Article: "Diplomacy: War and piecemeal"

Here is a Jpost article from the Friday edition that sheds a little bit of light on the piecemeal factor I have been talking about.

It cannot be understated just how demoralizing this type of war fighting can become on troops and commanders, as well as citizens. It will result in a reverse attrition in terms of morale, upon us. Decisive action is required to reach even minimal goals and Olmert has been completely incapable of achieving them in any form. He has failed time and time again in two separate theaters of combat--pointlessly risking our civilian soldiers lives. 

Imagine the same piecemeal strategy employed against Iran (which is what is happening based on the fact that Hamas and Hezbollah are both Iranian proxies). I can see Olmert sending bombers out over Iran just to call them back as they are about to drop their payloads just so he can announce on TV: "See we could destroy their weapons if we wanted to, now they will see just how serious we are and destroy them themselves. Now they have seen our power!"

Ridiculous.


Diplomacy: War and piecemeal

By Herb Keinon

Throughout a tense and dramatic week - a week of battles in Jabaliya and Grad missiles falling on Ashkelon - the government's leaders have repeatedly deflected questions about Israel's tactics and strategy in the Gaza Strip by saying they don't want to give the enemy any foreknowledge of what the country will do.

"Everything is possible: aerial and ground raids, special operations and other operations; everything is up for discussions," Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told the Knesset's Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee on Monday. "We will not be revealing what we are considering, or when, because we don't want to give our enemies the chance to prepare," he continued.

Fair enough. But there is one collateral problem: Not only is the enemy confused; so are the country's citizens. If asked what their government was trying to do in Gaza this week, most people would probably say the policy was aimed at protecting the citizens of the South and stopping the rocket fire. But follow-up questions - whether Israel was trying to topple Hamas; whether Israel wanted to go back into Gaza; whether Israel was aiming not only to stop the rocket fire, but also end the massive arms buildup there - would probably be met with befuddled looks, a scratch of the head, and a goofy "I dunno."

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