|
Guest -> Inside Track / The fire next time (11/5/2004 2:53:39 PM)
|
Inside Track / The fire next time
By Amir Oren
Bush's re-election will spark American preparations for an operation, perhaps together with Israel, against Tehran's nuclear program. The IDF, however, is not prepared for an Iranian counter-move that would set the northern front ablaze.
On the wall of the defense minister's bureau, to the left of the office of the minister, Shaul Mofaz, hangs a framed letter that was sent by one of his predecessors from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem about half a century ago.
"As you know," David Ben-Gurion wrote in the letter to Prof. Gershom Scholem, "our people was endowed with heroism already in ancient times. The unique quality of `sanctification of the name [of God],' giving one's life for the tenets of Judaism, has accompanied us throughout all the generations and all the places of exile, from the time of Hannah and her seven sons, the Ten Martyrs, down to the victims of the Nazis. Regrettably, though, this was only the passive heroism of those who were tortured, who demonstrated loyalty to their people. In our time we have been privileged to see the emergence of a wonderful young generation, as has been proved to us by the fighters of the Israel Defense Forces and as exemplified by active heroic exploits, which are beyond recounting by any historian - and Israel's independence was renewed. The heroic actions of the IDF fighters are not of a diminished moral level as compared to the ancients."
The sting of Ben-Gurion's message lies in the words below it: "Copy - Moshe Sharett, Prime Minister." The defense minister, on the brink of resuming the premiership, had sought to demarcate the difference between him and Sharett, his party colleague and ideological adversary. "Active" vs. "passive," the heroism of the initiators as compared with the martyrdom of the victims, reprisal raids and finally also a preemptive war from Tel Aviv and an emphasis on foreign relations and world approval from Jerusalem.
This was an extreme distinction, which Ben-Gurion himself was careful not to go too far in implementing, and his admirers at the time (Moshe Dayan, Shimon Peres, Yitzhak Rabin, Ariel Sharon) were drawn by it over the years, in the increasingly responsible positions that they held, toward Sharett's pole. However, Mofaz's decision to display this letter - if it was indeed a conscious, active choice - reflects his self-image as someone who continues Ben-Gurion's line of thinking with respect to security, not that of Sharett.
Next Thursday, barring some unexpected change in his schedule, Mofaz is scheduled to chair a meeting about a fateful issue: Iran's nuclearization. The date was set last month, but U.S. President George Bush's victory Tuesday over Senator John Kerry, which is equivalent to the defeat of the line of thinking of the Sharett from Boston to that of the Ben-Gurion from Texas, lends the discussion additional importance. The use of military force against Iran is looking more and more likely. The coming year will be one of confrontation. The Iranians will not yield, Bush will not give in, Israel will not remain outside the collision. Even if it wanted to, Israel will not be able to prevent the Iranians from launching an escalation against it, which will precede and disrupt the American plan.
Iran is provoking the world and the regime intent on curbing nuclear proliferation. In the election campaign Bush promised not to allow Iran to go nuclear. Now, encouraged by the renewed trust in him and his policy, strengthened in Congress, freed from electoral considerations, he can turn to advancing the move against the ayatollahs' nuclear project.
The U.S. military and the CIA would have continued the preparations for an operation against Iran even if Kerry had won, but the fact that Bush will remain in the White House ensures immediate continuity. The election outcome also signals that terrorism did not succeed in frightening the American people to the point where they would change the administration.
General Michael Wooley, head of the U.S. Air Force's Special Operations Command (AFSOC), gave implicit expression to the desire of many of his colleagues when, in a talk about two months ago, he condemned "terrorist victories [which] set dangerous precedents ... leading directly to coalition dissolution." Wooley was referring specifically to the terrorist attack in Madrid on March 11, which "resulted in a Spanish election where the country voted out a government who stood firm against terrorists and voted in one who supported a more nonconfrontational stance." In July, Wooley went on, the government of the Philippines also capitulated to terrorism by evacuating military forces in return for the release of hostages. Wooley, who is in active service, left it to his audience to draw the necessary conclusion: The terrorist organizations and the governments that are plotting to harm America will draw special encouragement from the greatest achievement of all - the removal of Bush from office.
Wooley disclosed that AFSOC, the counterpart of the Shaldag and 669 units in the Israel Air Force, are operating clandestinely, mainly at night, from bases in Asian and other countries that have chosen to assist the American battle against terrorism, but maintain a low profile. The forces are operating within the framework of the Special Forces Command and in cooperation with what the Pentagon refers to by the transparent code name of Other Government Agency (OGA), meaning the CIA.
In Israel, the preparations for thwarting Iranian nuclearization have been assigned to the Mossad, the Institute for Intelligence and Special Operations. The Mossad is now so preoccupied with Iran that, according to an IDF major general, it has effectively become the "Institute for Intelligence and One Special Operation." Mossad chief Meir Dagan is being called on not only to remove the threat of Iran's Shihab-3 missile, which can carry a nuclear warhead, but also to do it without noise and showmanship that will entangle Israel in a broad war on the northern front - against Syria and Hezbollah, which are the representatives and tools (in limited form) of Iran.
In the Mossad, as usual, they are whispering that marvelous exploits, "science fiction," have improved the opening conditions of an Israeli operation, if one will be needed. It's a safe assumption that the air force and navy are also preparing, as they have for years, for making long-distance flights and forays involving distances similar to those involved in an operation against Iran.
Israeli complacency
However, this will not be a sufficient response to the Iranian counter-move from Syria and Lebanon - and, after the evacuation of Gaza, from there, too - as far as the southern suburbs of Tel Aviv, with hundreds of Fajer 3 rockets (90 kilograms of explosives, 100 seconds' flight time, 43-kilometer range) and Fajer 4 rockets (175 kilograms, 140 seconds, 76 kilometers). There are also thousands of 122-mm. Katyusha rockets with a range of 20 and 30 kilometers. One of Chief of Staff Moshe Ya'alon's favorite tunes is about Hezbollah's rusting rockets. Proposals by experts in missile defense to develop, together with the Americans, a system to protect Haifa from Hezbollah rockets were not accepted. The IDF's working assumption is that it is possible to wait until 2010 or even 2012, and to focus American aid requests on other items.
The Israeli establishment is actually showing a peculiar duality: a high level of alertness with respect to a confrontation with Iran and serene complacency concerning escalation in the north against the background of a confrontation with Iran, not necessarily at the time and in the area of Israel's choosing. The shortcomings of Israeli preparedness are in part organizational and in part operational.
The organizational shortcoming stems from the structure of the establishment and the manning of the main positions. The General Staff is too involved in managing the fighting in the territories. True, every tactical movement vis-a-vis the Palestinians could have strategic significance, but the subordination of the two separate sectors to different territorial commands, which are answerable to the chief of staff, relegate the high command to dealing with immediately urgent and ongoing situations - instead of giving it the time to think and exert its influence.
About two years ago, the then head of the Plans and Policy Directorate, Major General Giora Eiland, prepared, at Ya'alon's request, a list of some 20 proposals for improvement and streamlining. Ya'alon went over the list and quickly erased the idea of making the head of Central Command the leader of the campaign against the Palestinians, with responsibility for both the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. The proposal also contained an economizing element: annulling the Southern Command during routine periods and assigning any emergency combat mission related to the peaceful states, Egypt and Jordan, should such an eventuality arise, to army headquarters (the ground forces' command).
However, the main upgrading was supposed to be aimed at the unification of the commands and the conception of the confrontation with the Palestinians. For Yasser Arafat, the split between different security units was meant to preserve his power; in Israel, the unification of forces was to augment whatever could be extracted from them. The chief of staff, according to this proposal, would gain more time and heighten attentiveness with respect to building the entire military force and preparing for the various Iran-Syria-Hezbollah options. He, the chief of staff, is not, after all, the commander of the air arm or of the sea arm or of intelligence; he is the commander of the commanders, and he will lose none of his honor or authority if the confrontation in which the IDF has been engaged for the past four years will be dealt with by a general of the "Palestine Command."
Ya'alon will conclude three years as chief of staff next July 9. If the heads of territorial commands are tired after two intensive years, in his opinion, then there is certainly no benefit to be gained from a fourth year for a chief of staff like Ya'alon. He didn't fail, which is saying not a little, but he didn't succeed, either, which is not enough. His General Staff appointments are peculiar, in some cases embarrassing. The overall level of the General Staff is inferior today to what it was two years ago, and then it was inferior to what it was four years ago.
Mofaz has no personal commitment to Ya'alon. The relations between the defense minister, who is the previous chief of staff, and the present chief of staff, his former deputy, are strained. Mofaz discovered that the small step from the chief of staff's bureau to that of the defense minister was, from his point of view, a big step backward. The minister is always, or almost always, weaker than the chief of staff, even if he is closer than him to the next station, the premiership. Mofaz found a stagnant, flaccid Defense Ministry, lacking the means to supervise the army. He has plans to change the situation, from which he benefited when he was chief of staff. Yesterday marked the second anniversary of his term as defense minister, and the plans are still in the drawer.
Joint campaign
Lieutenant Colonel Tal - military censorship allows only his first name to be published - is the head of a branch in the Defense Ministry. In the last issue of the ministry journal Ma'arachot, he warned that in order to launch volleys of thousands of surface-to-surface rockets into northern Israel, Hezbollah would need to make few and brief preparations, making it difficult for Israel to get advance warning. "Because most of the launches will be from densely populated areas, reaction capability will be limited," wrote the officer, who reflects a militant stream in the military establishment - including, it would seem, in the air force and Northern Command as well. Israel, therefore, should view such rocket strikes not as "a terrorist act that necessitates a Sisyphean pursuit of the perpetrators, but as a declaration of war by the state from which the missiles were launched and by those who rule it."
In other words: Get ready for a division of labor - an operation by one or more armies against Iran - and, in its course, for an Israeli operation, either in the form of an initiative or a response, against Syria and Hezbollah. The IDF's old assessment from the end of the 1980s, to the effect that "Israel will not become involved in a coalition war and will not act as a launching pad for such a war," is no longer valid. Fifty years after the joint Israeli-British-French operation against Egypt, in October 1956, and for the first time (apart from coordination against Syria to protect Jordan during "Black September" in 1970) in Washington-Jerusalem relations, the victory of the Republicans might engender a joint campaign, this time against Iran and its satellites. In November 2004, Israel is still not prepared for such a move.
|
|
|
|