ARGUMENT: FAILURE OF IMAGINATIONAl-Aqsa Storm Heralds the Rise of Non-state Special Operations
The surprise, brutal 7 October attack by Hamas has sent shockwaves around the world. Israel’s surprise was deeper than a combined intelligence and operational surprise. Leo Blanken, Ian Rice, and Craig Whiteside write that “It was failure of imagination.” What Israel missed “is the growing democratization of technology, which is rapidly providing new and dangerous capabilities to non-state actors.”
The shock of Hamas’ Oct. 7 assault continues to reverberate around the world amidst fears it will be the catalyst for a wider regional war. Many observers are comparing it to the 1973 Yom Kippur war, arguing that Israel repeated many of the same mistakes in failing to anticipate the attack.
Leo Blanken, Ian Rice, and Craig Whiteside write in War on the Rocks that this was more than an intelligence failure. It was failure of imagination. “Israel grew comfortable managing its relationship with Hamas in Gaza, keeping rocket attacks and suicide bombings to a relatively low level for almost a decade, they write. “Moreover, as we saw in a visit last month, Israel’s top security officials are obsessed with the non-state threat posed by Hizballah to the north and concerned with unrest in the occupied West Bank. There was little expectation that Hamas could launch anything Israeli forces couldn’t handle with their then-limited security posture near Gaza.”
The add:
What Israel missed is the growing democratization of technology, which is rapidly providing new and dangerous capabilities to non-state actors. Stephen Biddle, in his book Nonstate Warfare, argues that this is allowing violent non-state actors to achieve military capabilities that had previously been reserved for states. When carefully integrated into hybrid military-terror campaigns, these can challenge states that insist on maintaining dated misperceptions of their foes. Our research finds non-state actors are increasingly developing special operations capabilities, which are creating strategic and political effects beyond their tactical use.
(Under)estimating Actors Like Hamas
Hamas’ surprise attack had two dimensions. The first was “strategic surprise.” This refers to an adversary achieving strategic effects by attacking a known enemy using known methods but catching them unaware “at an unexpected time or place.” For example, the Pearl Harbor attack achieved strategic surprise even though the possibility of Japan using carrier-based aircraft was anticipated as a potential threat. The second dimension of the Hamas attack was “doctrinal surprise.” This refers to an actor employing “known technologies and capabilities in unexpected ways to produce powerful new effects.” Hamas achieved this by combining many elements of what the U.S. military refers to as a multi-domain military operation — and did so with a level of precision, coordination, and planning that shocked observers.
