Excuses! Excuses!

Yes-Men Only!
Critics Need Not Apply

In order to whitewash the disastrous "second Lebanese War," the Israeli military arranged a very well-tailored conference about "what happened last summer."

Postmortem Gathering on the War In and Outside Conference Hall
14:58 Jan 03, '07 / 13 Tevet 5767
by Hana Levi Julian

IDF top brass begin the second day of a two-day Senior Command Conference at the Israel Air Force base in Hatzor pondering the confidence crisis among the rank-and-file.

Some 600 officers from the rank of Colonel and up spent almost 12 hours on Monday listening to commanders present their edited analyses of last summerÂ’s war with Hizbullah guerrillas in southern Lebanon.

One of those hours was devoted solely to a long speech by the IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Dan Halutz, in which he made an effort to minimize the damage caused by the mismanagement of the war.

Halutz acknowledged that mistakes were made, but quickly added that the lessons had been learned and corrections were already underway.

The Chief of StaffÂ’s speech was preceded by a presentation of the initial findings of the various internal probes conducted by reserve officers into the IDFÂ’s performance during the war.

Officers who were willing to speak with news reporters on condition of anonymity, however, expressed their dismay at what they heard. “They only showed what was convenient; they did not approach the difficult questions, the important findings,” said one.

The important findings, he said, included the lack of the “After me!” attitude that characterized past IDF leadership. A report by IDF Personnel Corps Chief Maj.-Gen. Elazar Stern was not presented. It dealt with "values of war, which inspected how the senior commanders acted, those reports which claimed that they settled for sitting in front of the plasma screen instead of being on the field with the soldiers,” the unidentified officer said. Stern’s brief presentation was limited to his recommendation that the specific findings be discussed in a forum at general headquarters.

Hand-picked active commanders made the presentations, instead of the reserve officers who headed the various internal investigations into the IDFÂ’s performance during the war.

As a result, the real analyses of the mistakes made by the IDF leadership during the war ended up taking place outside the hall, where inconvenient truths were discussed without encountering the threat of retribution from the top.

“There were two conferences,” said one unnamed officer quoted by the Ynet news service. “One with the IDF Chief in the hall, where only words of praise were spoken without a drop of criticism, and another one outside the hall during recess, where we talked amongst ourselves about the failures of the war and the fact that firmer steps should have been taken against those who failed, for the lack of self-criticism and for the IDF Chief’s attempting to leave all the occurred behind.”

Many participants also took note of who was not present. The no-shows included Maj.-Gen. Udi Adam, who was the Northern Command Chief during the war and later stepped down, and Maj. Eyal Ben-Reuven, who served as his deputy.

Col. Boaz Cohen, the Operations Officer of the IDF Northern District, was also missing. He is now on leave from the military.

Also not present was Brig.-Gen. Gal Hirsch, who resigned as Commander of the Galilee Division after the Almog report was published, blaming him for much of the mismanagement.

“Any officer opposed to the Chief of Staff was asked to leave the conference hall,” said another participant.

Response to War-Time Missile Hit on Ship
Chief of Staff Halutz announced at the conference the steps he was taking against Navy officers who allegedly relayed sensitive information to the media. He began a process of filing criminal charges against one of the officers, and dismissed another from his post for the same reason: talking to journalists.

However, Halutz only reprimanded the commanders of the Navy vessel that sustained a direct hit by a missile fired by the Hizbullah guerrillas during the war. The anti-missile system on the ship was not activated prior to the attack which killed four men. The officer responsible for deactivating the system was removed from his post.