Lebanon 2006: The Hezbollah War

Surprise and poor leadership led to mixed results

Note: I am publishing this old piece in conjunction with Hezbollah’s 40th anniversary. This article originally appeared in Strategy & Tactics Magazine in 2008.           

The Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) not only failed to land a knock out blow in their month long war against Hezbollah, they didn’t even deliver their best punch. The blame lies with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, who lacked the political courage to order an all-out offensive into southern Lebanon. Instead, he allowed Chief of Staff, Lt. Gen. Dan Halutz, to place the burden for victory on Israeli airpower. During the subsequent half-hearted invasion, Israeli troops fought a surprisingly well trained, organized, and tenacious enemy. These battles revealed many shortcomings in Israeli training, especially amongst the reservist units.

Led by Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, Hezbollah is a Shia Muslim terrorist organization militarily and financially backed by Iran. Their goal is the destruction of Israel and the establishment of a Muslim caliphate. After Israel pulled out of Lebanon in 2000, Hezbollah moved in, creating a state within a state. The approximate northern boundary of Hezbollah’s territory is the Litani River. Their unofficial capitol is the centrally located town of Bit Jubail. The area is rough and hilly, with dozens villages located on hilltops and nestled in valley floors. The Lebanese government has no control over this part of the country.

Internet journalist Michael Totten traveled extensively in Lebanon and northern Israel during the spring of 2006.  In an article clairvoyantly titled ‘Anything Can Explode at Any Moment’ Totten describes Hezbollah fighters as fanatics wanting to die in Jihad.  He says that in southern Lebanon, ‘Psychotic roadside propaganda shows severed heads, explosions from suicide bombs, and murderous tyrants from Iran and Syria.’ Totten writes that both Lebanese and Israeli army officers were aware that Hezbollah was planning some kind headline grabbing operation and quotes an Israeli officer on the border as saying, ‘Any minute now something huge could break out…I am afraid to go home and leave my soldiers. When Hezbollah decides to do something, they do it. And they’re good at it.’

A few months after Totten’s trip, on 12 July 2006, Hezbollah struck. Terrorists attacked an Israeli army outpost on the Lebanese border, killing eight soldiers and kidnapping two others. Israel responded by bombing Hezbollah positions and Lebanese infrastructure; road junctions, bridges, a key mountain pass along the road to Syria, and most notably, Beirut International Airport. While these operations may have prevented Hezbollah from spiriting the kidnapped soldiers out of the country, they did not stop the terrorists from deploying their own troops or launching Iranian supplied rockets, over 4,000 of which reined down on Israel during the course of the war, killing 43 and forcing over a million people into bomb shelters.

Aside from a few raids, the IDF did not send troops into Lebanon until 22 July. Led by the elite Golani Brigade, Israeli forces drove on Bit Jubail, encountering heavy resistance to the south in the town of Mauron al-Ras. Bit Jubail fell to the Golani in heavy fighting on the 25th. Despite this hard fought victory, a serious drive into Lebanon did not begin until 1 August, when the IDF sent eight brigades forward (about 10,000 troops) as deep as six kilometers into Lebanon.

Again the Israelis waited, hoping for air strikes and commando raids (there were raids in Baalbek, Tyre and Ras al-Biyada) to win the war. Despite the incursion, Hezbollah rockets kept coming. Finally, as international pressure for a ceasefire mounted, on 10 August, Israel’s cabinet voted to expand the offensive to the banks of the Litani River. This furious advance against the time limit imposed by UN resolution 1701, saw heavy fighting in the northeastern villages of Rashaf and Marjayoun, as Israeli troops sought to cut Hezbollah off from its Bekka Valley logistics. By the time the ceasefire took effect on 14 August, the Israelis had managed to clear out most Hezbollah positions south of the Litani.

The Israelis can point to several successes in their war with Hezbollah. As many as 700 terrorists were killed, with the IDF being able to identify 440 of them not only by name, but by address, strongly suggesting the Israelis captured literally tons of valuable intelligence.  Most of Hezbollah’s long range Fajir and Zelzal 2 rocket launchers, around 50, were destroyed as were a hundred shorter range launchers. Hezbollah’s ‘capitol’ in Bit Jubail was gutted and their headquarters in Beirut was bombed to rubble. Still, while Hezbollah may have been hurt, it had not been destroyed.

Hezbollah’s survival was a consequence of indecision out of the Prime Minister’s office and flawed doctrine in the high command. Under Ehud Olmert’s leadership, Israel’s response was muddled and slow.  Nasrallah’s headquarters was not bombed until 14 July. Olmert also did not call up reserves until over one week after the war began, on 21 July. He waited until 22 July to order a serious attack on Bit Jubail. Even worse, he did not begin a push to the Litani River until 1 August. Reporting in the 4 August edition of the Israeli newspaper Haaretz  reveals that Olmert was reluctant to order the IDF to the Litani and instead favored a limited incursion only about eight kilometers into Lebanon in the hopes that the air force could win the war.

According to a story in the 9 August edition Israeli Insider, the war was further hamstrung because the senior military leadership did not trust one another, nor did they have confidence in Olmert. The news report alleges that ‘many of his [Halutz’s] general staff colleagues from the ground forces, say he and his "blue clique" [blue being the color of the air force uniform-ed] do not fully appreciate the nature of ground warfare.’ These same sources blame Olmert for ‘castrating’ Israeli operations and claim the original plan called for a surprise air assault on Hezbollah positions followed by an amphibious and airborne landing behind the Litani River to cutoff Hezbollah from its bases around Beirut and the Bekka Valley, pinning them in the south where they could be crushed beneath the treads of Israel’s elite armored units.

There were also problems in the field. Subsequent accounts from enraged reservists paint a chaotic picture. Reporting in the 7 August issue of Haaretz says units were sent into battle with old or improper equipment and seemed ill-trained for the urban guerilla warfare which ensued. Weapons actually had to be passed off from unit to unit. ‘Orders changed every few hours.  There was hesitancy all along; it felt as though the IDF brass was not utilizing the power they had in their hands,’ said one reservist in an interview with Ynet News conducted on, 25 August, ‘There was no coordination between the different corps or a defined objective.’ Most scandalously, some reserve units went into the field with inadequate supplies of food and water and were forced to take supplies from dead Hezbollah fighters and even Lebanese civilians.

Israeli’s hardships during the war were not just the result of their mistakes, but Hezbollah’s prowess as well. During the previous six years, whether they were battling Fatah, Palestinian Authority security forces, Islamic Jihad, or Hamas, the IDF always greatly outclassed the enemy, who were little more than armed militia. Not so with Hezbollah. Hezbollah fighters were well trained, some in Syria and Iran, some by members of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Al Qods force, many of whom had been in Lebanon for over a decade. Hezbollah fighters battled in platoon and company sized units. They wore body armor and used night vision gear, knew how to lay down suppressive and covering fire, and were continually able to sneak back into villages that the Israelis had pronounced secured. For instance, after the IDF took Bit Jubail on 22 July, Hezbollah terrorists returned on the 26th and in fierce fighting killing nine Israelis and wounded 27.

Hezbollah was also able to set several deadly ambushes as they showed in their attack of 12 July.  Under cover of diversionary artillery attacks, Hezbollah unleashed a mortar barrage on an Israeli outpost, overran it and took two soldiers captive. They then lured a pursuing Merkeva Tank onto a landmine and brought supporting IDF infantry under fire. Another deadly ambush occurred on 20 July when battalion 51 of the Golani Brigade was drawn into a field outside the village of Maroun al-Ras and brought under mortar, machinegun, and anti-tank missile fire. Hezbollah made great use of old Soviet and European anti-tank missiles, firing over a thousand and scoring fifty hits on Israeli tanks, heavily damaging half. Hezbollah was also able to make use of anti-ship missiles, firing a Chinese made C802 radar guided missile at an Israeli Saar-5 class missile boat, the Hanit, on 15 July, killing four. Another C802 was launched at an Egyptian ship as well. A third technological surprise was Hezbollah’s unmanned vehicles. On the last day of the war, Hezbollah launched two at Israel; one malfunctioned while the other one was shot down. Most troubling, Hezbollah had absolute control over its troops. While in the past, Israeli cease fires with the various Palestinian terrorist groups have been meaningless - with rockets being fired into Israeli hours after truces are announced - from the 14 August ceasefire through the end of the year, fighting has not resumed. This points to a high degree of discipline and central control.

Despite Hezbollah’s surprising competence and the IDF’s short comings, the Israelis won all of the major actions of the war, inflicting massive casualties on the enemy. Indeed, when Israeli troops took decisive action and forced pitched battles, they took a severe toll on Hezbollah. Reporting in the August 10th edition of the Jerusalem Post reveals that the fighting for Bit Jubail killed nearly 200 Hezbollah men, while the last minute drive to the Litani saw nearly 150 fighters killed in two days.

In response to what they have learned about Hezbollah’s capabilities and tactics, the Israeli’s are taking several steps. First, both regular and reserves units are seeing a thirty percent increase in training. This includes a heavy dose of urban warfare exercises against a special unit created to mimic Hezbollah. A mock Arab town has also been constructed. The town resembles an Arab urban area of 5,000 people, boasts minarets, pock-marked buildings, and blaring Arabic music. Officers will also be enrolled in what an article in the 5 December edition of the Australian calls ‘refresher courses’.

Second, the IDF is equipping their tanks with the new Trophy Active Protective System. The Trophy has a quartet of radar sensors and two guns, one mounted on each side at the turret. Once a threat is detected, the guns release a barrage of pellets that will break up an incoming missile at a range of 10-30 meters. The Trophy can auto-reload and engage multiple targets and is stored behind an armored shield. A RAFAEL spokesmen, the system’s manufacturer, is quoted in the 16 March, 2005 issue of Jane’s Defense Week as saying, ‘The system will not only protect the platform, but [personnel and assets] in the area around the vehicle,’ and claimed no more than 1% of dismounts around a Trophy armed tank would be wounded by a nearby missile detonation.

Thirdly, the Israelis have decided to build an anti-Kassam missile system. One possibility is the Sky Dome. Also built by Rafael, Sky Dome uses kinetic energy weapons to intercept incoming short range rockets before they hit their target.  The system has a range of a few dozen kilometers, giving the Israelis a short range compliment to their Arrow anti ballistic missile system deployed around Tel Aviv. Another option is the Nautilus. A laser system developed in conjunction with the American Northrop-Grumman company for more than a decade, the Nautilus is a Tactical High Energy or THEL, with a range of about 10 kilometers.

In a television interview given on 28 August, 2006, Nasrallah admitted that he did not believe the Israelis would respond so forcefully to the July 12th kidnapping. ‘You ask me, if I had known on July 11 ... that the operation would lead to such a war, would I do it? I say no, absolutely not.’ This strongly suggests that while Hezbollah forces may have been on alert, they were not fully prepared to repel an Israeli assault, nor was their leadership in hiding. Had Israel launched a lightning air assault followed by a quick amphibious and airborne landing they may well have captured or killed much of Hezbollah’s leadership and dealt the terrorist organization a death blow. Instead, Hezbollah lives on, Iran’s proxy in the mullah’s quest to destroy the Jewish state.

Afterwords, August 2022: I stand by the analyses but now believe the Israelis inflicted much more damage on Hezbollah than previously thought. Also, this war prompted the Israelis to develop anti-missile technology and prepare for a grand conflict in Lebanon. The 2006 War was an Israeli Strategic victory.