The rest is history. Reagan's election ushered in eight years of relative peace and prosperity for the United States. And his decisive actions led ultimately to the demise of the Soviet Union. I believe Ariel Sharon's ascendancy to the office of prime minister, once almost unthinkable to most Israelis, should be viewed through the prism of the Reagan parallel. Reagan showed the world conclusively that real peace can only be achieved through strength.
Deterrence is the most powerful weapon in the arsenal of any free people.
Weakness, or the perception of weakness, invites aggression. Ehud Barak has bent over backward to be conciliatory. He chose appeasement as a prescription for a settlement with the Arabs. After essentially offering Yasser Arafat everything he had previously asked for, he got more inflammatory rhetoric, he got more violence, he got more threats and he got a Middle East on the brink of war. One doesn't need to study much history to know that principled toughness, firmness and determination works in politics and leadership.