Is Israel’s Iron Dome a success or a failure? That depends on who you ask and on what level of war you look at. Its tactical success is unclear at this point, but the scale of Israel’s Operation Protective Edge suggests that it is a strategic failure. A more nuanced answer may also include the fact that it represents a squandered opportunity for political progress.
To many people, the Iron Dome system appears to be a modern miracle. Israeli officials tout the system as having “very, very high” success rate in intercepting the numerous rockets launched from Gaza, allegedly something in the range of 90%. The Washington Post reports that “it has allowed residents across the south [of Israel] to carry on with a measure of normality,” and quotes an Israeli as saying, “I can’t even explain with words how great it is…Now I can go out. I still get scared, but not like before.” There is even worry that Israeli citizens are too complacent now for their own physical good. Clearly, Iron Dome has had a major calming effect on the Israeli population.
On the other hand, there have been claims that it does not actually perform as advertised. John Mecklin recently wrote in the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists that Iron Dome is a “public relations weapon” but a technical failure. He maintains that when studied afterwards its performance always turns out to be less impressive than originally claimed. To further his argument he cites estimates from MIT scientist Ted Postol, a well-known missile defense skeptic, who states that Iron Dome may only be intercepting 5% or less of the rockets it fires at.
From one perspective, whether or not Mecklin and Postol are correct is irrelevant. Consider some history. As I wrote last year, during Operation DESERT STORM, the United States deployed Patriot missile systems to Israel to protect it against Iraqi ballistic missiles. After the war, the U.S. military claimed 50% effectiveness for the Patriot system. The very same Ted Postol challenged these numbers and argued that the real effectiveness was close to 0%. Eventually, the Defense Department lowered its estimates to 40%. Neither figure is very impressive, tactically speaking. However, in a strategic sense, the Patriots worked perfectly. They had a political impact by the sole virtue of their presence (combined with a vigorous but even less technically successful Scud hunt in western Iraq): they kept Israel’s Likud Prime Minister Yitzhak from striking Iraq and thereby probably saved the anti-Saddam coalition.
2012 brought a similar story. In November of that year, Hamas fired more than 2200 rockets at Israel. The new Iron Dome system swung into action. Israeli defense officials claimed some 80% effectiveness at that time. Later, an engineer at Tesla Laboratories in the United States concluded that the system succeeded only 30-40% of the time. Postol weighed in saying that Iron Dome’s successful interception rate had actually only been somewhere between zero and 10%. Nevertheless, whatever the technical truth, the defenses mostly succeeded on a political level. The Israeli air campaign against Hamas targets in Gaza lasted only eight days and Israel saw no compelling need for a ground invasion.
This time Iron Dome appears to be performing as well or better than in 2012 at the technical level (though whether that success rate is high or low is unclear), yet it is failing politically and strategically. This is evidenced by the extent of Israel’s offensive operations against Gaza. Israeli forces reportedly hit more targets in the first day and a half of the present bombing campaign than it did in the whole eight day bombing campaign in 2012. As I write this, the bombardment continues on both sides and Israeli troops have been in Gaza for just over two weeks. The war has already gone on three times longer than it did in 2012 and casualties on both sides are far higher than they were in that year.
Why the difference between 2012 and 2014? Brent Sterling’s 2009 book, Do Good Fences Make Good Neighbors? What History Teaches Us about Strategic Barriers and International Security, may help us find the answer to that question. He writes that we must consider both the internal and external effects of strategic barriers. The Maginot Line is one of several examples he analyzes. As we all know, France built the nearly impregnable Maginot Line during the inter-war years along the Franco-German border. Sterling notes that the French military understood that the line could be circumvented, but that its very existence nevertheless contributed to a defensive orientation and encouraged “false optimism” among the French population, many of whom incorrectly believed that the line covered the entire northern border. As for the external effects of the Maginot Line, German planners were affected to the extent that they realized that they certainly should not throw the Wehrmacht against it. Accordingly, when Germany decided to invade France in 1940, it went through the Benelux countries, neatly avoiding the entire problem. Rather amusingly, Sterling quotes an Army Corps of Engineers study as saying that “a fixed and static barrier system can be viewed as a puzzle contrived for the prospective attacker to solve.”
More broadly, Sterling finds that the governments that build strategic barriers such as Iron Dome often intend to buy time. This they hope to do by shifting the military balance of power and by creating a sense of safety among their population.
The parallel to today’s war is easy to see. Israel definitely bought time and in addition it created a possibly excessive sense of safety among Israelis. The external entity, Hamas in this case, was also affected though not deterred by what happened in 2012. Rather it solved the puzzle and adjusted to the Iron Dome strategic barrier by preparing to assault Israel along a completely different axis: underground. Indeed, it dug a remarkable set of “terror tunnels” into Israel, an undertaking that may have cost up to 40% of its budget. Already some observers are calling the existence of the tunnels, or at least their extent, an intelligence failure on the part of Israel, though at this point it is unclear, at least from the outside, that that is true.
By building these tunnels, Hamas got one step ahead of Israel and largely erased the strategic advantage of Iron Dome by forcing a far bloodier war than took place in 2012, thereby inflicting greater human, military, and political costs on Israel.
The tragedy is that Israel did not succeed in politically capitalizing on the time that it had bought with the stunning success of the Iron Dome system in 2012. Sterling notes that this has been a common failure historically, often engendered by an excessive perception of reduced threat. In fact, he calls strategic barriers a “wasting asset,” one whose value decreases over time. The logic of this suggests that right after Iron Dome performed so apparently spectacularly in 2012, Israel should have pushed hard to settle the underlying Israeli-Palestinian disputes. This did not happen.
Obviously, the depressing history of the Israel-Palestine problem suggests that such an effort probably would have failed. On the other hand, it just might have succeeded, and certainly the situation would not be any worse now had Israel given it a try.
Mark Stout is a Senior Editor at War on the Rocks. He is the Director of the MA Program in Global Security Studies at Johns Hopkins University’s School of Arts and Sciences in Washington, D.C.
Photo credit: Israel Defense Forces
CBCalif 
Aaron 
Bryan McGrath 
vwarren6 
Steven 
Consider the logic of the thought that an impenetrable defense line doesn’t work, because the French (demonstrating their routine operational foolishness) decided (or simply for other reasons did not) extend their so-called Maginot Line to defend the entire French Border.
The failure lies not in that the Maginot Line didn’t work, it lies in the fact that the French made no effort, or failed, to extend it to cover the entire French Border.
As a competing example, Israel has made such error with their Border Wall along the Israeli-Palestine West Bank dividing line. That Wall / Fence was constructed to keep out Palestinian bombers who were responsible for killing so many Israelis during the Intifada, and it is successful – as it covers the entire demarcation line between the two entities.
If the French had extended the Maginot Line completely across France, provided it with the necessary support, that their rather large Army (active duty and reserves) could have provided, it would have prevented the German Army from finding an opening into their country. To attempt an invasion of France, the German Army would have had to attack the defense line at one or more points. That would have robbed them of the value of the mobility and air support from their Stuka and other aircraft on which they relied. France had sufficient aircraft and tanks to have used them defensively to defend against any attacks and to defend the Maginot Defense Line.
The repeated historical focus on the German forces being able to penetrate through a purposeful gap in the French line doesn’t invalidate the value of a defensive line, instead it merely demonstrates the French seem to have lacked (from a military prospective) strategic common sense – on the above or other basis.
The French could have left gaps in the line with the realization that the Germans would pour into one of those funnels, had they made even a minor attempt to observe and study the German methods of war. They could have turned that funnel into a trap for the Germans, but alas it was not to be.
Again, there is no causal relationship between Strategic Stupidity and Engineering success or failure. Strategic stupidity is just that and nothing more.
In addition, one must disagree completely with the logic underlying the statement that:
“The logic of this suggests that right after Iron Dome performed so apparently spectacularly in 2012, Israel should have pushed hard to settle the underlying Israeli-Palestinian disputes. This did not happen.”
First, that Iron Dome success (which has occurred the ramblings of some MIT professor aside) has not changed the attitude and goals of Hamas. A nation cannot make peace with an enemy which attacks it routinely and has the objective of destroying its neighbor, and is not willing to live side by side in accordance with normal standards of international behavior. Their concept of a ten year truce is simply Medieval Logic and deserves no response, this it the 21st Century.
The USSR and NATO Nations faced off against each other, but lived in peace only because they did not shell or routinely attack the other.
Hamas has no interest in establishing an economically viable State in Gaza, If they did, they would have simply publicly renounced their goals, acted accordingly, and the Borders would have opened — under the supervision of a reliable non-Gazan force to insure that smuggling of weapons into Gaza did not occur. It didn’t happen and cannot happen because Hamas is a group of religious fanatics, with their own army, fixated on the goals of destroying Israel and attacking Jews — and nothing more.
Naivety about that fact doesn’t make for truth in contrary statements. Simply providing them with the ability to improve their military position through open borders will not change the nature of that organization. They have the guns and will use them to control Gaza, stop the PLO from taking control of Gaza, and continue acting as they currently do.
I was thinking many of the same things while reading the article.
Israel suffered very minor casualties. Seems the strategic failure was on the part of Hamas.
If the Iron Dome has failed so miserably, where are the Israeli casualties? The answer is there really aren’t any.
Then I would ask, OK, if there are no or virtually no casualties and I take your and this MIT professor’s word that the Iron Dome is ineffective I would have to then ask: Are Hamas’s rockets then completely ineffective? Are they blowing up in mid-air? Are they so “dumb” that they are landing near 100% of the time so far off their designated course that they end up in the ocean or empty desert?
Looks like reports put the # of rockets fired at Israel from Gaza at somewhere around 3000 this year.
Despite the large # of rockets fired at Israel this year only a single death has so far been attributed to “missile” fire. The other casualties attributed to mortar fire.
Looking at historic reports, the missile attacks were at their most effective back in what? the ’04-’05 period when at least 17 were killed and attributed to rocket fire (Qassam and Grad)on less than 700 launches? So you’ve gone from a death rate of 2.4% to one of .03%
SOMETHING has changed the game and the rockets used in Gaza aren’t getting LESS accurate or LESS powerful or shorter in range.
If I was Hamas, I’d dump the rockets and use mortars which appear to have a short enough launch/trajectory to not be intercepted or, at the very least, are more accurate (if you don’t believe the Iron Dome is effective)
If I was this MIT professor I might look at the tangible results and attack the problem from the otherside–“Why are Hamas rockets becoming less and less effective??”
and if I was the IDF I’d keep doing what I’m doing. Their people are safer, you’re bankrupting Hamas while relegating them to a wholly ineffectual force.
The author raises a number of interesting points, but in the end, synthesizes them to conclude “strategic failure” on the part of the Israelis. I see it quite differently.
The Israeli government has had the time a latitude it needs to deal powerfully with Hamas for two very important reasons. The first is the success of Iron Dome, actual and perceived. Indeed, the Israeli people do in fact believe that it is working, which has been part of the overwhelming support the government has had in waging this campaign. Secondly, one cannot dismiss the role of the Obama Administration here. Simply put, the Israelis no longer believe we have their back, they feel increasingly isolated, and their usually fractious domestic political scene has lined up in lockstep behind Mr. Netanyahu’s effort to deal Hamas a crippling blow. The author completely ignores the role of DOMESTIC Israeli strategy in waging a war essentially within the State’s borders.
The author writes “By building these tunnels, Hamas got one step ahead of Israel and largely erased the strategic advantage of Iron Dome by forcing a far bloodier war than took place in 2012, thereby inflicting greater human, military, and political costs on Israel.” The problem with this statement however, is that a bloody war seems to be exactly what Israel NEEDS to pursue its strategic objectives.
Whether the tunnels represent an intelligence failure or not, Iron Dome and American policy shifts have given Netanyahu the time and space he needs to wage a thorough and effective campaign to neuter Hamas. The siphoning of aid from programs to benefit the people of Gaza to build quixotic, elaborate tunnels, along with the daily revelations of Hamas use of civilians and protected facilities to shield their activities, are ALSO having dramatic impact on the perception of Hamas and its cause. When the story of this stage of the conflict is written, it is Hamas’ strategy that will come in for scrutiny, not Israel.
Hamas’s purpose for their missiles (whether accurate or not) is to provoke an Israeli reaction – often military – to continue their media campaign to turn the world’s opinion against Israel.
They are betting that they don’t actually have to defeat the Israelis in battle, they just have to out last them, and have public opinion turn against Israel, thus forcing the Israeli hand.
Whether the Iron Dome is seen as creating a Maginot Line mentality is up for debate. Israeli politicians must be seen as doing “something.” And unlike their French counterparts after WWI, the Israelis have no qualms about pre-emptive strikes. They don’t ask for permission from anyone. They act.
The next step against mortars is the Iron Beam which is in the development stage. Than a defensive shield that is put on go to edge of the territory. Finally when rockets are being fired the shield will stop the rockets which will explode back unto Gaza.
Sounds hypothetical but apparently it is not