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The Effect of Prolonged Routine Security Operations on Wartime Capabilities

Routine security operations (RSOs) in the Israeli context comprise a wide variety of activities, including border defense against terrorists, detentions and targeted killings in the West Bank (under IDF doctrine, referred to as limited conflict), and brigade-sized raids similar to those carried out during reprisal operations.¹ Specific examples of RSOs include the 1968 Karameh raid in Jordan, brigade-sized operations in the Israeli security zone in Lebanon (under IDF doctrine, limited-scale offensive operations), and Israeli operations against surface-to-air missiles (SAMs) on the Egyptian front during the 1967–1970 War of Attrition. The American equivalent to an RSO is a counterinsurgency operation, similar to those conducted in Iraq and Afghanistan, despite the absence of border issues in those cases.

In Israel, RSOs are relatively long lasting and are characteristic of every interwar period. RSOs must be successful for a number of reasons: to protect against the perpetual threat to Israeli citizens, to ensure relatively few casualties, to deter adversaries, and so forth. The need for success in RSOs usually compels commanders to do the following:

• Operate according to a detailed command and control (C2) approach that minimizes performance error.

• Prefer elite units.

• Request and employ state-of-the-art weapons.

• Adjust to fighting norms unsuited to wartime situations (for example, low casualty rates rather than mission accomplishment).²

Tension is created between operational success in limited conflict and reduced fighting capabilities in a future war, as the following points illustrate:

• The detailed command philosophy and measures used in small, intense actions in RSOs are the antithesis of the mission-oriented command that should be employed by an army in wartime. Therefore, the army’s ability to carry out large, complex, tightly scheduled operations is inhibited.

• The adoption of RSO norms, such as giving priority to the treatment of wounded rather than mission completion, is liable to spill over into wartime.

• The insistence on specific (sometimes special) units for offensive RSOs can harm the sense of competence in the rest of the army, which is burdened with numbing, repetitious activity that limits the opportunity to gain diversified military experience.

• The use of sophisticated weapons in RSOs risks their exposure, thus enabling the enemy to develop the means to neutralize them before the next war. This stands in stark contrast to the surprise revelation of such weapons in the next war.³

These actions are the responsibility of the regional brigade and division commanders. The bodies responsible for force design (the air force, army, and so forth) must also be aware of these problems and provide solutions that entail training for war and maintaining secrecy, among other things. However, the problem is aggravated when the bodies responsible for force design are focused on RSOs and the army loses its fighting capability in many areas. Diverting attention from war preparation often leads to the following:

• Investing more time on training and acquiring proficiency for RSOs than for wartime missions.

• Forming special RSO-designated units.

• Developing weapons geared primarily to RSOs.

Almost every war the IDF has fought took place after several years of RSOs. For example, the 1956 Sinai War began after retaliatory raids and defensive operations against fedayeen, and the Six-Day War broke out after the “battle” over the Jordan River’s water (1964–1967). Two wars in which the IDF’s performance was considerably influenced by the preceding routine security periods were the Yom Kippur War, which occurred after six years of defensive operations on the borders, especially in the Jordan Valley and Suez Canal region (including the War of Attrition on the canal front), and the Second Lebanon War, which erupted more than two decades after the First Lebanon War.⁴ In the latter case, the IDF had been engaged mainly in RSOs on the northern border (the Israeli security zone in southern Lebanon) and in Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and the Gaza Strip. This chapter analyzes the effect that years of RSOs had on the army’s combat capability in these two major wars. It does not deal with the psychological strain involved in shifting from daily security to wartime, as occurred in these two events (see chapter 4).

Impact of 1967–1973 RSOs on the Yom Kippur War

At the end of the Six-Day War, the IDF found itself engaged in operations on the new borders. Activity was concentrated in two regions: the Jordan Valley (against Palestinian terrorist squads) and the Suez Canal (against Egyptian artillery attacks, commando raids, ambushes, and sniper fire). A major air battle also ensued above the canal.

Edward Luttwak and Dan Horowitz write, “The conflicting demands of long term force design on the one hand and daily operations on the other were all the more acute because of the new defensive tactics that were coming to the fore.” They note, “In 1968–70 the army had to devise new tactical methods, retrain officers and men, absorb much new equipment—and do all this while fighting a conventional war on one front [the Suez Canal] and counter-guerilla on three [Lebanon, the West Bank, and Gaza].”⁵

Yoav Gelber’s analysis of these competing demands is similar. He describes a sharp decline in the amount of time devoted to training periods. Originally, training consumed approximately 90 percent of the army’s time; this percentage dropped to 50 percent, with the time being equally divided between training and RSOs.⁶ It should be noted, though, that this was still far more training than was performed before the Second Lebanon War, when almost 90 percent of the army’s time was allocated to RSOs. Another major difference between the 2000–2006 and 1967–1973 periods is that before the Yom Kippur War, armored units conducted their RSO missions on tanks and split into platoons on the Suez Canal and the Golan Heights. Between 2000 and 2006 they operated as infantry squads. Nevertheless, despite the dramatic change in the allocation of time and resources, training and weapons assimilation strengthened the IDF before the Yom Kippur War.

C2 Aspects

The IAF’s attacks against SAM sites on the canal in the War of Attrition were comparable to ground raids that require careful planning and elite units. In Israel’s case, new Phantom squadrons were formed. The air force’s missions, both along the Suez Canal and deep in Egypt, were meticulously prepared by the IAF headquarters, whereas most wartime operations (excluding specific cases such as Operation Moked—the IAF’s liquidation of Arab air forces at the start of the Six-Day War) were planned at the squadron level. Shmuel Gordon describes the difference between IAF operations in the War of Attrition (limited war) and in the Yom Kippur War (full-scale war). In limited wars and RSOs, operations are executed by a very small number of forces relative to higher headquarters’ C2 capability. Headquarters deals with each threat the moment it arises, changing targets, routes, and other microtactical details for flight leaders. It makes numerous decisions that flight leaders are capable of making themselves. Its ability to exert hands-on control in limited fighting addresses numerous restrictions and sensitive issues that are absent in a large-scale war, such as determining a certain line that must not be crossed or prohibiting aerial combat. But the need for constant supervision in limited fighting inhibits flight leaders’ freedom. They grow accustomed to obeying orders, leading to a diminution of their operational judgment and decision making. Because the orders for RSOs are precisely planned for each mission, they leave squadron leaders no room to introduce changes. Gordon explains:

In all-out war the situation is very different. Operational activity is much more intense. With hundreds of planes, helicopters and airborne assistance systems aloft simultaneously, the central command post has to instruct planning teams, approve operational plans, and perform other duties. Since its ability to control operations in real time is greatly reduced, it focuses only on vital decisions.

Given the combination of the central command’s inability to control all the forces and the expendability of such control, the flight leaders suddenly have freedom of action and decision-making that they are unaccustomed to. They are unprepared for responsibility and authority so unlike the patterns of conduct they had grown used to in the long period of limited warfare. Lieutenant Colonel Ben-Nun, the commander of the IAF planning branch for most of the offensive operations in the year before the Yom Kippur War, describes the situation: “In RSO we reviewed every order that the squadrons had to carry out down to the last detail. The squadrons became accustomed to receiving everything spoon-fed and neatly packaged. Everything was elaborated even for the smallest operation. During the [Yom Kippur] war I saw how we had failed to prepare the squadrons to act independently. The shift from RSO to wartime conditions became a cognitive issue.”⁷

The challenge lies not only in making the transition from RSOs to a war situation; the biggest challenge is the loss of the ability to act independently, a skill that cannot be acquired on the fly. The need for success in every operation during RSOs exacted its price in wartime. The crisis in trust between squadrons and IAF headquarters stemmed, in part, from the unpreparedness for headquarterssquadron contact in an all-out war.⁸

IDF ground forces found themselves in a similar situation. “In peacetime or in periods of relative peace, armies are sidetracked by demands that becloud their true purpose and divert them from developing the ability to fight effectively in wartime.” Veteran military personnel discovered that their accumulated experience was of little value when they were forced to make decisions far weightier than those in peacetime.⁹ According to Hanan Shai: “In the interwar period, armies conduct RSO whose main task is border defense that often involves the suppression of guerilla forces or paramilitary armies. Tactical, small-size fighting bodies generally conduct these operations in narrow time frames. During the interwar period neither senior nor junior officers acquire operational skills and practical experience in commanding large fighting formations. The political level is chiefly responsible for this phenomenon by placing limitations on the military echelon in order to preclude tactical mistakes developing into strategic problems that might escalate into a major war.”¹⁰