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Misreading the Lebanon War

[Jerusalem Post] Edward N. Luttwak - Hizballah certainly did not run away and did hold its ground, but its mediocrity is revealed by the casualties it inflicted, which were very few. There was a fully developed IDF plan in the contingency folders - a sophisticated blend of amphibious, airborne, and ground penetrations to swiftly reach deep behind the front, before rolling back to destroy Hizballah positions one by one from the rear, all the way to the Israeli border. That plan was not implemented because of the lack of casualties among Israeli civilians. Hizballah distributed its rockets to village militias that were very good at hiding them from air attacks, but quite incapable of launching them effectively. Instead of hundreds of dead civilians, the Israelis were losing one or two a day. This did not politically justify the hundreds of casualties that a large-scale offensive would certainly have cost.
2006-08-21 01:00:00
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