CDR, David Levy, BESA, Mar. 20, 2024
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: The US has embarked on a significant humanitarian initiative in Gaza, planning to establish a temporary maritime pier to facilitate large-scale aid delivery. This strategic move, announced by President Biden, aims to alleviate the humanitarian crisis in Gaza by ensuring the steady flow of food, water, medicine, and shelter to the region. While the initiative demonstrates the US commitment to humanitarian assistance, it also carries great risks. During other attempts to bring aid to conflict-torn areas, like civil war-torn Lebanon and Somalia, US aid distribution and peacekeeping efforts became full combat operations. Both of those combat operations faced critical failures that resulted in US casualties and humiliating US withdrawals. If successful, the Gaza port could be the first step of a Washington-led regional “Marshall Plan” – but failure would strengthen regional adversaries.
The US has chosen to cross the Rubicon. In his 2024 State of the Union address, President Biden reminded Americans, “The United States has been leading international efforts to get more humanitarian assistance into Gaza.” He said, “I’m directing the US military to lead an emergency mission to establish a temporary pier in the Mediterranean on the Gaza coast that can receive large ships carrying food, water, medicine, and temporary shelters.”
Washington has taken ownership of the crisis by committing significant US resources to mitigate the Gaza humanitarian emergency. It is now America’s problem to solve. The Marshall Plan saved Western Europe from starvation and Soviet domination, but it came at a serious price: the US became intimately and inextricably involved in European affairs, effectively becoming “the most important country in Europe.” The US Gaza port plan is the first step in a “Marshall Plan for Gaza.” It is the Port of No Return. …Source