“Analysis-, Spy-, and Instrument-Based Early Warnings”: the Changing Concept of Early Warning in the 1950s

Abstract

Israel’s national security doctrine considers early warning a strategic asset that provides the military with the option of operating preemptively with a small conscript army and relatively large reserve layout. The article discusses the role of early warning in Israel’s first decades, based on recently declassified documentation. After establishing a theoretical framework of three early warning environments (strategic, operative, and tactical), we contend that until the 1956 Sinai Campaign, strategic warning was the primary concept in IDF strategic and operative planning. The intelligence assessment that another Arabic attack (in the wake of the Arabs’ 1948 invasion), was not expected, and the recognition of the limitations of operative early warning, led Israel to base its military response on strategic and tactical early warning. 

Only after the Sinai Campaign, and the geopolitical changes in its aftermath and developments in IDF intelligence collecting, did operative early warning gain supremacy. However, while the operative early warning concept became an established element in strategic and operational planning, it was progressively relegated to intelligence gathering only.