Volume 5, No. 3 - September 2001
Volume 5, No. 3 - September 2001
By David Rodman
Editor's
Summary: Throughout
its history, Israel has faced acute challenges to its national security. Despite
this condition, it has never officially articulated all the elements of its
national security doctrine. Yet Israel's response to these challenges has not
been haphazard. A set of basic security concepts has informed the state's
conduct with respect to low-intensity conflict, full-scale conflict, and weapons
of mass destruction warfare. The “operationalization” of some of these concepts
has been remarkably stable over time, while it has evolved markedly in others to
take account of the state's changing internal and external circumstances.
No
state in the post-Second World War era has been more concerned with its national
security than Israel--and it is not hard to fathom why. In the first half
century of its existence, it fought six full-scale wars with its Arab neighbors:
the 1948-49 War of Independence; the 1956 Sinai Campaign; the 1967 war; the
1969-70 War of Attrition; the 1973 war; and the 1982 Lebanon war. Israel, in
other words, averaged more than one full-scale war per decade in its first five
decades of life. Additionally, it participated at least passively in the 1991
Gulf War, when Iraq repeatedly bombarded its territory with ballistic missiles,
and may have participated actively in searching out and destroying these
missiles in western Iraq.(1) Furthermore, despite Israel's formal peace treaties
with Egypt and Jordan as well as its present uncontested superiority in the
realm of conventional warfare, the threat of future full-scale Arab-Israeli wars
remains a real one.
Israel's
national security dilemma, however, has extended--and still extends--far beyond
the conventional battlefield. At the low end of the unconventional warfare
spectrum, Israel has been subjected to almost continuous violence in the form of
terrorism and guerrilla warfare (mainly Palestinian and Lebanese, but often
sponsored by Arab states and Iran), insurrection (primarily Palestinian), and
border skirmishing (along its frontiers with Egypt, Jordan, Syria, and Lebanon).
At
the high end of the unconventional warfare spectrum, Israel has faced the
prospect of chemical warfare since the early 1960s, following Egypt's use of
poison gas in Yemen, but most ominously during the Gulf War. Nuclear and
biological warfare emerged as genuine threats in the late 1970s and early 1980s.
So seriously did Israel take the threat of nuclear warfare in the early 1980s
that it sent the Israel Air Force (IAF) to destroy Iraq's Osirak nuclear
facility in spring 1981.(2)
The
lack of a formal national security doctrine notwithstanding, the combined
effects of the state's environment and experiences convinced Israeli defense
planners to formulate a set of basic security concepts.(3) On the one hand,
these concepts have been Israel's response to the geographic, diplomatic, and
resource environment in which it has had to survive. On the other hand, they
have also been shaped by the state's experiences in both wartime and
peacetime.
Developed
at various points in time, and not integrated into a set of closely linked
propositions that could be called a systematic and coherent "theory" of national
security, these concepts have nevertheless clearly driven Israeli thinking and
conduct over the course of the state's existence. They can be organized, in no
particular order, under eight distinct headings: geography; manpower; quantity
versus quality; offensive maneuver warfare; deterrence; conventional versus
unconventional threats; self-reliance; and great power patronage. The aim of
this article is to describe and analyze these concepts from a historical
perspective--that is, to trace their evolution and to consider their salience to
Israel's national security over the years.
But
a couple of caveats must be stressed up front. First, as suggested by the labels
of the headings, this article defines national security in a rather narrow
sense. A state's national security doctrine, in its broadest sense, encompasses
the totality of those military, diplomatic, economic, and social policies that
are explicitly intended to protect and promote the state's national security
interests. For the purpose of this article, however, the concept of national
security is restricted essentially to the domain of national defense. This
article, to put it differently, focuses chiefly on Israel's military doctrine.
Second, despite the restricted scope of its inquiry, this article cannot claim
to offer a comprehensive review of this doctrine. It can claim only to examine,
more modestly, the basic concepts that have constituted the core of the
doctrine.
GEOGRAPHY
Historically,
Israel's military doctrine has been heavily influenced by its geographical
situation. Though it had been victorious in the 1948-1949 War of Independence,
acquiring considerably more territory than had originally been allotted to it
under the 1947 United Nations Partition Resolution, Israel nevertheless emerged
from the war with troublesome borders. Very long and largely flat on the Israeli
side, they could not be adequately defended, as demonstrated by the routine ease
with which even inexperienced Arab infiltrators crossed into Israel's territory
during the early years of statehood. Moreover, Israel had no strategic depth.
The state's width varied from just a few miles at its narrowest to just a few
score miles at its widest. All of its major population centers, industrial
assets, and military facilities were potentially within easy reach of Arab
armies.
This
geographical situation early on led Israeli defense planners to the conclusion
that Israel could not afford to "host" either a full-scale war or a sustained
low-intensity campaign on its territory. A sustained low-intensity campaign,
they reasoned, would inevitably result in substantial damage to Israeli society,
while a full-scale war could undermine the very survival of the state. This
thinking gave birth to the concept that fighting must be transferred to Arab
territory to the greatest possible extent, certainly in the case of a full-scale
war.
This
concept, in turn, had profound implications for Israel Defense Forces (IDF)
operational and tactical principles (to be discussed under the heading of
Offensive Maneuver Warfare). Suffice it here to say that, with respect to
full-scale war, Israel's territorial situation from 1949 to 1967 forms part of
the explanation for its emphasis on preventive and preemptive war during these
years. Unlike many other states, which have either borders that make it possible
for them to prevent attacking armies from penetrating into their interiors
(e.g., Switzerland) or the territorial depth for their own armies to fall back,
regroup, and drive attacking armies out of their interiors (e.g., Russia),
Israel inside its pre-1967 borders possessed neither of these luxuries. Hence,
it fought a preventive war in 1956 and a preemptive war in 1967.(4)
With
respect to low-intensity conflict, Israel's geographical situation from 1949 to
1967 prompted its emphasis on retaliation. Because the IDF had neither the
manpower nor the material resources to seal the state's borders against armed
infiltrators, Israeli defense planners concluded that Israel required the
"cooperation" of the surrounding Arab states to bring peace to its borders.
Israel, therefore, attempted to compel the Arab states to stem infiltration by
imposing costs on their societies and armies through retaliatory raids.
The
outcome of the 1967 War radically altered the territorial status quo in the
Arab-Israeli conflict. Not only had Israel thoroughly smashed the Egyptian,
Jordanian, and Syrian armies, but it had also captured significant chunks of
Egyptian, Jordanian, and Syrian territory. It conquered the Sinai and the Gaza
Strip from Egypt, the West Bank from Jordan, and the Golan Heights from Syria.
These territorial acquisitions provided Israel with some strategic depth. Its
major population centers, industrial assets, and military facilities no longer
remained within easy reach of either Arab armies or irregular forces.
Furthermore, despite the extent of its territorial acquisitions, Israel now had
defensible borders. Not only did these borders follow militarily impressive
topographical obstacles, like the Suez Canal and Jordan River, and incorporate
militarily significant high ground, like the Judean and Samarian highlands, but
the length of the borders themselves had been shortened.
While
the post-1967 War territorial status quo did not have a great impact on the
IDF's operational and tactical principles, it nevertheless did affect Israel's
military doctrine. Two of the three full-scale wars that Israel has fought in
the post-1967 era have been initiated by the Arabs, while Israel initiated two
of the three wars fought in the pre-1967 era. Indeed, the lone Israeli-initiated
war since the 1967 War occurred across the only border--the border with
Lebanon--where Israel lacked strategic depth, the only border where its citizens
were routinely exposed to terrorist incursions and rocket attacks.(5) Israel's
decisions to initiate (or to refrain from initiating) war, to be sure, have
never been made solely on the basis of military considerations; however, it does
seem that the acquisition of defensible borders and strategic depth in the
post-1967 era has curbed, to a certain extent, Israel's propensity to engage in
preventive and preemptive war.
Israel's
approach to low-intensity conflict, on the other hand, does not seem to have
changed noticeably as a consequence of shifting borders, since retaliation as a
means of influencing enemy conduct has remained a central tool for dealing with
low-intensity conflict in the post-1967 era. And, with regard to the
proliferation of nuclear, biological, and chemical warfare threats to Israel
over the past quarter century, strategic depth and defensible borders do not
appear to have made any tangible difference to the state's national
security.
The
primary contribution of the post-1967 borders to Israel's national security,
then, is that they have insulated the state against a catastrophic reversal in a
full-scale conventional war. In the 1973 War, the depth and defensibility
provided by the Sinai and Golan Heights gave the IDF the room and the time that
it needed to recover from its early surprise and setbacks. But control of the
Sinai, the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, and the Golan Heights have also created
problems of their own. For starters, Israel's conquest of the Sinai and Golan
Heights served as the basis of Arab decisions to initiate both the War of
Attrition and the 1973 war.(6) Furthermore, mass Palestinian violence from the
late 1980s to the present, as well as guerrilla warfare and terrorism in the
South Lebanon security zone from 1985 to 2000, has called into question the
degree of strategic advantage derived by dominating territory that contains a
hostile population.
Consequently,
Israeli national security doctrine has steadily moved in the direction of
exchanging territory for formal peace treaties (e.g., with Egypt and Jordan) or
informal understandings (e.g., with Lebanon) that are accompanied by acceptable
security guarantees, including international monitoring, demilitarized zones,
early warning stations, bilateral security coordination, and so forth. The
decreased emphasis on control of territory as a national security asset also
means that, should Israel fight a full-scale war in the future, its aims are
unlikely to include territorial conquest, at least long-term conquest. Rather,
the IDF is likely to focus on the destruction of Arab military forces and,
perhaps, on the destruction of the economic and political infrastructures of
Arab states as a more effective method of ensuring Israel's national
security.
MANPOWER
In
1948, Israel had a Jewish population of 600,000-650,000 people. Collectively,
the surrounding Arab states had a population that numbered into the many
millions. From a military perspective, this extreme demographic imbalance, which
even mass Jewish immigration to Israel would not be able to redress, meant that
the Arab world could maintain sizable professional armies. Israel could not hope
to do so, for an attempt to maintain a sizable professional army of its own
would drastically inhibit the state's ability to build a healthy
economy.(7)
Israeli
defense planners overcame this demographic obstacle by opting to turn the IDF
into a militia-like army in the wake of the War of Independence. During
peacetime (i.e., in the absence of full-scale war), the IDF would consist of a
small number of professional soldiers, supplemented by a larger pool of
conscripts doing their mandatory military service. These professionals and
conscripts would be joined by a limited number of reservists, each of whom would
be liable for one to several months of military service annually, depending on
his or her specialty.(8) Unless he or she joined up as a professional soldier,
each Israeli who had been drafted into the IDF would become a reservist after
the completion of his or her mandatory service. Indeed, Israelis once fondly
quipped that they were a nation of soldiers on leave for 11 months of the year.
The number of soldiers in the peacetime IDF, therefore, would be kept to a
minimum so as not to disrupt the state's economic progress.
The
forces of the peacetime IDF have had two basic functions. First, they have been
in charge of Israel's day-to-day security. Responsibility for day-to-day
security, in the main, has meant dealing with low-intensity conflict, whether
border skirmishing with an Arab army, counterinsurgency tasks against a
terrorist organization, or mob insurrection. Second, they have had to prepare
for full-scale war. To this end, they have had to make sure that reserve units,
which have always formed the bulk of the IDF's warfighting potential, could be
quickly and smoothly organized and deployed for battle. Maintaining an efficient
mobilization system has been crucial to this endeavor. War readiness has also
entailed such tasks as training conscripts and reservists, maintaining equipment
in usable condition, and updating operational and tactical plans.
By
and large, a militia-like IDF has served Israel's national security well. Not
only has the IDF done an admirable job of protecting the state in both
low-intensity conflicts and full-scale wars, but it has also done so without
causing long-term economic disruption. Nevertheless, this elegant solution to
Israel's manpower problem has carried with it a military and diplomatic price
tag. Militarily speaking, the IDF experienced a near disaster at the outset of
the 1973 war, because its standing forces were too small to cope effectively
with the Egyptian and Syrian surprise attack. Diplomatically speaking, once
mobilized for war, the IDF must be either demobilized or unleashed in short
order. Israel's economy simply cannot survive an indefinite mobilization,
waiting for the often slow wheels of diplomacy to turn. Jerusalem, then, has
never had the luxury of time in a crisis.
While
Israel still remains strongly committed to a militia-like IDF, signs of change
in this regard have been in the air since at least the early 1990s. Senior
officers have frequently voiced the opinion that they would like to see the IDF
become a "slimmer and smarter" organization. The precise meaning of this term
with respect to future manpower requirements is not clear, but it seems to
indicate a desire to rely more on professional soldiers and less on conscripts
and reservists.(9)
Two
major reasons account for the preference for a more professional army. First, as
a consequence of both natural growth and mass immigration, Israel's Jewish
population has passed the five million mark. The state, according to many
officers, now has a surfeit of military manpower, suggesting that the IDF may
eventually be able to do without mass conscription.(10) Second, as warfare has
become an increasingly high-technology affair, it has also become more difficult
for part-time soldiers to operate and maintain state-of-the-art hardware and
software. Several branches of the IDF, particularly the air force, the navy, and
military intelligence, though they retain significant reservist elements, have
long relied principally on professional soldiers, precisely because of the
ultra-sophisticated nature of the hardware and software with which they fight.
Likewise, the IDF's special operations units are more professional than in the
past, reflecting the more demanding and politically delicate role that they now
play in Israel's defense.
The
IDF, unquestionably, is going to retain and rely upon a large cadre of
reservists for the foreseeable future--it would still need them if a full-scale
war were to erupt.(11) But, as high technology "force multipliers," including
advanced electronic systems and precision-guided munitions (PGMs), continue to
proliferate on the battlefield, the reservist component of the IDF is likely to
shrink as conscription becomes somewhat more selective and as more professional
soldiers join the ranks.
QUANTITY
VERSUS QUALITY
The
Arab-Israeli conflict has traditionally been characterized by an imbalance of
military resources, certainly in the realm of conventional warfare. Simply put,
Israel has had--and will continue to have--fewer soldiers and arms than the Arab
world. In response to its quantitative inferiority, the IDF has consistently
sought to achieve qualitative superiority with regard to both soldiers and
arms.
Israeli
manpower has always been more physically fit, more highly educated, and more
strongly motivated than its Arab counterparts. Israeli defense planners, who
recognized this fact from day one, have consistently sought to cultivate
Israel's manpower asset.(12) The IDF has capitalized on this superiority in
several ways. First, the IDF has always been known for its very rigorous and
realistic training, particularly of combat troops. The training of pilots in the
IAF, to cite just one example, is known to be more demanding than the training
of pilots in any other air force in the world, not to mention any Arab air
force. Second, the IDF has always placed great emphasis on the careful selection
and training of combat officers. The meticulousness of the selection process and
training of these officers probably exceeds that of any other army in the world.
Third, the IDF early on adopted a mode of warfare at the operational and
tactical levels (to be discussed under the heading of Offensive Maneuver
Warfare) specifically intended to maximize its manpower advantage.
Arms
superiority, on the other hand, is a more recent phenomenon. The
ultra-sophisticated arms with which the IDF is currently equipped frequently
obscures the fact that, before the 1967 War, Israeli arms were generally not
superior to--and were often inferior to--those in Arab hands. While the Arabs
received rather up-to-date Soviet arms, Israel usually had to make do with
secondhand Western weapons. Only in the quality of its air force, tank, and
intelligence units could the IDF's arsenal really be said to match that of the
Arab states in qualitative terms. The IDF achieved technological superiority in
the air only after the 1967 War, when the United States began to supply the IAF
with America's frontline combat aircraft. Similarly, the IDF gained
technological superiority on the water only after the 1967 War, when the Israel
Navy (IN) incorporated the then novel fast missile boat, equipped with an
indigenously developed ship-to-ship missile, into its order of battle. In the
realm of land warfare, technological superiority would only be achieved in the
wake of the 1973 War, largely through local production of arms (to be discussed
under the heading of Self-Reliance).
The
result of Israel's persistent quest to achieve and maintain qualitative
superiority in manpower and arms has been readily evident on the battlefield.
Despite suffering reverses in both full-scale wars and low-intensity conflicts,
the IDF has never been bested by any Arab military force. It has been the
undisputed battlefield victor in every full-scale war, with the exception of the
War of Attrition, which ended in a stalemate along the Suez Canal.(13) It has
also performed well in defending Israel during periods of low-intensity
conflict, even though it has never been able to deliver knock-out blows to Arab
terrorist organizations or mobs.
Today,
the IDF remains absolutely committed to the concept of qualitative superiority
in manpower and arms. Arguments to the effect that the quality of its soldiers
has declined over recent decades notwithstanding, the IDF's manpower is as well
prepared for war as ever.(14) Technologically speaking, the IDF is perhaps more
committed than ever to the idea of maintaining its "qualitative edge" over Arab
armies. This emphasis on quality, however, should not conceal the fact that the
IDF's attitude toward quantity changed after the 1973 War. Its traumatic
experience in that war, especially during the early days, when it incurred heavy
losses in men and machines, convinced the IDF that "quantity has a quality all
its own." Over the past quarter-century, the IDF has grown significantly in
size, to the point where its arsenal now contains approximately 800 combat
aircraft, 4,000 tanks, and 2,000 artillery pieces.(15) These figures make its
arsenal among the largest in the world. Still, the commitment to a slimmer and
smarter IDF should lead to a reduction in the quantity of arms over time.
OFFENSIVE
MANEUVER WARFARE
It
may seem paradoxical that Israel, a state that has never deliberately sought to
expand its territory at the expense of its Arab neighbors has been committed to
offensive maneuver warfare.(16) But the IDF's embrace of this type of warfare at
the operational and tactical levels has been quite sensible.(17) To understand
why, it is necessary to see that territorial, economic, manpower, diplomatic,
and quantitative versus qualitative considerations have all blended together to
favor this kind of warfare.(18)
Not
only has Israel sought to wage wars on Arab territory for the aforementioned
reasons (discussed under the heading of Geography), but it has also sought to
wage short wars. Israel's preference for short wars, like its preference for
wars on Arab territory, is not hard to fathom. Short wars, needless to say,
cause less economic disruption than long wars. Since the Israeli economy has
been particularly sensitive to the dislocating effects of war, Jerusalem has had
a powerful incentive to terminate wars as quickly as possible. Moreover, the
Jewish people's tragic past and Israel's small population have provided an
equally powerful incentive to end wars quickly so as to keep their human costs
to a minimum. Finally, Jerusalem has reasoned that terminating wars sooner
rather than later reduces the prospect of foreign military and diplomatic
intervention on behalf of the Arab world.
Not
only has offensive maneuver warfare offered an elegant solution to Israel's
territorial, economic, human, and diplomatic difficulties, but it has also
played to the IDF's military strength vis-à-vis Arab armies. This type of
warfare, after all, puts a premium on quality. Based as it is on rapid movement,
offensive maneuver warfare advantages the combatant whose forces are better
trained, better motivated, and better led. Numbers, on the other hand, have much
less of an impact on the outcome of this type of warfare than on the outcome of
attrition warfare.
The
IDF's actual battlefield experience has repeatedly reinforced its commitment to
offensive maneuver warfare.(19) During the final stage of the War of
Independence, the IDF routed the Egyptian army, driving it out of the Negev, in
an offensive maneuver campaign. In its early years, therefore, the IDF built
itself around mechanized infantry units of the kind that had defeated the
Egyptian army. In the 1956 Sinai Campaign, during which Israeli forces again
routed the Egyptian army, capturing the whole of the Sinai in a few days, the
IDF's air and tank units played a conspicuously impressive part. Thus, after the
war, offensive maneuver warfare in the IDF became synonymous with the primacy of
aircraft and tanks.
The
spectacular victories of its air and armored units in the 1967 War simply
reinforced the IDF's commitment to offensive maneuver warfare at the operational
and tactical levels. Israel's acquisition of defensible borders and strategic
depth in this war did little to temper the IDF's resolute focus on offensive
maneuver warfare.(20) Nor did the reverses suffered by its air and tank forces
at the hands of Arab anti-aircraft and anti-tank weapons in the opening days of
the 1973 War undermine the IDF's fundamental devotion to this type of
warfare.
To
the present day, the IDF continues to advocate strongly offensive maneuver
warfare; however, it has modified its operational and tactical models in the
aftermath of the 1973 War. One of the more significant changes involves the
shift to a more balanced mix of forces--that is, giving previously neglected
branches of the army, especially artillery, infantry, and engineers, a more
prominent role in the IDF's operational and tactical designs. Another of the
more significant changes involves a considerably greater reliance on firepower
to accomplish military objectives than in the past. Signs of a new emphasis on
firepower became unmistakable by the outbreak of the 1982 Lebanon War.(21) But
only in the 1990s did the IDF really begin to acknowledge explicitly (though
rather quietly) that mobility alone may no longer represent an ideal solution on
the modern Middle Eastern battlefield.
In
light of the "saturated" nature of this battlefield, where room for maneuver has
been degraded by the vast numbers of weapons in Middle Eastern arsenals, the
next war--if there would be one--may well see the IDF defer offensive maneuver
warfare until it has undertaken a brief but very intensive preparatory bombing
campaign, using short- and long-range air-, sea-, and ground-launched PGMs,
against Arab military, political, and industrial targets. Regardless of who
began the war, the IDF might first seek to weaken its opponent to such an extent
that an offensive maneuver warfare campaign could be carried out at low cost to
itself. If called upon to fight in the future, in other words, the IDF may try
to re-fight the Gulf War. It has certainly equipped itself to do so (see the
discussion under the heading of Self-Reliance).
DETERRENCE
Like
most states, Israel has aspired to defend its national security interests
through peaceful means. It has sought, to put it differently, to deter its Arab
opponents rather than to fight them. To this end, it has employed both general
and specific deterrence.(22) Furthermore, it has practiced deterrence in the
realms of both conventional and unconventional warfare.
Historically,
Israeli deterrence has focused most heavily on the prevention of full-scale
conventional war. Israel's general deterrent posture has been built around the
concept of projecting an image of overpowering strength. Jerusalem has been fond
of saying that, although Arab states can choose to start a war, Israel will
determine the scope and intensity of any war. This refrain has manifestly been
meant to communicate to the Arab world the message that it should not initiate
war, because Israel will inflict such a defeat on it that the costs of going to
war will outweigh any benefits of doing so. Israel's specific deterrent posture,
on the other hand, has been fashioned around the concept of laying down explicit
"red lines" that, if crossed, would draw a firm military response.
Jerusalem
has long made it known, to cite one instance, that the movement of any foreign
army into Jordan would be cause for war--an idea, incidentally, that now has
legal sanction as a consequence of being incorporated into the 1994 peace treaty
between Israel and Jordan. Jerusalem has also long made it known, to cite
another instance, that a maritime blockade of its sea lanes would trigger war.
Indeed, the Arab violation of both of these red lines in 1967 explains in part
Jerusalem's decision to launch a preemptive war.
In
contrast to its deterrent posture in regard to conventional war, Israel's
deterrent posture in regard to low-intensity conflict as well as in regard to
weapons of mass destruction warfare has been less clearly formulated. Perhaps
the concept of "massive retaliation" captures best Israel's deterrent posture in
the area of unconventional warfare. To deter low-intensity conflict, Jerusalem
has consistently promised to retaliate disproportionately against terrorist
organizations. To deter the use of weapons of mass destruction, Jerusalem has
essentially promised to do the same to any state employing such arms against
Israel.(23) To make its threat of retaliation more credible here, Jerusalem has
slowly but surely made its capability to wage nuclear warfare more
"transparent."
Israel's
violence-filled history would suggest, at first glance, that its deterrent
posture has not deterred its Arab opponents. Evidence exists to support this
contention. Israeli deterrence, after all, failed before the 1967, 1969-1970,
1973, 1982, and 1991 wars. Furthermore, Israeli deterrence of low-intensity
conflict, which has included the execution of prior threats of massive
retaliation, has not provided a long-term cure for this seemingly chronic
irritant. Yet, the claim that Israel's deterrence has been a mirage is too
simplistic. Since it is possible only to discern when deterrence fails--but
never when it succeeds--Israel's deterrent posture can easily be made to look
like a grand failure.
But,
when the fact that neither Arab states nor terrorist organizations have ever
expressed any compunctions about using whatever violence is necessary to advance
their exterminatory agenda is taken into account, Israel's deterrence record
begins to look rather better. Though Iraq, for example, was not deterred from
firing ballistic missiles at Israel during the Gulf War, it did not arm these
missiles with biological or chemical warheads, despite a capacity to do so.
Israel's threat of nuclear retaliation, it may safely be assumed (even if it
cannot be proven), deterred Iraq from using weapons of mass destruction. Whether
its overall record is judged a success or a failure, however, Israel's deterrent
posture is unlikely to change fundamentally any time soon.
CONVENTIONAL
VERSUS UNCONVENTIONAL THREATS
Israel
has been plagued by the threat of both low-intensity conflict and full-scale war
throughout its entire history. It has also faced the threat of weapons of mass
destruction warfare for much of its lifetime. Nevertheless, the relative impact
of these threats on Israel's national security doctrine has changed
significantly over time. The most useful distinction to make in this connection
is between the pre- and post-1973 War eras.
In
the pre-1973 War period, Israel's national security doctrine focused
overwhelmingly on the threat of full-scale war. Israeli defense planners, to be
sure, recognized that low-intensity conflict in the form of border skirmishes
with Arab states and Palestinian terrorism constituted a chronic threat, one
which the IDF had to be prepared to counter. Given Egypt's stock of chemical
weapons, they also took the threat of weapons of mass destruction warfare
seriously enough in the early 1960s to launch a sabotage campaign against
Cairo's efforts to build ballistic missiles.(24) Still, contrary to the threat
posed by conventional war, they did not view either of these threats as
representing genuine dangers to Israel's survival.
The
allocation of the state's defense resources in the pre-1973 War period proves
that Israeli defense planners viewed full-scale war as the gravest threat to
Israel during these years. True, a small proportion were invested in "perimeter
defense," in the form of border outposts, border patrols, anti-terrorist units,
and minefields. And, true, a small proportion of defense resources were invested
in the development of nuclear arms (as a "weapon of last resort") and to
equipping the IDF with anti-chemical warfare gear. But most resources were
invested in the means necessary to wage conventional (offensive maneuver)
warfare--that is, aircraft, tanks, armored vehicles, artillery, and so on.
In
the post-1973 war era, Israeli defense planners have continued to view
conventional war as the principal threat to the state's survival. That the IDF
currently maintains no less than 12 armored divisions and 4 mechanized divisions
is eloquent testimony to this fact.(25) Since the 1973 War, however,
low-intensity conflict and weapons of mass destruction warfare have come to be
seen as much more serious threats to the state's welfare than in the past.(26)
The former's upgraded status initially grew out of the Palestinian intifada of
1987-93 and the rise of Hizballah in the 1990s. The latter's upgraded status
derives from the proliferation of ballistic missiles and weapons of mass
destruction throughout the Middle East over the past two decades.
The
rise of unconventional warfare threats at both ends of the violence spectrum has
been reflected in Israel's defense resource allocations since the 1973 War.
While the state continues to invest the bulk of its resources in preparations
for conventional war, more and more resources have been sunk into preparations
for unconventional warfare, particularly from the 1980s onward. With the
outbreak of the intifada in the late 1980s, the IDF created special operations
units specifically dedicated to low-intensity conflict tasks.(27) It formed
Sayeret Shimshon and Sayeret Duvdevan, for instance, for the sole purpose of
taking out Palestinian death squads and terrorist leaders. These mista'arvim (or
Arab-masquerader) units have recently seen action again in the intifada.
Likewise, the IDF formed Sayeret Egoz specifically to wage a counterinsurgency
battle against Hizballah.
Even
more impressive has been Israel's answer to the threat of weapons of mass
destruction warfare. To deter Arab states from using such weapons, Israel
appears to have acquired a large and diverse nuclear arsenal of its own.(28)
This arsenal reportedly incorporates--but may not be limited to--bombs that can
be dropped from aircraft, warheads that can be delivered by ballistic missiles,
and warheads that can be delivered from submarine-launched cruise missiles.(29)
Israel, in other words, now seems to possess a secure "second strike"
capability. With respect to active defense measures, the state has developed a
whole range of arms and intelligence-gathering systems to defeat weapons of mass
destruction (to be discussed, along with its ballistic and cruise missile
production, under the heading of Self-Reliance).
Moreover,
since the late 1990s, if news reports are credible, the IDF has talked about
building a "Strategic Command," consisting of intelligence, air force, and
special operations units, which would undertake missions far from Israel's
borders, to defend the state against weapons of mass destruction (and
international terrorism).(30) Finally, passive defense measures have not been
forgotten. The IDF created a Home Front Command after the Gulf War to help
Israel's population protect itself against weapons of mass destruction. The rise
of unconventional threats, in short, has made the IDF into a very different army
from the one that emerged from the 1973 War.
SELF-RELIANCE
Partly
in response to the anti-Semitic myth of the Jew as a cowardly weakling and
partly in response to the need to defend the local Jewish community against
hostile Arab elements, the pre-state Jewish community consistently put great
emphasis on self-reliance in military affairs. Armed Jews ready and able to use
force to protect their lives and property materialized at the outset of the
Zionist effort. This emphasis on self-reliance would be inherited by
Israel.
The
concept of self-reliance may be divided into three separate components:
self-reliance in manpower, self-reliance in training and doctrine, and
self-reliance in arms. On only three occasions has Israel utilized foreign
military manpower, and on only one of these occasions has this military manpower
proven to be of importance to the state's fortunes in war. The first--and
consequential--occasion occurred during the War of Independence, when Jewish and
non-Jewish volunteers, known collectively as Machal, served in the fledgling
IDF. These foreign volunteers made up a disproportionate percentage of the
soldiers in branches of the IDF requiring specialized technical skills, like the
air force and the navy. It may be an overstatement to argue that Machal members
had a decisive impact on the outcome of the war, but they certainly contributed
more than their fair share to Israel's victory.
The
second occasion occurred during the Sinai Campaign, when Jerusalem requested
that France station interceptor aircraft at IAF airfields to prevent Egyptian
bombers from hitting Israel's cities, while the third occasion occurred during
the Gulf War, when Jerusalem requested that American- and Dutch-manned Patriot
anti-aircraft missile batteries be dispatched to shoot down Iraqi ballistic
missiles aimed at Israel's cities. The French aircraft proved to be unnecessary,
as no Egyptian bombers appeared in Israeli skies, while the Patriot missile
batteries provided little more than psychological reassurance to the Israeli
public. In terms of manpower, then, Israel has achieved a tremendous degree of
self-reliance.
The
same applies in the case of training and doctrine. A few IDF officers have
studied abroad at Western military academies, and a few IDF soldiers have
trained abroad with Western armies, primarily in order to learn how to operate
new weapons systems. The IDF, however, has always justly prided itself on the
fact that, unlike the armies of most post-Second World War states, it has never
sought foreign guidance in the areas of training and doctrine. Everything that
the IDF knows about low-intensity conflict, everything that it knows about
full-scale war at the operational and tactical levels, and everything that it
knows about weapons of mass destruction warfare, it learned on its own, often
through trial and error.
Self-reliance
in arms is a more complex story, however. Israel has always had its own arms
industry. Indeed, the Jewish community manufactured a wide range of small arms
and other equipment prior to the birth of the state. And this arms industry has
advanced steadily to the point where, today, it is as sophisticated as any in
the world.(31) Yet, Israel remains heavily dependent on foreign--that is, mostly
American--arms to ensure its national security. The reason why is to be found in
Israel's evolving industrial strategy.
Israel
has been subject to two damaging arms embargoes in its history: the first during
the War of Independence, when the United States and Great Britain stopped the
flow of weapons, and the second on the eve of the 1967 War, when
France--Israel's main arms supplier at the time--cut off further deliveries to
induce Jerusalem to forgo military action.(32) Psychologically speaking, these
embargoes reinforced Israel's quest to achieve as much arms self-reliance as
possible.
From
1949 to 1967, Israel's arms industry, though small in size, registered some
notable accomplishments--perhaps none more significant than constructing two
nuclear bombs immediately prior to the 1967 War.(33) In the aftermath of this
war, its arms industry made considerable strides by manufacturing combat
aircraft and naval vessels, in addition to the wide assortment of ammunition,
small arms, artillery, missiles, and electronics that it had already developed.
But explosive growth in the size and sophistication of the state's arms industry
would really occur after the 1973 War.
In
the three decades since this war, Israel's arms industry has designed and
manufactured an enormous array of arms--an amazing accomplishment for a state of
its size. In the area of spaceborne systems, it has produced reconnaissance
satellites and booster rockets.(34) It has produced intermediate-range ballistic
missiles (the Jericho series) and long-range cruise missiles, both of which are
apparently capable of carrying indigenously developed nuclear warheads, as well
as an anti-ballistic missile defense system (based around the Arrow missile).
Israel's arms industry produces all kinds of electronic systems, including
radar, communications gear, intelligence-gathering instruments, night vision
devices, and targeting pods. A full-range of airborne (e.g., Python IV, Derby,
Popeye, MSOV, and Pyramid), shipborne (e.g., Barak and Gabriel), and landborne
(e.g., Lahat and Gill) PGMs are in production.
Furthermore,
Israel's arms industry is the acknowledged world leader in the area of unmanned
aerial vehicles (UAVs), manufacturing variants for both intelligence-gathering
(e.g., Heron, Hermes, and Searcher Mk II) and attack (e.g., MOAB and Harpy)
missions. It may also be the world's most successful industry in developing
upgrading techniques to improve and extend the life of older weapons' systems.
Finally, the arms industry produces a full-range of land warfare systems,
including tanks (the Merkava series), armored fighting vehicles (e.g.,
Achzarit), artillery systems (guns, rockets, and mortars), small arms,
ammunition, and so on.(35)
Israel
has had the resources to design and manufacture all of these products because of
its conscious decision, taken in the 1980s, to rely on other states, mainly the
United States, for aircraft and naval vessels. The Lavi affair of the mid-1980s,
when Israel ultimately could not come up with the money necessary to manufacture
this locally designed aircraft, cemented this decision.(36) The industrial
strategy of eschewing the production of air and naval platforms, of course, is
the source of its heavy dependence on foreign arms. Though the Israel of the
twenty-first century has the technological knowledge, the industrial
infrastructure, and the money to produce aircraft and naval vessels, Jerusalem
has shown no inclination to do so. It seems to have reconciled itself to the
notion that, even if Israel did design and produce aircraft and naval vessels,
the state could never afford to build the numbers that would free it entirely of
dependence on foreign sources of supply.
GREAT
POWER PATRONAGE
Perhaps
aware that the state could never be completely self-sufficient, Israel's first
prime minister, David Ben-Gurion, set forth what has become a cardinal principle
of Jerusalem's national security doctrine: Israel should always have at least
one great power patron.(37) A small state with limited resources, he sensibly
concluded, simply could not afford to find itself isolated in the world
community during wartime. To protect Israel's national security interests, he
continued, the military, economic, and diplomatic support of a great power,
preferably the United States, would be absolutely vital.
Jerusalem
has always taken Ben-Gurion's dictum to heart. In each of the three Arab-Israeli
wars in which Israel fired the first shot--the Sinai Campaign, the 1967 War, and
the Lebanon War--Israel first received either the open or tacit consent of its
patron. In 1956, Israel's patron at the time, France, actually joined with it
and Great Britain to attack Egypt. In 1967 and 1982, Jerusalem secured initial
American approval for its military plans. Indeed, great power support has been
considered so important that, in the 1969-1970 and 1973 wars, Israel's military
plans were actually subordinated to American foreign policy interests. The IDF's
use of force in wartime, then, has always been highly sensitive to the wishes of
its patrons.(38) Consequently, it has had the assistance of a great power patron
in each Arab-Israeli war, except for the War of Independence.
As
a corollary to his dictum about great power support during wartime, Ben-Gurion
also advised that Israel never engage a great power in battle. For the most
part, Jerusalem has followed his advice; however, on a few prominent occasions,
it has felt that Israel's national security interests dictated a different
course. During the War of Independence, the IDF clashed with British forces,
most notably near the end of the war, when five Royal Air Force planes were shot
down by Israeli air and ground forces.(39) In every Arab-Israeli war from the
1967 War to the Lebanon War, the IDF engaged Soviet military forces.(40) What is
undoubtedly the most famous Soviet-Israeli encounter occurred near the end of
the War of Attrition, when five Soviet air force planes were shot down in a
brief dogfight with IAF aircraft. At any rate, though, these exceptional cases
had no long-term strategic consequences.
In
the future, Israel's fundamental attitude toward great power patronage is not
likely to undergo a change. Jerusalem will continue to view a strong
patron-client relationship with Washington as crucial to Israel's national
security interests. Similarly, Jerusalem's basic attitude toward military
confrontations with great powers is not likely to change. It will seek to avoid
such encounters to the extent possible without threatening Israel's core
national security interests.
CONTINUITY
AND CHANGE
Israel's
national security doctrine, then, has been marked by both continuity and change
over the state's lifetime. On the one hand, Israel has remained steadily
committed to concepts like deterrence through the promise of massive
retaliation, short wars on Arab territory, qualitative superiority in personnel
and arms, maximum feasible self-reliance in personnel and arms, and securing the
active support of a great power. But, on the other hand, Israel's national
security doctrine has also undergone evolutionary change over the decades.
Although Israel has always expressed a willingness to trade land for peace,
control of territory has become a steadily less valuable national security asset
in recent decades, especially as the costs of low-intensity conflict and the
specter of weapons of mass destruction warfare have grown apace. To a greater
extent than ever before, therefore, Israel now seeks to achieve strategic depth
and defensible borders through peace treaties that contain firm security
guarantees rather than through control of territory.
Similarly,
while the IDF is still built primarily to engage in offensive maneuver warfare,
it has also equipped itself to engage in alternative modes of combat, as its
acquisition of an extensive range of stand-off PGMs and ultra-sophisticated
electronic systems attests. Moreover, as the immediate threat of full-scale
conventional war has receded, it has devoted more and more resources to
countering the threats posed by low-intensity conflict and
weapons'-of-mass-destruction warfare.
Israel
in the twenty-first century may have entered the "post-heroic" phase of its
existence.(41) The same may be said of its national security doctrine--a
doctrine that is presently striving to come to grips with domestic and foreign
realities that are substantially different from those of earlier decades. The
threats that this doctrine will be called upon to address in the future may well
require less glorious and more dispiriting solutions than in the past. The
spectacular air and armored battles of the past century may no longer be the
defining component of Israel's warfare in this century. If the past is any guide
to the future, however, Israel's national security doctrine will contain
solutions that prove up to the task of defending the state's survival.
NOTES
1.
For the claim that Israeli troops operated in western Iraq during the Gulf War
in an anti-ballistic missile capacity see the web site dedicated to Israeli
special operations units at <http://www.isayeret.com>. This site,
apparently maintained by past or present members of the Israeli special
operations community, contains a vast amount of information on Israeli special
operations units. While this recent report of active Israeli participation in
the Gulf War awaits definitive confirmation, it certainly has a ring of
plausibility and authenticity about it.
2.
For an account of the Israeli raid see Amos Perlmutter, Michael Handel, and Uri
Bar-Joseph, Two Minutes Over Baghdad (London: Vallentine, Mitchell, &
Co., 1982).
3.
General overviews of Israel's traditional de facto national security doctrine
include the following: Yoav Ben-Horin and Barry Posen, Israel's Strategic
Doctrine (Santa Monica, CA: The Rand Corporation, 1981); Eliot A. Cohen, Michael
J. Eisenstadt, and Andrew J. Bacevich, Knives, Tanks, and Missiles: Israel's
Security Revolution (Washington, DC: The Washington Institute for Near East
Policy, 1998); Michael Handel, "The Evolution of Israeli Strategy: The
Psychology of Insecurity and the Quest for Absolute Security," in Williamson
Murray, MacGregor Knox, and Alvin Bernstein (eds.), The Making of Strategy:
Rulers, States, and War (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1994), pp.
534-578; Bard E. O'Neill, "Israel," in Douglas J. Murray and Paul R. Viotti
(eds.), The Defense Policies of Nations (Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins
University Press, 1994), pp. 497-541; Israel Tal, National Security: The
Israeli Experience (Westport, CT: Praeger, 2000); and Avner Yaniv,
Deterrence Without the Bomb: The Politics of Israeli Strategy (Lexington,
MA: Lexington Books, 1987).
4.
The fundamental distinctions between preventive and preemptive war are those of
timing and urgency. A preventive war is undertaken to impede a potential,
long-range military threat from developing into an actual, immediate military
threat. A preemptive war is undertaken to counteract an actual, immediate
military threat.
Although
Israel had multiple reasons for going to war against Egypt in 1956, the Sinai
Campaign constituted a preventive war in the sense that Jerusalem sought to
impede the Egyptian army's ability to upgrade its future combat potential. Egypt
had recently received large quantities of sophisticated Soviet weapons from
Czechoslovakia, and Israel did not want these arms to be integrated into the
Egyptian order of battle. The 1967 War, in contrast, constituted a preemptive
war in the sense that Jerusalem went to war to ward off an imminent threat to
Israel's very existence. Jerusalem's decision to attack rested upon the Arab
world's mobilization for war, its intentions to exterminate Israel, and the
failure of international diplomacy to remove the threat to Israel.
5.
The Lebanon War falls into the category of a preventive war in the sense that at
least part of the rationale behind Jerusalem's invasion of Lebanon revolved
around terminating Syrian and PLO hegemony in that country in an effort to
reduce what was perceived to be a steadily growing threat to Israel's northern
border.
Admittedly,
Israel most likely would have launched a preemptive strike at the outset of the
1973 War if not for American diplomatic pressure against such a move. Still,
part of Israel's willingness to allow itself to absorb an Arab attack stemmed
from its belief that the IDF's control of the Sinai and Golan put Israel in a
strong position to defeat an Arab onslaught. While the IDF high command favored
a preemptive strike, it had assured Jerusalem that Israel would not lose the war
if the Arabs struck first. For Jerusalem's thinking about whether to launch a
preemptive strike see, for example, Michael Brecher, Decisions in Crisis:
Israel, 1967 and 1973 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980).
6.
This statement is not meant to imply that Israel bears responsibility for the
outbreak of these wars. Quite the reverse, the Arabs began them in efforts to
regain their lands without signing peace treaties with Israel, even though the
latter had displayed a clear readiness to return most, if not all, of the
conquered territories in exchange for formal peace. Moreover, it is quite
possible that, in the absence of the Israeli conquests, the Arab world might
have seized on some other pretext(s) to initiate wars.
7.
A sizable professional army could also separate itself from civilian society, as
has happened in other states around the world, a development that both Israel's
military and civilian leadership have always sought to prevent. The IDF, in
fact, has always been called upon to assist in the construction of civilian
society. It has helped, for example, to absorb new immigrants and to harvest
crops. Over the decades, its role in building civilian society has diminished
somewhat, but it still exists to this day. To get a taste of the IDF's
historical contributions to Israeli society see Tom Bowden, Army in the
Service of the State (Tel Aviv: University Publishing Projects, 1976).
8.
Unlike most armies around the world, the IDF has always drafted women.
Traditionally, they have occupied non-combat support roles, but today female
soldiers are permitted to serve in combat units. To the surprise of certain
skeptical male IDF officers, several women have already begun to serve in elite
units, making it into the air force as pilots or navigators in fighter-bomber
squadrons or into the navy as naval commandos.
9.
For indications that the IDF does not intend to rely as heavily on reservists in
the future as it has in the past see Ron Ben-Yishai, "Israel No Longer Relies
Solely on the Reservists," Yediot Achronot, 13 January 1999 and Arieh
O'Sullivan, "IDF Plan Calls for Greater Readiness," The Jerusalem Post, 3
February 1999. These articles were taken from The Jerusalem Post
<http://www.jpost.com> and Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs
<http://www.mfa.gov.il> web sites.
10.
The IDF also appears to have resigned itself to the fact that, as Israel has
become a wealthier and more self-indulgent society, many Israelis have become
less committed to the communal, self-sacrificing spirit of their fathers and
mothers. Moreover, the IDF has expressed deep reservations about integrating
what it considers to be problematic groups in society, especially ultra-Orthodox
Jewish students, into its ranks.
11.
Furthermore, despite the general decline of a communal, self-sacrificing spirit,
most Israelis continue to see military service as an important right of passage
into society; therefore, social pressure alone would suggest that the idea of
mass conscription is not currently in danger of being swept aside.
12.
For an exhaustive treatment of how the IDF has cultivated its manpower see
Reuven Gal, A Portrait of the Israeli Soldier (Westport, CT: Greenwood
Press, 1986). A more critical view can be found in Stuart A. Cohen, "Portrait of
the New Israeli Soldier," MERIA Journal, Vol. 1, No. 4 (December 1997).
13.
An interesting attempt to quantify the superiority of Israeli manpower in the
1967, 1973, and 1982 wars appears in Trevor N. Dupuy, Understanding War:
History and Theory of Combat (New York: Paragon House Publishers,
1987).
14.
Harsh criticisms of the quality of IDF troops may be found in Martin van
Creveld, The Sword and the Olive: A Critical History of the Israeli Defense
Forces (New York: Public Affairs, 1998) and Emanuel Wald, The Wald
Report: The Decline of Israeli National Security Since 1967 (Boulder, CO:
Westview Press, 1992). To cite just one anecdotal piece of evidence in support
of the claim that the quality of IDF soldiers remains very high see Shlomo
Aloni, "Israel's Roving Warriors," Air Forces Monthly, Classic Aircraft
Series No. 5 (2001), p. 36. In this article, Aloni reports that, in recent air
combat exercises against United States Navy pilots, who are highly trained
aviators themselves, IAF pilots chalked up a "kill ratio" of about 20:1.
15.
The numbers and types of arms in Israel's conventional warfare arsenal can be
found in Shai Feldman and Yiftah Shapir (eds.), The Middle East Military
Balance 2000-2001 (Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2001). Israel is also
reputed to have a considerable stock of nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles,
though no reliable information about numbers is presently to be found in the
public domain.
16.
It is possible to distinguish between two broad types of warfare: maneuver and
attrition. Maneuver warfare is characterized by a fast-moving campaign in which
army A seeks to penetrate into the rear areas of army B in order to bring about
the collapse, rather than total destruction, of army B. To the contrary,
attrition warfare is characterized by a static or slow-moving campaign in which
army A seeks to whittle away army B to the point of total destruction. For a
more detailed treatment of the distinction between maneuver and attrition
warfare see John J Mearsheimer, Conventional Deterrence (Ithaca, NY:
Cornell University Press, 1983).
17.
The operational level refers to the way an army arranges and employs its combat
branches, such as its air force. The tactical level refers to the way an army
arranges and employs its combat units, such as its air force squadrons. On the
distinction between the operational and tactical levels of warfare see Edward N.
Luttwak, Strategy: The Logic of War and Peace (Cambridge, MA: Harvard
University Press, 1987).
18.
The following is not intended to suggest that the IDF has never waged anything
but offensive maneuver warfare. Out of necessity, the IDF has had no choice but
to wage defensive and attrition warfare at times. It waged both defensive and
attrition warfare, for instance, during the aptly named War of Attrition.
19.
An overview of the Israel's experience with offensive maneuver warfare can be
found in Ariel Levite, Offense and Defense in Israeli Military Doctrine
(Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1989).
20.
The IDF did tinker with the concept of static defensive warfare, particularly in
the form of the Bar-Lev Line, a string of small fortresses built along the Suez
Canal to prevent an Egyptian "land grab" and to provide shelter to troops
stationed at the front. This line, which really had a greater diplomatic than
military purpose, did not signal a weakening of the IDF's traditional commitment
to offensive maneuver warfare, however.
21.
This new emphasis on firepower, it should be noted, has also affected the IDF's
response to low-intensity conflict. From the 1978 incursion into South Lebanon,
through its battles with Hizballah in the 1980s and 1990s, down to the recent
Palestinian-instigated violence in Israel, the West Bank, and the Gaza Strip,
the IDF has frequently employed considerable firepower against guerrilla and
terrorist targets.
22.
A nuanced treatment of Israeli deterrence may be found in Uri Bar-Joseph, "The
Conceptualization of Deterrence in Israeli Thinking," Security Studies,
Vol. 7, No. 3 (Spring 1998), pp. 145-181.
23.
For accounts of Israeli nuclear deterrence see Louis René Beres (ed.),
Security or Armageddon: Israel's Nuclear Strategy (Lexington, MA:
Lexington Books, 1986); Avner Cohen, Israel and the Bomb (New York:
Columbia University Press, 1998); and Shai Feldman, Israeli Nuclear
Deterrence: A Strategy for the 1980s (New York: Columbia University Press,
1982).
24.
Israel's foreign intelligence service, the MOSSAD, assassinated or intimidated a
number of ex-Nazi scientists working for Cairo and damaged industrial facilities
linked to Egypt's ballistic missile project.
25.
Feldman and Shapir (eds.), The Middle East Military Balance 2000-2001, p.
173.
26.
For this trend in Israeli thinking see, for example, Cohen, Eisenstadt, and
Bacevich, Knives, Tanks, and Missiles and Stuart A. Cohen, "Small States
and Their Armies: Restructuring the Militia Framework of the Israel Defense
Force," The Journal of Strategic Studies, Vol. 18, No. 4 (December 1995),
pp. 78-93.
27.
Israel's special operations units, of course, have always played a major role in
the state's counterinsurgency warfare efforts; however, until recently, Israeli
special operations units were rarely set up for the particular purpose of
engaging in low-intensity conflict. Their role in counterinsurgency warfare was
traditionally viewed as secondary to their role in conventional wars. For
in-depth information on many of Israel's de-classified special operations units,
including their tasks in both conventional and unconventional warfare, see the
web site at <http://www.isayeret.com>.
28.
Because Israel has never admitted that it has nuclear arms, all of the
information regarding its arsenal currently in the public domain must be
considered speculative.
29.
For this last claim see the newspaper articles about Israel's acquisition of
German-built Dolphin-class submarines at the web site
<http://www.dolphin.org.il>.
30.
On the proposed Strategic Command see Douglas Davis, "Report: Israel Approves
New Plan to Deal with International Terrorism," Jewish Telegraphic
Agency, 2 February 1999. This article appeared on the JTA web site
<http://www.jta.org>.
31.
General treatments of Israel's arms industry may be found in Aaron S. Klieman,
Israel's Global Reach: Arms Sales as Diplomacy (Washington, DC:
Pergamon-Brassey's, 1985) and Stewart Reiser, The Israeli Arms Industry:
Foreign Policy, Arms Transfers, and Military Doctrine of a Small State (New
York: Holmes & Meier, 1989). See also Sharon Sadeh, "Israel's Beleaguered
Defense Industry," MERIA Journal, Vol. 5, No. 1 (March 2001), pp.
64-77.
32.
Israel has also been subjected to short-term American embargoes on occasion,
generally at times when Washington has been upset with Jerusalem's conduct. But
these short-term embargoes have not been meant to harm Israel's national
security, and they have had little, if any, effect on Jerusalem's foreign
policy.
The
French embargo had the opposite effect of the intended one, as it reinforced
Jerusalem's decision to opt for war.
33.
This claim is advanced in Cohen, Israel and the Bomb.
34.
An overview of Israel's military and commercial satellite programs appears in
Gerald Steinberg, "Commercial Observation Satellites in the Middle East and
Persian Gulf," in John C. Baker, Kevin M. O'Connell, and Ray A. Williamson
(eds.), Commercial Observation Satellites: At the Edge of Global
Transparency (Santa Monica, CA: The Rand Corporation, 2001). A draft of
Steinberg's chapter may be found at his personal web site
<http://faculty.biu.ac.il/~steing/index.shtml>.
35.
To get a sense of the range of products offered by Israel's arms industry see
Feldman and Shapir (eds.), The Middle East Military Balance 2000-2001,
pp. 170-171. An additional testament to the quantity and quality of products
offered by its arms industry is the fact that, over the last five years alone,
Israel has sold arms to no less than 46 states, including the United States,
Germany, Great Britain, and China. For a list of Israel's clients and their
purchases see pp. 165-170.
36.
For a thorough review of this affair see Dov S. Zakheim, Flight of the Lavi:
Inside a U.S.-Israeli Crisis (Washington, DC: Brassey's, 1996).
37.
Aaron S. Klieman, Israel and the World after 40 Years (Washington, DC:
Pergamon-Brassey's, 1990) describes and evaluates the basic principles of
Israel's foreign policy, particularly as they relate to its national security
interests.
38.O
n the way in which the American-Israeli patron-client relationship has
functioned since the 1967 War see, for example, David Rodman, "Patron-Client
Dynamics: Mapping the American-Israeli Relationship," Israel Affairs,
Vol. 4, No. 2 (Winter 1997), pp. 26-46.
39.
For this British-Israeli clash see Zeev Tzahor, "The 1949 Air Clash Between the
Israeli Air Force and the RAF," Journal of Contemporary History, Vol. 28,
No. 1 (January 1993), pp. 75-101.
40.
Soviet-Israeli military encounters are chronicled in David Rodman, "Red Star
versus Star of David: Soviet-Israeli Combat in the Arab-Israeli Wars,"
Midstream (forthcoming).
41.
This phrase belongs to Eliot Cohen. See Eliot A. Cohen, "Israel after Heroism,"
Foreign Affairs, Vol. 77, No. 6 (November-December 1998), pp.
112-128.
*David Rodman has taught courses at the University of Michigan and written articles for The Journal of Strategic Studies, Diplomacy and Statecraft, SAIS Review, the Journal of intelligence and Counterintelligence, and Israel Studies.
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