Posted on 08/14/2006 12:37:21 PM PDT by DannyTN
While the damage caused Israel’s military reputation tops Western assessments of the Lebanon war, DEBKAfile’s Iranian sources report an entirely different perception taking hold in ruling circles in Tehran.
After UN Security Council resolution 1701 calling for a truce was carried Friday, Aug. 11, the heads of the regime received two separate evaluations of the situation in Lebanon – one from Iran’s foreign ministry and one from its supreme national security council. Both were bleak: their compilers were concerned that Iran had been manipulatively robbed of its primary deterrent asset ahead of a probable nuclear confrontation with the United States and Israel.
While the foreign ministry report highlighted the negative aspects of the UN resolution, the council’s document complained that Hizballah squandered thousands of rockets – either by firing them into Israel or having them destroyed by the Israeli air force.
The writer of this report is furious over the waste of Iran’s most important military investment in Lebanon merely for the sake of a conflict with Israeli over two kidnapped soldiers.
It took Iran two decades to build up Hizballah’s rocket inventory.
DEBKAfile’s sources estimate that Hizballah’s adventure wiped out most of the vast sum of $4-6 bn the Iranian treasury sunk into building its military strength. The organization was meant to be strong and effective enough to provide Iran with a formidable deterrent to Israel embarking on a military operation to destroy the Islamic regime’s nuclear infrastructure.
To this end, Tehran bought the Israeli military doctrine of preferring to fight its wars on enemy soil. In the mid-1980s, Iran decided to act on this doctrine by coupling its nuclear development program with Israel’s encirclement and the weakening its deterrence strength. The Jewish state was identified at the time as the only country likely to take vigorous action to spike Iran’s nuclear aspirations.
The ayatollahs accordingly promoted Hizballah’s rise as a socio-political force in Lebanon, at the same time building up its military might and capabilities for inflicting damage of strategic dimensions to Israel’s infrastructure.
That effort was accelerated after Israeli forces withdrew from the Lebanese security zone in May 2000. A bunker network and chain of fortified positions were constructed, containing war rooms equipped with the finest western hi-tech gadgetry, including night vision gear, computers and electronics, as well as protective devices against bacteriological and chemical warfare.
This fortified network was designed for assault and defense alike.
Short- medium- and long-range rockets gave the hard edge to Hizballah’s ablity to conduct a destructive war against Israel and its civilians – when the time was right for Tehran.
Therefore, Iran’s rulers are hopping mad and deeply anxious over news of the huge damage sustained by Hizballah’s rocket inventory, which was proudly touted before the war as numbering 13,000 pieces.
Hizballah fighters, they are informed, managed to fire only a small number of Khaibar-1 rockets, most of which hit Haifa and Afula, while nearly 100 were destroyed or disabled by Israeli air strikes.
The long-range Zelzal-1 and Zelzal-2, designed for hitting Tel Aviv and the nuclear reactor at Dimona have been degraded even more. Iran sent over to Lebanon 50 of those missiles. The keys to the Zelzal stores stayed in the hands of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards officers who were in command of Hizballah. Nasrallah and his officers had no access to these stores.
But Tehran has learned that Israel was able to destroy most of the 22 Zelzal launchers provided.
That is not the end of the catalogue of misfortunes for the Islamic rulers of Iran.
1. The UN Security Council embodied in resolution 1701 a chapter requiring Hizballah to disarm – in the face of a stern warning issued by supreme ruler Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in person in the early days of the war. Revolutionary Guards commanders went so far as to boast: “No one alive is capable of disarming Hizballah.”
The disarming of Hizballah would therefore be a bad knock to the supreme ruler’s authority and prestige as well as a disastrous blow for the deterrent force so painstakingly and expensively fashioned as a second front line to protect the Islamic republic from a safe distance.
2. Hizballah’s ejection from South Lebanon, if accomplished in the aftermath of the ceasefire, would moreover deprive Tehran of the sword hanging over Israel’s head of instantaneous attack.
For the sake of partial damage control, Tehran handed Nasrallah a set of new instructions Sunday, Aug. 13:
First, to find a way of evading the ceasefire and keeping up war operations against Israeli forces.
Second, to reject the proposal to disarm before the Lebanese government meets on this Monday afternoon. In fact, that meeting was called off after Hassan Nasrallah sent a message to the Lebanese ministers flatly refusing to have Hizballah give up its weapons in the south. He also turned down a compromise proposal handed him later, whereby the Lebanese army’s first mission after deploying in the south would be to help Hizballah evacuate its fighters with their arms to positions north of the Litani River.
The strategy evolving in Tehran since the ceasefire went into effect Monday morning requires Hizballah to employ a range of stratagems – not only to prevent the truce from stabilizing but to stop the Lebanese army from deploying n the south and, above all, the entry of an effective international force.
Furthermore, Hizballah is instructed to stretch the military crisis into the next three of four months, synchronously with the timetable for a UN Security Council sanctions-wielding session on Iran.
According to exclusive reports reaching DEBKAfile’s sources, the Iranian government believes that Israel and the United States are preparing a military operation for the coming October and November to strike Iran’s nuclear installations. It is therefore vital to keep the two armies fully occupied with other pursuits.
Iranian leaders’ conviction that the Lebanon war was staged to bamboozle them rests on certain perceptions:
As seen from Tehran, Israel looked as though it was carrying out a warming-up exercise in preparation for its main action against Iran’s nuclear program. The Israeli army was able to explore, discover and correct its weak points, understand what was lacking and apply the necessary remedial measures. They therefore expect the IDF to emerge from the war having produced novel methods of warfare.
They also have no doubt that the United States will replenish Israel’s war chest with a substantial aid program of new and improved weaponry.
From the Iranian viewpoint, Israel succeeded in seriously degrading Hizballah’s capabilities. It was also able to throw the Lebanese Shiite militia to the wolves; the West is now in a position to force Nasrallah and his men to quit southern Lebanon and disarm. The West shut its eyes when he flouted the Resolution 1559 order for the disarmament of all Lebanese militias. But that game is over. The Americans will use Resolution 1701 as an effect weapon to squeeze Iran, denied of its second-front deterrence, on its nuclear program.
Tehran hopes to pre-empt the American move by torpedoing the Lebanon ceasefire and preventing the termination of hostilities at all costs.
So this assessment is very welcome.
"many Israeli supporters seem to have adopted a negative definition...So this assessment is very welcome."
Both are right. Debka is correct, this was far more costly for Iran and Syria financially than it was for Israel. The reason I still see it as a defeat is that Olmert (inexplicably) did not apply ground pressure until the cease-fire was already called. Because of this, Israel is now in a position to crush billions of dollars of Iranian/Syrian funded military infrastructure, but can do nothing because it did not take this position until after the ceasefire was called.
It took Israel 30 days to destroy 75% of them.
The existence of an even better outcome does not make this a defeat. That's a crazy way of defining victory and one that gives aid and comfort to the enemy.
You must remember the source. DEBKA does get it right about 50% of the time.
I think they get it right far more often than that, but most of their reports are not neither confirmable nor debunkable. Just like this article, confirmation of internal Iranian assessments and current strategy will not likely be confirmed or debunked by other sources.
This war was only the beginning anyway.
Tehran hopes to pre-empt the American move by torpedoing the Lebanon ceasefire and preventing the termination of hostilities at all costs.
So then more Iranian/syrian funded infrastructure will be destroyed and more Hezbollah and Iranian revolutionary guards killed. I'm sure that the IDF is going to start exploring around Southern Lebannon and start finding all the weapons stashes & bunkers and destroy it. I've heard that christian and other non-shiite villages in the south have been informing the IDF on where Hezbollah has been hiding and where their infrastructure is located.
This is what happens when you appoint mullahs and morons like Iamjihadmadman to run a country.
I think of Debka as a live feed. It lacks editing and is sometimes later proved to be wrong when the truth comes out...but IMO they serve a valuable purpose.
The points made in this article are valid and good to hear, though, as said upthread, the serious degrading of Hezzie missiles and manpower still doesn't make up for Olmert's obvious failures.
Olmert held the IDF back from doing its job and as a result Hizbullah still exists. Shameful. Bring back Bibi!
Maybe it is a setback for Iran's program. Too bad DEBKA is alone telling this story.
"The MSM is spouting Muslim propaganda of a Hezbullah win. And many Israeli supporters seem to have adopted a negative definition of winning so that any win for Israel short of a perfect outcome is not a win, thus buying into Hezbullah's definition of a win, despite 530+ dead Hezbullah.
So this assessment is very welcome."
It is welcome and perhaps part of the grander plan which may have worked. However, I still believe Israel should have went in on the ground from day 1.
Questions like "since the enemy specifically targets our civilians, why should we be so concerned about theirs?", and "why, when the enemy hides among a "civilian" population which gives them aid and comfort and lets them store their rockets in the basement be a matter of concern to a civilized nation when it comes to collateral damage?"
Israel should have given warning for the Lebanese civilians to flee, and then destroyed every village and bunker south of the Litani with fuel-air explosives, the kind that reach right down into the bunkers and burn up the air in the terrorists lungs. In short, a genocidal action against Hezbollah.
The time has come to take off our self-imposed gloves and destroy these beasts.
"their compilers were concerned that Iran had been manipulatively robbed of its primary deterrent asset ahead of a probable nuclear confrontation with the United States and Israel."
No question that Iran is going to confront the US with the nuclear bomb.
Olmert should have done the end run around South lebanon to cut it off. Then pound the crap out of it from the air.
I agree there does need to be public debate and awareness about some of these issues.
"should the Geneva convention be scrapped, since we're the only ones who abide by it?"
The Geneva convention shouldn't be scrapped because they have protected our POW's in some cases, but only western countries seem to abide by them. The convention should stand, but our response and the world's response to a combatant failing to heed the convention needs to be examined. The world should really ban together against anyone failing to heed the convention, because that's an automatic uncivilized behavior.
"since the enemy specifically targets our civilians, why should we be so concerned about theirs?",
This one needs more care. You could make the case that Hezbullah wasn't hiding behind their own civilization but rather Lebanon's. Is the civilian population willing supporters of terrorists such as the Palestinians or are they a people held hostage like Iraq and Lebanon?
"why, when the enemy hides among a "civilian" population which gives them aid and comfort and lets them store their rockets in the basement be a matter of concern to a civilized nation when it comes to collateral damage?"
Valid point. So far, Israel and the U.S. don't seem to be too concerned about bombing civilian houses when they are used for the military. However we have precision munitions. But again the world outrage at such tactics of hiding behind civilians is not what it should be.
"In short, a genocidal action against Hezbollah."
You are drifting to the dark side. Against Hezbullah fighters or all populations whose leadership supports Hezbullah?
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