Summary of ISW Comprehesive Review on Israeli-Lebanon campaign

Raylan Givens tweeted the following:

MUST READ: HEZBOLLAH’S COLLAPSE IN SOUTHERN LEBANON – The Institute for the Study of War (ISW) released a comprehensive study today about Hezbollah’s string of military failures against the IDF in Southern Lebanon. Here are some of the key takeaways:

The summary upfront is that Hezbollah is trying to hide the reality that its military forces in Southern Lebanon are disorganized, incoherent, and not conducting an effective campaign against IDF forces. ISW alleges that Hezbollah’s military forces have been “badly damaged and disrupted” by the IDF and that Israel has so far “successfully destroyed and disrupted many of the capabilities required for Hezbollah to threaten northern Israel.”

For example, ISW points out that any military force conducting a tactical withdrawal will take or destroy its munitions to prevent the enemy from capturing them. Hezbollah completely failed at this task and left even its most “prized and high-end” munitions like advanced Russian anti-tank missiles and night-vision systems.

ISW also points out that Lebanese social media pages continue to report the deaths of Hezbollah commanders on a near-daily basis, “demonstrating the continued IDF pressure against Hezbollah forces.” Hezbollah forces have failed to execute any major military operations coherently, “showing limited resistance in some sectors while abandoning others in a way that shows no clear plan or pattern of operations.”

ISW concluded by arguing that Hezbollah’s failures so far demonstrate that its military forces are in “disarray” and that the group has “failed to execute any major military campaign at scale effectively.”