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Basic Assumptions on the Peace Process Revisited

[Strategic Assessment-Institute for National Security Studies-Tel Aviv University] Ron Tira - The peace process represents a legitimate strategic move, but the complement to its risks should have been the strengthening of the IDF. Israel's military power was what created the context and motivation of leaders like President Sadat to abandon the path of war in the first place. However, Israel's leadership believed that the peace process represented a substitute for military power, and did not understand that military power was the foundation of peace. Israel sought to cash in on the peace dividend several decades too early. The Second Lebanon War aroused a sense of competence among Israel's neighbors, and brought war back into the range of viable options. Syria began to invest enormous amounts of money into its military and train it intensively after 15 years of neglect. Since the new fire capabilities of the Arabs are liable to disrupt the mobilization of the reserves, the need for a large regular military benefiting from redundancy becomes acute. Over the years Israel formulated an approach to security arrangements appended to political agreements. Their core is the prevention of surprises. Therefore, Israel strives to disengage the forces by defining demilitarized zones, inviting multi-national supervision, and using other mechanisms intended to give early warning about the enemy preparations for waging war. This approach was perhaps appropriate for the challenges of the past, but its relevance to the present is questionable. The war paradigm of some of Israel's enemies has changed from a direct approach of conquering territory to attrition by means of rocket fire from the depth of enemy territory towards the Israeli home front. In this new reality, placing distance between the armed forces does nothing to protect Israel from a surprise attack. Separating the forces provides the enemy's firepower sources with an additional layer of protection, and makes it more difficult to take control of the launching areas or undertake a strategic maneuver deep into enemy territory. Ironically, what Israel needs today is not the separation of forces but actually convenient corridors of approach to neighboring territories. The writer is formerly the head of a unit in Israel Air Force Intelligence.
2009-09-03 08:00:00
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