Shocker: Conventional Wisdom Wrong on Middle East
Lee Smith has a very interesting and counterintuitive piece up at Tablet regarding the discovery by Hezbollah of CIA infiltrators in their midst. While the conventional wisdom on this incident is that it is a CIA failure, Smith points out that the fact of the infiltration actually shows Hezbollah’s weakness. Hezbollah has long perpetuated the myth of its impenetrability to outside intelligence assets, and this public admission of their penetration pierces that myth. Smith makes the compelling point that Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah “has spent the last five years since the end of the party’s 2006 war with Israel bunkered underground because he fears his organization is so porous that the Israelis have a good shot at assassinating him.” Smith also notes that the weakening of the Assad regime in Syria is harming Hezbollah as well. Definitely worth a read.
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Re: Shocker: Conventional Wisdom Wrong on Middle East
That the CIA infiltrators were eventually discovered is a failure, I guess, but I'm always happy to hear that our intelligence community is engaging in operations such as these.
A dozen discovered CIA informants? That's horrible news for Hezbollah! I wonder how many undiscovered CIA informants we have there.
Re: Shocker: Conventional Wisdom Wrong on Middle East
My guess is a bunch more, and I certainly want Hezbollah to think that.