Strike First or Wait Defensively: The Formulation of the idf’s Fighting Strategy after Israel’s War of Independence

Abstract

Two facts related to the fighting strategy adopted by the Israel Defense Forces (idf) following the first Israeli-Arab War of 1948 are well accepted. The first is that after the war, the idf adopted a ‘defensive-offensive’ strategy. The second is that in 1953 this strategy was replaced by an ‘offensive-defensive’ strategy. Over the years, researchers have suggested several explanations for this change. However, opinions remain divided. This article argues that although the ‘offensive-defensive’ strategy was preferred particularly by officials in the planning and operational departments, they reluctantly chose the ‘defensive-offensive’ strategy for economic and strategic reasons. Only a few years later, however, after re-evaluating the premises on which the ‘defensive-offensive’ strategy had been based, the idf switched gears and returned to the strategy it had wanted from the beginning: to strike first.