Rob Kall of OpEdNews had some interesting speculation on the violation of Syrian airspace by Israeli jets:
- Did Israeli Jets Violate Syrian Airspace to Test New Russian Defense Technology Also In Iran
When “enemy” nations acquire new military technologies, how do you assess their capabilities? How do you determine whether the manufacturers claims for the technology are accurate?
Last week, Syria reported that several Israeli jets violated Syrian airspace.
Now, the Israeli news site, debka.com suggests that the fly-over exposed the failure of new, Russian technology that both Syria and Iran just installed to protect their airspace.
DEBKAfile’s military experts conclude from the way Damascus described the episode Wednesday, Sept. 6, that the Pantsyr-S1E missiles, purchased from Russia to repel air assailants, failed to down the Israeli jets accused of penetrating northern Syrian airspace from the Mediterranean the night before.
The new Pantsyr missiles therefore leave Syrian and Iranian airspace vulnerable to hostile intrusion.
This finding is VERY important to any nation interested in and considering attacking a country using this new technology for defense– like the USA, and Dick Cheney’s plans for Iran.
It is often suggested, by detractors, that debka.com is a surrogate of the mossad . This report could be a publicity effort for Israel, that demonstrates Israel’s role in helping the US prepare for an attack against Iran. Or, it could be a test by Israel to determine the abilities of the new systems so Israel is more ready to attack, or at least threaten attack of Iran.
Either way, it looks to me like this was far more than the accidental territorial violation Israel reported it to be. It removes one impediment to attacking Iran– one which no-one has discussed.
Of course, it also reveals that Russia has a stake in the looming conflict. This could be good or bad. Russia is making a lot of money selling to Iran, as the sabers are brandished. The more the US raises the threat of conflict, it is likely that Iran will spend more with Russia and possibly China. The more Iran is driven to Russia and China, (China is believed to be supplying the Taliban with weapons, using Iran as the channel. )
The bad news is that Russia and China are siding with Iran, providing military technology. The good news is that the Russian and Chinese connections to Iran may be enough to dissuade chickenhawks Bush and Cheney from actually attacking, and may even be enough to get Cheney and Bush to prevent Israel from attacking Iran too.
Some of us think that the bad news is that Iran is apparently attempting to build nuclear weapons. Just how sanguine (a word which means both optimistic and bloody) ought we to be with the idea that a large, oil-wealthy country, run by religious fanatics, with a president who has an obviously active hatred for another country that goes well beyond the norm, might just get nuclear weapons? As much as our friends on the left were appalled that Israel launched a surprise attack to take out Saddam Hussein’s nuclear program in 1981, just how thrilled would they have been if the Israelis had not done so, and in around four more years Iraq had built a bomb, given that Iraq was at war with Iran at the time? Saddam Hussein certainly didn’t care that his country had signed the 1925 Geneva Conventions, because Iraq used both mustard gas and nerve agents in its war with Iran, a war Iraq started, despite the treaty and despite United Nations’ protests. (Iran began to use chemical weapons late in that war, though with less success.) If Saddam Hussein had been willing to use one type of banned weapon, what makes anyone sanguine (there’s that word again!) that he would not have employed atomic weapons if Iraq had had them?
What if the Israelis had left Osiric alone, and it had taken until 1990 for Iraq to build an atomic bomb; 1990 was the year that Iraq invaded Kuwait. Shouldn’t our friends on the left be glad (if perhaps secretly) that the Iraqi nuclear program had been so seriously set back by the Israeli raid?
I wouldn’t think that even those who support the Palestinians and oppose Israeli policies would be particularly happy with the notion that the Islamic nations might use nuclear weapons to try to get what they want. Thus, if the Israeli airspace violations were attempts at real assessment of the defensive capabilities of the Pantsyr-S1E missile systems, that’s a good thing.
Because, in the end, if the Iranians cannot be persuaded by diplomatic means to cease their nuclear weapons program, a conventional military strike to take out that program would be preferable to the Persians having the bomb — and quite possibly using it.
Just how sanguine (a word which means both optimistic and bloody) ought we to be with the idea that a large, oil-wealthy country, run by religious fanatics, with a president who has an obviously active hatred for another country that goes well beyond the norm, might just get nuclear weapons?
I believe the US is a net oil-importer these days.
We lost a few aircrews when planes ‘strayed’ near (or over) Soviet airspace during the Cold War. While the failed U-2 flight of Gary Powers made the headlines, there were no known survivors of the other incidents.
Many of the flights were undertaken to oblige the Soviets to light off their air defense radar and provide on-board personnel with the electronic signatures needed for appropriate countermeasures just in case things got hot. The U-2 flights were intended to gather photographic evidence of the extent of military activity and capabilities.
Such actions may violate some rules but they were reasonable and prudent.
Israel seems to have a similar instinct for survival. “Never Again” has rather deep meaning.
[...] The initial story was that the IAF had violated Syrian airspace, which Rob Kall noted as a possible testing of Syrian air defense equipment. I said, on September 11th, that if such were the case, it would probably be a good thing. But the mission’s real purpose (if even what has been reported recently is true) has been kept quiet, by both Israel and Syria. [...]
[...] The initial story was that the IAF had violated Syrian airspace, which Rob Kall noted as a possible testing of Syrian air defense equipment. I said, on September 11th, that if such were the case, it would probably be a good thing. But the mission’s real purpose (if even what has been reported recently is true) has been kept quiet, by both Israel and Syria. [...]