Chair of urban warfare studies at West Point, John Spencer, expressed his amazement regarding the strategy behind the recent attack on Hezbollah terrorists in Lebanon after analyzing the incident in a thread of Wednesday X/Twitter posts.
The attack on Tuesday involved the explosion of pagers used for communication among the terror group, injuring an estimated 4,000 people and killing 11.
The following day, another wave of explosions across Lebanon injured an additional 500 and resulted in 20 deaths, according to the Lebanese Health Ministry late Wednesday night report.
Spencer shared his insights on the attack, stating that while there have been significant intelligence operations and surprise attacks throughout history, he has not seen one as precise, forceful, and geographically widespread as this.
“I cannot find a similar intelligence/military operation with such secrecy, lethality, ingenuity, and audacity,” he remarked in the post.
1) Historic & unprecedented. I cannot find a similar intelligence/military operation with such secrecy, lethality, ingenuity, audacity, impact. While there have been other major intelligence operations in war (breaking Enigma, various spies inside governments) or surprise attacks…
— John Spencer (@SpencerGuard) September 18, 2024
Furthermore, he highlighted that this single operation significantly impacted Hezbollah, with reported injuries in the thousands and dozens killed.
“The attack also exposed the Hezbollah network, not just in Lebanon but in other parts of the Middle East where Hezbollah agents or affiliates carried this specific pager issued by the group,” he noted.
Spencer emphasized the psychological aspect of warfare, stating, “War is a contest of will. It includes psychology and emotion.”
Additionally, Spencer remarked on the substantial psychological impact caused by the attack, explaining that “Hezbollah cannot trust their equipment, cannot communicate (they switched to pagers out of concerns that Israel was monitoring their communications), and will likely alter many elements of their operations, which could lead to further mistakes that can be exploited. With a single push of a button, fear was instilled in Hezbollah forces.”
Why now?
Acknowledging that Hezbollah is an Iranian proxy force in Lebanon that has been relentless in its attacks since October 8, Spencer concluded, “Israel is fighting many enemies on multiple fronts. What it does and when it does it must consider many stakeholders, including their enemies, allies, and domestic and international contexts, as well as other ongoing operations.”