I asked that you read my previous post on the subject, appearing in this thread. It appears that you didn't since it answered some of the questions that you posed--before you even asked I might add--so it isn't accurate to say that neither I, nor anyone else, has provided a rebuttal. Here is a C&P of what I wrote (I'll place this in italics):
"The USA funds Egypt, Israel, and Jordan, and supports the Saudis and Gulf States in other quite expensive ways. Yet when the USA needed a place to host a new radar system in the Middle East, every single Arab state turned us down; the Israelis are hosting the system. Now this system is run by and controlled by Americans, and the Israeli defense establishment has already said that this could undermine Israeli security, as they aren't entitled to any information from this installation that the Americans don't want them to have as all this information could be used both by the USA, other American allies, or even leaked to American and Israeli enemies theoretically. This is not the first time, nor will it be the last, the Israel has taken security risks in aid of the USA.
Additionally, in both Persian Gulf wars the USA was a major beneficiary of Israeli doctrines in dealing with Arab/Iraqi forces. Like all armed forces, Israel has learned these lessons, and developed and honed these doctrines while the blood of its own people have been spilled. This is why most nations are covetous of obtaining doctrinal information. In both wars the Israelis trained Americans, helping to minimize our casualties. This has been undeniably valuable in this most recent war where Israeli urban warfare doctrine--certainly the most advanced in the world--has saved countless American lives. Speaking to American officers back when I was still doing my PhD program, this shared knowledge helped to reduce our learning curve; the American Army would have developed equally good doctrines, but only after months or years of bloody mistakes.
These are some of the reasons why we have supported Israel. Democracy, Ideology, a common bond, these are all fine and dandy, but I submit that these pale next to the pain of having to tell some parent or spouse that their loved one is dead.... but hey, on the bright side we don't have to fund those Israelis any more!"
Now these are merely a few examples, and no, this speaks nothing of the quid pro quo during the Cold War. It could be argued, admittedly subjectively, that the assistance Israel provided during the Cold War has been of far greater value than all the economic and military aid that Israel has ever received from the USA. Cases in point:
1. Passing on state of the art Soviet weaponry to US agents (eg- MiG-21, tanks, artillery, radar equipment, etc.)
2. Passing on intelligence gathered by Mossad (eg-operations in Iran, Iraq, etc.)
3. The air-doctrines developed in 1973 to overcome Soviet air defenses. Subsequently perfected in 1982, ex-Soviet advisors have gone on record as citing this as one of the major reasons why they threw in the towel. In effect, they're entire strategy for controlling their airspace was built around SAM systems. Once Israel had beaten this system and passed on these findings to the USAF, they knew they were finished.
As I've written before, in other forums, it was Israeli intelligence more than our own that allowed us to determine how far ahead American arms really were in some areas and allowed the USA to focus on either catching up in areas where the USSR had small leads or was neck and neck. This both saved the USA billions of dollars (hundreds of billions to be more precise), and allowed us to bring the Cold War to a more rapid, less costly conclusion. If you tally up all the assistance that Israel has ever received from the USA versus the money that the USA would have spent had we and Israel not aligned, and passed up on things like Israeli intelligence, the USA is to the good somewhere around US$200billion, and probably way more.
Has Israel benefited? Damn straight! What the hell is a quid pro quo if it doesn't go both ways. But you seem to forget that the only reason for the existence of any government... the ONLY reason, is the protection of ITS interests. So amazing at it may seem, the Israeli government is actually more concerned about appealing to its citizens than to you, just as the American government should be more concerned about appealing to you than to misc. corporations or even foreign governments (this is an argument for another day). So why do you expect the American govt. to represent your wishes and the Israeli govt. not to represent its own peoples' wishes? It seems like this is what you want, but is that reasonable?
So how many times have the US used Israeli soil for basing their operations? There may have been the odd covert operation, but as has been pointed out by others, if anything Israel was a liability in GWI and GWII. Any direct involvement in that war and the coalition and basing opportunities would largely have disappeared. I'm sure at odd times Israel is (or more probably was given that there are now bases that can be used in other countries in the region)advantageous to have. I understand the need for bases and allies such as the US facilities in my own country, Australia (Pine Gap, North West Cape), and in Australia's case there is a quid pro quo to be had. The US gets to use some of our training areas and ranges, we share intel, we provide a friendly pro US influence in the region and I believe we were the first international nation to step forward with assistance when the US requested in GWII, and we get US assistance if things turn to poo in our region. So I understand that very well. What does Israel provide to the US? Where is the quid pro quo?
Answered above. Just like Kuwait needs us and we need Kuwait, same with Israel. Turkey is our ally too, but what happened when we asked them to use their territory for the Gulf War? Don't remember? They gave us the diplomatic finger. You'd have a much stronger point if you were arguing for an isolationist America. After all, you are correct below in that all foreign aid can be likened to a bribe, although that's a very pessimistic way of looking at things.* Still, this is the price that is paid to maintain influence. Consider Pakistan. We just gave Pakistan a huge new package and Pakistani lawmakers threw a fit. You know why? Because there were strings attached. The Pakistani response was, seriously, that if we are going to give them money we have no right to expect anything in return or to tell them how or where they can spend it! OTOH, Israel stopped the Yom Kippur war early in deference to American interests, despite having lost 3,000 dead (per capita equiv. to 300,000 Americans dead) and about 7,500 wounded. You really think that isn't worth anything?
*-I think a more constructive way of looking at these things is calling it the 'price of doing business.' If you go to a car dealership you aren't 'bribing' the dealer to let you take than car off the lot, but you are giving to get, the key is what is the car worth to you versus what is the money or trade-in worth to the dealer. Diplomacy isn't really any different at its most base. Sometimes we send aid because it is the 'right' thing to do, but there is almost always a baser motive beneath the outward altruism. Look at Haiti: all this aid is rushing there to help those poor people devastated by the earthquake. Is that altruism? Yes.... and no. After all, it is morally and ethically the right thing to do, but it is important to remember that desperate people will soon be at YOUR front door. How do you forestall that problem? Solve it down there before they come up here. It is cold and self-interested, but when this calculation crosses paths with an altruistic greater good the money does seem to flow, doesn't it?
You cannot invade and control a country without putting troops on the ground. A better argument would have been to point out where the US has people (some uniformed, most not) on a Pakistani Airbase.
The USAF would beg to disagree, but I said nothing about invasion. You mentioned air operations and I mentioned that we have pleaded and made deals with central and south Asian governments for AIR bases and the use of AIR space. Long-term air operations require land-based air bases if they are to be conducted in sufficient numbers (sorties), cheaply (relatively), safely, and at reasonable strain to our military capacity.
BTW, if Pakistan is such a wonderful ally, why do our people have to dump their uniforms, operate covertly, and why does their government continue to lend support to, or at the very least harbor, the Taliban and al Qaeda. Seems to me you are willing to place the bar outrageously high for Israel and outrageously low for everyone else in order to try to rig a result that convinces you that Israel is a 'failure' of an ally, but even by these standards its a tough sell.
BTW, you may want to explain how using the Carrier groups is difficult and dangerous to use. I cannot remember any carrier being targeted by suicide bombers or VBIED in the past 50 years - unlike say Baghdad. Also difficult? The US has perfected carrier ops in the 1930's and seems to have faith in the 12 carrier groups and the ability of the USMC or for that matter the US army's airborne and airmobile forces.
As noted above, carrier groups operating as lone air-support are only meant to operate that way for short term use--a few days, a week, even a month. There is no conflict, EVER, where that rule has been allowed to be broken successfully. Today we operate with the support of friendly land-based air in both theatres of operation. In the First Gulf War, same thing. Vietnam, same thing. Korea, same thing. World War II, same thing.
So how long has the war in Afghanistan gone on? I think it has been longer than a month now, so I think we're getting past the point of needing land-based air-support. But for the sake of argument how could one get around this? There are a few ways.
1. Fly at maximum efficiency. While you are right that the USA has the most efficient carrier forces in the world--perfected is a loaded word, but as close as can be, sure--they're still staffed by human beings, human beings working in limited spaces, with huge amounts of explosives and traffic. So the only way to maintain an acceptable number of sorties over a theatre of operations without any land-based support would be to wear your crews, planes, pilots, etc. to a dangerous level. At this point you're courting mistakes. These happen anyway, even when all the safety checks are made, but tired people rushing to turn planes around will make more mistakes. Someone sends the wrong signal, doesn't duck, etc. and you've got a real problem.
2. Fly from distant bases. Very expensive, wears down pilots with long flight times, wears down planes with long flight times, and limits sorties due to the enormous time in flight.
3. Use numerous carriers. You'd need to do this anyway, but this creates other problems. The more carriers you concentrate, the fewer that act as a political deterrent elsewhere. Also, and this is mucho important, the larger the primary group the smaller the pool you have to rotate out, and you WILL need to rotate your carriers over time. And at the end of the day, normal operations aboard a carrier are still and always will be more expensive and more dangerous than equivalent operations on land.
4. Use land-based airpower....
So in the end, you need local bases, and consequently, you need local allies. If you didn't then we'd have forsaken many nations like South Korea or Taiwan, but we need them and they need us. End of story.
Two asides:
1. While a suicide bomber could drive onto an airbase, that is a threat than can be controlled. As you've noted, teh USN has already taken just about all the precaustions that it can on a carrier and they are still dangerous places to operate. After all, how much movement is there in the runway at Bagram versus an aircraft carrier, eh?
2. The USA did not perfect carriers in the 1930s, this is really a teleological argument. In fact, we didn't even have the largest carrier fleet by the time war arrived (the Japanese did) nor did we have the most robust (the British steel deck carriers got that honor, albeit at a very heavy price). However, ours were the best combination of size, range, planeload, and surviveability, and we soon did essentially "perfect" the art of the carrier force and we've never looked back.
So, you believe we need Israel as an ally to invade one of these 4? Why, where is the threat? If the US is going to strike Iran, it will strike Iran, not Syria (besides, the cynical would possibly point out that there is not sufficient oil under Syria to bother). If you think it will do that from Israeli territory, you'd be very much mistaken. As with anything in that region, that will inflame sentiments in the Arab world against the US, why would the US risk trashing the diplomatic relations it has carefully built by doing that? So, any strike against an Arab country cannot be conducted from Israel - explain to me again its usefulness as a base?
I think that Israel's uses are greater than as a base, but that is a factor. Let's look at the second Gulf War as an example. Because of American largesse it would seem that we had four avenues from which we could attack the Iraqis:
1. Kuwait- the one we used.
2. Turkey- we asked, they said no.
3. Saudi Arabia-if we'd have pushed they might have assented, but it was essentially a no.
4. Israel-Jordan-didn't end up needing it.
The above was the scenario as it turned out, but what if Kuwait boots us? Unlikely given their reliance on us, but stranger has happened. That would have left only one option: using Israel as a staging point and moving thru Jordan after twisting his arm ruthlessly. Jordan's one tiny little port could never have handled American needs, and its infrastructure is piss poor, so Jordan would've been the conduit and Israel the base.
Another scenario, a repeat of 1956, but this time an Islamist government seizes Egypt and American interests are at stake. Not only is this possible, I believe this will happen within a decade (Mubarak is an old fart and he doesn't have a successor).
As for other scenarios, mostly they would be in support of friendly regimes under threat and so on. After all, we routinely base our ships at Haifa where they are much safer than, say, Yemen, where they might blow up.
These scenarios may never come to pass, but then again, there has never been another invasion of South Korea, another Chinese civil war, and the Soviets never crossed the Fulda Gap. Why? Was it because of these allies or in spite of them? That only G-d knows....
At the end of the day, all money is a bribe - a method to seek influence. The Egyptians have upheld their part of the bargain, the Israeli's seem hell bent in making the US look like fools (ignoring US requests to stop building settlements on disputed territory, scuttling US attempts at peace in the region). So, explain again the point of the $2.5Bn...
My quote about bugger any sense of restraint has to do with the Israeli settlements and their attitude to their neighbours. No, I do not define all relationships this way, but tell me, where was the quid pro quo in all this? What does America get out of its expensive relationship with Israel? .....
When you look at what the US gets from it relationships with Australia or the UK it pales by comparison with what it gets from Israel (at face value - obviously I am not privy to any intel links etc). From the outsiders point of view if it wasn't for a vocal jewish minority with influence or power in the US, the US would have and probably should have dumped its close ties with Israel at the end of the cold war.
Again, I ask, why is there such support in the US for Israel?
Listen, if you are frustrated with Israel, I can understand that. I'm Jewish and I get frustrated sometimes as well. Then again, I'm an American and I get frustrated with American policies, and as an historian I get frustrated with global policies, etc. You get my point?
As for Jews with influence, I ask you this: what exactly is wrong with this? Arabs use their oil for influence (they've actually held the world hostage effectively). Corporations use their influence. The Japanese use their influence. Environmental groups, abortion groups (pro and con), education, unions, etc. Why it bad/evil when Jews fight to be heard, but not when others do?
I could make a reverse argument for you: if it weren't for Arab oil, do you think we'd give a damn what the Arabs say? Would we cow-tow to them and pay so much attention to the Palestinians when things like Darfur happen? Would the Christian west ignore the wholesale repression of
12-18million Egyptian Copts (Christians) if not for fear of Arab oil?
Now let me ask you this: Why does it bother you more that these are Jews who influence your government when they're Americans exercising their constitutional rights? And why would you be okay by giving in to OPEC influencing your government when it is not an American institution?*
*-As an aside here, I'd prefer all of the PACs to be disbanded, but that's the system we've got and I cannot and will not fault groups for operating within it, including the Arabs if they'd like.
Anyway these are really mostly rhetorical questions, and not aimed entirely at you either, but to get people to think. However, these are things that concern me.
There is one last point that I'd like to make. You noted that the USA would not be targeted were it not for our support for Israel, but this argument hasn't held up over the years even though it seems so obvious (and I agree that it does). Way before modern Israel was even a glimmer we were fighting the barbary pirates, but more recently are two telling examples. During the Second World War the Arabs made it clear that unless Britain curtailed Jewish immigration to Palestine the Arabs would turn against the Brits. The Brits did what the Arabs wanted (this helped to trigger the Holocaust) and the Arabs of Palestine, Egypt, Syria, and Iraq all still staged attempts in greater and lesser degrees to go over to the axis. The problem was that while they were pissed about Jewish immigration, and it made for a great rallying cry, they were more pissed about colonialism and perceived attempts by the west to control them.
After the Second World War, after India gained independence, the Indians kept Israel at arms length, siding with the Arabs against Israel in the UN and so forth. They did this for about 45 years! Finally, exasperated, the Indian government began abandoning this policy in the 90s. In the end, according the Indian officials, there was never any quid pro quo. The Arabs never supported them with their own Muslim problems and, in fact, actively supported hostile anti-Indian, anti-Hindu policies adopted by Pakistan and the south Asian muslim community. This, the Indians felt, was their repayment for supporting the Arabs against Israel for nearly 1/2 century; many sub-Saharan states have begun feeling the same way.
Damn I'm sooo verbose..... but if I missed anything let me know,
Aaron
