Sharon/Iraq: for want of a nail

"In the 1920s, Zionist leader Vladimir Jabotinsky called for Israel to rule “from the Nile to the Euphrates,” as the famous slogan went, by smashing the fragile mosaic of its Arab neighbors into ethnic fragments, then seizing the oil riches of Arabia. So Israel’s far Right and its American neocon fellow travelers are perfectly happy to see Iraq divided de facto into its three component ethnic parts: Shia, Sunni Arab, and Kurd. Better a feeble Iraq broken into weak cantons, like post-1975 Lebanon, than a nation united, even under a U.S.-run regime." Eric S. Margolis (hat to Christoher Guida)

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Over the last couple of days Norman Finkelstein, who I admire very much, and Alan Greenspan who I don't, have both voiced the opinion that Israel was not behind the American invasion of Iraq.

I could hardly ever disagree with Norman Finkelstein, who is one of the bravest of American intellectuals about anything, but on the causes of the invasion of Iraq, I regretfully have to differ with him.

It is/was all about Israel, because Israel really is in a desperate situation. The entire flow of world affairs is going against Israel and the Israelis and the "friends of Israel" are pulling out all the stops trying to remake the Middle East in their favor while America is still the hegemon.

I am of the opinion that the destruction of Iraq as a functioning state -- its being broken up into separate, nonthreatening (for Israel,) mini-states -- as is happening now, was not an unforeseen eventuality. It was in fact one of the primary objectives of the war.

For Israel, Kurdistan, bordering hostile Iran, Syria and Turkey and totally dependent on American and Israeli support for its existence, is an enormous strategic asset.

The next step after the "shock and awe" was to move directly on a supposedly terrified Iran and provoke regime change in that country... Iran was always the objective -- Iraq was a stepping stone to that objective. "Anybody can go to Baghdad, real men go to Tehran". With both Iraq and Iran neutralized Israel would be free to deal with the rest of the Muslim world as it wished, ad infinitum.

From the Israeli point of view all this makes sense. It is from the American point of view that things don't add up.

What none of the perps suspected is how wrong it would all go, or that the Republican Guard would just take off their uniforms and start effective guerrilla warfare.

I believe that the brains behind all of this were Ariel Sharon's. He is/was the only person in this story with enough strategic vision and Gordian Knot decisiveness to have come up with something as "game changing" as this debacle. We are looking at an evolution of such daring concepts as his crossing the Suez Canal in 1973, which saved Israel from defeat, his invasion of Lebanon in 1982 to obliterate Arafat and the OLP, or his creating today's Palestinian Bantustans behind walls and calling it peace. Only Sharon always looks to deliver the one punch knockout in every round. He is/was always on the brink of disaster, always tightrope walking out.

Unfortunately for the game plan, if not the world at large, Sharon's brain is now in never-never land and none of the clods left behind in Jerusalem or Washington can fill his shoes, much less his suits. There is no one left with enough of his evil moxie to sort this mess out.

"For want of a nail the shoe was lost.

For want of a shoe the horse was lost.

For want of a horse the rider was lost.

For want of a rider the battle was lost.

For want of a battle the kingdom was lost.

And all for the want of a nail."

DS