The Chakravyūha or Padmavyūha was a very special military formation (vyuha), created by Guru Dronacharya on the thirteenth day of the Mahabharata war to protect the Kaurava forces. Abhimanyu, the son of Arjuna, managed to enter the Chakravyūha but was soon encircled and trapped. The soldiers kept moving in the form of a spinning wheel, and their movement closely resembled the helix of a screw commonly seen in watches. The Chakravyūha is a multi-tier defensive formation that looks like a disc (chakra, चक्र) when viewed from above.
This military formation ensures that a specific stationary object or a person can be totally encircled and breaching the formation by the surrounded individual is impossible. It is a hopeless ‘no escape’ situation for the entrapped victim who is sure to get decimated. The formation of Chakravyūha cannot be comprehended at ground level but can be instantly understood from an aerial perspective.
From the above map, it is obvious that Israel is bounded to the north by Lebanon, to the northeast by Syria, to the east and southeast by Jordan, to the southwest by Egypt, and to the west by the Mediterranean Sea. All these neighbours – Egypt, Syria, Jordan, and Lebanon have committed acts of aggression, at various points in time, against Israel.
Over six Arab nations attacked Israel in 1948 — Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, and Iraq, as well as the Palestinian Arab forces of Gaza, and the Holy War Army of Arab Palestinian irregulars. Over five Arab nations attacked Israel in 1967 — Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Saudi Arabia, and Iraq along with Kuwait and Lebanon. On October 6, 1973, Egypt and Syria attacked Israel’s forces in the Sinai Peninsula and the Golan Heights. This war is also referred to as the Yom Kippur War, the Ramadan War, the October War, the 1973 Arab-Israeli War, or the Fourth Arab-Israeli War, which was an armed conflict fought from October 6-25, 1973, between Israel and the coalition of Arab countries led by Egypt and Syria.
On January 17, 1991, Iraq initiated a missile campaign against Israel. Over the course of more than a month, approximately 42 Scud missiles were fired into Israeli territory, primarily at the cities of Tel Aviv and Haifa. In addition, Israel has been periodically attacked by terrorist organisations from the PLO, to Hamas, to Hezbollah, to the DFLP, supported by various nations of the Muslim world.
Iran has been constantly threatening Israel with dissolution. The Iran-Israel proxy conflict is on the basis of vitriolic antisemitic reasoning, which has cobbled up an Axis of Resistance which includes the Syrian government, Hezbollah, Hamas, and other militant groups from Iraq to Yemen. Hezbollah, the most powerful group in the axis, boasts a force of 100,000 fighters, and a formidable arsenal of rockets.
Not to be outdone in rhetoric warfare, Israel’s Minister of Economy, Nir Barkat, warned that Iran’s Ayatollahs will be “wiped off the face of the earth” should Hezbollah attack Israel. He also called Iran a “snake” and vowed “to cut off the head of the snake” if Israel is attacked.
The current war started by the terror group Hamas on October 7, 2023, is one day after the 50th anniversary of the start of the Yom Kippur war. One striking similarity between the 1973 war and the 2023 war is the fact that Israel has been caught on both occasions by total surprise. The 2023 war started on a Saturday, when many Israelis stayed home to observe the Sabbath, while the 1973 war started on Yom Kippur, a holy day when many Israeli businesses observe the holiday for religious purposes.
It is surprising that despite decades of facing brutal hostilities and violent attacks, Israel’s famed intelligence and national security officials let their country down. Despite Israel’s sophisticated technological prowess in espionage, intelligence, and counter-intelligence operations, Hamas fighters had undergone extensive preparations for the assault, undetected for at least a year. The blitzkrieg by the terrorist fighters, who were divided into different units with specific goals, had extensive and intensive knowledge about military bases, their exact locations, and the layout of the Kibbutzim. The resultant carnage left more than 1,400 people killed, including many women, children and old people who were murdered systematically and brutally. Women had to face savage rapes reminiscent of the ordeal faced by the Yazidi women at the hands of the terror group ISIS. Hundreds of Israelis are held hostage or are reported missing, as of date.
Another monumental failure has been the total ignorance about the construction of a massive network of tunnels, claimed to be around 500 kilometres, which is another dimension to the Chakravyūha formation. Reports also suggest the existence of a second underground network that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) colloquially refer to as the ‘Gaza metro’, which is used for transporting people and goods; storing rockets and ammunition caches; and housing the command-and-control centres of the terror group Hamas. That no intelligence agency had any inkling about this maze of tunnels, speaks volumes about their utter inefficiency.
Israel has to reconcile with the fact that none of its neighbours will ever permit the nation to live in peace. Their overarching philosophy is ‘ask not what your religion can do for you, ask what you can do for your religion’ (modification of John F. Kennedy’s famous words). The military superiority edge that Israel presently enjoys might not be a permanent feature. A combined joint attack, simultaneously, by all the neighbours, can be disastrous for Israel, prompting the use of undisclosed weapons of mass destruction (WMDs). Iran is also perfecting its hypersonic missiles, and this can change the contours of war in future, in the region.
Israel has to think about redefining existing geographical boundaries, to escape from the stranglehold of the Chakravyūha.
The writer is a retired officer of the IRS and the former director-general of the National Academy of Customs, Indirect Taxes & Narcotics. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely that of the author. They do not necessarily reflect News18’s views.
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