Hezbollah, however, was determined to drive the IDF out of Lebanon, believing that, unless attacks continued, the Israelis would never leave. Beginning in 1985, they relentlessly assaulted the IDF and SLA in the security zone. Hezbollah developed 13 principles of war, specifically designed to defeat a relatively fixed, technologically advanced enemy.
Avoid the strong, attack the weak-attack and withdrawal!
Protecting our fighters is more important than causing enemy casualties!
Strike only when success is assured!
Surprise is essential to success. If you are spotted, you have failed!
Don't get into a set-piece battle. Slip away like smoke, before the enemy can drive home his advantage!
Attaining the goal demands patience, in order to discover the enemy's weak points!
Keep moving; avoid formation of a front line!
Keep the enemy on constant alert, at the front and in the rear!
The road to the great victory passes through thousands of small victories!
Keep up the morale of the fighters; avoid notions of the enemy's superiority!
The media has innumerable guns whose hits are like bullets. Use them in the battle!
The population is a treasure-nurture it!
Hurt the enemy and then stop before he abandons restraint!
Canadian Army officer L. Craig Dalton, who interviewed Naveh in 2006, described SOD as an "intellectual exercise that draws on the creative vision, experience, intuition, and judgment of commanders to provide a framework for the development of detailed operational plans." For this new design, Naveh drew heavily on terminology from "post modern French philosophy, literary theory, architecture and psychology." An IDF general explained SOD in the following way:
This space that you look at, this room that you look at, is nothing but your interpretation of it. Now, you can stretch the boundaries of your interpretation, but not in an unlimited fashion, after all, it must be bound by physics, as it contains buildings and alleys. The question is, how do you interpret the alley? Do you interpret the alley as a place, like every architect and every town planner does, to walk through, or do you interpret the alley as a place forbidden to walk through? This depends only on interpretation. We interpreted the alley as a place forbidden to walk through, and the window as a place forbidden to look through, because a weapon awaits us in the alley, and a booby trap awaits us behind the doors. This is because the enemy interprets space in a traditional, classical manner, and I do not want to obey this interpretation and fall into his trap. Not only do I not want to fall into his traps, I want to surprise him! This is the essence of war. I need to win. I need to emerge from an unexpected place... This is why we opted for the methodology of moving through walls... Like a worm that eats its way forward, emerging at points and then disappearing.
For the IDF, the major problem with SOD was the new terminology and methodology. Not every officer in the IDF had the time or the inclination to study postmodern French philosophy. It was questionable whether the majority of IDF officers would grasp a design that Naveh proclaimed was "not intended for ordinary mortals." Many IDF officers thought the entire program elitist, while others could not understand why the old system of simple orders and terminology was being replaced by a design that few could understand.
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