The world's two hottest spots require nerves of steel

 I've written before about how there are parallel phenomena - or perhaps mirror-opposite phenomena works better - on the post-American Right and Left regarding the two currently raging conflicts on the world stage.

The one with Israel at its epicenter, but which involves a considerably wider array of actors, including a malevolent and nearly-nuclear Iran, which is orchestrating a lot of what is happening, has US progressives calling for Israel to stop defending itself. The acceptance of - or at least lack of courage to confront - blatant Jew-hatred among progressives is a major factor.

The Trumpist Right is thumbs-down on supporting a country, Ukraine, that was invaded without provocation by its much bigger neighbor. Devoid of pushback, this move would set a precedent of the erosion of the post-1945 international order. It's about as insular  stance as one could take. Its main champions, such as JD Vance and Marjorie Taylor-Greene, couch their argument in zero-sum terms, saying that sending missile-defense systems and fighter jets siphons off resources needed to protect the southern US border. The movement's Dear Leader, the Very Stable Genius, says that his charm and vision could convince Putin and Zelensky to reach a reasonable settlement within a day.

Actually, the current administration in Washington is calibrating its actual support in each case, rhetoric about resolute victory notwithstanding.

With regard to the Mideast, Antony Blinken continues to search for a workable ceasefire deal, even though Hamas has not sent a representative to the latest round of talks in Doha and Cairo. He even still speaks of a two-state objective. He and the administration he works for are trying to lean on Israel to keep the northern front of the multi-pronged jihadist threat from spiraling out of control.

It seems that ship has sailed:

The Biden administration may be encountering the limits of its ability to keep a lid on the looming hostilities between Israel and the Iran-backed terror group Hezbollah. The U.S. has had a number of naval assets parked off the coast of the Levant for months in an effort to deter Iran and its proxies — an exercise that has succeeded only in limiting exchanges of fire between the terrorist cadre and the IDF. But the outright confrontation the White House hoped to forestall may not be preventable for much longer.

“The only way left to return the residents of the north to their homes is via military action,” Israeli defense minister Yoav Gallant told reporters on Monday. Gallant added that he had relayed the same message to his American counterpart, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin.

Indeed, military action may be the only way for Israel to reclaim the territory in the country’s north that tens of thousands of its citizens evacuated shortly after the October 7 massacre and to which they have not yet been able to return. Joe Biden’s efforts to craft a cease-fire deal that would restore temporary calm to the region have all been rejected by Hamas, and as the New York Times wrote, summarizing remarks attributable to one of Gallant’s aides, Hezbollah “has decided to ‘tie itself’ to Hamas.” The time for half measures is coming to an end.

The risks of such an operation will be significant, and no president would want to court them in the absence of a viable alternative. Hezbollah has an arsenal of about 150,000 rockets and missiles, according to Israeli estimates, and it can field between 40,000 and 50,000 fighters. The Justice Department has previously identified alleged Hezbollah agentsoperating inside the U.S., and it was only last week that the DOJ charged a Pakistani national in connection with Iran’s reported interest in assassinating “a politician or U.S. government official on U.S. soil.”

To call what seems likely to happen Gaza redux doesn't quite convey the military power Hezbollah can unleash. 

Then there is the Iran factor. Hezbollah has a stronger ideological tie to Iran than that of Hamas. Not to mention that Iran is where those 150,000 rockets and missiles came from.

Iran is also a break-out state regarding you-know-what:

Its stock of enriched uranium, which was capped at 202.8 kg under the deal, stood at 5.5 tonnes in February, according to the latest quarterly report by the U.N. nuclear watchdog that inspects Iran's enrichment plants.

Iran is now enriching uranium to up to 60% purity and has enough material enriched to that level, if enriched further, for two nuclear weapons, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency's theoretical definition.

And now there's a development involving the country that figures into both of the hot-spot situations: Russia:

The US and UK are concerned that Russia has been helping Iran develop its nuclear weapons program in exchange for the recent delivery of ballistic missiles it was provided by Tehran for use in its war against Ukraine, according to a report Saturday that cited sources familiar with the matter.

The issue of deepening ties between Russia and Iran was a matter of concern during meetings between US President Joe Biden and UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer in Washington, DC, on Friday, as well as during talks between US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy earlier in the week.

According to the Guardian newspaper, however, the two countries aren’t just focused on the ballistic missiles supplied to Russia by Iran, but are also concerned about what Russia may provide in return.

Citing British sources familiar with the high-level talks last week, the news outlet reported that the two countries believe Iran may be working with experienced Russian specialists to streamline its manufacturing process as it grows its stockpile of enriched uranium and prepares to make its own nuclear weapons.

In Ukraine, President Zelensky is cajoling, pleading and shouting at the West to allow Ukraine to fire Western-supplied long-range missiles at targets deep inside Russia. He seems to be getting Western leaders to take him seriously, but not enough to seal the deal:

Ukraine's hopes of being allowed to use Western-supplied long range missiles to strike deep inside Russian territory were put on hold once again on Sept. 13, after the leaders of the U.S. and U.K. stopped short of making the announcement Kyiv wanted.

Anticipation had been high ahead of meetings between President Joe Biden and U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer in Washington, but the White House dampened expectations even before the pair had finished talks.

"There is no change to our view on the provision of long-range strike capabilities for Ukraine to use inside of Russia," National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby told reporters.

Ukraine was hoping for permission to use two Western-supplied long range missiles that it already possesses to strike military targets such as airfields located deep inside Russian territory.

With the bans in place, Kyiv says it cannot effectively defend Ukrainian cities from intensifying aerial attacks.

The two missiles are the U.S.-supplied ATACMS, a short-range supersonic tactical ballistic missile, and the U.K.-France-supplied Storm Shadow.

Both Storm Shadows and ATACMS were initially given to Kyiv on the provision that they only be used to strike Russian targets within Ukraine or in Russian-occupied parts of the country.

Western fears of escalating the war with Russia have been behind the restrictions.

Germany is saying outright that it won't even send the requisite missiles:

While Washington and London are facing pressure to allow Ukraine to strike targets deep inside Russia using the Western-made missiles already in the country, Berlin declines to even provide such missiles.

“Germany has made a clear decision about what we will do and what we will not do. This decision will not change,” Scholz said on Sept. 13, remaining adamant in his refusal to provide the country’s Taurus long-range missiles to Ukraine.

His remarks came after U.S. President Joe Biden and U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmerstopped short of lifting restrictions on using Western-supplied long-range weapons on Russian soil during their meeting in Washington.

In the spring, Washington confirmed that it had begun providing Ukraine with long-range Army Tactical Missile Systems (ATACMS). Kyiv had previously received missiles that could travel up to 160 kilometers, and the new batch consisted of advanced ones with a range of up to 300 kilometers.

But Berlin's transfer of Taurus missiles did not follow.

Prior, Germany followed the U.S. lead in handing over the first Patriot air defense system in early 2023 and the long-anticipated battle tanks.

When Kyiv launched a surprise incursion into Russia’s Kursk Oblast, the operation received endorsement from Berlin. Germany’s Defense Ministry said Ukraine is “free to choose” the weapons to use inside Russia for self-defense in compliance with international law.

Yet, Berlin continues to hold off Ukrainian requests to provide the last piece of the puzzle, the missiles that can target the Russian military in the rear.

"A nightmare scenario for Scholz is that Ukraine would use Taurus to strike politically sensitive targets inside Russia. Scholz fears that this could escalate the war and throw Germany into direct hostilities with Russia," Fabian Hoffmann, doctoral research fellow at the University of Oslo, who specializes in missile technology, told the Kyiv Independent earlier this spring.

“Fundamentally, this means that Scholz is restrained by a lack of political will, which stems from a lack of trust in Ukrainian leadership to not break any promises.”

President Volodymyr Zelensky suggested that Germany’s refusal to provide Ukraine with long-range missiles is linked to Russian President Vladimir Putin's nuclear saber-rattling.

“As I understand it, the chancellor says that Germany is not a nuclear state and that this (Taurus missiles) is the most powerful weapon system in Germany,” Ukraine’s president said in an interview with Bild.

The hesitancy to allow these Western allies to achieve total victory as quickly as possible is not without reasonableness. We've all seen the photos and videos of nuclear weapon tests, and even their use in a war situation, in August 1945. Humankind has imposed on itself an apocalyptic set of considerations from which there is no going back.

But this raises a basic question which humankind has always had to deal: Is the cost of doing what's right ever too high?

It's obviously the right thing to do to give both Israel and Ukraine what they need to defeat their enemies resolutely and in a minimum amount of time. The West could provide them what they need to do it. Right away. 

But how sure can we be that either the Putin-Medvedev regime or the theocracy in Tehran would find, not even a moral compass, but the degree of reason needed to see that an uninhabitable world is only hours away from the use of the unthinkable?

So what is to be done? Do we tolerate absolute evil, let precedents for unprovoked aggression be set, and accept a certain level of moral murkiness, just to keep the whole thing from being reduced to ashes?

Is not the correct answer of the same cloth as the firefighter who goes back into the house one more time before its burning frame collapses, in order to rescue a baby or pet?

Is not the eternal record book going to show that justice, love, and defense of life prevailed even as darkness covered the fallen world?

A lot of layers to this beyond military capability specs or political considerations. This gets to the thorniest dilemma those of our species ever face.

How will we proceed?