Scuds on Tel-Aviv: Strategic Effects & Quantitative Measures

1. Scuds on Tel-Aviv: Strategic Effects & Quantitative Measures The Israeli Experience in the First Gulf War Moshe Sharvit hgrtmr@zahav.net.il

2. Take military action Neutralize enemy’s military capabilities Achieve strategic goal The Traditional Concept of “Total War” Military realm Military success is assumed to be a sufficient condition for achieving the Strategic Goal

3. Implications for Analysis • No need to analyze operational-strategic link • Attrition is a (the) primary MOE

4. Modern (limited) War Military action ? Non-Military action Strategic Effects Strategic Goal Other factors

5. Implications for Analysis • Military success (in the traditional sense) is neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition for the attainment of the Strategic Goal • Strategic Effects are: • mostly outside the military realm; • (often) not physical • Analysis of Action-Effect relation has to deal with non-military aspects. • Attrition is insufficient/inadequate as a MOE • What are the relevant MOE’s? How can they be derived?

6. An Example: Israel’s Part in Desert Storm • Sadam’s invasion of Kuwait was universally perceived as a blatant act of aggression. • The UN sanctioned military action. • A US-led coalition was formed. • 3 Arab states - Saudi-Arabia, Egypt & Syria – were key members

7. Sadam’s Strategy • Goal: Breakdown the Coalition* • Strategy: Shift perception of context – * Or at least strain its cohesiveness West vs. Moslems/Arabs Good guys vs. Villain OR Arab-Israeli conflict

8. Sadam’s Strategy (2) Attack Israeli cities Action: Anxiety in Israel Effect: Political pressure for Israeli military action Israeli military intervention Context becomes the Arab-Israeli conflict Arab member-nations quit the Coalition Coalition disintegrates/weakens

9. The Israeli Side • Strategic interest: Allow Coalition to Achieve its Mission (= do not intervene) • Operational Goal: • Mitigation of political pressure to a manageable level • Success decided by: • Actual hardship endured by the Israeli population; • The public’s perception of the government’s ability to provide adequate remedies.

10. Military Means • Counter force – performed by the coalition • Interception of SCUDs • Civil Defence

11. Analytic Challenge Relate military action and achievements to the attainment of the Operational Goal

12. Observations • Considerable public anxiety despite minimal casualties (2 dead; 1 seriously injured) and relatively minor physical damage. • The issues are: • the “perceived risk” rather than the “objective risk”; • Hardship resulting from prolonged, continuous civil defence posture.

13. Working Assumption • Perception is basically subjective but is influenced by objective parameters. Some important independent variables are objective Political Pressure = F(a, b, c…)

14. Independent Variablesobjective • Duration of the conflict • Max. # of casualties in a single incident • # of civil-defence alerts • # of warhead impacts within city perimeter • Disruption of civilian routine • Disruption of vital public utilities • Loss of income

15. Attributes of Function • F is monotone in all independent variables • F is “logarithmic” in all independent variables • Suggestion: Use (log of) objective independent variables as MOE’s.

16. Implication for Policy Formation Examples • What can be accomplished by the military means at hand? • Take a calculated risk of suffering more casualties in order to minimize disruption of civilians’ daily routine • Make use of estimates of points of impact in order to minimize # of alerts (another trade-off with # of casualties).

17. Some Lessons • We need to understand the strategic context, goals, environment etc. • Strategic effects are usually non-physical; often not strictly military • In general, the Action-to-Effect relationship cannot be fully specified. However, it may be possible to deduce some of its attributes. It may be possible to use these attributes to derive MOE’s. • Such MOE’s are often “logarithmic”