Kevin Drum marshals a lot of smart people lamenting the tactical error of Israel's sustained retaliation and the in-retrospect-superiority of a swift but limited response but worries that such advice is contrary to all relevant incentives and impulses:
It's human nature to demand action following an attack. Any action. Counseling restraint in the hope that it will pay off in the long run is politically ruinous.
But our lives may depend on figuring out how to make this case. If it wasn't obvious before, it should be obvious by now that conventional military assaults are usually counterproductive against a guerrilla enemy like the ones we're fighting now. We can't kill off the fanatics fast enough to win, and in the meantime the war machine simply inspires more recruits, more allies, and more sympathy for the terrorists.
Just so. It's a real problem, too, because it's a case of wise foreign policy setting itself in straight opposition to public opinion. No politician doubts that the greatest adulation and political capital comes from a justified and powerful attack against an aggressor, and so few leaders ever give a moment's thought to passing up their chance for War King status in order to avoid a costly, deadly, and useless engagement. They should, but how can that be forced? More to the point, how can that be made to seem a safer idea than war? As it stands, we're in the absurd position -- as we saw during the runup to Iraq -- of having calls for peace face a higher burden of proof than demands for war. It's crazed, but I don't see how you reverse it.
