The doctrine of limited conflict assumes that, unlike the wars of the past, this time Israel is fated to wage a protracted war, as if it was a superpower like the United States, Britain, or France, that waged remote, protracted, conventional wars that invariably ended with their withdrawal from the battlefield. This kind of fighting is referred to as a war of attrition, and is the ideological backbone of the limited conflict doctrine. However, this concept absolutely contradicts the basic assumptions of the traditional Israeli security doctrine, which eschews any possibility of prolonged fighting due to Israel's endemic shortage of resources, both human and material. Adoption of the attrition doctrine means shelving Israel's traditional security doctrine.

A rapid decision not only prevents loss of life, it also forestalls the severe economic impact of a protracted war. Since the outbreak of the current fighting, at the end of September 2000, the Israeli economy has paid a heavy price. Instead of an annual growth rate of 4 percent, the economy contracted at a rate of 1 percent per year, a loss valued at about 45 billion shekels in the first two years alone.

Economist Bryan Caplan did research on the historical connection between a war's battlefront and its economic cost; he concluded that a "local" war causes significant economic damage to the state involved, while a "distant" war usually stimulates economic growth of the state whose soldiers are fighting abroad. Thus, the immediate conclusion of Israel's "local" war is also imperative because of the serious economic and social implications of the continued confrontation.

In the mid-1950s, Israel was also subjected to a terrorist onslaught. The IDF's reaction was dictated by a security doctrine that led to the 1956 Sinai Campaign, a war intended to defeat the terrorist entity that had emerged in the Gaza Strip under Egyptian auspices. When it became clear to Israel's leadership that acts of retaliation were unable to halt the terror, it reached the inevitable conclusion that the only solution was a rapid military victory, that would conquer the territory and eliminate the instigators of the terror and their hosts.

The supposed division between "political" and "military" wings is another perspective totally divorced from the conceptual world of the subjects of this interpretation. It has produced a situation in which the first group enjoys immunity from harm, because it is not perceived as an instigator of violence. Yet an examination of the structure and organization of underground movements like the PLO, which since its very inception has been run along the lines of a communist resistance movement, indicates that the violence is orchestrated by both the political and military wings. According to Robert Thompson, those belonging to the political wing are responsible for terror and sabotage, whereas the military wing oversees guerrilla activities, such as ambushes and attacks. It is not by chance that the head of the political wing of the Palestinian Authority continues to wear his military uniform, and it is similarly not surprising that many of those who instigate terror have never worn battle fatigues.

It is more than disturbing that Israel has adopted a military doctrine convenient exclusively for the other side. The doctrine of limited conflict creates precisely the combat reality that the enemy expects and desires as a means for our defeat. For this reason, it involves -- though obviously not intentionally on Israel's part -- elements that strengthen the enemy.

As noted earlier, according to the doctrine of limited conflict, a decision is achieved through "protracted attrition." This doctrine further states that "limited conflict is political in terms of the nature of its means and not only in terms of its objectives and constraints, and that as a result, the form of military action will be dictated directly by the political consideration." From the moment that the State of Israel and the IDF determined that the aim was a political victory, while the enemy kept striving for a victory based on brute force, we became the victims of conceptual confusion, one which harnesses and adjusts the use of force in accordance with political restrictions and considerations that make military victory impossible.

During the period between November 1947 and March 1948, political considerations prevented the Haganah from attacking areas that were under Arab control.

A similar situation emerged during the period between November 29, 1947 -- after the adoption of the UN Partition Resolution -- and March 1948, when political considerations prevented the Haganah, which was numerically and qualitatively superior to the combined Arab forces in Mandatory Palestine, from attacking areas that were under Arab control. Instead, the Haganah was only able to attempt to open roads to besieged Israeli towns and villages. In this "Battle for the Roads," political constraints forced the Haganah to operate along a battlefront about as broad as the front bumper of an armored car. By March 1948, this crisis had culminated in the loss of 1,200 lives; Arab bands were in control of all major arteries of transportation; and remote Jewish settlement blocs were cut off and isolated.

In a practical expression of the final disenchantment with diplomacy's ability to resolve the conflict through superpower intervention and the forced implementation of a political solution, Operations Head Yigal Yadin wrote to David Ben-Gurion in 1948, under the heading, "Summary of the Combat Situation": "It must be determined that all the stages of the fighting until now have been dictated to us by the enemy, and we have not been able to

April 2004               - 5 -               Outpost