The other day the Triggernometry boys sat down with a Professor Robert Pape to discuss the Iran War. Here are his main points along with my commentary:
- Airstrikes do not change regimes. Spot on. They don’t change their aims either. Although they may change their capabilities.
- The 12-Day War of 2025 didn’t work. That sounds about right. It would appear that Iran still has stocks of the stuff you make nuclear bombs out of.
- Kharg Island will be difficult to take. Nonsense.
- Iran has become an oil “hegemon”. In other words, by demonstrating it can close the Straits of Hormuz it dominates supply. I doubt it.
- Suicide bombing has nothing to do with religion and everything to do with desparation. While I am always open to other ways of looking at things I can’t help but notice that suicide attacks are almost never carried out by Westerners however desperate.
- The Obama deal – which Pape advised on – is as good as it gets. He’s losing me.
- Israel is involved in ethnic cleansing in Gaza. Now he’s completely lost me. “To Hell or Connaught” it is not.
- Israel will end up having to allow inspections of its – hitherto unacknowledged – nuclear facilities. Maybe, but there won’t be any bombs to inspect because by then the Israelis will have used them.
There was something else that bugged me. It was his general tone: defeatism mixed with smugness.
*Of course, this interview does no such thing. It seems to me that Obama’s guiding principle was the destruction of American liberties and their replacement with a communist tyranny. The Papes of this world just provided suitable intellectual cover.
