The Middle East

Demand Answers

Dave Davis Commentary, Policy, The Middle East, Uncategorized , , , ,

You see an accident about to happen, but no matter how loud you yell, no one hears. Or maybe no one was listening. Even before the US and Israel started their attack on Iran, some foresaw the need for friends on the ground in that nation. Some suggested the Kurds as a good bet for establishing a safe area in Iran to organize, train, and equip the resistance. If others had a better idea for the armed overthrow of the ruling Regime, that’s fine, but without this basic strategy, just bombing would fail.

Once the attack unfolded, we had nothing-zilch on the ground. Worse, we were unprepared to counter the likely Iranian response—no adequate defense against the Regime’s large stock of rockets, and especially drones. When Iran closed the Strait of Hormuz, likely with mines, we had no minesweepers. To top things off, we went through so much of our very expensive ordinance that we may run out.

The next thing we knew, we had a ceasefire that left us short of all our objectives. We needed real regime change to have an Iranian government we could trust not to develop nuclear weapons, and the rockets to deliver them. No more pawns such as Hezbollah, Hamas, and the Houthis terrorize our area friends, especially Israel.

Now we have a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) that has opened the Strait but also removes our counter-blockade. This situation puts us back to before the attack, but illuminates our failure to achieve any of our objectives. We’ll talk about Iran’s nuclear program over the next two months. Trump has conceded any restraint on ballistic missiles. If Iran behaves, we’ll return the money we seized and set up a $300 billion “reconstruction fund ” paid for by our Gulf friends.

With the opening of the Strait, oil money flows to Iran without sanctions. These funds will feed its terrorist network to threaten Israel and its neighbors, while it strengthens the Regime—the MOU depends on the end of hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel. Not part of the negotiations, Israel is still under pressure to abide by it. Yet it needs a buffer in Lebanon to protect its northern areas from constant attack:

While the US and especially Israel have gained nothing so far, Iran shows its dominance over the Strait, its ability to hit not only its neighbors, but targets as far away as Europe, money will increasingly flow into its coffers to finance its pawns, and drive a visible wedge between the US and Israel, while doing nothing on Iran’s nuclear program. This situation goes a long way toward Iranian regional hegemony. Any reasonable person would conclude Iran is coming out on top.

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Choosing to Lose

Dave Davis Commentary, Policy, The Middle East, Uncategorized , , , ,

Unless we’re willing to inflict enormous pain on those we were supposed to help, the Iranian people, or put boots on the ground, or some combination of the two, we have a lost war with the Iranian theocracy. Awishy-washy nuclear deal, akin to, but maybe not as good as the one Obama negotiated, will end our involvement.

This conclusion leaves our Gulf allies in a precarious situation. Iran illustrated how it can hit their infrastructure anytime with rockets and drones. Closing the Strait of Hormuz or changing tolls remains subject to Iran’s whims. Spending billions on this outcome, we expected much better. Faith in America’s ability to protect our friends and allies is now questionable.

A recent feel-good story in the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) shows both a possible path to right the war’s trend and exposes the lack of proper action that put us in this situation in the first place. Going into the war, the different radars that alert troops to incoming drones and missiles, and the interceptors used to shoot them down, didn’t talk to one another. This situation required a large number of personnel to monitor many monitors. This lack of integration may have contributed to the loss of six soldiers in Kuwait.

On a trip to Europe. Army Secretary Dan Driscoll became aware of the incompatibility issue and how the Ukrainians resolved it using proper software. The secretary got the Dense Contractors and bureaucrats to waive objections, and the engineers got together and came up with a Google Maps-type single screen, allowing for the proper response to any threat. After demonstrating it worked, we are now achieving the needed integration.

While we have now solved a major battlefield problem, it raises the question: why wasn’t it done before we went to war? Didn’t we wargame before we committed? Drone warfare has been a key feature of the Ukraine war for years. We’re just now finding out how they handle them. We actually reverse-engineered the key Iranian drone for our use, so we should know all about them. Yet we lack drone dominance to control the area.

The Administration and Iran Hawks can loudly claim success in the war all they want, but the facts on the ground say otherwise. Giving statistics on how many ships we sunk, or bombs we dropped, sounds reminiscent of the Vietnam War body counts. If we sunk their Navy, why are we looking for mines in the Strait, and why are so few ships risking leaving? Hawks such as Condoleezza Rice can claim, “It has achieved enough to produce a far better Middle East.”

Our Gulf friends and allies turning to the Ukrainians for answers to Iran’s drone and rocket capabilities threatening them doesn’t sound like they feel the area is “more stable.” Can we assure them of safe passage of the Strait, now and into the future? The Strait was open before the war. How are they better off?

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Crossroads

Dave Davis Commentary, Policy, The Middle East, Uncategorized , , , ,

Forgoing his son’s wedding, President Trump is in Washington promising to inform us of a decisive next move in the Iranian War. With the “ceasefire in effect for about a month, at the beginning of May, the Wall Street Journal editorialized that the administration must successfully finish the War. I agreed, but in an unpublished letter to the editor, I pointed out the changes needed, or we would fail:

To: WSJ letters to the editor

      Trump’s resolve on Iran at 60 Days.”

       The Journal’s editorial board is correct in stating that Trump’s abandonment of the War is unpalatable. However, this ignores the elephant in the room: the failure, from the start, to set clear goals, develop a strategy, and equip the military with the tools to achieve them. We attacked without the ‘why’ and ‘how’ being determined. We failed to anticipate the enemy’s likely countermeasures. Closing the Strait of Hormuz, and the widespread use of drones and rockets against our friends and us, weren’t anticipated and countered. Our lack of offensive and defensive drone capacity, or even of mine sweeping, shows a lack of real preparation.  

If we fail to rectify these shortcomings, dragging out an unfocused war will end with the same untrustworthy fanatics in control in Iran. The taste of defeat and humiliation will not only remain foul but will be much more costly.

It will likely take replacing the current ineffective military command with new, knowledgeable, and imaginative leadership to put a workable plan into action. With help from others, such as Ukraine and the Kurds, to fill in the gaps, there is still time to win this War, but not without recognizing how we went wrong in the first place.  Dave Davis, Phoenix, AZ 

If Trump decides to escalate from here, what visible signs will there be to hope for success? Some indication of armed revolt or turning of existing military units within Iran. Bombing and the blockade by themselves don’t directly threaten the ruling Iranian Regime. One has only to look at Cuba, where the people are living with next to nothing, and still the communists are in charge. The people can’t shoot back.

Conversely, a successful armed uprising is an existential threat. The Revolutionary Guard Corps. (IRGC) has no choice but to divert troops and resources to quickly suppress the uprising or ultimately face being crushed. However, moving to contain the revolt exposes the IRGC to the overwhelming U.S. and Israeli air power.

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Anatomy of a Failure

Dave Davis Commentary, Policy, The Middle East, Uncategorized , , , ,

We’ve ceased our offense against Iran, while the same Regime controls the vital Strait of Hormuz. Our Gulf allies are increasingly at the mercy of this ruthless gang. Israel is off bombing Hezbollah in Lebanon, trying to salvage something from this fiasco. Our other allies in Europe and Asia wonder why they’re suffering from this mess when nobody asked them. Yet the Trump administration expects them to clean it up.

How did the most powerful nation on earth end up behind the eight-ball? By breaking every rule for success. Presumably, we had an objective. We had already bombed Iran’s nuclear facilities, putting that program back, maybe for years. We controlled the skies over that nation. Having already mowed their capabilities, there is no need to mow again now.

\What was present was an Iran in dire straits. Sanctions, mismanagement of water resources, and the economy had sparked mass protests. The vast majority of Iranians demanded change. Other than those directly benefiting from the Regime, support evaporated. The Mullahs had never been in a weaker position. What was here was the chance to free the people to form a government that didn’t threaten their neighbors.

The Trump administration took notice. The President told the Iranian protesters we had their back. No question what our goal was, toppling the Regime. We started sending our forces to the area. The head Mullah and many of the key players in his government were killed from the air.

In the meantime, the Iranian government slaughtered in excess of 40,000 protesters. The streets went quiet. This result shouldn’t surprise anyone. We’ve seen this movie many times before. Ruthless dictatorial governments use their monopoly of weapons to trounce unarmed protestors. No matter how bad the government is, it stays in power because nobody can shoot back. Cubans have lived at the subsistence level for decades. Does it even have an economy? Still, the communists persist.

Oil-rich Venezuela has followed the same path. When faced with losing power, there is no limit to the pain the absolute rulers will inflict on their defenseless citizenry. The picture of an unarmed Tiananmen Square protester standing in front of massive tanks illustrates the imbalance.

The only successful revolutions in history took place where armed people existed from the start, or military units refused to fire on the people, and changed sides. Imagine how poorly our forefathers would’ve fared if only the redcoats had arms. Instead, we turned them back at Lexington and Concord. To have a “shot heard round the world, ” you have to have a gun. The minutemen had guns and knew how to use them. The rest is history.

Other revolutions, such as the French and Russian, saw military units refuse to fire on the people and turn against their rulers. No matter how great the air superiority, only armed resistance on the ground can drive out the despots.

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Minority Positions Won’t Win

Dave Davis Commentary, Policy, The Middle East, Uncategorized , , , ,

We finally bombed Iran’s nuclear facilities. Without opposition, the Israelis and then the U.S. hit the major sites. At this point, we don’t know the extent of the damage. An earlier leaked assessment said it might have only set the program back for a few months, while others have said it had done such damage that Iran will need years to get back on track. Without people on the ground, a definitive answer is impossible, but if and when Israel goes in again, it will tell us what the nation at existential risk has determined.

A decade ago, I proposed bombing Iran’s nuclear facilities. If they revive the program, we should strike back. Living in a real version of the Myth of Sisyphus, the Mullahs would eventually tire of pushing the boulder up the mountain, only to start again. So long as Israel controls the skies over Iran, follow-up attacks will take place as needed. It was a good plan then, and it remains so now.

Stopping religious fanatics from possessing weapons of mass destruction removes a grave threat not only to Israel but also from Iran’s long-range missile development to everyone else on Earth. If we denied North Korea and Pakistan nuclear weapons, we’d all sleep better. Iran is much scarier—every day, it’s death to America and death to Israel, and they mean it.

One might think we’d have a national sigh of relief, knowing Iran isn’t about to have nuclear warheads topping Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBMs) aimed at us, but some aren’t cheering. Some Democratic leaders alluded to the leaked study.

The information is preliminary and labeled as having low confidence. Yet, the left-leaning legacy media pounced on it and spread it far and wide. Instead of lauding our military for its work, publicizing a possible Trump failure took precedence. Democratic politicians joined in.

This response seems to reinforce the perception of an anti-Israel bias by the left in its conflict with Iran. Support for pro-Hamas, an Iranian ally, and protesters who harassed Jews by the progressive wing of the Democratic Party indicates the left is anti-Semitic.

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