Bluesman, I am a big fan of total war as a means to end them quickly, but it didn't work for the IDF becuase the ground troops could not pull thier own weight.
Quote:
|
Unless you can show that the IDF could NOT have won in a gloves-off all-or-nothing fight
|
1- Israel ran out of bombs and needed emergancy resupply from the US.
2- 22 tanks knocked out, dozens more damaged with no breakthrough achieved and the border area was never cleared.
3- unprecedented losses of infantry as a proportion to the force committed to battle
4- flat rate of exchange with Hezzbollah vis a vis causalties.
5- depsite complete command of the air, counter battery radars, UAV's etc was never able to stop Hezzbollah rocket attacks
6- Was never able to get inside Hezzbollah command cycle
7- 30,000 troops, hundreds of tanks and aircraft, attack helicopters, self propelled artillery, called up reserves, paratroops and yet they could not dislodge 3,000 light infantry fighters.
Short of going nuclear what more could Israel have done? Her soilders (not the politicians) did not have the will to win, and her tactical through operational commanders didn't have the skill the greatest military sins of arogence and the inability to learn on the fly and would not press the attack, She dropped bridges and cut roads only to find out air interdiction would not work. They went from fighting Hezzbollah to attacking Lebanese in an attempt to force lebanon to act and instead ended up as an international parahia.