My Peace Plan: An Israeli Victory
by Daniel Pipes
National Post
April 29, 2010
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?
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My peace plan is simple: Israel defeats its enemies.
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 17-century Austrian, said
that “The objective in war is victory.” Carl von Clausewitz, a
19-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 observed
that “in war, there is no substitute for victory.” These insights from
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 First World
War, 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
their 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
defences 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 centre 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?
Of course, Israel faces obstacles in achieving victory. The country is
hemmed in generally by international expectations (from the United
Nations Security Council, for example) and specifically by the
policies of its main ally, the U.S. government. Therefore, if
Jerusalem is to win, that starts with a change in policy in the United
States and in other Western countries. Those governments should urge
Israel to seek victory by convincing the Palestinians that they have
lost.
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 (2000-2005). Jerusalem appeared back on track during
Ariel Sharon’s first three years as prime minister (2001-2003) 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 by Benjamin 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 neighbour would finally offer
them a chance to tend their own 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.
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