Role of War Strategists in US Military Defeats for Israeli Political Success By James Petras Al-Jazeerah, CCUN, September 28, 2018

Palestinians in the West Bank at an Israeli military checkpoint	What has remained of the city of Mosul after years of US-led air strikes

Introduction

In a previous article (‘US: The Century of Lost Wars”) I recorded the repeated
US military defeats over the past two decades. In this discussion I will describe the role
of military strategists who bear responsibility for the US defeats, but also for Israeli
political successes.

The key to this apparent contradiction is to uncover how and why the destruction
of Israeli adversaries prolonged costly US military invasions.

The two outcomes are inter-related. The same US military strategists whose
policies lead to failed US wars in the Middle East facilitated and augmented the power of
Israel.

US war strategists’ operations reflect ‘dual loyalties’. On the one-hand they
receive their elite education and high positions in the US, while their political loyalties to
Tel Aviv express their Israel First strategic decisions.

Our hypothesis is that dual loyalist strategists have fabricated threats, identified
adversaries and committed hundreds of thousands of US soldiers to losing wars based on
calculations that effectively increase Israeli power and influence in the Middle East.

We will proceed by identifying the war strategists and their policies and conclude
by proposing an alternative framework for re-thinking the relationship between dual
citizens and military strategy.

The ‘Best and the Brightest’: The Blind Ally of Military Defeats

There is an apparent contradiction between the high academic achievements of
elite military strategists and their abominable record in pursuing military conflicts.
Most, if not all, policy makers who led the US in prolonged wars against Iraq,
Somalia, Libya, Yemen, Afghanistan, Lebanon and Syria were Israel-firsters, either
Zionists or Israeli ‘fellow travelers’.

In each of these wars, the Israel firster war strategists, (1) identified the enemy,
(2) exaggerated the threat to the US and (3) grossly inflated the military capacity of the
targeted country. They started with Iraq and Afghanistan and then proceeded to the other
nations, all opponents of Israel.

By ‘coincidence’ all countries supported the Palestinians’ rights of self
determination and opposed Israeli annexation and colonization of Arab lands.
Driven by their loyalty to Israel’s ‘expansionist goals’, the military strategists
ignored the ‘real world’ political and economic costs to the US people and state.
Professional and academic credentials, nepotism and tribal loyalties, each contributed to
the Israel firsters advance to securing strategic decision-making positions and elite
advisory posts in the Pentagon, State Department, Treasury and White House.

Their policies led to an unending trillion-dollar war in Afghanistan; losing wars in
Libya, Iraq and Syria; and costly economic sanctions against Iran.

The main beneficiary was Israel which confronted less political and military
opposition; zero cost in lives and money; and substantial gains in territory.
Why did the Yale, Harvard, Princeton, Chicago, Johns Hopkins’ cum laude
graduates repeatedly produce the worst possible military outcomes?

In part because the US acted as an instrument of another power (Israel).
Moreover, the Israel firsters never were obliged to reflect in self-criticism nor to admit
their failures and rectify their disastrous strategies..

Their refusal to assume their responsibilities resulted from several causes. Their
criteria for success was based on whether their policies advanced Israeli goals, not US
interests.

Moreover, while their decisions were objectionable to US citizens they were
supported by the 52 Presidents of the Major American Jewish Organization including the
powerful Zionist lobby, AIPAC, which dictated Middle East policy to both political
parties and the US Congress.

Ordinarily, military strategists whose policies lead to repeated political disasters
are denounced, fired or even investigated for treasons. In our experience nothing of the
sort happened.

The best and the brightest rotated between six-digit jobs in Washington to seven
digit positions on Wall Street, or secured positions in lucrative law firms in Washington
and New York (many with offices in Israel) or were appointed to prestigious academic
posts in Ivy League universities.

What Should be Done?

There are countervailing measures which can lessen the impact of the strategic
policies of the Israel Firsters. Academic Israel firsters should be encouraged to remain in
Academia; rather than serve Israel in the State.

If they remain in the Ivory Tower they will inflict less destructive policies on
American citizens and the state.

Secondly, since the vast-majority of Israel firsters are more likely to be arm chair
war monger, who have not risked their lives in any of the wars that they promote,
obligatory recruitment into combat zones would dampen their ardor for wars.
Thirdly , as matters stand, since many more Israel firsters choose to serve in the
so-called Israeli Defense (sic) Force (IDF) they should reimburse US taxpayers for their
free ride to education, health and welfare .

Fourthly, since most Israel firsters who volunteer to join the IDF prefer shooting
unarmed Palestinian protesters,medics,journalists and kite flying kids they should be
drafted into the US Army to serve in Afghanistan and face armed Taliban fighters

surrounding Kabul, an experience which might knock a bit of realism in their dreams of
converting the Middle East into an Israeli fiefdom.

Many national loyalties are forged by shared lives with families and friends of US
soldiers who endure endless wars. Israel firsters dispatched to the war front would
receive existential experiences that the Harvard, Princeton and Yale military strategists
who make wars for Israel failed to understand.

Obligatory courses on the genocide of millions of Palestinian, Iraqi, Syrian, and
Libyan people would enrich Israel firsters understanding of “holocausts’ in diverse ethno
religious settings.

Face to face encounters in life threatening military situations, where superior arms
do not prevail, would deflate the hubris, arrogance and superiority complexes which fuel
the tribal loyalties of Israel firsters.

In conclusion

We offer modest suggestions for educated and cultured scientists,
doctors, artists and entrepreneurs:

1. Convert your skills to raising a new generation which will defend democratic values
and social solidarity and eschew wars, persecution and phony claims of anti-semitism
against critics of an ethnically exclusionary state.

2. Forsake exclusive control of the mass media which glorifies Israeli war crimes and
denigrates critics as ‘anti’ Semites for speaking truth to power.

Let’s join together to liberate America from military entanglements that privilege
multi-billion-dollar have-nots to Israel while thirty million Us workers lack health
coverage and forty percent of upstate New York children live in poverty.

Yes, there is an honorable place for everyone who joins in solidarity with the
victims of Israeli-First war strategists.

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