Monday, June 16, 2025

Part I

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Degrading the Threat of Iran’s Nuclear Capabilities: The Military Strategy of Israel and the Hope of Her Allies

We now know that Israel’s attack on Iran’s nuclear capacity is ongoing. Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that the operation will go on, “For as many days as it takes,” and he went on to say that all of this is because of the threat to Israel’s existence posed by a nuclear-powered Iran, that is to say an Iran with nuclear weapons. But we also know a lot of details about how Israel did this and the timing, why it happened when it happened.

So number one, one of the things we now know is that Israel had forward deployed drones and other weapons. Now just remember the fact that that was basically unknown in terms of the tactics of modern warfare until the very same thing happened when Ukraine struck deep inside Russia, and it was because they had forward deployed drones. A very similar thing turns out to have been undertaken virtually at the same time by Israel. So even as the attacks were certainly coming about because of weapons sent from Israel to Iran, and that included rockets and missiles, the reality is that drones were a big part of this picture and may continue to be.

But it’s also true that Israel, even as it has undertaken this attack upon Iran with the avowed declaration that it’s not going to stop until that nuclear capacity is nullified, at least for now. It’s also true that Israel is deployed across a number of different fronts, most importantly in its war against Hamas and continuing military efforts there in Gaza.

But putting this in a strategic context, here’s something we need to consider. This is exactly how Israel plays the game. Or to put it another way, this is how Israel has survived. I want to mention three groups in particular, just put Iran in the background here, but mention Hezbollah, mention Hamas, mention the Houthi rebels. What Israel has sought to do in every single case is to degrade the attack power, the military threat posed by those groups against Israel, and they’ve done so in two tactical moves.

Number one, they’ve tried to take out senior military leadership. And when it comes to Hamas, when it comes to Hezbollah, when it comes to even the Houthi rebels, it is really interesting that Israel has been spectacularly successful in this effort. Now, when it comes to a comparison, say with the military strategy and military doctrine of the United States, the United States has no such avowed aim, either as a part of its military strategy or of its tactics. That’s not to say the US wouldn’t do it, it is to say that Israel rather uniquely, in terms of the defensive situation it finds itself in and has since 1948, Israel has from the beginning had a very ambitious plan to try to degrade the military leadership of its enemies.

The second thing in terms of the big strategic goal that Israel’s about here is the attempt to try to degrade Iran as a military threat the same way they have done to Syria, they’ve done in Lebanon, they have effectively done when it comes to Hamas, and as they have done in at least cooperation with others with several other regional powers. The reality is that Israel wants to degrade any threat just in terms of the military power involved, and it also wants to knock out senior military leaders. And even as the leadership of Hezbollah, basically wiped out by Israel, the leadership of Hamas, even just in recent days again wiped out by Israel, you are now looking at the fact that Iran has conceded that it has lost three or four of its most senior military leaders in just this most recent attack from Israel, and no less than nine of its senior research scientists in terms of the nuclear weapons program.

Now, it’s one thing for Israel to claim this, it’s yet another thing for Iran to confirm it. But looking at this situation, again I’m struck by the approach taken by the editorial board of the Wall Street Journal. Their headline basically tells the story, “Israel’s Nuclear Good Geed.” Now they make a point that I’ve wanted to make ever since this most recent news developed, and that is that Israel has done this before. Most importantly in 1981, Israel unilaterally destroyed Saddam Hussein’s nuclear reactor, and then in 2007 it did the very same thing in Syria. Now it has done so in Iran.

Now, just in order to put this into historic context, I went back through the files and pulled up some of the news stories from 2007 and then some from 1981. Here’s the thing, in 2007, major American military officials were saying that it was virtually impossible that Israel could do the same thing that it had done in Iraq and Syria, it was impossible that it could do the same in Iran. But it appears that Israel once again is doing what at least many had considered to be impossible.

Now, back in 2007, the reason they said it was largely impossible, is because Israel does not have long-range attack aircraft able to go all the way to penetrate into Iran and then return safely. So I’m not saying that in 2007 they were wrong, I am saying that since 2007 something has changed, and that something comes down to at least two things confirmed in these reports. Number one, the use of drones and similar kinds of autonomous craft directable from Israel, able to penetrate into Iran and, as we’ve seen, even to be forward deployed long before the attack took place. The second thing is the use of missiles and other forms of strategic weapons that Israel didn’t possess or that it didn’t possess in terms of this sophistication back in 2007.

But there’s another factor in play here, and that has to do with the changes in the international situation. As you look at Iran’s nuclear program, one of the things I pointed out last Friday is that this is a long-standing program. The nuclear program in Iran was actually assisted by the United States back when Iran was an allied power, a friendly power, and it was not then a nuclear weapons program. But after the Islamic Revolution of 1979, that is exactly the aim undertaken by the theocratic regime.

Now, the United States has recognized this as an important threat, although it is interesting to note that at least some American strategist said that if Iran were to develop an Islamic bomb, it could be something of a checkmate against the fact that Israel has the bomb. But for the most part, not only the friends of Israel, but the friends of the United States have understood that a nuclear-powered Iran, that is to say in Iran with nuclear weapons, would be a profoundly destabilizing force on the world stage, and so the United States has wanted to prevent Iran from gaining usable nuclear weapons.

Now, here’s what we also know now we didn’t know a week ago, and that is that Israel had evidence that the United Nations also had, that the United States had, that the White House had, saying that Iran was hours away from the development of a usable nuclear weapon. At that point, Israel was basically already in motion.

Now, this is where the New York Times comes in with a fascinating front page story yesterday, evidently in Iran, they thought the fact that talks were continuing meant that Israel would not be authorized by the United States to go ahead with this kind of strike. Now, American officials have said that there was no such authorization, but President Trump did acknowledge in the last say, 24 hours that the White House knew the attack was going to take place.

Okay, in terms of weapons, here’s a big issue. What Israel does not have that the United States does possess is the bunker-busting weapons that could reach far into the subterranean nuclear facilities that Iran has developed. Israel is doing its best to knock out as much of the facilities that it can, and for that matter, to wipe out as many of the personnel as it can, but it is only the United States that possesses some of the weapons, both in terms of the delivery systems and the weapons themselves, that will be able to penetrate all the way underground to totally destroy the Iranian facilities.

Now, will that happen? There is no indication from the United States that it will, but it is also a situation that is unfolding, and it’s very interesting to see that America’s allies are strangely silent on these issues. And when I say that it is because on issues like this, you usually see, for example, NATO allies and others come along, and even if they want to keep some distance, they make some kind of statement about, well, solidarity with the United States. But when it comes to Israel right now, there is a strange silence in terms of that kind of statement. On the other hand, there is also no condemnation.

That’s kind of the moral point that the editorial board of the Wall Street Journal is trying to make. Brett Stevens makes a similar moral point in the New York Times, and that is that even if the United States wasn’t behind this, it wasn’t, even if European powers weren’t behind this, maybe weren’t even advised of it, they are very pleased that it has taken place. They will be very, very pleased if the nuclear threat of Iran is, if not eliminated, at least significantly degraded.

And it’s also interesting to know that some military authorities have said the point is that when you’re talking about nuclear weapons, you’re talking about, number one, a knowledge of how to do it. Iran has the knowledge of how to do it. So in that sense, it is going to be a continuing threat. But if that threat can be degraded, if Iran can be put in the situation where it would take months and years for them to be able to develop a usable weapon, that’s going to be counted as a win, at least a tactical win, if not a strategic win, as the recognition sets in that we’re in a very, very long battle and a very, very long war. Iran has declared that war, it has declared itself the enemy of the United States, it has declared itself intent on eliminating Israel, and for that matter, eliminating all evidence of the great Satan, that is the United States, in the entire Middle East. The threat actually couldn’t be more clear. This is not a case in which they’ve hidden their intention, they’ve been saying it out loud since about 1979.

When we think about theology coming into this, and I mentioned on Friday people who want to say we’re way past theology mattering. Well, you can’t really say that when you’re looking at the Islamic theocracy, the Islamic Republic of Iran declaring itself committed to the annihilation of Israel as a Jewish state. But it’s also interesting to consider the fact that when you look at this theocratic state, this Islamic regime and the ideology behind it, you’ll understand that Israel and the United States fit into a similar position. Israel is the object of particular hatred for two reasons, it is a Jewish state and it is on what they would declare to be historically Islamic land.

But when it comes to the United States, well, if anything the United States, and behind it the legacy of Britain and the British Empire, well, you’re looking at what, in Iranian eyes, are the great Satans, the UK and the USA, because it is due to the British Empire in the 19th and 20th centuries, the United States especially since World War II, that they see an effort by the West, and they declare the West to be Christian even if the West declares itself to be secular, they declare this to be a Christian encroachment upon the historic lands of Islam.

Now remember, Islam differentiates between the world, it divides the world into the world of Islam and the world of war. So now you come to understand that the United States is the great Satan precisely because it is the leader of the world of war. And Islam, and especially in its Shiite form that shapes the ideology there in Iran, it’s apocalyptic. It believes that a great battle will bring about the Islamic victory. So, at least in this sense, we are warned.

Part II

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A Shooting War Threatens Our Constitutional Republic: Our Culture War Cannot Turn Into a Shooting War – Not in Minnesota Nor Anywhere Else

All right, coming back to the United States, we’re also warned about the development of political warfare in this country, and as we look at events in just the last several days, we go to Minnesota where as the Times, the New York Times reports, “A person pretending to be a police officer assassinated a democratic state legislator in Minnesota and killed the lawmaker’s husband in an act of targeted political violence.” That statement was made by Minnesota governor Tim Walz. We’re also told that the assailant, “Shot and injured another democratic lawmaker and his wife.”

Now, the murdered lawmaker is state representative Melissa Hortman. She was killed with her husband Mark in the attack upon their home in one of the suburbs of Minneapolis. It is also true that state Senator John A. Huffman was shot, along with his wife, shot multiple times, but at least as of now both are still living. By the time the news began to be clarified over the weekend, authorities in Minnesota identified the suspect, a man by the name of Vance Luther Boelter. He is from Green Isle and was identified as having incorporated an armed security company. He is also avowedly someone who is an anti-liberal. He has indicated the fact that he wants to take out, or at least to take significant action against liberal influences there in the state of Minnesota. He was, as the local authorities have warned, armed and dangerous.

And so you look at this and you recognize this is really one of those unfolding stories. It’s something similar to what took place when you had a man from the other side who shot at the Congressional baseball game and was targeting some conservatives. Now, I’m not saying that this isn’t a matter in this case of someone on the right, I’m not going to give him the label conservative, but someone certainly on the right who undertook this particular act of violence. But we are in a different situation now where this kind of violence now is not unprecedented in the United States, and this is a game changer, it’s something that should certainly have our moral attention.

This is an incredibly tragic development. If we reach the point where our culture war becomes a shooting war, then we really do undermine the very idea of the United States of America. We undermine the idea of an electoral and constitutional democratic self-government in terms of a political system. We are threatening our very understanding of how America works, and so we are looking at a very dangerous development here and we’re going to have to track this.

Clearly this is someone who is far outside the bounds of any kind of responsible political recourse, or any kind of political movement, any kind of political reaction, for that matter. This is someone who has crossed a line, it’s going to be interesting to see when he crossed the line. In other words, as this kind of story almost always unfolds, we’re going to find out that at some point that person was considered even by his allies to be dangerous, although at this point there are some identified as those who had been, at least at times, something of roommates to this man who said they didn’t see this coming, but there are other indications from law enforcement that there were troubling signs, at least in the months leading up to this very tragic action.

It does, and we need to just underline this, it does, at least at this point, look to be a strategic effort to try to target some liberal legislators. Melissa Hortman, state representative, was key to democratic efforts, especially when there was a much more solid democratic majority there in the legislature of Minnesota, and as the Times said she, “Helped Democrats pass several key policies on abortion rights, marijuana, medical leave and other issues.” But what we have here is an ominous indication that at least some in our society will cross the line from political battle into something like actual battle, from culture war into a shooting war, and that is something we need to recognize immediately for what it is, and we need to recognize the threat it represents. We also need to hope the law enforcement there in Minnesota will be able to apprehend this suspect very quickly.

Part III

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A War of Demonstrations This Weekend: The 250th Anniversary of the Military Parade in D.C. and the ‘No Kings’ Protests Across the Country

Okay, let’s come back to the United States where over the weekend, I think the New York Times had this right, there were events that indicated, “Two visions of the United States, both taken to the streets.” David Sanger for the Times reported, “President Trump prepared on Saturday to make a show of American military might with a parade of tanks, missiles, and aircraft through the heart of the nation’s capital, a celebration of the 250th anniversary of the United States Army that had already been transformed into a test of wills and competing imagery with demonstrators around the country decrying his expansion of executive power.”

So what happened over the weekend, there was a massive military parade in the nation’s capitol. It was to mark the 250th anniversary of the United States Army. It was one of the very first actions of the Continental Congress to establish the army, shortly thereafter George Washington became the Continental Army’s commanding officer.

So okay, the event took place there in Washington DC, it was a massive display of the history of the Army, by the way, very interesting, showing unit by unit the history of the Army, sometimes in historic uniforms. It was a show of national pride and national power. At the same time, there were events in all 50 states, organizers claim, that were allied either directly or indirectly with a movement known as “No Kings.” And you can see directly where this is going, there are those who are crying that the United States is on the brink of becoming an autocracy, or worse, frankly, with some the language that’s being used. The organizers of those events claimed participation in the multiple millions, even as it was recorded something like a quarter of a million gathered in Washington DC. It’s very hard to document these figures at this point.

But it’s indisputable that the New York Times has it right, that the events demonstrated two visions of the United States. You might put it in different terms and say two very different worldviews, certainly two very different pictures of how the United States should be ordered.

Now, I have looked very closely at the news coverage on this, I did watch some of the parade, I did see evidence of the No Kings demonstrations. Let me just say that you wouldn’t have to look very closely, you wouldn’t have to pay much attention to understand these were very different events, and to also understand there’s a different picture of America held in terms of these two very different events. It’s not just the dividing line of say, the political figure Donald J. Trump, the President of the United States. It’s a far larger, more fundamental divide.

At the same time, as we talked earlier about the difference between a culture war and a shooting war, a war of demonstrations is not the worst thing that could happen in this country, but some historical context I think would also be helpful. The major media went at this particular parade there in Washington DC saying that democracies don’t do this, constitutional republics don’t do this, but that’s not exactly true. The United States did it back in 1991 after the first Gulf War. And furthermore, we are told that President Trump got the idea for this parade when he was watching a similar parade in Paris, undertaken for Bastille Day, as he was the guest there of French President Emmanuel Macron. Other nations have done this, certainly the United Kingdom, this is a part of the annual celebration, including flyovers and all the rest, and of course continuing events that showcase the British Navy as well as other parts of the British defense forces.

So this isn’t unprecedented, but in the United States it is awkward. It was less awkward in 1991, it was something of a way of saying that the Vietnam era is over. That’s a statement directly attributable to the President of the United States at the time, George H.W. Bush, who said basically, well, this just proves that Vietnam is over. I guess another way of putting it is that in 1991 there was very little complaint about that particular parade and frankly all the military might that was shown.

But it is interesting that 2025 is a different time, and if anything was worthy of a parade, it would be the 250th anniversary of the United States Army. But these days, everything’s going to be made into some kind of ideological warfare, it’s going to be into some kind of context of ideological battle, and we’re just going to have to get used to that. And at least part of it is that the divide right now that runs through the culture, it might run at least partly through the military.

That is one of the issues that has come up in terms of major media coverage and political analysis of the parade on Saturday, and it has to do with the fact that when you look at recruitment for the United States military in general, obviously a challenge in recent years, you look at the recruitment for the United States Army, it has missed its goals in two of the last three years. Does a parade like this help? Well, maybe it does, maybe it points to national pride, patriotic duty, the historic honor of serving in the United States Army, but it is also true that the historic call to serving the United States Army has been to be ready to wage war against America’s enemies, in particular foreign enemies.

If those enemies are going to be domestic enemies, it’s going to be a very different army for a very different age, and that’s one of the issues that comes up in the problematic situation of having military troops at least routinely called up in domestic contexts, and President Trump is clearly testing the limits of that even as he was surrounding himself with all the historic grandeur and the patriotism of the United States Army.

It’s also clear that the mainstream media went after the President saying that he was basically surrounding himself with all the symbolism of the military, but if he was guilty of that, so was his predecessor in office, so was Barack Obama for that matter. Most presidents have done this. As a matter of fact, some of the most heated criticism against President Biden is that when he gave a clearly political speech against Donald Trump, he did so with two uniformed Marines carefully put into the screenshot behind him. If nothing else, all of this does demonstrate that there is a great divide in the United States, and at least one aspect of that great divide is between those who look at the United States military with pride and those who see it as an institution of continuing patriarchy and oppression.

Part IV

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One of the Most Significant Airplane Tragedy Events in Two Decades: Air India’s 787 Crash

The world’s attention over the weekend was also directed to India where a Boeing 787 flown by Air India crashed shortly after takeoff, and immediately there was the huge question, how did this happen? First of all, there had never been the loss of a 787, there are more than a thousand of them flying. The 787 began service as a commercial aircraft in 2007, had never had what’s called a whole loss, that is the loss of an airplane in a crash.

Almost immediately though, this is interesting, just in terms of what it means that we’re made in the image of God and we take human life with such seriousness, when something like this happens, we want the answer, how did this happen? Was it human error? Was it a mechanical failure? Now, at this point, it’s not known, and everything’s a bit of speculation.

What was released, just in terms of the news late yesterday, largely due to the release of a far clearer video that had been available previously showing the last seconds of the aircraft’s tragic flight, and what it revealed is that something had been deployed, it’s automatically deployed, it’s known as an R-A-T, it’s often referred to just as a RAT. It is a ram air turbine. It is basically a propeller that comes out under these massive jet aircraft that will propel and create power such that there is electrical power for the aircraft so that the pilots can try to do something to save the aircraft in an emergency situation. The point is the pilots can’t deploy it, it is deployed automatically, and the main reason it is deployed on takeoff is if there is a total loss of power.

So at least at this point that would be consistent with the crash itself, there was some kind of total loss of power, the RAT was deployed, and yet the pilots, given the fact that the plane was at such a low altitude, simply didn’t have the time even to try to do much of anything to respond. And the tragedy is massive. This is the most significant casualty event in aviation in something like two decades.

I think it is very significant, even as we grieve with those who have lost loved ones on this flight, we immediately turn to ask the question, well, there are two questions, aren’t there? Number one, “How did this happen?” And number two, “How can something similar be prevented in the future?” Both of those are questions that come at us with great moral urgency, and we understand that because we are moral creatures, we can’t look at something like this without asking the deepest moral questions.