Israel's intelligence-driven bombardment of Hamas and related jihadis worked pretty well. Let's not forget the "intelligence-driven" part.
That left a mark the next morning:
Hamas and Iran were particularly alarmed by the unexpected tactics Israel used in 2021. The result was dozens of key Hamas and Islamic Jihad (the smaller Iran supported terrorist group in Gaza) personnel killed. Nearly 70 percent of those killed in Gaza were Hamas and Islamic Jihad members and that was no accident.
The Israelis attributed their success to their first wartime use of new communications and intelligence collection and analysis systems used with new software whose full potential had been hinted at during recent training exercises. Hamas and Iran may have belittled these new Israeli capabilities at the time but after a ten-day live demonstration during the May war, the Iranian attitude has shifted. The Iranians were particularly shaken because they were already paranoid about the Israeli success in identifying, locating and acting against key Iranian leaders and facilities. ...
And speaking of similar American efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan:
The targets were located through various means, one of the most important being a network of informants on the ground, as well as the UAVs and satellites.[emphasis added]
One problem I've warned about is the need for intelligence to drive a firepower-driven strategy. That intelligence is often gained from a network on the ground. I worry that no persistent aerial surveillance can fully replace the people on the ground talking to sources and observing people up close:
[There] seems to be stubborn thinking in our government that counter-terrorism is a job separate from counter-insurgency, so we can wage war with special forces and drones against terrorists who target us without paying attention to a wider war.
This is a mistake because counter-terrorism relies on counter-insurgency if we want more than a strategy of drive-by dronings, even though the special forces may kill disproportionately despite their small size compared to total forces involved[.]
This reality was repeated more recently (quoting the CENTCOM commander):
McKenzie explained that U.S. special operators in Afghanistan operate in a “conventional force structure.”
That means they require support from enablers like logistics, air power, intelligence and strike capabilities from both U.S. conventional troops and host nation partner forces.
Israel is close by with a land border. It can get that ground-based human intelligence. And Gaza is small. Ground-based cameras can see a lot. And even aerial surveillance is easier with a small, close target.
I don't think America can do that without maintaining relations on the ground in Afghanistan or Somalia, as I've mentioned. Or anywhere else absent a reliable local ally that has that information and shares it without corruption making it worthless.
Remember, such information-driven approaches to killing enemy leaders worked before drones, aircraft, and satellites. Don't mistake the newer systems as the only tools needed.
We can't "end" the war on Islamist terror by coming home. We can only end our participation. Face it, we plan on losing the Long War against jihadi terrorism, but don't want to admit it.
