ABSTRACT
The basic assessment holds that there is no point in a decisive military victory because the enemy enjoys nondepletable economic and psychological resources, national consensus, and unqualified superpower support. Apart from some marginal commentary, neither the political echelon nor the General Staff did much after the 1950s to reevaluate the security concept formulated by the founding generation. The basic assessment, which holds that military and political decisions are unlikely given the familiar conditions of resource asymmetries and superpower involvement, reflects the "original sin." Syrian President Assad's concept of "strategic parity" is grounded in the assumption that military moves can be risked, provided they are limited to attrition and small-scale land grabs, because Israel is convinced that it cannot achieve a decisive victory over Syria. The military results of the October 1973 war did not lead to a reassessment of military capability, and the Israel Defense Force's self-evaluation before the Lebanon War was also almost absurdly unrealistic.
