Contribution of the Israeli War Experience to the Strategic Theory of Air Power, 1967-2014

Authors

  • Javier Jordán Universidad de Granada

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.53351/ruhm.v6i12.350

Keywords:

Air power, Israel, Middle East, Military History, Strategy

Abstract

This article studies the contribution of Israeli war experience to the general theory of military air power. The article begins with a brief theoretical framework with two views on the strategic utility of air power. The first vision is that of 'primacy'. This current considers that the air military power is capable of breaking the adversary's will to fight and/or of depriving him of the means to continue fighting. It also considers that military air power could achieve it independently, or with a secondary participation of the ground forces. The second current defends the necessary complementarity between the different forms of military power to achieve synergistic effects.

Then the article examines the main military operations and conflicts in which Israel has fought since the Six Day War to the present. The article orders the way in which air power has been used according to the two currents of the theoretical framework. First, there are the so-called strategic air attacks that correspond to the theoretical vision of 'primacy'.

The article establishes four subcategories in this strategic employment: 1) strategic air attacks with coercive purpose that directly or indirectly harm the civilian population, 2) strategic air attacks against military objectives in enemy territory with a coercive political purpose, 3) strategic air strikes of decapitation, against leaders and adversary command cadres, and 4) aerial attacks against generation of force, nuclear counter-proliferation or against certain conventional military capabilities. Second, the article analyzes military operations that correspond to the theoretical vision of 'integration': 1) close air support, and 2) operational interdiction.

The article concludes that the use of strategic airstrikes has been strategically ineffective and in many cases counterproductive. On the contrary, the integrated use of the air force with the land force, especially in conventional wars, has shown greater effectiveness.

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Author Biography

  • Javier Jordán, Universidad de Granada
    Javier Jordán es Profesor Titular del Departamento de Ciencia Política y de la Administración de la Universidad de Granada, director del Master en Estudios Estratégicos y Seguridad Internacional. Ha sido investigador invitado en el Centro de Estudios Internacionales de la Universidad de Oxford (2001), en el Instituto Europeo de la London School of Economics (2002 y 2004), en el Instituto de Política Internacional del King’s College of London (2003), así como en el Departamento de Sociología (2006), en el Leonard Davis Institute for International Relations (2013) de la Universidad Hebrea de Jerusalén y en el Instituto Español de Estudios Estratégicos (Madrid, 2015/2016). Ha sido docente invitado para impartir seminarios sobre seguridad y defensa en el Instituto de Estudios Políticos de Burdeos y en la Universidad de La Sapienza en Roma.

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Published

2017-12-30

Issue

Vol. 6 No. 12 (2017): Arquitectura e instituciones militares: política, cultura y sociedad

Section

Estudios

License

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How to Cite

Contribution of the Israeli War Experience to the Strategic Theory of Air Power, 1967-2014. (2017). Revista Universitaria De Historia Militar, 6(12), 221-240. https://doi.org/10.53351/ruhm.v6i12.350

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