Military leaders and social scientists often regard unit cohesion as the key element in combat motivation and fighting resilience. However, a close look at today’s battlefield calls for rethinking this assumption. This study is based on observations of combat units during the current Arab-Israeli conflict (the “Al-Aqsa Intifada”). In contrast to the usual depiction found in the scholarly literature, these units were characterized by some rather unique features. Instead of socially cohesive structures (based upon mutual, continuous, and common experiences), the action of these combat units during operations is based upon temporary frameworks based on short-term, ad hoc, and diverse components. In general, the components comprising these ad hoc frameworks do not have a common background and do not belong to the same organizational arms of the Israeli military. Nevertheless, the fighting power of the emergent amalgamations has not been diminished or damaged. Our study depicts several possible explanations for the social dynamics of such “instant units” and focuses on the importance of “swift trust” to their functioning.
Nora Kinzer-Stewart, Mates and Muchachos: Unit Cohesion in the Falklands/Malvinas War(New York: Brassey’s, 1991), 15-15; and William Darryl Henderson, Cohesion: The Human Element in Combat (Washington, DC: National Defense University Press, 1985), 1-7.
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Samuel L. A. Marshal, Man against Fire(NewYork: William Morrow, 1947), 41-42; RoyR. Grinker and John P. Spiegel, Man under Stress(Philadelphia: Blackiston, 1945), 21-22; and Samuel A. Stouffer, Arthur A. Lumsdaine, Marion Harper Lumsdaine, Robin M. Williams Jr., M. Brewster Smith, Irving L. Janis, et al., The American Soldier: Combat and Its Aftermath, vol. II (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1949), 100-4, 136.
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Peter C. Boer, “Small Unit Cohesion: The Case of Fighter Squadron 3-V1.G.IV.,”Armed Forces & Society28, no. 1 (Fall 2001): 36-36.
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Paul T. Bartone, BjørnHelge Johnsen, Jarle Eid, Wibecke Brun, and Jon C. Laberg, “Factors Influencing-Small-Unit Cohesion in Norwegian Navy Officer Cadets,”Military Psychology14, no. 1 (2002): 1-22.
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Guy L. Siebold, “The Evolution of the Measurement of Cohesion,”Military Psychology11, no. 1 (1999): 5-26.
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Shils and Janowitz, “Cohesion and Disintegration,”280-280.
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Martin W. Rempel and Ronald J. Fisher, “Perceived Threat, Cohesion, and Group Problem Solving in Intergroup Conflict,”International Journal of Conflict Management8, no. 3 (Summer 1997): 216-234.
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13.
Bartone et al., “Factors Influencing Small-Unit Cohesion,”2-2.
14.
Siebold, “Evolution of the Measurement of Cohesion,”6-7.
15.
Manning, “Morale, Cohesion, and Esprit de Corps,”456-459.
16.
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17.
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Roberst S. Rush, “A Different Perspective: Cohesion, Moral and Operational Effectiveness in the German Army, Fall 1944,”Armed Forces & Society25, no. 3 (Spring 1999): 477-508.
19.
Moskos, “American Combat Soldier in Vietnam,”25-25.
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21.
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Fabrizio Battistelli, “Peacekeeping and the Post Modern Soldier,”Armed Forces & Society23, no. 3 (Spring 1997): 467-484.
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Brian Mullen and Carolyn Cooper, “The Relation between Group Cohesiveness and Performance: An Integration,”Psychological Bulletin115, no. 2 (1994): 210-227; and Segal and Kestenbaum, “ Professional Closure,” 452.
28.
Segal and Kestenbaum, “Professional Closure,”454-454.
29.
AnthonyKellett, Combat Motivation: The Behavior of Soldiers in Battle(Boston: Kluwer, 1982), 97-112; Patrick Mileham, “Moral Component: The Regimental System,” in New People Strategies for the British Armed Forces, ed. Alex Alexandrou, Richard Bartle, and Richard Holmes (London: Frank Cass, 2001), 63-84.
30.
Field Marshal B. L. Montgomery cited by Kellett, Combat Motivation, 62-62.
31.
Chrles Kirke, “AModel for theAnalysis of Fighting Spirit in the BritishArmy,” in British Army: Manpower and Society into the Twenty First Century, ed. Hew Strachan (London: Frank Cass, 2000), 227-241.
32.
Nora Kinzer-Stewart, “Military Cohesion: The South Atlantic Conflict of 1982,” in Problems and Options of the Mass Armed Forces, ed. Jurgen Kuhlmann (Munich, Germany: SOWI, 1990), 191-210.
33.
Paul Bartone and Amy Adler, “Cohesion over Time in a Peacekeeping Medical Task Force,”Military Psychology11, no. 1 (1999): 85-107.
34.
Debra Meyerson, Karl E. Weick, and Roderick M. Kramer, “Swift Trust in Temporary Groups,” in Trust in Organizations: Frontiers of Theory and Research, ed. Roderick M. Kramer and Tom R. Tyler (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 1996), 166-195.
35.
Meyerson et al., “Swift Trust,”166-166.
36.
Michael Barnett and Emanuel Adler, “Studying Security Communities in Theory, Comparison and History,” in Security Communities, ed. Emanuel Adler and Michael Barnett (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1999), 418-418.
37.
Meyerson et al., “Swift Trust,”180-180.
38.
Roxana Tiron, “Military Training Needs More Flexibility, Analysts Contend. National Defense,”National Defense, November 2001, http://www.nationaldefensemagazine.org/issues/2001/Nov/Military_Training.htm (accessed June 28, 2005).
39.
David A. Mangelsdorff, “Preface to Special Issue: Military Cohesion,”Military Psychology11, no. 1 (1999): 1-1.
