Andrew Anglin demonstrates that while he’s got astute political observers on his writing committee, he doesn’t have a military historian:
There is a group of commentators on the internet who have been telling people for a year that Iran and its allies, Hezbollah in particular, were well capable of somehow crippling Israel. I don’t want to name names, but if I did want to name names, at the top of the list would be names like “Scott Ritter,” “Pepe Escobar,” and “Jackson Hinkle.”
Anyone who understands the Jewish problem enjoyed hearing from these self-proclaimed experts on the “Axis of Resistance” that Israel was finally going to get its comeuppance. This didn’t seem totally out of the question, given that the IDF has faced significant setbacks in Gaza. However, what we’ve seen in the days since the shocking exploding pager attack of September 17th has demonstrated that the Jews are very much in the game and that there is a very real chance they will have success in their long term objectives in the region.
Reality isn’t based on what we want. Reality stands on its own, regardless of what anyone thinks about it. People who are still claiming that everything the “Axis of Resistance” is doing is going according to plan are delusional, denying basic reality. Hezbollah was the single most important Iranian proxy, and Israel has wiped them out like it was nothing.
Things in the Middle East are looking quite grim, and you should not let anyone tell you otherwise.
It’s always intriguing to see how those who know nothing of war, have never read much about it, have never taken part in wargames, and who really aren’t very interested in the subject never hesitate to opine and even prophesize on the subject.
From the military perspective, nothing has substantially changed in the Middle East except the Israeli military occupation of Gaza has gone from passive containment to active repression and expulsion. The reported decapitation of Hezbollah is the equivalent of a major battle won, not the war itself. And while Nasrallah was a gifted political leader and diplomat, he wasn’t a military strategist; the assassination of Iran’s General Soleimani was a much bigger blow in that regard for the so-called Resistance.
Whether Israel is actually engaged in a full-scale invasion of Lebanon or is merely clearing out a buffer zone in order to permit its 60,000 settlers to return to the north doesn’t matter much in the grand scheme of things. Either way, the IDF, and more importantly, its primary weapons supplier, are being attritted much faster than they can replace their manpower or their weapons. Just as NATO can afford to fight to the last Ukrainian, Iran can afford to fight to the last Arab; remember, for all their words about pan-Islamic unity, the Iranians are not Arabs, they are Persian.
We are now hearing that the leadership of Iran was told by the United States that if they did not retaliate, there would be a ceasefire in Gaza. It’s virtually unfathomable that the Iranians would believe this, but they are apparently so devoted to avoiding war that they are willing to believe anything.
Of course they didn’t believe anything that the “Great Satan” told them. But there is a reason why Iranians call the USA “the Great Satan” and Israel “the Little Satan”. They know which enemy genuinely matters for them; without the significant US support upon which it is dependent, Israel would be overrun within five years. The Iranians understand, as so many media commentators do not, that this is a global war, and that blows to the NATO economies are probably more useful to them than any number of missiles raining down on Tel Aviv.
What happens on the tactical level seldom signifies much at the strategic level, much less the geostrategic level. One of the hardest things for any commander, at any level, to do is to wait for the right moment to engage, especially when everyone is on edge and desperate for someone to something, anything. And as any wargamer knows, taking ground and killing zergs is meaningless if you are expending too many resources to last you until the end of the conflict.
Was it worth the reported 85 Mark 4 JDAMS to eliminate the Hezbollah leadership? Quite possibly, given that the IDF were given 14,000 bomb kits over the last two years by the USA. But at that burn rate, they’d run out in less than half a year. It’s one thing to bomb civilians and a trained militia with the benefit of air supremacy. It’s another to attempt to take on a full-fledged military in possession of the sort of modern air defense systems that prevent anyone from flying anywhere near the battlefield in Ukraine.
Nothing is over. In fact, World War III has barely begun.