How Is This Ally Different From All Other Allies?
Simple. In every formal U.S. military alliance, the motive of our allies is painfully clear. If they get into trouble we will fight their battles.
Israel, with which we have no formal alliance, fights our battles. It fights them better than we do ourselves.
Since the collapse of the Soviet Union Iran has been by far the most relevant and potent enemy of the United States. Its leaders seethe with an irrational hatred that makes its pursuit of a nuclear bomb the most frightening prospect we have faced in decades.
Iran has brought piracy back to the Red Sea disrupting one of the world’s most important trade routes by backing the Houthi. Iran threatens the Sunni middle east, which otherwise is increasingly integrated into the western economy, not merely as a collection of petro-states but important sources of capital and innovation.
Iran is the primary support of Hezbollah and Hamas, both dedicated to the destruction of Israel which among many other crucial roles is the frontal lobe of the U.S. semiconductor industry and the American path forward on the defense technology of the coming era.
American performance vs. Iran has been dismal, starting with the elder Bush’s bizarre decision to go to war against Iraq, at that time Iran’s most dangerous enemy.
When enforced, sanctions have been damaging but ineffective in pushing Iran toward peace.
All told in the 45 years since Iran declared itself by seizing the U.S. embassy and 66 American hostages, the U.S. government has not done anywhere near the damage to Iran that Israel has done in the past six months and especially the past two weeks.
Start with the complete repulse of the massive Iranian missile and drone attack against Israel in April, during which Israel warded off some 170 Iranian drones, more than 30 cruise missiles, and more than 120 ballistic missiles, and sustained no fatalities. That day changed the world, testifying to a massive shift in the military advantage toward the defense and against aggressors.
Just as important in the near-term Iran, was humiliated after more than four decades of humiliating the U.S.
Then came the great booming pager caper, followed by the walkie-talkie terror and now pinpoint Israeli air strikes into Lebanon that eliminated essential the entire command structure of Hezbollah.
Iran spent well over $10 billion, decades of effort, and enormous political capital building up Hezbollah and Hamas as proxy armies. Both stand on the brink of ruin today, thanks to Israel.
Israeli strikes against Houthi bases in the past few days have been many times more destructive and effective than hardly more than symbolic U.S. reprisals.
Once America’s ineffectiveness against Iran seemed mostly a matter of will. Today Israel exceeds us not only in will but in skill. Not in all its history has the U.S. intelligence apparatus pulled off anything like Mossad secretly supplying those pagers and walkie talkies to Hezbollah or locating dozens of the leaders of Hamas and Hezbollah in real time to facilitate their destruction with so little collateral damage. Not to mention packing an Iranian safe house with explosives two months in advance to assassinate Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh the moment he was confirmed to be in his room. That was one well hidden bomb.
As we write Iran’s “supreme leader” Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is in hiding in a secure location out of fear that he is high on Israel’s target list. No “supreme leader” has ever gone into hiding for fear of the U.S.
For many decades American supporters of Israel, including on occasion your servant rather condescendingly referred to that country as “our closest ally in the middle east.” Damning with faint praise. Today Israel is unquestionably our most important and capable ally in all the world. Israel is also our most underfunded ally considering the value we get.
Since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, we’ve sent some $85 billion in aid to that country. Exclusive of aid to Ukraine we spend more than $100 billion a year on U.S. forces deployed in Europe in support of NATO.
Israel typically gets about $4 billion a year in U.S. aid. It will get an extra $3.5 billion to alleviate the costs of the current wars. Much U.S. aid, however, is in support of manufacturing the elements of Israel’s world’s best missile defense systems including Iron Dome, David’s Sling, Arrow, and laser weapons under development. In exchange the U.S. gets to share all the Israeli intellectual property behind those systems. Another $5 billion in U.S. aid has recently been authorized to advance those systems. Compared to the maddeningly inefficient U.S. weapons development process, these are piddling sums.
Deplorable is the Russian invasion and horrifying has been Russian conduct of the war. Yet the U.S. has no strategic interest in whether Ukraine remains independent. The $85 billion and counting we’ve gone through buys us essentially nothing. It will buy us less than nothing if Russia ultimately prevails. Heartbreaking it is to contemplate what Israel could have done for herself and the West with such an investment.
Israel is no longer a pet. It is more effective on behalf of U.S. interests than the U.S. Of all the nations in the world it is the ally we can least afford to lose.
Now comes our chance to show them if we have their back …