U.S. Scales-Back Military Exercise with Israel, Affecting Potential Iran Strike
39 replies, posted
[QUOTE]A smaller U.S. contingent may make it more difficult for the Israeli government to launch a pre-emptive strike on Tehran's nuclear program.[/QUOTE]
[IMG]http://timeglobalspin.files.wordpress.com/2012/08/03366464.jpg?w=900&h=600&crop=1[/IMG]
[QUOTE]Israeli soldiers are seen during a military exercise in Golan Heights, Aug. 21, 2012. Israeli Armed Forces have been conducting maneuvers amid raising tensions in the region.[/QUOTE]
[QUOTE]Seven months ago, Israel and the United States postponed a massive joint military exercise that was originally set to go forward just as concerns were brimming that Israel would launch a strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities. The exercise was rescheduled for late October, and appears likely to go forward on the cusp of the U.S. presidential election. But it won’t be nearly the same exercise. Well-placed sources in both countries have told TIME that Washington has greatly reduced the scale of U.S. participation, slashing by more than two-thirds the number of American troops going to Israel and reducing both the number and potency of missile interception systems at the core of the joint exercise.[/QUOTE]
[QUOTE]“Basically what the Americans are saying is, ‘We don’t trust you,’” a senior Israeli military official tells TIME.
The reductions are striking. Instead of the approximately 5,000 U.S. troops originally trumpeted for Austere Challenge 12, as the annual exercise is called, the Pentagon will send only 1,500 service members, and perhaps as few as 1,200. Patriot anti-missile systems will arrive in Israel as planned, but the crews to operate them will not. Instead of two Aegis Ballistic Missile Defense warships being dispatched to Israeli waters, the new plan is to send one, though even the remaining vessel is listed as a “maybe,” according to officials in both militaries.
A Pentagon spokesperson declined to discuss specifics of the reduced deployment, noting that planning for the exercise was classified. But in an e-mailed statement, Commander Wendy L. Snyder emphasized that the Israeli military has been kept informed of the changes. “Throughout all the planning and coordination, we’ve been lock-step with the Israel Defense Force (IDF) and will continue to do so,” Snyder said.
U.S. commanders privately revealed the scaling back to their Israeli counterparts more than two months ago. The official explanation was budget restrictions. But the American retreat coincided with growing tensions between the Obama and Netanyahu administrations on Israel’s persistent threats to launch an airstrike on Iran. The Islamic Republic would be expected to retaliate by missile strikes, either through its own intermediate range arsenal or through its proxy, the Hizballah militia, which has more than 40,000 missiles aimed at Israel from neighboring Lebanon.
In the current political context, the U.S. logic is transparent, says Israeli analyst Efraim Inbar. “I think they don’t want to insinuate that they are preparing something together with the Israelis against Iran – that’s the message,” says Inbar, director of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies at Bar-Ilan University. “Trust? We don’t trust them. They don’t trust us. All these liberal notions! Even a liberal president like Obama knows better.”
The U.S. anti-missile systems are important because while Israel has made great strides in creating anti-missile shields that protect its population, it doesn’t have enough of them to deploy around the entire country, even with the U.S. aid specifically dedicated to building more (as well as crucial offensive capabilities, such as mid-air refuelers and possibly bunker-busting bombs). That makes the presence of the Patriots – first deployed to Israel during the First Gulf War, when Saddam Hussein fired Scuds toward the Jewish State — and other U.S. anti-missile systems extremely valuable. Austere Challenge was billed by assistant secretary of state Andrew J. Shapiro last November as “by far the largest and most significant exercise in U.S.-Israeli history.” A stated goal was to “improve interoperability” between American and Israeli anti-missile systems – which are already significantly linked. The U.S. maintains an X-band radar installation in Israel’s Negev Desert, pointed toward Iran and linked to Israel’s Arrow anti-missile system.
The radar is extraordinarily powerful, so sensitive it can detect a softball thrown into the air from thousands of miles away. But as TIME reported earlier, only Americans are allowed to see what’s on the screens, a situation that likely serves to inhibit any Israeli decision to “go it alone” against Iran, because the U.S. array can detect an Iranian missile launch six to seven minutes earlier than Israel’s best radar. Difficult as it may be to imagine U.S. decision-makers holding back information that could save Israeli lives, both by giving them more time to reach a shelter, or their interceptors to lock onto and destroy an incoming Shahab-3, the risk looms in the complex calculus of Israeli officials mulling an attack on Iran.
Inside Israel, reports persist that prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and defense chief Ehud Barak are determined to launch a strike, and American officials continue to urge restraint. Israeli analysts say Netanyahu wants Obama to send a letter committing to U.S. military action by a specific date if Iran has not acceded to concessions, but the U.S. administration does not appear to be complying. U.S. Joint Chiefs chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey told reporters in London this week that a military strike could damage but not destroy Iran’s nuclear capability, and added, “I don’t want to be complicit if they choose to do it.”[/QUOTE]
[url]http://world.time.com/2012/08/31/exclusive-u-s-scales-back-military-exercise-with-israel-affecting-potential-iran-strike/[/url]
The situation with Iran seems to keep hitting near boiling point so much these days. I'm glad the US seems to be showing restraint, but I can't help but feel things will change for the worse after the election, especially if the GOP gets in.
[QUOTE]“Basically what the Americans are saying is, ‘We don’t trust you,’” a senior Israeli military official tells TIME.[/QUOTE]
Oh, excuse us. Sorry if we're untrustworthy after all the back-rubs and hot chocolate you've been giving us.
[QUOTE=Spooter;37501683]Oh, excuse us. Sorry if we're untrustworthy after all the back-rubs and hot chocolate you've been giving us.[/QUOTE]
I can't believe he's saying that after the shit Israel has been pulling
[quote]
“Basically what the Americans are saying is, ‘We don’t trust you,’” a senior Israeli military official tells TIME.[/quote]
YOU FUCKING SOLD OUR PATRIOT MISSILE DESIGNS TO THE CHINESE.
[I][B]FUCK YOU.[/B][/I]
[editline]1st September 2012[/editline]
They've given us more grounds to actually [I]ATTACK THEM[/I] than anyone else in the history of our nation being around.
[QUOTE=Swilly;37501851]YOU FUCKING SOLD OUR PATRIOT MISSILE DESIGNS TO THE CHINESE.
[I][B]FUCK YOU.[/B][/I]
[editline]1st September 2012[/editline]
They've given us more grounds to actually [I]ATTACK THEM[/I] than anyone else in the history of our nation being around.[/QUOTE]
Wait, when was this?
How the fuck did I miss that?
I don't want to sound like I'm one of those "America fuck yeah" types, but it's [I]REALLY[/I] not a good idea to mess with the country who has two aircraft carriers and a shitton of troops in your country and the surrounding ones.
[QUOTE=_Kent_;37503289]Wait, when was this?
How the fuck did I miss that?[/QUOTE]
Just before Christmas, Israel sent 70 Patriots and launcher designs to China but got intercepted by Finnish authorities at a dock, don't quote me on this its what others have said quite alot.
[QUOTE=Chernarus;37503448]Just before Christmas, Israel sent 70 Super Patriots and launcher designs to China but got intercepted by Finnish authorities at a dock.[/QUOTE]
Got a link to that? I'd love to read that.
[QUOTE=Chernarus;37503448]Just before Christmas, Israel sent 70 Super Patriots and launcher designs to China but got intercepted by Finnish authorities at a dock.[/QUOTE]
Thank you, Finland :v:
[QUOTE=LtKyle2;37503847]Got a link to that? I'd love to read that.[/QUOTE]
[url]http://www.veteranstoday.com/2011/12/23/breaking-patriot-missiles-seized-sold-to-china-by-israel/[/url]
[url]http://www.thetotalcollapse.com/breaking-patriot-missiles-seized-sold-to-china-by-israel/[/url]
[url]http://www.dailypaul.com/196406/israel-caught-selling-69-us-patriot-missiles-to-red-china[/url]
not very reputable sources, but it looked like this happened
[QUOTE=Zillamaster55;37503892]Thank you, Finland :v:[/QUOTE]
Finland: Protecting Americas freedom since 2011.
[QUOTE=Swilly;37501851]
They've given us more grounds to actually [I]ATTACK THEM[/I] than anyone else in the history of our nation being around.[/QUOTE]
I'm surprised we haven't especially after the Liberty incident. If any other country pulled the shit Israel pulls then we would [I]liberate[/I] the ever loving fuck out of them
Thank god, I'm tired of the overwhelming support for Israel by the US.
[QUOTE=Pig;37504209]Why are people rating this winner, there isn't anything good about this.[/QUOTE]
Are you pro-Israel getting the US involved in a war and causing mass death, radiation leaks and possibly chemical and dirty weapons going off all over the middle east?
[editline]1st September 2012[/editline]
Holy shit you changed your fucking attitude on the entire Israel vs Iran vs US bullshit pretty quickly.
[URL="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-16292244"]http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-16292244[/URL]
[URL="http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20111222-710097.html"]http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20111222-710097.html[/URL]
[URL="http://articles.cnn.com/2011-12-22/world/world_europe_finland-ship-missiles_1_patriot-missiles-shipment-surface-to-air-missile-system?_s=PM:EUROPE"]http://articles.cnn.com/2011-12-22/world/world_europe_finland-ship-missiles_1_patriot-missiles-shipment-surface-to-air-missile-system?_s=PM:EUROPE[/URL]
LITERALLY five mins of research. No Israel is not responsible for the rouge Patriots. Germany was selling the Patriots to South Korea as part of an under-the table arrangement, because the South Koreans did not have the proper transit papers to ship them through Finland. And Finland got them red handed.
They didn't get the transit papers because they didn't want to wait for all the diplomatic stuff, they wanted the weapons pronto:[URL="http://www.defencetalk.com/south-korea-wants-impounded-patriot-missiles-as-early-as-possible-39279/"] http://www.defencetalk.com/south-korea-wants-impounded-patriot-missiles-as-early-as-possible-39279/[/URL]
[QUOTE=Chernarus;37504231]Are you pro-Israel getting the US involved in a war and causing mass death, radiation leaks and possibly chemical and dirty weapons going off all over the middle east?
[editline]1st September 2012[/editline]
Holy shit you changed your fucking attitude on the entire Israel vs Iran vs US bullshit pretty quickly.[/QUOTE]
No, I just didn't read the title correctly.
[QUOTE=Disotrtion;37504278][URL="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-16292244"]http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-16292244[/URL]
[URL="http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20111222-710097.html"]http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20111222-710097.html[/URL]
[URL="http://articles.cnn.com/2011-12-22/world/world_europe_finland-ship-missiles_1_patriot-missiles-shipment-surface-to-air-missile-system?_s=PM:EUROPE"]http://articles.cnn.com/2011-12-22/world/world_europe_finland-ship-missiles_1_patriot-missiles-shipment-surface-to-air-missile-system?_s=PM:EUROPE[/URL]
LITERALLY five mins of research. No Israel is not responsible for the rouge Patriots. Germany was selling the Patriots to South Korea as part of an under-the table arrangement, because the South Koreans did not have the proper transit papers to ship them through Finland. And Finland got them red handed.
They didn't get the transit papers because they didn't want to wait for all the diplomatic stuff, they wanted the weapons pronto:[URL="http://www.defencetalk.com/south-korea-wants-impounded-patriot-missiles-as-early-as-possible-39279/"] http://www.defencetalk.com/south-korea-wants-impounded-patriot-missiles-as-early-as-possible-39279/[/URL][/QUOTE]
Then why were they headed for Shanghai, and AFAIK Germany doesent have Super Patriots. Plus, Germany has a history of war guilt and for some reason feels the need to always do shit for Israel.
[QUOTE=trotskygrad;37503958][url]http://www.veteranstoday.com/2011/12/23/breaking-patriot-missiles-seized-sold-to-china-by-israel/[/url]
[url]http://www.thetotalcollapse.com/breaking-patriot-missiles-seized-sold-to-china-by-israel/[/url]
[url]http://www.dailypaul.com/196406/israel-caught-selling-69-us-patriot-missiles-to-red-china[/url]
not very reputable sources, but it looked like this happened[/QUOTE]
These are all terrible.
The first one is a [URL="http://www.veteranstoday.com/category/911-and-terror-war/"]9/11 truther[/URL] site. That also posts Alex Jones-esque stories such as [URL="http://www.veteranstoday.com/2012/08/06/us-army-psy-ops-behind-wisconsin-massacre/"]"US Army Psy-Ops Behind Wisconsin Massacre At Sikh Temple"[/URL]
The second one is run by a lunatic who claimed [URL="http://www.thetotalcollapse.com/the-us-civil-war-of-2016/"]here [/URL]that the US plans to start a civil war with the Tea Party in 2016
The third website's sole purpose is to cater to Ron Paul fans. It doesn't even have an article but instead links to a blog, that is hilarious, and I included it [URL="http://chasvoice.blogspot.com/2011/12/israel-caught-selling-69-us-patriot.html"]here[/URL] for laughs.
[editline]2nd September 2012[/editline]
[QUOTE=Chernarus;37504495]Then why were they headed for Shanghai, and AFAIK Germany doesent have Super Patriots. Plus, Germany has a history of war guilt and for some reason feels the need to always do shit for Israel.[/QUOTE]
Israel didn't even have the 69 Patriots to send in the first place.
The entire thing is a lie.
Germany's been decommissioning the patriots, and SK wants them to defend itself from NK.
So you're saying Patriots were not destined for Shanghai? Every other clearly says they were and Germany does not have Super Patriots afaik, pretty sure the articles said they were from the official finnish report afaik.
[QUOTE=Chernarus;37504642]So you're saying Patriots were not destined for Shanghai? Every other clearly says they were and Germany does not have Super Patriots afaik, pretty sure the articles said they were from the official finnish report afaik.[/QUOTE]
Show me.
Give me some sources.
First give me a credible source that the seized missiles were "Super Patriots" or whatever the fuck you are trying to say, because "super patriots" don't exist. There literally is not Patriot missile system named "Super Patriots"[URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIM-104_Patriot"]Here's[/URL] the list of current Patriots.
2. Give me a credible source that states the Patriots, AND NOT THE SHIP, were bound for Shanghai.
3. Give me a credible source that states the 69 missiles were matched to missing missiles from Israel's inventory.
4. Give me a credible source that says the Germans claimed responsibility in err, and the South Koreans claimed responsibility in err, too.
[QUOTE=Disotrtion;37504770]Show me.
Give me some sources.
First give me a credible source that the seized missiles were "Super Patriots" or whatever the fuck you are trying to say, because "super patriots" don't exist. There literally is not Patriot missile system named "Super Patriots"[URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIM-104_Patriot"]Here's[/URL] the list of current Patriots.
2. Give me a credible source that states the Patriots, AND NOT THE SHIP, were bound for Shanghai.
3. Give me a credible source that states the 69 missiles were matched to missing missiles from Israel's inventory.
4. Give me a credible source that says the Germans claimed responsibility in err, and the South Koreans claimed responsibility in err, too.[/QUOTE]
Eh apparently its a nickname for the most modern variant, and apparently only Israel and the US has the most modern variant. I dont really care anymore so you can win this dumb argument. But I have to ask, why are you so pro-Israel?
[QUOTE=Chernarus;37505003]Eh apparently its a nickname for the most modern variant, and apparently only Israel and the US has the most modern variant. I dont really care anymore so you can win this dumb argument. But I have to ask, why are you so pro-Israel?[/QUOTE]
Why can't he support a country when they are in the right without having to be "pro-Israel", as if that's a terrible thing?
Just saying, he may or may not be, but the assumption that he's probably just a "pro-Israeli jew lover" is not a good assumption to be made just because he defends them on something.
[QUOTE=Clementine;37505068]Why can't he support a country when they are in the right without having to be "pro-Israel", as if that's a terrible thing?
Just saying, he may or may not be, but the assumption that he's probably just a "pro-Israeli jew lover" is not a good assumption to be made just because he defends them on something.[/QUOTE]
Almost every single Israel thread I see him posting for them, its not just one topic. I was just genuinely interested.
[QUOTE=Chernarus;37505003][B]Eh apparently its a nickname for the most modern variant,[/B] and apparently only Israel and the US has the most modern variant. I dont really care anymore so you can win this dumb argument. But I have to ask, why are you so pro-Israel?[/QUOTE]
no it doesn't exist because you made it up.
I'm not pro-Zionist, its just that when you, Chernaus, try to feed the forum shit and they all gobble it up, it pisses me off.
Sure Israel's done some really shitty things, and then they haven't done some shitty things and people are just plain lying.
The path to peace in the middle east doesn't revolve around painting the Israelis as a nation of horrible monsters, so we can justify Palestine's terrorism and sway people to their side, or the Palestinians as a nation of murderous terrorists, so we can justify Israel's terrorism and then sway people to their side. It's not supposed to be petty like that. The solution lies between the two extremes.
[QUOTE=trotskygrad;37503958][URL]http://www.veteranstoday.com/2011/12/23/breaking-patriot-missiles-seized-sold-to-china-by-israel/[/URL]
[URL]http://www.thetotalcollapse.com/breaking-patriot-missiles-seized-sold-to-china-by-israel/[/URL]
[URL]http://www.dailypaul.com/196406/israel-caught-selling-69-us-patriot-missiles-to-red-china[/URL]
not very reputable sources, but it looked like this happened[/QUOTE]"Not very reputable" is a gigantic understatement. Shit, have you even read them? :v:
Any source that channels the spirit of McCarthyism through scare phrases like "Red China" is generally not a particularly reliable source, for a start.
Nor is a site that puts images like this up reliable.
[IMG]http://www.veteranstoday.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/Tech-Snatch002edited.jpg[/IMG]
Dozens of other news sites reported on the story, but not a single one makes mention of Israel. Nor is any mention made of which version of the system was found. Israel only has PAC2/GEM+, so even if they sold the weapons to China for some utterly unfathomable reason, it's obsolete on arrival for a nation that has some already very capable systems.
Israel's done enough shit without anyone having to fabricate stories like this to demonise them or whatever; for example, the stuff in the posts below me.
[QUOTE=Swilly;37501851]“Basically what the Americans are saying is, ‘We don’t trust you,’” a senior Israeli military official tells TIME.[/QUOTE]
Yeah, why should we trust you when you send in your mossad agents into Iran and let them calim they're CIA, so we catch flak?
[url]http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/israeli-mossad-agents-posed-as-cia-spies-to-recruit-terrorists-to-fight-against-iran-1.407224[/url]
[url]http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2012/01/20121142232610383.html[/url]
[url]http://rt.com/usa/news/israel-cia-mossad-iran-763/[/url]
What about that time that israel tried to sell nukes to South Africa as well?
[url]http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/israel/7757687/Israel-offered-to-sell-South-Africa-nuclear-weapons.html[/url]
[url]http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/may/23/israel-south-africa-nuclear-weapons[/url]
[url]http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/25/world/middleeast/25israel.html[/url]
[QUOTE=richard9311;37506363]Yeah, why should we trust you when you send in your mossad agents into Iran and let them calim they're CIA, so we catch flak?
[url]http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/israeli-mossad-agents-posed-as-cia-spies-to-recruit-terrorists-to-fight-against-iran-1.407224[/url]
[url]http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2012/01/20121142232610383.html[/url]
[url]http://rt.com/usa/news/israel-cia-mossad-iran-763/[/url][/QUOTE]
Mossad also spies on the CIA Operatives who are supposed to be helping them. That's shady as fuck.
Apparently the CIA actually considers them to be the biggest intelligence threat in the region.
USA and Israel stop that shit before you cause WW3
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