Understanding Hezbollah’s rockets:Katyushas and the failed Westphalian system
To appreciate the thorny, complex, multi-layered difficulties Israel confronts –from house to house battles to the highest levels of international diplomacy– one needs to understand the rather simple Katyusha rocket Hezbollah shoots at Haifa and other Israeli cities.
I should say Katyusha-type, for the barrage rocket Hezbollah is using out-ranges the Katyushas the Russians once aimed at NATO ground units in Western Europe.The Katyusha is a “barrage rocket.” The Russians fired them from multiple-launchers. Hezbollah has some small mobile launchers but the Katyusha can be fired singly, from a pipe or one-rail launcher.Fired singly or in small numbers there is little likelihood they’ll hit a specific target unless the target is “Haifa” or “Tel Aviv.” Depending on range you can expect a rocket barrage to “scatter” over a rather wide surface area. In the case of northern Israel Hezbollah is using rockets to target predominantly civilian zones. If a rocket hits a hospital in the civilian area it hits a hospital. Hezbollah’s attacks on Haifa are –compared to Israeli attacks in Gaza and Lebanon– quite indiscriminate.
When fired from positions in southern Lebanon or Gaza, the extended-range Katyushas place roughly sixty percent of Israel’s population in range. (That’s my estimate.) All of Israel’s major cities and towns may soon be a bull’s eye– Hezbollah leaders boast of striking beyond Haifa and “beyond beyond Haifa.” Indeed, there are indications that longer range rockets are being employed. These rockets are “FROG-type” — free rocket over ground. They lack guidance systems but have more reach. They may be able to carry chemical warheads (the Russian series of FROGs could carry chemical warheads).
But now for the layer complexity: Hezbollah hides these weapons among apartment houses and in villages– other words, nests of rockets in neighborhoods.
These neighborhoods and villages are controlled by Hezbollah, not the Lebanese government.
Israel is being fired upon from a Lebanon that “is not quite Lebanon” in a truly sovereign sense.The rockets, of course, come from “somewhere,” but Hezbollah’s “somewhere” is a political limbo in terms of maps with definitive geo-political boundaries. Lebanon is a “failed state”– a peculiar failed state (its not Somalia), but nevertheless failed. It will continue to fail so long as the Lebanese government cannot control Hezbollah–and control means disarm.
So Hezbollah attacks Israel with ever more-powerful, longer-range rockets, then hides behind the diplomatic facade of the greater Lebanese nation state.
Thus terrorists and terror-empowering nations, like Iran and Syria, abuse the nation-state system– or exploit a “dangerous hole” in the system..
Iran and Syria then appeal to the United Nations (a product of the Westphalian “nation state” system) to condemn Israel for attacking Lebanon– when Israel is attacking Hezbollah, which “is and is not Lebanon.”
Everybody’s got to be somewhere, but maps and UN seats and press bureaus don’t make an effective nation state; they are the trappings of state-dom.
Weaknesses in the Westphalian system exist, in part because it has never been a complete system. (The Westphalian system evolved from the Treaty of Westphalia (1648) and the series of peace settlements that ended the Thirty Years War in Europe.) Westphalia’s “nation-state system” has always faced “gaps” (anarchic regions) and “failed states” (which are often collapsing tribal empires with the trappings of modernity, not the institutions).
Israel indicates disarming Hezbollah is its objective. But to truly achieve that goal –to stop the rockets– means ending Iranian and Syrian control of Lebanese neighborhoods.
Terrorists and tyrants together exploit failed states.
StrategyPage has more on Hezbollah’s rockets.
By pulling back, though, Israel turned the Gaza Strip into a de facto state, and that made the PA the government. In essence, they could hold the PA accountable for terrorist actions. ED NOTE: I don’t disagree. Sufficiently damaging Hezbollah might empower the Lebanese government.
Comment by Harold C. Hutchison — 7/18/2006 @ 7:41 am
Lebanon, the failed state… All I can give the Lebanese is a prayer: Adonai bless you and keep you. May Adonai shine His countenance upon you and be gracious to you. May Adonai lift His face to you and give you peace….
Trackback by Cozy Corner — 7/18/2006 @ 8:38 am
MidEast War: XIV… July 18, 2006 06:00 PDT Frequent updates. Scroll down for more stories. Previous coverage links in right sidebar. Links to Lebanese and Israeli bloggers covering the conflict are @ Truth Laid Bear, plus a map view with pointers to the……
Trackback by Pajamas Media — 7/18/2006 @ 8:43 am
[…] Austin Bay has an essay about Katyushas and links to another informative piece of Strategy Page. […]
Pingback by One Hand Clapping » Blog Archive » More on Hezbollah rockets — 7/18/2006 @ 9:32 am
The “Tel Aviv” rocket… An Iranian-made Zilzal rocket, destroyed by Israeli aircraft, falls to earth in Lebanon Ha'aretz, via Blue Crab Boulevard: an Israel Air Force air strike in Lebanon on Monday destroyed at least one long-range Iranian-made……
Trackback by Winds of Change.NET — 7/18/2006 @ 9:41 am
Failed states… Austin Bay sheds some light on both the modern state system and why Hezbullah’s rockets are so difficult to stop. While a quite useful post, he omits the final key part of the old Westphalian state system: a concert of…
Trackback by Posse Incitatus — 7/18/2006 @ 9:44 am
Diplomacy and the Hounds of Hell… Why do people many consider to be smart keep making the same stupid decisions time and time again? Why do people keep insisting that we have to talk with the terrorists who keep raining down rockets and missiles on Israel? Hamas and Hizbullah are doi…..
Trackback by A Blog For All — 7/18/2006 @ 11:52 am
[…] Courtesy of Austin Bay: […]
Pingback by NoisyRoom.net » Blog Archive » Understanding Hezbollah’s rockets:Katyushas and the failed Westphalian system — 7/18/2006 @ 12:58 pm
Omar’s thoughts… Omar at Iraq the Model has useful insights on the current Isreal/Lebanon action. I completely agree with all of his points. If Hamas/Hezbollah aren’t fatally weakened sooner or later this cycle will rep……
Trackback by Gibbie's Bioscience World — 7/18/2006 @ 2:09 pm
Human Rights watch has issued a press release stating that the use of the katyushas against civilian targets are a violation of International Law and may constitute a war crime. http://www.humanrightswatch.org/english/docs/2006/07/18/lebano13760.htm It is a war crime, but “may” is the strongest words they can use. I also think that shooting katyushas from civilian occupied housing is a violation of international law and a war crime, but Human Rights Watch will not directly state that either. In Their FAQs on the conflict Human Rights Watch does state that the capture of soldiers for exchange is a war crime. In other words this war was started by a war crime. http://hrw.org/english/docs/2006/07/17/lebano13748.htm But the problem with this is that the FAQs are one sided. The questions are all framed as Is Israel this or is Israel that. . . Human Rights Watch will not come out and explicitly state the truth, which is that almost all of Hezbollah’s actions in this war are war crimes. The MSM never mentions that Hezbollah is committing war crimes right and left. Hope you will do an article on this. A fellow denizen of the peoples republic of A.
Comment by rich — 7/18/2006 @ 7:45 pm
[…] Speaking of military equipment, "To appreciate the thorny, complex, multi-layered difficulties Israel confronts –from house to house battles to the highest levels of international diplomacy– one needs to understand the rather simple Katyusha rocket Hezbollah shoots at Haifa and other Israeli cities." It’s so weird that with each armed conflict we learn about new missiles. Remember the scud? [Emphasis added by me.] […]
Pingback by Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying » President Bush Strikes From Behind — 7/19/2006 @ 8:34 pm
The changing nature of war, or is the West only just starting to catch up?… The kind of war that most of us remember, and that most history books contain, are wars against nations. Armies, navies, air forces – all are the forces of nation-states use to either conquer other nations (re: Iraq taking……
Trackback by GraniteGrok — 7/21/2006 @ 6:57 pm