Bomb Them To Gain Their Support?

Ted Galen Carpenter is Vice President of defense and foreign policy studies at the CATO Institue. To those of you who do not know, CATO is a Libertarian heavy think tank. There are some virtues to Libertarianism that I like: such as economics. The Libertarian thoughts on social issues (which tend to be liberal and atheistic) is where I part ways.

Carpentary published an essay at CATO entitled, "Bomb Them To Gain Their Support?" It is an essay that is critical of Israel's strategy in Lebanon.

An Israeli air strike killed almost 60 civilians in the Lebanese village of Qana on Sunday. Israeli leaders stress that their primary objective is to degrade Hezbollah's ability to launch rocket attacks against northern Israel, but they also mention another motive: forcing the Lebanese people to understand that supporting Hezbollah will bring them nothing but grief. With that realization, so the reasoning goes, most Lebanese will turn against the terrorist organization.

Logic suggests that the more likely reaction will be greater Lebanese hatred of Israel and, hence, more support for Hezbollah. It is bizarre to assume that displacing a population and destroying a country's infrastructure will somehow lead the people being targeted to turn against the adversaries of the attacking power rather than the attacking power itself.

Carpenter believes that Israel is not helping themselves by causing collateral damage in Lebanon. He does have a point that civilian casualties will not endear the Israelis to the Lebanonese. I think Carpenter misses the point of bombing South Lebanon. Israel is bombing South Lebanon because Shi'ite (Iran and Syrian supported) Hezbollah has attacked Israel on Israeli soil then began a missile launching campaign on civilian Israeli cities.

Israel regrets civilian casualties, however they regret Israeli casualties even more. The Shi'ite civilians of South Lebanon are either supporting Hezbollah or are being forced to be utilized as human shields.

The question by Carpenter is "Bomb them to gain their support?" The answer is Bomb them to protect Israel!