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Forty Years Ago Today - Part 6

Forty years ago today, the Yom Kippur War continued through its sixth day. Israel had retaken the Golan, driving the Syrians back across the Purple Line. However, in the south, Egypt was continuing to expand its bridgeheads.

After the meeting last night, Bar Lev had decided that there would be no advance at the moment. Egyptian missiles had gutted the Israeli armored formation. Many of the vehicles were recoverable, and some were already being returned to service by the IDF’s field repair depots. But Bar Lev would need more time before he would risk an attack on the Egyptian positions.

(L to R: Sharon, Unidentified soldier, Bar Lev, Elazar in Sinai in 1973)

Bar Lev, Sharon, and Adan all agreed on one thing: it would be better if the Egyptians would push for the passes. In the open, on the move, the Egyptian tanks and infantry would be out of the protective bubble of the SAMs and Sagger anti-tank missiles.

In an effort to keep the Egyptians from becoming too comfortable, the IDF began a series of small raids by their commandos. The most notable one was Operation Pontiak. A team of Saryeret Matkal commands and artillery men were helicoptered over the Suez Canal. The American built CH-53s not only carried the men, but in slings under the helicopters, they carried artillery pieces. Landing them in range of the Egypt’s Third Army HQ, they bombarded the headquarters for a short time before the helicopters returned to spirit them back to Israeli lines.

The main focus of Israel’s military on October 11 would be on the Golan. Dayan and Meir made it a priority. Offensive action had to be taken somewhere. It had to be successful. It had to occupy enemy territory. Without a success, Israel would be at a disadvantage once the UN intervened and imposed a cease fire. If that happened, the Arabs would be able to claim a clear cut victory, even though they had failed to conquer Israel or even hold the Golan. From the Israeli perspective, the Arabs had to be taught that there was a consequence for going to war with Israel.

After defeating the final drive through the Kuneitra Gap and the reconquest of the Golan, the IDF believed the Syrians to be shattered as an offensive fighting force. However, the surprise of the previous days made them wary of the Syrians ability to stand up to the Israelis in battle. Though wrecked as an offensive force, the Israelis appreciated that an advance into Syria would mean Syrians fighting on their home soil from prepared positions that they had been developing for years. Some, including the Northern Front commander, Gen. Hofi, felt that one more blow to the Syrians, based on intercepts during the previous days fighting, might be enough to cause them crumble.

There was another part of the calculation that had to be made by the Israeli policy makers: how far could they push without prompting the Soviet Union to directly intervene in the war? Already, even though they had not been privy to the Arabs plan for the war or had advance notice, the Soviet Union had begun shipping and airlifting supplies to Syria and Egypt.

Ultimately it was decided that they would threaten Damascus with their invasion, but they would stop well short of it. Strict controls were to be maintained to prevent errant bombs or artillery barrages from falling on the sections of the city where the Soviet military advisory group and their families lived and worked.

The task of invading Syria would fall to two divisions. One was the 36th Division under Gen. Eitan, contained the battered 7th Armored, Barak Brigade, Golani Infantry Brigade. Although they had suffered tremendous losses over the preceding days, reservists were filling the gaps and tanks had been brought back into service thanks to the herculean efforts of the IDF’s field repair teams. The second division was 240th Reserve Division under Gen. Laner, comprised of Sarig’s Brigade and Orr’s Brigade as well as two other reserve brigades. Like Eitan’s division, Laner’s brigades had suffered heavily in the fighting in the south. Peled’s division would defend the Golan.

(IDF Centurion (Shot’Kal) and command halftrack on the Golan)

Kahalani, still commanding one of the battalions of the 7th Armored Brigade, was faced with a difficult situation. The brigade had lost 75% of its men, wounded or killed. The survivors were had had one day of rest after four of almost continuous combat. Their replacements were a group of reservists that were complete ciphers to him. He did not know any of their names. An hour after they arrived, he would be leading them into battle. His battalion was designated to be the spearhead of the attack.

When they arrived, Kahalani took the group aside and introduced himself. He was their new commander, Kahalani told them. He then had each on introduce themselves in turn. As they did, Kahalani asked them what they did before the war? Were they married? Did they have kids? Kahalani’s operations officer watched the briefing, confused. This was not the typical way to prepare for an attack. But then he realized what Kahalani was doing: he was humanizing each of them. Like Kahalani, almost none of the replacements knew each other. The battalion’s survivors did not know them either. It was not the ideal way, but under the circumstances, it was what Kahalani could do. Twenty minutes after the introductions were done, Kahalani’s tanks were rolling into Syria.

The IDF would attack into Syria on two axis, a northern and souther one. The northern on was Eitan’s division, spearheaded by Kahalani’s battalion. They quickly penetrated through the Syrian defenses. Although Syria had spent years planting mines. However, the IDF was able to get through with little trouble because the Syrians had left breaks in the minefields to allow their farmers to plant and harvest the crops. These had been noticed by IDF observers on Mt. Hermon and now Kahalani’s battalions sped through the gaps, evading Syrian positions.

The southern advance was Laner’s division. Unlike Eitan, his division was being tasked with breaking through the Syrian defensive lines, incuding the fortified village of Khan Arnabe. The IDF had long considered the hamlet to be too strong to attack head on. Gen. Hofi, commander of Northern Command, believed that Syrian morale had been broken and that they could not withstand an attack. Sarig’s brigade lead the way and discovered that the Syrians were not so demoralized as Hofi believed. In a vicious fight, Sarig’s brigade lost 25 tanks, fully 2/3rd of its armor, attacking the village. However, six of his tanks made it into the village. As the fighting moved into the village, Orr’s brigade advanced and exploited the breakthrough. Half-track born paratroopers were brought up to clear out the remaining defenders as the tanks continued to move east into Syria.

The spearheads of the two divisions approached their first day objectives, Mazraat Bet Jaan (in the north) and Tel Shams (in the south), at the end of the day. Both were defended. Mindful of the losses the hasty attack Khan Arnabe, Hofi approved requests to allow his units to launch prepared attacks on their objectives in the morning.

As with most things during the Cold War, the fight between Israel and the Arab nations was not a private affair. Moscow and Washington were both deeply involved. From the Israeli perspective, it was a war for survival. From the Arabs, it was alternately a war to destroy the Zionist state or to start the peace process. For the superpowers, however, it was a proxy way, a demonstration of what their equipment could do. It was also, they believed, being watched by their other allies and clients. Whoever blinked first in supporting their ally in the war would see their influence diminished.

Over the first few days of the war, the mood in Moscow had swung from dismay to exhilaration. When the war had begun, they were dismayed. Sadat all but expelled the Soviets from his country. Syria had failed to inform Moscow of the joint plans. The Soviet military commanders reported to the Polituboro, once the invasions were underway, that they expected the Arabs be defeated handily by the Israelis. But by the end of the second day’s fighting happened and the Soviets started to undergo a change of heart. With the Arabs engaged, and even winning, the Soviets realized that perhaps they could win. And if they, clients of the USSR using some of the latest Soviet weapons systems, were seen as victorious it would enhance the expansion of Soviet Union’s influence. To that end, the Soviet military missions in Syria and Egypt were instructed to assist the Arab governments. They would help service and repair damaged vehicles, and assist in any way short of combat that they could. And, as the Arabs advanced, they would collect abandoned or damaged Israeli vehicles to be sent back to USSR for testing.

In Washington, D.C., Kissinger made it clear to the rest of Nixon’s advisers: Israel could not be allowed to lose. Already, Moscow had begun rearming its clients. An airlift had begun, shipping missiles, ammunition and spare parts to the Soviet advisers. America could not be seen as abandoning her ally. Kissinger called for an American counter to the Soviet supply efforts as a “demonstrative counter”.

Kissinger was not just worried about a client state. What he saw was an opportunity to break the Soviet sphere of influence that had sprung up over the previous twenty years. If the Israelis could win, the Arabs might see that the Soviets were not the benefactors that they wanted. It would allow the US, if Israel’s eventual retribution could be controlled, to become the mediator of the future peace. With that, the US could be the dominant influence in the region. To achieve this diplomatic coup, Kissinger was willing to risk the detente that had been developing between the US and the USSR.

To that end, Kissinger began to stall efforts in the UN to impose a cease fire. With Egypt and Syria still seen as prevailing, prior to the Israeli counter-attack over the Purple Line, Moscow had begun to press for a cease fire resolution. For Kissinger’s plans to remake the playing field of the Middle East, Israel had to be winning when the cease fire happened. After the first days of the war, that seemed to be a distant possibility.

On Tuesday, Israel revealed to the US how badly the war was going. In the first three days of the conflict, she had lost 49 aircraft and 500 hundred tanks. That represented an eighth of the IAF and a quarter of the IDF’s tanks. Not only was Israel suffering heavy casualties, but she was running out of ammunition.

It has been written that at this time, Israel had nuclear weapons armed and on aircraft ready to be used. Israel, although she still denies it, had nuclear weapons available because of the Dimona nuclear power plant. Although popularized as a theory, the few people who have had verifiable connections to the Israeli nuclear weapons program during this year deny that this was the case. The weapons were assembled, but they were never loaded on aircraft. In fact, per orders from Prime Minister Meir, they were assembled out in the open to ensure that SR71 reconnaissance flights would pick up the work. It appears that they issued the orders to ready the weapons through channels that were regularly monitored by the NSA. Both the USSR and USA would be able to know what would happen if Israel was pressed too far.

Kissinger called a meeting of the rest of the National Security Council. The CIA chief, William Colby, was stunned by what Kissinger told him. His analysts, although they had missed the warning signs of war in Egypt and Syria, were adamant: Israel had enough ammunition, even taking into account what they had expended in combat. (It turned out that CIA actually knew better in this case. Israel had lost track of ammunition after it left the warehouse. The ammunition was reaching the units, but the system was not reporting them properly.) Colby and Secretary of Defense Schlessinger were both wary of supporting Israel further. Schlessinger, in particular, wanted to make a distinction in supporting Israel’s survival and supporting Israel retaining occupied territory.

Eventually, Kissinger took his case to President Nixon personally. Nixon was in the midst of his own fight for survival. The Watergate scandal was nearing its peak. The independent investigator for the Watergate committee as issuing subpoenas to his administration that Nixon was fighting. However, when Kissinger brought him the situation and the results of the NSC’s meeting. Nixon took in the information and immediately made a decision: Israel would not be allowed to lose. Everything Israel requested, with one exception (laser guided weapons which were just entering the US inventory of weapons) would be furnished. All of her tank losses would be replaced.

This raised a problem. How to get the equipment to Israel. Israel had only 7 planes capable of shuttling the equipment from the US to Israel. The US, as part of its strategy to emerge as the trusted broker of peace, could not be seen shipping the equipment on USAF flights like the Soviets were. Attempts would be made to find charters. But for the first few days, everything would have to go on those El Al flights.

With Syria seeming to collapse, it was looking like the principal would be Israel and Egypt. And neither wanted a cease-fire. The Egyptians believed they could further improve their bargaining position. The Israelis because they needed time to regain their lost territory to have an incentive to get long term compromises from the Arabs.

But the war was about to take another change.

#Forty Years Ago #Sinai #Golan #Kahalani #Kissinger #Nixon #Yom Kippur War