BURN LEBANON BURN: THE WAR-OF-THE-CAMPS. AND TURKEY TO ISRAEL: “MOVE OVER, SUCKER.”

3d draft, with somewhat significant changes

Pincer: "One part of a double envelopment in which two military forces converge upon opposite sides of an enemy position." Webster’s

NO DRUNK AND LOOSE WOMEN: KEEP ME OUT OF IT

People send me emails from across the political spectrum. Lately there has been a spike in emails from Lebanese Christian right-wing groups. I was able to stop one, using humor. I told the guy to send me emails only when they’re having a party attended by drunk and loose women. He promised he would (!) and stopped his emails. Then on to the others. Then I gave up.

One last email came from yet another Christian right-wing group. These work closely with Diaspora nationalists – indirectly confirmed to me a few days ago by one of them . The last email wanted to brief me on what a harmful idiot, now idiot-reluctant, by the name of Feltman had said about Lebanon. Like I care.

LEBANON AND THE HARMFUL FELTMANS

I wasn’t going to read what the harmful Feltman had said because, frankly, it’d be Israel-inspired. Go after Hezbollah. Blah. Blah. Blah. Fight wars for oil, claiming they’re wars for Israel, to mobilize the Jewish community. Tell them it’s for Israel’s security. Get that oil away from the Chinese. Haul it away from the Russians. Do it all as an Israel-anchored warring country. In the meanwhile, be such an idiot as not to realize that foraying around leads to national bankruptcy. You don’t even understand the limits of your own country. Blame it all on that “unipolar moment.” (That should excuse your harmful mediocrity.) Forget public policy. Be part of a team which aimed to bankrupt the Federal government so that the darker ones don’t get ideas about enacting such initiatives as a national health plan. Go for oil grabs and call them wars so you can pay-off your constituency with money we don’t have – again, to keep those darker ones A.K.A. federal government weak.

(But, WOW: we didn’t aim for such a severe bankruptcy. And now, Mr. Obama will spend on domestic priorities anyway, even if it takes printing money - - “quantitative easing” - - which should put us - - the Republicans? Or what passes for Republicans now that they have disowned Crusader - - in a corner where the next time we get to the White House, we HAVE to be fiscally conservative - - and therefore unpopular. )

I’m tired of addressing myself to idiots.

Okay. Got it out of my system. I needed that. Here:

PRINCIPLES TO-LIVE-BY

(1) Lebanon cannot be governed but by consensus. Hezbollah is needed to evolve and define that consensus, just as any other Lebanese cargo cult, like it or not.

(2) Lebanon is part of Iran’s strategy to defend itself. Hezbollah is part-and-parcel of that strategy. That doesn’t mean that Hezbollah is Iranian. It’s not. It’s got its own persona. It’s a vanguard of Arab nationalism, a force that's forever evolving to escape assassination attempts by the American-Israeli-NATO alliance. As the situation on the ground changes, Hezbollah will either die off or, more likely, transform itself into a more politically powerful and less Shia Arab nationalist group.

(3) Unlike Feltman’s “assets,” Hezbollah is a non-corrupt political entity. Together with Hamas, their style in politics is mostly devoid of corruption. That offers a new paradigm for the Arab nation. Non-corruption bestows tons of legitimacy on Hezbollah. Feltman’s Grand Thieves don’t have that advantage. (Once again: political scientists have always known that a modicum of corruption is necessary to get things done; but, in Lebanon’s case, we’re talking Grand Thievery of a national purse – a method imported by Hariri from that paradise of non-corruption – Saudi Arabia.)

(4) Syria will not let Lebanon go its own way on peace with Israel - - and can one blame it? Unless, of course, one is a harmful idiot who is a Feltman, living in a world of Israel-as-our-life illusions. Besides, Hezbollah and Syria share in Arab nationalism. They understand each other in a way that harmful idiots and their assets in Britain and France and Germany could never fathom, however often they try to expand their grab of that oil and ignite civil wars in the region. Not that Hezbollah will forever remain so strongly allied to Syria. But we're talking probabilities.

(5) Still talking probabilities: Breaking up Syria’s link to Iran, and to Russia, is yet another hope-borne-out-of-illusions. The Iran-Syria-Hezbollah “axis,” to use a word drummed up by Feltman’s former boss, Harmful Crusader, to take us for an oil grab-miscalculated-to-become-national-bankruptcy, is a winning axis. You, Feltman, and your Israelis (the Axis of Conquest and New Colonialism), are not. If anything, Syria now should be expected to act as the bridge between America’s new (way newer than before) strategic ally, governed by Islamists, Turkey, and its faithful backer: Iran. Israel and Saudi Arabia and their ilk are - - oh boy - - eminently insignificant. Any significance they can salvage would for Israel come out of its ability to block and delay and kill and maim; for Saudi Arabia: you guessed it - - it's oil.

(5.a) The Pincer: But things will certainly change radically if you wage full war on Iran, which is unlikely in the short-to-medium term, but likely in the longer term. You certainly are preparig for it in the future. That is: for now, you're deterring Iran conventionally and doing your damnest best not to let it tilt Iraq in full in Iran's camp. But these same combat troops, and those in Kuwait and Qatar and the French and British ones in the UAE, in the long-term, would be meant for full war on Iran.

Hence the following: To keep 50,000 combat troops in Iraq (they ARE combat troops regardless of what you call them) is meant to give the (false) impression to the American public: (a) that these are not combat troops; and (b) that their number is only 50,000.

Their number is much higher. Borders are imaginary, in a sense. So one should add to the 50,000 those troops in Kuwait and in Qatar. These should join with Turkey’s armed forces to form a pincer squeeze against Iran. Conventional balance of power established, and deterrence to boot.

(That’s why the Iranians weren’t as awed by Mr. Obama’s overture to them as we were, silly us. The war for the Iranians is now appearing to be much longer and much more arduous. They have the entire Western World lined up against them - - the U.S., NATO. And now Turkey as the spearhead - - for all practical purposes. They now know that they can’t rely on our bankruptcy to get things done for themselves in Iraq. That oil and its routes are way too precious and if it takes printing money to keep the troops there to secure it, then be it. They must be feeling the leaden weight of empire's boot more than they have ever felt it before. Any wonder they need a nuclear weapon? (It won't help them any, though it likely does bring the elite together.) It’s up to Russia and China now to sweeten the deal to Iran. Will they? Will Abushehr start actual operation any time soon? Will Russia and Iran both cease trying to bargain away parts of their relationship in exchange for concessions from the U.S.? We’ll see.)

(6) Locking the door and handing the keys to Turkey by the retreating - - not retreated - - harmful idiots -- not that they have a choice, though they do have illusions and false hopes –-- is so fraught with traps (for all) that Turkey is unlikely to carry out the agenda of Israel/Feltman – as the idiots-reluctant are hoping. (The pincer strategy is only that - - for now: a theoretical construct. If ever applied, then the oil will blow up. Unless it’s a waiting game - - to wait out the Islamic regime in Iran, which has been a strategy all-along. Or, at the very least, to tame the Islamic Republic now that that Republic has tamed the harmful idiots. Our turn: we’ll do it through Turkey-as-a-Sunni-force. In the absence of domestic pressure at home in the U.S., Iran will be the one that'll be tamed, not Turkey nor the U.S.)

I’m hoping Turkey goes its own way to assure peace-first - - not oil-first - - in that region. But, what are the chances that the leaders of the Justice and Development Party, so thrilled to be of use to the idiots-reluctant, wouldn’t themselves miscalculate? ( The Islamic Justice and Development Party is right to be happy; the idiots-reluctant now have accepted it as legitimate. Islamic Hamas next? Perhaps this is only an Obama thing; Perhaps another administration wouldn’t be as enamored with Islamist-ruled Turkey. Likely, however, it's the result of an overall strategic re-assessment. Still: It’s a huge step for the United States, a positive one that's long overdue; Islamic Turkey should replace Israel as the strategic base. That’s likely the hope. So you should expect as aggressive a campaign against Turkey by the Diaspora nationalists as one can imagine. Their baby is losing importance so fast. But then, they may decide to tag along with Turkey; but they will have to make concessions on the ground in Palestine/Israel and the Joulan. Will they? Can they?)

The Turks are flattered. But the road they’re taking is so fraught with potential (even likely) high turbulence for the region, and for Turkey. Should Turkey try to execute a Feltman/Israel agenda, money will pour to the Kurds of Turkey, enough to bring back the fascist generals to power. Too, it’ll be war by proxy in Iraqi Kurdistan, spreading inside Turkey and Iran, deeper inside Turkey if only because there are more Kurds there than in Iran. (Talabani may yet get his chance to whip Barazani’s ass as he nearly did in the past, but for the intervention of 30,000 Iraqi troops.) In other words, Turkey better sit down with the Iranians and coordinate with them.

(7) Lebanon’s Palestinian refugees are a time-bomb waiting to explode, because people like the Feltmans, allied to the Diaspora nationalists, and impregnating this government’s foreign policy and intelligence establishment, monopolizing American foreign policy towards the Arab nation and the wider Muslim world, just want it done the way of their beloved.

SATI3 LOST HIS FATHER. MY MOST SINCERE SYMPATHY.

And so what inspired this piece isn’t really Feltman. It was Sati’ Nour-el-Din of as-Safir. On 3/26/09, in commenting on the recent assassination of Kamal Midhat, Deputy to the Representative of the PLO in Lebanon, Mr. Nour-el-Din pointed the finger at the Palestinians themselves. He warned that the intra-Palestinian war might just turn into a “war-of-the-[refugee] camps” which should spread into the immediate surrounding.

(My take on the assassination, without having spent much time on it: Hamas – and possibly Hezbollah – are forcing the issue with the Abbas people: continue on wanting Hamas eliminated from political life and we’ll eliminate you politically from among the 410,000 Palestinians of Lebanon.)

That war-of-the-camps should burn Lebanon, that helpless victim of the Israel-as-our-anchor harmful thinking of the harmful idiots and the idiots-reluctant.

Be mindful that Lebanon is one of the highest densely-populated countries on earth. So a war-of-the-camps will really be yet another Lebanese civil war, if only in impact. That the late Rafiq al-Hariri, now a “martyr” as so many are in that part of the world, had imported the Saudi model of governance into Lebanon and, accordingly, saw to it that Lebanon was sunk into a debilitating national debt (mostly, I suspect, to Lebanon’s banks, and chiefly, I suspect, to the Hariri family AKA Saudi royals’ bank(s).) That debt had continued to grow, in part to meet the payroll and social security for all the people Hezbollah and Amal had placed on the payroll of the Lebanese state. Anything short of the harmful idiots stopping to bug the hell out of the region will only burn Lebanon, yet again, financially and in civil strife. If that Feltman harmful idiot cannot pay Lebanon’s national debt, and he can’t since we’re bankrupt, then he should just stay the hell out.

(But the region’s leaders want us there, say the Feltmans and other harmful idiots. Of course, they do. There are the reactionary ones, our “friends,” and there are the many who are on our payroll -the “assets”– and who will say what we tell them to say. And the Feltmans tell them to ask for us, and they do.)

Going back to Mr. Nour-el-Din. He is worried about the repercussions of a war-of-the-camps. His proposed solution, though, is naive – but a good try nonetheless. He wants Lebanon’s political discourse to match that of the Palestinian refugees, as a way of disarming these, with the proviso of allowing Lebanon to be a stage for these refugees to pursue their cause politically and diplomatically. What’s that all about? Either Mr. Nour-el-Din wants to disarm the Palestinians or he wants to use the ruse of having the Lebanese politicians act as Arab nationalists to become ones. Once they act out the role, they become the role itself – so goes Nour-el-dine’s thinking.


Serious: Like you’re going to have harmful idiot proxies like Samir Geagea , who can’t seem to mobilize his people but via the Holy Eucharist and Hariri-Saudi money, use Arab nationalist discourse! Or Saad al-Hariri, who’d rather talk motorcycles than read up on Jamal Abdel Nasser, Michel Aflaq, the Nakbah, and so on.

CELA DIT...

Averting a Palestinian war-of-the-camps in Lebanon starts by having the idiots-reluctant instruct their native mercenaries in Palestine to heal their Elliott Abrams’-engineered rift with Hamas.

If not: Lebanon will burn.

Or maybe not. Maybe it’ll sit there, waiting forever, dying a slow death, courtesy of the Diaspora nationalists, the harmful Feltmans, and the Feltmans-reluctant.