Recent days have produced quite real fears of the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza blowing up into a major regional war. Several decades ago in the aftermath of the first Gulf War the late George Carlin did a comedy routine describing Desert Storm as an exercise in Bush 41 and Saddam Hussein having engaged in a “dick waving” contest. It was rather more than that as it started with Iraq’s brutal takeover of Kuwait. Bush 41 brought together a true coalition to kick Iraq back across the border and degrade them militarily enough that only Iran would have to worry about them. The current situation is different in many respects, and is much closer to Carlin’s description of two countries dick-waving. Plenty bad to be sure but one small misstep or miscalculation and the middle east powder keg will explode so this is actually a far more dangerous exercise in “dick waving” or “measuring.”
How the hell did things get to this point? Iran has sponsored Hamas and therefore largely responsible (along with Netanyahu’s for installing and funding Hamas in the Gaza strip) for Hamas’ terrorist strike last October and the ensuing war. Their proxy Hezbollah in Lebanon has played an active part. By active I’m speaking literally as in strikes at and even over the northern border of Israel.
So, Israel made a strike at a target in Lebanon that was an Iranian diplomatic site. Technically, embassies and consulates are considered the “soil” of the country sponsoring such sites. Iranian honchos including a couple of generals got killed, so Iran responded by launching a large scale missile/drone attack the other night. No one was killed and damned near every one of the weapons was shot down mid-air. I’ll get to that. The Biden administration privately and publicly told Israel to “Take the win” but Netanyahu just couldn’t leave things at that. He and other hard-liners just had to huff and puff and show off with a retaliatory strike to Iran’s retaliatory strike to Israel’s strike (in Lebanon I remind you) that started all this. Last night Israel launched a strike (again, missiles and drones) in Iran near, and I emphasize near an Iranian base.
(More) Dick waving.
Now, as reported by the Wall Street Journal we are waiting to see what’s next. The hope of course is that things DE-escalate from this point. At least for a while but we will just have to wait and see.
Let’s take a closer look at that large, some would say massive Iranian strike that was repelled. At least several hundred missiles and drones were launched at Israel. But most of them were from many hundreds of miles away. A remarkable coalition combined intelligence and even aircraft and ship launched missiles of their own to shoot down all that ordnance Iran had sent at Israel. Iran could have launched a lot more from a lot close and quite frankly Israel’s famed “Iron Dome”, even with our help from nearby warships wouldn’t have been able to stop a lot of them. However, by launching from so far away and perhaps even “accidently on purpose” leaking their intentions to Saudi and other country’s intelligence telegraphed their punch.
Iran felt like it HAD to make a big show. However they didn’t want to risk a regional war so they counted on Israel to minimize actual damage. Which is exactly what happened and why President Biden and other world leaders including allies of Israel to take the win. Iran was quite public in saying as far as it was concerned that was that, and there was every indication they were willing to let things go. Unfortunately Netanyahu and others could NOT let things go. Oh hell know. If only to get in the last word they made it clear they were going to retaliate. I can’t help but wonder with so many countries PUBLICLY telling them to stand down how much pressure was being applied privately.
If the pressure didn’t work completely there are indications it might have had an impact. I’m quite certain Israel’s strike last night could have been larger and more effective as in hitting that base. I’m hearing it said they wanted to send a message that “we can hit you and hit you hard anytime we want. You know what? Iran, in it’s much larger attack said pretty much the same to Israel by launching a handful of missiles from Syria. Each is making a “look what we can do if we want” show of force.
Dick waving.
The problem is that a single missile or drone going off course and hitting in a spot that causes significant casualties, whether military or civilian and all bets are off. So you’re damned right the dick waving needs to stop and both countries need to tuck their junk back in and zip up their pants. So where do things stand today? Per the linked WSJ article:
Israel is under pressure to restore deterrence with Iran and its proxies but also must hold together the tenuous strategic partnership that helped it block Iran’s attack last Saturday.
“A ‘de-escalatory strike,’” Yonatan Touva, a senior analyst at Mitvim, a think tank in Tel Aviv, wrote on X of Israel’s attack on Iranian territory. “Barring any unexpected developments, Israel’s strike inside Iran earlier today may well merit the coinage of this new term.”
I don’t know about you but that’s not a term I want to see become part of the lexicon. Both sides need to say publicly this exercise in dick waving (they can call it something else of course) is over. And actually follow through. Ratchet down the rhetoric, and no more launching of attacks. Let the people in both countries, the middle east in general and for that matter the wider world sleep easier.
Both countries have right wing governments, which is to say a great deal of theater, which is actually preferable to an all-out war with no advance warnings through third parties.
There are circumstances when “dick waving,” as you so tastelessly put it, is preferable to hitting every red button on the console for real. It may be an annoyance for you, but it’s their lives on the line. Neither country has a fall-back to retreat to. Mutually Assured Destruction has proven its worth as a deterrent.
Netanyahoo is pretending to be a ‘war time leader’ – not trying to defend Israel but to wriggle out of the criminal charges he should be facing.
He’s oping that they will be swept under the carpet and let him continue with his graft
btw – don’t forget that Israel also took a poke at Iran before the consulate bombing when they assassinated an Iranian government member in Syria and Iran, basically, let that slide with nothing more than a protest, so the Yahoo upped the ante by the consulate strike.
To me, anyway, his only intention was to provoke Iran so he could claim that they had been ‘unfairly attacked’