Iron Dome success excites, but army balks at the bill

The path to peace has to be paved with good faith and reconciliation. Diplomacy will create a lasting peace. A fortress mentality will lead Israel down the path of confrontation and polarization. Israel is hardly an example of what a nation based on the Jewish faith should be.

First of all the question: how much money may cost a war for a non-existent economy like that of Gaza and how high costs can burden Israel. Is it a 100:1 relation. How great the costs are from economic disruptions and losses from a constant bombardment menace, even when not a single Israeli objective would be touched? Yearly losses higher than 400.000.000 (that would be 10.000 sky-dome rockets). For sure. Which is the disparity once the Israelis begin to inflict losses on the Palestinians, while they are completely out of means to provoke any damage? 1.000.000:1? At least. Which is the psychological warfare result? In the moment tremendous. It could have the negative side-effect, to make the Israeli military establishment dormant, exclusively fixed on defensive, and experience a Ligne Maginot effect, like the French in the second world war. It provides best protection against shelling by artillery but none against a mass attack by infantery et al.

And then Israelis claim they are alone. Wow, what a hypocracy. Raise your own taxes and fund it.

The US is lacking in innovation. These funds could hire engineers & scientists in the US helping create an industry and much needed high-tech US jobs.

A hundred years after the rebirth of the State of Israel, it has shrunk to a small statelet comprising the Tel-Aviv - Jerusalem corridor. It's remaining citizens squat cheek by jowl under a dome shaped force field, watching Arab, Persian, and EU missiles explode against it, showering fire and sparks into the night. They worry that it is only a matter of time before the enemies figure out how to penetrate the shield, for then it will all be over. The economic elites, who were at the vanguard of the Left, had left 20 years prior, using their foreign passports and connections to escape, leaving their poorer brethren to their fate. So ends the experiment of 'Land for Peace', which Israel facilitated by its brilliance in low impact defensive weaponry.

Enemy rockets cost between $500(the simple ones) to $2,000(Hezbollah ones with higher explosives and the standard 1,020 metal balls inside). Iron-Dome missile costs $40,000. The big punch here is that the system is capable of ignoring a huge chunk of the missiles as only 20% of them hit populated areas thus saving a ton of money. The main main thing here is that the cost of the interception of a rocket that would otherwise damage a building and/or take innocent lives is NOTHING compared to the economic (and morale) loss of the construct repairs and the lives taken. Thus this system would not only save money for Israel and minimize the civilian casualties, it would also offer a sense of protection, enough for people not to desert their homes and perhaps their jobs. In conclusion Iron dome = huge success.

the soviets were forced to spend spend spend on defense to keep up with America. at 40k an intercept missile, israels enemies need only fire 10,000 rockets into israel to bankrupt them...

I am reminded of NORAD. There is a great story told here in Canada, where the USA originally wanted to build NORAD such that it would only protect the USA. Partially becuase it would require joint work between Canada and USA and USA couldn't really do that unilaterally. Anyways, the story goes that when the idea was presented, the Canadian Prime Minister at the time John Diefenbaker, was a little hesitant as it was an instrusion onto Canadian Sovereignty, until he looked at a map and realized that the vast majority of the Canadian Population lived 200KM from the USA Border and if missiles were intercepted at 49th Parallel they'd fall onto Canadian Cities. So I ask, where will the rockets once intercepted fall?

Instead of initiating concrete steps to create a peace, one that ignores all of the BS propaganda about hollow peace talks and talking with Abbas, a non-player, Israel has placed a band-aid upon their gaping wound with this dome. Each gas-powered pipe rocket Hamas and Hezbollah create and fire for less than $10 and scrap metal will cost Israel at LEAST $40,000-50,000. If you know ANYTHING about warfare, you know that this sort of cost disparity will lose the war for Israel ultimately. If I were the opposing factions, I'd be initiating policies right now to expose the costs of this system for exploitation. I doubt the system is good enough to differentiate between ALL flying objects, such as those actually built to damage or those built just to fly in the air for a $50,000 rocket to shoot down.

HAMAS & hIZBALAH will not be afraid from all these initiatives because when the waR starts the whole stratigies change as we saw in 2006 and 2009,,,,,99%...noW israel and america tell them what s the maxemum!!!!

I don't know if you want to believe me but making peace is much much cheaper and better investment. Also believe it or not, you the oppressed can always find ways to fight the occupation and make Isreal insecure so why spend this money on something useless. Try to create jobs for the young people whom you send to unjustified war....killing innocent people and destroying homes and uprooting trees will only back fire and cause more instability in israel.

The worlds deal to Israel will now be... You can defend your borders so it's time to shrink. Well done to Israel for the completion of the Iron Dome. May all of Israel know peace,

Have the tests been honest? The US Pentagon has an office to ensure integrity of weapons tests, in the Director of Operational Test and Evaluation. The Bushies exempted Star Wars from it. Thus, all the tests of Star Wars are suspect and cannot be trusted. Was Iron Dome subject to testing integrity audits? Does it really work? Or is it just another weapons program meant to advance someone's career?

Chris, you apparently assume that "peace" depends only on ISRAEL-which is a way to put responsability of whatever happens in the Middle East on ISRAEL's side. The examples you give are so deprived of logic and coherence (you pu on the same level those who are supposed to have lost their homes, with hostile actions in GAZA, etc...). Please try to have a more balanced perspective on the conflict. There would be another way to look at IRON DOME: what if the palestinians (as welle as HEZBOLLAH and arab countries don't be too naÏve), at lat being aware that there actions could not harm ISRAEL, would then be obliged to negociate with realistic demands? And why not look at the fact that civilians in ISRAEL would at last be protected against rockets from all around (GAZA, LEBANON, and in the future a possible other arab country, since they are all so unstable)?

OF COURSE NOT !

Such a project obviously needs more, much more funding and I think this 205 million is just the little bit the Israelis and Americans managed to fit in a conventional military aid scheme, I am sure at least 10-15 times this money will actually flow to Israel and I am sure Americans will provide such a critical know-how to Israel that when Elbit will market its variants to Chinese in a few years, again AIPAC will prevent the Americans to protest for this. Same old Israel and same old lobby, the history is not tired to repeat itself as far as the US-Israel relations are concerned.

How about removing the motivation from those who fire rockets into Israel? This would probably involve compensating those who lost their homes in 1948, ceasing hostile actions in Gaza and the West Bank, making peace with the Arab world (perhaps along the lines of the Arab peace initiative which your government largely ignores). Wouldn't that be better for all involved, than installing a system which just treats one of the symptoms of the problem?