Israel Isn’t Prepared for a Three Block War
Most Americans were as horrified as the Israelis when three Israeli hostages brandishing a white flag were killed by Israeli Defense Force (IDF) soldiers in Gaza. I was saddened by the incident but not surprised. As a U.N. observer in South Lebanon and a participant in urban fighting in Mogadishu, Somalia, I witnessed the confusion of urban fighting in an environment where one side deliberately uses human beings as shields.
Like many marines and soldiers with similar experiences, I came to believe that we Americans would have to get much better at urban combat, not just by improving training and equipment, but by preparing psychologically.
Lessons Learned in URBAN WARRIOR
By the late 1990s, the Marine Corps as an institution dedicated itself to improving urban combat capabilities, so it launched a series of urban operations experiments called URBAN WARRIOR. In our first full-scale, force-on-force urban experiment at the former Oakland Naval Hospital compound using simulated munitions, the results were horrific. Our assault forces suffered up to 80 percent casualties. The psychological intensity of combat — even simulated — in conditions where the enemy could pop up behind our force from sewers and tunnels was intense. In some cases, discipline broke down and fistfights broke out between our blue force and captured red personnel, even after time-outs had been called. (READ MORE: Silence That Can Kill: Where Are the Black Friends Jews Need?)
One of the early results of urban experimentation was the development of a concept dubbed by General Krulak — the commandant of the Marine Corps at the time — as the “Three Block War.” Modern urban operations are such that a soldier or marine can be doing humanitarian or peacekeeping missions in one place, the equivalent of civilian policing in a second, and full-scale urban combat in a third.
We found that ramping up from the first block to the third quickly was much easier than going from the third to the second or first. Troops in that situation needed a period of decompression and orientation on the ever-changing rules of engagement before being recommitted.
This is not to make excuses for what happened in Gaza, but I suspect what transpired was exactly that. Tired IDF soldiers coming off hours of intense combat encountered people waving a white flag who might or might not be suicide bombers. Not being prepared or trained to do the police work of hostage recovery, they opened fire.
Israel Doesn’t Have Time
When I was in Israel in 2006 for a military conference, the only troops in the IDF fully trained in urban operations were several battalions of special forces and the paratroops. To subdue Gaza using two to three divisions, the Israelis were forced to call up reservists, and there was no time to train them for heavy urban combat, much less the three-block war.
URBAN WARRIOR helped us to better prepare our marines and soldiers for heavy combat for the three-block war required for the pacification of places like Fallujah, Ramadi, and Baghdad. What can our experience in Iraq teach the Israelis? First, there is every indication that the IDF will be in Gaza for a long time and that Hamas and related radical groups will not go quietly into the night. That means that the IDF will be fighting the three-block war for the foreseeable future. Unfortunately, the Marine Corps could not replicate Fallujah and Ramadi today. Some unfortunate force structuring decisions have eliminated the tanks and heavy engineering equipment that were used to keep casualties low. (READ MORE: Israel Must Obtain an Unconditional Surrender)
Even when Hamas’s control over the streets is broken, the Palestinian Authority, which exercises nominal control over parts of the West Bank, is in no immediate position to conduct police functions or to ensure the safe delivery of relief supplies to the population. In the words of the late Colin Powell, having broken Gaza, the Israelis bought it. That will require a huge shift in training, psychological preparation, and the size of the standing army.
In Iraq, the Marines found that it took about three months of intensive training to prepare for urban combat in the Al Anbar Province. The two Army brigades that I partnered with while working as a governance advisor in West Baghdad had similar work-ups. In both those situations, our forces were trying to keep the Iraqi urban fence sitters at least neutral, if not winning their hearts and minds. At this point, there are very few fence sitters in Gaza. Consequently, the three-block war will be even more critical for them. We had the advantage of having an all-volunteer force and could afford the time it took to train to the three blocks. Israel’s wartime reserve army is also its workforce. She doesn’t have that luxury. (READ MORE: Throw That York Professor in Jail, Canada. Her Vandalism Was Anti-Semitic.)
America could afford to spend nearly a decade in Iraq. The Israelis would be very hard-pressed to do it in Gaza. Mr. Netanyahu and his cabinet will have to make some hard decisions regarding the force structure and training of the IDF.
Gary Anderson retired as the Chief of Staff of the Marine Corps Warfighting Lab that conducted URBAN WARRIOR.
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