Israel’s Air Force Capabilities to Increase 400%

[Desertfalcon]

Ofcourse security is best achieved through peace. Peace in this case is best achieved by a 2 state soln in which Palestinian aspirations and rights are taken care of.


I was talking strictly from a on-the-ground military perspective. India for example can afford to lose wars and still remain a viable country, so can US, etc.

From that perspective, how much does Israel have to expand - both territorially and population wise - such that it can afford to lose a war and not become extinct.

How could Israel expand territorially while embracing a two state solution? Expansion, specifically the illegal settlements in the West Bank, is the fuel that feeds the conflict that Israel constantly faces. Israel needs to maintain her excellent military forces for certain, specifically because she can only lose one war, and that will be her last, but her future security is going to have to be based on peaceful coexistence with the Palestinian people and that will entail a degree of contraction and restraint, not expansion.

 

[al-Hasani]

Ofcourse security is best achieved through peace. Peace in this case is best achieved by a 2 state soln in which Palestinian aspirations and rights are taken care of.


I was talking strictly from a on-the-ground military perspective. India for example can afford to lose wars and still remain a viable country, so can US, etc.

From that perspective, how much does Israel have to expand - both territorially and population wise - such that it can afford to lose a war and not become extinct.

I am not Desertfalcon but I can give my own personal views.

Israel is, as you know it, not a big country. Most of its population (90% or so) live near the Mediterranean Sea and in the fertile areas of the Northern and Central plains. That area is even significantly smaller than all of Israel's current territory (although it is somewhat disputed to say the least). This means that a military lose could have fatal consequences depending on the nature of that military lose. India cannot be compared with Israel. India is slightly smaller than the entire Arabian Peninsula (to put ME geography in perspective) yet 1.2 billion strong with vast geographical distances and natural barriers in the North (Himalayas). Otherwise India is somewhat vulnerable from the West (Pakistan) and East (Bangladesh). In any case India is about 500 times bigger than Israel or something along those lines. I have not checked to be sure or calculated it. Just an estimate from the top of my head.

Israel is much, much more vulnerable with few natural barriers in comparison.

Israel will always have a much, much smaller population to draft from which means that they must have an technological advantage. Mostly in the air. Which they have.

Also it depends on what kind of war you are talking about. A land invitation? A few week long air bombardment? An all-out war involving nuclear weapons etc.?

Most importantly you need to ask yourself which regional country would be foolish enough to attack Israel to begin with as of 2014?

I hope that this partially answered your question.

 

[l'ingénieur]

Pakistan has the best pilots in my opinion

 

[al-Hasani]

@Contrarian

This might catch your interest:

Israel's strategic nuclear doctrine: ambiguity versus openness | OUPblog

Israel fundamentally changes its strategic military doctrine | Watchdog Wire - Florida

There are much more detailed reports about the Israeli strategic doctrine out there but they are not something that you read in a few minutes so I will not post them. But you can Google them.

@Desertfalcon

Probably has more interesting articles to share on this topic as a military man.

 

[Contrarian]

How could Israel expand territorially while embracing a two state solution? Expansion, specifically the illegal settlements in the West Bank, is the fuel that feeds the conflict that Israel constantly faces. Israel need to maintain her excellent military forces for certain, specifically because she can only lose one war, and that will be her last, but her future security is going to have to be based on peaceful coexistence with the Palestinian people and that will entail a degree of contraction and restraint, not expansion.

I already agree that peace will come from a 2 state solution.
However I am not talking about peace here! forget about peace. I understand expansion will only fuel more trouble.

Now Take a clean white slate. My question is from a military perspective. And tell me...how much would Israel have to expand territorially and population wise to be able to lose a war and not become extinct as a country/nation/a people.

 

[al-Hasani]

I already agree that peace will come from a 2 state solution.
However I am not talking about peace here! forget about peace. I understand expansion will only fuel more trouble.

Now Take a clean white slate. My question is from a military perspective. And tell me...how much would Israel have to expand territorially and population wise to be able to lose a war and not become extinct as a country/nation/a people.

Sorry, I could not avoid posting that map.​

 

[Desertfalcon]

Now Take a clean white slate. My question is from a military perspective. And tell me...how much would Israel have to expand territorially and population wise to be able to lose a war and not become extinct as a country/nation/a people.

You are not liking my answer because I do not accept the premise of your question. Even if I approach it from a "clean white slate", any Israeli expansion would weaken not strengthen, her security. The more Arab lands and Arab people's under her control, the worse her security situation would become.

 

[LeveragedBuyout]

You are not liking my answer because I do not accept the premise of your question. Even if I approach it from a "clean white slate", any Israeli expansion would weaken not strengthen, her security. The more Arab lands and Arab people's under her control, the worse her security situation would become.

Desertfalcon, he's talking about strategic depth. Israel has none. Not sure why you believe that contraction will increase Israel's security--you are far too focused on insurgency and too dismissive of a conventional war. Even so, the Gaza withdrawal would suggest that there's no scenario where contraction enhances Israel's security.

 

[Contrarian]

I am not Desertfalcon but I can give my own personal views.

Israel is, as you know it, not a big country. Most of its population (90% or so) live near the Mediterranean Sea and in the fertile areas of the Northern and Central plains. That area is even significantly smaller than all of Israel's current territory (although it is somewhat disputed to say the least). This means that a military lose could have fatal consequences depending on the nature of that military lose.

Israel is much, much more vulnerable with few natural barriers in comparison.

Israel will always have a much, much smaller population to draft from which means that they must have an technological advantage. Mostly in the air. Which they have.

Also it depends on what kind of war you are talking about. A land invitation? A few week long air bombardment? An all-out war involving nuclear weapons etc.?

I am talking about an all out war without the use of nuclear weapons.
That would mean long air bombardment on Israel, if the IsAF loses.
So in such a scenario..assume that Israel starts losing.

Now I ask the question, how big would Israel have to be - in land and people - to be able to withstand that loss. Do the countries that want to attack Israel want complete destruction of jews?

I can give an example, Singapore understands that a first strike on Singapore would mean complete destruction of its military if not the city state itself. And it understands that it cannot expand geographically.

So it keeps a major part of its military abroad at all times, but close enough to Singapore such that it can come swiftly.
It has not been reported as widely, but Singaporean AF has been given a military base in East India. They keep an AF sqdrn there along with other assets.

We gain - we get to constantly practice against F-16 blk 52 - the exact model that Pakistan has. We get to know of the strategies of the plane and all details.
They gain - Every country would think twice about waging war on India to take out Singapore. So their assets are safe as long as they are within Indian territory. And if their military is destroyed, they can call up a significant force that is posted abroad. They also have similar bases in Australia. So their military is distributed that way.

Most importantly you need to ask yourself which regional country would be foolish enough to attack Israel to begin with as of 2014?

This is a hypothetical question.

India cannot be compared with Israel. India is slightly smaller than the entire Arabian Peninsula (to put ME geography in perspective) yet 1.2 billion strong with vast geographical distances and natural barriers in the North (Himalayas). Otherwise India is somewhat vulnerable from the West (Pakistan) and East (Bangladesh). In any case India is about 500 times bigger than Israel or something along those lines. I have not checked to be sure or calculated it. Just an estimate from the top of my head.

You are slightly wrong there.
You don't understand the Eastern borders of India. East is ridiculous terrain. It is extremely marshy. Bangladesh has huge rivers criss crossing the entire terrain. The entire area is one big massive delta. Infact the situation is so bad that despite all the infrastructure we have built for our military to move, the Indian Army literally refused the order of the Prime Minister to attack East Pakistan(Bangladesh) before the winters, because they said no large scale military can move across Bangladeshi terrain at any halfway decent speed. Even in Winters, Indian Military had to para drop troops directly to their locations in Bangladesh to get the desired speed of operation.

The only place where a proper military invasion of India can occur is from the West - ie Pakistan.

 

[LeveragedBuyout]

I am talking about an all out war without the use of nuclear weapons.
That would mean long air bombardment on Israel, if the IsAF loses.
So in such a scenario..assume that Israel starts losing.

Now I ask the question, how big would Israel have to be - in land and people - to be able to withstand that loss. Do the countries that want to attack Israel want complete destruction of jews?

I can give an example, Singapore understands that a first strike on Singapore would mean complete destruction of the city state and its military. It understands that it cannot expand geographically.

So it keeps a major part of its military abroad at all times, but close enough to Singapore such that it can come swiftly.
It has not been reported as widely, but Singaporean AF has been given a military base in East India. They keep an AF sqdrn there along with other assets.

We gain - we get to constantly practice against F-16 blk 52 - the exact model that Pakistan has. We get to know of the strategies of the plane and all details.
They gain - Every country would think twice about waging war on India to take out Singapore. So their assets are safe as long as they are within Indian territory. And if their military is destroyed, they can call up a significant force that is posted abroad. They also have similar bases in Australia. So their military is distributed that way.


This is a hypothetical question.



You are slightly wrong there.
You don't understand the Eastern borders of India. East is ridiculous terrain. It is extremely marshy. Bangladesh has huge rivers criss crossing the entire terrain. The entire area is one big massive delta. Infact the situation is so bad that despite all the infrastructure we have built for our military to move, the Indian Army literally refused the order of the Prime Minister to attack East Pakistan(Bangladesh) before the winters, because they said no large scale military can move across Bangladeshi terrain at any halfway decent speed.Even in Winters, Indian Military had to para drop troops directly to their locations in Bangladesh to get the desired speed of operation.

The only place where a military invasion of India can occur is from the West - ie Pakistan.

I am not a military professional, but I think it depends on the front or type of war one is talking about. The Sinai seemed to be sufficient against Egypt. I am not sure the Golan is quite enough against Syria, given how dangerous the situation was in 1973. And the Jordan valley is probably a minimum vs. Jordan, although it's never really been tested.

But in any case, I would disagree with Desertfalcon that contraction would enhance Israel's security, at least in the current and foreseeable environment.

 

[Contrarian]

Desertfalcon, he's talking about strategic depth. Israel has none. Not sure why you believe that contraction will increase Israel's security--you are far too focused on insurgency and too dismissive of a conventional war. Even so, the Gaza withdrawal would suggest that there's no scenario where contraction enhances Israel's security.

I did not want to use the word Strategic depth, though it is apt in the scenario.
@Desertfalcon . I hope you understand my question better now?

 

[al-Hasani]

I am talking about an all out war without the use of nuclear weapons.
That would mean long air bombardment on Israel, if the IsAF loses.
So in such a scenario..assume that Israel starts losing.

Now I ask the question, how big would Israel have to be - in land and people - to be able to withstand that loss. Do the countries that want to attack Israel want complete destruction of jews?

I can give an example, Singapore understands that a first strike on Singapore would mean complete destruction of the city state and its military. It understands that it cannot expand geographically.

So it keeps a major part of its military abroad at all times, but close enough to Singapore such that it can come swiftly.
It has not been reported as widely, but Singaporean AF has been given a military base in East India. They keep an AF sqdrn there along with other assets.

We gain - we get to constantly practice against F-16 blk 52 - the exact model that Pakistan has. We get to know of the strategies of the plane and all details.
They gain - Every country would think twice about waging war on India to take out Singapore. So their assets are safe as long as they are within Indian territory. And if their military is destroyed, they can call up a significant force that is posted abroad. They also have similar bases in Australia. So their military is distributed that way.


This is a hypothetical question.



You are slightly wrong there.
You don't understand the Eastern borders of India. East is ridiculous terrain. It is extremely marshy. Bangladesh has huge rivers criss crossing the entire terrain. The entire area is one big massive delta. Infact the situation is so bad that despite all the infrastructure we have built for our military to move, the Indian Army literally refused the order of the Prime Minister to attack East Pakistan(Bangladesh) before the winters, because they said no large scale military can move across Bangladeshi terrain at any halfway decent speed.Even in Winters, Indian Military had to para drop troops directly to their locations in Bangladesh to get the desired speed of operation.

The only place where a military invasion of India can occur is from the West - ie Pakistan.

I don't know any current country that has voiced any desire to completely annihilate Israel other than the rabid Mullah's in Iran.

Also it's difficult to tell. It depends on the strength of the attack. I mean in year 2014 it's not realistic to kill the entire Israeli population of which 20% are Palestinian Arabs (both Muslim and Christians).
I think that it's an unrealistic scenario. Also Israel is not THAT small. But I imagine that it would require the annexation of Lebanon, Jordan, Sinai and Palestine. Population wise? Are you only talking about "native" Israeli population here or population that they might incorporate? All of this is obviously highly unrealistic. Again it's difficult to give numbers. Is 8 million not enough? What about 15 million? Where does it end or begin?

Yes, it is indeed. But I think that the question is no otherwise there would have been an attempt.

Yes, I know about the swampy terrain of Bangladesh and the rivers there but I was comparing it to the Himalaya's that with all due respect are a more difficult barrier to cross for any conventional force if not an impossible barrier. Although that is only in Northern India. Also India could be vulnerable by the sea but once again which country would want to or is even interested in a full scale invasion of India? That to me sounds HIGHLY unrealistic as well.

 

[anonymus]

@Contrarian

I don't think that any amount of strategic depth would be able to provide security to Israel. Israel's problem is not land but low population.. On top of it, in middle eastern terrain , lack of forests and mountains means that distance would never be a limiting factor in middle east as nothing suits modern warfare like deserts.

An army hiding in Himalayan mountain range , if it could secure supplies, would be untouchable even to US armed forces. There is no equivalent geographical feature in middle east.

 

[al-Hasani]

@Contrarian

I don't think that any amount of strategic depth would be able to provide security to Israel. Israel's problem is not land but low population.. On top of it, in middle eastern terrain , lack of forests and mountains means that distance would never be a limiting factor in middle east as nothing suits modern warfare like deserts.

An army hiding in Himalayan mountain range , if it could secure supplies, would be untouchable even to US armed forces. There is no equivalent geographical feature in middle east.

Well, there are plenty of mountain ranges in the ME but it's true that none are as tall as the Himalayas. On the other hand you have plenty of geographical difficulties in the ME and HUGE geographical distances and climatic challenges. In the case of Israel not that much but in the case of countries such as KSA, Turkey, Iran, Yemen, Morocco, Algeria etc. you have.

Actually there are mountains in Israel and forests as well as in every other surrounding country but that's again nothing compared to the natural barrier that are the Himalayas. An invasion of Israel by the desert would only come from the Negev Desert. Otherwise the terrain is mostly flat field terrain.

 

[anonymus]

Well, there are plenty of mountain ranges in the ME but it's truth that none are as tall as the Himalayas. On the other hand you have plenty of geographical difficulties in the ME and HUGE geographical differences and climatic challenges. In the case of Israel not that much but in the case of countries such as KSA, Turkey, Iran, Yemen, Morocco, Algeria etc. you have.

Actually there are mountains in Israel and forests as well as in every other surrounding country but that's again nothing compared to the natural barrier that are the Himalayas. An invasion of Israel by the desert would only come from the Negev Desert. Otherwise the terrain is mostly flat field.

Himalyan is not a difficult barrier because of it's height but it is because of it's width. It is 150-400 Km wide which means that even if you cross Great himalyan range with average height of 6600 mts, you still have to contend with 2-5 more ranges all with average height of 3000+ ms laid out in hapazard manner, depending upon location.