Israel's beefed-up Leviathan capacity after Lebanon '06 bought them a non-fight from Hamas in 2009

MIDDLE EAST: "Lopsided Battle: Israel anticipated a stronger fight from Hamas in the Gaza war, the military says," by Howard Schneider, Washington Post National Weekly Edition, 13-19 April 2009.

We are told that Israel's turn to small-wars thinking in previous years accounted for its poor performance in Lebanon in 2006, as Hizbollah proved fairly potent. So we are encouraged to learn this lesson: SysAdmin stuff ruins your Leviathan.

So Israel retooled and came into the Gaza with guns blazing, routinely bulldozing houses just to be sure no threats remained. In short, focus this time was totally on making sure every Israeli soldier got home, so little care for the locals. Indeed, the purpose of the visit was to inflict maximum damage--a war on the people in addition to Hamas.

So what did Israel get for its rejection of the COIN/SysAdmin/small wars strategy?

Hamas simply refused to fight:

Interviews with Israeli officers and soldiers who took part in the assault, along with a review of IDF information released during the war, indicate that Hamas fights did not significantly challenge the assault and that gunmen who did used tactics and weapons that were largely ineffective.

In short, Hamas wasted some fodder but kept back its talent and best weapons, like Iranian-supplied antitank weapons.

So Hamas takes its beating , and Gaza becomes that much more damaged. This is the Israeli version of the Powell Doctrine: come in heavy, destroy all, focus on low casualties (for yourself) and don't spend a minute worrying about how many locals you kill or what enmity you leave behind.

I see good things coming out of this effort, all right. I see a Gaza with more opportunity for its people.

It make take an entire village to raise a child, but it only takes one tank to raze an entire village.

Yes, yes, we should take many lessons from Israel's improved Leviathan approach.

Comments

[jason]

Another interesting take on the Gaza incursion:

http://thomaspmbarnett.com/weblog/2009/01/what_rockets_wrought.html

[Stuart]

The unsatisfied Israeli leviathan is the cause of Israel’s crisis of confidence potentially escalating into truculent violence, and further deterioration of the situation in the region.

Israel is looking for a fight and it is what they do next post-Gaza, to give themselves a sense of victory and supremacy that will be of import

[Tom Barnett]

Two different subjects Jason. In the first post, I state that I understand Israel's motivations.

In the second, I'm talking tactics and impact, and what each logically says to the United States.

You have to be able to separate the two (decision to go to war, how it's waged).

Feeling righteous isn't the same as waging war intelligently.