Quote Originally Posted by Norfolk View Post
And Hezbollah, for all the striking political success it scored, has suffered the loss of the majority of its best fighting men. It is now a shell of what it used to be, and has kept fairly quiet, militarily, ever since.
I don't think Hizbullah lost the majority of its best fighting men, and its losses were compensated by both stepped-up recruitment and greater combat experience. In my view it is at least as powerful now as it was in 2006.

Hizbullah's relative quiet in the south derives from a combination of its desire to have time to continue its rearmament, fortification and training programme; its current primary focus on Lebanese domestic politics; and the domestic costs of being seen to spark another confrontation with Israel at this time.

Perhaps the most interesting contrast, btw, is between Hizb performance in 2006, and PLO performance in 1982. The PLO was, by the standards of the day, at least as well as equipped as Hizbullah. It had larger field forces, deployed in battalion and larger formations. It was fighting for its political life, and consisted of personnel (largely Palestinian refugees) who had strong ideological motivations to fight Israel.

Its battlefield performance, however, was much worse. In fairness, it faced a much larger IDF force. However, the variation had much more to do (I think) with differences in leadership, command and control, training, and political-organizational (rather than religious-ethnic) cultures.

(Actually, we have a PhD student doing a thesis on this very comparison.. wait a few years and you may be able to buy the book!)

Again, I'm not suggesting that culture is irrelevant--I think its quite important. I do think that the right mix of other factors, however, can have dramatic effects on combat effectiveness.

Umm, what was the original thread? *lol*