In May 1962, when I reported for active duty as a newly commissioned officer to Fort Gordon, Georgia (now Fort Eisenhower, given that US military posts have recently been purged of the names of Confederate generals), the military was gearing up for a larger US presence in the Vietnam War of 1955-75.
At the time, the US military leadership wanted to understand how American troops would fare if they were captured and imprisoned in Vietnamese prisoner-of-war camps and subjected to physical and mental torture, so they built a mock Vietnamese village and interment camp somewhere in Alabama.
Except for its location in rural America, the camp, built on intelligence gathered by the military, did a good job replicating the physical surroundings that captured prisoners of war might experience.
The plan was to send people like us there for two weeks to see how we would react under the simulated conditions of a real POW camp. The program was put in place, but the psychologists who were in charge were disappointed with the results.
They found that even if people were subjected to the same treatment in Alabama that they were likely to receive if incarcerated in a Vietnamese facility, their mental health would not be not similarly affected.
The examiners concluded that because each of the officers sent to the mock-up facility knew that in two weeks, their internment would end, and they would be back home in the arms of their families and friends, they were able to handle their capture with a positive attitude. In an actual Vietnamese internment camp, of course, they would have no idea how long they would be held.
After less than a year, the program was shut down, the camp was dismantled, and the evaluators were sent home. Their final conclusion was that in a situation where people are under stress but know when the stress will abate, they can easily handle the pressures of the moment.
This memory came back to me 63 years later when Israel restarted the war against Hamas earlier this week.
Where is the parallel? When the war started in October 2023, our government had clearly stated goals, even if some of them, in retrospect, were, at best, unrealistic and, at worst, undefined and immeasurable.
But everyone here knew that the situation in Gaza could not continue as before, that our people living in the South had a right to live there peacefully, and that, in truth, we were fighting an existential war for our survival, ultimately on multiple fronts.
Massive government failures
In the face of massive failures by our government to protect us in the run-up to October, along with the very long time it took the same government to get its act together and put the country on an organized war footing, our reservists answered the call, fought valiantly, and proved that we in the home front and they in the field were up to the task.
Sadly, we buried almost 1,000 of our best and brightest who, with the incredible support of their families, presumed the sacrifice was worth it.
To return to the psychologist’s conclusion of many years ago, in a situation where people are under stress but know when the stress will abate, they can easily handle all of the pressures of the moment.
In our case, before the ceasefire, we did not know for sure when the fighting would stop; we all knew it would, were sure we would be victorious, and were willing to suffer the consequences.
Today, we are in a different position altogether. Eighteen months after October 7, we are at war once again, but now, we have no idea what victory means, how the end of the war will be identified, or if the goals of the government (which seem now fuzzier than ever) are even achievable.
It is almost as if the government is saying that because we have the full support of the White House and Hamas is not doing everything we say, then we might as well start fighting again.
But we are no longer in October 2023. It is now March 2025, and after a year-and-a-half of active fighting on multiple fronts, the people of Israel need to know that its government has a plan, realistic and measurable objectives for this newest military activity, and a program to move the country forward after the war.
At the moment, we seem to have none of those. Rather, we appear to be, as Dan Perry wrote this week in the Forward on the end of the ceasefire, subject to “Netanyahu’s survival politics and Trump’s volatility.”
We can be sure that, given the lack of a clearly stated plan, we will no doubt find the mental health of the citizenry drastically and negatively affected. We, the people of Israel, are owed clarity on the plans and objectives of the government that serves at our will.
We are capable of being up to any task that has a defined set of objectives and a measurable end date. Lacking both, the only ones who will benefit will be the psychiatrists in Israel, and we don’t have nearly enough of those to deal with the resultant trauma.
Former US president John F. Kennedy famously said, “Israel was not created in order to disappear – Israel will endure and flourish.”
We have done a great job of realizing that vision in the first 75 years of our existence. Let us hope our success will continue.
The writer has lived in Israel for 41 years and is the founder and chair of Atid EDI Ltd., an international business development consultancy. He is also the founder and chair of the American State Offices Association, former national president of the Association of Americans and Canadians in Israel (AACI), and a past chairperson of the Board of the Pardes Institute of Jewish Studies.