Suchergebnisse

Although Israel constitutes an interesting case for the study of civil--military relations, the role played by its Directory of Military Intelligence (AMAN) has rarely been discussed in this context. This role is of special interest, since Israel is the only liberal democracy today in which a military intelligence service functions as the leading national estimator not only in military but also in civilian affairs. The unique Israeli model is usually justified by Israel's security concerns--primarily the threat of a sudden conventional attack. To test this model's validity, this article (1) traces and elucidates its historical development; (2) employs five crucial mini case studies to test its practical success or failure; and (3) explains how, in light of the fact that AMAN failed in four of the five cases, its military characteristics create inherent weaknesses that hamper its ability to serve as a high-quality national intelligence estimator. [Reprinted by permission; copyright Inter-University Seminar on Armed Forces and Society/Sage Publications Inc.]

Although Israel constitutes an interesting case for the study of civil—military relations, the role played by its Directory of Military Intelligence (AMAN) has rarely been discussed in this context. This role is of special interest, since Israel is the only liberal democracy today in which a military intelligence service functions as the leading national estimator not only in military but also in civilian affairs. The unique Israeli model is usually justified by Israel's security concerns—primarily the threat of a sudden conventional attack. To test this model's validity, this article (1) traces and elucidates its historical development; (2) employs five crucial mini case studies to test its practical success or failure; and (3) explains how, in light of the fact that AMAN failed in four of the five cases, its military characteristics create inherent weaknesses that hamper its ability to serve as a high-quality national intelligence estimator.

During the decade after the 1973 War of Yom Kippur, the consensus was that Israel's military defeat in the war's first stage was caused by the failure of intelligence to provide a warning prior to the Arab attack, but many experts maintained later that it reflected improper preparations for war. Using recently released evidence, this article analyzes Israel's inadequate war deployment when firing commenced and its impact on the failure to repel the attack. It concludes that since this deficient deployment resulted from the absence of a sufficient intelligence warning, the intelligence failure was at the root of the Israeli failure at the war's start.

Most studies of the attempts to reach a political solution to the Egyptian–Israeli dispute between the wars of 1967 and 1973 focus predominantly on the Jarring mission (1968–71), the Rogers plan (1969–70) and Sadat's plan for a partial agreement in the Canal sector (early 1971). However, as this article shows on the basis of new archival documents, the most important diplomatic initiative during this period was Sadat's proposal for a comprehensive settlement of the Egyptian–Israeli dispute, which was secretly submitted to Kissinger in February 1973. Despite the fact that it met most of Israel's requirements regarding peace, Sadat's proposal was rejected by Golda Meir, who refused to return the territories occupied in 1967. Meir's stand did not change even when, in April 1973, Israel's leadership concluded that the only alternative to the diplomatic process was war — which would break out soon. By making this decision, Golda Meir and her colleagues opted for war rather than peace and turned the October 1973 Yom Kippur War into 'a war of choice'.