The
Times [of London] headline said it all: "Attack
Iran the day Iraq war ends, demands Israel."
What
more do we need to know about our "special relationship"
with Israel? Israel demands, we obey. Yes, there is something
very "special" indeed about U.S.-Israeli
relations: like John
Williams-Muhammed and John Lee Malvo, Bonnie
and Clyde, Nathan
Leopold and Richard Loeb, the Israeli and American governments
are team serial killers symbiotically linked, one a cat's-paw
for the other's murderous rage. One a controlling authority,
the brains of the operation, and the other a servile gofer,
an accomplice whose passion for obedience is surpassed only
by a perverse desire to love beyond the limits of rationality.
The "team killer" pattern is here replicated on
the global stage, as Sharon takes on his John Muhammad persona,
the dominating personality prepping his accomplice for yet
another murderous spree:
"In
an interview with The Times, Mr Sharon insisted that
Tehran one of the 'axis of evil' powers identified
by President Bush should be put under pressure 'the
day after' action against Baghdad ends because of its role
as a 'center of world terror.'"
Got
that, Mr. President?
And
lest anyone think the Israeli Prime Minister is getting ahead
of himself, Sharon has the course of the upcoming Iraq attack
all mapped out and ready to roll:
"He
made clear that western Iraq would be one of the first areas
targeted by the US in any invasion, saying that lessons had
been learnt from strategic mistakes of the 1991 Gulf War when
Iraq successfully fired 39 Scud missiles into Israel."
I
trust the boys in the Pentagon are taking notes assuming
that Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld hasn't bypassed
them altogether. After all, if we're going to take our marching
orders from Sharon, then perhaps the question of strategy
and tactics is best handled by the IDF.
They, after all, are the best judges of Israel's military
interests, which – let's face it are the overriding
consideration here. In any case, this arrangement would merely
take the military reality to another level, since American
troops are already being trained by Israeli commandos,
who have plenty of experience in the unique brutalities of
Middle Eastern-style warfare:
"Israeli
infantry units with experience in urban warfare during the
Palestinian uprising helped train U.S. Army and Marine counterparts
this summer and fall for possible urban battles in Iraq, a
foreign defense official says."
We're
going to do to the Iraqis what the Israelis have been doing
to the Palestinians – some "liberation"!
One
would assume this training program is supposed to be a deep
dark secret, but the sheer number of administration officials,
diplomats, and others in the know who blabbed to John Diamond
of USA Today makes it look like a deliberate leak.
Although it is hard to believe even of this administration
that the Americans are throwing this in the faces of
their Arab allies, that news sends an unmistakable signal.
The USA Today story goes on to describe the Israeli
training facility:
"The
Israelis have built two mock cities, complete with mosques,
hanging laundry and even the odd donkey meandering down dusty
streets. A defense official said the sites far surpass U.S.
facilities."
Of
course they do – they're the best American tax dollars can
buy. Since carrying out Israel's national interests in the
region is our diplomatic and military objective, why not
have the very best training sites in Israel rather than the
U.S.? Here is an actual physical demonstration of an important
point made by Professor
Paul W. Schroeder in a recent issue of The American
Conservative, who noted the unique
precedent that would be set by a U.S. war on Iraq:
"It
would represent something to my knowledge unique in history.
It is common for great powers to try to fight wars by proxy,
getting smaller powers to fight for their interests. This
would be the first instance I know where a great power (in
fact, a superpower) would do the fighting as the proxy of
a small client state."
But
it is perfectly understandable in terms of individual psychology,
where it is possible to have the smaller, physically less
prepossessing half of the killing team be more dominant: the
brains behind the brawn. One
study of team killers draws a vivid psychological portrait
of the killers and their relationship, which is invariably
that of master and slave:
"Sometimes
the team leader or dominant partner sends the others out to
do what he wants, and sometimes he participates."
The
Israelis haven't quite made up their minds if they're going
to directly participate. The Times reports:
"
[Sharon] also issued his clearest warning yet that Israel
would strike back if attacked by Iraqi chemical or biological
weapons, no matter how much Washington sought to keep its
controversial Middle Eastern ally out of any war in Iraq."
In
spite of the Americans' eagerness to keep the Israeli connection
at a very low profile, Sharon just can't help tweaking the
noses of State Department diplomats. Not only does it play
well at home, but it also serves as a reminder of just who
is the dominant member of this killing team.
The
Americans and the Israelis are going on a murder spree, and
their victims will be untold thousands of Iraqis, Iranians,
Palestinians, and Arab Muslims of every description. There
can be little doubt as to which of the two is the team leader
in this case. Washington, avers Sharon, is already on board:
"I
have been to Washington and one of the things I talked about
was what will be (sic) later, if Iraq is going to be disarmed.
One of the things I mentioned is that the free world should
take all the necessary steps to prevent irresponsible countries
from having weapons of mass destruction: Iran, Iraq of course,
and Libya is working on a nuclear weapon."
But
why take on Iran, whose mullahs would be given a new lease
on life with the threat of an American invasion? Because,
you see, the Iranians are said to be sponsoring the Hezbollah
guerrillas harrying Israel's northern border. While we invade
Iran, the IDF will presumably re-invade Lebanon, a convenient
division of military labor – convenient, that is, for the
Israelis.
I
wonder how long it will take Jack Straw to get slapped down.
On hearing the Israeli Prime Minister's comments, the
British foreign secretary said:
"I
profoundly disagree with him. I think the way to ensure proper
progress with Iran is not by that kind of hostile threat,
but by the process of constructive and critical engagement
that we are involved in."
Straw
just doesn't get it, although this shouldn't worry Sharon.
In any fight for the attention of the American hegemon, there's
no doubt that Sharon would win out over Blair. The Anglophile
lobby in the U.S. is hardly the power it once was. The Israelis
are playing the preemption game much better than the Brits,
but that's to be expected: they, after all, invented it. George
W. Bush merely followed in their footsteps in announcing his
own doctrine of "preemptive defense." Just as
the Israelis see the invasion and occupation of Palestinian
lands as the fulfillment of their "security needs,"
so the Americans are now applying the same principle to Iraq
– and, soon enough, to the entire Middle East.
In
analyzing how nations interact on the world stage, what we
are studying is the behavior of certain individuals, the leaders,
who exhibit all the foibles of ordinary human beings – and
some not so ordinary. That's why, in studying the special
relationship of the U.S. and Israeli governments, the psychology
of team killers, as described in the study cited above, is
so useful. The study goes on to make an important point about
the dynamics of the relationship that is all too applicable
in this case:
"At
times they're related or married, and other times they're
strangers who happen to spark the right chemistry. When females
are involved, it's generally the male who masterminds the
homicides, unless the female is dominant, such as in a mother-son
team. There is always one person who maintains psychological
control."
As
Sharon travels around the world, from Washington
to London
to Moscow,
laying down conditions, issuing diktats, and generally throwing
his weight around, the efficacy of the dominance principle
is all too apparent. But what happens if the Israelis get
their Middle East war, and it starts to turn sour, at least
for the Americans? What happens when the conquest of more
territory than ever dreamed of by Alexander hits a few unexpected
glitches – such as retaliation via acts of terror right here
in the U.S.? Back to that study:
"Generally
when things get hot, psychopaths save themselves by turning
on the other person, or at the very least, they spread the
blame."
When
the terror comes home, along with the body-bags, and the economic
consequences of this war hit Americans in the pocket-book,
the Republicans – classic suckers – will take the blame. The
Democrats, loath to take a position against either the war
or Israel, will cash in without pledging to change U.S. foreign
policy in any fundamental sense. Meanwhile, to point out the
real causes of this needless disaster will be deemed "anti-Semitic,"
and we'll get dragged into decades of constant warfare that
can only end in disaster.
LEFT
AND RIGHT UNITE
Although
Ronald
Radosh will no doubt be horrified, the prospect of a Left-Right
alliance against a U.S. war in the Middle East is taking shape
on the internet in the form of a unique group-blog: Stand
Down, which bills itself as "the Left-Right Blog
Opposing an Invasion of Iraq." Their statement
of unity is a veritable model of what the antiwar movement
ought to be saying:
"The
members of Stand Down hold a wide variety of different and,
indeed, conflicting political positions, but all are in agreement
on a single proposition: that the use of military force to
effect ‘regime change’ in Iraq is ill advised and unjustified.
We do not deny that the current Iraqi regime is monstrous,
but we hold, following John Adams, that the United States
need not go ‘abroad in search of monsters to destroy"
unless they pose a clear and direct threat to American national
security."
Not
pacifist, not in denial as to the nature of the Iraqi regime,
and standing proudly in the tradition of the Founders of this
country. And they’re patriots:
"The
more shrill advocates of invasion have tried for some time
to imply that lack of enthusiasm for military action implies
insufficient patriotism, or even hatred of America. Nothing
could be further from the truth. It is precisely our affection
for the ideals of a constitutional republic that leads us
to believe that a country imbued with America’s enormous power
must exercise equally great restraint."
This
is an expression of a truly American radicalism. Its authenticity
is a thoughtful reproach not only to the War Party’s bombastic
calls for jihad, but also stands in stark contrast to the
formulaic bromides offered up by the A.N.S.W.E.R. crowd. Bookmark
this one.
Justin Raimondo
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