Wednesday Shake Up: did Hezbollah win?
Jonny_Paycheck
17,825 Posts
I say yes. peace, 'Check . . . 
Jonny_Paycheck
17,825 Posts
Comments
But if you were going to try and debate it. I say Hezbollah kinda does. Unless of course they keep with the cease fire and the Lebanon army is the only power in the region with the backing of the UN. Then maybe Israel got what it wanted and they come out on top.
But, I still say innocent people on both sides died. So, nobody won...
For real, its a war and a lot of innocent people died, so no, no one won.
Austin, Texas is the clear winner.
Those are just birth pangs, man. Come on.
The entire mission of "democratizing the middle east" or at least de-radicalizing it went up in smoke as the vast majority of Arabs embraced Hezbollah, Syria, and Iran during this conflict.
I think it will go down as one of the biggest military mistakes in Israeli history.
Israel played right into its enemies' hands, they did EXACTLY what Hezbollah, Iran, Syria, etc wanted them to do - wage a sloppy air war with massive civilian casualties, invade, occupy, and then withdraw while Hezbollah, flush with Iranian money, plays the role of people's champ.
Yeah, well, they should really stop reading from our playbook in that regard.
This will happen in Iraq too.
...except for Austin, Austin kept it real
a replay of their civil war seems possible.
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This kind of bullshit reminds me of when someone tried to tell me with a straight face that Vietnam was "more like a tie".
So either our leaders are so incompetent they couldn't anticipate this obvious outcome or so diabolical that they have some other wacked ulterior motives? I'd like to think they are simply incompetent.
It's what has pretty much already happened in Iraq. Bin Laden wanted to draw the US into a quagmire of sectarian violence and general clusterfuckiness in a Muslim country so as to inflame Muslim sensibilities. His only miscalculation was that he thought Afghanistan was going to be the country we got stuck in when Iraq turned out to be the place. All the same, we played right into his hands. And for that, thousands of people are dead.
Hezbollah has been in the construction industry for a while. If you ask me its a cheap ploy to gain favor with a people who's reigon they set up as a battle field.
Poor residents of the area are stuck in the middle of war and in the end the dudes who took up digs in their spot say hey "sorry we got your house bombed and your family killed but look we're good guys so we'll fix your windows. By the way this is all Israels fault".
I think some time has to pass before this statement can be looked at as true. The bigger divide in Hezbollah approval will come after a couple of months when we see how both Sunni and Shi'ite muslims reflect back.
sadly, I got to agree. Hezbollah, the peoples champ...as long as the peoples lives aren't taken into account.
I'm not calling it a tie. I'm just saying there is no clear cut winner in a war in which more civilians died than combatants and no clear cut goal was attained.
definitly not a victory for israel definitly not a victory for Hezbollah. ergo both sides can't honeslty claim victory
I believe Hezbollah did achieve a very clear cut goal: draw Israel into a conflict they could not possibly win, further demonize Israel in the minds of the people, reassert status as people's champ, increase stature in Lebanese government and society, further destabilize American mission in Iraq...
I am also not sure more Israeli civilians died than military, although that could be true. IDF were taking some pretty severe losses once they went in with ground troops.
KEEP IT OUT YA MOUFS, YA HEARD?????
Israel did not "carpet bomb" lebanon. I have been to the border twice and can tell you that even the towns on the border had numerous houses still standing. Carpet bombing is a specific term that refers to what America did to Hanoi in the Tet Offensive, or what the Nazis did to London in WW2. As a general rule, modern airforces, with the advance of guided munitions, no longer just drop tons of bombs on civilian areas. Some of lebanon, such as the Hezbollah suburbs of beiruts are indeed in smithereens. But most of Beirut is fine right now.
That said, Israel lost the war. It failed to destroy hezbollah. And hezbollah made up in prestige what it lost in physical infrastructure. I think you are right that the air campaign was a poor strategy for accomplishing the goal of decimating Hezbollah. But keep in mind that political perception also changes over time. I doubt very much that the coalition behind the cedar revolution takes kindly to explicit threats from nasrallah and assad in the aftermath of victory. And keep in mind, there will be a lot more aid money coming not only from america, but from saudi arabia, the world bank and others. Plus, Iran and Hezbollah talk a big game and try to maximize this stuff in the media, but at the end of the day they lack the engineers and planners necessary to actually do the reconstruction necessary.
repeat in 4 years or less.
Heard a radio report today from BBC/American Public Radio show that said over 50% of Israelies feel that this was a botched operation. The military leadership thought it would be a short and simple operation to knock out Hezbollah simply through air strikes. I guess none of those guys studied military history, or recent Israeli military actions at least.
Also heard that Hezbollah's leader is offering to pay one years rent for any family that lost their home. During the bombings they would go around neighborhoods and write down all of the buildings that were damaged and get in touch with the owners and offer to help them rebuild the house after things had settled down. Iran is pretty much basking in oil money right now so I'm sure Hezbollah will have the cash to follow through with many of their promises.
If destroying Israel was Hezbollah's main goal then you'd be right, but I don't think it is. The way I read things, fighting Israel is a means to an end, not an end to itself.
Hezbollah starting fighting Israel for two reasons in the 1980s. The biggest reason was because the Israel's invaded Lebanon and started acting like occupiers. At first the Shiites in the South welcomed the Lebanese because they didn't like the PLO that acted as the militia for the Sunni Arabs and had been forcing Shiites to join their fighting force and getting their villages blown up in retaliation strikes by the Israelis. The goodwill quickly dried up and Hezbollah was formed as a resistance group, but there was more to them than that.
Hezbollah was also a revolutionary organization inspired by, funded and trained by Iran. Who specifically was their revolution for? Shiites, the long ignored and impoverished minority Muslim sect. Iran had been trying to export its revolution around the Persian Gulf but had largely failed because they were Persians not Arabs. Now, Hezbollah was formed and there was finally a legitimate bridgehead in an Arab country. How was Hezbollah going to gain its legitimacy with Sunni Arabs however? By linking its struggle with THE issue in Arab politics, the Arab-Israeli conflict.
Fighting Israel than was about kicking them out of their country, but also a way to gain legitimacy with other Arabs. That continues to hold true to this day. They claim that they are the only Arabs to have defeated the Israelis and kicked them out. They claim they are the only group actually helping the Palestinians against Israel. They claim this little swath of the Golan Heights, is actually Lebanese territory so they still claim that they are fighting to drive out the Israelis from their country.
Since the Israelis departed Hezbollah has also moderated its stance within Lebanon and dramatically changed. It truly is a state within a state now. It???s more than a revolutionary terrorist group like Al Qaeda or Hamas, it largely runs part of a country, has seats in Lebanon???s government, and institutions like hospitals and a TV network. It doesn???t talk about revolution in Lebanon anymore (hence it didn???t march to Beirut after the Israelis left to take over the government), I think it???s real goal these days is to change the Lebanese political system so that the Shiite majority can actually have majority rule in the country. (Lebanon has an arcane political system set up by the former French colonists that reserves seats and positions in government based upon sectarian differences, the Christians hold the top position.)
I???m not saying Hezbollah wouldn???t be playing ???Celebration??? and partying in the streets if Israel was destroyed tomorrow, but it wouldn???t change their situation within Lebanon, which is their main focus.
this is not aimed at Paychecks specifically, just wondering peoples thoughts on this...
What should Israel have done? [/b]
Its easy to look back in hindsight, see Hezbollah largely intact and more popular than ever, and brand the whole thing a mistake on Israel??s part.
But assuming Israel was trying to defeat Hezbollah and just couldn??t do it, like, how was this a mistake ?
what, Israel??s army should have been more effective? OK...that??s another issue but does that make this whole operation a mistake ? what was the alternative?
??kill fewer civilians so that Hezbollah??s support would not have been so dramatically increased?? you say.
OK, but what matters is Hezbollah??s operational capabilities i.e. can they still launch missles at Israel. the answer is yes. and the UN resolution doesnt even require them to disarm. so yeah the operation was a defeat for Israel. but a mistake? they tried to destroy Hezbollah and couldnt do so before the international community imposed a ceasefire. a catastrophic defeat, yes, but i dont see how this was a mistake.
I'd say that Hezbollah's ability to strike at Israel has been all but taken away. I don't think you can every properly say that you've won when fighting a group like this because they are a rogue organization operating within another country. We don't know about the extent off their operations; they're a clandestine military group. For Israel to have won this encounter in conventional terms, it would have meant a complete and utter obliteration of the country of Lebanon. Southern Lebanon would be a smoldering crater. The death toll would be 500,000 not 1000. That's why Israel agreed to a cease-fire. The price of a total Israeli victory over hezbollah would have been too high for the Lebanese.
no one mentioned how Israel used White Phosphorus against civilians in an urban warfare enviornment
but most importantly this was a warm exercise for the iranian invasion/bombing campaign which will also fail as well
i am just bummed that the 34 day war didn't lead to "Armageddon/WW3"
get it over with already
maybe next time
the suspense is killing me