Short 06 Stokes Debate

[William F. Owen]

I got e-mailed this this morning.

Seriously, if this article is in anyway accurate, then you have the wrong folks in the Pentagon. I know and respect Frank Hoffman, and I have a lot of time for Stephen Biddles work, but the tone and content of this argument is woeful. I assume both men are quoted out of context.

A great many of the statements of fact in this article are just plain wrong, and intent on lionising Hezbollah in a way that is just contrary to the operational record. The IDF problem in the Lebanon War was the plan, and the lack of objectives.

Even Exum's paper concludes that one the IDF got it's act together, Hezbollah had considerable difficulties.

...and if Hezbollah are so confident, why did they not fire 1,000 or rockets during Cast Lead? If they weren't going to fire then, when were they? How many have they fired since 2006? All these facts are wonderfully absent from the debate.

If anyone in any US institution is seriously suggesting that the US Army can fight well armed insurgents in A'stan and Iraq, but couldn't face Hezbollah, then they need to removed from their post. It flies in the face of facts, and rational military analysis. Hezbollah are not a Soviet Artillery Machine Gun Brigade (even though they try to use the same tactics) and not even close in threat the a Soviet MRR!

As for the "you can't do it all" issue, how come IDF Reservists, have fought in the Lebanon, done anti-terrorist duties on the West Bank, and then fought in Gaza, - and that's based on a total of 4 months training in 3 years, as well as holding down a civilian job.

I hope this is a journalist, with little or no military knowledge trying to make a story where there simply is not one.

[Tom Odom]

If anyone in any US institution is seriously suggesting that the US Army can fight well armed insurgents in A'stan and Iraq, but couldn't face Hezbollah, then they need to removed from their post. It flies in the face of facts, and rational military analysis. Hezbollah are not a Soviet Artillery Machine Gun Brigade (even though they try to use the same tactics) and not even close in threat the a Soviet MRR!

As for the "you can't do it all" issue, how come IDF Reservists, have fought in the Lebanon, done anti-terrorist duties on the West Bank, and then fought in Gaza, - and that's based on a total of 4 months training in 3 years, as well as holding down a civilian job.

I hope this is a journalist, with little or no military knowledge trying to make a story where there simply is not one.

Wilf

This kind of "analysis" has been going on as a means to an end, notably to reniforce arguments that COIN degrades conventional. It is useful to those who use it because rightly or wrongly the IDF gets looked at as a guinea pig. I sat in a brief a year or more ago that went into all of this and at the end when they were taking questions, I raised my hand. I asked did they look at patterns/trends of IDF operations from earlier periods. I got a blank look followed by what is your point. My point was that some--not all--of the issues highlighted had occurred in IDF operations well before 2006 (as they have in ours). I renforced my point by pointing to a slide where they had a picture of southern Lebanon and saying all of that was true when I was there in 1987 watching the IDF.

My comments were not well recieved as they did not fit the intent of the brief.

Best
Tom

[William F. Owen]

My comments were not well recieved as they did not fit the intent of the brief.

...and I am become Tom Odom, slaughterer of sacred cows and crusher of pet agendas....

I can live with that!

[Hacksaw]

A couple of things...

If my memory serves me correctly, Greg Jaffe is actually quite familiar with the US Military, but...

Greg tends to take months to put together a story, quotes could very well have been taken largely out of context... its been quite sometime since I tracked what journalist were writing to determine where their agenda was heading... Mr Jaffe usually has an agenda, or at least an opinion, which he then pens articles to support...

My sense from the cheap seats, is that no one of any real significance, is looking at the IDF experience(s) in Lebanon and the West Bank and drawing conclusion... They are, however, very interested in learning from the IDF experiece... The CSI reference appears to come from an info paper written to suggest that a larger observation paper was warranted... I thought the info paper rather over-stated... an OP from CSI should be very balanced...

So I think My Jaffe's piece is much ado about nothing... well not nothing... just overstating the US response/internalization of IDF experiences...

Of course my soda straw might be pointed in the wrong direction

Live well and row

[Cavguy]

Exum has some excellent commentary at his blog:

Here's the problem with that, though. As Jaffe notes toward the end of the article, the 2006 war is a kind of Rorschach test that does not so much point toward obvious conclusions but rather highlights pre-existing biases on the part of those researchers looking to draw conclusions. Personally, I believe you can take any number of important lessons from the war and can use the war writ large to argue all sides of the ongoing defense debates. If you just look at the war within the 34 days of open fighting, for example, it is clear the Israelis allowed their conventional war-fighting skills to atrophy as they engaged in low-intensity operations in the Palestinian territories between 2000 and 2006. But if you look at the war from the other side of the border -- which few studies have done -- you see the way that, over a span of time beyond the 34 days of open fighting, Hizballah employed non-kinetic lines of operation (to include information operations and the provision of essential services to their population), to virtually ensure that no matter how the Israelis performed operationally, they would have a tough time winning strategically. Or, to put it another way,

"Even if the Israelis had done better operationally, I don't think they would have been victorious in the long run," said Andrew Exum, a former Army officer who has studied the battle from southern Lebanon. "For the Israelis, the war lasted for 34 days. We tend to forget that for Hezbollah, it is infinite."

So there are lessons to be found in the 2006 war for Cold Warriors and COINdinistas alike. What we should do, instead, is study the wars we are actually fighting. That will cost guys like me several thousand dollars in consulting fees each year for those war games Frank Hoffman mentions, but it makes a lot more sense to study the wars in which Americans are actually fighting and dying than it does to study a war whose lessons are only vaguely applicable to the future of American war.

Paging COL Gentile .....

[William F. Owen]

"Even if the Israelis had done better operationally, I don't think they would have been victorious in the long run," said Andrew Exum, a former Army officer who has studied the battle from southern Lebanon. "For the Israelis, the war lasted for 34 days. We tend to forget that for Hezbollah, it is infinite."

In the long run, Hezbollah did not act militarily during Cast Lead. The War did not last 34 days for Israel. That was just the fighting. It has lasted 61 years, and everyday of Israel's existence, and continues. Hezbollah are a pretty recent players in this game.