Mark Helprin Quotes
If one accepts Hezbollah's self-description as a resistance movement, in which case one must, in light of the fact that Hezbollah never ceases to provoke, view Israel's mere existence as a continuing act of aggression, then Hezbollah has indeed shown that it can initiate conflict, resist, and survive.
Helprin, Mark. "Israel's Modest Aim." The Wall Street Journal, Dow Jones & Company, 26 July 2006, p. A14.
The English were at War with Napoleon and Denmark was neutral. British leaders feared that Denmark might either ally themselves with Napoleon or provide him with ships from their well equipped fleet. The English decided on a preemptive attack on Denmark and Paget and other Captains were ordered to Denmark. When they arrived they were ordered to bombard Copenhagen and force the Danes to surrender. When this happened, the British seized the Danish ships and simply took them as war prizes. The issues of the morality and wisdom of preemptive attacks, as with the Americans in the Iraq war, was thoroughly debated but the government view prevailed to the shame of most Englishmen.
Nasser was indeed planning an attack. Israeli intelligence had discovered it, and the Israeli’s informed President Lyndon Johnson who in turn called Kosygin. Nasser and the Arabs had miscalculated again and ended up being not only defeated in the war they wanted but totally embarrassed by the incredibly poor performance of the Arab armies who greatly outnumbered the Israelis but had no stomach for a fight.
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Mark Helprin is an American novelist, journalist, conservative commentator, Senior Fellow of the Claremont Institute for the Study of Statesmanship and Political Philosophy, Fellow of the American Academy in Rome, and Member of the Council on Foreign Relations. While Helprin's fictional works straddle a number of disparate genres and styles, he has stated that he "belongs to no literary school, movement, tendency, or trend".
