Wesley Clark: US Shouldn't Support Israel When Israel Defends Itself Against Acts of War
Vital Perspective is on a tear about recent statements made by Wesley Clark, that paragon of what passes for centrist military credibility in today's Democratic party:
Thanks to an alert reader, we'd like to direct your attention to a speech that Retired U.S. Army Gen. Wesley Clark delivered at The University of Alabama on Friday. The former presidential candidate and current military analyst for Fox News had this to say about U.S. foreign policy and the Israeli war with Hezbollah: "There's a lot of demonstrations out there against the American government and its policies. We've made some serious, serious mistakes, the latest being - it's hard to pick the latest - but one of them, recently, was the one where we sided with the Israelis in that air campaign in Lebanon. And instead of stopping the bombing, we were cheerleading it. It hurt Israel, it hurt Lebanon, and it hurt us. It helped Iran."
This is some scary rhetoric that holds the possibility of serious implications for the U.S.-Israel relationship. We research his statements and found an August 1 interview where Clark said, "We don’t believe in reckless bombing. We believe in humanitarian assistance. We believe in ending quarrels by the peaceful settlement of disputes and we believe in the use of war only as a last resort." The two statements square up pretty well, so this wasn't an instance where Clark somehow 'misspoke'... So here's a lesson in foreign policy and the war on terror for Clark... you don't leave a friend like that standing alone when they are fighting against a terror organization that has killed more Americans than any group other than al-Qaeda, and you recognize that Israel could have attacked the government of Lebanon, but chose to restrain itself to a limited campaign against the terrorists.
There's more in the original article. You should also check out the other VP article from yesterday, about how Olmert requested direct peace talks with Lebanon. Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Siniora huffily rejected the offer and said that Lebanon will be the last country to make peace with Israel. Presumably, Wesley Clark blames Israel's oh-so-unjustifiable air campaign for that too - even though that's been Lebanon's position for several decades. And even though the airport campaign was in response to an act of war perpetuated against Israel by an agent of the Lebanese government (oh, we're sorry - by the 'armed wing' of a party that has nothing to do with the Lebanese government, except they have seats in the Lebanese cabinet and so actually are in the Lebanese government - they're not even an opposition party).
We don't want to say that Clark's sudden and almost incoherent attack on Israel is a result of the massive injection of Soros money that he just got. Actually, we kind of do believe that - but only because the argument for Israel's culpability in Lebanon II is just so bad.
Thanks to an alert reader, we'd like to direct your attention to a speech that Retired U.S. Army Gen. Wesley Clark delivered at The University of Alabama on Friday. The former presidential candidate and current military analyst for Fox News had this to say about U.S. foreign policy and the Israeli war with Hezbollah: "There's a lot of demonstrations out there against the American government and its policies. We've made some serious, serious mistakes, the latest being - it's hard to pick the latest - but one of them, recently, was the one where we sided with the Israelis in that air campaign in Lebanon. And instead of stopping the bombing, we were cheerleading it. It hurt Israel, it hurt Lebanon, and it hurt us. It helped Iran."
This is some scary rhetoric that holds the possibility of serious implications for the U.S.-Israel relationship. We research his statements and found an August 1 interview where Clark said, "We don’t believe in reckless bombing. We believe in humanitarian assistance. We believe in ending quarrels by the peaceful settlement of disputes and we believe in the use of war only as a last resort." The two statements square up pretty well, so this wasn't an instance where Clark somehow 'misspoke'... So here's a lesson in foreign policy and the war on terror for Clark... you don't leave a friend like that standing alone when they are fighting against a terror organization that has killed more Americans than any group other than al-Qaeda, and you recognize that Israel could have attacked the government of Lebanon, but chose to restrain itself to a limited campaign against the terrorists.
There's more in the original article. You should also check out the other VP article from yesterday, about how Olmert requested direct peace talks with Lebanon. Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Siniora huffily rejected the offer and said that Lebanon will be the last country to make peace with Israel. Presumably, Wesley Clark blames Israel's oh-so-unjustifiable air campaign for that too - even though that's been Lebanon's position for several decades. And even though the airport campaign was in response to an act of war perpetuated against Israel by an agent of the Lebanese government (oh, we're sorry - by the 'armed wing' of a party that has nothing to do with the Lebanese government, except they have seats in the Lebanese cabinet and so actually are in the Lebanese government - they're not even an opposition party).
We don't want to say that Clark's sudden and almost incoherent attack on Israel is a result of the massive injection of Soros money that he just got. Actually, we kind of do believe that - but only because the argument for Israel's culpability in Lebanon II is just so bad.
