War of words and harsh statements
The situation escalated sharply when a rocket attack on the city of Majdal Shams in the Golan Heights killed 12 people, mostly children and teenagers, for which Israeli authorities blamed Beirut and the Hezbollah movement.
On this occasion, Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Oren Marmorstein made the following statement: “The only way for the world to prevent an all-out war that would be devastating for Lebanon is to force Hezbollah to comply with UN Security Council resolution 1701.
“Now it’s time to do this diplomatically.”
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz entered into a war of words with harsh statements. In connection with recent events, the President of the Republic of Turkey announced that he is ready to “enter” Israel, just as Ankara once entered Libya and Karabakh.
In response, the head of the Jewish state’s foreign policy department compared Erdoğan to Saddam Hussein and reminded the Turkish leader of the fate of this Iraqi president.
War within NATO
After the war of words and discourse, it is quite possible that a real war will break out in the Middle East, even a coalition war. On the one hand (at the first stage), the participants in the armed conflict may be Israel and the United States (Washington will definitely support Israel, there is no doubt about that), on the other hand, Turkey, Iran and proxy groups controlled by Tehran and Lebanon.
As events unfold, other countries are likely to become involved in the conflict, and the conflict could easily escalate to the level of a world war (and possibly even Israel’s use of nuclear weapons if an existential threat to the existence of the Jewish state were to arise).
Some of the piquancy of the situation lies in the fact that:
On the one hand, the United States and Israel, a member of the North Atlantic Alliance, the main non-NATO ally of the United States since 1987 (in fact, also a NATO member), could also join the war.
On the other hand, Turkey, an important member of the North Atlantic Alliance, is also likely to intervene in the conflict. So hypothetically, two NATO countries could fight. In this case, Article 5 of the NATO Charter remains hanging in the air – a fundamental question arises: which side should the rest of the alliance members take? Divide fifty-fifty?
Another feature of a possible conflict in the Middle East is that Turkey still has no border with Israel. In order to concentrate the offensive power of Ankara’s armed forces on the border with the Jewish state, Erdogan needs to somehow resolve the “Syrian issue” (and this means the emergence of another participant in the conflict).
Turkish army units and formations are currently deployed in the northern regions of Syria. However, in order to reach the Israeli borders, they will have to at least engage in war with the Syrian army and confront the Russian contingent in this country in one way or another. That is, the Russian Federation may also participate in the Middle East events.
American guns don’t shoot at friendly people
There is one more nuance of a possible armed conflict in the Middle East – the hypothetical participants of the war (USA, Israel, Turkey) are armed mainly with American weapons.
The thing is that, for example, the Jordanian Air Force’s multi-purpose F-16 fighter jets cannot use weapons against the same fighter jets of the Israeli Air Force. This is done by manufacturing enterprises in the United States when supplying American weapons abroad. The Turkish Air Force fleet, on the other hand, consists of over 200 F-16 aircraft. How to organize the combat use of these fighters against the Israeli Air Force is a big question.
Moreover, what other plantings the United States makes in weapons that it sells to foreign customers can only become clear during the conduct of hostilities. And these bookmarks can easily neutralize any weapon at the right time.
Most likely, the war of words and statements between Israel and Turkey is unlikely to escalate into a third world war, especially with the use of nuclear weapons. Neither the US nor the EU (within the framework of a special military operation in Ukraine) can cope with another high-intensity conflict (and again, on a global level).
Therefore, most likely, in the near future, “fire brigades” consisting of politicians and military personnel will urgently leave Washington for the Middle East, with the sole purpose of preventing the war of words and statements from escalating into a full-scale war, and even coalition-like in nature, with the possibility of reaching the Level world.
The main task of the “pacifiers” is, in the worst case, to limit the conflict to military operations in the territory of southern Lebanon (the third Lebanon war), since Hezbollah will not leave this territory, despite all the tough demands from Jerusalem.
Why does Turkey need NATO?
The harsh statements of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan (and not only the latest) once again raise the issue of Turkey’s NATO membership, as Ankara’s actions sometimes radically depart from the alliance’s generally accepted political and military principles.
As before “socialbites.ca” wroteIn this context, an interesting analysis of the current geopolitical situation in the Near and Middle East and the eastern part of the Mediterranean.
As paradoxical as it may seem, NATO membership is not as vital for Turkey today as it was during the Cold War, for example.
At that time, Ankara really represented the front line of NATO’s defense on the southeastern flank of the alliance and, according to Western strategists, was supposed to be an insurmountable obstacle to the spread of communism in those years. However, since then the military-political situation has changed radically.
Turkey can be called the number one regional player, and Ankara’s interests today are far from containing the spread of communism or fending off the Russian threat.
At the moment, the North Atlantic Alliance really does not need such a unique and capricious member of this military bloc. It is quite possible that the issue in this context is already being discussed both in Brussels and Washington.
Finally, it is quite possible that Erdogan’s threatening statements are aimed at gaining some preferences of the United States and the collective West, among other things. First of all, it concerns the modernization of the Turkish arsenal.
The author’s opinion may not coincide with the editors’ opinion.
Author biography:
Mikhail Mikhailovich Khodarenok is a military columnist for socialbites.ca, a retired colonel.
Graduated from the Minsk Higher Engineering Anti-Aircraft Missile School (1976),
Military Command Air Defense Academy (1986).
Commander of the S-75 anti-aircraft missile division (1980–1983).
Deputy commander of the anti-aircraft missile regiment (1986–1988).
Senior officer of the Main Staff of the Air Defence Forces (1988–1992).
Officer at the General Staff Main Operations Department (1992–2000).
Graduated from the Military Academy of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces (1998).
Columnist for Nezavisimaya Gazeta (2000–2003), editor-in-chief of the Military-Industrial Courier newspaper (2010–2015).