US study: Hizbullah fought better than Arab armies

From the summary:

…………………………………………………………

Hezbollah did some things well, such as its use
of cover and concealment, its preparation of fighting
positions, its fire discipline and mortar marksmanship,
and its coordination of direct fire support. But it also
fell far short of contemporary Western standards
in controlling large-scale maneuver, integrating
movement and indirect fire support, combining
multiple combat arms, reacting flexibly to changing
conditions, and small-arms marksmanship. Hezbollah
appears to have attempted a remarkably conventional
system of tactics and theater operational art, but there
is a difference between trying and achieving, and in
2006 at least, Hezbollah’s reach in some ways exceeded
its grasp.

Yet Hezbollah is hardly alone in this. Many state
actors have fallen far short of Western standards
of military proficiency, both in today’s world and
historically. Saddam’s “elite” Iraqi state Republican
Guard, for example, proved systematically incapable
of integrating movement and indirect fire support,
combining multiple combat arms, reacting flexibly to
changing conditions, or consistently hitting targets
with either small or large caliber weapons; in two wars
with the United States, the Iraqi state military’s use of
cover and concealment, combat position preparation,
and fire discipline were consistently far less proficient
than Hezbollah’s. The Italian state military in 1941
proved much less proficient in conventional warfare
than did Hezbollah in 2006; French defenses on the critical
Sedan front in 1940 were more exposed, and no more
able to react to changing conditions than Hezbollah’s.
The Egyptian state military proved systematically less
adept than Hezbollah in cover and concealment, and
little better than Hezbollah in coordinating large scale
maneuver with combined arms or flexibly responding
to changing conditions in 1956 or 1967; the Syrian state
military did no better in 1967, 1973, or 1982. In fact,
Hezbollah inflicted more Israeli casualties per Arab
fighter in 2006 than did any of Israel’s state opponents
in the 1956, 1967, 1973, or 1982 Arab-Israeli interstate
wars. Hezbollah’s skills in conventional warfighting
were clearly imperfect in 2006—but they were also
well within the observed bounds of other state
military actors in the Middle East and elsewhere, and
significantly superior to many such states.

In all, then, Hezbollah’s behavior in 2006 conformed
to neither an ideal model of “guerrilla” warfare nor
one of “conventional” warfighting, but its approach
and proficiency nonetheless place it well within a band
that has characterized many past state militaries in
interstate conflicts.

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Or go to SSI website