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As We Go to Press: DESPITE FEARS OF TROJAN HORSE, UKRAINE TO LET RUSSIAN AID TRUCKS ENTER— With a theatrical flourish, Russia on Tuesday dispatched hundreds of trucks covered in white tarps and sprinkled with holy water on a mission to deliver aid to a desperate rebel-held zone in eastern Ukraine. The televised sight of the miles-long convoy sparked a show of indignation from the government in Kyiv, which insisted any aid must be delivered by the international Red Cross. Ukraine and the West have openly expressed its concern that Moscow intends to use the cover of a humanitarian operation to embark on a military incursion in support of pro-Russian separatists. Amid those anxieties, Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday was set to travel to Crimea, the Black Sea peninsula Russia annexed in March, where he was to preside over a meeting involving the entire Russian Cabinet and senior lawmakers. (National Post, Aug. 12, 2014)
Contents:
To Rely on Abbas to Defang Hamas Would be Delusional: Isi Leibler, Jerusalem Post, Aug. 10, 2014 — As of now, most Israelis, including his long-standing opponents, endorse Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s leadership during Operation Protective Edge.
The West Must Oppose Russia’s ‘Humanitarian’ Invasion of Ukraine: Washington Post, Aug. 11, 2014 — Russia again appeared on the verge of invading Ukraine over the weekend, this time in the guise of a “humanitarian operation.”
The Putin Test for Obama in Ukraine: William A. Galston, Wall Street Journal, July 29, 2014 — A sovereign nation in the heart of Europe is under attack from without as well as within.
Putin Restores a Cuban Beachhead: Mary Anastasia O'Grady, Wall Street Journal, July 29, 2014— Cuban spy Ana Belen Montes was the highest-ranking Pentagon intelligence analyst ever to be busted for working for the Castros.
Ukrainian Troops Retreat From Russian Border, Leaving 100 Kilometers Open to Invasion: Pierre Vaux, Daily Beast, Aug. 12, 2014
Obama Vacations as the World Burns: Dana Milbank, Washington Post, Aug. 11, 2014
Soldier’s Selfies Might Prove Russia’s Direct Role in Ukraine: David K. Li, New York Post, July 31, 2014
End to the Putin Puzzle?: Holman W. Jenkins, Jr., Wall Street Journal, July 22, 2014
TO RELY ON ABBAS TO DEFANG HAMAS WOULD BE DELUSIONAL Isi Leibler
Jerusalem Post, Aug. 10. 2014
As of now, most Israelis, including his long-standing opponents, endorse Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s leadership during Operation Protective Edge. From the outset he displayed determination but avoided demagoguery or generating unrealistic expectations. He refused to be pressured into a full invasion of Gaza, which in addition to even greater casualties would probably have culminated in global sanctions, forcing us to withdraw and thus providing Hamas with “victory.”
But the jury is still out and should Hamas continue launching missiles, Israel will not engage in a war of attrition and may still be forced to launch a full invasion of Gaza. The IDF inflicted enormous damage on Hamas, demolishing the major attack tunnels and destroying two thirds of its missile infrastructure. Indications are that the vast majority of Gaza inhabitants blame Hamas for the terrible devastation and casualties they endured. Alas, yet again Israel has been pulverized in the battle for public opinion. Despite a clear-cut case and highly articulate spokesmen, logic and reason were drowned out by the emotional impact of the global media sympathetic to Hamas by depicting – out of context and sometimes even totally fabricated – footage of heartbreaking and devastating war casualties and loss of innocent lives.
The media mostly failed to point out that Hamas deliberately employed children as human shields and located their command posts and missile launching sites inside or adjacent to schools, mosques and UN centers. Israel was endlessly condemned for responding disproportionately to Hamas aggression, unleashing an outflow of hatred and a tsunami of global anti-Semitism reminiscent of the Middle Ages when Jews were demonized as the source for all the natural disasters facing mankind. Any objective assessment of the IDF behavior would confirm that there has never been a military conflict in which such extraordinary efforts were taken to minimize civilian casualties. It would be a salutary exercise to compare Israel’s efforts to avoid collateral damage among innocent civilians to those of the US while it bombed ISIS in Iraq. There are already murmurings from hostile anti-Israeli human rights and left-wing groups to extend the demonization to demands that Israeli leaders be tried for war crimes. Many cowardly Western governments are likely to endorse or, at best, abstain from such a manifestly immoral initiative.
The initial Egyptian proposals, requiring a cessation of hostilities without preconditions, remain the only sane option currently available to Hamas and the ultimate outcome of the conflict will be determined by negotiations. The curtailment of Hamas aggression could only be achieved if the US and Western countries – backed by the Egyptians who revile Hamas as an extension of the Muslim Brotherhood – steadfastly supported the initial European demand for the disarmament of Hamas and monitoring of its future imports and funding to prevent the creation of new tunnels or replenishment of the missile stockpiles. Indeed, if implemented, we could even visualize a major tilt in the political landscape in which the traditional hostility and hatred of Israel in significant sectors of the Arab world is superseded by alliances to confront the common threat of the radical Islamic movements. But we should not hold our breath that this scenario will eventuate. It is already being undermined by the repeated calls from the US and the Europeans to give control of Gaza to the Palestinian Authority headed by Mahmoud Abbas, and encourage him to create a Palestinian state as soon as possible.
This places Israel in an impossible position. Despite the conflict, Abbas has failed to dismantle the PA merger with the genocidal Hamas. It would be catastrophic for Israel to ignore the principal lesson of this conflict by failing to appreciate the perils that we would confront were we to withdraw the IDF and accept a Palestinian state based on the indefensible 1949 armistice lines. The dire consequences could include terrorists operating from within our heartland, closure of Ben Gurion Airport and extension of tunnels even into Tel Aviv. The majority of Israelis has no wish to rule over Palestinians and yearn to disengage from them. But for a country which faces existential threats and cannot afford to lose a single war, Israel’s security needs are paramount. The Israeli government cannot, as of now, gamble on a Palestinian state without total demilitarization and defensible borders. Of course we prefer Mahmoud Abbas, who makes soothing remarks about peace, to Khaled Mashaal or Muhammad Dief who openly exhort their followers to murder us. But we should not delude ourselves. Aside from a few statements, Abbas has never been a partner for peace. As a matter of strategy he has temporarily set aside “armed conflict” and substituted it with diplomacy, for which he has benefited considerably in the global arena. His tactic is to make no concessions while demanding unilateral concessions – in order to dismantle Israel in stages. His end goal parallels that of Hamas. But instead of calling for our destruction he concentrates on the “non-negotiable” right of return to Israel of descendants of Arab refugees, which would spell an end to Jewish sovereignty.
Incitement against Israel saturates the PA-controlled media, the mosques and schools where children from an early age are brainwashed with the culture of death in which martyrdom is sanctified as the greatest spiritual objective. This is reflected in state-sponsored salaries to terrorists in jail with generous pensions to families; city squares, institutions and even football clubs are named after killers of women and children; mass murderers released from Israel received as heroes with many proudly describing their monstrous acts on TV. This toxic culture, initially inculcated among the people by Yasser Arafat and maintained by Abbas, has created such a climate of hatred that any Palestinian leader seeking an accommodation with Israel would be in danger of assassination.
Moreover, despite initially opposing the inclusion of the pro-Hamas Qatar and Turkey as mediators, Abbas soon joined the chorus defending Hamas and adopted all its demands against Israel. He failed to denounce Hamas for breaching the cease-fires and launching rockets against Israel. During the conflict, Abbas met with Hamas chief Khaled Mashaal in Qatar and issued a joint statement, calling for an end to Israeli “aggression.” The PA accused Israel of initiating the war, engaging in genocide and provided notice of its intention to initiate war crimes indictments against Israeli leadership at the International Court of Justice and the UN Human Rights Commission. Under such circumstances, Israel is caught between a rock and a hard place. Netanyahu has effectively agreed to ease Gaza border restrictions on condition that demilitarization and genuine supervision of border posts is introduced. But the solution cannot be based on handing over control of Gaza to the PA – a partner to Hamas. The Egyptians, US and Europeans must supervise this procedure. After the abysmal failure of the UN to restrict Hezbollah in Lebanon, it would be inconceivable for Israel to accept the proposal for a UN peacekeeping force to take responsibility for monitoring imports and preventing the rearming of Hamas.
On the other hand, it would represent the harbinger of a new era if we could be convinced that a PA takeover would be paralleled by a scheme similar to the Syrian process of removing chemical weapons in which Egypt and a reliable international monitoring body ensured that imports to Gaza are monitored and that Hamas is ultimately demilitarized. Only under such conditions could Israel could achieve a genuine long-term “quiet” which could also extend to a positive relationship with Egypt and the moderate Arab states. But, as of now, Israel faces concerted pressure from the US and the Europeans to make massive concessions to Abbas – without any meaningful provisions for security and compliance. There is a failure to recognize that Abbas and the PA represent a problem rather than the solution and that were it not for the corruption and incompetence of the PA, in the absence of an IDF presence Hamas or extremists within Fatah would by now have taken control of the region.
Regrettably, the Obama administration – which could influence Western countries to pressure Hamas – repeatedly condemns its ally for the “indefensible” and “totally unacceptable manner” in which it was defending itself. In contrast, President Barack Obama merely referred to Hamas launching thousands of rockets against Israeli civilians as “extraordinarily irresponsible.”…
[To Read the Full Article Click the Following Link—Ed.]
‘HUMANITARIAN’ INVASION OF UKRAINE
Washington Post, Aug. 11, 2014
Russia again appeared on the verge of invading Ukraine over the weekend, this time in the guise of a “humanitarian operation.” President Obama and other Western leaders sounded the alarm, warning that the prospective intervention “is unacceptable, violates international law and will provoke additional consequences,” as a White House statement put it. For his part, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko agreed to a non-military relief operation under the auspices of the Red Cross that would allow for Russia’s participation. Whether that would be enough to deter Russian ruler Vladimir Putin wasn’t clear on Monday. According to NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen, tens of thousands of Russian troops remained poised on Ukraine’s border; he said “there is a high probability” of invasion. Though a vacationing President Obama is already overseeing U.S. air strikes in Iraq, the United States and its allies must be prepared to act quickly if Russian military forces cross the frontier.
The motive for another escalation in Russia’s ongoing meddling is clear enough: not the “humanitarian crisis” the Kremlin claims is occurring in areas held by its surrogate forces but the threat that the Ukrainian army and allied militias will win a military victory. Government spokesmen say Kiev’s forces have succeeded in surrounding the cities of Donetsk and Luhansk, where the remaining Russian-backed forces are concentrated, after recapturing three-quarters of the territory they held. So Mr. Putin faces the collapse of his proxy force, a development that would not only loosen his hold on Ukraine but also potentially lead to political trouble at home — where state propaganda has whipped up a nationalist fervor over Ukraine.
To their credit, Western leaders who once pressed Mr. Poroshenko to accept a cease-fire deal tilted toward Russia have not tried very hard to stop the Ukrainian military offensive. In a phone call Monday, Mr. Obama urged Mr. Poroshenko “to continue to exercise restraint and caution in military operations in order to avoid civilian casualties,” according to a White House statement, but did not say the operations should stop. The continued fighting risks providing Mr. Putin with a pretext for “humanitarian” intervention. Western leaders, though, appear to accept Mr. Poroshenko’s argument that the military operation is not about defeating Russia but saving Ukraine. If Mr. Putin’s forces are able to hold onto a piece of territory, the Russian president will be able to block Ukraine’s stabilization indefinitely, just as he has used “frozen conflicts” to sabotage other Russian neighbors.
Mr. Poroshenko is still offering a peace plan that involves a cease-fire and political dialogue on the condition that Ukraine’s border is sealed to further infiltrations of Russian weapons and fighters. That could perhaps provide a face-saving exit for Mr. Putin, but it’s one Moscow is unlikely to embrace unless its proxy forces are on the verge of defeat. That’s why the Ukrainian military operation should continue with Western support, including fresh aid for the army, and why the United States and its allies should do everything possible to deter Mr. Putin’s “humanitarian” invasion. What “additional consequences” can Moscow expect if it crosses the line? A robust package should be readied and telegraphed to the Kremlin.
THE PUTIN TEST FOR OBAMA IN UKRAINE
William A. Galston
Wall Street Journal, July 29, 2014
A sovereign nation in the heart of Europe is under attack from without as well as within. The toughened economic sanctions the United States and the European Union have announced will sting Russia's Vladimir Putin and his cronies but will not stop them. Veteran observers in Moscow believe that Mr. Putin is willing to escalate the assault on Ukraine to avoid capitulating. Faced with these grave risks, how will we respond?
The Obama administration has made its position clear: Russian forces are directly engaged in the military conflict in Ukraine. On Sunday the Office of the Director of National Intelligence released photographs taken between July 21 and July 26 backing up claims of artillery fire from Russia toward Ukrainian military positions. In a statement accompanying the photos, ODNI stated: "The following images provide evidence that Russian forces have fired across the border at Ukrainian military forces, and that Russia-backed separatists have used heavy artillery, provided by Russia, in attacks on Ukrainian forces from inside Ukraine." Gen. Philip Breedlove, NATO's supreme commander, has leveled a similar charge, backed by video evidence. On Tuesday, President Obama reiterated these points in a statement delivered at the White House.
Speaking last week at a security forum in Aspen, Colo., Gen. Martin Dempsey, the chairman of the Joints Chiefs of Staff, was blunt: "At a time when some folks could have convinced themselves that Putin would be looking for a reason to de-escalate, he has actually taken a decision to escalate." The general went on to say that Russia has "made the conscious decision to use its military force inside of another sovereign nation to achieve its objectives," adding that the Russians are "on a path to assert themselves differently not just in Eastern Europe, but Europe in the main, and toward the United States." Whether the U.S. response will be as firm as these statements is unclear. The New York Times reported July 26 that the Pentagon and intelligence agencies are developing plans to provide the Ukrainian government with the specific locations of surface-to-air missiles controlled by the separatist forces backed by the Russians, which would enable Kiev to target them accurately. But this proposal reportedly faces an uncertain fate. The reason, an unnamed senior official told the paper: "The debate is over how much to help Ukraine without provoking Russia."
Provoking Russia? The country that seized and annexed the Crimea? The country that is inciting civil war? The country that provided the missiles that shot down Malaysia Airlines Flight 17? We're worried about provoking the country that is threatening the peace of Europe? All this should have a familiar ring. Many officials in the departments of State and Defense and the intelligence agencies long supported arming the Syrian rebels. Robert Ford, our brave and principled ambassador to Syria, resigned his post in February because he could no longer in good conscience support the Obama administration's refusal to do so. While the White House dithered, the moderate Syrian opposition lost ground both to President Bashar Assad's forces and Islamist extremists…Yes, the Bush administration used military force recklessly. But all too often, the opposite of a mistake is the opposite mistake. There are always plausible reasons not to act. Every course of action comes with downsides whose odds are hard to assess and easy to exaggerate. But risk is unavoidable, and the effort to avoid it often backfires. Although it is sometimes prudent not to act, prudence and inaction are not the same.
This is the proverbial moment of truth for the Obama administration's foreign policy. The administration has formally accused Russia of military intervention in Ukraine, and it has released evidence to support this charge. Russian-provided surface-to-air missiles have enabled the separatists to inflict significant losses on Ukraine's air force. Economic sanctions will not suffice to halt this aggression. There are times when a military attack requires a military response, and this is one of them. No one is talking about the direct involvement of American forces. The issue is whether we are willing to provide the Ukrainian government the intelligence—and, I would add, the arms—it needs to defend itself. Failing to do so would unmask our accusations as just so much empty bluster. President Obama's decision goes well beyond the vagaries of public opinion and the imperatives of a midterm election. The peace of Europe hangs in the balance. So does U.S. credibility. President Putin is watching, and so is the world.
PUTIN RESTORES A CUBAN BEACHHEAD Mary Anastasia O'Grady
Wall Street Journal, July 27, 2014
Cuban spy Ana Belen Montes was the highest-ranking Pentagon intelligence analyst ever to be busted for working for the Castros. What's also notable, in light of Vladimir Putin's visit to Havana earlier this month, is that she was nabbed in 2001, long after the Cold War ended. Besides leaking classified material and blowing the cover of covert U.S. intelligence agents, Montes seems to have been charged by her handlers with convincing top brass in Washington that Fidel Castro —who had wanted the Soviets to drop the bomb on this country during the 1962 missile crisis—no longer presents a threat to the U.S. Montes, who rose to become the U.S. military's resident intelligence expert on Cuba, partly accomplished that mission. The Pentagon's 1998 Cuba threat assessment played down its military and intelligence capabilities. The best Cuba watchers were less sanguine. The Castros remain as paranoid, power-hungry and pathological as ever. They may be economic fools, but they run a good business making the island available to criminal governments, like Iran and North Korea. Mr. Putin's Cuba trip reinforces the point. The old Cold War villains are up to no good one more time. Russia's president is trying to rebuild the Soviet empire. Eastern Europe won't cooperate and in Asia the best he will ever be is China's junior partner. But in Latin America Mr. Putin's KGB résumé and willingness to stick his thumb in the eye of the U.S. gives him traction. Colonizing Cuba again is an obvious move.
After the Soviet Union fell in 1991 and the gravy train to Havana was cut off, Fidel was furious with the Kremlin. It hasn't been easy to get back in his good graces. In 2008 the Moscow news outlet Kommersant reported that Putin friend and Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin got the cold shoulder when he visited the island to work on "restoring full-scale cooperation." Kommersant reported that the Castros were "displeased" that Russia had been talking up a military deployment to Cuba without Havana's approval. But it seems that the world's most notorious moochers are willing to forgive—for the right price. With sugar-daddy Venezuela running into economic problems in recent years and Mr. Putin itching for a place in the Caribbean sun, Cuba has decided to deal. In February 2013 Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev traveled to Cuba, where he signed agreements to lease eight Russian jets worth $650 million to Havana and proposed some $30 billion in debt forgiveness. Two months later, Russian Chief of Staff Gen. Valery Gerasimov visited key military and intelligence sites on the island. In August a spokesman for the Black Sea Fleet announced that the Russian guided-missile warship Moskva, the fleet's flagship, had set off for Cuba and other ports in Central and South America.
Fast forward to February of this year. Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu announced that Russia had engaged in talks to establish military bases in Venezuela, Nicaragua and Cuba. The next day a Russian intelligence-gathering ship docked in Havana. In May, Russia's Security Council and Cuba's Commission for National Security and Defense agreed in Moscow to form a joint working group. "The situation in the world is changing fast and it is dynamic. That's why we need the ability to react promptly," Nikolai Patrushev, secretary of the Russian Security Council, told the press. Cuban Col. Alejandro Castro Espin, son of Raúl Castro, led the Cuban delegation. In June Russia signed a space cooperation agreement with Cuba to allow it to use the island to base its Glonass (Russia's alternative to GPS) navigation stations. When he called in Havana this month Mr. Putin flaunted his intentions to restore a Russian beachhead in Cuba. The shootdown of the Malaysia Airlines flight on the same day that he ended his Latin American tour raised the visibility of a trip that was made for both psychological and strategic reasons. Mr. Putin wants to assure the Free World that he can be a menace in the U.S. backyard—and he wants a local foothold to make the threat real.
Mr. Putin officially wrote off $32 billion of bad Cuban debt on his trip, leaving just $3.2 billion due over the next 10 years. Russia is looking for oil in Cuban waters, and Mr. Putin signed new agreements in energy, industry and trade with Castro. Days after the visit he denied rumors that the Kremlin intends to reopen its old electronic-eavesdropping facility on the island. That's cold comfort, even if you believe him. Satellite technology has made land-based listening posts obsolete in many ways. Far more troubling is the emergence of Mr. Putin as a Latin American presence. Tyrants all over the region, starting with the Castros, admire his ruthlessness and skill in consolidating economic and political power. They want to emulate him. It's a role model the region could do without.
Ukrainian Troops Retreat From Russian Border, Leaving 100 Kilometers Open to Invasion: Pierre Vaux, Daily Beast, Aug. 12, 2014—For the last few days all media attention on the Ukrainian crisis has been focused on two topics: the advances made by Ukrainian forces around the city of Donetsk and, more worryingly, the threat of Russian invasion under the guise of “humanitarian intervention.”
Obama Vacations as the World Burns: Dana Milbank, Washington Post, Aug. 11, 2014 —President Obama must really be teed off. Hillary Rodham Clinton, his once-loyal secretary of state and his likeliest successor, has gone rogue, criticizing his foreign policy as too timid.
Soldier’s Selfies Might Prove Russia’s Direct Role in Ukraine: David K. Li, New York Post, July 31, 2014 —A goofy, selfie-loving Russian soldier might have supplied the best proof yet of Moscow’s direct support of Ukrainian rebels — and potential role in the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17.
End to the Putin Puzzle?: Holman W. Jenkins, Jr., Wall Street Journal, July 22, 2014 —Perhaps what we've been actually watching since the start of 2014 has been the last chapter of Vladimir Putin's rule.
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