“The Israeli army does not have a state!” Ariel Sharon declared this week, after theChief-of-Staff tried to create a fait accompli behind his back.
I am not sure that Sharon knows where this phrase comes from. It was coined by the Count Honore deMirabeau, one of the instigators of the French revolution, in his essay about Prussia. Afterstating that “war is the national industry of Prussia”, Mirabeau said that while in othercountries the state has an army, in Prussia the army has a state.
It has been said more than once that Israel is the “Prussia of the Middle East”. I have tried toanalyze the origins of this similarity.
The Prussian state came into being after a holocaust, before which it was just another smallGerman state, called Brandenburg at the time. In 1618, the Thirty Years War broke out, killinga third of the German people and devastating most of its towns and villages. It left behind atrauma that has not yet entirely disappeared.
In the Thirty Years War almost all the major European armies took part, and all of them foughteach other on German soil. Germany is located in the middle of Europe and has no naturalboundaries. No sea, no desert and no mountain chain defend it. After the calamity, the leadersof Prussia drew the obvious lesson: if we have no natural barriers to defend us, we must createan artificial barrier in the form of a regular, big and efficient army. That’s how the Prussianarmy came into being, a force that was designed to defend the fatherland, and in the course oftime became the terror of its neighbors, until, in the end, it became the Nazi army ironicallycalled the Wehrmacht – the “defense force”.
Israel is faced with a similar dilemma. Zionism was, in the beginning, a small and weakmovement, rejected even by the majority of the Jews. When the first Zionists came to thiscountry, they were surprised to find here a population that did not agree to turn its homelandover to another people. It resisted violently, and the Zionists defended themselves as wellas they could.
Then came the Holocaust and annihilated a third of the Jewish people. It gave Zionism atremendous impetus. The movement was seen as a valiant effort by the Holocaust survivors toredeem themselves. By the same measure, Arab resistance grew. The Zionists needed to createan “Iron Wall” (as Ze’ev Jabotinsky phrased it) against the resistance, a “defense force”strong enough to withstand the onslaught of the entire Arab world. Thus the IDF was born and, inthe war of 1948 conquered some 78% of Mandate Palestine, and in the June 1967 war the remaining22%, as well as great chunks of the neighboring countries. Since then, the “defense force” hasbecome an army of occupation.
In the Second German Reich there was a popular saying, “der Soldate / ist der beste Mann inStaate” (The soldier is the best man in the state.) In Israel, the slogan was “The best go to theAir Force”. In the young state, the army attracted the best and the brightest. The attitudetowards the senior officers sometimes bordered on idolatry.
From the time the state was established until today, the generals have controlled the media,both by means of strong personal relations with the editors and by a complex network of armyspokesmen masquerading as “our military correspondent”, “our Arab affairs correspondent”(generally former army intelligence officers) and “our political correspondent’.
Foreign observers have frequently asked whether a military coup could occur in Israel.That’s a silly question, because a coup is quite unnecessary. Since its early days, the armycommand has had a decisive influence on national policy, and its members have occupied keypositions in the Israeli democracy, in a way unimaginable in any other democratic state.
A few facts may suffice: of the 15 chiefs-of-staff who preceded Mofaz, two became primeministers (Rabin, Barak), four others became cabinet ministers (Yadin, Bar-Lev, Eytan,Lipkin-Shahak). Two prime ministers were past leaders of the pre-state armed undergroundorganizations (Begin, Shamir), and one a former Director General of the Defense Ministry(Peres). Two generals became Presidents of Israel (Herzog, Weizman). In the presentgovernment there are five generals (Sharon, Ze’evi, Vilnai, Sneh, Ben-Eliezer.)
Former generals have always been allotted the key economic positions and have controlledalmost all big corporations and state services. Many generals became mayors. The entirepolitical-military-economic-administrative class in Israel is full of generals.
The dispersal of the generals among different political parties does not change anything.This is proved by the fact that many generals, upon leaving the army, were offered leadingpositions in both major political parties – Labor and Likud – and chose one or the otheraccording to the price offered. Some wandered from one party to another (Dayan, Weizman,Sharon, Mordecai). At the beginning of the present Knesset, four political parties wereheaded by generals (Likud by Sharon, Labor by Barak, Merkaz by Modecai, Moledet by Ze’evi).The religious camp has, until now, been bereft of generals, but with the appearance of thefar-rightist, Effi Eytam, this will be corrected.
There would have been nothing bad in all this if it would have been only a personal andprofessional phenomena. But the problem is much more serious, because all the governinggenerals have a common mentality. All of them believe in the policy of force, annexations andsettlements, even if some of them are less extreme than others. The exceptions can be countedon the fingers of one hand, and some would say on one finger (the late Matti Peled).
In this respect, there is no difference between active and retired officers. All of themtogether have always formed a kind of super-party, directing the political establishment.Not because they are organized and decide together, and not because of their strong socialbonds, but because of their uniform way of thinking, which leads them almost automatically tothe same conclusions in any given situation – irrespective of their belonging to Likud,Labor, National Union or Merkaz. Not necessarily on every detail, but in the generaldirection.
One of the results is the neutralization of women in the Israeli political system. Women haveno place on the upper echelons of the army and its machoist ethos, which directs all spheres ofIsraeli policy. (The only outstanding exceptions, Golda Mair, took pride in being “the onlyman in the government” and surrounded herself with generals.)
All this is being done quite democratically. In the “Only Democracy in the Middle East”, thearmy gets its orders from the government and obeys. In Israeli law, the government as such isthe Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces. But when the government itself is controlled byformer generals, this is meaningless.
That’s how it was in the 50s, when the Chief-of-Staff Moshe Dayan imposed on the government apolicy of “retaliatory actions” and had it implemented by Major Ariel Sharon. And that’s howit is today, when the same General Sharon imposes the same policy and has it implemented bygeneral Ben-Eliezer, the Minister of Defense, who happens to belong to the rival party. (Indemocratic countries, it is extremely rare for a Minister of Defense to be a former general.)Sharon’s predecessor, the former Chief-of-Staff Barak, surrounded himself with a bunch ofgenerals, rejecting all civilians.
Lately a new and dangerous development has taken place. Under the leadership of theChief-of-Staff, Shaul Mofaz, a man with a far-rightist outlook, the army has started to rebelagainst the “political directives”. It mobilizes the media against the government and makesit responsible for its abject failure in the war against “terrorism”- reminding one of thePrussian generals after World War I who accused the politicians of “sticking a knife in theback of the army”. When Foreign Minister Peres, with approval of Sharon, recently started toinitiate a meeting with Arafat, a “senior military source” leaked to the media that the armystrongly objects to all such meetings.
Things reached a climax this week, when the Chief-of-Staff decided to create across the GreenLine (the pre-1967 border) “closed military areas”, with detention camps and military,Kangaroo courts for Palestinians trying to enter. This means de facto annexation, withfar-reaching political, international and national implications.
Sharon, who heard about this while on a state visit in Russia, seethed with anger. A game ofaccusations and counter-accusations began, with the army leaking secret documents to themedia. (“I came across a document…” a TV commentator announced.)
If this gives the impression that this is a major fight between the government and the army,it’s an illusion. Sharon himself belongs to the military clique more than anyone else. But hehas an old grudge against the General Staff, which at the time prevented him from becomingChief-of-Staff. On top of that, contrary to civilian politicians, he has no inferioritycomplex when dealing with the generals.
This is a fight within the family. There are no real differences of opinions between Sharon andMofaz. Both believe in the same policy of enlarging the settlements and preventing anycompromise with the Palestinian people. Both believe in the maxim “If force doesn’t work, usemore force”. Both are moving towards escalation and more escalation.
In the Weimar republic after World Wart I, there was a saying: “The Kaiser went, the generalsremained”. In Israel, the government changes hands from time to time, but the generals alwaysremain.