A Martingale in Gaza
Do you guys know what a Martingale is? Here's a definition from wikipedia:
Originally, martingale referred to a class of betting strategies popular in 18th century France. The simplest of these strategies was designed for a game in which the gambler wins his stake if a coin comes up heads and loses it if the coin comes up tails. The strategy had the gambler double his bet after every loss, so that the first win would recover all previous losses plus win a profit equal to the original stake. Since a gambler with infinite wealth will with probability 1 eventually flip heads, the Martingale betting strategy was seen as a sure thing by those who practised it. Unfortunately, none of these practitioners in fact possessed infinite wealth, and the exponential growth of the bets would eventually bankrupt those foolish enough to use the Martingale.
Abu Muqawama had the Martingale in mind when he read this article in Vanity Fair on the U.S. and its disastrous response to the Hamas electoral victories of early 2006. We don't usually post on the Israel-Palestine conflict because it tends to inflame strong opinions that mask any good points to be made about tactics and strategy, but this well-researched article is a pretty damning indictment of U.S. bungling and certainly supports the claim that the Bush Administration has never, really, recovered from the elections which gave Hamas control of the Palestinian parliament.
7 comments:
A strong candidate for the "You just cant make this sh*t up" files:
“I’ve asked why nobody saw it coming,” Condoleezza Rice told reporters. “I don’t know anyone who wasn’t caught off guard by Hamas’s strong showing.”
“Everyone blamed everyone else,” says an official with the Department of Defense. “We sat there in the Pentagon and said, ‘Who the fuck recommended this?’ ”
Amateurs with blowtorches and heavy machinery.
Your comparison is right on the mark, Abu. I had read some of the arab perspectives in the past, related to this chain of events, so the American maneuvering was new to me. What do you make of it? After seven years at this Mideast game, they still behave like rank amateurs.
The reference to Egyptian-made assault rifles made me remember the old Kalishnikov factory in Egypt. Those pics in Yahoo news of Hamas soldiers sporting black, folding-stock AK’s appear to represent booty arms captured from Fatah, that were originally provided on orders from Washington.
It really is too bad Abu shrinks from providing analysis on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. In many ways, it represents the continuation of a successful to date, “old school” style, war of occupation. Which is COIN without the cosmetic make-up. Notable in the latest flare-up is the Israeli threat of indirect artillery fire on civilian targets, by means of massed self-propelled guns. From the Palestinian military perspective, the continued volleys of rocket artillery (including use of Grad missiles) provide something of a very small-scale comparison to the 2nd Lebanon War. The Israelis appear the best equipped ever, as do the Hamas fighters. Even though the losses were disproportionate, the IDF did suffer casualties and Hamas remains heavily armed, in possession of the battlefield and ever defiant.
They got their families out through the wall, now the martyrs are behind. Fallujah all over again. From an Arab perspective, they are very strong, Alamo style.
And since I have friends down there, and friends who have worked there, I cant helping this one, for those who like Dylan.:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WME495PWWJE
Thats all your going to say? Not only a complete failure, but blatantly sinister in its total hypocrisy? This is Epic. Here's their bloody paradigm in all its glory.
Sorry, can't resist, Abu M:
Toljya so. In 2006. And you didn't believe me.
No, I didn't.
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