March 07, 2007
On the Record with IDF Intelligence
I spoke recently with an Israeli Defense Forces intelligence officer about last summer’s war between Israel and Hezbollah in South Lebanon. He still serves in the IDF and therefore must remain anonymous. I’ll call him David, which isn’t his name.
David works in a fire control unit stationed in the Northern Command. During the war he managed intelligence pertaining to Hezbollah rocket fire, selected targets for air and artillery strikes, and occasionally assisted in real-time control of fire. He is familiar with some of the high-level decision-making and hints at some of what he knows that is officially classified.
MJT: Let's start with a general question. What, exactly, did Israel accomplish in the summer war with Hezbollah? Are there any tangible lasting benefits?
David: Well, to understand what was accomplished we need to look at the starting point. Virtually all Israelis were very happy the IDF withdrew from Lebanon -- many think it was foolish to have gotten in there in the first place and even those that don't agree we overstayed our welcome, so to speak. Following the pullout Hezbollah established itself very firmly in South Lebanon -- of particular worry to the military was their ground-ground rocket and missile array, ranging in various calibers and ranges. I cannot go into all the intelligence data, but Hezbollah's capability to hit Israeli population centers was well known for quite some time. So this was the primary problem -- only it was never tackled by any Israeli leadership, not that there was much that could have been done. That remains a problem today, though from what I hear they're having a much more difficult time restoring their abilities. I wouldn’t call it a success story, though. The problem's still there. Another worry was Hezbollah's attempts at kidnapping Israeli soldiers.
There have been several attempts made, and each one was more calculated and planned than the last. Apart from the famous instances in which IDF soldiers did in fact die or get kidnapped, there was one memorable attempt that was foiled due to good thinking and alertness in the tactical levels. There were also "anti-aircraft” barrages that hit inside Israel, killing one boy in one instance if I recall correctly. Hopefully, the last conflict sent a message that will make these acts less desirable.
There were also general shows of force at the border, usually organized "demonstrations" or throat-cutting gestures at soldiers from armed persons. There's a road that passes a few meters from the border and they made sure to build a position right on top it with Hezbollah flags, just as a gesture. We no longer have Hezbollah right on the border, and that is the most tangible benefit.
The UN forces have uncovered a few munitions hideaways. It's not much, but every rocket counts. So that's a somewhat limited benefit.
MJT: Hezbollah may no longer control the border. But they can still sneak across the fence to kidnap more soldiers if they really want to. UNIFIL doesn't have the authorization to stop them. And they can still fire Katyusha rockets from just north of the border and shoot them over the heads of UNIFIL. Meanwhile, if there is another war between Israel and Hezbollah, UN soldiers will be in the way as obstacles or even human shields. How much of a "win" is this really?
David: It's not much of a win at all -- and it's no secret here. The Chief of Staff is being replaced by the same person he competed against for that job. You can't get a stronger signal than that. We knew we could not deal with the rockets without sending in ground troops. There were plans for the exact scenario at the start of the conflict. We practiced these plans a very short time before the real thing. These plans included a much larger ground offensive that would systematically clear out Hezbollah rocket fire.
Unfortunately, the Chief of Staff was the first Air Force man to have this job. The general attitude in the IDF was to let the Air Force control everything, and so the ground forces weren't called up early enough, and the plans were never used. That was the biggest problem, in my opinion -- the way the Air Force "runs the show". In some cases, soldiers that were not given water one day, because the Air Force did not want to risk landing a helicopter, were dehydrated and airlifted the next day. In general, the coordination between the ground forces and the Air Force was very lacking. There was a helicopter that crashed due to what was later discovered to be a manufacturing fault, but at the time they thought it was hit with artillery fire. So they limited artillery fire in a real knee-jerk sort of way, etc.
The failure to follow the pre-determined plans would be the second biggest problem, in my opinion. Everything was improvised, units would have their orders change constantly, the high-level commanders failed to utilize some very important principles in warfare that every officer in the IDF memorizes. Perhaps their hands were tied by the politicians, but no one can deny a major part of the blame lies on the Chief of Staff's neglect of the regular military, which was very eroded by policing the territories and later evacuating the settlers from Gaza, without any sort of rehabilitation afterwards.
But there are other sides to the coin. I think Hezbollah's leadership and the Iranians take Israel a little more seriously now. They did not agree to end the hostilities for no reason. Nasrallah himself said he did not expect that kind of backlash. I believe they have a different image of Israel now. They saw the way we handle the territories -- where we tense up over every soldier that gets hurt -- and they made sure we would know they're waiting for us in south Lebanon, and that it is going to be costly to send ground forces in there. But this was not the territories -- tanks were getting hit all over the place, there were some very costly battles -- and Israel seemed like it could go on for a while. If you ask me, that is the truest victory. Apparently Hezbollah and the Iranians thought rocket barrages on Northern Israel would weaken us - the opposite was true.
I cannot comment much about the situation today. What's important is that there is no regular Hezbollah presence right on the border. This presence was essential to their planning and desensitizing of IDF forces prior to the kidnappings. True, they can still sneak -- as they probably do -- but it is quite different from having Hezbollah men sit in positions right on the border, from the Mediterranean to Mt. Hermon.
As for the UN -- no Israeli believes they do any good any more.
How much of a win is it? Not much, which is why a lot of people think there will be another conflict with Hezbollah in the near future. As soon as they feel they have something to gain by it, they will try it again.
MJT: Do you think anything concrete was achieved by bombing Hezbollah's command and control center in the dahiyeh, in the suburbs south of Beirut? The area was pretty heavily pulverized -- I was recently there and took pictures -- but many Israelis have discounted it as irrelevant. It's hard for me to say because, for the most part, I can't tell by looking at the area what was hit and what wasn't.
David: Bombing the dahiyeh made a genuine contribution to the military effort -- every organization would have its function impeded without its permanent headquarters. Furthermore, forcing Hezbollah commanders to be mobile also increases the chances of them being located. However, Israelis are mostly disappointed that none of Hezbollah's leaders were eliminated in the dahiyeh strikes. They probably stayed hidden away before the kidnapping took place, but asymmetric warfare is about producing "effects," and the fact that there was no tangible, immediate achievement that the IDF could present shows good preparations on the part of Hezbollah.
MJT: Do you think either side "won" the war? Or was it more of a draw? It looks to me like both sides lost, but in different ways. Israel failed to meet most of its objectives, but Hezbollah was clearly more wounded.
David: This is an academic question. What constitutes a victory? Besides, it's a piece in a much bigger conflict that's still being played (which is why I don't often refer to it as a "war"). Hezbollah is heavily reliant on Iran. Iran needs a functional, armed Hezbollah as a deterrent, a hanging sword over the heads of Israeli policy-makers (and ordinary Israelis). This conflict was never out of control as far as Iran is concerned. They control the heights of the flames, and they made sure to extinguish them when they thought the price to continue was too high. They would rather keep a few cards up their sleeve for whatever happens next. In the internal Lebanese field, I'm not sure whether Hezbollah reaped significant fruit from this conflict. Lebanon was on the way to restore its former glory after the IDF, and later the Syrians, left. Hezbollah is constantly subverting Lebanon's progress. I hope the Lebanese manage to solve this problem. Time will tell. The current events there definitely serve as strong leverage for Iran over the West. It's a shame Lebanon has to pay the price for other nation's aspirations.
Most Israelis think Israel's deterrence was damaged in this conflict. Deterrence is a crucial element in Israel's security, and so this is quite a major deal. However, Israelis are used to winning every battle decisively. But in this day and age there are some things a military simply cannot achieve without paying a price.
Hezbollah were meticulously prepared for this conflict by Iran, and had numerous advantages. I wish I could reveal just a sliver of what we know of Iran's preparation of Hezbollah. The IDF, on the other hand, was much less prepared for this conflict. However, as I mentioned, asymmetric warfare is about achieving effects on your enemy. In this case, Hezbollah and Iran's desired effect is to demoralize Israel's society and so to tie the hands of its elected leadership, as well as some other, long-term effects. They proved to achieve the exact opposite -- Israeli society united for the first time in a long while.
I know quite a few people who volunteered for reserve service. Many residents of the north left their homes but others remained, some because there was no alternative and some simply in defiance. A Channel 10 reporter spoke recently of an instance when she was reporting from a house in Tiberia that was hit by a Hezbollah rocket. Next to her at the time was a reporter for Channel 2, who completed his report by saying Tiberia's residents are tired of the bombardments -- and the local residents around him were very angry to hear this. She made sure to mention their high spirit, and was cheered by the crowd when she ended her report.
Iran and Hezbollah mistakenly see the opposition within Israel to the occupation and various other internal struggles as a weakening of Israeli society. They were definitely surprised by Israel's strong stand during the fighting -- and in my opinion, in asymmetric warfare that can be termed as a small victory. Israeli politicians are ,of course, paying a price for their mistakes in managing the conflict. However, there are grander issues plaguing them so their role in the conflict takes a secondary role most of the time.
Olmert's failure to define clear, achievable, and measurable objectives is often criticized, as are Peretz's poor rhetoric skills and lack of military experience. It does not matter much -- they will go and others will take their place -- and whatever their successors do and say will be criticized as well. Such is our nature.
MJT: You're an intelligence officer. Target selection was part of your job. Can you tell us about Hezbollah's alleged use of human shields? Are any of these reports overblown, or was Hezbollah's use of civilian lives and infrastructure even more common than we've been led to believe? I spoke to Lebanese civilians who said their entire village of Ain Ebel, which was full of people at the time, was used as a shield. And I spoke to an Israeli soldier who said he didn't see a single civilian anywhere in South Lebanon. These people were describing events in different places, but they do contradict each other a bit.
David: Before the conflict, Hezbollah would do in South Lebanon as they pleased. In those villages that supported them -- Shia villages -- they had absolute freedom to establish an infrastructure that offered them some protection against strikes as well as intelligence collection. Prior to the hostilities, Hezbollah personnel lived inside the villages or in their vicinity and were mostly indistinguishable from the local populace. They had stored weapons and ammunition inside civilian residences, set up local command and control facilities etc. I know this not only from processed intelligence, but also from direct unprocessed reports from ground forces that uncovered such facilities left and right.
For example, in one residence our forces found a room that served as a long-range observation post equipped with advanced thermal imaging equipment, maps, and communications equipment. Hezbollah drew detailed plans for holding each village, and as the soldier testified, even prepared stationary combat positions in the villages it was able to do so.
As the Ain Ebel resident testified, during the fighting Hezbollah fighters prevented civilians from leaving their villages. Intelligence from several locations perfectly matches the testimony of Hezbollah attacking fleeing civilians in your report. Hezbollah did not exclusively use villages, as you saw in the valley below Ain Ebel.
The demolished building that you saw was probably used for long term stay during calm periods and was quite probably abandoned prior to the kidnapping that sparked the fighting. They had meticulously prepared many such valleys with systems of foxholes and bunkers, designed to protect their men and weapons while maintaining readiness and making them difficult to clear by ground forces. They knew exactly how to minimize the window of opportunity to locate and destroy these small fighting elements, and indeed it took much effort to silence them. Though we did manage it, the rate at which the small rocket launchers were silenced was unsatisfying. Still, they had considerably more advantage in the villages, especially once our ground forces started clearing these valleys.
We had maps and aerial photographs of every village that had mosques, schools, UN positions and other sensitive locations marked, and we tried to avoid hitting them, especially after the death of UN observers from IDF return fire.
We also have various tools for locating and analyzing what is termed "steep trajectory fire," and there was an evident trend in their rocket fire: as the conflict progressed, Hezbollah rocket fire came closer and closer to those locations we tried to avoid hitting, and in many cases originated there. In addition, when the UN coordinated safe passage for a convoy, Hezbollah would launch rockets near the convoys' paths. They could have been informed (perhaps the UN coordinated with them as well) or they could have simply observed the UN convoys at some point during their journey.
Hezbollah's military-like organization was not limited to the tactical levels. They had a military-like logistic structure. In simple terms, their biggest supply stores were north in the Bekaa valley, from which their weapons and munitions were transported to secondary supply locations, where in turn they were distributed to smaller fighting units. There is much criticism of the IDF's targeting of bridges and roads, but it made a big difference in their ability to fire deeper inside Israel, again evident in their launch patterns: the Litani river has two "knees" where its flow alternates between south and west. These are the closest locations from which they could fire shorter range rockets into Israel -- specifically its northern tip -- without crossing the river, and accordingly, the north/west banks around these "knees" were regular launch hotspots.
I do not think there is a contradiction between the soldier's and the villagers' testimonies. The IDF tried to steer clear of non-Shia villages such as Ain Ebel, both in the fire and in the maneuver effort. We would only return fire in response to rocket launches from these villages, and as far as I know ground forces stayed away from them as much as was possible. The Shia villagers were probably allowed to leave their villages as the IDF approached them. Ground movement in such a theater is very slow and careful, there is no element of surprise, so the villagers -- as well as Hezbollah -- were quite probably aware of IDF forces en route.
MJT: What was your experience like during the war? I understand part of your job was watching the war in real-time on monitors while the rockets were flying.
David: I'm one of many Israeli students, and the war caught us during an exam period. Like I mentioned, most of the reserves weren't called up for a few days, so we stayed at home, unable to study with the events continually unfolding on the TV. I belong to a generation that has known relative safety, and the conflict changed my perspective on the seemingly trivial safe life I lead here.
It was unlike the first Gulf War, when everyday life would continue amidst the polyethylene sheets and gas masks. It was more like living in a history piece about the days when the Syrians and Jordanians were shelling Israeli settlements, but even in those days I don't think it was so intense, it definitely was not as deep into Israeli territory as Hezbollah's attacks. Considering my reserve service I was better prepared than most Israelis who paid little attention to the headlines about Hezbollah's arsenal that would show up in the newspapers every once in a while.
When I was finally called up I made my way up north, where the mood was set by the empty roads and closed businesses that became more evident the further I traveled. There were also many fires scarring the green Galilee. At one point I had to meet someone at a rallying point, passing by several fresh hits on the way, with trucks carrying all sorts of weapons and supplies passing me by -- not unlike an action movie. These sights motivated me for the work ahead, but when I joined my unit I was somewhat let down.
The Air Force was doing everything, us "green" units weren't doing much -- there was no significant ground maneuver yet. We returned fire to where Hezbollah would launch the rockets, tried our hardest to make sense of all the launch data we collected and prepared for whatever would come next, but there was no real work to do.
When you sit in front of monitors and maps showing countless trajectories from Lebanon into Israel -- into the very places your friends and family live -- it can be quite agitating. Some of us were becoming very impatient, and in the many dead moments there were debates whether our response should be harsher. Of course, none of us were in any position of real influence. It was somewhat of a relief when the ground offensive was escalated, even though virtually everyone had people who were very close to them in combat units. I had some very tense conversations with people who were about to enter Lebanon, trying to prepare them without letting out really sensitive information. Talking to friends and family back home sometimes proved difficult because they would ask questions I could not answer -- either because I did not know the answer or because it was sensitive. Even today there are some very basic facts about the conflict that I would like the entire world to know, but divulging them would mean that we'll have poorer intelligence in the next round.
After the ground offensive was escalated things were getting better, though as I previously mentioned it was not according to any of the predetermined plans and that led to a lot of problems. Some of us would leave to go to funerals and then come back. The cease-fire was called when it was clear the IDF would clear South Lebanon in a few days.
There was one instance before the cease-fire, though, that was personally unnerving. The Syrians were making threats and preparing for an attack. We started organizing for working on the Syrian front, and if seeing trajectories over maps of south Lebanon is agitating, seeing tactical unit markings over maps of the Golan is downright scary. I don't mean to exaggerate -- I never really thought they would attack, and we're much better prepared for dealing with the Syrian army than with Hezbollah -- but it was an ominous sign nonetheless.
MJT: Can you give us any hints about those basic facts you wish you could divulge? Don't tell us so in so much detail that it will weaken your intelligence capabilities next time. Be as vague as necessary to protect yourself and your assets. But give us an idea of what you're talking about, if you can. If you're thinking of basic facts here, the world should know as much as possible, even if you can only tell us one thing we didn't already know.
David: Unfortunately, information these days is not worth much unless presented in raw form, which is impossible for me to deliver. I can only repeat matters that have already been leaked.
For example, the reports on the Hezbollah bombings of the Jewish community center and Israeli embassy in Argentina state there was increased communication activity from the Iranian Embassy before the attacks, leading to the conclusion the Iranian embassy was used to coordinate these attacks. Quite obviously, this is only the publicly disclosable part of the intelligence regarding the bombing -- it is very likely that it is not only the volume of these communications that was monitored, but also their contents. This example also proves Iranian embassies have been used by Hezbollah in the past. One can safely assume this practice continues today. Add to this already leaked information regarding the whereabouts of Nasrallah during the conflict and you can extrapolate the nature of at least one undisclosable piece of intelligence.
[Note: He is referring here to reports during the war that Hassan Nasrallah used the Iranian embassy in Beirut as a safe house.]
MJT: The Israeli political establishment is suffering severe criticism inside Israel for botching the war. Do any of these critics, perhaps including yourself, have any idea what might work better against an asymmetric enemy like Hezbollah in the future? If there is another Israeli-Hezbollah war in Lebanon, can we expect better results next time if the right people make the decisions?
David: Analyzing your and your enemies' weaknesses and strengths is crucial for success in asymmetric warfare. In the case of Hezbollah I believe there are two major weaknesses: their geopolitical distance from their power base (Iran), and their incompatibility with what the majority of Lebanese agree is the path to a secure and prosperous future.
These weaknesses require attacks of a diplomatic nature. Any direct Israeli involvement in these areas will harm its interests, so currently the best thing for Israel is to do is persuade "neutral" parties to strengthen pro-western Lebanese behind the scenes. Distancing Syria from Iran would provide a serious blow to Hezbollah, but the Syrians are well aware of this (they are arming Hezbollah for leverage over Israel) and considering the internal conditions in Israel as well as the Syrian expectations, I believe peace with Syria is highly unlikely. There is also the possibility that this is part of a concerted Iranian effort to prevent an attack on their nuclear program by presenting such an attack as dangerously destabilizing what may seem to be a finally stabilizing Middle East. That may explain the US Administration's prohibition of any official Israeli contact with Syria.
Iran and Hezbollah assumed the greatest Israeli weakness would be the Israeli public's reaction to the war. It would seem Israel weathered this particular test. While they thought their actions would be met with the then-typical knee-jerk attacks that incur little damage or that a large-scale response would be criticized by what they perceived as a defeatist society, there is very little debate in Israel whether the response was disproportionate. Of course the situation outside Israel is very different, and this is one flank Israel must reinforce, but there is little you can do against such a well-oiled propaganda machine that is Hezbollah.
From a pure military perspective, I am certain the lessons will be learnt and applied. Though the commission that is investigating the conflict has yet to publish its findings, the initial reports in the papers suggest they have hit the tactical aspects on their proverbial heads: they have pointed out the rift between the Air Force-dominated General Staff and the Northern Command as one of the main reasons for the IDF's failure to stop rocket fire into Israel. The new Chief of Staff seems to be emphasizing cross-arm cooperation and training. However, the IDF needs to prepare for the next conflict, not the last. Russia is arming Syria with very advanced rockets of various sorts, a previously unknown "Palestinian liberation" organization in Syria has made headline-grabbing announcements and suddenly Syrian "peasants" are lobbing land mines across the border. Hezbollah's successes have certainly not gone unnoticed.
If there will be another conflict with Hezbollah it will be different by several aspects: Hezbollah is somewhat less obvious these days, particularly south of the Litani. Their rocket re-armament, according to the media, is primarily north of the Litani. They realize, as do we, that to stop rocket fire on Israel the IDF must clear the launch areas with a large ground maneuver. They will probably utilize the region south of the Litani as a defensive belt, to weaken and slow down an IDF attack and later disrupt logistical support of IDF forces north of the Litani. They will probably forgo the inaccurate medium and large sized rockets that were nearly annihilated during the first stages of the fighting and expand their small-rocket array. They will certainly try and recreate their real and perceived naval successes (Nasrallah believes Israel has covered up the drowning of a second ship), though the relevant weapons were very likely operated by IRGC teams. They may also try and expand their anti-aircraft capabilities, especially in the rear. Hopefully we will never have to address these new challenges, but as I mentioned several times: this is part of a bigger puzzle. Iran will certainly utilize Hezbollah in case of a conflict with Israel or the US, and it seems such a conflict is not unlikely.
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Michael, thanks very much for another excellent interview. This conversation says a very great deal about why things proceeded as they did.
Posted by: Zvi at March 8, 2007 01:17 AMPardon my ignorance on this, but what ever became of the two soldiers that were captured at the onset of this? I never have read or heard anything of their fate.
Posted by: Jim at March 8, 2007 04:29 AMThe 2 Israeli Jewish soldiers kidnapped by Hizbollah remain missing and in Hizbollah control, or to whomever they passed them.
The same is true of the 1 Israeli Jewish soldier kidnapped in Gaza by Hamas.
This ugly inconvienent fact is being ignored by the Israeli political eschalon (as it's not polite for Israel to threaten), and Hizbollah & Hamas believe they can get more by quietly negotiating (in the past they've gotten the release of hundreds or thousands in return for 1).
Posted by: Akiva at March 8, 2007 05:39 AMA good interview. That intel officer is a pretty smart guy.
The backlash against Olmert and Peretz is bullhonkey, with an undertone of right-wing hysteria (and, in the case of Peretz, of full-on anti-Sephardi racism.) As the intel interview almost explicitly verifies, the worst thing that can be said of Olmert and Peretz is that they were cautious in overruling the IDF - but who in their right mind would consider being cautious in overruling IDF command, especially someone hawkish, a bad principle?
The real story behind the war is a) the IDF, all on its own, loused the job, and b) a clean, classic, 1967-victory was never going to happen at any time.
Israel would have lost disturbing numbers of soldiers had they invaded with ground forces on the first day. They would have faced very long delays in silencing the Katyushas, just as they did. They had no real capability to hurt Hizb more than they did or take less losses, unless you consider annihilative carpet-bombing of everything that moved in South Lebanon. (I'm sure one of the idiot dwellers will stand up and vouch for that in a minute, but that wasn't a feasible option anyway, considering the permanent reprecussions such an act would have had on Israel's relations to the West, not to mention Arab countermoves).
The war isn't Olmert/Peretz's fault. Meanwhile, the diplomacy building over the Saudi initiative is very promising. Olmert is handling the Palestinian issue, frankly, pretty well. I believe that the Israeli public will belatedly recognize these things.
Posted by: glasnost at March 8, 2007 05:58 AMI agree with glasnost that a lot of the opposition to Olmert and Peretz is bullhonkey (although I'm not actually familiar with this term), but I can't agree that it is right-wing and racist hysteria.
Israeli governments have been consistently losing elections for the past 2 decades, and Olmert and Peretz were never very popular to begin with. Olmert inherited a new party built on the persona of someone else, and Peretz is ex-union leader as defense minister leading a party disappointed with its election results after he won the primaries with less than 50% support. And they don't get along very well.
They may be making good decisions, but it is almost inevitable that Olmert has few fans, and that Peretz's own party wants to get rid of him.
Michael Totten, thank you for another extraordinary report, with insight unavailable elsewhere. Keen questions, and informative responses. Your readers very much look forward to further excellent work upon your return to Iraq.
Posted by: Seppo at March 8, 2007 06:54 AMExcellent interview Michael. Very interesting.
This is off topic, but I wanted to ask how the information in this article:
http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/03/06/news/poll.php
- and particularly the referene to 85% of Lebanese having a negative view of Israel - reconciles with the basic impression that your articles deliver that Lebanese aren't actually en-masse "anti-Israel"?
BTW, I think its interesting they didn't quote the percentage of Americans that have a positive or negative view of Israel.
I also would have found it intreesting to see how the Lebanese percieve Iran and Syria.
Posted by: jonorose at March 8, 2007 07:17 AMOk, more info here. Quite interesting.
http://www.globescan.com/news_archives/bbccntryview/backgrounder.html
Sorry for being off topic.....
Posted by: jonorose at March 8, 2007 07:36 AMThe person who posted as me above (now deleted) forged my identity. That person's IP address is now blocked.
Posted by: Michael J. Totten at March 8, 2007 08:30 AMjonrose -- the poll did not ask whether people had a positive or negative view of the various countries in question, but whether they felt those countries had a positive or negative influence on the world. a subtle, but significant distinction.
it is difficult to imagine how even the most rabidly pro-israeli lebanese (and there are some) could say that israel has a positive influence in recent years on the intl community as it relates to lebanon. nonetheless, if you look at the survey results, you'll see that 6% of lebanese did in fact respond with a "mainly positive" view of israel's influence.
regarding the US's influence, Lebanon responded with 34% "mainly positive," which sounds low but in fact ties it with canada's perception of the US as reported in the poll (also 34% positive), and puts it ahead of the global average of 30% including all of europe minus poland and italy, and all of the middle east.
the lebanese polled were pretty evenly split on iran's influence, with just a slight majority having a negative perception -- 42% responded with "mainly positive" and 44% with "mainly negative."
Posted by: carine at March 8, 2007 09:56 AMWhat the IDF intelligence officer fails to acknowledge is that Hezbollah now has massive support from most lebanese (check the polls). How will Israel change the situation?
Posted by: ben at March 8, 2007 10:08 AMJonorose,
I have never said that the Lebanese mainstream is pro-Israel. The Lebanese mainstream is anti-Israel. The Lebanese mainstream, however, does not wish to destroy Israel or even to fight Israel. The majority want some kind of negotiated settlement either now or after the minor outstanding issues between the two countries have been resolved.
I know even some Hezbollah supporters who want a negotiated settlement at some point, although all of them (of course) are interested in using violence as means to extract that settlement.
I quoted several Lebanese in my recent articles who are at least somewhat sympathetic with Israel. You may have noted that all of them were critics of the war in July, and all say the Israeli invasion was bad for Lebanon.
Lebanese public opinion is hypercomplex, and no grouping of 85 percent into a single category can shed any light.
Posted by: Michael J. Totten at March 8, 2007 10:15 AMCarine: regarding the US's influence, Lebanon responded with 34% "mainly positive," which sounds low but in fact ties it with canada's perception of the US as reported in the poll (also 34% positive), and puts it ahead of the global average of 30%
That doesn't surprise me, as I'm sure it doesn't surprise you.
The flip side, though, is that anti-American opinion in Lebanon is sometimes (depending on the person) much more vicious than anti-Americanism in Canada.
What I'd like to see are statistics comparing Canada minus Quebec and Lebanon minus the Shia.
Posted by: Michael J. Totten at March 8, 2007 10:18 AMBen: Hezbollah now has massive support from most lebanese
Which polls are these?
Hezbollah scores radically different in polls depending on the question. When Hezbollah is pitted against invading Israel soldiers, Hezbollah scores well. When Hezbollah is pitted against the Lebanese government, not so much.
Posted by: Michael J. Totten at March 8, 2007 10:21 AMOther questions in that poll are absolutely fascinating, and possibly totally bogus. American opinion of Iran is higher than the world average?
Canadians and Europeans have a much more negative view of Iran than Americans do? Who on earth would have predicted something like that? Either the world is a stranger place than I thought, or those statistics are crap. I
Posted by: Michael J. Totten at March 8, 2007 10:26 AMconsidering israel's wartime leadership problems and lack of preparedness, just imagine the tail-kicking if israel was ready with good leadership.
now that hizbullah is overconfidently boasting and possibly preparing for another skirmish, it makes one wonder if they understand that being further from the israeli border means that israel will strike that much deeper into lebanon next time.
heaven forbid that there is another conflict. but if there is, my money is definitely not on hizbullah.
Posted by: abu yussif at March 8, 2007 10:42 AMThe backlash against Olmert and Peretz is bullhonkey, with an undertone of right-wing hysteria (and, in the case of Peretz, of full-on anti-Sephardi racism.)
Care to back up your claim, glasnost?
This from Friedman in the NYT last week:
"I never saw in the streets of Israel such a total contempt for the government by almost everybody -- the poor and the rich, the Jews and the Arabs, the left, the right and the collapsing center."
and from Reuters yesterday:
"The Channel Ten television survey found that just 3 percent of Israelis would vote to re-elect Olmert"
So I guess 97% of Israelis are right wing anti-Sephardi racists?
Posted by: mertel at March 8, 2007 10:53 AM59 percent of Chinese have a positive view of Russia? That's strange.
The director of the one of the groups involved in the poll said:
“It appears that people around the world tend to look negatively on countries whose profile is marked by the use or pursuit of military power. This includes Israel and the US, who have recently used military force, and North Korea and Iran, who are perceived as trying to develop nuclear weapons.” “Countries that relate to the world primarily through soft power, like Japan, France, and the EU in general, tend to be viewed positively,” he added.
I'd expect that the BBC, who also sponsored the poll, liked the results.
It's also interesting that they chose to ask about the UAE but not Saudi Arabia, Israel but not Syria...
In Lebanon, people were polled in "Akkar, Aley, Baabda-Maten, Baalbak, Batroun, East Center, Eastern Suburbs, Jbeil, Jezzine, Keserwan, Koura, Nabatieh, Rashaya, Shouf, Sidon, Tripoli, Tyre, West Center, Western Bekaa, Western suburbs, Zahle, Zgharta"
Info about the poll is
here (pdf)
Someone still thinks it's cute to forge my identity. It only takes one click of the mouse to get rid of forged comments, however.
Posted by: Michael J. Totten at March 8, 2007 10:59 AMThis is the post that inspired me to make a donation, Michael. I put my comment on the "Syrian" joke by mistake, not that I don't enjoy jokes too!
Posted by: savtadotty at March 8, 2007 11:44 AMMore great work, Michael.
David said:
We knew we could not deal with the rockets without sending in ground troops. There were plans for the exact scenario at the start of the conflict...These plans included a much larger ground offensive that would systematically clear out Hezbollah rocket fire... the ground forces weren't called up early enough, and the plans were never used. That was the biggest problem, in my opinion ...The failure to follow the pre-determined plans would be the second biggest problem, in my opinion.
This backs up comments I have made in other threads in this subject. The IDF had the correct operational plans, but Olmert, hoping to win the war from the air and acting out of fear of international reaction to a large-scale invasion even though international opinion gave Israel a free hand for almost a month, overrruled the IDF and didn't follow their recommendations. Once he realized he couldn't win it with the Air Force, it was too late to send in the troops. The political window had closed.
The incompetent chief of staff has been replaced. The only thing that remains to be done is to get rid of Olmert and that buffoon Peretz, who, in addition to being a party hack with no military experience to speak of, doesn't even have the sense to remove the lens caps on his binoculars when he's watching maneuvers. An idiot is an idiot, Ashkenazi, Sephardi or Mizrachi. Israel has always learned from its mistakes. I am sure they will do it this time as well. Hizballah may have given Israel just the kick in the pants it needs to clear out the deadwood.
David also makes Hizballah's war crimes very clear (using civilans as human shields, firing from mosques and other supposedly civilian locations, hiding behind the UN, etc.).
Finally, David illustrates Hizballah's main failure, indeed, the most important miscalculation that the Arabs have made from the very beginning: their belief that the Jews are cowards and that Israeli society is weak and brittle, only needing a little push that will bring it crashing down and send the Jews screaming to the boats. How can they still believe this after all the ass-kicking they have taken?
As long as the Arabs base their strategy on illusions like this, they will lose every time. As Sun Tzu said: If you do not know yourself or your enemy, you will always lose.
Here's hoping that they never wise up.
Posted by: Ephraim at March 8, 2007 12:32 PMMichael: I have never said that the Lebanese mainstream is pro-Israel. The Lebanese mainstream is anti-Israel. The Lebanese mainstream, however, does not wish to destroy Israel or even to fight Israel.
Me: blah blah blah reconciles with the basic impression that your articles deliver that Lebanese aren't actually en-masse "anti-Israel"?
I didn't think Lebanese are "pro-Israel", but I would feel better with the world that perhaps they weren't "anti-Israel", the same way I'm not "pro-New Zealand" nor am I "anti-New Zealand".
I can't take a great deal of comfort from the fact that there is a country to my North whose people hate me, but its ok since some of them (the ones with no actual power to do anything about it) don't actually want to destroy me.
Actually, you know whats the MOST interesting thing missing from that survey? What Israelis think of everyone. But then come to think of it, no one gives a rat's ass.
Posted by: Jonorose at March 8, 2007 01:16 PMThe backlash against Olmert and Peretz is bullhonkey, with an undertone of right-wing hysteria (and, in the case of Peretz, of full-on anti-Sephardi racism.)
This statement is so completely and utterly removed from reality that it is in fact amusing.
Peretz is unanimously considered the poorest candidate for Minister of Defense in human history. The guy should have stepped down THE SECOND the war broke out, but his political ego has caused him to remain, even until today, despite the fact that he has absolutely nothing positive to contribute to the position. If you have a good reason for why he is qualified for the position, I for one would love to hear it.
The aftermath leads me to wpoonder about the political fallout in Lebanon. Hez. now seems more and more at odds with large elements of Lebanon and there is bound to be a struggle for some time to come, with of course Syria and Iranian input.
The war ended because the US wanted it ended and the UN came in to do their usual nothing...giving legitimacy to the cessation of the fighting.
this intel guy is correct about the losses that Israel would have sustained with a big invasion, but it is also clear that non-stop bombardement does nothing to eliminate the full problem.
We know now that Hez (ie, Iran) did not expect the Israeli reaction, and thus they may be reticent to try again for some time to come...if bombardments start up again, that will signal a growing threat, but in the meantime, the internal Lebanese problems will keep Hez. busy and unwilling to start up again against Israel.
Posted by: fred lapides at March 8, 2007 03:06 PMSun Tzu's side lost, btw, Ephraim.
Great interview, but it would be nice to get more than a one-dimensional portrait of Hezbollah, Iran and their intentions.
Posted by: alphie at March 8, 2007 03:21 PMWho was Sun Tzu's side?
If you mean Israel, I admit that they did not do as well as they should have. They should read Sun Tzu as well. They seriously underestimated Hizballah. However, Hizballah seriously underestimated Israel even more. Nasrallah said candidly that he would not have done what he did if he thought the Israelis would react the way they did. That is, essentially, an admission of defeat.
Israel "lost" in the sense that they didn't completely defeat Hizballah in 48 hours as everyone expected them to. However, Israel was not defeated in any military sense. This round was basically a draw.
Israel has started fixing its problems. Once Olmert and Peretz are out, things should be better. Don't get me wrong; I think that Israel pretty much blew it militarily. However, this was due primarily to a failure of will on the part of the government.
And I believe that Israel is far more capable than Hizballah of taking the proper lessons from what happened.
Posted by: Ephraim at March 8, 2007 03:43 PMI wonder what would happen if next time they bombed the Iranian embassy all to hell for hiding somebody like Nassrallah. I mean, other than the obvious setback to Iranian/Isreali diplomatic relations.
Posted by: d00d at March 8, 2007 03:44 PMOh,OK.
Well, maybe they didn't listen to him like they should have.
Posted by: Ephraim at March 8, 2007 04:12 PMAs for the UN -- no Israeli believes they do any good any more.
Well, I think that everybody can agree to that no? Friend and enemy alike ....
Posted by: tsedek at March 8, 2007 04:12 PMWe're hoping that such interviews as this will cumulate to provide invaluable verbatim transcripts for students of such "asymmetrical wars". As petro-dollars drain from Saudi coffers, Islam's post-WWII anti-civilizational offense will be exposed for what it is-- a brutal and corrupt power-grab under Salafist and Wahabi death-cult auspices, a graveyard "peace" without any redeeming features whatsoever.
Why any in the West genuflect before Hezbollah's reeking cruds, for "multicultural" or collectivist Statist reasons, is a mystery-- as ever, feminists and their assorted PCBS allies are Mullah-dullahs' first targets-of-opportunity. Israel shall survive, thanks in part to clear-and-present voices such as Michael Tottens'.
Posted by: John Blake at March 8, 2007 04:16 PM"Olmert treated unfairly ... anti-Sephardic racism ... yada yada ..."
Olmert bears the stench of the loser. He had 85% popular approval for his war yet failed to meet his stated primary objective: securing the release of the hostages.
He's the Israeli Jimmy Carter. Of course the people hate him. Whether it's unfair or not, when the time for war is at hand yet you blink and back down without winning it, your people will despise you. Sephardic versus ashkenazic has nothing to do with it -- above all else people expect their leaders to be strong.
All this other "analysis" is pure bunk. If Olmert had been sitting at the table with Condi and the cease-fire was all agreed to but then right as they stood up to leave he had said, "Yep, just as soon as we get our hostages back I'll implement this cease-fire immediately!" he would have been treated like a hero. Instead he caved. Granted, he caved to us, but he still caved. That's why people hate him.
We hated Jimmy Carter, and every time he used the word "peace" while the Ayatollah held our nation hostage we hated him a little bit more. If the Israelis are anything like us Olmert's background has as little to do with why they hate him as our hatred of Jimmy Carter was based on his once farming peanuts.
Posted by: Laika's Last Woof at March 8, 2007 04:51 PMmertel (quoting glasnost)
" 'The backlash against Olmert and Peretz is bullhonkey, with an undertone of right-wing hysteria (and, in the case of Peretz, of full-on anti-Sephardi racism.)'
Care to back up your claim, glasnost?"
mertel, you should know that antisemites never let the facts get in the way of a good Jew-baiting story.
Posted by: Gary Rosen at March 9, 2007 12:39 AMGlasnost is not anti-Semitic.
Anti-Semitism is something I take seriously, and is an offense that will get a commenter instantly banned.
Posted by: Michael J. Totten at March 9, 2007 02:39 AMSomeone still thinks it's cute to forge my identity. I am electronically alerted whenever this happens, and it only takes a single mouse click to delete forged comments. But if you happen to see ridiculous comments from "me," you know to ignore them.
Posted by: Michael J. Totten at March 9, 2007 03:20 AMThis conflict was never out of control as far as Iran is concerned. They control the heights of the flames, and they made sure to extinguish them when they thought the price to continue was too high.
That is the key insight of the entire interview. It says that the Iranian mullahs still consider Lebanon their playground and battlefield, and even if Israelis and most Lebanese respect human lives, they don't. Unless the Iranians are ejected, Lebanon can look forward to another Hezbollah War - or worse.
March 14: cut a deal with the Shi'a, then close the Iranian Embassy and kick their diplomats out. What have you got to lose other than your chains?
Posted by: Solomon2 at March 9, 2007 06:13 AMglasnost said:
The real story behind the war is a) the IDF, all on its own, loused the job, and b) a clean, classic, 1967-victory was never going to happen at any time.
Israel would have lost disturbing numbers of soldiers had they invaded with ground forces on the first day. They would have faced very long delays in silencing the Katyushas, just as they did. They had no real capability to hurt Hizb more than they did or take less losses, unless you consider annihilative carpet-bombing of everything that moved in South Lebanon.
If there was absolutely no possibility for Israel to hurt Hizbullah more than they did or take fewer losses than they did, then in what sense did the IDF "louse up the job"?
glasnost continued by saying:
(I'm sure one of the idiot dwellers will stand up and vouch for that (carpet bombing) in a minute, but that wasn't a feasible option anyway, considering the permanent reprecussions such an act would have had on Israel's relations to the West, not to mention Arab countermoves).
Arab countermoves? Historically, "retreat" followed by "surrender" are the two Arab countermoves that follow an all-out application of Israeli military power. The Arabs have had a fair amount of practice at both.
As far as carpet bombing is concerned, that is what it took to finally defeat two of the greatest evils of the twentieth century. It's interesting to me that you are so desperate to keep the option of using overwhelming force off the table. It indicates that pacifists like you are not actually opposed to war -- they are opposed to victory.
Posted by: Michael Smith at March 9, 2007 06:50 AMJonorose:
Peretz is unanimously considered the poorest candidate for Minister of Defense in human history. The guy should have stepped down THE SECOND the war broke out, but his political ego has caused him to remain, even until today, despite the fact that he has absolutely nothing positive to contribute to the position.If you have a good reason for why he is qualified for the position, I for one would love to hear it.
I tell you what, good buddy, why don't you start by giving me a good reason why he's not qualified for the position. The above paragraph is the exact kind of platitude recycling that I find unconvincing. Question: Why is Peretz incompetent? Answer: "Duh, don't you read the papers? Everyone's saying it!" Who the bleeding f*ck cares what everyone's saying, can I ask?
My opinion is that Peretz was caught up in a negative media cycle, basically created by Labor hacks, suicidally angry that he managed to win a primary, and the Israeli right-wing, who hates him extra special because he's louder, tougher and further left then Shimon Peres - and this was solidified by war errors that were fundamentally the IDF's fault. It has nothing to do with Peretz's performance, anymore than Avrham Mitzna's got dumped on because he had "bad ideas" that Ariel Sharon went on to implement.
Having said that, I don't have a rolodex full of all the smart things Peretz has done as Minister of Defense. I have an impression of the post in Israel as follows: it doesn't do much, and it never has. But I can't think of any bad decision he's made, either, nor has anyone else supplied one.
As for the racism crack, as you already know, it was a suspicion of mine, not a well-evidenced assertion (what am I supposed to do, take surveys?). It's obviously not the only factor at work, but from what I understand, plenty of lower-class Sephardi feel like this is a problem. If Aryeh Deri was a victim of it, has this force magically dissapeared for Peretz?
I definitely stand behind "hysteria". Peretz was a strong man who spoke openly of taking action - nonmilitary, for once - for peace. Gush Eminem's infiltrants in the media would say and do anything to bring him down. The war took place immediately after Amona, which was the beginning of the hysteria.
If there was absolutely no possibility for Israel to hurt Hizbullah more than they did or take fewer losses than they did, then in what sense did the IDF "louse up the job"?
That's probably an overstatement. The strategic parameters were just about fixed beforehand, and weren't going to change. However, the ground invasion certainly could have started earlier, the extraneous bombing of Beirut, the well-documented under-preparedness and undersupply of the reserves, that's all Halutz and the men under him. Peretz had been defense minister for... what, 3 months?
That's right, MS, I hate victory. Day after day, I struggle with a burning tide of low-self-esteem that I come out here and project onto foreign policies designed to make the West weak and Osama Bin Laden strong. What a superbly accurate psychic you make!
Or wait, maybe not.
Mike, it doesn't take a genius to know by now that 1967, while maybe a great day of victory, really didn't solve Israel's problems. Nor did a bunch of great days of victory in 1982, all the way up to the capture of West Beirut. "Didn't solve" is kind of a euphemism here.
But, hey, if you think carpet-bombing South Lebanon would have created an environment of less, rather than more, problems for Israel, than feel free. I don't. I also think you're a fool. And I'm pretty sure the Mossad would agree. Israel's relative restraint allowed it to take on Hizballah by itself, not to mention allowed a situation to be created where Israeli troops are not getting their behinds shot off in South Lebanon for the next decade. Which is the environment in which Hizb became a force in the first place.
Oh, but I should add, that even if said carpet-bombing (I regret taking this bait, what a juvenile and fantastic toping to be wasting my time with) did not constitute a strategic net loss, rather than net gain, you're right: I'd still oppose it. It's not a challenging principle, MS. Saddamn used chemical weapons on Kurdish guerillas in the 1980's, and we supposedly invaded him because this was bad. The moral of the story is that, in the West, we don't commit moral atrocities for tactical gains that can be achieved through another, less atrocious method. That's why we're called, ahem, the 'Good Guys'. Or so I'm told.
Posted by: glasnost at March 9, 2007 08:00 AMMichael Smith to Glasnost: It's interesting to me that you are so desperate to keep the option of using overwhelming force off the table. It indicates that pacifists like you are not actually opposed to war -- they are opposed to victory.
I'm against carpet bombing as well. So are most Americans. It's a war crime. Are we all a bunch of pacifists opposed to victory?
Posted by: Michael J. Totten at March 9, 2007 09:06 AMJust to mix things up a little - this, by David Horowitz, who I often don't agree with, is nevertheless fairly well-written.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1173173966646&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
Horowitz can't point to any particular mistakes or lousy performance specifically by Peretz, either, but he certainly has had to swim uphill against the fact that it's logically convenient to associate mediocre IDF performance (or strategic blind alleys) with a new MoD, whether or not it makes analytical sense.
Posted by: glasnost at March 9, 2007 09:57 AMGlasnost sez:
The moral of the story is that, in the West, we don't commit moral atrocities for tactical gains that can be achieved through another, less atrocious method.
Ummmmm.....hello? Dresden? Tokyo? Hiroshima? Nagasaki?
Posted by: Ephraim at March 9, 2007 11:08 AMMr. Totten said:
I'm against carpet bombing as well. So are most Americans. It's a war crime. Are we all a bunch of pacifists opposed to victory?
That depends. If, with respect to a particular conflict, you acknowledge that carpet bombing is the only way to victory, and you are opposed to it nonetheless, then yes, I’d say you are opposed to victory in that conflict.
If however, you are opposed to carpet bombing because you think it is unnecessary and victory can be achieved by alternative tactics, then no, one could not say you are opposed to victory.
Glasnost’s position, as far as I can tell, is the former, not the latter.
No, I don’t think you are a pacifist. A pacifist believes that the use of military force is both inherently immoral and impractical and will concoct both types of arguments against the use of military force. I haven't seen you do that.
Let me clarify my position. Insofar as “carpet bombing” means the use of overwhelming military force for purposes of killing the enemy, destroying his infrastructure, disrupting his supply lines or destroying a civilian population that is supporting the war effort, I support it as a completely legitimate tactic. To win a war, you must either destroy the enemy’s will to fight or destroy his ability to fight. Insofar as “carpet bombing” achieves one or both of those goals, I am in favor of it. Insofar as “carpet bombing” means the gratuitous killing of civilians, in a fashion that does not destroy the enemy or advance us toward victory, I am opposed to it.
Thus, I am completely in favor of what we did to Japan and Germany in WWII. If that sort of bombing is now a war crime, then we have merely added more stupid laws that help our enemies.
Posted by: Michael Smith at March 9, 2007 11:20 AMglasnost said:
Oh, but I should add, that even if said carpet-bombing (I regret taking this bait, what a juvenile and fantastic toping to be wasting my time with) did not constitute a strategic net loss, rather than net gain, you're right: I'd still oppose it. It's not a challenging principle, MS. Saddamn used chemical weapons on Kurdish guerillas in the 1980's, and we supposedly invaded him because this was bad. The moral of the story is that, in the West, we don't commit moral atrocities for tactical gains that can be achieved through another, less atrocious method. That's why we're called, ahem, the 'Good Guys'. Or so I'm told.
Could you clarify your position, glasnost? In the statement above, you first state that you are opposed to carpet bombing even if it is practical, i.e. produces a net strategic gain, period. Then at the end, you add in the qualifier that you are opposed if there is a better way of achieving the goal.
So are you unconditionally opposed, or only opposed to doing it "unnecessarily"?
Also, if the alternative to carpet bombing results in greater casualties to your own soldiers, how many of them do you allow to die to save the civilians that would perish under the carpet bombing?
Posted by: Michael Smith at March 9, 2007 11:38 AMOh Mr. Totten, I forgot to say thanks for the great interview with the Israeli intelligence officer. Very educational.
Posted by: Michael Smith at March 9, 2007 11:41 AM"Carpet Bombing", as understood by folks who are not Andrew Sullivanesque hysterical lefty whiners means dropping a huge number of small or medium sized bombs very rapidly from large bombers with the intent to target and completely destroy a large geographical area (ie a city or, in the case of Desert Storm, the assembly area for a Republican Guard corps). Since Israel possesses absolutely zero strategic bombers - they only have a few hundred hundred F-16s (each of which can only carry a few bombs) and maybe 50 or so F-15s (which can carry a dozen or so bombs), they are INCAPABLE of carpet bombing opertations. The partial destruction of the dahiyeh was accomplished over the course of weeks - whereas a raid by US B-52s could accomplish the same or more destruction in 15 minutes - the significance being that weeks gives everyone but the very small % killed in the first strikes time to move out of the way, whereas a true carpet bombing operation would kill everyone pretty much right away.
This is really just another corruption of a military term of art by those who know nothing about the military except that they hate it - and sadly other, better, people fall into their rhetorical trap.
Posted by: holdfast at March 9, 2007 11:44 AMglasnost said:
Mike, it doesn't take a genius to know by now that 1967, while maybe a great day of victory, really didn't solve Israel's problems.
Granted, it didn't solve all their problems. But are you saying, then, that Israel would have been better off not to have launched a pre-emptive strike against Egypt's air force? They should have tolerated Egypt's blockade of the Straits of Tiran? Or are you just saying that, overall, the Israeli's should have used less military force, not fought as hard, or what?
Posted by: Michael Smith at March 9, 2007 11:49 AMI can sum it up pretty nicely, Mike: The IDF had no way to achieve a quick, neat, tactical military victory in South Lebanon, and i.e. end the rocket fire rapidly and completely except the use of completely indiscriminate aerial bombing to eliminate everything that moved south of the Litani river (even assuming, thanks holdfast, the IDF has the number of planes and neccesary armnament to even accomplish this).
What the objectives of the war were and whether they were achieved, or how they could be achieved, are a matter subject to debate,
Such a depopulation campaign would have neither served Israeli strategic interests, nor been morally defensible.
Neither the strategic and political reprecussions, nor the moral calculus, are the same for Israel in 2006 as they may have been for America in 1944. Fair, unfair, that's the way it is.
As for 1967, the pre-emptive strikes were a gray area, international behavior that can and should be discouraged, generally, but as far as I know, it was military on military and not something I condemn on a moral level. Also not a similar environment, not a similar kind of confrontation, and yet, this part of the comparison is valid - brought long-lasting problems for short-term gains.
Posted by: glasnost at March 9, 2007 12:15 PMGlasnost's point about Peretz simply following the chief of staff underscores the weakness of the Israeli civilian defense establishment in general. Basically, the defense minister is entirely dependant on the IDF and its institutions for intelligence and planning. There is no national security council, or similar civilian entity to coordinate intelligence and prepare a national security estimate. It was just this kind of blindness that in 1982 allowed Ariel Sharon, acting more like a general than a minister, to hoodwink the government into an escalation of the war in Lebanon that it had never approved. The fact that a military lightweight like Peretz could be appointed defense minister shows that the office itself is a joke.
Posted by: MarkC at March 9, 2007 12:37 PMI'm going to be away from the computer for a day or so. Any posts after this one with my name on them are by someone who thinks it's funny to forge my identity.
This is my last genuine post on this thread. Any and all others are fake.
Enjoy the laughs while you can. Anyway, a guest-blogger will be joining me and will help purge bogus comments.
By the way, the person forging my name is Abraham, who was banned earlier. He isn't as clever as he thinks he is.
Posted by: Michael J. Totten at March 9, 2007 12:40 PMglasnost sez:
The IDF had no way to achieve a quick, neat, tactical military victory in South Lebanon, and i.e. end the rocket fire rapidly and completely except the use of completely indiscriminate aerial bombing to eliminate everything that moved south of the Litani river
I disagree with your general premise, glasnost. The IDF plans that Olmert ignored called for landing troops on the Litani, thereby leapfrogging the Hizballah positions, so that Hizballah would be caught in a North-South pincer movement. Instead, after relying too much on aerial bombing, Olmert sent troops directly into the teeth of Hizballah, hamstringing them with indecisive orders becaue he lacked the guts to prosecute the war properly. If Olmert had had the stones, and hadn't underestimated Hizballah, victory would have been possible.
More importantly, why does victory have to "quick and neat"? Are you saying that Israel is incapable of fighting a long and messy war? If so, why?
1967 was not a "grey area" in any way, shape or form. Egypt knew that closing the Straits of Tiran was an act of war. Israel obliged them. Israel was 100% in the right. The war was on when Egypt closed the Straits. Anyone who thinks a war starts only when somebody starts firing doesn't understand what war actually is.
You say that 1967 was "military on military" so you have no problem with it. So let's try a thought experiment:
Hizballah says all of Soutn Lebanon is Hizballah. Since Hizballah is an army dedicated to the destruction of Israel and initiated a war against it, how and in what way would Israel be unjustified in considering everyone in South Lebanon the enemy and attacking them? It is common knowledge that the Shia villages in South Lebanon doubled as heavily fortified Hizballah poositions, often with rocket launchers inside peoples' homes. Does this not make such homes legitimate military targets? If not, why not?
I am not asking about whether "indiscriminate" bombing would be a productive military strategy. I think it would not be and there are smarter ways to fight a war. However, if the people in South Lebanon are actually in cahoots with Hizballah, as opposed to being forced to cooperate, then why would it be immoral to target them?
Finally, Israel committed only a very small proportion of their troops to this fight. Hizballah did not "defeat" the IDF. They held out against a few brigades hobbled by incompetent political leadership who did not let them fight properly.
As I said, I doubt Israel will make the same mistake the next time.
Posted by: Ephraim at March 9, 2007 12:57 PMThere's no proof our bombing of civilians in WWII or Vietnam helped the bring about a victory, holdfast.
Bombing civilians is usually just an act of a country that is unwilling or unable to commit sufficient ground forces to do the job right.
In effect, carpet bombing is an admission of defeat.
Posted by: alphie at March 9, 2007 12:58 PM"In effect, carpet bombing is an admission of defeat."
Wait, so the US was defeated in WWII? Damn, I was miseducated in my history class...
Posted by: JB at March 9, 2007 02:45 PMNot saying that, JB,
But America's role in the defeat of the Nazis has been greatly inflated by entertainment companies and propagandists.
The Soviets beat the Nazis with their massive infantry, at best, America gets an assist.
And Japan lost to us the moment they bombed us.
They knew it, we knew it, too. Not even a close match.
Our bombing of them was more the work of sociopaths in the military, not a military need or strategy.
Posted by: alphie at March 9, 2007 03:05 PMNo, no, it's an admission of defeat, not defeat itself, silly.
Seriously, though, what it is is an admission that the lives of your soldiers are more important then the lives of the enemy, soldiers or civilians.
Curtis LeMay was one of the architects of the Tokyo firebombing, which killed more than 70,000 civilians. He later said "I suppose if I had lost the war, I would have been tried as a war criminal". However, he believed that it saved lives by encouraging Japan to surrender earlier. This is backed up by former Japanese prime minister Fumimaro Konoe, who said that, fundamentally, the thing that brought about the determination to make peace was the prolonged bombing by the B-29s.
Posted by: Ephraim at March 9, 2007 03:08 PMAnd Japan lost to us the moment they bombed us. They knew it, we knew it, too. Not even a close match.
You mean they surrendered the day after Pearl Harbor? Because they knew they had no chance against us?
So everything I was taught in school was a lie? Those four years, those hundreds of thousands of dead, it never happened?
Still, good to know we never really nuked all those people.
Posted by: Ephraim at March 9, 2007 03:13 PMglasnost said:
Such a depopulation campaign would have neither served Israeli strategic interests, nor been morally defensible.
I disagree.
If, ultimately, the alternative facing Israel is to exist in a perpetual state of war and fear of Hizbullah's rocket attacks, terrorism, kidnappings, etc -- OR eliminate that threat by "depopulating" the southern part of Lebanon, then Israel has every moral right to do precisely that.
No sane version of morality can demand that the people of one nation surrender their right to self defense and accept a state of perpetual threat of war, terrorist attacks, rocket attack, kidnappings, etc., perpetuated by killers imbedded in the population of a neighboring country.
No civilian -- coexisting with killers in their midst who are threatening and attacking a neighboring country -- can expect or demand to remain free of harm from the retaliatory force that the victims of those murderers have every right to employ. The civilians of Lebanon do not have the moral right to demand that Israelis suffer and die so that they, the citizens of Lebanon, can remain free of harm and live. They can only try to stop the killers themselves or leave or run the risk of dying when the Israelis’ finally retaliate -- but they cannot demand that other people surrender their lives so that they don’t have to take any action.
In any conflict between a free nation and totalitarians bent on their destruction, the moral responsibility for ALL deaths, civilian or military, rests SOLELY with the totalitarians that make the conflict necessary. They, and they alone, bear guilt for those deaths, for they, and they alone, are the initiators of force or threat of force that causes the conflict.
Posted by: Michael Smith at March 9, 2007 04:43 PMalphie said:
There's no proof our bombing of civilians in WWII or Vietnam helped the bring about a victory, holdfast.
No military builds its own weapons and ammunition. They do not construct their own battleships and fighter aircraft. They do not grow their own rations or sew their own uniforms. They are dependent on the civilian population for all these things, either in the form of actual material production or in the form of taxes collected to pay for that production.
Furthermore, most members of the military have relatives and loved ones in the civilian population. The military's morale, therefore, is affected by the fate of those civilians and what they are experiencing.
It is, therefore, ridiculous to claim that one can inflict mass death and destruction on the civilian population of an enemy nation without affecting both the material ability of its military to fight and its morale and willingness to fight.
Japan and Germany surrendered because they were facing extermination and mass starvation if they did not. This was achieved by utterly destroying their economies, their homes and hundreds of thousands of them. The best way to achieve this with the lowest level of casualties to our forces was through strategic bombing.
It worked, it was completely moral and proper, it achieved the permanent destruction of two of the twentieth century’s greatest evils, and it resulted in the creation of two of the most prosperous and peaceful nations on earth.
Posted by: Michael Smith at March 9, 2007 05:13 PMEph, I can't disprove that Israel had other tactical choices available that would have made a difference, i.e. the Litani amphibs and all, but I'm personally not convinced.
Mike, your moral calculus, implemented by the good guys as well as the bed, is a recipe for a return to the Middle Ages, all pointless universal suffering definitely implied. The world depends not on your imaginary need for decisive victory to solve an imaginary Gotteramdung, but on the civility of the West to continue to diminish violent conflict among nations, inch by inch. I'm going to continue to scorn your postings to such effect, as and where I come across them. But thanks for the civility.
Posted by: glasnost at March 9, 2007 05:45 PMFirebombing Japan was an immoral shortcut to a messy problem that was, however, permissible by the standards of the time. The standards have changed. But we'll never know if Japan would have surrendered in a ground invasion or not, or how soon, or how many lives would have been lost. I doubt that the 700K we killed were all really neccesarily. But that was the last gasp of an old set of rules (or, perhaps, the window between the development of a new method of warfare and the development of moral guidelines for said warfare) best left behind.
Posted by: glasnost at March 9, 2007 05:47 PMTwo further points.
#1.
However, if the people in South Lebanon are actually in cahoots with Hizballah, as opposed to being forced to cooperate, then why would it be immoral to target them?
Eph, the people of Israel are in cahoots with the IDF. It is nevertheless, I hear an awful lot, immoral to target them. Connect the dots. Some seemingly complicated questions are only complicated when you're holding a hand over your eyes.
Here, I'll spell it out for you: most of the moral restraints that we've managed to build around war in the past thousand years involve the idea that killing unarmed people is wrong. Hope that answers your question, because when you question it, you question the firmnament of order that sustains our collective lives as surely as Osama.
#2:
In any conflict between a free nation and totalitarians bent on their destruction, the moral responsibility for ALL deaths, civilian or military, rests SOLELY with the totalitarians that make the conflict necessary. They, and they alone, bear guilt for those deaths, for they, and they alone, are the initiators of force or threat of force that causes the conflic
I can condense this logic quickly down to, "Everything (evil) I do is the other guy's fault, he started it". It wouldn't hold up for ten seconds on a schoolyard playground, and it doesn't hold up for ten seconds here. Morality 101: you're responsible for your own actions. Period.
It's a good thing world leaders, at least on the Good Guy side, don't think like you, Mike. An Israel that followed your way of thinking would be dead in three generations - abandoned by the West, strangled of its own innovation, and left as one petty dictatorship surrounded by a sea of much larger, hostile petty dictatorships. It's no coincidence that you're describing Syria and Iraq's basic approach to warfare.
As an immediate example, any government that even attempted your type of solution six months ago would have collapsed amidst the backlash. Right away. Unless it resorted to anti-democratic methods to sustain itself.
Three generations might be a conservative estimate.
Posted by: glasnost at March 9, 2007 10:41 PMGlasnost,
I'm curious to know if you think that Moshe Katzav is also a victim of anti-Sephardic Racism?
You have already shown you think that Arye Deri was innocent.
And as for your question "what am I supposed to do, take surveys?" - well, it would be nice if your gut feelings that you so forcefully put forth as your opinions had some basis in reality.
www.slickblog.wordpress.com
Posted by: MTM at March 10, 2007 07:13 AMglasnost said:
Mike, your moral calculus, implemented by the good guys as well as the bed, is a recipe for a return to the Middle Ages, all pointless universal suffering definitely implied.
Nonsense. My "moral calculus" ended WWII and destroyed Japanese Imperialism and German Nazism. Did it lead to a return to the middle ages? No. That is a historical fact that you continue to evade.
You have not, and cannot, refute a single moral principle that I have stated. My argument does not amount to claiming that any act can be justified by arbitrarily asserting, "Everything (evil) I do is the other guy's fault, he started it".
I certainly did NOT say that any country has the moral right to attack another country by merely making the unsubstantiated claim that "the other guy started it". Restating my position in that kind of wording is a pathetic and lame straw man argument. You should have the grace to address my actual position, not a caricature of it.
You express your idea of morality as follows:
Here, I'll spell it out for you: most of the moral restraints that we've managed to build around war in the past thousand years involve the idea that killing unarmed people is wrong.
Your approach to morality is to tell the killers of the world that they may get away with an unlimited amount of killing simply by surrounding themselves with unarmed civilians. You invite the evil to take the innocent hostage and use them as permanent human shields. Thus, your version of morality simultaneously empowers evil by telling it how to escape justice and dooms the good to suffer unlimited attacks without fighting back.
Any notion of morality that works in favor of evil and punishes the good is not a morality at all – it’s a monstrous negation of the whole concept of morality.
Posted by: Michael Smith at March 10, 2007 07:33 AMglasnost said:
Eph, the people of Israel are in cahoots with the IDF. It is nevertheless, I hear an awful lot, immoral to target them. Connect the dots. Some seemingly complicated questions are only complicated when you're holding a hand over your eyes.
The only thing that is complicating anything here is your effort to evade the moral difference between those who initiate the use of force or threaten to do so – Hizbullah – and those who use force in retaliation – the Israelis. Attacking those who ally themselves with the police is not the same as attacking those who ally themselves with the criminals the police are seeking to stop.
A mugger and his victim who fights back are not moral equals - they cannot both be damned for using force. Only the one who initiates its use or threatens to do so may be condemned. The man acting in self-defense has every moral right to do so.
Posted by: Michael Smith at March 10, 2007 07:41 AMGlasnost said:
An Israel that followed your way of thinking would be dead in three generations - abandoned by the West, strangled of its own innovation, and left as one petty dictatorship surrounded by a sea of much larger, hostile petty dictatorships
Israel has followed my way of thinking in the past and none of what you claim will happen ever happened. How many times must history refute your notions before you drop them and rethink your position?
Posted by: Michael Smith at March 10, 2007 07:46 AMglasnost said:
The standards have changed.
Translation: there are now vast numbers of pacifists who demand that we empower evil by granting it unlimited sanctuary to hide among the unarmed.
Posted by: Michael Smith at March 10, 2007 07:52 AMHere is a must read for those who wish to see western civilization prevail over Islamic totalitarianism:
http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/issues/2006-winter/no-substitute-for-victory.asp
Posted by: Michael Smith at March 10, 2007 07:55 AM
