WINOGRAD FINAL REPORT -- HARSHER ON IDF THAN ON

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 TEL AVIV 000245

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 01/30/2018
TAGS: PREL PGOV PINR MOPS IS LE
SUBJECT: WINOGRAD FINAL REPORT -- HARSHER ON IDF THAN ON
OLMERT

REF: TEL AVIV 238

Classified By: Political Counselor Marc J. Sievers. Reason 1.4 (B/D)


1. (C) Jerusalem's first snowstorm of the season coincided
with the public release of the Winograd report that has
created a political storm of its own. How the media describe
the findings of the report will determine, in large measure,
the magnitude of that storm. Our initial assessment is that
on a scale of 1 to 5 (light to harsh treatment),the grade PM
Olmert received was a 2 while the Israeli military leadership
fared significantly worse. Senior officers in the IDF
reportedly told the Jerusalem Post that they had been
preparing for a "worst case scenario" in which the military,
not the political echelon would be blamed for most of the
war's failures. This preliminary assessment will need to be
reviewed once the report has been digested by the media, the
Israeli public, and Defense Minister Ehud Barak, who will be
the focus of intense scrutiny and speculation over the coming
days. Key findings presented by Judge Winograd follow below.

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Key Findings
--------------


2. (U) Judge Winograd emphasized in the course of his press
conference January 30 that his Committee investigated the
Second Lebanon War with a view toward drawing lessons for the
future -- and hence refrained from including personal
conclusions and recommendations in the final report.
Winograd summarized the import of the interim report (of
April 2007),stressing that Israel went to war without
choosing a clear option for achieving its objectives and
without an exit strategy: "these (lapses) constituted
serious failures, which affected the whole war." The
Committee produced a press release on its 600-plus page final
report.


3. (U) Chief among the failures identified by the Committee
were:

-- Overall, we regard the Second Lebanon War as a serious
missed opportunity. Israel initiated a long war, which ended
without its clear military victory. A semi-military
organization of a few thousand men resisted, for a few weeks,
the strongest army in the Middle East...

-- After a long period of using only standoff fire power and
limited ground activities, Israel initiated a large scale
ground offensive, very close to the Security Council
resolution imposing a ceasefire. This offensive did not
result in military gains and was not completed.

-- There were serious failings and shortcomings in the
decision-making processes and staff-work in the political and
military echelons and their interface.

-- There were serious failings and flaws in the quality of
preparedness, decision-making and performance in the IDF high
command, especially in the Army.

-- There were serious failings and flaws in the lack of
strategic thinking and planning, in both the political and
military echelons.

-- There were severe failings and flaws in the defense of the
civilian population and in coping with its being attacked by
rockets.

-- These weaknesses resulted in part from inadequacies of
preparedness and strategic and operative planning which go
back long before the Second Lebanon war.


4. (U) In addition, Winograd highlighted:

-- "Israel did not use its military force well and
effectively, despite the fact that it was a limited war
initiated by Israel itself."

-- "At the end of the day, Israel did not gain a political
achievement because of military successes; rather, it relied
on a political agreement, which included positive elements
for Israel, which permitted it to stop a war which it had
failed to win."

-- "The IDF... failed to provide the political echelon with a
military achievement that could have served as a basis for
political and diplomatic action."

-- "There were those in the IDF high command, joined by some
in the political echelon, who entertained a baseless hope

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that the capabilities of the Air Force could prove decisive
in the war."

-- UNSCR 1701 constituted a "significant diplomatic
achievement." "The staff work in the MFA concerning the
adoption of a favorable resolution in the Security Council
was, in the main, quick, systematic and efficient... but did
not reflect clear awareness of the essential need to maintain
an effective relationship between military achievements and
diplomatic activities."


5. (U) On decision-making related to the final ground
offensive -- an issue of intense public interest due to the
relatively heavy IDF losses and charges that the Prime
Minister approved it to score political points, Winograd
found ambiguity and determined that it was "impossible to
evaluate the ground operation at the end of the war without
recalling the developments that preceded it and the repeated
delays in the adoption of the Security Council resolution."
Thus, Winograd assessed:

-- "It is not clear what the ground operation contributed to
speeding up the diplomatic achievement or improving it. It
is also unclear to what extent starting the ground offensive
affected the reactions of the Government of Lebanon and
Hizballah to the ceasefire."

and concluded that:

-- "The decision to start the ground operation was within the
political and professional discretion of its makers, on the
basis of the facts before them. The goals of the ground
operation were legitimate, and were not exhausted by the wish
to hasten or improve a diplomatic achievement. There was no
failure in that decision in itself, despite its limited
achievements and its painful costs."

-- Both the prime minister and minister of defense "acted out
of a strong and sincere perception of what they thought at
the time was Israel's interest."

--------------
Eyes on the Two Ehuds:
--------------


6. (C) PM Ehud Olmert and his allies, notably Haim Ramon,
have invested a great deal of time pulsing the political
elite and pundits in the past few days, stressing the
positive results of his leadership since the Second Lebanon
War (reftel). With selective leaks and open access, Olmert
has won over key supporters in the Yediot Ahronot newspaper
and Channel 2, the most widely read and watched media
outlets, but faces hostility from writers and reporters in
other outlets, such as Maariv and Channel 10. He has
countered possible calls for his resignation or early
elections with arguments about the cost such decisions would
have for the nation, including bringing a halt to the
Annapolis process. On January 30, Olmert received the report
an hour in advance of the public, and his team worked quickly
to get their spin to the public. In particular, they have
highlighted the report's assessment that the decision to
launch a ground operation in the final three days of the
34-day war was reasonable in the framework of diplomatic and
military considerations that faced the decision-makers at the
time. (See para 5 above.)


7. (C) DefMin Ehud Barak has cleared his calendar for the
next 48 hours to provide time to fully digest the report
before reacting to it. All eyes are on him, and our contacts
assess that he will be under enormous pressure to react
publicly and clearly. Given the tenor of Winograd's
presentation of the final report, it appears to us that Barak
will have leeway to find a rationale to remain in the
government. Only if a political tempest brews quickly and
with great intensity will Barak keep his campaign commitment
to call for early elections in late 2008 or 2009, which,
given Olmert's adamant stance that such a call would
immediately render him a lameduck, would amount to a major
coalition crisis. In fact, Olmert told one Barak associate
that should Barak demand early elections in the wake of
Winograd, Olmert himself will act to dissolve the government
and hold early elections in 90 days, a move that would be
lose-lose for Olmert and Barak. We anticipate a measured
reaction from Barak over the course of the next four days.


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