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Tank Warfare In The Gaza Battlefield
The tactical success of the Israeli military incursion into Gaza over the past week confirms a lesson we noted after the five-day Russian conquest of one-third of Georgia in the Caucasus last August: Main Battle Tanks still rule ground war, whatever the high-tech, guerrilla-war and minimum-army enthusiasts say to the contrary.In the first four days of its ground forces' incursion into Gaza, Israel inflicted an estimated 500 military fatalities on the forces of Hamas, the Islamic Resistance Movement, not counting the many civilians killed in the fighting. But the Israeli army forces involved suffered only five or six fatalities. This obviously reflected the extremely poor military performance of Hamas so far. Hamas' military weakness has been in striking contrast to the very impressive performance against the Israelis of Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed Shiite Party of God, in the mini-war in southern Lebanon in July 2006. On that occasion, Hezbollah forces were well dug in and they used improvised explosive devices very effectively against Israel's much vaunted, homemade Merkava (Chariot) Main Battle Tanks. Hamas had had plenty of time to equip itself with IEDs and to train its cadres how to use them. Also, the densely populated urban maze of Gaza City should have provided plenty of opportunities to inflict significant casualties on the Israeli Main Battle Tanks. But so far Hamas forces have had negligible impact on them. Part of the contrast obviously reflects the renewed emphasis on training, unit cohesion and sheer disciplinary toughness that Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak and his highly respected Chief of the General Staff Lt. Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi have had upon the Israel Defense Forces -- Zahal. But there is another factor as well: While tanks have many vulnerabilities in different aspects of modern ground and guerrilla war, it is impossible to conquer a country, win a full-scale battle or hold occupied hostile territory without them. continued at link Posted by: 3dc 2009-01-09 |
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