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alternatehistory.com
Hi everyone. This is a new TL of mine, this time about the Yom Kippur War. The POD is a small one: a Syrian officer that died OTL lives though scarred and decides to press the advance in the Golan rather than stop just before Nafah. The real changes will be in the next post though.
Shadows of Yom Kippur
Prologue: Background and Lead-up to the Conflict, 1948-1973.
The war was part of the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Arab world, a dispute which had included many battles and wars since 1948, when the Zionist state was formed after which most Arab states had the stated goal of destroying it. Arab leaders based themselves on the “three no’s” which were “no peace, no recognition and no negotiation” which was a clear summary of their intentions for Israel. During the Six-Day War of 1967, the Israelis had captured Egypt's Sinai Peninsula all the way to the Suez Canal (which became the cease-fire line in a de facto annexation) and roughly half of Syria's Golan Heights. Both countries’ leaders had made regaining the lands lost in the 1967 “Third Arab-Israeli War” or “Six-Day War” the stated goal of their foreign policy and they formed an alliance. Other countries were less eager to join: Iraq had become estranged from Syria for the latter’s support of the short-lived 1963 Ba’ath regime and subsequent interference in Iraqi politics, Lebanon wasn’t expected to join due to its weakness and instability, and Jordanian King Husain had become estranged due to Egyptian and Syrian support for the P.L.O. in his country and Syrian intervention on their behalf in the civil war.
In the meantime, Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser died in 1970 and was succeeded by Anwar al-Sadat who wanted to regain the Sinai Desert. He initially believed that a minor victory would be enough to bring Israel to the negotiating table, but Syrian leader Hafiz al-Assad rejected this option and viewed the matter as a purely military affair. Al-Assad believed that his military modernized with Soviet equipment could deal a decisive blow to the Israelis. In his opinion, negotiations would begin after the Golan Heights had been seized after which Israel could be forced to relinquish the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. Besides this, Egypt and Syria were at their most demoralized point ever due to economic problems, poverty and of course their defeat in 1967 and so they needed victory. Egypt’s peace initiative, on the basis of a retreat to pre-1967 borders in exchange for a non-belligerency treaty, was rejected. Israel heavily fortified the Golan Heights and their side of the Suez Canal. The Egyptians and Syrians strengthened their armed forces with Soviet T-55 and T-62 tanks, MiG-21 and some MiG-23 fighter craft, modern Soviet-made anti-aircraft defences, and took preparations for war; in fact, Sadat’s planning for war started in 1971 although he expelled 20.000 Soviet “advisors” to prevent conflict with the United States. The Soviet Union in turn was sceptical about Egyptian success due to the heavy fortifications of the Golan Heights and Israel’s side of the Suez Canal. Israeli intelligence, in the meantime, predicted that attack from Egypt wasn’t imminent since they were supposedly waiting for Soviet MiG-23 fighter bombers the crews of which would take weeks if not months to train. Also, the Egyptians kept up a steady stream of false information in a deception campaign which threw off the Israelis and besides this Sadat’s threats weren’t taken seriously anymore due to his frequent brinkmanship. In the meantime, Assad and Sadat met with King Husain in September 1973, mere weeks before the outbreak of war, to probe whether he would join although he didn’t receive any concrete war plans due to mutual mistrust. He secretly flew to Tel Aviv to speak with Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir, but his warnings were surprisingly dismissed as Mossad chief Zvi Zamir didn’t “consider war an Arab option”. No pre-emptive strike ever took place because of this uncertainty and to not lose foreign support. Yom Kippur was chosen for obvious reasons: during this specific holiday the country comes to a complete standstill. Yom Kippur is the holiest day in the Jewish calendar; both religiously observant Jews and most of the secular majority fast, abstain from any use of fire, electricity, engines, communications, etc., and all road traffic ceases. Many soldiers also go home from military facilities for the holiday, and Israel was therefore more vulnerable than at any other time with much of its military on leave. Egyptian and Syrian leaders realized this and planned their war accordingly. Operations would commence on October 6th 1973 and no Israeli pre-emptive strike ever came, making the Arab offensive an initial success. The war would profoundly alter the balance of power in the region.
October 6-8, 1973.
The Sinai Desert
The Egyptian assault was broad, across the entire length of the Suez Canal, and therefore utilized five divisions for a total of 100.000 men, 1.350 tanks, and 2.000 guns and mortars for the attack. Opposing the Egyptian invasion force were only 450 men of the so-called Jerusalem Brigade and 290 tanks divided into three tank brigades, only one of which was immediately available at the time for defence. Anticipating swift Israeli armoured and aerial counterattack, Egyptian troops were issued with RPG-7 and AT-3 “Sagger” anti-tank missiles, and RPG-43 grenades as well as surface-to-air missiles. The offensive commenced with the construction of enormous ramps up against the Israeli made sand wall, thereby providing cover to advancing infantry. High pressure water cannons were used to destroy the sand wall and thusly the first enemy defences. Earlier that day on 2:00 PM October 6th an enormous Egyptian air offensive known as Operation Badr had commenced against Hawk SAM batteries, artillery positions, several radar installations, three airbases and three known command centres. Airfields at Bir Tamada and Refidim were temporarily out of commission afterwards, and a Hawk battery at Ophir was damaged and rendered temporarily out of order too. The Egyptian aerial air attack was coupled with a barrage from more than 2.000 artillery pieces for a period of 53 minutes against the Bar Lev Line and rear area command posts and concentration bases. Israeli air offensives took their toll on the Egyptians who acknowledged the loss of five aircraft although the Israelis claimed more. 32.000 Egyptian soldiers then crossed the Suez Canal at five different points in twelve waves, prevented Israeli strengthening of the Bar Lev Line, and went on to attack Israeli fortifications. Israeli attempts to prevent the bridges from being built at the crossings were prevented by Egyptian anti-aircraft missiles, and secondly the sectional design of the bridges made quick repair possible. The Israeli brigade fought fiercely, but couldn’t hold the Bar Lev forts and Egyptian troops captured fifteen strong points in a matter of hours, advancing into the Sinai Desert by several kilometres. Only the northernmost fortification known as “Fort Budapest” held out and in the meantime the remaining bridges were finished. Additional Egyptian infantry started to cross into the Sinai Desert as did the first armour by 8:30 PM. Egyptian efforts with helicopters to stop Israeli reinforcements from arriving failed miserably with severe losses. Egyptian forces still advanced four or five kilometres into the Sinai with two armies and 850 tanks by morning. The Israeli air force at this moment played a smaller role because they needed to deal with the much more threatening Syrian invasion of the Golan Heights. Egypt consolidated its positions, repulsed counterattacks from the north and moved into the town of Qantara by October 7th, clearing the latter the next morning. Egyptian commandos tried to interdict the arrival of Israeli reinforcements with moderate success and serious losses. The Egyptian advance had stopped for the moment although no one knew what they would do next. Moods were wildly optimistic among Arab leaders as Israeli defeat seemed at hand while Israel worried and made a fateful decision.
The Golan Heights
In the Golan Heights, the Syrians attacked two Israeli brigades and eleven artillery batteries with five divisions and 188 batteries. The offensive commenced with a 50 minute artillery strike and an air strike by one hundred aircraft after which the forward brigades of three divisions penetrated the 1967 ceasefire lines and bypassed UN observer posts followed by the main force. On the eve of battle, Israel fielded 3.000 troops, 180, tanks and 60 artillery pieces in the region to oppose 28.000 Syrian troops, 800 tanks and 600 artillery pieces. Needless to say, the defenders were outnumbered by far and from the second day onward Syria also deployed two armoured divisions to the theatre. All available Israeli tanks in the region were put to use; they were outnumbered, but Israeli Centurions and M60s proved superior to the T-55, although less so to the T-62. Syrian commandos seized the most important Israeli position on Mount Hermon where they had a large amount of surveillance equipment. They also ambushed and repelled an enemy counterattacking force. As had the Egyptians, the Syrians had made use of advanced Soviet anti-tank and anti-aircraft missiles to great effect which was enhanced due to the element of surprise. The Golan Heights front was given top priority by the Israeli High Command due to the closeness to Israeli soil and the threat that its capture would pose to large population centres like Tiberias, Safed, Haifa and Netanya. The fighting in the Sinai was sufficiently far away that Israel’s major cities and key economic regions weren’t under any immediate threat. Reservists were therefore directed to the Golan as quickly as possible. They were assigned to tanks and sent to the front as soon as they arrived at army depots, without waiting for the crews they trained with to arrive, machine guns to be installed on the tanks, or taking the time to calibrate the tank guns. The Syrians had expected it to take at least 24 hours for Israeli reserves to reach the front lines, but reserve units started to arrive after fifteen hours instead, a testimony to Israeli willpower and organisational skill. The Israeli defenders made extensive use of mobile artillery and their gunners already had extensive practice in the Golan under their belts which made them very effective. Syrian SAMs shot down forty Israeli aircraft although the latter’s pilots adopted a different tactic which entailed coming in low over the river Jordan, avoiding most Syrian SAM installations. Syrian armoured columns suffered under these attacks and their enemies fought heavily throughout the day, but after six hours Israeli lines had been overrun through sheer Syrian numerical advantage and severe losses had been inflicted upon the defenders.
During the night, Israeli forces successfully warded off numerically superior Syrian troops. The Syrians were equipped with night-vision goggles, and struck with precision while the Israelis had to allow the Syrians to advance to ranges close enough for them to fight and then open fire. Whenever Syrian tanks penetrated the Israeli lines, though, Israeli gunners would immediately rotate their turrets and destroy them with great effectiveness before turning their attention back to the oncoming forces. The Syrians seized some of the high ground during the night but were soon dislodged by an Israeli counterattack. During several days of fighting, the Israeli seventh armoured brigade in the north succeeded in holding the rocky hill line defending the northern flank of their headquarters in Nafah and inflicted severe losses on the Syrians. But by the afternoon of October 9th, however, only six of their tanks remained in action. Just as it was starting to be pushed back, it was bolstered by a small force of individual tanks arriving from within Israel, and held firm.
To the south, the Barak Armoured Brigade was bereft of any natural defences, but their enemies were at first slowed down by a minefield and the Barak Brigade's well trained artillery gunners inflicted serious casualties on the Syrians with accurate gun fire. Unshaken by these losses, Syrian forces continued pushing and the Barak Brigade started taking heavy casualties The Israelis continued to fight desperately, hoping to buy time for reserve forces to reach the front lines. In several instances, some Israeli tank crews sacrificed themselves rather than voluntarily give ground. At night, the Syrians made deadly use of infrared technology, while the Israelis responded by using illumination rounds and xenon light projectors on their tanks and carried out a series of small blocking actions. Israeli Brigade Commander Colonel Shoham was killed on the second day, along with his second-in-command and operations officer, as the Syrians desperately tried to advance towards the Sea of Galilee and Nafah. By now, the Barak Brigade had ceased to function as a cohesive fighting force although the surviving tanks and crewmen continued fighting independently. Around this time, Syrian Brigadier-General Omar Abrash survived his command tank being hit by a shell, mostly due to it not being a direct hit which would have killed him. The Syrians were close to reaching the Israeli defenders at Nafah, yet stopped the advance on Nafah's fences at 17:00 hours. Syrian brigadier general Omar Abrash, however, was scarred and vengeful towards the Israelis. He said: “we still have half a tank of gas, let us finish them off!”. Thusly, he commenced with an unauthorized offensive which was one of the reasons why it took the Israelis off guard since it took place with a radio silence vis-à-vis Damascus. He launched a massed armoured attack against Nafah and took the disorganized defenders by surprise. He then aggressively pressed on along the road to the Jordan River which was only a mere ten kilometres ahead of him, encountering fierce but scattered resistance from the remnants of the Barak Brigade. His superiors threatened to court martial him, but the attack was retroactively condoned by President Hafiz al-Assad himself who praised such a show of initiative. His forward columns occupied the Israeli kibbutz of Gadot, they had actually occupied Israeli soil! They also pressed on to threaten Safed. It inspired Al-Assad to send in all remaining Syrian reserve forces and he inspired his Egyptian allies with Sadat lauding the efforts of the Syrian half of the alliance. It also inspired Iraq, Jordan and a number of other Arab countries to enlarge their expeditionary forces. Iraq sent two armoured brigades for example while Libyan leader Gaddafi to send an extra armoured brigade and an additional squadron of Mirage Vs. Moods among the Arab leaders were widely optimistic, but not for long. The war would go down in history as the most decisive event in Middle Eastern history and as a catastrophe for the Arab cause though in hindsight this was not the case.