Strategic Assessment

The public discourse on the campaign in Lebanon has focused almost exclusively on the war’s negative aspects, while the professional post-mortems are dwelling on what must be inferred and learned from the war’s failures and lapses. Yet a balanced review of the war requires delineating the positive outcomes along with the negative results. Indeed, as we expound on the minuses of the war, it is important to remember that the plus column of the balance sheet is neither blank nor, for that matter, even sparse. What follows, therefore, is a brief overview of the positive outcomes of the war in Lebanon.