Israel falls prey to its war on definitions

[scandium]

Its a bit late for me to judge if that's the best possible title for this snafu, but I couldn't think of what else to title it:

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satelli...cle%2FShowFull

The battles in Bint Jbail this week were the result of a mistaken operational concept. IDF generals constantly refer to Hizbullah fighters as "terrorists." While this is a reasonable distinction for politicians, it is fatal for those actually waging war. It is true that Hizbullah is a terrorist organization. But on the ground in Lebanon, it has organized itself as a near-conventional force that uses terror and guerrilla warfare tactics along with standard flanking maneuvers and ambushes.

When military commanders define the enemy as "terrorists" rather than as "fighters" they engender a perception of Hizbullah as an enemy little different from Fatah or Hamas. The result of this intellectual indolence is unwillingness on the part of IDF commanders to recognize the magnitude and quality of the military challenge they face and to take appropriate measures to surmount it.

When an army knows it is fighting a well trained opposition, its commanders remember to activate and man the electronic warfare defensive systems on their missile boats.

When an army fights against a conventional foe that has trained continuously for this exact war in earnest for the past six years and periodically for the past 24 years, its spokesmen and commanders do not make empty, unverifiable claims of victory. They do not make bombastic statements claiming to have destroyed 50 percent of the opposing force's infrastructures by aerial bombardment after two days and argue that ground forces are unimportant.

When an army fights an army, it does not attempt to cordon off an entire village with a single infantry battalion and it does not claim to have cordoned off a village when it has only surrounded it from 270 degrees.

As an increasing number of voices in and out of the IDF claim, it is possible that the IDF commanders who insist on fighting in Lebanon with force levels and methods bettered suited to Gaza will have to be replaced. Galilee Division Commander Brig.-Gen. Gal Hirsch, OC Northern Command Maj.-Gen. Udi Adam, IDF Spokeswoman Brig.-Gen. Miri Regev and Chief of General Staff Lt.-Gen. Dan Halutz may not be capable of successfully performing their duties.

I suppose what I find ironic is that I myself have been criticized here at various times for calling Hezbollah a "guerrila army" rather than the more politically correct phrase "terrorist organization". But it seems words really do matter and impoverishing the discourse for the sake of appeasing the prevailing political conventions actually has consequences - real military consequences. But that is part of the problem with the "War on Terror" paradigm specifically and the war on abstract concepts in general.

Meanwhile, in the Arab world, the popularity of the leader of Hezbollah has eclipsed that of Bin Laden, and this article provides a nice little bio on Israel's Public Enemy #1:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article...0203_1,00.html

[Edit] In case anyone is wondering what is significant about this particular battle, it is that after 4 weeks of Lebanon being pounded by hundreds of bombing sorties and thousands of shells, Hezbollah still managed to inflict upon their vastly numerically and technologically superior opponent the worst single day losses the IDF has incurred in 20 years of fighting.