Claire’s comment on the US Navy caught my attention. It’s not correct; in fact, is one-eighty out.
In the immediate aftermath of the Cold War, the idea gained traction in DoD that blue water naval dominance was so ten minutes ago. The demise of the USSR removed the US Navy’s sole peer competitor, and it seemed that the world’s littorals would be the scene of future naval operations. This was the genesis of one of those not infrequent military debacles, an innovative, forward-looking concept: the Littoral Combat Ship. I wrote about it here:
But on the bottom line, the Navy’s lack of capability is not the problem. It’s the Biden Administration’s unwillingness to use existing capabilities that has reduced the United States to paper tiger status.
Really enjoyed this podcast, thanks much to both of you.
I just happened to get referred to this 1982 piece from Ms. Magazine about antisemitism in the women's movement though much of what was said also applied to society at large. Every trope used today to attack Jews and Israel is there. It especially surprised me to see the "anti-colonialist" theme from back then, but what do I know.
Seemingly little has changed -- except that now one finds even some Jewish students siding with Hamas. But then, the piece did discuss women being afraid to identify as Jewish, so, maybe such behavior is not all that new after all. Most eye opening to me, Rosa Luxemburg was cited as not caring about pogroms in Eastern Europe, and for fighting for just about every downtrodden group but her own.
Claire, you don’t need to “invade and occupy” Iran to solve the problem. Your three options is missing something — #4 option: cripple their economy. (Does Khark Island ring a bell? ).
If Israel can push an air-to-surface missile into a S-300 SAM site in Esfahan undetected, then Khark Island can be turned into a smoking heap. (An environmental mess, yes. But Gaia would recover, whereas Israel and the region may not.)
But China needs the oil, they say! China does need the oil,but Saudi has plenty and can turn the taps on when Iran can no longer pump oil into tankers at Khark Island.
The mullahs can’t survive a crashing economy. They hardly survived women in the streets without headscarves. Cut their cash flow and they can’t pay the proxies and maybe even the IRGC. The strategy collapses — no, that’s too harsh. The strategy can’t be financed and the regime eventually collapses.
I know you hate Trump, but “maximum pressure” was working. Biden would never do anything like that. Four more years of Biden and Iran will have a nuke, Israel will have to deal with it alone (as Slow Joe screams for de-escalation), and the Middle East will… well, it will be an even hotter mess than it is today.
Iran is vulnerable. We just aren’t playing our cards right. Unfortunately, that’s because the guy holding the our hand can’t remember the game he’s playing and, as you said, the guys whispering the next play in his ear don’t know the rules.
Don't you think destroying Khark island would invite some kind of retaliation from Iran - doing things to disable the oil exporting infrastructure on the other side of the Persian Gulf, or mining the Straits of Hormuz? Iran isn't going to just sit there, right?
Yup. You’re right. And it would make Russia rich (which isn’t good), and we would have $5.00 - $7.00 in the US (for a while), but the alternative is worse. Imagine a Middle East with Iran holding a nuclear arsenal that NoKo has today.
Choose your poison.
PS. The regional air defense system that pitched in to help Israel on April 13-14 is designed to mitigate the missile threat that Iran might try to use to threaten the west side of the Arabian/Persian Gulf. No, it’s not perfect yet, but the results they achieved in April were impressive and gave Iran something to think about.
I think you're underestimating Iran's military capacity. The April event was deliberately telegraphed by Iran days in advance (to make sure Israel, and the US etc. could prepare) and its purpose was clearly more to threaten than to destroy. imo.
Yes, I saw that. And yes, I’m not an expert when it comes to Iran’s order of battle and military doctrine. But it seems to me that the only offensive / force projection capabilities they have are their hired guns (aka proxies). The Artesh is a home defense army. The IRGC is a palace guard with a few Green Beret-type units (Quds Force) to bolster proxy capabilities. Neither have the logistics capabilities to reach Israel in fighting condition. Their Navy is….well, not much. Their missile force has a big inventory of reasonable strike capabilities, but it too has its issues (like the reported 50% fail on-launch/in mid-air performance in mid April.). More on missile forces below.
Here’s my hypothesis: April 13-14 was a pre-meditated test… of Iran’s missile forces, and of the air defenses they knew they would eventually have to face.
How do you design a test to maximize the knowledge gained? You throw your best shot (tell the missile command to go all out) and you make sure the opposing air defenses are given the best chance of success (let them know when you’re coming). That way you see what each side can produce.
I don’t think Iran wanted to kill Israeli’s that night. On the contrary, a big civilian body count would provoke a response they did not want to receive. They wanted to know how many ballistic missiles they could drop into Israel when the air defenses are at their peak performance. They adopted the tactics Russia taught them from their Ukraine experience, tactics designed to overwhelm the air defenses. Russia gets up to 40% through the air defenses. Iran got 1%. That’s bad news for Iran, but good to know if they want to do better in the future.
The results of the test show that Israel is virtually immune from an all-out conventionally-armed missile barrage launched from Iran when they and their allies are at peak ready alert.
Change one word in the above sentence and the conclusion changes. What Iran learned is that their MRBMs are good enough provided they can launch 130 of them in a single salvo, even when a big percentage of them fail on launch/in mid air.
Think about that…..and then go look up how much HEU Iran has in their current stock pile.
Iran’s not stupid. They needed to know some stuff and they figured out how to do it at the lowest risk possible (given the current state of ME affairs).
Now all they have to figure out is how to produce 130 nuclear warheads.
And that, dear friends, is why Israel (and perhaps the rest of us) need to radically alter the current rate of progress of Iran’s nuke program. One bomb or even 10 is not the arsenal needed for true deterrence given what we all learned from Iran’s April test. We had best not kick the ball down the road much longer. The risk and cost of solving the problem will only go up.
And forgot to say: I don't think they'll respond to Khark Island being destroyed by aiming missiles at Israel. They'll mine the Straits of Hormuz and perhaps aim some missiles at Saudi/Gulf export facilities. Voila: energy crisis and a global recession (except for that other oil exporter whose name we shan't take)....if you push them too far. They are by far the weaker opponent in this conflict but they retain the capacities they have.
Why would Iran want to let its opponents know what its maximum capabilities are - its best, most effective weapons - if it could get the information it wanted (and has shared, doubtless, with Hezbollah) with lower grade, cheaper weapons?
Why do they want to avoid a response to deaths in Israel today, but are willing to commit suicide by nuking Israel down the road? That part doesn't make sense to me either.
imo they want nuclear weapons for the same reason North Korea or Pakistan want them. They discourage military 'regime change' attempts by opponents.
First, Zac, I appreciate the dialogue. It helps sharpen my thinking.
From the top:0
Israel knows the rough capabilities of various missiles in Iran’s inventory. What Israel and Iran didn’t know, in fact nobody knew before the Iranian attack, was if Iran could launch a mixed-platform salvo that could overwhelm the regional air defenses now in place. Iran has done lots of test and combat firings of the BM types they have in inventory. What they have never done is launch an all-out attack like the one in April. Most of their experience has been with salvos of 20 or so missiles and mostly against targets without modern air defense. It’s not the same when you try to pull the trigger on a 330 vehicle strike package.
Keep in mind that it’s very rare that a country has the opportunity to do a test like that. You can do large scale ground force and naval exercises, but I can’t think of any example where a country did a full scale test of their offensive missile forces.
So you say, “ Why a test? Why now? I think Iran’s nuke program is approaching a fork in the road. They can either quickly pull together a bomb or two in a lab environment (which is very hard to detect) and then do an underground test to validate their designs, etc. The world would ooh and ahh and pronounce that Iran is a nuke power and that the game has now changed. But a bomb or two is not an arsenal and you need an arsenal for an effective deterrence. So the end point there is nuke club membership and what? Can they build an arsenal? Can they deliver the arsenal and fulfill the sovereign sacred mission of wiping Israel off the map? Who knows.
Or, Iran could go down the path that they outlined in their Amad Plan — that is develop the infrastructure necessary for the serial production of lots of warheads. (It’s like the difference between investing in a lab version of a new product for proof of concept or going forward with building a factory before you have the design finalized. )
If they go the lab-scale beta product route Israel will be on their case immediately. If they opt for building infrastructure for serial production of a nuclear arsenal they invest more in both time and capital without knowing if they can deliver the product when it comes off the assembly line.
Remember, both IDF and US military sources said Iran had 50% of what they launched fail at launch or in mid-flight. That’s a huge number. If true it means Iran’s missile forces have a lot of work ahead of them in improving reliability, etc.
I think Iran knew they could launch MRBMs one or two or eight at a time. But they fidnt know they could launch enough to penetrate the new air defense environment they now face.
Re your comment about using Hezbollah as the learning pkatform. Hezbollah doesn’t have the top of the line of Irans MRBMs. So having Hez go at Israel full bore doesn’t answer Iran’s strategic question — can my IRCG guys actually launch an all-out attack?
Why didn’t they want to avoid the max response from Israel? Because that response would be targeted at their nuke program assets. Yes, a lot of those assets are buried, but a lot aren’t. A 20-20 day air campaign by Israel targeting their nuke program assets would set them back years. I submit that the Iranians didn’t want to kill Israelis. that night. They didn’t have to to learn what they wanted to know. Killing lots of Israelis is dangerous to your health, as Hamas is finding out.
Your comment on NoKo and Pak is well taken but remember neither of them have declared that they are on a mission from God to eliminate an adversary. They built Nukes to discourage adversaries from eliminating them. Neither Pak or NoKo have an aggressive offensive objective. Neither is out to eliminate their neighbor. (I know, Kim has made noises to that effect, but he knows better). That’s a big difference. Go back and read what the Iranian leadership has said about Little and Big Satan beginning the moment they seized power in ‘79. If you think they’re just blowing smoke, OK. Everyone is entitled to their opinion. But may be we should take them at their word. If I were responsible for the security of a nation I wouldn’t sit back and think they really won’t do what they say they will do. Remember the guys running Iran are mullahs, not politicians. You expect politicians to lie. I’m not so sure hard line islamists won’t act on their threats.
And on your comments about the probability of retaliation for an attack on Iran’s economic infrastructure — my sense is that they will do what they think they have to do and then we and regional allies will go what we have to do. War’s a bitch but sometimes (let us pray not often) necessary. Remember the US sank 1/2 of Iran’s navy in about 8 hours one day in April 1988 for doing exactly what you mentioned. I have no doubt the Iranians would respond, the only issue is would it be enough to prevent the collapse of their economy should their oil revenues evaporate over night.
And, while not of the same economic magnitude as an “oil crisis” the world economy has adjusted quickly to the near closure of the Suez Canal. Container prices have doubled, but things keep ticking along even though prices of everything are higher.
I guess my bottom line is nothing is without risk. No matter what you choose to do it’s not going to turn out perfectly. Strategy is often about deciding what set of problems you’d rather manage. Managing Iran before it has a large nuke arsenal will be much better than trying to do so afterwards.
I don’t know why, short of invading and occupying, we can’t just bomb Iran’s nuclear sites while enforcing sanctions to the maximum extent. Like bomb repeatedly with massive heavy-handed strikes over and over again until Iran renounces their nuclear ambitions. What do we have to lose? I highly doubt it would make Iran go to war with us. And that’s a risk worth taking to arrest their nuclear ambitions anyway.
They might not respond by immediately going to war with us. But what about the 150,000 rockets Hezbollah has pointed at Israel? Isn’t that among their primary deterrents? The issue might be that any major bombing campaign severe enough to cripple their nuclear program would inspire them to play that card, and then we end up at war with them anyways.
Hezbollah’s rockets and missile are their primary deterrent. They could use them and probably do a lot of damage deep into Israel, but Israel would survive and would be whopping mad. Israel would still have an Air Force and Iran would be left holding an empty gun.
I say we call Lebanon’s bluff. That would be the end of Hezbollah. They don’t want to do that. We need to balance the risk of those rockets against a nuclear Iran where, with the push of a button, Iran could wipe Israel off the map.
Claire’s comment on the US Navy caught my attention. It’s not correct; in fact, is one-eighty out.
In the immediate aftermath of the Cold War, the idea gained traction in DoD that blue water naval dominance was so ten minutes ago. The demise of the USSR removed the US Navy’s sole peer competitor, and it seemed that the world’s littorals would be the scene of future naval operations. This was the genesis of one of those not infrequent military debacles, an innovative, forward-looking concept: the Littoral Combat Ship. I wrote about it here:
https://unwokeindianaag.substack.com/p/the-lcs-debacle?utm_source=publication-search
But on the bottom line, the Navy’s lack of capability is not the problem. It’s the Biden Administration’s unwillingness to use existing capabilities that has reduced the United States to paper tiger status.
I long ago pointed out that Putin’s nuclear threats are illusionary. This is so obvious that Biden’s inability to understand it is just ludicrous.
https://unwokeindianaag.substack.com/p/vladimir-strangelove-putin?utm_source=publication-search
So if I were running Ukraine, I’d place not the slightest faith in the United States. Ditto Israel. The Biden Administration’s not to be trusted.
Judith is a strong participant. Please invite her more often. Her views on recent European elections a possible discussion topic for you both?
Here’s the impact of “maximum pressure”:
Iran foreign reserves 2016 - $120 billion, 2020 - $17 billion (Source: Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis).
See here for info on change in oil revenues: https://www.iranintl.com/en/20211103369526
To stop the wars in the Middle East cut Iran’s cash flow.
Enjoyed today’s class.
Pax.
Scott
Fascinating discussion, thanks. Re: birthday gifts, some had noticed - eg. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/10/17/russia-israel-putin-hamas-gaza/
Another great Elephant Cage session. Thanks
Really enjoyed this podcast, thanks much to both of you.
I just happened to get referred to this 1982 piece from Ms. Magazine about antisemitism in the women's movement though much of what was said also applied to society at large. Every trope used today to attack Jews and Israel is there. It especially surprised me to see the "anti-colonialist" theme from back then, but what do I know.
Seemingly little has changed -- except that now one finds even some Jewish students siding with Hamas. But then, the piece did discuss women being afraid to identify as Jewish, so, maybe such behavior is not all that new after all. Most eye opening to me, Rosa Luxemburg was cited as not caring about pogroms in Eastern Europe, and for fighting for just about every downtrodden group but her own.
https://jwa.org/sites/default/files/jwa102e.pdf
Claire, you don’t need to “invade and occupy” Iran to solve the problem. Your three options is missing something — #4 option: cripple their economy. (Does Khark Island ring a bell? ).
If Israel can push an air-to-surface missile into a S-300 SAM site in Esfahan undetected, then Khark Island can be turned into a smoking heap. (An environmental mess, yes. But Gaia would recover, whereas Israel and the region may not.)
But China needs the oil, they say! China does need the oil,but Saudi has plenty and can turn the taps on when Iran can no longer pump oil into tankers at Khark Island.
The mullahs can’t survive a crashing economy. They hardly survived women in the streets without headscarves. Cut their cash flow and they can’t pay the proxies and maybe even the IRGC. The strategy collapses — no, that’s too harsh. The strategy can’t be financed and the regime eventually collapses.
I know you hate Trump, but “maximum pressure” was working. Biden would never do anything like that. Four more years of Biden and Iran will have a nuke, Israel will have to deal with it alone (as Slow Joe screams for de-escalation), and the Middle East will… well, it will be an even hotter mess than it is today.
Iran is vulnerable. We just aren’t playing our cards right. Unfortunately, that’s because the guy holding the our hand can’t remember the game he’s playing and, as you said, the guys whispering the next play in his ear don’t know the rules.
That’s two cents. See you Sunday afternoon.
Peace,
Scott
Don't you think destroying Khark island would invite some kind of retaliation from Iran - doing things to disable the oil exporting infrastructure on the other side of the Persian Gulf, or mining the Straits of Hormuz? Iran isn't going to just sit there, right?
Zaf,
Yup. You’re right. And it would make Russia rich (which isn’t good), and we would have $5.00 - $7.00 in the US (for a while), but the alternative is worse. Imagine a Middle East with Iran holding a nuclear arsenal that NoKo has today.
Choose your poison.
PS. The regional air defense system that pitched in to help Israel on April 13-14 is designed to mitigate the missile threat that Iran might try to use to threaten the west side of the Arabian/Persian Gulf. No, it’s not perfect yet, but the results they achieved in April were impressive and gave Iran something to think about.
I think you're underestimating Iran's military capacity. The April event was deliberately telegraphed by Iran days in advance (to make sure Israel, and the US etc. could prepare) and its purpose was clearly more to threaten than to destroy. imo.
https://www.chathamhouse.org/2024/04/irans-attack-israel-was-not-failure-many-claim-it-has-ended-israels-isolation
Yes, I saw that. And yes, I’m not an expert when it comes to Iran’s order of battle and military doctrine. But it seems to me that the only offensive / force projection capabilities they have are their hired guns (aka proxies). The Artesh is a home defense army. The IRGC is a palace guard with a few Green Beret-type units (Quds Force) to bolster proxy capabilities. Neither have the logistics capabilities to reach Israel in fighting condition. Their Navy is….well, not much. Their missile force has a big inventory of reasonable strike capabilities, but it too has its issues (like the reported 50% fail on-launch/in mid-air performance in mid April.). More on missile forces below.
Here’s my hypothesis: April 13-14 was a pre-meditated test… of Iran’s missile forces, and of the air defenses they knew they would eventually have to face.
How do you design a test to maximize the knowledge gained? You throw your best shot (tell the missile command to go all out) and you make sure the opposing air defenses are given the best chance of success (let them know when you’re coming). That way you see what each side can produce.
I don’t think Iran wanted to kill Israeli’s that night. On the contrary, a big civilian body count would provoke a response they did not want to receive. They wanted to know how many ballistic missiles they could drop into Israel when the air defenses are at their peak performance. They adopted the tactics Russia taught them from their Ukraine experience, tactics designed to overwhelm the air defenses. Russia gets up to 40% through the air defenses. Iran got 1%. That’s bad news for Iran, but good to know if they want to do better in the future.
The results of the test show that Israel is virtually immune from an all-out conventionally-armed missile barrage launched from Iran when they and their allies are at peak ready alert.
Change one word in the above sentence and the conclusion changes. What Iran learned is that their MRBMs are good enough provided they can launch 130 of them in a single salvo, even when a big percentage of them fail on launch/in mid air.
Think about that…..and then go look up how much HEU Iran has in their current stock pile.
Iran’s not stupid. They needed to know some stuff and they figured out how to do it at the lowest risk possible (given the current state of ME affairs).
Now all they have to figure out is how to produce 130 nuclear warheads.
And that, dear friends, is why Israel (and perhaps the rest of us) need to radically alter the current rate of progress of Iran’s nuke program. One bomb or even 10 is not the arsenal needed for true deterrence given what we all learned from Iran’s April test. We had best not kick the ball down the road much longer. The risk and cost of solving the problem will only go up.
I’d welcome a critique of the test hypothesis.
And forgot to say: I don't think they'll respond to Khark Island being destroyed by aiming missiles at Israel. They'll mine the Straits of Hormuz and perhaps aim some missiles at Saudi/Gulf export facilities. Voila: energy crisis and a global recession (except for that other oil exporter whose name we shan't take)....if you push them too far. They are by far the weaker opponent in this conflict but they retain the capacities they have.
Why would Iran want to let its opponents know what its maximum capabilities are - its best, most effective weapons - if it could get the information it wanted (and has shared, doubtless, with Hezbollah) with lower grade, cheaper weapons?
Why do they want to avoid a response to deaths in Israel today, but are willing to commit suicide by nuking Israel down the road? That part doesn't make sense to me either.
imo they want nuclear weapons for the same reason North Korea or Pakistan want them. They discourage military 'regime change' attempts by opponents.
First, Zac, I appreciate the dialogue. It helps sharpen my thinking.
From the top:0
Israel knows the rough capabilities of various missiles in Iran’s inventory. What Israel and Iran didn’t know, in fact nobody knew before the Iranian attack, was if Iran could launch a mixed-platform salvo that could overwhelm the regional air defenses now in place. Iran has done lots of test and combat firings of the BM types they have in inventory. What they have never done is launch an all-out attack like the one in April. Most of their experience has been with salvos of 20 or so missiles and mostly against targets without modern air defense. It’s not the same when you try to pull the trigger on a 330 vehicle strike package.
Keep in mind that it’s very rare that a country has the opportunity to do a test like that. You can do large scale ground force and naval exercises, but I can’t think of any example where a country did a full scale test of their offensive missile forces.
So you say, “ Why a test? Why now? I think Iran’s nuke program is approaching a fork in the road. They can either quickly pull together a bomb or two in a lab environment (which is very hard to detect) and then do an underground test to validate their designs, etc. The world would ooh and ahh and pronounce that Iran is a nuke power and that the game has now changed. But a bomb or two is not an arsenal and you need an arsenal for an effective deterrence. So the end point there is nuke club membership and what? Can they build an arsenal? Can they deliver the arsenal and fulfill the sovereign sacred mission of wiping Israel off the map? Who knows.
Or, Iran could go down the path that they outlined in their Amad Plan — that is develop the infrastructure necessary for the serial production of lots of warheads. (It’s like the difference between investing in a lab version of a new product for proof of concept or going forward with building a factory before you have the design finalized. )
If they go the lab-scale beta product route Israel will be on their case immediately. If they opt for building infrastructure for serial production of a nuclear arsenal they invest more in both time and capital without knowing if they can deliver the product when it comes off the assembly line.
Remember, both IDF and US military sources said Iran had 50% of what they launched fail at launch or in mid-flight. That’s a huge number. If true it means Iran’s missile forces have a lot of work ahead of them in improving reliability, etc.
I think Iran knew they could launch MRBMs one or two or eight at a time. But they fidnt know they could launch enough to penetrate the new air defense environment they now face.
Re your comment about using Hezbollah as the learning pkatform. Hezbollah doesn’t have the top of the line of Irans MRBMs. So having Hez go at Israel full bore doesn’t answer Iran’s strategic question — can my IRCG guys actually launch an all-out attack?
Why didn’t they want to avoid the max response from Israel? Because that response would be targeted at their nuke program assets. Yes, a lot of those assets are buried, but a lot aren’t. A 20-20 day air campaign by Israel targeting their nuke program assets would set them back years. I submit that the Iranians didn’t want to kill Israelis. that night. They didn’t have to to learn what they wanted to know. Killing lots of Israelis is dangerous to your health, as Hamas is finding out.
Your comment on NoKo and Pak is well taken but remember neither of them have declared that they are on a mission from God to eliminate an adversary. They built Nukes to discourage adversaries from eliminating them. Neither Pak or NoKo have an aggressive offensive objective. Neither is out to eliminate their neighbor. (I know, Kim has made noises to that effect, but he knows better). That’s a big difference. Go back and read what the Iranian leadership has said about Little and Big Satan beginning the moment they seized power in ‘79. If you think they’re just blowing smoke, OK. Everyone is entitled to their opinion. But may be we should take them at their word. If I were responsible for the security of a nation I wouldn’t sit back and think they really won’t do what they say they will do. Remember the guys running Iran are mullahs, not politicians. You expect politicians to lie. I’m not so sure hard line islamists won’t act on their threats.
And on your comments about the probability of retaliation for an attack on Iran’s economic infrastructure — my sense is that they will do what they think they have to do and then we and regional allies will go what we have to do. War’s a bitch but sometimes (let us pray not often) necessary. Remember the US sank 1/2 of Iran’s navy in about 8 hours one day in April 1988 for doing exactly what you mentioned. I have no doubt the Iranians would respond, the only issue is would it be enough to prevent the collapse of their economy should their oil revenues evaporate over night.
And, while not of the same economic magnitude as an “oil crisis” the world economy has adjusted quickly to the near closure of the Suez Canal. Container prices have doubled, but things keep ticking along even though prices of everything are higher.
I guess my bottom line is nothing is without risk. No matter what you choose to do it’s not going to turn out perfectly. Strategy is often about deciding what set of problems you’d rather manage. Managing Iran before it has a large nuke arsenal will be much better than trying to do so afterwards.
Pax
Let me think about that. I’ll respond tomorrow.
I don’t know why, short of invading and occupying, we can’t just bomb Iran’s nuclear sites while enforcing sanctions to the maximum extent. Like bomb repeatedly with massive heavy-handed strikes over and over again until Iran renounces their nuclear ambitions. What do we have to lose? I highly doubt it would make Iran go to war with us. And that’s a risk worth taking to arrest their nuclear ambitions anyway.
They might not respond by immediately going to war with us. But what about the 150,000 rockets Hezbollah has pointed at Israel? Isn’t that among their primary deterrents? The issue might be that any major bombing campaign severe enough to cripple their nuclear program would inspire them to play that card, and then we end up at war with them anyways.
Hezbollah’s rockets and missile are their primary deterrent. They could use them and probably do a lot of damage deep into Israel, but Israel would survive and would be whopping mad. Israel would still have an Air Force and Iran would be left holding an empty gun.
I say we call Lebanon’s bluff. That would be the end of Hezbollah. They don’t want to do that. We need to balance the risk of those rockets against a nuclear Iran where, with the push of a button, Iran could wipe Israel off the map.