Introduction
xxxixTHE UNIQUE ISRAELI NEED FOR
HIGH QUALITY INTELLIGENCE
In the late 1960s, there was a weekly program on Israel Radio called
“On a Desert Island.” Guests on the show were asked what they would
take to the island if they were allowed to take just one item. One guest
replied that he would take a Bible, for example. Based on this idea, an
interviewer asked the chief of the general staff of the Israel Defense
Forces (IDF) in the mid-1970s, Lieutenant General Mordechai Gur,
what he would take with him to the desert island. “An intelligence offi-
cer,” he said. He added that as chief of staff he might be able to serve
as an artillery officer or command the armor, but without an intelligence
officer he would be unable to direct any battle.
This is true for any country, but for Israel as a small country, inferior
in terms of resources and quantity of manpower to its hostile neighbors,
it is especially true. The majority of IDF troops are reserves, who can-
not be mobilized for long periods without harming the country’s econ-
omy. Therefore, the Israeli decision makers impose on Israeli intelli-
gence a unique requirement, unlike anything known in any other
intelligence community in the world: to provide early warning of the
danger of Arab armies massing along the Israeli borders with the inten-
tion of waging war against Israel. The early warning has to be delivered
at least 48 to 72 hours before a military attack against Israel, allowing
Israel time to mobilize its reserves. This task of providing such early
warning has been assigned to Military Intelligence (MI).
After the 1973 Yom Kippur War surprise, it became clear that pro-
viding early warning against such a war was almost impossible. It actu-
ally meant predicting the unpredictable. The Yom Kippur War can be re-
garded as unique in the sphere of surprises, since all the information06-102 (01) FM.qxd 3/24/06 7:22 AM Page xxxix