Thanks for the history lesson tw. It's always interesting to get a different perspective on these things.

I think the most important questions here are; what motivated the capture of the Israeli soldiers in the first place? Who decided to create this situation? Who thinks they're going to gain something by it?

Everyone has their suspicions and individual thoughts on the matter. I don't think any of us will ever know the full truth of it. I think we'll all be lucky to survive it.

Apparently Hezbollah was doing what it had done previously to get large numbers of imprisioned (and uncharged) Palestinians out of prision in exchange for kidnapped soldiers. However, they did not 'feel the wind'. The resulting escalation is probably a major surprise to Hezbollah. They were probably only doing a deal and ended up with far more than they expected. Remember, no parties talk to one another. Israel does not even talk to Lebanon's government. Notes are only exchanged via the UN. Therefore war (and these minor and mostly irrelevant kidnapping) are situation normal.

Again, feel the air. The US administration wants war. A Cheney agenda whereby war is preferred over diplomacy as a quick, ultimate, and final solution. It is, BTW, a same concept promoted by Gen Curtis LeMay who said we were already at war with the USSR; American did not yet know it. This has a 'Cheney agenda' written all over it.

One more question. Will the Lebanonese government remain intact if Israel invades? Probably. But don't forget a previous Israel invasion that created a Lebanon civil war. Another civil war is remote - but still remains possible.

All who had to do? Hezbollah wants this to happen.

With Lebanon being a country with fairly equal parts of Islamic and Christian values, it would seem fairly likely that civil war is exactly what will happen with the Christian population being funded by the Israelis et al and the Islamic population being funded by their old partners in crime.

I agree that this was a bad time for any 'deals' to occur for the militants. I agree that this situation has been anticipated avidly by some groups of the international community and I would even go as far as suggesting that these particular parties have orchestrated the entire incident in order to achieve their own goals.

Funny how everyone's forgotten Iraq for the time being huh?

Michael Totten, April 28, 2006:

"Everything Could Explode at Any Moment"

I was flipping around and watched a couple of reports on Fox, CNN, and MSNBC.

An idea started in my head, and I feel a need to express it, because, well, it's not a very nice idea, but I think it could use some kicking around.

Given the general instability in the Middle East ... Do you think that the Israelis would sacrifice themselves (and their country) if by doing so they could bring about the ultimate fall of Islam and the Arabic Countries? They know that Judaism would survive, as there are more Jews (by culture and by religion) in the rest of the world than there are in Israel.

Hmmm... that's a really interesting idea... I personally don't think they would do it, but I'm not exactly an expert on Israeli culture and such.

Hmmmm...Jewish people aren't martyrs are they? :rolleyes:

Hey, Jesus was a Jew!

Ooh boy.

You clearly never met my friend's grandmother ... she was one of the old fashioned, "I'll just sit here alone in the dark" type ...

I'm not saying that they want to die, or have the country turned into glass ... but if every last man, woman, and child is wiped off the map, they'll be 6 million more Jews from around the world ready to move in and start over.

I read in the paper today that the bunkers Hezbollah are hiding in must have taken YEARS to build. That's an interesting bit of information. This doesn't bode well at all.

Well, they've been occupying the area for decades. They didn't spend the time playing volleyball.

Just saw Clerks 2, didja? :-)

Deja vue Vietnam. We only needed kill enough 'enemies' to win the war. Such tactics never work. They even violate fundamental military science. As a result, we killed every person in N Vietnam three times over, as Gen Westmoreland's own numbers proved. Meanwhile, he says we lost because we did not kill enough. Because he did not have enough troops. Because we were not willing to stick it out.

Only solution to such violence is actions that drive centrists out of extremist ranks. One method is to impose 10% casualties on all sides. Sell weapons freely so that all are suffering massacres. Only when centrists are driven back to a centrist political mindset, then a solution occurs - also called negotiation.

The entire purpose of war is only to get a conflict back to a negotiation table. If not obvious, then a proposal is nothing more than fiction. What is the largest number of books in the library? Fiction. Too many have ideas without first learning reality. Only solution is found in the purpose of war. The George Jr administration is chock full of fiction writers. Even worse, many Americans so hate this country as to believe their fiction.

One solution to Lebanon is to arm or to restrict arms to all sides so that 10% of each population is killed. Then centrists will obviously be regarded as the only solution.

Problem is not arabs or jews. Problem are the extremists in ranks of those populations. If you still belive myths about 'good and evil' then appreicate where the problem lies - in maybe 10% of the population. Therefore all jews and all arabs involved have become evil. They did not turn about and shoot the only evil ones among them. You tell me how that solution will be implemented. It will not. An only solution is found in this defintion - 'the purpose of war'.

It only says something relavent if you believe anything military will solve the problem. Cheney believes that (which is why he did not do his job in 1992). Bunkers only mean more jews may die in the invasion. That would be a good thing because then the losses on both sides might be high enough to address the only purpose of war.