Thread by @ThreshedThought

This is the first of several 🧵 on the strategic challenges facing the world ….

First up … the Middle East.

The most acute challenge is obviously Gaza-Palestine.

Following the appalling attacks of Oct 7th, Israel has completely mismanaged its response, squandering the immense sympathy, goodwill and support that it had.

The most important thing about war is to understand the type of war that you are fighting.

Israel has either mistakenly or deliberately done this. To state that Israel’s aims are the complete destruction of Hamas, a paramilitary organisation mixed in with the population, is setting a goal that is not achievable.

Problems like Hamas are not solved solely with military means - they are solved politically, with the use of military power to reinforce the politics.

As a result, or potentially by design when one considers the comments of Israeli government and military officials, 25,000 Palestinians are dead.

These levels of civilian casualties are not commensurate with a military that is staying on the right side of international law when it comes to protecting civilians.

And so Israel has backed itself into a strategic black hole - an unachievable goal, eroding international support, and absolutely no plan for the future.

Hamas will still exist and Israel will still be insecure.

Of course the story of why Israel has been so stupid is because of one man - Netanyahu. The fact that the Oct 7th attacks happened on his watch, and some blame can be attributed for the security failure, means that he knows that as soon as the war ends, he is out of power.

And so he keeps forcing Israeli policy into a maximalist unacheivable position because it keeps the war going longer, and keeps him in power longer.

And as they say about things that cannot continue carrying on the same for long … they will not carry on the same for long.

Now that Netanyahu has rejected out of hand the two state solution… and the ICJ is in the initial deliberations as to whether Israel has committed genocide… and Israel’s war continues to fail.

At some point Netanyahu will be thrown from power, and a different path will be taken.

But the continuance of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has energised and destabilised the whole region.

The most serious manifestation of that are the various activities committed by Iran.

Now Iran does not want a major war, but it does want to make the point about its various interests in the region.

Everyone senses a decline in American power, and Iran is no different - it wants to see what it can get.

These various muscle flexings raise the spectre of miscalculation from Hezbollah, to northern Iraq, to Baluchistan on the Iran-Pakistan border.

Miscalculation is a seriously underrated cause of major wars starting.

But probably the most serious spill over has been the Houthi attacks on shipping in the Red Sea.

The Red Sea counts for 15% of global maritime trade.

Freedom of Navigation - keeping the sea lanes open - is a vital global public good.

And so far, it has been left to the US and the UK (mostly the US) to try and convince the Houthis that they shouldn’t disrupt global shipping.

This is the wrong approach to take for a couple of reasons:

- This is an international problem (by definition) and should have an international solution;

And…

- The US and the UK have a bit of a history of bombing in the Middle East, and even in this case although they are right, their history doesn’t help them - they are doing all the work, and getting all of the blame.

What is needed is an international solution - something like what was put togehter to deal with the problem of Somali pirates over 15 years ago: Operation Atalanta.

This is a UN mandate from the Security Council and then an internal task force composed of many nations.

To put it another way the Chinese benefit from the Red Sea being open as much as the Europeans and the US.

Why shouldn’t they support legally, pay for, and provide maritime assets to keep it open?

For what it’s worth, I don’t think we are going to end up in a massive war in the Middle East in the near future - because no-one wants that, and it would take some serious miscalculation to get there.

But the Gaza abomination needs sorting, and it won’t change with Netanyahu in power.

And the sea lanes in the Red Sea need to be kept open.

ENDS