Operation Ramp – The Lebanon Evacuation: Overview of a Mass NEO and Some Lessons for the Future

Abstract

Operation RAMP was a mass Non-combatant Evacuation Operation (NEO) from Lebanon carried out by the ADF during the war between Israel and Hezbollah in 2006. This article provides an overview of the conduct of this successful interagency operation and examines Whole of Government preparations for future interagency operations.

Introduction

The Australian Defence Force (ADF), as part of a whole-of-government operation, conducted a successful mass Non-combatant Evacuation Operation (NEO) of Australian Nationals (ASN) and Approved Foreign Nationals (AFN) from Lebanon during the 34-day war between Israel and Hezbollah forces in July and August 2006.

The mass NEO, codenamed Operation RAMP, was the ADF’s support to the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) for the evacuation of Australians from Lebanon after the outbreak of hostilities. The operation makes an interesting NEO case study in itself, given the scale (5300 ASN and 1350 AFN evacuated), complexity, and length of the evacuation chain (over 10 000 km). However, the dominant ‘interagency’ nature of the operation also provides a solid context for discussing preparations for inevitable future interagency operations.

This article outlines the events that led up to the outbreak of war between Israel and Hezbollah forces and examines the implementation and successful conduct of Operation RAMP. It then discusses a number of issues to be taken into consideration in the planning for any future out-of-region mass NEO, and concludes by using Operation RAMP as a vehicle to discuss ADF and whole-of-government preparations for future expeditionary interagency operations.

The Road to War

• 12 July 2006: Hezbollah guerrillas capture two Israeli soldiers and kill up to eight on the Lebanese border. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert calls it an “act of war” by Lebanon. 2500 Australians in Lebanon are registered with the Australian Embassy in Beirut.
   
• 12–16 July 2006: Israel conducts an air and ground offensive into Lebanon. Hezbollah fighters based in southern Lebanon launch Katyusha rockets into Israel. Casualties on both sides. Significant international media coverage.
   
• 17–19 July 2006: The international community begins to step up its evacuation of foreigners from Beirut as thousands of Lebanese flee their homes. Now 12 000 of an estimated 25 000 Australians in Lebanon are registered with the Australian Embassy in Beirut.
   
• The international community faces a staggering number of evacuees with estimated numbers of foreign nationals in Lebanon including:
  • Canadians: 40 000
  • Filipinos: 30 000
  • Australians: 25 000
  • Americans: 25 000
  • British: 22 000 (inc. 10 000 with dual nationality)
  • French: 20 000
  • Other nationals: numbers unknown

Operation Ramp

At 4:15pm on 18 July 2006, Headquarters 17 Brigade was advised verbally of a potential NEO for Lebanon. On 19 July, Headquarters (HQ) Joint Operations Command issued a Warning Order for the establishment of Joint Task Force (JTF) 629 to deploy on Operation RAMP. On 19 July, the JTF 629 Advance Party deployed and the main body concentrated in Sydney. Within the following thirty-six hours, the Joint Task Force main body deployed. The JTF consisted of a headquarters with a support element, a Liaison Officer (LO) group, two Evacuation Handling Centres (EHCs), and a C-130 Detachment.

In addition to the JTF, two Defence Supplementation Staffs (DSS) were deployed. The first DSS deployed with the JTF Advance Party and the second deployed with the remainder of the Joint Task Force. In all, 120 ADF personnel deployed to Lebanon, Cyprus and Turkey. Defence personnel also reinforced the DFAT Crisis Centre in Canberra and were central to the Canberra-based whole-of-government evacuation planning.

Immediately upon arrival in the Area of Operations, the JTF commenced Non-combatant Evacuation Operations continuously for ninety-six hours. The JTF operated Evacuation Handling Centres in both Turkey and Cyprus, and extracted evacuees from Beirut Port on a daily basis for a further six days. On the second day of the operation, the JTF established a RAAF C-130 air-bridge from Cyprus to Turkey as part of the onward movement of Australian evacuees. The JTF also mounted a short-notice sea evacuation on day three to extract Australians from Tyre Port in southern Lebanon.

By D+6, over 4800 Australians had been evacuated from Lebanon and Operation RAMP had become the ADF’s largest Non-combatant Evacuation Operation (NEO). This mass NEO involved seventeen Australian chartered ship movements, over 470 bus movements, and twenty-two Australian charted aircraft and C-130 movements. By the end of the 34-day war, over 5300 Australians and 1350 Approved Foreign Nationals had been evacuated. The JTF also facilitated the medical evacuation to Australia of an Australian Army United Nations Military Observer who was serving at a UN observation post in Southern Lebanon during the first week of the war. She had been seriously injured in an armoured personnel carrier traveling at high speed that was attempting to avoid a bomb crater in the road.

By day thirteen, the last Australian chartered ship departed and the JTF had commenced drawing down and was postured in ‘Over Watch’ to support any further evacuations. With only small numbers of Australian evacuees continuing to depart Lebanon, on 17 August 2006 (D+28), the JTF completed its drawdown, bringing JTF 629 to a close. By the following week, all ADF personnel had departed the Area of Operations.

The Evacuation Chain - 3 to 6 Days and 10,000km

Once Australian evacuees had registered with the Australian Embassy in Beirut for evacuation, the evacuees were advised of the time and place Australian Evacuation Assembly Areas (EAA) would open. Once at the EAA, the evacuees were checked for valid passports and visas and put into family groupings before being moved by bus to the Australian Evacuation Handling Centre (EHC) established in Beirut. At the EHC, further processing and briefings were conducted. Once the shipping had arrived, the evacuees were moved again by bus to the Evacuation Point (EP) at Beirut Port. At the EP, the Lebanese immigration officials stamped passports prior to the evacuees boarding ships.

The Australian-chartered ships had ADF personnel aboard, as well as Australian Federal Police (AFP) personnel on board most ships from Cyprus. These personnel escorted the evacuees on their sea journey. The chartered ships varied in size from that of a Sydney Harbour ferry to a cruise liner. The ships took up to twelve hours to travel to either Cyprus or Turkey from Lebanon. Most evacuees suffered from sea sickness and there were many severe cases leading to dehydration. At the ports of arrival, the evacuees cleared local immigration and were processed through an Australian EHC. After being married up with their luggage, they were then moved by bus to accommodation where they were generally held for between twenty-four to seventy-two hours before being moved by bus to an airport to meet an Australian chartered aircraft. In some cases, this bus trip took up to ten hours for those flying out of Turkey. Given the limitations on getting chartered flights into Cyprus—due to the peak Mediterranean holiday season being in full swing—a C-130 air-bridge was established to transport some evacuees from Cyprus to Turkey, which had a higher capacity air hub. The evacuees then faced up to another twenty-four hours of flying before finally reaching destinations in Australia.

Key Contributing Factors to the Successful Outcome of Operation Ramp

There were a number of contributing factors to the successful outcome of Operation RAMP and this article discusses four of them: Rapid Mounting and Deployment, Interagency Operations, Liaison Officers, and Public Affairs. The cooperation and support of the Governments of Turkey, the Republic of Cyprus, Lebanon and Israel to the evacuation operations need to be also acknowledged as a key contributing factor to the success of the evacuation operations.

Rapid Mounting and Deployment

The JTF was formed, mounted and commenced force preparation within twenty-four hours of notification. Vital to the success of the rapid mounting was the use of standing high-readiness headquarters for the JTF HQ and standing high-readiness Force Elements to form two Evacuation Handling Centres. The Army EHC was provided by 4 Field Regiment and the RAAF EHC was provided by 386 Expeditionary Combat Support Squadron. Fortunately during the initial planning there was no attempt to form an ad hoc JTF Headquarters in order to create a Joint HQ with tri-Service staffing. The important point is a Task Force does not require a joint HQ to be a Joint Task Force. An existing HQ will always be able to mount, deploy and establish full operational capability in a shorter period of time than an ad hoc Headquarters consisting of tri-Service personnel who have no existing equipment, procedures and collective training. Thus, future short-notice JTFs should continue to be based on a standing HQ with integral communications and administrative support, with a task-organised JTF structure based on existing capabilities at a state of high readiness.

Interagency Operations

There will always be room for improvement in all interagency operations. However, the whole-of-government preparations and investments in developing contingency plans that have basic doctrinal interagency team structures for crisis response situations were critical to the successful conduct of this NEO.

This interagency offshore operation was led by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) and included the mobilisation of personnel from DFAT, Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs (DIMA), Centrelink, the AFP and the ADF. The cooperation between the agencies and the integration of their personnel into the Emergency Response Teams (ERTs), one each in Lebanon, Turkey and Cyprus, was very effective. Where interagency issues required resolution, the very positive approach by the personnel in the ERTs assured those issues were addressed very quickly. This was also the case in the DFAT Canberra Crisis Centre where ADF personnel were also employed and provided the detailed logistic planning for the interagency evacuation operations.

Liaison Officers (LOS)

The ADF Joint Task Force was very modest in size compared with the JTFs from the United Kingdom, the United States, Canada and France. These nations had significant military capabilities in the region. The UK JTF Headquarters, which was deployed from the United Kingdom, was only marginally smaller than the entire ADF Joint Task Force.

The ADF Joint Task Force was able to utilise international military capabilities in the region through the effective employment of Liaison Officers. There had been some preliminary strategic-level liaison and negotiation prior to the departure of the JTF from Australia. However, as the situation on the ground was changing rapidly, the local liaison function was critical. The support generated and maintained from international military capabilities in the region through the network of LOs was particularly crucial to the early successes in this NEO.

Public Affairs (PA)

The PA function for a high-profile media activity such as Operation RAMP can be demanding and time-consuming at the tactical level. Channel Seven and Channel Nine had deployed television crews and presenters, and there was a plethora of international and freelance TV crews covering the crisis. The JTF PA effect had instant strategic impact, giving the focus of media coverage in Australia a more positive sentiment. The media reported on the difficulties and complexities of the crisis but also reported on the action being taken by the ADF and the success of these efforts.

Interestingly, the PA effect was also found to be a force multiplier in terms of the second- and third-order effects impacting on the morale of JTF personnel. There was a positive impact on morale from the high profile recognition (in TV, radio, print and web-based media) of the tactical-level effort of deployed personnel. Also generated was a greater sense of ‘connectedness’ for families of JTF members, who could see what their loved ones were achieving. This then fed back to JTF personnel, contributing further to the morale of the deployed force.

Preparing for Future Interagency Operations

The Nature of Future Interagency Operations

Over recent years the ADF has been involved in a number of successful interagency operations in addition to Operation RAMP. One of the more notable of these was Operation ANODE to Solomon Islands in 2003. This was led by DFAT, with the AFP re-introducing law and order, AusAID and other departments strengthening economic, governance and institutional capacity, and the ADF providing security and logistic support.

The reality is that many future ADF expeditionary operations will be part of a whole-of-government effort in the form of an interagency operation. The requirement to deploy elements of Defence in support of Australian interests is likely to be in assisting other nation-states, particularly those in the arc to Australia’s north.

Department of Defence involvement will often be required for states that are unable to deal with natural disasters or other events that lead to a breakdown in local security and law and order. However, if the ADF alone is used to tackle security issues, then often only the symptoms will be addressed, rather than the underlying causes. Apart from natural disasters, the sources of instability are likely to be such issues as unemployment and poor economic conditions, land rights and local political infighting, corruption and financial instability, or other governance-related concerns. Addressing such issues is not the ADF’s core business and it will take a whole-of-government approach to establish an interagency Task Force to deal with such matters.

Striving for Professional Excellence in Interagency Operations

Professionals of any discipline will always seek continuous improvement in their effectiveness and efficiency, and those professionals who will be involved in interagency operations are no exception. While lessons from previous crises have been addressed, and further whole-of-government enhancements are being implemented in light of the Operation RAMP after-action review process, further discussion and debate is encouraged as part of the striving for professional excellence in interagency operations.

There will be an argument that the ADF should remain primarily focused on a capability to conduct close combat in a joint environment in Defence of Australia, not on short-notice interagency offshore deployments. The conventional wisdom has always been for the ADF to maintain its major focus on combat capability for high intensity conflict—and that there will be on-occurrence subsequent adjustments for all other less demanding requirements—is the best risk management approach. However, with interagency-type deployments becoming far more likely, investing in preparations for future such operations is warranted.

What Does Good Whole-of-Government Preparation for Interagency Operations Look Like?

There is a body of work required to develop and validate the specific outcomes required of whole-of-government preparations for best practice interagency operations. Rather than attempt to discuss and define the whole-of-government deliverables in preparation for future interagency operations, the remainder of this article will focus on proposing what the mechanism may look like in order to achieve a high level of effectiveness.

Define Objectives

A clear set of whole-of-government preparation objectives need to be defined and validated, along with a corresponding set of metrics in order to be able to assess achievement, or progress toward achievement, of best practice interagency preparations.

Assign Whole-of-Government Responsibility

Assigning responsibility for achieving the whole-of-government preparations for potential future interagency operations must be formalised. This would include providing the responsible organisation with both the authority and the resources to undertake assigned tasks.

Develop and Maintain Interagency Doctrine

While already there has been significant whole-of-government investment in policy and plans for interagency operations for a range of crisis situations, the development and maintenance of procedural-level interagency doctrine is required if best practice is to be achieved.

Interagency Individual Training

Professional development in the field of interagency operations for personnel across a range of government departments in the form of a short course (one or two weeks) would be a useful start to a training regime. Such a short course, perhaps run by the ADF Warfare Centre (ADFWC), would cover interagency doctrine including terminology, organisational structures, capabilities, and planning processes. A number of historical case studies, in order to provide some operational context, would be useful, prior to a series of scenario-based Tactical Exercises Without Troops (TEWTs) and desktop war games.

Interagency Collective Training

A commitment to a collective training regime is a very strong indication of the level of professionalism of any organisation in any discipline. Military personnel are well schooled and take for granted a number of aspects of conducting operations to which most personnel in other departments will have had very limited exposure.

This is particularly the case for command and control aspects of conducting operations and the operation of a Command Post (CP). Thus, collective training activities such as Command Post Exercises (CPX) are a useful method for collective training. A CPX is a good platform for developing, refining and practicing interagency staff procedures. Desktop scenario-based planning exercises (PLANX) are also useful for refining and practicing interagency doctrinal planning processes.

A Field Training Exercise (FTX) in the form of a Mission Rehearsal Exercise (MRE) is then the ultimate commitment to a collective training outcome. Not only does a full-scale FTX provide the opportunity to allow an organisation to enhance its collective competency, but it is also a good platform to expose each government department to other departmental cultures and methods.

Differences in cultures and expectations of deployed personnel are best addressed in a training environment. Departmental cultural expectations may appear at first glance to be minor issues. However, if not identified and managed to provide a common level of expectation, the interagency leadership of a deployed interagency Task Force will have significant morale issues to deal with in order to maximise the effectiveness of the deployed organisation. Such issues will include expectations about living conditions and conditions of service entitlements. Expectations of sharing non-core business duties such as watchkeeping and phone picquets, and other general duties within a camp environment, are all best sorted out and agreed in a training environment, and not in the first days of managing an actual crisis. Managing expectations of limitations on recreation activities when rostered ‘off duty’, such as alcohol consumption, curfews and fraternisation may appear superfluous or unnecessary, but if left unaddressed can have significant impacts.

Conclusion

Operation RAMP was a mass NEO conducted during the thirty-four day war between Israel and Hezbollah in 2006. In broad terms this was a permissive NEO but not without risk from the threat of collateral damage and incidental threats. The situation was made all the more complex by its scale in terms of the number of evacuees involved. It was also conducted out of region, producing an evacuation chain that stretched for 10 000 km.

There appears little doubt the ADF will more often than not be part of future expeditionary interagency Task Forces. Much of what was achieved by this NEO is credited to the whole-of-government preparations for what was a significant interagency operation. However, in striving for excellence in interagency operations, the ADF is in a good position to take the lead in promoting the enhancement of preparations for future expeditionary interagency operations to a higher level of professionalism.