Don't let a fixation on "controlling the narrative" in a campaign in an enemy populated city get in the way of battlefield victory. The former is important achieve the latter. Victory should not be sabotaged to "win" the narrative.
The UN human rights chief was appalled by effects of renewed Israeli strikes on Hamas in Gaza. But not so horrified over the initial Hamas rape and murder invasion of Israel.
You want (tip to Instapundit) a lesson from the 10/7 war? Hamas started a war with a rape and murder invasion of Israel. Israel gave them war. End of lesson. Will the Islamist fanatics of Hamas learn that?
Because a decision to fight for a city is a decision to destroy it. That's long been true. Hamas chose to fight behind human shields in densely populated Gaza. Will Gazans who paid the price of death and destruction for cheering the invasion learn the lesson? Will they keep backing Hamas? Will they cheer another terror attack on Israel? Fear is said to be the beginning of wisdom. So maybe there is hope.
Will those outside of Gaza learn that lesson? Probably not. Gazans did not learn the lesson from the campaign for Mosul, Iraq, when ISIL decided to defend that city.
For me, the war for Gaza is another reason to avoid large-scale urban warfare if possible, as I wrote in Army. Clearly for Israel, it was not possible in this war. And when it comes to megacities, I really want to avoid primary responsibility for fighting in them.
Still, the battlefield lessons are useful. Most are old lessons. Check the second link out.
NOTE: TDR Winter War of 2022 coverage continues here.
NOTE: You may also like to read my posts on Substack, at The Dignified Rant: Evolved. Go ahead and subscribe to it.
NOTE: I made the image with Bing. Which is getting harder and harder to use for illustrating defense topics. I had to alter my request to be non-urban warfare related ("a color photo of a city street with rubble caused by an earthquake. Soldiers, bulldozers, and aerial drones are looking for survivors"). I've loved this capability. But it is getting harder to use lately. Why? Also, the AI doesn't know what a bulldozer looks like, apparently.
