“The ground war has begun,” says Stratfor. “Several Israeli brigades now appear to be operating between the Lebanese border and the Litani River. According to reports, Hezbollah forces are dispersed in multiple bunker complexes and are launching rockets from these and other locations.“
Hezbollah’s strategy appears to be threefold. First, force Israel into costly attacks against prepared fortifications. Second, draw Israeli troops as deeply into Lebanon as possible, forcing them to fight on extended supply lines. Third, move into an Iraqi-style insurgency from which Israel — out of fear of a resumption of rocket attacks — cannot withdraw, but which the Israelis also cannot endure because of extended long-term casualties. This appears to have been a carefully planned strategy, built around a threat to Israeli cities that Israel can’t afford. The war has begun at Hezbollah’s time and choosing…
Hezbollah has implemented its strategy by turning southern Lebanon into a military stronghold, consisting of well-designed bunkers that serve both as fire bases and launch facilities for rockets. The militants appear to be armed with anti-tank weapons and probably anti-aircraft weapons, some of which appear to be of American origin, raising the question of how they were acquired. Hezbollah wants to draw Israel into protracted fighting in this area in order to inflict maximum casualties and to change the psychological equation for both military and political reasons…
Israel is caught between three strategic imperatives. First, it must end the threat to Israeli cities, which must involve the destruction of Hezbollah’s launch capabilities south of the Litani River. Second, it must try to destroy Hezbollah’s infrastructure, which means it must move into the Bekaa Valley and as far as the southern suburbs of Beirut. Third, it must do so in such a way that it is not dragged into a long-term, unsustainable occupation against a capable insurgency.…
Simply occupying the border-Litani area will not achieve any of Israel’s strategic goals. Hezbollah still would be able to use rockets against Israel. And even if, for Hezbollah, this area is lost, its capabilities in the Bekaa Valley and southern Beirut will remain intact. Therefore, a battle that focuses solely on the south is not an option for Israel, unless the Israelis feel a defeat here will sap Hezbollah’s will to resist. We doubt this to be the case…
An extended engagement in southern Lebanon is the least likely path, in our opinion. More likely — and this is a guess — is a five-part strategy:
1. Insert airmobile and airborne forces north of the Litani to seal the rear of Hezbollah forces in southern Lebanon. Apply air power and engineering forces to reduce the fortifications, and infantry to attack forces not in fortified positions. Bottle them up, and systematically reduce the force with limited exposure to the attackers.
2. Secure roads along the eastern flank for an armored thrust deep into the Bekaa Valley to engage the main Hezbollah force and infrastructure there. This would involve a move from Qiryat Shimona north into the Bekaa, bypassing the Litani to the west, and would probably require sending airmobile and special forces to secure the high ground. It also would leave the right flank exposed to Syria.
3. Use air power and special forces to undermine Hezbollah capabilities in the southern Beirut area. The Israelis would consider a move into this area after roads through southern Lebanon are cleared and Bekaa relatively secured, moving into the area, only if absolutely necessary, on two axes of attack.
4. Having defeated Hezbollah in detail, withdraw under a political settlement shifting defense responsibility to the Lebanese government.
5. Do all of this while the United States is still able to provide top cover against diplomatic initiatives that will create an increasingly difficult international environment.
Sounds tough to pull off, even under ideal circumstances. And what happens if the Sabras have to do all this, while fighting the Lebanese army, too?
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Hisbollah killed 240 marines in a cowardly bombing in Lebanon. A perfect gift to the Marines memory would be the bodies of 2400 Hizbollah vermin, all missing their right hands.
Although two decades have passed, hopefully some of those bodies would be of the original criminals. If not, their sons and grandsons will do just fine.
I would hope that President Bush picks up the tab for this action in gratitude to the Israeli peoples gift.
These arab Nazi’s should get what they give only 10000 times more. I served in the last days of WW2 and never thought that the Nazis would arise again. Since these arab Nazis would never love us let them FEAR and RESPECT us. War is hell so let them and their families fear hell fire!
Respectfully,
Lloyd
Hez strategy: “kill Whitey” Israeli strategy: “kill Brownie.” Neocon strategy: profit from it! God will curse all the murderers of Innocent women and children and all who profit from the killing! Praise be to God!
All tactic issues can be well handled by Israel army, I am sure. Like “long supply line”, as previous comment has stated, is not a problem at all. The key point is how to end it. Now US’s problem is that they can’t get troops out of Iraq. Similar things happened for Soviet Union to get troops out of Afganistan.
The universal solution is to find a native agent to help you to clean the mess. You need to pick a potent agent who can do it. I know most of the time, this agent may go wild and out of control, but that’s much better than suck all your troops in the fighting for insurgency. Now Israel faces the same problem. Strategically, they need to reduce the power of Hizbollah and let Lebanon government take care of the mess. Currently Lebanon army is too weak to rein Hizbollah.
the israeli will win becausre they are right
“I just wanted to say that the media, including this site, are over-estimating Hezbollah.“
Well it seems from 12 days of fighting that Israel has greatly under-estimated Hezbollah. Israel has been living in dream land for the past six year (ever since they withdrew and gave Hezzbollah what they wanted), they have no intelligence, they cannot find hezbollah leaders, they cannot stop the rockets and Hezbollah has technology & rockets that Isarael knew nothing about.
“Israel has bunker busters, remember? Though these “fortifications” aren’t the kind of thing you’d need one for anyway. Static targets will NOT survive. “
Even if Israel has Bunker Busters, one cannot bust bunkers that they cannot find. Hezbollah has had six years to dig in, and from what we have seen they have realy dug in and made every effort to hide and keep these bunkers secret. They have bunkers, tunnels and supplies hidden deep underground. Israel is trying to find these bunkers but is having a very hard time. The well planned and devolped bunker system along with Israels lack of inteligance, will make winning the war without massive ground forces, impossible.
Israel is facing a hard time, the main cause for the present situation is lack of decision by Isreali leaders. Olmert should decide if he is playing at war, then go to war and destroy the enemy. Israel cannot afford a half war effort, it is either all or nothing in the Middle East. Olmert and Peretz have to decide where they are taking Israel and stop playing games. Once the decision is made Israel can and will achieve victory,simply because they have no other choice. With Israel it is always a surival issue.
If the leaders cont. with there half hearted attempts at fighting a war and not calling it a war, of trying not to continue with there present peaces plans and frame of mind, then Israel can expect dark times ahead. Evean Israel cannot win if they really don’t want to.
The question that one has to ask is , has Israel lost its nerve? Have 15 years of peace talks and giving in to terorrist, which reached it peak last summer with the so called disengagment, caused Israel to lose site of its purpose and goal.
Israel can survive and win if it wants to, but do they want to? Or has Israel been completely blinded from its vison of peace and the “New Middle East”.
To win a war one must fight it!!
Hezbollah can only fight at basic levels of ground combat with no armor and little artillery or what seems to be a poor excuse for rockets.
The best bet is for the IDF to push everyone out of the buffer zone and search all areas destroying anything that has been used by Hezbollah. Leave nothing for them to use in the future.
Hezbollah is not going to stand and fight like an army so there’s no point in hanging around for suicide and poorly guided rocket attacks. Now that the IDF parades thru the streets Hezbollah is nowhere to be seen. So much for all that bravado and flag burning.
It just shows how weak and cowardly they really are.
“Israel has bunker busters, remember? “
Interestingly, Israel has run out of precision guided munitions and is currently asking for a US resupply during the middle of their air campagin. As for bunker busting, it requires the use of troops to at the very least locate the positions, with exacting detail. Meanwhile there is certainly mountiansides and pathways prepped for the assult.
“Can you really say with a straight face that Israeli logistics couldn’t easily handle supplying forces a mere 30–40 miles distant from the Israeli border?“
The road from baghdad airport is still not secure. Enough said, however I will point out that it is through hostile terrian in both population and geography, meanwhile all of the roads have been bombed by israel. Beyond this there is a lot of evidence suggesting that hez basicly was the research lab for IEDs, so you can bet that they are very prepared to use them on the supply lines after forcing israel deep into the territory to push back the rocket attacks.
“No, Israel can withdraw, Israel has already withdrawn before.“
I am afraid you are wrong in this, it is not possible for an israeli withdrawl. Israel withdrew before, after an 18 year occupation, which still failed to stop the threat. Politically in israel all rocket attacks must be ceased.
” Lebanon already has a government in place, Israel is NOT nation-building.
Are you refering to the government was only barely begining of pulling the territory out of a long civil war and has yet even begin to control Hezbollah, which composes a significant part of said government? Israel cannot just wall of lebanon like it did to Gaza; it cannot stop the resupply, but it must try, and the only way it can do this is the total anihilation of the threat. Israel would rather lebanaon in civil war, though the stray rocket into israel would make withdraw still impossible. The key fact here is if israel ceases activity on lebanon and one more rocket hits israel olmberts government is going to more likely than not collapse.
“The best bet is for the IDF to push everyone out of the buffer zone and search all areas destroying anything that has been used by Hezbollah. Leave nothing for them to use in the future.“
That sounds like a perfect scenario for one of the worst humanitarian disasters I’ve ever heard of, not only with the refugees but it’ll spark massive tensions and pressure to return to civil war.
“Hezbollah is not going to stand and fight like an army so there
I was in the navy when the Israelis warned the PLO about suicide bombings and the Lebanese ‘safe zones’ When they ignored the warning the U.S. Marines on peacekeeping duties on the Lebanese border got a visit from ‘a scruffy looking guy in a beat up jeep.’ He identified himself as a brigadier general and informed the marines that needed to move. The marine det. commander replied that they were U.N. peace keepers and that thye were staying. The brigadier responded that had fourteen people with one .50 machine gun and a radio and he had 64 tanks and they wouldn’t stop them, he then ever so politely requested they evaquate to the nearest U.S. position not is Isreal or Lebanon, which turned out to be our ship. Within minutes of their evacuation the Isreali’s began “Operation Peace in Galili (sp?)“
which resulted in a confirmed scores of 75 kills of SAM sites for 0 (that is ZERO!)Isreali aircraft and resulted in the PLO evacuating to Cyprus for the next five years. Isreal is an anomoly in the modern world in that when they tell you not to do something there are serious and permanent consequences when you ignore them. While verging on overkill they do seem to get their point across ask those trying to rebuild the highway bridges to Syria or restore power to the southern half of the country.
We have sleeper cells in the Texas prison system.
When the Democrat Senate under George Mitchell took away our prisons, they allowed prison gangs to form. Each prison has its Islamic gang, tended to by so called “clerics” from the outside, with funds from unknown sources.
What most are forgetting is that ‘insurgencies’ usually win. Vietnam, Afghanistan (the Soviets), Algeria, and so on are simply examples of places where superior forces were forced to capitulate. It is only a matter of time before Iraq and Afghanistan are added to that list.
Israel’s strikes, regardless of how damaging or not they may be to Hezbollah, are far more damaging to Israel itself in the same way that the US occupation of Iraq is to the US.
The only military way to defeat an insurgency is a “final solution” in which the entire population is decimated, thereby eliminating all actual and potential foes. This is “total war”, and no target, tactic, weapon or strategy is off-limits.
The media is complicit in total war. We don’t hear a peep about violations of the Geneva Convention (targeting of civilians and civilian infrastructure, torture, etc.). The media whitewashes such counter-information, blocking news and especially images that would have any sane human being screaming in their sleep (http://www.fromisraeltolebanon.info/ — be warned).
Israel is as responsible for creating these enemies as the US has been in creating Al Qaeda (http://msnbc.msn.com/id/3340101/). The Mossaud, taking a page from the CIA, has funded groups that later turn out to be even worse enemies that those they were trying to destabilize. By providing support for Muslim fundamentalists in an attempt to destabilize Arab regimes, Israel has not only further alienated those neighboring Arab countries, it has empowered it’s most dangerous enemy, which has now been elected to office in Palestine (Hamas) and Lebanon (Hezbollah).
Re: “What most are forgetting is that ‘insurgencies’ usually win.“
Tell that to the British about the Malaya campaign.
Noah, I think John B was referring to the conflict known as the ‘Malaya Emergency’ fought between 1948–60 by the British against Communist guerillas (drawn mostly from the ethnic Chinese population).
The campaign was hard fought and cost around 600 British lives, but the ‘insurgents’ were ultimately defeated and the campaign is often regarded as a textbook example of an anti-insurgency campaign.
Furthermore the British army has more experience in this field than any other in history.
And with regard to your comment we’ve only lost one major war against ANYBODY since the 15th century.
Perhaps you’d like to learn a bit more history and engage your brain before making such statements.
I really pray this whole thing can come to an end. God loves that we live as one, motivated by the desire to help one another, living through our differences and making a better world available for generations to come. I beseech both empires & all nations of the world to embrace the path of peace.
Oohrah! War Buff you are a good man.
Pres Bush will pick up the Israeli tab all right budd!!!$125 MILLION in aviation fuel bill for the Israeli air campaign was sent to the American taxpayer…Who the hell knows how much for a rush shipment of precision guided munitions to replace expended Israeli stocks!!
This over and above the $15 MILLION A DAY in US taxpayer aid Israel receives.
This ofcourse does not include the Lebanese tab of infrasructure destruction caused by Israel.