I Think We Can Safely Say That We Are Now In WWIII - End Game Territory.

The Dynamics of the War in Israel-Palestine Is Spiraling Out of Control Quickly!

For several decades, most military strategists agreed on one very salient point- The Third World War would arise from the Middle East. Things seemed to cool for the past couple of decades, in part, because the US was busily destroying Iraq, Afghanistan, and also squelching Syria, Yemen, etc.

Obviously for the past few years, the US has shifted it’s focus to the Ukraine/Russia, and China/Taiwan.

However, the raid into Israel by Hamas, and the subsequent Siege of Gaza, and the ongoing bombing offensive, is bringing the entire region to a boil. Hezbollah has already stated that they will open up a second front with Israel, if/when IDF ground forces move into Gaza, which seems inevitable.

Conversely, Israel may just continue to bomb Gaza into oblivion, which will also cause a great deal of hyper-dynamic tension, as the videos and images of the Palestinian suffering are broadcast across the entire Muslim world.

Iran is now vocalizing threats similar to Hezbollah, and there is also, reportedly, hundreds of thousands of Muslim volunteers, in the region, amassing to enter the conflict. The Taliban in Afghanistan has requested passage through Iran, in effort to join the fight as well, requesting troop support from Iran, Iraq, and Jordan.

Many members of the worldwide Jewish diaspora are saying that Israel must defeat Hamas as quickly as possible, to avoid an expanded war.

As if all of that isn’t volatile enough, the US is moving at least one carrier strike group into the Eastern Mediterranean ocean, to “support” Israel, and “prevent further escalations in the region”, with specific stated intent to attack Hezbollah, Lebanon, and Iran, should they become involved. I’ve no doubt that their mission statement is even more broad than the publicly expressed version, but we will have to see what happens. No matter what, it’s definitely significant.

Along with the USS Gerald Ford aircraft carrier and associated strike group, the U.S. is sending the cruiser USS Normandy, destroyers USS Thomas Hudner, USS Ramage, USS Carney, and USS Roosevelt, and the U.S. is also augmenting Air Force F-35, F-15, F-16, and A-10 fighter aircraft squadrons in the region.

In further escalations, Israel and groups in Syria have exchanged mortar, artillery, and rockets, resulting in the closure of two Syrian airports.

Israel ordered the evacuation of Northern Gaza, forcing the one million refugees to move toward a closed Egyptian border, and to do so within 24 hours. There are already reports of those evacuee caravans being bombed during their forced exodus from the north, with videos of the truckloads of men, women and children, both before and after the air attacks circulating in the Muslim world.

Iraq, Jordan, Egypt, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Lebanon, Turkey, and Hezbollah… have all issued rather pointed statements regarding the ongoing situation in Gaza, and Israel is intentionally deaf to all of it.

There are a handful of ways that this all plays-out, and frankly, none of them look very promising.

Scenario #1- Israel decides to flatten Gaza, with bombs, artillery, rockets and mortars, minimizing ground troop exposure, and a bogged down, fixed commitment, and instead involves the minimum number of ground troops… I guess to merely shoot the people that try to escape the deadly bombardment?

Gaza is a densely populated, all urban area, 5 miles wide, and 25 miles long, with an ocean shoreline on the western, non-Israeli side, and with only one border, Egypt, that is sealed, and Egypt refuses to accept Palestinian refugees. Israel has also bombed that border crossing.

While this is the smart, strategic approach, from a purely conservation of ground forces perspective, it essentially amounts to the biggest war crime since, I don’t know, maybe Sarajevo? Gaza has a population of two million people, half of which are reportedly under 18, so this would equate to a horrific blood-letting, and make for unacceptable optics, large scale international condemnations, legal charges of massive war crimes, and a unified Muslim world intent on Israel’s destruction (which may be unavoidable).

However, it would leave a larger amount of Israeli forces to flex toward other challenges and incursions, whereas…

Scenario #2- After softening northern Gaza with it’s relentless and brutal bombing campaign, Israeli troops advance into Gaza, and in conjunction with an enormous combined arms attack, advance toward the south, fighting hidden and dug-in Hamas fighters (and any other Gazan willing to pick-up a gun, which there will be many of after the horrific bombings, when everyone there has lost close family members), street by street, house by house, building by building, in the remaining rubble.

This will be a “worst case scenario” for Israeli ground troops! Even with the flexibility to call in support fire from planes, drones, rockets, mortars, artillery, etc., the Israeli ground force losses will be bordering on unacceptable. One could even make the case that it is unwinnable.

Either way, it would take weeks, or months, with casualty rates climbing daily, for as along as it continues. Each day, Israelis will be fed a steady stream of names, on the nightly news, watching an entire generation of young Jews liquidated in the grinding battle.

Worse still, it would require a very large military force for the entire misadventure, drawing forces away from the West Bank, the northern border with Lebanon and Hezbollah, the eastern border with Syria and Jordan; Allowing an endless stream of Muslim Jihadi guerillas and terrorists to infiltrate the country, and wreak havoc on the Israeli’s rear flank, in their cities, everywhere!

And… it would STILL provide the Muslim world with a steady diet of videos and pictures, of the atrocities- killed women and children, tortured prisoners, 17, 15, 12 year old “Freedom Fighters” dying while fighting the invasion and occupation, inspiring tens of thousands Muslims from around the world, to join the fight.

Scenario #3- Israel figures-out a way to satisfy their national bloodlust with a more moderate and tempered approach, which will be pretty hard considering how enraged their population, and Jews/Gentiles/Warmongers around the world are, after a 24/7 PR blitz of gore porn, genocidal rhetoric, and a world wide “escalation verbiage” contest unlike anything we have ever seen before.

Also, Bibi Netanyahu is in a very deep political hole, which makes every possible choice even worse. A recent poll found that 86% of Israelis blame the government for the Hamas attacks, and 56% want Netanyahu to resign. This is an especially troublesome reality because Netanyahu sold himself as the “strength and security” option as PM, aside from all of his other political problems and national unrest, and this attack will either be his death nail, or his chance for redemption. The obvious fact is these realities all encourages him to react as sternly and severely as possible. That’s very dangerous!

But, assuming they can pull it off, they soften the northern section of Gaza, forcing one-quarter or one-half of the population to evacuate into the southern section, and set up a new northern barrier, having killed a couple hundred thousand “Hamas Fighters” and/or Gaza citizens, call it all a “proportional response” with some chatter about “security”, and end it quickly.

This is essentially a hybrid of #1 and #2, and certainly the wisest option, but I’m not sure that the Israeli’s will be satisfied with it, or if it will save Netanyahu’s political position. Also, it does not leave Israel with the sense that the problem has been permanently removed.

Lastly, it still doesn’t ensure that Hezbollah, and others, don’t attack Israel, while they are focused on the Gaza Campaign. Hezbollah has already stated that they will attack if Israel doesn’t stop bombing Gaza, and/or if they invade Gaza. I’d argue that the greatest threat dynamic in this entire situation, is the likelihood that countless Muslims decide that this is their best chance to attack, invade, and destroy Israel!

The US is weak, both with Biden, the fiasco in Afghanistan, and the 18 month losing affair in the Ukraine, which drained US-NATO ammunition stockpiles, energy supplies, financial coffers, and the intangible “will to fight”. None of these can be fixed before the events in Israel unfold.

Moreover, nobody on the planet can predict how things will evolve, because there are far too many dynamics at play!

Making matters worse-

The Ukraine Effect-

The SMO in Ukraine has proved one VERY IMPORTANT FACT- “The West” can be beaten! (which I’m sure played a role in the timing of the Hamas attack) The US & NATO, the Five Eyes, all of it, poured every possible resource into the Ukraine, in their fool-hardy attempt to defeat the Russians (or severely weaken them) as a way to send some message to China… dumb!

Playing right into the hands of their global adversaries, the US-NATO alliance- depleted their weapons and ammunition reserves, drained their money supply, amassed huge levels of debt, weakened their economies, and humiliated themselves by taking a hard loss after dedicating everything they had to defeat the Russians!

That’s why the US is sending Carrier Strike Groups, instead of weapons and ammo by the ton. We have nothing left to give, except to involve our own military forces and equipment.

The stated plan is to intervene on Israel’s behalf, if/when “other entities” get involved, which at this point, seems like a certainty.

Here’s the thing- The Muslims and Jews hate each other, and they have for centuries. The Palestinian issue, just gave the Muslim world a talking point to vocalize that hatred. This latest series of events, might just give the Muslim world their best chance, to destroy Israel for good!

Israel has shown themselves to be in vastly weakened state than in the past, both by allowing this attack to take place, but also as reports come in that the reactivation of their military reservists, is not going well.

If the Muslim world chooses to, this is their best chance to overrun Israel. The US is weak, and cannot really defend against it without involving ground forces. Most wars cannot be won by air campaign only.

Do you think the citizens of the United States will support ANOTHER ground war in the middle east, against more Muslims, again? On the border with Lebanon, near Beirut, where we lost 241 Marines, sailors, and soldiers, almost exactly 40 years ago, during our last “peace keeping” mission in the region?

With Wounded Warriors still crowding our VA hospitals from our last TWO WARS in the Muslim world? With the embarrassing Afghanistan debacle still fresh in the minds of the American public? After that God awful display, who will want to get go and “get back into the fight”, having seen how the last one ended? It’s too absurd to even contemplate!

And even if we try to only take part from the air, one doesn’t need a very long memory to know that airplanes, even ours, get shot down, or crash, or just have some weird issue… and what happens then? American pilots being beheaded on the news?

Final Thoughts-

This situation, at the moment, seems like a powder keg with a short, and already lit, fuse. Israeli passions are turned up to 11, and their blood is boiling. The Muslim world, empowered by recent events, is equally outraged by what they are seeing transpire in Gaza. The US-NATO-The West has never been weaker. The political dynamics in every western nation is simmering, and ready to boil over. The US and Europe has allowed unknown numbers of unknown people, from the Muslim world to infiltrate their nations, resulting in massive protests already, but the risk of domestic terrorism have NEVER been greater.

Weak economies, unstable political environments, sky rocketing debt, anemic militaries, Muslim immigrant populations, and a spurned adversary, Russia, that has a better relationship with every country on the other side of this recent global alignment than the US-NATO alliance, and a Worldwide Muslim Population that is bent on Israel’s destruction, they fight this war with the destruction of their nation, potentially hanging in the balance, and a questionable ally in the US…

Two Questions Remain- What does Turkey do, and what does China do?

The answer to these two questions very well may decide if Israel survives, and or if World War III is officially underway.

My bet- 65% chance Israel is destroyed, and 75% chance for a global World War III.

Stay Frosty My Friends, Volatility is afoot, and growing by the minute!