Codeword: Hannibal

Please note that the idea that their problems might be resolved by building up Lebanese civil society (Law enforcement, education, housing, civil engineering, mass transit, social welfare, health care, etc.) is conspicuously absent from this piece.

…I fear that we might not stop there, and that we might succumb to the delusion that military action can transform Lebanon’s political and social realities. That same delusion led Israel to occupy Lebanon for an agonizing decade and a half in which hundreds of our troops — and many more Lebanese and Palestinians — were killed.

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The following winter, helicopters suddenly descended near the muddy clearing in Galilee, where my unit was training. We were sent to Beirut, where before long I saw that our mission had little to do with protecting my neighbors back home. Instead, we served as a wedge between Christians, Muslims and Druze, who were taking advantage of the occupation to settle old scores. It would be the first of several tours of duty for me in Lebanon.

Sharon’s grand plan failed. True, the PLO was forced out three months after the invasion, and the rockets stopped falling on Israeli settlements. But we paid a huge price in Israeli troops killed and wounded — not to mention the casualties suffered by the Lebanese. Instead of remaking Lebanon, we found ourselves bogged down there much as the United States is now bogged down in Iraq. During some of my tours, we spent most of our energy keeping Lebanese from killing one another, rather than protecting Israel’s borders and civilians.

…[B]eing angry…can cloud your judgment and make you do foolish things. I can only hope that Prime Minister Ehud Olmert will not fall victim to the same fantasies that sent me and so many other soldiers to Lebanon. In Lebanon’s unending political vacuum, no government can be strong and decisive. That’s why the country has been a pawn that the stronger countries around it have so willingly sacrificed. Absent a multinational campaign against Iran and Syria, Israel cannot permanently prevent southern Lebanon from serving as a forward base for enemy forces. Instead, Israel must use force every few years to push back the enemy, knowing that once we leave, our foes will return and rearm.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/07/21/AR2006072101372.html