Inside Israel's Northern Command: The Yom Kippur War on the Syrian Border

by Dani Asher (Editor)

Overview

On October 6, 1973, Israel's Northern Command was surprised by the thunder of cannon fire and the sight of dense, black smoke. A Syrian force of 1,400 tanks supported by artillery and air power had attacked from the north while the Egyptian military invaded the Sinai Peninsula in the south. Syria sought to avenge its devastating loss of the Golan Heights in the 1967 Six-Day War—a conflict that not only resulted in territorial gain for Israel but also cemented the nation's reputation as the region's preeminent military power. Although Israel ultimately prevailed, the Yom Kippur War (or Ramadan War, as it is known in Arab countries) shattered the illusion of Israel's invincibility.

In Syrians at the Border, Israel's foremost scholar of the war, Dani Asher, and an eminent group of experts provide the definitive history of this key conflict. The contributors—Major General Yitzhak Hofi, the Northern commander in chief; Major General Uri Simchoni, head of Command Operations; Brigadier General Avraham Bar David, head of Artillery; and Colonel Hagai Mann, the command's intelligence officer—all held key positions during the fighting. Together, they offer fresh insight into the prewar debate that raged between the Israeli Northern Command and intelligence officers who believed that Syria would not instigate conflict.

This seminal study also examines the pivotal battles that changed the course of the war, as well as the disastrous effects of a flawed postwar evaluation that adversely affected the careers of several high-ranking intelligence officials and the course of defense strategic planning thereafter. The contributors' incisive analyses contribute significantly to our understanding of this troubled region.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780813167374
Publisher:	University Press of Kentucky
Publication date:	03/18/2016
Series:	Foreign Military Studies
Pages:	704
Product dimensions:	6.20(w) x 9.30(h) x 2.00(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Brigadier General Dani Asher, IDF (Ret.) is the author of many books, including The Egyptian Strategy for the Yom Kippur War: An Analysis. He lives in Israel.

Table of Contents

Editorial Notes & Acknowledgments 17

Preface 21

Foreword 25

Introduction 29

Part I Preparation for War

Chapter 1 Syria Wants War 39

Chapter 2 Kachol Lavan (Blue and White) Alert 55

Chapter 3 Operational Planning 61

Chapter 4 Preparations: Regular Service Forces-Air-Armored Corps 69

Chapter 5 The Final Road to War 77

Part II From Desperate Holding to an Offensive Towards Damascus

Chapter 6 Halting the Syrian Attack 127

Chapter 7 The Fall of the Hermon Outpost 175

Chapter 8 Defensive-The Morning of October 7 to the Morning of October 8 187

Chapter 9 The Attempt to Capture the Hermon on October 8 223

Soldiers Decorated in the Holding Battle 239

Chapter 10 The Syrian Army-From Penetration to the Depths of the Golan Heights to the Delay in the Eastern Defensive Alignments 287

Chapter 11 The Counterattack, October 8-10 293

Chapter 12 The Breakthrough into Syrian Territory October 11-12 341

Chapter 13 The Breakthrough, the Threat on Damascus, and the battles against the Expeditionary Forces 391

Chapter 14 Operation Kinuach (Dessert) Recapturing the Herman 427

Soldiers Decorated in the Breakthrough Phase 479

Part III Operating the Command System at War

Chapter 15 General Staff Branch 511

Chapter 16 Intelligence 523

Chapter 17 Artillery 537

Chapter 18 Field Engineering 565

Chapter 19 Air force 575

Chapter 20 Logistics 601

Chapter 21 Ordnance 625

Chapter 22 Medical Corps 631

Chapter 23 Military Police 641

Chapter 24 Adjutant Branch 647

Chapter 25 Signal Control and Communications 651

Soldiers Decorated among the Firepower and Combat Support Alignments 659

Quantitative Summary of the War on the Northern Front 679

Afterword Major General (res.) Uri Simchoni 681

Writers and Their Contributions 695

Bibliography 699

Editorial Reviews

The book's principal virtue is that it offers something we have not had before: the inside story of the 1973 war from one of the world's most historically secretive and tight-lipped organizations, the Israel Defense Force. No other book on the Yom Kippur/Ramadan War of 1973 even comes close to it in terms of detail, operational insight, or human drama.

Robert M. Citino

This book is a gold mine of tactical and operational details on operations by Israel's Northern Command during the 1973 Yom Kippur War. General Asher's book covers the entire Northern Command during the war, and his four primary contributors were all senior leaders with intimate and detailed day-to-day experience of the war.

David T. Zabecki

"This book is a gold mine of tactical and operational details on operations by Israel's Northern Command during the 1973 Yom Kippur War. General Asher's book covers the entire Northern Command during the war, and his four primary contributors were all senior leaders with intimate and detailed day-to-day experience of the war." — David T. Zabecki, coeditor of The Encyclopedia of the Arab-Israeli Conflict

"The book's principal virtue is that it offers something we have not had before: the inside story of the 1973 war from one of the world's most historically secretive and tight-lipped organizations, the Israel Defense Force. No other book on the Yom Kippur/Ramadan War of 1973 even comes close to it in terms of detail, operational insight, or human drama." — Robert M. Citino, author of The Wehrmacht Retreats: Fighting a Lost War, 1943

From the Publisher