Syrian combat performance in Lebanon showed improvement over
past wars in some respects, while in other ways it showed no improvement
whatsoever.
Strategic Performance.
Given the conditions under which they were forced to
operate—and despite Asad’s continued commissarist politicization of his armed
forces—Syrian generalship was fine, even good, although not brilliant. Syrian
moves in the first few days were wise given their desire to avoid provoking
Israel while preventing the IDF from securing a decisive advantage and then
attacking the Syrian forces in Lebanon. Syrian units were placed on alert right
away and ordered to begin preparing and repairing defensive positions along key
axes of advance. Damascus bolstered its air defenses in the Bekaa and
redeployed two of its best armored divisions plus several more commando
battalions to reinforce its units in Lebanon, many of which had been on
occupation duties for so long that they were not combat ready.
When the Israelis began pushing up the spine of the Lebanon
range toward the Beirut-Damascus highway, the Syrians recognized the danger of
this move and decided to block it, regardless of the potential for provoking a
war with Israel. This too was probably the right move: as badly as the fighting
in the Bekaa actually went for Syria, it almost certainly would have been worse
had the Israelis been able to cut the Beirut-Damascus highway and then attack
into the Bekaa from behind the main Syrian defense lines.
Syria’s strategy for fighting the Israelis once it became
clear that war was unavoidable was also reasonable. Damascus deployed its
commandos forward with armor support in ambushes along the narrow paths into
the Bekaa. They were ideally placed to contest the Israeli advance. The
alternative, deploying all of the commandos with the reinforced 1st Armored
Division along the main Syrian defense lines in the Bekaa, would not have taken
full advantage of the commandos’ capabilities, and their impact would have been
diminished.
The Syrian defensive strategy in the Bekaa was
straightforward: a standard, Soviet-style defense-in-depth with two brigades up
and one back, but entirely appropriate for the situation. It may be the case
that a truly brilliant general might have found a better approach, but the
Syrian strategy was not bad, and it is unclear that Syrian tactical forces could
have implemented a more sophisticated defensive scheme. For instance, any kind
of elastic defense strategy would have given up the enormous advantage of the
terrain. It also would have required Syrian units to prevail over the IDF in
fluid maneuver warfare. Given the drubbing the Syrians took when they were
defending in place and had all of the advantages of the terrain, and how badly
their forces fared when they tried to maneuver against the Israelis, it seems
likely that any such mobile defense would have failed far worse.
Finally, although the decision to commit the Syrian Air Force
to defend the SAMs and the ground forces in the Bekaa Valley resulted in the
destruction of about a quarter of the Syrian Air Force, it too was probably the
best move. Not sending out the Air Force to confront the Israelis would have
been a severe blow to morale throughout the Syrian armed forces. Moreover, the
Syrian Air Force did succeed in keeping much of the Israeli Air Force occupied
on June 9–10, the key days of the battle. In fact, the IAF was so intent on
killing Syrian MiGs that they concentrated most of their effort on the air
battles. As a result, the IAF did not provide much support to Israeli armor in
the Bekaa until late on June 10 when the Syrian lines had already been broken.
Of course, what can be faulted in the decision to commit the Syrian Air Force
was the absence of any real strategy that took into account the well-known
shortcomings of Syrian planes and pilots and so might have allowed the Syrian
fighters to accomplish something more than merely serving as a punching bag for
the IAF to distract it from the ground battles.
Tactical Performance. The real variations in Syrian
military effectiveness were at the tactical level. Specifically, there was a sizable
gap between the performance of Syrian commandos and that of the rest of the armed
forces. Syria’s commando forces consistently fought markedly better than any
other units of the Syrian military. They chose good ambush sites and generally
established clever traps to lure the Israelis into prepared kill zones. The
commandos showed a decent ability to operate in conjunction with tanks and
other armored vehicles, integrating them into their own fire schemes and doing
a good job protecting the tanks from Israeli infantry. The Syrian commandos
also were noticeably more aggressive, creative, and willing to take initiative
and to seize fleeting opportunities than other Syrian units. Their surprise
counterattacks on Israeli armored columns at Ayn Zhaltah and Rashayyah in the
Bekaa stand out in particular. Finally, the Syrian commandos did an excellent
job disengaging whenever the Israelis began to gain the upper hand in a fight,
at which point they usually pulled back to another ambush site farther up the
road.
In contrast, the rest of Syria’s armed forces performed very
poorly, manifesting all of the same problems that had plagued them in their
previous wars. In the words of Major General Amir Drori, the overall commander
of the Israeli invasion, “The Syrians did everything slower and worse than we
expected.” Without a doubt, the Syrian Air Force performed worst of all the
services, but having discussed their problems in some detail above, I will
concentrate on the Syrian Army.
As opposed to the competent performance turned in by their
commandos, Syria’s line formations had little to brag about other than their
stubborn resistance and orderly retreat. Syrian armor consistently refused to
maneuver against the Israelis, with the result that in every tank duel, no
matter how much the terrain or circumstances favored the Syrians, it was only a
matter of time before the Israelis’ superior marksmanship and constant efforts
to maneuver for advantage led to a Syrian defeat. Chaim Herzog has echoed this
assessment, observing that the Syrian military’s greatest problem was its
chronic “inflexibility in maneuver.” Syrian artillery support was very poor and
had little effect on the fighting. Syrian artillery batteries showed almost no
ability to shift fire in response to changing tactical situations or to
coordinate fire from geographically dispersed units. Syrian armored and
mechanized formations recognized the need to conduct combined arms operations,
but showed little understanding of how to actually do so. Infantry, armor, and
artillery all failed to provide each other with adequate support, allowing the
Israelis to defeat each in detail. In general, the Syrians relied on mass to
compensate for their tactical shortcomings, but Israeli tactical skill proved
so overwhelming that even where Syrian armored and mechanized formations were
able to create favorable odds ratios, they were still easily defeated by the
Israelis.
Damascus’s ground forces had other problems as well. Syrian
units were extremely negligent in gathering information and conducting
reconnaissance. Many Syrian commanders simply failed to order patrols to keep
abreast of Israeli movements in their sector, instead relying on information
passed down from higher echelons. Those patrols that were dispatched seemed to
have little feel for the purpose of reconnaissance and rarely gathered much useful
information. As a result, many Syrian units blundered around Lebanon with
little understanding of where the Israelis were, sometimes with fatal
consequences. Syrian units showed poor fire discipline, squandering rounds so
quickly that they were forced to retreat because they were out of ammunition.
Despite extensive training in night-combat from their Soviet advisors, Syrian
units were almost helpless after dark. Syrian personnel at all levels could not
night navigate, their units lost all cohesion in the darkness, and morale
dropped accordingly. Only some of the commando units showed any ability to
actually apply the training they had received and operate after dark but,
fortunately for the Syrians, the Israelis generally halted each night.
The Syrian Gazelle helicopter gunships made a huge
psychological impact on the Israelis, but did little actual damage. The
Gazelles were not able to manage more than a few armor kills during the war,
and although they employed proper “pop-up” tactics, they could only delay the
Israelis. Although this was useful in slowing the Israeli advance to the Bekaa
and then hindering the Israeli pursuit after they had broken through the Syrian
lines, the Gazelles were unable to prevent Syrian defeats, even when they were
committed in large numbers as in the fighting around Lake Qir’awn. One Israeli
officer observed that the Syrian Gazelles were “not a problem” because they did
not employ them creatively, had bad aim, and operated only individually or in
pairs, making it easy for the IDF to handle them. Anthony Cordesman has
commented that Syrian helicopter operations in Lebanon suffered from “The same
tactical and operational rigidities, training, and command problems that
affected its tank, other armor, and artillery performance.” Consequently, their
contributions were negligible.
Syrian combat support was another impediment to their
tactical performance. In particular, Syrian logistics were appalling. Damascus
had established huge stockpiles of spares and combat consumables in the Bekaa,
yet during the combat operations many Syrian units could not get resupplied
(although part of the problem was their wasteful expenditure of ammunition).
Graft had riddled the Syrian quartermaster corps with the result that a lot of
things that were supposed to have been available were not. In addition, the
Syrians did not understand their Soviet-style “push” logistics system, with
quartermasters demanding formal requests for provisions, rather than simply
sending supplies to the front at regular intervals as intended.
Maintenance was another problem area for the Syrians. Most
Syrian soldiers were incapable and unwilling to perform even basic preventive
maintenance on their weapons and vehicles. Instead, these functions had to be
performed by specialized technicians attached at brigade and division level,
and for most repairs, equipment had to be sent back to a small number of
central depots around Damascus. These facilities were manned in part by Cuban
technicians who handled the more advanced Soviet weaponry. The Israelis
reported capturing a fair number of Syrian armored vehicles abandoned because
of minor mechanical problems.
The fact that Syria’s commandos performed so much better
than Syrian units ever had in the past should not obscure the fact that, in an
absolute sense, when compared to the forces of other armies, Syria’s commando
battalions were still mediocre. In general, the Syrian commandos were content
to sit in their prepared positions, fire down on Israeli forces that wandered into
their ambushes, and then retreat as soon as the Israelis recovered and began to
bust up the Syrian defensive scheme. Incidents such as the commando
counterattacks at Ayn Zhaltah, Rashayyah, and a few other minor engagements
were still exceptions to the rule. They are noteworthy because they were among
the only times that even the commandos tried to get out and upset Israeli
operations. The rule, however, was for the commandos to establish ambushes and
then wait passively for the IDF to come to them.
The commandos also weren’t terrific with their weapons: on
any number of occasions, Israeli units were completely trapped by Syrian
commando ambushes, and subjected to a hail of gunfire, grenades, and missiles,
only to emerge having suffered just a handful of casualties. In addition, like
other Syrian formations, the commandos frequently neglected to cover their
flanks or were too quick to conclude that terrain was impassable. As a result,
many Syrian ambushes were cleared by Israeli flank guards or bypassed altogether
when Israeli combat engineers found a way through terrain the Syrians had
deemed impassable.
Unit cohesion among Syrian formations in Lebanon was
actually quite good. For the most part, Syrian units stuck together and fought
back under all circumstances. Few Syrian units simply disintegrated in combat.
The rule was that Syrian units fought hard and then stuck together and
retreated well. Although it is true that Israeli pressure was
uncharacteristically light on the Syrian armored forces withdrawing up the
Bekaa after their defeat on June 10, there were still many instances of Syrian
units showing good discipline and retreating in good order under heavy
pressure. The commandos in particular showed outstanding unit cohesion. In many
fights they clung to their defensive positions until they were overpowered by
Israeli infantry units, and in several clashes, Syrian commando units fought to
the last man to hold particularly important positions or when acting as rear
guards to allow other forces to escape.
Syrian Combat Performance and Underdevelopment
It’s easy to get distracted by the better performance of
Syria’s commandos in 1982 and see it as evidence that the Syrians had improved
dramatically over their performance in 1948 (and 1967, 1970, 1973, and 1976).
It’s just as important not to. The commandos represented no more than about 5
percent of the Syrian forces that fought against the Israelis in Lebanon. They
were better than the other 95 percent, but not dramatically so. They never
proved the equal of their Israeli opponents. They were always beaten, sometimes
badly, sometimes very badly.
Meanwhile, the rest of the force was pretty disastrous and
showed no marked improvement over the conduct of their predecessors back in
1948. It’s not that there weren’t any differences between the Syrian Army of
1948 and that of 1982. There were. And in some important areas and in some very
noticeable ways. But overall, it’s hard to make the case that Syrian combat
effectiveness had improved much.
Syrian strategic performance was notably better in 1982 than
it had been in 1948, but that had nothing to do with underdevelopment. If
anything, it is another bit of evidence regarding the impact of politicization.
Asad had found a handful of generals who were both competent and loyal to
command his forces before the October War, and these men largely remained in
charge in 1982.
Syrian tactical leadership, however, demonstrated the same set
of problems that plagued their forces in 1948 and all of the wars in-between.
Their junior officers would not act aggressively or creatively, could not
execute ad hoc operations, did not bother to patrol or otherwise try to collect
information, could not maneuver for advantage or even shift their forces to
react to enemy maneuvers. They rarely counterattacked, and when they did so it
was generally a clumsy frontal assault. Time and again, Syrian tactical forces
just sat in their defensive positions and blasted away (inaccurately) until the
Israelis killed them or maneuvered them out of position. And while the
commandos did noticeably better with combined arms, an ability to improvise defensive
positions quickly, and a somewhat greater reactivity to Israeli moves, so too
did some of the Syrian forces in 1948, notably in their second assault on
Zemach and the fighting at Mishmar HaYarden. Moreover, the performance of the
Syrian Air Force in 1982 was absolutely dreadful, more than compensating for
any plaudits the commandos might have won. In terms of tactical leadership,
there was little, if any, improvement among Syrian forces despite Syria’s
significant economic development from 1948 to 1982.
A variety of other problems persisted or actually got worse
as Syria developed economically between 1948 and 1982. Syrian logistics were
not great in 1948, but neither did they have to be. Very little was asked of
them. Syrian logistics were awful in 1982, although corruption was a big part
of the problem. Syrian maintenance and operational readiness rates did not
improve much, nor did Syrian weapons handling. To some extent, all of these
issues need to be seen in relative terms: in 1982, the Syrians were operating
far more sophisticated equipment requiring far greater logistical needs than
they had in 1948. They were still bad, but they seemed to be keeping pace,
staying at the same mediocre level, even as the sophistication of their
equipment increased. That suggests an improvement that paralleled their rising
level of development.
The one area where that didn’t seem to apply was Syria’s air
force pilots. In 1982, they were utterly incapable of flying (let alone
fighting) their planes when they lost their GCI guidance. There is no parallel
in 1948, and this suggests that the MiG-23 and even the MiG-21 may have been
beyond the ability of even a better-developed Syria to employ properly.
In an absolute sense, the Syrian military of 1982 was vastly
more powerful than that of 1948. It was better armed, better trained, more professional,
larger, and had more combat experience. If they somehow could have fought each
other, the Syrian military of 1982 undoubtedly would have beaten the Syrian
military of 1948. Two things are noteworthy for our purposes, however. First,
many of the most crippling problems that the Syrians (and other Arab
militaries) have consistently experienced since 1948 in tactical leadership and
information handling remained unabated. If anything, they got worse. Second,
despite the significant improvement in Syria’s socioeconomic circumstances, its
problems with logistics, maintenance, weapons handling, and even combined arms
operations did not improve much, if at all. At best, they kept the same
mediocre pace with the increasing sophistication of Syria’s Soviet-supplied
kit.
All of this suggests that underdevelopment probably did have
an impact on the effectiveness of Arab militaries since World War II, but like
politicization, it came in certain areas, and not necessarily those that were
the most deleterious.
