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The foundational theme of your thesis - that the desperate often feel they have no choice other than to commit an extreme act to trigger the general public to either support or oppose them - is a good start. But the essay itself falls apart because it deflects itself into a a false black and white narrative in which Mao, Lenin, and 'Hamas' are the 'bad' people and their opponents are the 'good' people.

That narrative is far more CIA and Mossad neoliberal war propaganda, than reality.

Here's a more tenable essay founded on the same premise, but using objective facts and analysis to paint a much more accurate picture of what is happening in Palestine and Israel, and to better explain the actions of the Gazans in their attack on Israel, by comparing that attack to similar strategies used by the Allies, and in the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, in World War II.

Why Gaza's Attack On Israel Made Sense To Palestinians & Why It Doesn't Make Sense To Call It "Barbaric"

LINK: https://ericbrooks.substack.com/p/why-gazas-attack-on-israel-made-sense

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Interesting and I think very accurate analysis--but I'd consider using a more traditional state-based lens. It occurred to me a few days ago that Hamas is acting like a state (a widespread terror attack reminiscent of the Tet Offensive) while simultaneously claiming the protection of a non-state (a group of displaced people, a people oppressed by a tyrannical imperial power, etc.). The problem every guerilla group eventually faces is that force is only truly effective to get What You Really Want when conducted by disciplined, professionally-trained and -equipped regulars; and organizing one of those gives your enemy something to smash...and he usually will if you had to guerrilla him in the first place. The enemy may be too far away, have other things to think about, etc., but if you mess with a state you'll tend to get the horns.

If the state surrounds you, is vastly better-equipped, and has a plausible belief that you are an existential threat, 'tis better to tread lightly. You haven't conducted a terror attack. You've entered the State Vs State arena by invading a sovereign state. Hamas has, I think, lost the ability to control the perceptual narrative, at least in terms of people who decide whether and how to fight wars. They're not just a horrible fringe group anymore. They deserve a full-state response, or so the thinking will go.

More recent perspectives have argued that Tet was a long-game play by the North Vietnamese Army to remove or neutralize the VC, who presumably would get a share of the post-war pie otherwise. I leave it to the reader to think about whether there may be any parallels here.

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Some points here I can agree with. But my understanding (and I'll accept correction) of the present consensus is that the VC were more tightly integrated with the NVA than the US perception was at the time, and not any kind of independent power base. I don't think Hanoi was playing 4D chess on Tet. They were as surprised as anyone when an offensive that, militarily, went much worse than they hoped would nonetheless break America's will to fight.

I likewise don't think Hamas' benefactors (i.e. Iran) are trying to destroy Hamas. Hamas is valuable to Iran. Iran doesn't really care about the future division of material spoils in some hypothetical far-future destruction of the State of Israel. What it cares about is staking its claim over moral leadership of Islam and the anti-Zionist cause, contrasting the effectiveness of its efforts with the fecklessness of corrupt Arab governments.

But I suppose you could reasonably argue that the risk/reward is different for Iran than for Hamas. For Iran, Hamas is just one pawn on the chess board whose loss it can trivially survive and perhaps even profit from (if, again, it fulfills the real objective of boosting the Islamic Republic's moral legitimacy in the eyes of the Muslim and Arab worlds). It goes without saying that this does NOT apply to Hamas' leadership.

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Jim Dunnigan's book (2000) is provocative in regard to the VC-as-bait scenario. If anyone is posed to be a "knowledgeable source" across the entire US military, it's him...just in terms of what he's overheard or been told. Without access to the archives--unlikely, and impossible for me--we may never know for sure.

Hamas is indeed a pawn. Not arguing seriously that this was Iran's intention: but I'd look at motives. Hamas is expensive and has been quiescent after the initial promise of their election victories. Pushing them to commit might bring about useful chaos in Israel...and if it failed, Israel probably won't be able to destroy them completely, and if so, well, back to the applicant pool (which as we both know is deep). And there's a tiny chance it might work. Worth the risk. No, they won't be part of future divisions (unless they are...history shows these groups have a funny tendency to show up in the future government, even decades later). I mean, if you build a weapon it's gonna get used, the Chekhov's Gun of military funding. If not, why pay to build it? Not sure how far I want to take that, but I'll be keeping an eye out, is all.

We do have evidence of longstanding internal conflicts between North and South, politically, despite the proffered ideal of universal Communist brotherhood. Fire in the Lake (the book, not the excellent simulation) is interesting in this regard.

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I grew up reading Dunnigan's "How to Make War" off my dad's bookshelf (I was an odd kid) but haven't read his book on Vietnam. I'll give it a look. I don't have a partner to play GMT COIN games with these days, but I'll consider it a mark of culture that you've had the opportunity to play Fire in the Lake.

I've spoken with two young grad students from Vietnam in the last few years, one from the North and one from the South. The Northerner gave me a "party-line" account of the war -- it was a noble victory, a right and proper response to American imperialism and its puppet regime. The Southerner comes from a Catholic family and accepts his family's handed-down account of the war as one of the North's tyrannical and unprovoked aggression against a real independent country. I was surprised he was so frank with me to be honest, but he made clear that he had never breathed such words outside his family back home.

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Hoo boy. The Catholics in Vietnam (cf. Diem) had as biased a viewpoint as, say, Israel has to the Palestinians. They made up most of the traditional power structure before 1960 and, IIRC, had ties to organized crime. They were the most bitter enemies of the Communists and are involved in systematic protests even today.

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The article seems to rest on the claim that Hamas intended to target civilians. I think there is significant evidence that has emerged to the contrary.

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I'm not convinced that Hamas believed (or at least, would've been justified to believe) that time was not on their side. The long-term trend is towards reduced Western popular support for Israel, and reduced US government focus on the Mideast. Compared to those fundamental, important factors, whether Arab states have formal diplomatic relations with Israel seems unimportant. After all, whether or not those formal relationships exist, the fundamental factors faced by Arab governments are the same (their people dislike Israel, they dislike Iran even more, and they simultaneously need and distrust the US). When the rubber meets the road, fundamental factors matter more than diplomatic formalities.

It is true that the liberalization of Saudi Arabia and the unpopularity of the Islamic regime in Iran are long-term dangerous trends for Hamas. But is there any reason to believe that provoking a major war with Israel would change those trends? Will MBS bring back the morality police, or will Iranian women suddenly want to wear headscarves?

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Time was not on their side as <i>political leaders within Gaza.</i> Qatar had just slashed their funding, street protests were being led against them in Gaza. Their internal situation was degrading. Perhaps Israel's position would be have degraded on the longer long term, but wouldn't have been Hamas who benefited from it.

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