Assessing Iron Dome: What Makes a Weapon System Effective?
Monday, April 29, 2013 at 2:48PM 
Mark Stout is a member of the faculty in the MA in Global Security Studies at Johns Hopkins.If a doctor feeds a sugar pill to a hypochondriac and the patient feels better because of the placebo effect, is the doctor guilty of malpractice? Keep that question in mind as you consider the recent reporting about the effectiveness of Israel’s Iron Dome antimissile defense system. Israeli defense officials claim approximately 84% effectiveness for the system which is primarily intended to stop primitive rockets launched from Gaza and southern Lebanon. Now engineer Richard Lloyd at Tesla Laboratories in the United States has done research suggesting that the system succeeded only 30-40% of the time in detonating the Qassam’s warheads. This has stoked great debate which was only invigorated by President Obama’s visit to an Iron Dome site. There have even been accusations that the Israeli government has been lying to the US government about the system’s effectiveness, which is a potentially serious charge because the United States helped fund the system.
I can’t help but be reminded of a similar debate some twenty years ago. During the Gulf War, also known as OPERATION DESERT STORM, the United States deployed Patriot anti-ballistic missile systems to Israel and Saudi Arabia to protect those countries against Saddam Hussein’s modified Scud missiles. The United States military claimed 50% effectiveness for the Patriot system in Israel (and greater effectiveness in Saudi Arabia). MIT physicist Ted Postol challenged these numbers and argued that the real effectiveness was close to 0%. Eventually, the Defense Department lowered its estimates to 40%. Postol has now emerged as a key ally of Lloyd and Tesla Laboratories in the Iron Dome debate saying that Iron Dome has destroyed Qassam warheads a mere 5-10% of the time.
From one perspective, it doesn’t matter who is right. Of course, engineers should continue trying to improve the system. But, for both Iron Dome and Patriot, the debate has been all about the tactical trees. Meanwhile, the strategic forest goes unremarked upon.
The simple fact of is that neither the Palestinian rockets nor Saddam’s Scuds were very physically dangerous. (Had the Iraqi Scuds been armed with chemical or biological warheads that would have been different. But they weren’t.) While rocket attacks are undoubtedly frightening, injuries and even infrastructure damage from the Qassams and their cousins the Grad are extremely rare and they were even before Iron Dome came online. In 1991, the story was much the same. Thirty-nine Iraqi missiles landed on Israel. The result: two deaths and one severe injury. It is true that 231 additional people were admitted to emergency rooms for injuries directly related to the explosions and several hundred others had lesser injuries. On the other hand, another 544 Israelis were admitted to emergency rooms for “acute anxiety.” 230 people harmed themselves by administering atropine—a standard treatment for nerve gas—when, in fact, no nerve gas was present. Another 40 people hurt themselves getting to bomb shelters.
In other words, the threats to Israel from all of these rockets and missiles has been primarily psychological and hence political. If Patriot and Iron Dome made Israelis feel more secure, then they succeeded at their most important task, keeping people feeling secure and thus tamping down pressures for my drastic military action. That doesn’t look like malpractice to me.
Reader Comments (9)
What are the chief reasons for this dangerous gap between psychological perceptions and military realities?
Unbelievably superficial and misguided piece. Bring yourself and your family over to Israel during the next bout of rocket salvos and I'm sure you'll regret such drivel.
@Barbara Rome
Unless you are suggesting that the author is a liar with regards to the amount of physical damage caused by rockets, then you are saying that he somehow underestimates the amount of psychological damage they do to Israeli citizens. The article is stating that if the Iron Dome system makes Israelis feel safer, (thus decreasing the psychological effects of the attacks) they are succeeding at minimizing the greatest harm the weapons are capable of. Your response seems trite, and reads like an argumentum ad misericordiam.
Iron Dome targets those missiles that are likely to hit a residential area, Iron Dome does not need to detonate the Qassam’s warhead, all it needs to do is deflect the missile.
The rockets fired at Israel are not just an emotional/psychological threat. A rocket is a rocket and can kill people and damage property. Hamas does not fire these rockets into Israel for fun or because they have any love for us. One of these rockets landed 200 meters from my home. I could have been dead, which is not a psychological result, but a physical one.
No doubt the anti Israeli left will pick this up and start shrieking what they always do, to whit: 1) the evil Jews control America, 2) the evil Jews are secretly using these things to murder babies, and of course 3) the evil Jews know these things don't work so their own people get killed so as to elicit yet more control over the world. You can read and hear this sort of nonsense every day at Huffington Post, the Guardian, MSNBC or al Jazeera.
The fact is, they work because they work. If far left Jew haters prefer to live under military missiles crashing into their homes and schools, then fine. Go there and stand around waiting for them. I dare you.
@Trudy
It is obvious if you read the post carefully-- or even not that carefully-- that the author is saying that Iron Dome doesn't work very well right now, but is a good idea any way. I would guess that he would probably support a better-functioning missile defense system. This post doesn't deserve your knee-jerk right-wing response... just read a bit more carefully.
So 'Rina', your assertion is let's simply listen to the slings and arrows of anti Israeli condemnation anyway because....well...because. And if it adds some kind of vaporous psychological benefit, which, at best is completely made up and imaginary that's fine too.
But what you ignore is that pure defense is just that - defense, it's not deterrence. It's simply pulling up the drawbridge and hoping the bad people go away on their own. How has worked for you so far, "Rina"?
@Trudy
There is no sign of any anti-Israeli sentiments in the article not in the comments that I can detect, would you like to rant at your strawman elsewhere?