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DanielPipes.org looks at the Middle East, Islam, terrorism, U.S. foreign policy,
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Daniel Pipes
My Peace Plan: An Israeli Victory
http://www.danielpipes.org/8309/my-peace-plan-an-israeli-victory
This month, Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak declared that Israel must
withdraw from Palestinian territories. "The world isn't willing to accept —
and we won't change that in 2010 — the expectation that Israel will
rule another people for decades more," he said. "It's something that doesn't
exist anywhere else in the world."
Is he right? Is peace even possible? And if so, what form should a final
agreement take? Those are the questions we asked National Post writers
in our series "What's Your Peace Plan?"
 Ehud Barak, Israel's defence minister. |
Victory uniquely creates circumstances conducive to peace. Wars end, the
historical record confirms, when one side concedes defeat and the other wins.
This makes intuitive sense, for so long as both sides aspire to achieve their
ambitions, fighting continues or it potentially can resume.
The goal of victory is not exactly something novel. Sun Tzu, the ancient
Chinese strategist, advised that in war, "Let your great object be victory."
Raimondo Montecuccoli, a seventeenth-century Austrian, said that
"The objective in war is victory." Carl von Clausewitz, a nineteenth-
century Prussian, added that "War is an act of violence to compel the
enemy to fulfill our will." Winston Churchill told the British people:
"You ask: what is our aim? I can answer in one word: Victory -
victory - at all costs, victory, in spite of all terror, victory,
however long and hard the road may be." Dwight D. Eisenhower
served that "In war, there is no substitute for victory." These insights f
rom prior eras still hold, for however much weaponry changes, human
nature remains the same.
Victory means imposing one's will on the enemy, compelling him to
abandon his war goals. Germans, forced to surrender in World War I,
retained the goal of dominating Europe and a few years later looked to
Hitler to achieve this goal. Signed pieces of paper matter only if one
side has cried "Uncle": The Vietnam War ostensibly concluded through
diplomacy in 1973 but both sides continued to seek their war aims until the
North won ultimate victory in 1975.
Willpower is the key: shooting down planes, destroying tanks, exhausting
munitions, making soldiers flee, and seizing land are not decisive in
themselves but must be accompanied by a psychological collapse.
North Korea's loss in 1953, Saddam Hussein's in 1991, and the Iraqi
Sunni loss in 2003 did not translate into despair. Conversely, the
French gave up in Algeria in 1962, despite out-manning and out-gunning
their foes, as did the Americans in Vietnam in 1975 and the Soviets in
Afghanistan in 1989. The Cold War ended without a fatality. In all these cases,
the losers maintained large arsenals, armies, and functioning economies.
But they ran out of will.
Likewise, the Arab-Israeli conflict will be resolved only when one
side gives up.
Until now, through round after round of war, both sides have retained t
heir goals. Israel fights to win acceptance by its enemies, while those enemies
fight to eliminate Israel. Those goals are raw, unchanging, and mutually
contradictory. Israel's acceptance or elimination are the only states
of peace. Each observer must opt for one solution or the other.
A civilized person will want Israel to win, for its goal is defensive,
to protect an existing and flourishing country. Its enemies' goal of
destruction amounts to pure barbarism.
For nearly 60 years, Arab rejectionists, now joined by Iranian and leftist
counterparts, have tried to eliminate Israel through multiple strategies:
they work to undermine its legitimacy intellectually, overwhelm it
demographically, isolate it economically, restrain its defenses
diplomatically, fight it conventionally, demoralize it with terror,
and threaten to destroy it with WMDs. While the enemies of Israel have
pursued their goals with energy and will, they have met few successes.
Ironically, Israelis over time responded to the incessant assault on their country
by losing sight of the need to win. The right developed schemes to finesse
victory, the center experimented with appeasement and unilateralism, and the
left wallowed in guilt and self-recrimination. Exceedingly few Israelis understand
the unfinished business of victory, of crushing the enemy's will and getting him to
accept the permanence of the Jewish state.
Fortunately for Israel, it need only defeat the Palestinians, and not the
entire Arab or Muslim population, which eventually will follow the
Palestinian lead in accepting Israel. Fortunately too, although the
Palestinians have built an awesome reputation for endurance, they
can be beaten. If the Germans and Japanese could be forced to give up in
1945 and the Americans in 1975, how can Palestinians be exempt from defeat?
 The United Nations Security Council, one factor extending the Arab-Israeli conflict. |
This means undoing the perceptions of Israel's weakness that grew during
the Oslo process (1993-2000) and then the twin withdrawals from
Lebanon and Gaza (2000-05). Jerusalem appeared back on track during
Ariel Sharon's first three years as prime minister, 2001-03 and his tough
stance then marked real progress in Israel's war effort. Only when it
became clear in late 2004 that Sharon really did plan to withdraw unilaterally
from Gaza did the Palestinian mood revive and Israel stopped winning.
Ehud Olmert's debilitating prime ministry has been only partially remedied
y Binyamin Netanyahu over the past year.
Ironically, an Israeli victory would bring yet greater benefits to the
Palestinians than to Israel. Israelis would benefit by being rid of an atavistic
war, to be sure, but their country is a functioning, modern society. For
Palestinians, in contrast, abandoning the fetid irredentist dream of
eliminating their neighbor would finally offer them a chance to tend their
wn misbegotten garden, to develop their deeply deficient polity, economy,
society, and culture.
Thus does my peace plan both end the war and bring unique benefits to all
directly involved.
Mr. Pipes is director of the Middle East Forum and Taube distinguished
visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution of Stanford University.
Related Topics: Arab-Israel conflict & diplomacy receive the latest by email: subscribe to daniel pipes' free mailing list This text may be reposted or forwarded so long as it is presented as an integral whole with complete information provided about its author, date, place of publication, and original URL.
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