military culture:
RegressionEarlier this week, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert announced that the planned inquiry into Israel’s defeat in Lebanon would be indefinitely delayed. His hope, obviously, is also to delay his own departure from office, since the findings of any half-honest probe are not likely to redound to his glory. The fact that his likely eventual successor, "Bibi" Netanyahu, is Israel’s most outspoken conservative will not save Olmert’s seat after the fiasco he ordered and led. Israel seems to be unavoidably heading down the road from bad to worse, as far as its political leadership goes.
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The virtues required in military officers involved in weapons development and procurement are the virtues of the bureaucrat: careful, even obsessive attention to process; avoiding risky decisions, and whenever possible making decisions by committee; avoiding responsibility; careerism, because success is measured by career progression; and generally shining up the handle on the big front door. Time is not very important, while dotting every i and crossing every t is vital, since at some point the auditors will be coming, and the politicians and the press will be waiting eagerly for their reports. Remunerative careers in defense industry await those officers who know how to go along to get along. While the Israeli defense industry has produced some remarkably good products, such as the Merkava tank, getting the program funded still tends to be more important than making sure the weapon will work in combat. As time goes on, efficiency tends to become more important than effectiveness; not surprisingly, the simpler and more effective Israeli weapon systems came earlier, and more recent ones tend to reflect the American tendency toward complex and expensive ineffectiveness.
The Israeli inquiry into the Lebanon fiasco is unlikely to address this issue for the same reason it is not addressed in the United States: too much money is at stake. The R&D and procurement tail now wags the combat arms dog. Nor is the question of how to reverse the process and restore the virtues a Third Generation military requires in its officers an easy one. Those virtues – eagerness to make decisions and take responsibility, boldness, broad-mindedness and a spirit of intellectual inquiry, contempt for careerism and careerists – are not wanted in Second Generation militaries, and officers who demonstrate them are usually weeded out early. A Third Generation culture is difficult to maintain, and even more – impossible perhaps? – to restore once lost.
Lew RockwellWhat did Machiavelli say?---
In the meantime, the investigation has fallen into the hands of politicians, members of the various subcommittees of the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee. The interests of most of these politicians are focused first and foremost on placing the blame on other politicians. Numerous nations have faced a situation in which they have had to address the failures of their military leaders. The wisest and most experienced of these were the Romans, about whom the statesman and philosopher, Niccolo Machiavelli, wrote in his book "Discourses on the First Ten Books of Titus Livius:"
"The Romans were not only less ungrateful than other republics, but were also more lenient and considerate in the punishment of the generals of their armies. For if their misconduct was intentional, they punished them humanely; and if it was caused by ignorance, they not only did not punish them, but rewarded and honored them nevertheless. This mode of proceeding had been well considered by them; for they judged that it was of the greatest importance for those who commanded their armies to have their minds entirely free and unembarrassed by any anxiety other than how best to perform their duty, and therefore they did not wish to add fresh difficulties and dangers to a task in itself so difficult and perilous, being convinced that, if this were done, it would prevent any general from operating vigorously.
"As to errors
through ignorance, there is no more striking example than that of Varro, through whose temerity the Romans were routed at Cannae by Hannibal, where that Republic was brought in danger of its liberty, none the less because it was ignorance and not malice, they not only did not castigate him, but honored him, and on his return to Rome, the whole Senatorial order went to meet him, not being able to thank him for the battle, they thanked him for returning to Rome and for not having despaired of Roman affairs."
Haaretz
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