Ineptness ... Round II

 Map of North-East and North-West Passage shipping routes

In A Sense of Foreboding, yours truly discussed the ineptness of the Biden Administration regarding the Great Game of geopolitics and the dangers of backing the wrong horse, in this case, Israel, bent on subjugating the Palestinians for as long as it takes no matter the cost. To that end, genocide and the intent to move the Palestinians to the Sini is the end game in order to create a greater Israel, something not feasible given the colonized will not give up. Add to this is the possible two front war Israel may embark upon vis a vis Lebanon and the Hezbollah, a far more powerful entity than Hamas, which equates to the often repeated phrase, Houston, we have a problem. 

With Bibi caring more about avoiding jail and not saving his county by creating a viable two state solution, the impact on the US will be swift due to the continued rip offs perpetrated by Raytheon and significant others in developing absurdly expensive weapons unable to be produced in large enough quantities to effectively counter the asymmetrical and cheap tech of drones, a true game changer in all things related to war.

Ike warned us about the MIC in 1960. 63 years later, the chickens have come home to roost as the tenets of The  Art of War have been violated and the US and Israel will now pay the price of not understanding the great game and the importance of the world island and how it applies to geopolitics.

Mackinder’s Concept of the World Island, From The Geographical Journal (1904)

For even the greatest of empires, geography is often destiny. You wouldn’t know it in Washington, though. America’s political, national security, and foreign policy elites continue to ignore the basics of geopolitics that have shaped the fate of world empires for the past 500 years. Consequently, they have missed the significance of the rapid global changes in Eurasia that are in the process of undermining the grand strategy for world dominion that Washington has pursued these past seven decades.

War, driven by cheap tech, will never be the same.

Map of the US-led Combined Maritime Forces (CMF) in West Asia and North Africa

Yemen, the poorest nation in the Middle East, has done the following ...

To date, Ansarallah has successfully targeted nine ships using drones and missiles, and managed to seize one Israeli-affiliated ship in the Red Sea, according to their official statements. These operations have prompted the largest international shipping companies, including CMA CGM and MSC, and oil giants BP and Evergreen, to re-route their Europe bound ships around the horn of Africa, adding 13,000km and significant fuel costs to the journey.

Delays, transit times, and insurance fees for commercial shipping have skyrocketed, threatening to spark inflation worldwide. This is especially worrisome for Israel, which is already contending with the economic repercussions of its longest and deadliest conflict with the Palestinian resistance in history. 

Additionally, Ansarallah has launched multiple missile and drone attacks on Israel’s southern port city of Eilat, decreasing its commercial shipping traffic by 85 percent.

Ineptness as art form strikes yet again.

The Pentagon plans to defend commercial ships using missile defense systems on US and allied naval carriers deployed to the region.

But the world’s superpower, now largely on its own, does not have the military capacity to counter attacks from war-torn Yemen, the poorest country in West Asia.

This is because the US relies on expensive and difficult to manufacture interceptor missiles to counter the inexpensive and mass-produced drones and missiles that Ansarallah possesses.

Austin made his announcement shortly after the USS Carney destroyer intercepted 14 one-way attack drones on just one day, the 16th of December.

The operation appeared to be a success, but Politico swiftly reported that according to three US Defense Department officials, the cost of countering such attacks “is a growing concern.”

The SM-2 missiles used by the USS Carney cost roughly $2.1 million each, while Ansarallah's one-way attack drones cost a mere $2,000 each.

This means that to shoot down the $28,000 worth of drones on 16 December, the US spent at least $28 million in just one day.

Ansarallah has now launched more than 100 drone and missile attacks, targeting ten commercial ships from 35 countries, meaning the cost of US interceptor missiles alone has exceeded $200 million.

Whether invented in northern India, eastern China or Central Asia – from Persia to Turkestan – chess is an Asian game. In chess, there always comes a time when a simple pawn is able to upset the whole chessboard, usually via a move in the back rank whose effect simply cannot be calculated. 

Yes, a pawn can impose a seismic checkmate. That’s where we are, geopolitically, right now. 

The US-led Armada put together for Operation Genocide Protection, which collapsed even before birth, may have been set up to “warn Iran,” apart from giving Ansarallah a scare. Just as the Houthis, Tehran is hardly intimidated because, as West Asia analyst ace Alastair Crooke succinctly put it: “Sykes-Picot is dead.” 

This is a quantum shift on the chessboard. It means West Asian powers will frame the new regional architecture from now on, not US Navy “projection.” 

That carries an ineffable corollary: those eleven US aircraft carrier task forces, for all practical purposes, are essentially worthless.  

Houston, we have a problem.