Quote of the Day: Israel’s Own Cuban Missile Crisis?
As more fiery rrhetoric surfaces from Iranian officials and news about Iran’s quest to join (along with North Korea) the world’s increasingly less exclusive Nuke Club, is Israel facing it’s own version of JFK’s Cuban Missile Crisis?
Our Quote of the Day comes from historian Victor Davis Hanson, writing in RealClearWorld, thinks so — and argues that it’s a crisis “all the time.”
Why would the Iranian government spend billions of dollars on trying to develop a few first-generation nuclear bombs (as nearly everyone believes is the case) when the country is so poor that it has to ration gasoline?
A lot of reasons have been offered by various experts.
He then rattles off a slew of reasons. But what does he think is the “real” reason?
Yet, the real reason may be otherwise.
More likely, Iran wishes to break Israel’s will – not necessarily by a nuclear strike. Instead, periodic threats from a nuclear theocracy, it may recognize, would do well enough.
Once armed with the bomb, Iran will likely increase the frequency of its now-familiar denial of the Holocaust. In between such well-publicized lunacy, some Iranians like President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will periodically threaten to wipe Israel off the map – or promise Armageddon if Israel retaliates against Hamas or Hezbollah.
The net effect would be for half the world’s Jews to hear constantly two messages – there was no Holocaust, but there might well be one soon. It would be analogous to the American public reliving the threats of the Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962 – every day.
A recent poll revealed that a fourth of Israel’s population quite understandably might emigrate if Iran gets the bomb. And it seems likely that within a decade or two, a nuclear Iran could so demoralize the Israelis by such psychological intimidation that it could unravel Israel demographically without dropping a bomb.
Countries around the world would continue to sit idly by as they profit from lucrative trade with oil-rich Iran – now and then warning the Israelis not to be the preemptive aggressor and “start” a war.
Already, the Obama administration – through pro-Palestinian Middle East affairs nominations like Charles Freeman and Samantha Power, its pledge to help rebuild Gaza, its outreach to Syria and Iran, and its irritation with Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu – seems to be telling Israel that it is increasingly on its own.
Given demographic realities in the Middle East, if a large minority of Israelis emigrates, then the end of the Jewish state becomes possible without Iran ever dropping the bomb that it now so eagerly wishes to acquire.
The real long term strategy? And, if this is it, how does Israel prepare for it and counter it?
3 Responses to “Quote of the Day: Israel’s Own Cuban Missile Crisis?”
We Americans often forget the hundreds of thousands of Iranians killed by gas attacks in the Iran/Iraq war. Perhaps the Iranians feel the only way to protect themselves from weapons of mass destruction is to have their own nuclear option. Certainly the Iranian president has made disagreeable statements, but the people may be driven by fear.
We’ll put the tip jar up there soon. Thanks!
Joe – First off ,Congratulations on the new look – it is classy and first rate. It reminded me to send some money your way to pay for all this nice work but I can't find the tip jar anymore. Help!
Now on to the issue at hand. Having spent the equivilent of several years in Israel over the past 50 years and having lived there in 82 – 83, I can tell you that the current existential fear far exceeds the mood prior to 1967 and 1973. Currently some 700,000 to 1 million Israelis live elsewhere and as speculated an Iran with nuclear weapons would dramatically increase that number. It would be the best and the brightest of the Israelis that would move and Israel would be left with the poorer and more religious Jews.
The ONLY solution is a peace agreement with the Palestinians and all the arab countries. Israel has the capacity to be the economic and technological hib of the mideast. Building cooperative and dependent relationships with neighboring countries is Israel's best defense for longevity. It doesn't mean arabs and/or persians are suddenly going to love Israel or Jews but over time everyone in the mideast will come to depend on each other. It is the only way Jews are going to become acceptable in the mideast if the others NEED them for their own well being.