It is devoutly to be wished that this whole thing go back to simmer mode.
Until November 8th, Lord. Until November 8th at the least.
On November 8th we can start assembling yardarms in the Rose Garden.

Posted by: Antifa | Jul 31 2006 5:04 utc | 3

I couldn’t get into Hizbullah’s al-manar web site again, so wondered if it had been hacked, just as the Al-Jazeera web site had been hacked at the beginning of the Iraq war in order to stop showing photographs. Well, apparently so — both the web site and the TV station.
See

IDF intelligence unit manages to hack al-Manar broadcast, plant caricature of Hizbullah’s leader with caption: ‘Your days are numbered’
After repeated Israeli efforts to destroy Hizbullah’s al-Manar television station have failed, an IDF intelligence unit succeeded this week in hacking the station’s live broadcasts, planting Israeli PR messages in the transmissions..
I can’t get to
http://www.almanar.com.lb/
— hopefully only temporary.
It was a well-designed and informative web site, and it performed a service for many days.

Posted by: Owl | Jul 31 2006 5:10 utc | 5

If this is really how it ends, then this is amazing. Time to start thinking about the implications.
Hezballah are only going to re-arm themselves. They will know, and the Israeli’s will know that any future operations are going to be met with a hail of rockets that Israel cannot stop. Israel’s strategic options have been massively curtailed. They may even have to start respecting their northern border.
In the back of their mind, the Israeli’s are also going to be wondering what sort of surprises Hezballah will come up with next time. More anti-ship missiles? Will they take out an F-16 ? What about longer range rockets that actually hit the target?
And Hezballah will inevitably learn more from this than Israel. Will the success of the rockets get them googling low cost cruise missiles ?
Its also got also got to get military minds thinking about the effectiveness of rockets and missiles and the impotence of air power. If this is what a militia can do with a few home made rockets, imagine what an innovative full blown state could come up with.
The success of the Silkworm attack on the Israeli frigate will make Iran alot more confident it can shut down the gulf with its anti-ship missiles. Iran has missiles that are much better than a Silkworm.
I have been thinking this for a while, and this conflict has only re-inforced my opinion. Relatively cheap and effective rockets and missiles are going to completely transform modern war. Its going to make virtual “air force’s” affordable to everyone.

Posted by: still working it out | Jul 31 2006 5:44 utc | 7

And even if Israel can’t get it up, Cheney and Rumsfeld have surely got other ways to start this war with Iran. In their view, it has got to be.
I wonder what Russia and China have been up to behind the scenes.

Posted by: Malooga | Jul 31 2006 6:07 utc | 9

I found this over at INFORMED COMMENT;
Pope Urges Immediate Ceasefire In Lebanon
and God said Can You Hear Me Now???… George???…Are You There???

Posted by: tescht | Jul 31 2006 7:05 utc | 11

The rockets are chum to the Israeli shark. The Hizbollah fighters are baiting the beast and waiting for it in and under the destroyed villages and farms of Lebanon.
Hizbollah is showing every Arab government in the Middle East how to hook and gut armed forces that think and fight just like Guderian did in 1940, that still think territory is victory, when it is only terrain.
Israel is making the same fundamental error that the US/UK is making in Iraq. Certainly air & armor, lightning war can conquer and claim territory, again and then again. It is strategically irrelevant to do so. A successful occupation is the only end to the insurgency.
To occupy foreign turf, you must remove the population or police it fairly. To police it fairly, you must live honorably among the people you would supervise. Without the respect and cooperation of the populace, you cannot safely occupy even your own shoes. No, you do not own even that much territory.
The existential need of the neocon Bush Administration, and the American nation that has yet to repudiate them, is to create a puppet regime in Iran this year so that the 20 years of oil left in the Middle East moves through the American economy. Without that puppet regime, we are bust.
That is why this splendid little war was started, and must continue. That is why we fight in Iraq. That is why these wars will be mere footnotes to the war that is coming.
This Lebanon campaign will be remembered as the fuse, not the cannon.
Whomsoever in the Middle East fights the Americans and Israelis from today will not drive tanks and fly planes. They will not march in uniformed ranks together, and they will not have front lines or rear areas.
That means they can never win, but then, they don’t need to. They simply need to see that the pumps and pipes and ports and priceless tankers that convey petroleum and gas to the West — do piss poor business.
And that means America and Israel can never win, not without removing the population from the territory they conquer. Only the death or deportation of a billion Muslims can hope to end such an insurgency.
One planet spinning through space. One precious resource going up in smoke, dribbling away alongside a river of blood as we homo sapiens fight over it.
A global UN conference could be called tomorrow, and all the oil remaining in the Earth could be tallied up and then shared among all 192 nations. We could wrap up such a conference in a month or two, skip the bloodshed, and turn our efforts as a species to our planet.
The reason to do so is that there simply is no military solution to this approaching petroleum shortage. There is only cooperation, or death like you cannot imagine.

Posted by: Antifa | Jul 31 2006 8:24 utc | 13

Not throwing the towel – just a change in tactic

Window of opportunity about to be closed, Israel plans barrage of fire: In the next few days Israel is expected to boost its military ground efforts in a bid to emerge from the war in Lebanon with a significant achievement before a complete ceasefire is imposed, a senior security-political sources in Jerusalem said Sunday evening.
Israel plans to significantly boost the activities of its armor and infantry corps, in light of the decision to halt all air strikes in Lebanon for 48 hours following the Qana village bombing.
A senior source at the Prime Minister’s Office estimated Monday morning that Israel had about a week left to complete the military operation
in Lebanon.
“The discussions at the Security Council will begin this coming Wednesday, and a possible decision on a ceasefire will not be made before Friday. According to our estimations, an immediate international intervention force is expected to arrive next Monday, and only then it will be possible to apply a ceasefire in the area,” the source said.

Posted by: b | Jul 31 2006 9:09 utc | 15

6:41 AM ET
“JERUSALEM (AP) – The Israeli air force carried out strikes Monday in southern Lebanon despite an agreement to halt raids for 48 hours after nearly 60 Lebanese civilians were killed in an Israeli bombing, the army said.
“The airstrikes near the village of Taibe were meant to protect ground forces operating in the area and were not targeting anyone or anything specific, the army said. (emphasis added)
“Meanwhile, Hezbollah guerrillas attacked an Israeli tank in southern Lebanon, wounding three soldiers, the military said. The attack occurred near the villages of Kila and Taibe on border, where Israeli ground forces have been fighting Hezbollah guerrillas for nearly two weeks.
“Israel Radio also reported that Hezbollah rockets hit the northern town of Kiryat Shemona.”
***
not targeting anyone or anything specific . . . apparently once you pickle off your bombs, the blame lies entirely with the law of gravity.

Posted by: Antifa | Jul 31 2006 11:46 utc | 17

“The discussions at the Security Council will begin this coming Wednesday, and a possible decision on a ceasefire will not be made before Friday. According to our estimations, an immediate international intervention force is expected to arrive next Monday, and only then it will be possible to apply a ceasefire in the area,” the source said.
The Israelis continue to forget that the enemy always gets a vote.

Posted by: billmon | Jul 31 2006 13:36 utc | 19

If one US soldier steps foot on Lebanese soil, all bets are off. Bombs over Damascus and Tehran within days.

Posted by: Cloned Poster | Jul 31 2006 16:19 utc | 21

Antifa wrote:
Israel is making the same fundamental error that the US/UK is making in Iraq. Certainly air & armor, lightning war can conquer and claim territory, again and then again. It is strategically irrelevant to do so. A successful occupation is the only end to the insurgency.
To occupy foreign turf, you must remove the population or police it fairly. To police it fairly, you must live honorably among the people you would supervise. Without the respect and cooperation of the populace, you cannot safely occupy even your own shoes. No, you do not own even that much territory.
I agree.
However, both Afgh. and Iraq show that USuk think they can take a different road – that they can let the territory go into the hands of circumscribed and local governing parties or dominators of any kind, while they (with a puppet Gvmt. or any other arrangement) control the strategic ressources – fossil fuels, pipelines and transport routes, mines and their routes, water, etc. This means splitting the territory into different ‘zones’ and controlling only those, with Rumsfeld-type light high-tech guarding force.
It also means, of course, subjugating the population utterly, which requires killing a lot of them, often more for psychological effect than number reduction, and that old stand-by, divide to conquer – if they are all at hammers and tongs with each other, they will not notice the overlay of the dominator. The people on the ground also have to be plunged into poverty, become food-dependent. Any Union or worker’s movement must be immediately smashed, as these tend to be quite determined, and receive popular support, as people can see what the workers do, such as provide milk, fridges or viable bridges, etc. That is why all State-run or enterprises have to go, in the name of the sacrosanct free market.
That is also why indiscriminate bombing, or shock and awe, is an aim in itself.
This strategy worked in Yugoslavia, which was split up, its industries taken over, the pipelines organised, etc. Billy C. though had the support of Europe, and Yugoslavia is still a fairly rich, civilized, and controllable place. Afgh. – oh long story.
The model rests in part on what Israel has accomplished. The other part is corporate inspired – pass a few laws written on napkins, and tell people to shut up, or wait long years for suits to come to corrupt courts (that has worked in the US) and meanwhile do as you like. The last part is hubris that rests on seeing Arabs as non people, a mistake the US has made before (Vietnam) and not learnt from. Technotopia plays a role as well. Lastly, let’s not forget the ‘accurate’ (inverted commas needed there) perception of Joe Public, who in his guts, knows what is at stake, that is, his survival, and is willing to make many sacrifices.

Posted by: Noirette | Jul 31 2006 16:32 utc | 23

@Malooga – in a three-way pincer (Iraq, Turkey, and Lebanon)
Attacking Syria through Turkey? No way the Turkish government will allow that. Public opinion in Turkey is rabbit anti-american by now.

Posted by: b | Jul 31 2006 18:09 utc | 25

The pacifists are alive and kicking, yours truly at least ;(
Besides that, citizen, the world has changed. Profoundly. Post ww2 and the de-colonisation era that followed was a time of plenty, of technological development – particularly the Green Revolution -, and the attendant social changes (such as they were, but never mind that now), a growing, and very real belief that war is harmful and wasteful, not really necessary, even if there were still plenty of ‘em going on. The stasis of the Cold war saw to it that many of the desired effects of war (e.g. arms sales, hyping enemies – McCarthyism, etc.) could be achieved without killing people – the threat of Hirohishima as an imagined reality was good enough.
The reasons why this state of affairs unravelled are multiple, and one can look at them from different povs.
The main reason, in my eyes, is dwindling resources. The luxury of war without war could no longer be sustained. That’s the very short answer.

Posted by: Noirette | Aug 1 2006 15:05 utc | 27

@Noirette, malooga et al..
The luxury of war without war could no longer be sustained.
As malooga says, well put, well put indeed.
One has to ask, what is war?
If I may be so bold as to reword your fine statement here Noirette, if only to make it clear for myself…it would look like this:
“The luxury of [covert] war without [overt] war could no longer be sustained.
For as Scott Ritter sd, “…Americans, and indeed much of the rest of the world, continue to be lulled into a false sense of complacency by the fact that overt conventional military operations have not yet commenced between the United States and Iran….”
and
“..Most Americans, together with the mainstream American media, are blind to the tell-tale signs of war, waiting, instead, for some formal declaration of hostility, a made-for-TV moment such as was witnessed on 19 March 2003.”
And to bring it home, i.e. the homefront:
The [all-ways has been ongoing] Long War, indeed, despite the hate mail, the ACTA witchhunt and the angry Op-ed pieces against Anthropologist Catherine Lutz and her work entitled: Homefront: A Military City and the American 20th Century , she has blown wide open the ideology and memetics that covertly govern our way of life in America. She has shown empirically and scientifically Our Legacy of War. In it she states, [we] …”have already been in a permanent state of war since the late 1930s. Mainly outsourced to the global south since 1945″, however, that has changed the essence has not. Another anthropologist I admire is both of whom give language to the unexamined “long war” ideals as Philip Bobbit speaks of. For me personally, it all boils down to ‘corporate colonialism’.

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Aug 1 2006 15:42 utc | 29