From the middle of last week onward, media military commentators carped about how the aims of the war weren't being defined. Carmela Menashe stepped into this loop in her confrontation with Education Minister Yoav Kisch; it happened again on one of the TV channels. Whenever it occurs, like the reports that swamped the whole internet about an imaginary invasion of UFOs, one infers that the media reflect a state of mind of some kind at the top of the IDF hierarchy.
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Troubled about the matter due to its importance, I called up a senior government minister who has a significant security background. He dismissed this argument totally and advised me to read the orderly media release that was issued pursuant to the government resolution. By Sunday night, the Diplomatic-Security Cabinet had already made "a series of operational decisions meant to lead to the destruction of the military and governing capabilities of Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, such that will render them unable and unwilling to threaten and injure Israeli citizens for many years to come."
This is a clear statement that the IDF commanders can pick up and interpret broadly. The Diplomatic-Security Cabinet is asked to approve grand démarches only; it cannot take the place of senior commanders decisions on the ground. It might approve a ground operation plan and its timing in general terms, although experience shows that specifically here the details should not be overdone because they might leak.
Some among the public may expect a Churchill in our "darkest hour" to enter the stage. So here's the news: We have Churchills. They are a military leadership that has risen from the ranks and is composed of a number of top-notch field commanders who have been kept away from the IDF high brass by shortsighted chiefs of staff. Their names are Chico Tamir, Ofer Winter, and others of their kind who ought to be mobilized right now.
Never in wartime have the IDF and the nation placed their trust in political higher-ups; instead, they turned their eyes to senior commanders on the ground. "The political system will always collapse; then, only the army and the soldiers plug the dike." So Brig. Gen. (Res.) Tsuri Sagui described the general situation to me nearly ten years ago.
It is the division and brigade commanders who will determine the fate of the battle. It is they who should be giving the government resolution and the public's will the broadest interpretation. It is they who should execute first and then get ex-post authorization from the chief of staff or the Minister of Defense. That's what happened in 1967 and in the other great defensive wars.
We observed their ability to improvise and storm the enemy on the first day of the war, as the massacre proceeded. Two important interviews teach us something about how the forces on the ground acted immediately upon the first incursions. The first was an interview by Lilach Shoval for this newspaper with the helicopter pilot Lieut. Col. A; it reveals important facts about how the Israeli Air Force functioned. The second, an interview with the Armored Corps company commander Bar, conducted by Tal Ariel Yakir for this newspaper, yields a picture of what the tanks were doing on the frontline.
It turns out that about half an hour after the offensive began, two helicopters set out on the basis of what their pilots had heard in the media, and around two hours later they were joined by four additional choppers. The Israeli Air Force command didn't function. A company commander in the Armored Corps received a forewarning immediately after rocket fire began at dawn from his brigade commander and, like the helicopter pilots who reached the field on their own counsel, Captain Bar's tank was highly effective. If only there had been twenty helicopters and not six; 15 tanks and not four.
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