Together at Last: After Civil Wars, Sectarian Split, Lebanese Army Maintains Cohesion in Dealing With Israel and Party Militias

Text and photos by JoMarie Fecci

On a desolate hilltop in southern Lebanon a single Lebanese Army soldier looks across the wadi at the fortified compound of his enemy. It seems deceptively quiet. No movement is visible under the stacks of old tires used to soften the impact of indirect fire on the concrete bunkers. Then he hears the boom of a 155-mm howitzer round fired from a faraway post. A column of smoke rises up from a village he cannot see. Frustrated, he turns back toward the position across from him—it remains silent.

Busiliya, the small village where his platoon is deployed, hasn’t been hit since the Lebanese Army’s 1st Intervention Regiment occupied this spot several months ago. Prior to its arrival, the village and surrounding area had been a frequent target of the South Lebanese Army, Israel’s puppet militia.

The hilltop above Busiliya is one of the critical points along the Lebanese Army’s defensive line. Soldiers from the 1st Intervention Regiment man a post overlooking the road that crosses the wadi dividing “liberated” and “Israeli-occupied” Lebanon. If enemy ground troops were to invade in this direction, the unforgiving terrain would force them to come this way. The 1st Intervention Regiment soldiers must remain vigilant, while reining in their frustration as Israeli Air Force jets flying overhead break the sound barrier once again.

“When Israel first occupied southern Lebanon, on March 14, 1978, the Lebanese Army’s role was not shaped nationally due to prevailing circumstances,” explained Col. Elias Farhat, of Army headquarters, referring to the civil war-era army. Soldiers of today’s Army, a modest and lightly equipped force, are in the unenviable position of trying to defend their small nation from the formidable forces of their well-armed Israeli neighbors.

“We cannot really maneuver with our mechanized forces due to the Israeli Air Force,” said 1st Intervention Regiment Operations Officer Lt. Col. Pierre Salem. “So for this reason, and also because of the terrain, we use highly mobile small units in key places. We have a deep defense with a reserve built on the light infantry model.”

One of several specialized units in the Army, the 1st Intervention Regiment is designed to work independently as a light infantry force, or in combination with mechanized infantry units. According to Lt. Colonel Salem, the deployment of his companies at key places on the front line, as well as in reserve, provides the flexibility to respond to a variety of contingencies.

Little by little the Army is extending its presence in the south, trying to provide some measure of security while preparing for the day when Israel will no longer occupy Lebanese territory.

Rebuilding a National Army

The Lebanese Army, which was torn apart during 17 years of factional civil war, has since 1991 become a credible national defense force.

It was current Lebanese President Emile Lahoud who, when he was head of the armed forces during the early 1990s, began a program to rebuild the army as a truly “national” force. As the nation re-emerged from civil war, the Army’s future seemed uncertain. It had split along confessional lines soon after the start of the civil war in 1975, and in the eyes of many Lebanese the Army, whose chief of staff is always Christian, became irreconcilably associated with the Christian militias during the civil war period.

Yet, somehow, President Lahoud successfully reunified the Army across confessional lines, making sure that each unit had both religious and regional balance. In 1993, the Army instituted “flag service,” subjecting those born after Jan. 1, 1973 to national military service for one-year periods. Flag service was intended to simultaneously create a sense of “national identity” across regional and confessional lines and to provide a pool of personnel. The new army was given a coherent military doctrine for the first time, with a single and unchanging enemy—Israel and its SLA allies.

Proof of the Army’s growing cohesiveness was seen in a series of operations carried out by the force in support of the internal security mission. Since Lahoud’s reunification program, the Army has been able to militarily engage a Palestinian group, intervene against a Hezbollah-affiliated religious personality with widespread support in northern Bekka, and arrest and imprison one of the most powerful leaders of a Christian militia. Any one of these acts would have been unthinkable before, but all were carried out without fracturing the new force.

The Lebanese Army’s Mission

The new Lebanese Army faced its first real challenge in 1993 as it deployed the first 300 troops into part of the southern sector after a violent round of clashes between Hezbollah and Israeli forces culminated in the IDF’s Operation Accountability. The Army initially deployed alongside UNIFIL, and made a decision not to disarm Hezbollah, which has continued to conduct operations against Israel in the “zone.”

The Army has a daunting task as it prepares to defend the country from external aggression in a situation where between 8 and 10 percent of the nation’s territory currently is occupied by an enemy force with an overwhelming advantage in terms of arms, equipment and resources.

“A great gap exists between us and Israel. The Israeli defense budget is $8.5 billion, whereas the Lebanese is $400 million—multiply that by 20 years,” explains Colonel Farhat. The largest gap is in sophisticated arms, which Farhat places at a ratio of “about one to zero, in Israel’s favor.”

Approximately half of the Lebanese Army’s fighting forces are currently deployed along the confrontation line, where they must prevent Israeli forces from entering liberated areas, and support the steadfastness of the people of the south to remain on their land. Troops in the south are authorized to respond to any aggression within the “available means.”

Army troops do try to draw a “line” in the south, firing back at enemy positions that have fired at Lebanese military targets or hit residential areas. When the Israeli jets fly low, Army gunners respond. But Army personnel, painfully aware of the disparities between their modest force and the well-equipped Israelis, are careful not to slip into a situation which could provoke another Israeli invasion.

“We cannot engage in a war of attrition with the Israelis because we don’t have the means,” Farhat explains. “If we fire 12 or 100 shells, they will fire back 12,000 on us.” Army units in the southern sector focus most of their efforts on guarding and patrolling the edges of the liberated area.

The Army and the Resistance

Offensive operations against the Israelis and their SLA proxy militia are left to the “resistance.” According to Colonel Farhat, “They conduct operations with small teams of two to eight men. There is no coordination between us and the resistance. They know the terrain better than we do and don’t need our military organization or operational support.”

In the official Army view, the resistance is recognized as a legitimate and separate entity which may operate within the occupied territory but is not allowed to operate and hold arms in areas already under Army control. The most active resistance group, Hezbollah’s armed movement, has developed into a well-trained, disciplined guerrilla fighting force that conducts both longer-range harassing actions and close-quarter attacks that have inflicted increasing casualties on IDF and SLA personnel.

While maintaining the separation between the resistance groups and the Army, President Lahoud and Prime Minister Selim Hoss have both continued to reiterate their support for the resistance. And in a highly unusual move, the president presented four resistance men with commendations after the Hezbollah fighters captured an enemy armored personnel carrier when they overran an SLA compound at Beit Yahoun in May.

The Army, Security Guarantees and Israeli Withdrawals

The Lebanese Army’s role in various Israeli withdrawal scenarios has become a major issue. A scenario in which the IDF/SLA withdraws, handing their posts over to UNIFIL, which then hands them to the Lebanese Army, is seen by many as presenting Israel with “security guarantees.”

Lebanon’s government, as well as all the Lebanese parties, have repeatedly stated their refusal to provide such guarantees. However, the government also is committed to extending the Army’s area of operations to the international borders, and bringing its authority to liberated areas as soon as possible.

Some observers believe a basis for a deployment option meeting both the “no security guarantees” and the “extension of government authority” requirements might be seen along the lines of the response to the SLA’s Jezzine withdrawal this past spring.

As the SLA began making plans to leave Jezzine, Lebanese officials struggled to avoid any appearance of providing even a “de facto” security guarantee. Midway through the withdrawal, it became clear the Lebanese government intended to use police and Internal Security Forces to control security in the town, rather than Army soldiers.

Referring to the tired question about “security guarantees,” Col. Farhat stated simply, “It’s not our job to defend Israel’s border. We are here to defend Lebanon’s border.”

JoMarie Fecci is a free-lance photojournalist based in the New York City area.