Posted on 10/08/2023 9:03:31 PM PDT by Drew68
Artillery is 90% of all effective firepower. Airborne munitions can't cycle through endless tons of explosive the way arty can, and they cost vastly more.
If this is true and Israel has only 20% its arty stockpile, then Hamas isn't suiciding Gaza on pyre of defiance like people think. They timed this perfectly to lure Israel into writing cheques they can't cash in the hopes Israel will invade Gaza with infantry at which point they can grind them down endlessly with basically unending Arab volunteers in brutal urban warfare... where most of their technological advantage is gone and they won't have the most important 1/3rd of combined arms warfare.
This also would explain the brutality and the focus on taking as many civilian hostages as they can, since Israel can't just leave hundreds of Israeli civilians in Gaza and declare they aren't going to get them back... They're pretty much trapped fighting a ground war with what little artillery they have.
If the 300,000 rounds the US took from Israeli stockpiles to give to Ukraine corresponds to that 80% that Israel's supposedly down then they basically can't sustain combined armed warfare, since the 2014 Gaza war took 34,000 rounds of artillery alone.
Even if they have hundreds of thousands left, they can only use a fraction of them on Gaza since they need enough that they could fight a high intensity war with Egypt, Syria, and Lebanon if they intervene... let alone if Iran and Iraq start sending forces (US invasion handed Iraq to the Shia majority who align with Iran)
So even if they have another 300k artillery shells lying around, at most that'd be tens of thousand of available to actually use on Gaza without risk of being drowned by its rivalled arab neighbors in a multi-nation war.
That means the fighting to "open the gates of hell" or "wipe Gaza off the map" as some commentators are calling for will have to be done by air assets which can't realistically deliver the tonnage, and ground troops who would be dying at horrific ratios as urban settings negate most of the advantage of military tech.
Israel's active duty force only has 20ish thousand infantry in active force, even activating the 400k reserves you can only use a portion since there's the constant threat of a multinational war breaking out, Hezbollah in the north, and the entire west bank that could pop off...
So they have to punish Gaza, extract the hostages or their bodies, and achieve enough objectives to declare victory... against a population of 4 million! +Every radical fighter in the middle-east from Afghanistan to Aberdeen chomping at the bit to get in there... and they'll have to do it with... maybe 10k full time infantry? Maybe 20-30k counting the reservists?
In urban warfare? With limited artillery?
Hamas might actually have them...
They might have actually played their cards right to create the conditions for a Vietnam in the holy lands.
Remember Israel's active force of 169,000 is both genders and conscripts... You start losing a lot of people or start having to reassign 19 year old girls who never wanted to hold a rifle to infantry. that will grind down morale damned fast and tear open Israel's social divisions.. Not least between liberal secular jews who actually serve and the conservative orthodox who dodge the draft through "religious study."
Interesting, maybe helps to understand why Hamas thinks there is even the remoted chance this is not a futile suicide. Anyway, regardless, I don’t see any way they can win, Israel can be equally as brutal, even now leveling whole apartment buildings. Given the need I have no doubt that Israel will level Gaza one building and one city block at a time.
Barrel bombs.
Start with the tallest buildings and work your way down.
Office buildings, hotels, hospitals, apartments, schools, and most of all - every single mosque.
If my understanding of Gog and Magog is correct, Israel’s one war, where its existence is actually threatened, will bring Israel to repentance. Then, God will intervene.
That is what I understand, but I don’t know if it is this war where that happens.
Pray for them.
I assumed from the start that that was all part of the plan.
Even if Israel is woke, I would guess they would possess a stockpile from the last intifada 20 years ago. They’ll learn how to fight in a hurry. I guess we have some arms to give to the Israelis. Hope our factories are manning three shifts now to replace all the munitions we are sending to Ukraine (and Israel).
There was a report tonight describing Israel’s Iron Dome interceptors are depleted.
Siege warfare is effective. No electricity. No water. No food.
I also think Israel won't worry too much about the hostages. Collateral damage, and all that.
The last sentence stood out to me. I wasn't aware that the conservative orthodox Jews are permitted to dodge Israel's compulsory military service.
I hadn’t heard that but it was obvious Hamas was set on doing just that.
I suspect we don't have nearly as much as we'd like to think.
Ukraine has been quite taxing on our munitions.
The conservative orthodox Jews also comprise Israel’s largest number of welfare recipients. They expect to be supported because they are so pious.
All part of the plan.
We were drained of munitions, so we couldn’t come to the rescue of Israel or Taiwan.
Aren't they all on welfare in NYC as well?
Large caliber gunfire, automatic, airborne, or not, targeting every motorized vehicle in Gaza. Nukes and drones not required. Donkeys and camels can’t wage any modern war.
I fear you may be correct. FJB.
The US is up to its eyeballs in Ukraine. The US has been pushing confrontation in the South China Sea. One of the two deployed US carriers is heading to the Eastern Mediterranean. The Persian Gulf looks as dicey as ever considering the West’s unprecedented reliance on ME oil. Our Korean friends are getting a little jumpy about those 50,000 artillery tubes aimed at Seoul. Thank goodness we have those Pentagon and White House brainiacs to figure out how to also support and supply Israel in a potential all out war with the Arabs. Nasty tweets, you say?
It’s daylight over target/Gaza now, and the air-delivered munitions have been coming in pretty strong and regular.
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