This war in Lebanon and Iran has shown that “might is right” is a fallacy for Israel. Israel has, since its founding in 1948, attempted to use as a strategy, a “might is right” policy deploying escalating kinetic retaliation against any attacks on Israel. “Strike us and we will strike back harder”. Nowhere was this more evident than in the Gaza War initiated by Hamas’s attack on Israel on October 7, 2023. While the numbers do not tell the full story, they nonetheless illustrate the Israeli approach: 1,156 Israelis killed on October 7, 70,000 Gazans killed in the resulting war. 

Although Israel’s overwhelming military superiority was on full display in Gaza, subsequently twice in Iran, and currently in Lebanon—integrating artificial intelligence into operations, targeting and killing leaders seemingly at will, the exploding pagers operation, and achieving aerial supremacy at low cost, the ability for fighter aircraft to roam at will over Iran and Lebanon— it also revealed deep problems.

These wars have shown that the value of Israel’s might is easy to overestimate especially in modern asymmetric warfare against an enemy armed with drones, rockets, and missiles. Israeli and American factories cannot resupply Israeli armed forces fast enough with the expensive interceptors and guided ammunition needed to sustain a long-term engagement. In contrast, Iran fought an asymmetric war with limited weapons, using limited drones and missiles to terrorize millions of Israeli civilians for more than five weeks, joined by barrages of rockets and missiles from Hezbollah in Lebanon. Too much testosterone leads to wretched judgments that confuse lethality and destruction with winning. 

Overwhelming firepower without a political strategy saps Israeli strength, leads to hubris, and results in a lack of an effective strategy to ensure long-term peace. Nowhere is this currently more evident than on the Israeli TV news channels, which parade........

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)