Wednesday, August 16, 2006
The always entertaining Debka has an interesting story on the view from the Iranian side of the Lebanon coin (via IsraPundit). Here's the gist: Tehran Takes Gloomy View of the Lebanon War and Truce
After UN Security Council resolution 1701 calling for a truce was carried Friday, Aug. 11, the heads of the regime received two separate evaluations of the situation in Lebanon – one from Iran’s foreign ministry and one from its supreme national security council. Both were bleak: their compilers were concerned that Iran had been manipulatively robbed of its primary deterrent asset ahead of a probable nuclear confrontation with the United States and Israel.
While the foreign ministry report highlighted the negative aspects of the UN resolution, the council’s document complained that Hizballah squandered thousands of rockets – either by firing them into Israel or having them destroyed by the Israeli air force.
The writer of this report is furious over the waste of Iran’s most important military investment in Lebanon merely for the sake of a conflict with Israeli over two kidnapped soldiers.
It took Iran two decades to build up Hizballah’s rocket inventory...
There is some truth here, regardless of the veracity of the details. For years, a state much like that prevailing between the two Koreas has prevailed between Lebanon and Israel -- just as North Korean artillery has held the South hostage to any potential strike, so too has Hizballah rocketry held Israeli civilian life and infrastructure hostage to any action against them. In the case of the Lebanon/Israel border, that deterrent has now been tested. Leaving aside how much of Hiz's rocket inventory or launch capability has been lost, and without intending to minimize the truly terrible effects of those attacks on Israel, they do, in fact, appear not to have lived up to our worst nightmares. Israel showed it was ready and could take it if push came to shove. Whether Hizballah has a significant inventory now or not, the deterrent has been lost. That means a layer of comfort has been removed for both Syria and Iran, and more options -- military and diplomatic -- open for us.
