The evolution of Hezbollah's strategy and military performance, 1982–2006

This article fills a gap in the research on Hezbollah by evaluating their military performance from their formation in 1982 and up till the 2006 Israel–Hezbollah war. This study tests the theses that Hezbollah had developed a very strong tactical proficiency in the late 1990s and that there are more similarities in their strategy and tactics during the 2006 war and the 1982–2000 insurgency in Southern Lebanon than previously assumed. Another central theme of this article is how Hezbollah has been constantly adapting and evolving for the duration of its existence.     

Explaining Lebanese Shii adherence to Hezbollah: alienation,religiosity and welfare provision

Data from a cross-sectional survey of 176 Lebanese Shiis living in Metropolitan Beirut have been used to investigate the relationship between social and religious variables and attitudes toward Lebanon's “Party of God” (Hezbollah). The results indicate that Islamic religiosity, political discontent, and access to social welfare are positively associated with endorsement of the party. The implications of these findings for the party's future in light of recent political developments are discussed.     

Airpower in the Mau Mau conflict: the government's chief weapon

Strategists are currently debating the efficacy airpower provides in counterinsurgency operations. Through the lens of Colonel John Warden's theory of systemic paralysis, this essay reveals the truth about how airpower was employed in the Mau Mau conflict – a subject that has, until now, been both shrouded in mystery and inaccurately reported. It reveals that the use of airpower in a conflict occurring almost 60 years ago proffers a number of lessons for its use in counterinsurgencies today. Moreover, it discovers that although useful in many respects, Warden's model is somewhat limited for analysing the true use of airpower in counterinsurgencies today and consequently, a more appropriate model is offered for airpower strategists to use in such conflicts.     

The Kashmir conflict in South Asia: voices from Srinagar

This article looks at the Kashmir conflict in South Asia, which has been going on since 1947, when India and Pakistan became independent from British colonial rule. After looking at some historical background, the article looks at both the external dimension as well as the internal dimension of the conflict. The external dimension tends to focus on Indo-Pak relations over Kashmir and the internal dimension looks at India's repressive state policies within the state of Kashmir. This article uses Mary Kaldor's “New War” thesis as a theoretical framework to understand the situation and pays special attention to the conflict's very complex and multifaceted nature. The article argues that although the levels of violence have differed from time to time in the region since 1947, today the conflict seems to have less to do with Indo-Pak relations or the external side of things and has more to do with the internal dimension and India's undemocratic ways within Kashmir. Today, Kashmir is one of the most militarised conflict zones in the world. The stationing of the Indian military and paramilitary forces in the region has only exacerbated the situation since it is the security personnel who cause much of the problem. The Armed Forces Special Powers Act gives these security forces extraordinary powers in the region, which they often abuse. The armed forces have no real understanding of the local culture or sympathy for local religious sentiments. Poverty, corruption, administrative failure, police brutality, identity politics and human rights abuses are some of the key features associated with this conflict. Methodologically, a number of interviews were carried out with the local people in the region recently. From the data gathered through the interviews, it is very obvious that the people still feel very oppressed and that the situation is still very volatile, fraught with uncertainty. Finally, after making an assessment of the situation, the article tries to suggest methods of peaceful building and conflict management as the way forward.     

Military Innovation and Tactical Adaptation in the Israel–Hizballah Conflict: The Institutionalization of Lesson-Learning in the IDF

This article highlights a pattern of military adaptation and tactical problem-solving utilized by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) while engaged in protracted conflict with the Lebanese militant group Hizballah. It discusses the IDF’s recent attempts to institutionalize their historically intuitive process of ad-hoc learning by developing a formal tactical-level mechanism for ‘knowledge management’. The diffusion of this battlefield lesson-learning system that originated at lower-levels of the organization is examined, as well as its implementation and effectiveness during the 2006 Lebanon War. A nuanced analysis of IDF adaptation illustrates the dynamic interplay between both ‘top-down’ and ‘bottom-up’ processes of military innovation.     

A Clash of Wills: Hizballah's Psychological Campaign Against Israel in South Lebanon

This article analyzes Hizballah's war against Israel in south Lebanon as a psychological contest where public opinion, perception, and persuasion were the real determinants of victory. Hizballah successfully mobilized popular support for its war by communicating nationalist and religious themes to different sectarian groups in Lebanon. At the same time, it used classic guerrilla warfare as a carefully calibrated psychological tool to erode the morale of Israeli forces, their Lebanese allies, and the Israeli public's support for the war. Hizballah's sophisticated media capability, particularly combat video footage aired on its satellite TV station and the Internet, played a critical role in amplifying the effects of its attrition campaign. By orchestrating information-age media and guerrilla tactics, this strategy has important implications for the future of irregular warfare.     

Goodbye to all that: On small wars and big choices

This article reflects on a decade of British counterinsurgency operations. Questioning the idea that lessons have been learnt, the paper challenges the assumptions that are being used to frame future strategic choice. Suggesting that defence engagement is primarily focused on optimising overseas interventions while avoiding a deeper strategic reassessment about whether the UK should be undertaking these sorts of activities, the article calls for a proper debate on Britain's national security interests.     

PEACEFUL CHANGE AND THE RISE OF SUDAN'S DEMOCRACY MOVEMENT

Negotiations to end Sudan's devastating civil war have repeatedly faltered, but among other developments, the re-emergence of civil society in both the north and south provides greater impetus for peace, as well as greater prospects for democracy and respect for human rights. Particularly important, but thus far relatively unnoticed, is the rise of a southern-led civil society movement in the north. Although Sudan's complex history and demographics provide an explanation for much of the conflict, in fact the conflict is essentially political, while it is this very complexity that could provide a basis for the resolution of the conflict. Some intriguing parallels with South Africa's recent experience underscore the role of civil society, and point to some options for the future.     

Urban violence and the militarisation of security: Brazilian ‘peacekeeping’ in Rio de Janeiro and Port-au-Prince

Despite problems of violence domestically, Brazil has played a key leadership role as part of MINUSTAH peacekeeping operations in Haiti since 2004. This article addresses how Brazil's international military engagement is shaping domestic approaches to urban security, and what may be the implications of the use of military strategies, operations, and norms to address issues of public security in Brazilian cities. It is argued that current approaches toward urban security employing military-trained peacekeepers actually represent a continuation of old paradigms, yet these recent militarised approaches are likely evolving into newer and potentially more accountable forms by constraining indiscriminate use of force and establishing a positive state presence in marginal urban areas. As such, the article connects long-established issues of dealing with urban violence in Latin America with ongoing debates in the United States and beyond about post-counterinsurgency approaches to increasingly urban conflict settings. It reflects on potential lessons to be learned from the Latin American perspective, while showing also how these have changed over the last decade. The article concludes that despite the potential utility of force in some urban conflict settings, this approach could entail a normative shift towards legitimising forceful containment of violence, and hinder democratic consolidation in Brazil.     

Nuclear Weapons and the Vietnam War

This article analyzes why US leaders did not use nuclear weapons during the Vietnam War. To date, there has been no systematic study of US decision-making on nuclear weapons during this war. This article offers an initial analysis, focusing on the Johnson and Nixon administrations. Although US leaders did not come close to using nuclear weapons in the conflict, nuclear options received more attention than has previously been appreciated. Johnson's advisers raised the issue of nuclear weapons and threats on several occasions, and Henry Kissinger, Nixon's national security adviser, looked into nuclear options to bring the war to an end. Ultimately, however, both administrations privately rejected such options. The conventional explanation for the non-use of nuclear weapons during the Cold War – deterrence – is insufficient to explain the Vietnam case. This article analyzes the role of military, political and normative considerations in restraining US use of nuclear weapons in the Vietnam War. It argues that while military and political considerations, including escalation concerns, are part of the explanation, a taboo against the use of nuclear weapons played a critical role.     

Radio Jamming: The Disarmament of Radio Propaganda

To more concretely define what the UN's policy towards international peacekeeping should be in the twenty-first century, novel methods of addressing inter-and intrastate conflict need examining. Consequently, this article argues that UN peacekeeping operations must begin to include technological capabilities – namely UN jamming of hate radio – when certain prerequisites are met. Using the Rwandan genocide and the radio station that largely inspired the conflict, RTLMC, as a case study, this article illustrates hate radio's power in both inter- and intrastate conflict and devises a system wherein UN peacekeeping efforts can effectively silence this menace to international security.     

Setting a place at the table: ending insurgencies through the political process

This article argues that, under certain conditions, allowing insurgents into the political process – through elections or government posts – can be a useful tool in the peace process and can help end insurgencies. However, bringing insurgents into the political process is unlikely to end insurgencies on its own, particularly if insurgents, the government, or the population believes that force is still a viable means of defeating the opponent and changing the status quo. The article begins with a brief overview of the causes of insurgency and on conflict resolution for internal wars. The article then considers two examples of insurgents that have entered the political process – the Irish Republican Army (IRA) in Northern Ireland and Hezbollah in Lebanon – and the differing degrees of success in transforming these insurgents to non-violent participants in the political process. It concludes by suggesting how insurgents can be brought into the political process as part of conflict resolution and the implications for Afghanistan.     

Prologue to Suez: Anglo-American planning for military intervention in a Middle East war, 1955–1956

This article contributes yet another perspective to the Suez War – the strategic and military planning carried out since the end of the Second World War by the Western Allies for the contingency of a new world conflict against the Soviet bloc. The Middle East was of vital strategic significance. Colonel Nasser's announcement of the Czech arms deal in September 1955 triggered the countdown to a new war in the region. London and Washington urgently drew up contingency plans for intervention, both with economic sanctions and armed force. Joint staff talks were held in Washington from March to August 1956. They were halted just two months before the United Kingdom decided to collude with France and Israel to attack Egypt.     

The missing dimension: IDF special operations forces and strategy in the Second Lebanon War

In the course of the 2006 Lebanon War the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) employed special operations forces (SOF) for raids against Hizb'allah's command and control structure. This article argues that a faulty conceptualization of the value of special operations and misguided expectations determined by the new IDF concept of operations impacted adversely on the employment of SOF for this kind of operations. Both these elements contributed in turn to substantially degrade SOF performance in the context of the war.     

The Israel Defense Forces as an epistemic authority: An intellectual challenge in the reality of the Israeli – Palestinian conflict

The changes in the nature of warfare and its transformation toward Low Intensity Conflict (LIC) intrastate conflict have challenged the patterns of interaction between the political and the military echelons in Israel. It seems that the political echelon's superiority is maintained at the institutional and formal levels, but on the substantive level, which demands relying on knowledge and systematic staff work, the political echelon's position is weakened and loses its validity.

Introducing the military echelon in Israel as an epistemic authority regarding the violent confrontation and the main outlines of the military knowledge development process might clarify why the absence of the required dialogue between the echelons and the weakness of the intellectual effort increased the military's influence over the shaping of Israeli conflict-management strategy. The argument's validity and its explanatory power can be found relevant for other countries whose militaries are deeply involved in the management of LIC.     

The challenge and meaning of justice in northern Uganda

Even though the peace talks in northern Uganda have faltered, attempts at negotiations between the Ugandan government and the rebel Lord's Resistance Army are continuing. The current rapprochement between the two sides is the most significant move towards peace in the twenty-year civil war in northern Uganda. Even though the war has been extreme in its brutality, it is little known of outside the region—with reports on the conflict often portraying a protective government pitted against a crazed rebel group. But the issues are much more complex. The article examines the history of abuses and atrocities committed by both sides; the wider implications of the conflict for the north; why the rest of Uganda are seemingly disinterested in the conflict; and the politics behind why northern civil society have little trust in the Ugandan government or the International Criminal Court (ICC). The current prospect of peace has also stirred up the debate around justice and the forms of justice for victims of both rebel and government atrocities. And this is where the biggest cleft between the northern civil society and officialdom (government and international NGOs) resides. The article further examines the implications of the ICC's work in Uganda, and why there has been such widespread hostility towards it from northern civil society. The article also asks if—beyond the end of fighting and terror—peace will really mean that northern Uganda can finally partake in the prosperity the rest of the country has almost taken for granted.     

India's Pursuit Of Ballistic Missile Defense

This article analyzes India's efforts to deploy a Ballistic Missile Program (BMD). The article has three objectives. First, it argues that scientific-bureaucratic factors and India's incapacity to deter Pakistan's use of terrorist proxies have driven its quest for BMD. Second, the article also evaluates the current state of India's two-tiered missile defense shield. In spite of various claims on the part of India's defense science establishment, the paper estimates that India still lacks a deployable BMD system and is still far from developing an effective strategy of deterrence-through-denial. Third, the article analyzes the implications of the development of India's BMD system for nuclear stability in South Asia. The article shows how India's BMD capacities, however limited, have indirectly exacerbated the security concerns of India's regional rival, Pakistan.     

Desert insurgency: lessons from the third Tuareg rebellion

This article provides an in-depth examination and analysis of the 2006–2009 Tuareg rebellion in Mali and Niger. It identifies the underlying reasons behind the rebellion, explores contrasting counter-insurgency (COIN) strategies employed by the two governments, and presents some lessons learned. While both COIN approaches ultimately produced similar peace settlements, the article argues that the Malian strategy of reconciliation combined with the selective use of force was far more effective than the Nigerien iron fist approach at limiting the size and scope of the insurgency and producing a more sustainable peace. It concludes by looking at the role of external actors, particularly the United States, and how the failure to internationalize the conflict was actually more beneficial to the local COIN effort, as well as to the longer strategic interests of the United States in the region.     

From the people's army to the Jewish people's army: the IDF's force structure between professionalization and militarization

The article discusses processes of “religionization” within the institutional identity and ethos of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and the connection of these processes with the significant structural changes the IDF has undergone in recent decades. The main argument presented is that since the late 1980s, the IDF has been in a culture conflict, torn between soldiers and civilians who advocate turning the IDF into a professional army “military professionalization,” and others who wish to preserve, and even strengthen, the “people's army” model. The present article shows that the meaning of the term “people” in this phrase has shifted to refer strictly to the Jewish people, and that a national-ethnic perception strongly influenced by religious-national ideology has been adopted.     

Learning ‘Under Fire’: Israel’s improvised military adaptation to Hamas tunnel warfare

What organisational attributes enhance a military’s ability to effectively adapt on the battlefield? Upon the outbreak of war in July 2014 between Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) encountered an expansive network of tunnels from which Hamas was launching large-scale assaults into Israel. This article illustrates that the IDF’s ability to successfully adapt ‘under fire’ to this battlefield surprise was facilitated by several important attributes related to its organisational learning capacity: a dynamic, action-oriented organisational culture, a flexible leadership and command style, specialised commando units which acted as ‘incubators’ for learning and innovation, and a formal system to institutionalise and disseminate lessons learned.