According to the final report released this week by the government-appointed Winograd Commission, Israel’s 2006 war against Hezbollah consisted of little but failures. For this Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was to blame, Defense Minister Amir Peretz was to blame, the Israeli military was to blame, everybody was to blame — and since the commission’s members declined to name names, nobody was to blame.
Much of this criticism is well taken. The war was indeed marked by a long series of failures. Failures in planning, failures in intelligence and counterintelligence, failures in command, failures in mobilization, failures in execution, failures in logistics, failures in properly protecting the rear, and perhaps a failure to terminate hostilities earlier and at the cost of fewer Israeli casualties.
And failure has already come at a price, at least for some. From Peretz through the military’s chief of staff, General Dan Halutz, and commander of the Northern front, Udi Adam, all the way down to several division and even brigade commanders, those responsible have either been fired or resigned on their own initiative.
That the Winograd Commission should point out failures is not surprising; after all, that was the mandate it was given. What is surprising, however, is the commission’s own failure — and that of the overwhelming majority of Israelis — to take into account the following facts.
For 20 years after the War of Independence in 1948, Israel’s border with Lebanon was almost entirely quiet. Trouble started in 1968; from then on, apart from one period in 1981-1982, hardly a week went by without incident.
Rockets were fired, mines laid, ambushes set, hostages taken and many kinds of terrorist acts launched. In response, Israel bombed and raided. In 1982, not even a major Israeli invasion that led to the occupation of Beirut and the eviction from Lebanon of the Palestine Liberation Organization was able to restore calm.
It was only in May 2000, 32 years after the violence started, that things calmed down somewhat. Still, a major incident involving sniping, rocket fire, artillery fire or attempts to kidnap Israeli soldiers continued to take place on average every three or four months. It was in response to just one such incident that Olmert, with almost the entire Knesset as well as public opinion behind him, launched the 2006 offensive with which his name will always be associated.
It is true that the offensive did not go nearly as well as it should have, and that it brought to light numerous deficiencies in the Israeli military. However, it is also true that Hezbollah, judging by its leader’s repeated statements, was shocked by the violence of Israel’s reaction. What’s more, Syria and Iran, instead of coming to Hezbollah’s aid, did no more than replenish its weapon supply.
Meanwhile, the international community, instead of reining in Israel as it had done so often in the past, gave Olmert almost all the leeway he needed. By the time the guns fell silent, hundreds of Hezbollah fighters had been killed. The organization had been thrown out of southern Lebanon, and to make sure it would not return, a fairly robust United Nations peacekeeping force was put into place.
At least for the time being, Hezbollah appears to have had the fight knocked out of it. For well over a year now, Israel’s border with Lebanon has been almost totally quiet — by far the longest period of peace in four decades. This was something that neither Golda Meir, nor Yitzhak Rabin in his two terms as prime minister, nor Menahem Begin, nor Shimon Peres, nor Yitzhak Shamir, nor Benjamin Netanyahu, nor Ehud Barak, nor even the formidable Ariel Sharon, was able to achieve.
Given the numerous military shortcomings that the war revealed, the lion’s share of the credit belongs to Olmert. His performance may not have been perfect, but what performance ever is?
It was Olmert who decided that enough was enough and that force had to be used to end Hezbollah’s antics. It was also Olmert who, in spite of all the difficulties and in the face of numerous Israeli casualties, persisted until there was nothing more to be gained. For all this he ought to be commended, not condemned.
Whether the Israeli public and political system will, in fact, take this view remains to be seen. The key player is Ehud Barak, the defense minister and leader of the Labor Party. Should he want to, he could bring down the government, either opening a succession struggle within the ruling Kadima Party or forcing new elections.
Either way, the result would almost certainly be to bring Likud back to power; hence it is doubtful whether such a move would benefit either Israel, or the Labor Party, or Barak personally. Moreover, a recent poll among Barak’s own party members shows that most of them want the present government to stay.
Not only was the premise that led to the establishment of the Winograd Commission — namely, that the war was a failure — wrong, but the commission took a very long time to conclude its deliberations. When it finally did so, many of its recommendations had been overtaken by the fact that the main culprits were gone and that Israeli military, having completed its own inquiry, was working very hard to correct its shortcomings.
Thus there is a good chance that the commission’s final report will prove a blow in the air. Everything considered, it is probably better that way.
Martin van Creveld, a former professor of military history at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, is the author of “The Changing Face of War: Lessons of Combat, From the Marne to Iraq” (Presidio Press, 2007).
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Since very serious failures were found by the Winograd report and no names were appointed, this tells that even M. Winograd is part of the powerful Israeli nomenklatura. Who is not from the team is ousted, they removed Katsav in order to put in his place "il cappo di tutti il cappi".
Israel's 2006 war in Lebanon should never have happened!
Truth be told, what, I ask, was accomplished? UNIFIL and the LAF, are acting as covers for Hezbollah, which has 20,000 rockets (many more lethal than those fired into Israel), and a base of operations north of the Litani. In effect, UNIFIL is guarding Hezbollah, FROM any further Israel attacks, while Hez rearms, and reinforces it's defenses. Look, over 150 Israeli died..to rescue 2 solders...that's the same as over 7,500 US forces fighting in Iraq (in less than 32 days). You do the multipying. It's obvious that Israel's problem is political..and stagnation in the army's preparedness to battle a quasi military force (Hez). Another week would have insured an Israeli defeat of Hez, the killing or capture of it's top leaders..and freeing the rest of Lebanon from Syrian influence and control (which it still retains). Bombing Beirut didn't accomplish much of anything..but enhanced the Arab view of Israeli war crimes (clusters and all that). Whether Olmert should resign or be replaced is another matter. The jury is still out in Iraq..Iran is making nukes..Al Qaeda is re-emerging in Afghanistan..should the entire (US) gov't quit?
So "Iran is making nukes", is it Dave? What do you know that 16 American security and intelligence agencies don't? Creveld does not take into account the prestige Hezbollah has won, in and beyond Lebanon. In the popular imagination of the Middle East Muslim street, it thwarted the IDF more devastatingly than all the conventional Arab armed forces since 1948; and afterwards it patched up the battlefield and succoured the people where the paralytic, corrupt, unrepr4sentative Lebanon government failed, as its army had failed to resist the southern incursion. Israel's victory was pyrrhic, Hezbollah's the opposite. It can well afford to lose a few hundred foot soldiers and see a wobbly UN peacekeeeping force installed on the border: it is now poised to become the dominant political force in Lebanon, still aided by a similarly defiant Iran.
Anyone who believes that the demilitarised space between Lebanon and Israel is "quiet" is in serious need of a reality check. The airspace of south Lebanon is violated numerous times. Also a giant omission was the fact that the IDF refuses to give the UN any co-ordinates of cluster bombs that littered the "quiet" zone that van Creveld boasts about, which not only the Winograd condemned, but also the international community. But I suppose pro-Israel supporters can construe any failed activity into a positive, one way or another.
"... pro-Israel supporters can construe any failed activity into a positive, one way or another." and no matter what happens, israel-bashers blame israel, even though it was started by hezbollah, and hezbollah impersonated unifil troops, used civilians (including children) as human shields, deliberately targeted israeli civilians, and faked news reports of "atrocities". and of course we have every reason to believe nasrallah's view of events, even though he hasn't been caught telling the truth yet.
Creveld is part and parcel of the military-political industrial complex that rules Israel. Of course he would see positives in the war against Lebanon he cannot bite the hand that feeds him. Claiming that Hizballah leadership's surprise at the disproportionality of Israel's response to a routine border skirmish as evidence of the war's success is at best naive, and at worst terroristic. Is he exhorting other Israeli leaders to use extreme force in retaliation ? Is using extreme force a guarantee of success however defined? Additionally, the fact that Hizballah stood "alone" and taught Israelis both soldiers and civilians the taste for war's horrific consequences ( when it was the that Lebanese that always suffered before) is a major evidence of Israel's failure in this war. Hizballah did all that alone, which adds to Israel's failure beacuse to taught Israel the lesson was a small Lebanese party with a militia. Claiming it an israeli success simply because Iran and or Syria did not help them directly is ridiculous BS rants from a supposedly expert in military strategy. For those of us who abhor Israeli inhumane policies, we are not surprised to see experts like Creveld opining and giving advice to the israeli military establishment. However, it clearly shows the bankruptcy of the Zionist project because of its incessant anti peace drive, relying totally and only on militaristic solutions, in concept and in practice. Time to change the mindset if peace is ever an objective.