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The Arab-Israeli War of 1973: Honor, Oil, and Blood
Posted on: 2014-03-18 16:03:15 By O'Brien Browne @ Historynet.com HEAT WAFTED UP IN SLEEPY SPIRALS from the Sinai Desert on the afternoon of October 6, 1973. Lizards lay about on sun-warmed stones, blinking in contentment. Falcons circled lazily in the pale blue sky. The waters of the Suez Canal lapped gently at its sandy shores. Suddenly, at exactly 2 p.m., this hushed stillness erupted as 2,000 Egyptian artillery pieces, Katyusha rockets, howitzers, and surface-to-surface missiles blasted the canal's eastern bank, throwing tremendous plumes of sand into the air. Israeli defensive positions years in the making were pulverized in minutes. Without warning, 222 Egyptian MiG and Sukhoi fighters came screaming out of the sky and bombed command posts, surface-to-air batteries, air bases, supply dumps, and radar installations. Simultaneously, a few hundred miles to the north, the rugged hills of the Golan Heights shook with massive explosions as 100 Syrian MiGs attacked Israeli positions and an assault force of as many as 900 tanks and 40,000 infantry crossed into Israeli territory. Read on... |