Escalation Dominance:  The Israelis Decimate Hezbollah

A multi-phase operation was initiated by the three thousand or so simultaneous pager blasts on Tuesday, September 17 in Lebanon.  The next day other items such as handheld radios and solar arrays also blew up.  The operation was likely related to Israel, but besides the Prime Minister donning sunglasses and rejecting the James Bond moniker for his own name, there’s no official confirmation.  The pager operation was one of the greatest covert operations ever. It was brilliantly planned and executed.

The ability to interdict the supply chain, place the small explosive charges, and have the pagers delivered to Hezbollah operatives was the greatest ever targeted, mass carnage on a terrorist group.  The devastating operation significantly wounded and killed almost 3,000 Hezbollah members, likely heavy in leadership cadre.  The operation appears to be ongoing as a second wave of other personal electronics blew up on Wednesday – often during burials of the dead terrorists.

The targeted eliminations were possibly a preparatory strike for larger Israeli action to destroy Hezbollah once and for all.  On Wednesday, Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant announced “a new phase in the war” as Israeli forces lifted and shifted from Gaza and other borders toward the north of Israel.

Israel has shown a decisive advantage in what’s called “Escalation Dominance.”  Iran started this war on October 7, 2023, using their proxy of Hamas.  Iran had spent a year funding, equipping, and training the “3H Club” of Hamas, the Houthis, and Hezbollah.  Hamas is now almost eliminated in Gaza, and the Houthis continue to harass Red Sea shipping but have been severely degraded.  The overseer of the Middle East Theater of Conflict is Iran, as the world is set on fire by the Chinese Communist arson campaign.  Israel has roughed up and humiliated Iran.

In another decisive, remote access operation, the remaining Hamas Leader, Ismail Haniyeh was blown up at his guest apartment in Tehran.  The bomb apparently having been placed months in advance.  In April, when Iran attempted the largest barrage of ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, and drones ever to strike against Israel, the score was at least 350 to 0, not including missiles blown up on the launch pad by coordinated cyber effects.

Many are wondering what happened, who did it, and how did it happen regarding the epic Pager Operation.  Here are the key takeaways:

Importance of Trusted Supply Chain: The Pager Operation was likely conducted by the operators understanding and penetrating the production and distribution of the pagers.  Supply Chain surveillance is complicated and difficult, but very important. You have to have trust and confidence down to the piece part of all incoming components and major end items.  The American Government has been mostly concerned with software bugs and other capabilities being inserted into national security products that allow intelligence gathering, internet access, or perhaps remote access and “takeover” of the product.  Embedded, small explosive charges are a new angle.

Intersection of Cyber and Kinetics: This operation took exhaustive planning. Artificial Intelligence, Big Data, and Big Data Analytics helped collect and analyze the data to support the storyboarding of the whole concept of operation (CONOP) and the execution of the CONOP.  There were many moving parts and variables, AI enablement was needed to understand all the possible issues when a change was detected in the kill chain.  Cyber was blended with decisive kinetic effects to wreak carnage.

Precise Targeting: These devices, with small charges, for the most part, largely hit only the intended recipient. If someone had one of the pagers, they were very likely terrorists. Hezbollah has been a designated Terrorist Organization since 1997.  Hezbollah has a long history of terrorist killings; no remorse should be shown for them.  In 1983 over 300 U.S. Marines, Sailors, French Paratroopers, U.S. Embassy staff, and innocent civilians were killed in bombings by Hezbollah.

Mass impact and effect: Thousands were wounded or killed, and it is ongoing. This significantly degrades the entire Hezbollah force.  With the announcement of a northward focus and shift in forces, the Pager Operation can be looked at as the opening artillery barrage by Israel, and it was devastating.  It successfully eviscerated, en masse, Hezbollah leadership.

Escalation Dominance: The Israelis have once again shown, though tiny, they have the reach, depth, agility, and pervasive presence to hit back hard against Hezbollah, which works for Iran, which works for China.  Iran started this war but now seems wobbly as its proxies are chewed up and Israel strikes at will inside of Iran.

Psychological Operations: Hezbollah had switched to pagers to reduce their vulnerability to Israeli signals intelligence. Now they can’t trust pagers or any delivered electronic device. This operation could have been pulled off with coffeemakers. Maybe coffee makers are the next round. Hezbollah has now been conditioned to not trust anything, including each other. Keeping Hezbollah hyper-paranoid degrades their capability and leads to massive infighting.

Be careful of playback: The US and Israel have shown great innovation over the years. However, the terrorists and China study the US and Israel in incredible detail and learn from us. The U.S. Government buys small electronics on a massive scale. Supply Chain Surveillance is a high priority but is not perfect.  Has China already played this back against us?  Will F-35 engines disintegrate on command via remote access operations?  Will Government Cell phones do interesting things on command?  Be very careful and start double-checking.

This was a great victory against terrorists, who are working on behalf of Iran, and Iran is owned by China. Celebrate, but be vigilant. This is far from being over.

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