNN TV program [Reliable Sources], Howard Kurtz of the Washington Post interviewed Thomas Ricks, the Post's Pentagon reporter and author of the book Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq.

RICKS: "One of the things that is going on, according to some U.S. military analysts, is that Israel purposely has left pockets of Hezbollah rockets in Lebanon, because as long as they're being rocketed, they can continue to have a sort of moral equivalency in their operations in Lebanon."

KURTZ: "Hold on, you're suggesting that Israel has deliberately allowed Hezbollah to retain some of its fire power, essentially for PR purposes, because having Israeli civilians killed helps them in the public relations war here?"

RICKS: "Yes, that's what military analysts have told me."

KURTZ: "that's an extraordinary testament to the notion that having people on your own side killed actually works to your benefit in that nobody wants to see your own citizens killed but it works to your benefit in terms of the battle of perceptions here."

RICKS: "It helps you with the moral high ground problem, because you know your operations in Lebanon are going to be killing civilians as well."

This is, of course, anonymously-sourced speculation and would not remove culpability from Hezbollah forces who are firing into civilian neighborhoods but, if true, it would be a shocking betrayal of Israelis by their own government.

Quote:Original post by honey
IDF captures Lebanese soldiers

Quote:Lebanon claims IDF troops have captured around 350 Lebanese soldiers and security personnel in a military base in Marjayoun. It appears that there are also Lebanese civilians taking shelter in the base.

The Lebanese interior minister told Arab reporters on Thursday that IDF troops had come to the base, asked to enter it, and then apprehended all of those present. The Al-Jazeera network reported that the IDF had separated the soldiers from the officers and disarmed them.

The Lebanese soldiers who were being held were not members of combat units. The Lebanese minister said his government has called on France and the United States to help release the soldiers.

if that is true - is Israel completely nuts? why capturing soldiers that a) are not combat soldiers and b) belong to an army that is not fighting the invaders/occupiers? that doesn't make any sense! the next base the IDF encounters will not willingly give up but fight the IDF - is that maybe the aim? drag the Lebanese army into it to justify the carpet bombing of the entire country? in the end army bases are all over Lebanon, not only in the south ....

Israel appears to have lost the momentum of the war. If the Lebanese troops move in to form a buffer, Hezbollah will have won.

The Buck Stops Where?

Quote:
...
The name of the American game is: to give the Israeli army more days, and perhaps more weeks, to go on with the war, to pursue the mirage of victory, while pretending to make great efforts to stop the war. It seems that Olmert has promised Bush to win after all, if given time.

The new proposals of the Beirut government have lit red lights in Jerusalem. The Lebanese government proposes to deploy 15 thousand Lebanese troops along the border, declare a cease-fire and get the Israeli troops out of Lebanon. That is exactly what the Israeli government demanded at the start of the war. But now it looks like a danger. It could stop the war without an Israeli victory.

Thus a paradoxical situation has arisen: the Israeli government is rejecting a proposal that reflects its original war aims, and instead demands the deployment of an international force, which it objected to strenuously at the start of the war. That's what happens when you start a war without clear and achievable aims. Everything gets mixed up.
...
I am going now to say something I did not think I would ever utter: It is quite possible that we would not have slid into this foolish war if Ariel Sharon were in charge. Fact: he did not attack Hizbullah after the withdrawal in 2000. One attempt was enough for him. Which proves again that there is nothing so bad that something worse cannot be found.
...

I included that last paragraph because it's almost the same thing that I said last week.

Quote:Original post by honey
IDF captures Lebanese soldiers

Quote:Lebanon claims IDF troops have captured around 350 Lebanese soldiers and security personnel in a military base in Marjayoun. It appears that there are also Lebanese civilians taking shelter in the base.

The Lebanese interior minister told Arab reporters on Thursday that IDF troops had come to the base, asked to enter it, and then apprehended all of those present. The Al-Jazeera network reported that the IDF had separated the soldiers from the officers and disarmed them.

The Lebanese soldiers who were being held were not members of combat units. The Lebanese minister said his government has called on France and the United States to help release the soldiers.

if that is true - is Israel completely nuts? why capturing soldiers that a) are not combat soldiers and b) belong to an army that is not fighting the invaders/occupiers? that doesn't make any sense! the next base the IDF encounters will not willingly give up but fight the IDF - is that maybe the aim? drag the Lebanese army into it to justify the carpet bombing of the entire country? in the end army bases are all over Lebanon, not only in the south ....

It seems the responsible thing to do. I think it would be rather difficult for Israel to insure nothing happened to them otherwise.

I'll note the vulnerability of the Merkava tanks (world's best protected) to Russian anti-tank missiles changes the whole strategic status-quo in Iraq.

Quote:Original post by Diodor
I'll note the vulnerability of the Merkava tanks (world's best protected) to Russian anti-tank missiles changes the whole strategic status-quo in Iraq.

I doubt it since few ever face our tanks in Iraq.