Never Again

Israel certainly is a land of contrasts. I'm in my Sheraton Hotel room in Tel Aviv, just having watched the last of the sunset over the Mediterrean Sea. But, we just came from the Palmachin IDF Base (IDF -- Israel Defense Forces) where we were given a movie and tour on the Arrow defense missile. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arrow_missile

There were several cool aspects to this show and tour. The first is that we got to go into one of the two control rooms in the country that coordinates the Arrow missile. The control room was in training mode, not full search and destroy mode, which is good -- one because it meant no one was shooting at us (and by "us" I mean the nation of Israel, and by "no one" I mean Syria or Iraq. I know which side I'm on in this one), and two (yes, it's a long sentence, but it's a blog for pity's sake!), because we got to see some stuff happening on the screens.

The room is like a James Bond film come to life. Serious (yet very young) IDF officers perched at oversized computer screens with lots of cool stuff going on. think an HD version of Missile Command.

Another cool aspect is that President Reagan's SDI is mentioned in the briefing as a genesis of this self defense missile. Remember, the point of the Arrow missile is to shoot down Ballastic Missile (not rockets fired across the border from the Gaza Strip -- they are too small and hit in eight seconds from detection). No, this is for the 40 seconds they have to react from Syrian-fired missiles. Hmmm -- wonder where the concept came from (thanks, President Reagan).

I'm not a defense expert, but it appears the Arrow is the Patriot missile on steriods. Barry Bonds-style -- more accurate, more successful. They still use the Patriot, but the Arrow is the cornerstone.

Then, we were taken on a bus tour around one of the two main Arrow missile sites (they also have mobile launchers). With several Israeli military on the bus to narrate, Rob Stutzman and I tried to decide whether we would get shot for taking photos of the launchers. I started taking pictures, and he joined in (we had the theory that the Chinese already had satellite pics of it).

The moral of the story (from my perspective) is that Israel, between the security fence, the Arrow missile, and the willingness to move out of areas like the Gaza Strip, want to make sure that they will always have the upper hand against those who wish the worst upon Israel -- be it Hamas or Iraq.

(I know I'm jumping around in my blog posts now -- I've skipped Monday afternoon, all of Tuesday, and now Wednesday morning to cover Wednesday afternoon. Not to worry -- I'm going to catch up tonight.)