ABSTRACT
No major conflict has occurred between Israel and its Arab neighbors since 1982. Nevertheless, the shifts in the Arab-Israeli military balance, and in the forces of Israel and its Arab neighbors, reflect both the lessons of the 1982 war and the broader lessons each nation has drawn from the regional and global arms race. Ironically, Palestinian forces have returned to Lebanon and a new Lebanese threat to Israel has developed in the form of Shi’ite factions in Lebanon, which owe their birth largely to the impact of the Israeli invasion. Estimates of Israel’s military spending after 1982 are difficult to arrive at because Israel’s official defense expenditure data do not reflect all the costs of its force posture and because of the difficulty in adding the proper amount of US aid into the Israeli total. Israel is far from eliminating its military problems as a result of the shifts and changes in its forces since 1982.
