An interesting report crossed my in-box, which compared the intelligence performance of Israel during the Second Lebanon War. Broadly speaking, it did very well in the strategic aspects but failed miserably on the tactical aspects, therefore letting Hizbollah escape without the overwhelming defeat which is usually the fate of Israeli opponents.
The author points to two aspects. The first and frankly admirable aspect is that of Hizbollah, it has amazing security protocols, which made it impossible for israeli intelligence to penetrate the organisation. Compartmentalisation of information was taken to an insane level, the communications security was top class (no evesdropping on their comms), and very worryingly, have a very good counter-intelligence activity. The fact that Israeli soldiers were using mobile phones was stupid, and Hizbollah is reported to have hacked into the mobile phone network, tracked their movements and in many cases, ambushes were setup. Also, by knowing their movements, they hid their rockets!
On the Israeli side, they did not have human agents inside Hizbollah, the Christian Maronites were not used, high turnover of israeli officers within the services, lower priority given to tactical intelligence gathering over strategic reporting, and sadly, even when they did have reports, they did not distribute them effectively or efficiently to the ground forces. End result? well, we all know it.
Now India and Israel are collaborating closely, but I wonder if the Israeli forces read the Kargil report from a few years back? Here is a good overview of that report and here is another. Here is a good conference review on the conflict. I strongly believe that the intelligence agencies should review and read these again.
All this to be taken with a grain of piquant salt!!!
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