BREAKING THE LINE
Yom Kippur, or the Day of Atonement, is the most important festival in the Judaic religious calendar. In 1973, it fell on Saturday 6 October, coinciding with the Sabbath. This was the date chosen by the Egyptian high command to launch Operation Sharara or Spark in conjunction with the Syrian Army. The codename for the assault across the Suez Canal was Operation Badr after the first victory of the Prophet Mohammed in AD 624. The day gave the optimum combination of tidal flow and currents in the canal and sufficient moonlight to allow bridging operations to continue through the night: any later and the chances of snow on the Golan Heights would be too high. It was also assumed that the Israelis would be at a low level of preparedness on such a day when even the radio and television stations were closed down. For many months previously, the Egyptians had been building enormous sand ramparts that were far higher than their counterparts on the Bar Lev Line. From their dominating heights, observation was possible deep into the Sinai as far as the Artillery Road and they also overlooked the Maozim positions. By their very size they obscured any direct observation by the Israelis beyond the far bank of the canal. Military intelligence had dismissed them as purely a labour project for Egyptian conscripts and they were known derisively as the ‘Pyramids’. However, they now contained hull-down firing positions for direct-fire weapons as well as firing pits for Sagger teams to engage Israeli armour rushing to the aid of the Bar Lev Line. Rather than enlarge their own sand ramparts as a countermeasure, the Israelis built a number of tank revetments some 1,000 to 1,500m opposite them so as to destroy any AFVs or troops on the ramparts by superior long-range gunnery techniques. Because of their shape these revetments were known as ‘fins’. Behind the imposing bulk of the Pyramids, the Egyptians concentrated their assault forces and their equipment away from the prying eyes of the Israelis.
155MM GUN EMPLACEMENT
The Bar Lev Line was not just a string of strongpoints along the Suez Canal but a sophisticated series of field fortifications stretching deep into the Sinai Peninsula supported by an extensive road network to replenish and support the farflung positions. During the War of Attrition a second line of strongholds known as Taozim was constructed on the ridgeline behind the Artillery Road some eight to ten kilometres inland from the canal. The Taozim were to be manned by reservists during any period of emergency. Most of these were capable of housing an infantry company. As the anchor at the southern end of the Bar Lev Line, there was a completely different Taoz that incorporated six 155mm howitzers in heavily armoured encasements. These powerful guns dominated the southern entrance of the Suez Canal as well as Suez City itself. The steel and concrete structure of the gun emplacements was encased in multiple layers of rock gabions with further ones to the front to reduce obscuration on firing and absorb shell splinters from counterbattery fire. The guns could be withdrawn inside the emplacements with steel shutters that could be lowered to protect the weapons against counterbattery fire. The whole structure was covered by camouflage netting to blend it in with the surrounding desert while powerful fans dispelled gun fumes through ventilator pipes poking through the roof.
These comprised two field armies, the Second and Third, with five infantry divisions and several independent brigades, both armour and infantry, backed by three mechanized and two armoured divisions. In addition, there were independent tank brigades, two paratroop brigades, a marine brigade and some 28 battalions of commandos, as well as numerous battalions of the vital combat engineers to breach the Bar Lev Line. The Egyptian Second Army was deployed along the Suez Canal from Lake Manzale to the Great Bitter Lake with the Third Army onwards to the Gulf of Suez. In total, there were some 180,000 troops, 2,200 tanks and 2,000 artillery pieces lining the Suez Canal. These were protected from air attack by the densest air defence system in the world with 130 SAM sites comprising SA-2, SA-3 and SA-6 SAM systems integrated with numerous AAA batteries. Within three hours of the initial crossing, each division was to have deployed to its front as a counter to Israeli armour some 314 RPGs (effective out to 500m); 108 57mm recoilless rifles (effective out to 1,600m) and 48 Sagger launchers with an effective range out to 3,000m. In addition there were scores of tanks, self-propelled guns and supplementary Sagger teams in overwatch from the sand ramparts on the western side of the canal. Combined with the thorough training and higher motivation of their troops, the Egyptian armed forces now had a formidable answer to the IAF and IAC.
On 15 June 1973, Major-General Shmuel ‘Gorodish’ Gonen became GOC Southern Command in place of General Sharon. This coincided with a number of other changes in the top postings within the IDF that resulted in a number of relatively inexperienced field commanders in place at the outset of the October War. Technically competent and personally brave, General Gonen was an armour officer who was a stickler for detail and had an abrasive not to say abusive manner with subordinates. He could hardly have been more different than the mercurial General Sharon who inspired total loyalty in his men: the latter now took command of a reserve division in time of war within Southern Command. After almost three years of ‘No War No Peace’, the purpose of the Bar Lev Line had become even more clouded. Many in the high command believed that in a general offensive the line would be quickly overwhelmed but military intelligence indicated that such a prospect remained ‘highly improbable’. Since there had been no artillery bombardments for three years, maintenance of the infrastructure of the forts had declined as the IDF sought to reduce its overall expenditure. However the political imperative did not allow them to be abandoned. Accordingly there was no coherent policy as to the role of the Bar Lev Line in time of war except as outlined by its namesake on leaving his post as Chief of Staff: ‘Its day-to-day mission is to prevent a serious breaching of the canal but the system can easily be turned into a jumping-off point.’ The former was hardly possible if over half of the forts had been closed down. General Gonen soon decided to reopen 14 of them as well as build long-range observation towers in order to see over the sand rampart ‘Pyramids’. But it was to prove too late. Similarly he ordered his chief of engineers to reactivate the Dusky Light ‘fire on the water’ weapon system that had not been maintained since 1971 and was now inoperable. An engineering team commanded by Second Lieutenant Shimon Tal arrived at the Hizayon strongpoint on the morning of Saturday 6 October – Yom Kippur.
Just days before, most of the regular troops manning the Bar Lev Line were relieved so that they could go home for Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur. Their replacements were reservists drawn from the 116th ‘Etzioni’ Brigade based in Jerusalem, which had never before been assigned to the Suez Canal. None were happy at the prospect of military service away from their families over the religious holiday. Many were in their late 30s and some had virtually no training at all since they were recent immigrants to Israel: some even could hardly speak Hebrew. Nevertheless, it was just for a month and then their annual tour of duty would be over. They arrived at the forts festooned with books, fishing rods and sheshbesh boards to alleviate the boredom. Captain Motti Ashkenazi, the commander of Moaz Budapest on the Mediterranean coast, even brought his German Shepherd puppy called Peng. However, Captain Ashkenazi had severe reservations as to the state of the defence works at Budapest and immediately demanded more barbed wire, sandbags and mines. He was also dismayed at the arrogance of the resident brigade intelligence officer who had conducted their briefing given prior to deployment. When asked the question by a sergeant: ‘What will happen if the Egyptians simply decide to roll forward? We wouldn’t even know. The first warning would be when they crush us.’ The disdainful answer came back: ‘When someone farts in Cairo, we hear it in Tel Aviv. We’ll have plenty of time to replace you with regular units if and when we think something is about to happen. Even if they surprise us and cross over,’ continued the intelligence officer, ‘the air force and armored divisions will give them the heave-ho half an hour afterwards!’ The reality was to be very different.
As its name implies the War of Attrition was intended by the Egyptians to inflict unsustainable casualties upon the IDF until such time as the Israelis sought a political resolution to the occupation of the Sinai Peninsula. During an incident on 6 November 1969 an M48 Magach comes to the aid of an M3 half-track after Egyptian Commandos had ambushed it. With blood streaming down his face from a head wound after a bullet penetrated his helmet, Private Sigali renders assistance to a wounded comrade for which he received a citation for valour. Despite continuing and debilitating casualties the Israeli public displayed stoical resolution during the War of Attrition as did the Egyptian armed forces, who suffered considerably higher losses.
Against the combined might of the Second and Third Egyptian armies, there were just 450 troops manning the Bar Lev Line including a few supplementary soldiers such as Lieutenant Tal’s engineering team while the three southernmost Maozim were manned by regular troops. There was only one platoon of three Magach (M48) tanks deployed along the canal at Maoz Orkal at the extreme north of the line. To the rear, along the Artillery Road were the 91 tanks of the 14th Armoured Brigade under the command of Colonel Amnon Reshef. In support were 12 artillery batteries, each of four guns, including one battery each of M107 175mm self-propelled guns and M109 155mm self-propelled howitzers, together with a further six batteries of Israeli-manufactured M50 155mm self-propelled howitzers as well as further batteries of Soltam 160mm and 120mm self-propelled mortars. In addition there were the 11 Taozim secondary fortifications manned by service personnel. While never truly part of the Bar Lev Line, the Taoz named Tzeider at the extreme south of the line incorporated six French Obusier de 155mm Modele 50 howitzers in fortified emplacements that were capable of bombarding Suez City and providing fire support to positions such as Masreq and Nisan. To the east were almost 200 tanks of the Sinai Division under the command of Major-General Albert Mendler to give a grand total of 290 together with approximately 18,000 troops. Unfortunately, only the understrength 14th Armored Brigade was deployed forwards with the two other brigades in reserve rather than two forwards and one in reserve as required by Shovach Yonim. Such was the complacency induced by the ‘Konseptziya’. With no reserves to hand and few regular troops manning the Bar Lev Line, Plan Dovecote was coming apart at the seams. On 5 October, scores of Egyptian reconnaissance teams, some dressed as Bedouin tribesmen, crossed the canal to conduct a final intelligence assessment as to recent Israeli redeployments. The scouts radioed back: ‘The Israelis are asleep’. That night frogmen swam across the canal and blocked all the fuel outlet pipes, be they real or dummy, of the Dusky Light weapon system. The Egyptians were leaving nothing to chance.
The Egyptians acquired their first SAM system from the Soviet Union in 1965 and, by the outbreak of the Six Day War, 27 batteries of the SA-75K Dvina (SA-2 Guideline) were in service. Following the war, the network was greatly expanded and on 1 July 1968 all SAM systems came under the control of the Air Defence Command that was separate from the Egyptian Air Force. Based on the Soviet PVO-Strany model, the new command also controlled two brigades of MiG-21 interceptors as the Egyptians attempted to gain air superiority over the Suez Canal. Such a division of resources led to some friction and mutual recrimination, which was exacerbated by the often difficult working relationship between the Egyptian armed forces and their Soviet advisors. This is the combination of the SA-75MK Dvina on its SM-63-1 launcher and the RSNA-75M (Fan Song B) fire-control radar. (Lon Nordeen)
At 1405hrs on 6 October 1973, an artillery bombardment of unprecedented ferocity fell on the strongpoints of the Bar Lev Line. Some 2,000 guns opened up along the entire front with 10,500 shells striking Israeli positions in the first minute at a rate of 175 rounds a second. Meanwhile, EAF fighter bombers, Scud and FROG surface-to-surface missiles struck targets further east while heliborne commandos flew deep into the Sinai to intercept Israeli reinforcements. In a massive barrage lasting 53 minutes, some 3,000 tons of high explosive saturated the Moazim: the weapon of choice to attack the well-protected bunkers being the Soviet M-55 240mm heavy mortar with its 288lb projectile. At 1415hrs, 720 rubber dinghies took to the water transporting the first assault troops across the canal to cries of ‘Allahu akhbar’ – ‘God is the greatest’ – as they paddled their heavily laden craft. Most of these troops crossed at points not covered by fire from the Maozim but even so the Egyptian artillery isolated the strongpoints further with a sustained barrage of smoke shells. So acrid was the dense yellow smoke that many defenders thought that the Egyptians were using poison gas. After instructing the troops at Maoz Hizayon as how to ignite the Dusky Light system with incendiary grenades, the unfortunate Lieutenant Tal, who had only arrived at the front that morning, was on his way to Matzmed when the assault began. He became the first POW to be captured.
Initially, the Egyptian assault troops bypassed the Maozim as they rushed to take up their allotted fire positions at the tank ‘fins’ beyond the Bar Lev Line but once the artillery barrage subsided many of the strongpoints were subjected to ground attack. The fate of the Maozim depended to a large degree on the level of leadership. Those where the officers or senior NCOs became early casualties tended to lack a cohesive defence. In those strongpoints where the troops manned the firing pits as soon as possible, Egyptian casualties were significant. There were extraordinary acts of bravery and some of cowardice: of men broken in will by the force of the bombardment; of slovenly, insubordinate private soldiers in peacetime that became natural leaders in the crucible of battle. Soon after the assault began, desperate radio messages were being transmitted from the Maozim:
‘Request air force assistance the length of the northern sector,’ came an officer’s voice over the radio. ‘Egyptians present at Mifreket, Lazanit and Milano Aleph … Lazanit and Mifreket overtaken. Request aerial assistance urgently in the northern sector … No contact with Budapest and Orkal. … In the southern sector the situation is good, except for an incursion onto the Gidi Road. No incursions at central [sector]. At northern [sector] the situation is bad. The strongholds have been captured.’
Reflecting the informal nature between ranks in the IDF, there were persistent and repeated calls of ‘I need Benny’: Major-General Benny Peled being the commander of the IAF. But after a number of largely ineffectual ground-attack missions along the Suez Canal, the Phantoms and Skyhawks were diverted to the Northern Front where the situation was even more desperate after the Syrians had penetrated the Purple Line in force. The Maozim were left to their own devices.
None of the positions surrendered or were evacuated without the express orders of higher command. The first to fall was Lituf at 1330hrs on Sunday 7 October: the last was Masreq on the Quay at Port Tewfiq at 1100hrs on 13 October. From the outset, Southern Command despatched tank formation after tank formation towards the Suez Canal in a vain attempt to bolster the defences of the Bar Lev Line but invariably they fell victim to the swarming Egyptian anti-tank teams hiding in every hollow and sand dune. By dawn on 7 October, the Sinai Division had lost 180 tanks, by the evening over 100 more. That is one tank for virtually every casualty sustained in the Maozim. Of the 14 tanks despatched to Milano, only five returned. Of the 18 despatched to Mifreket, only another five returned. If their purpose had been to evacuate the troops in the strongpoints, there might have been some sense in their sacrifice. Of the three Magach tanks at Orkal, two remained mobile when the garrison received permission to break out on Sunday afternoon, 7 October. Together with an M3 half-track, the survivors from the three Orkal positions charged through the surrounding Egyptian infantry. After a couple of miles, they picked up some other stragglers but after a few hundred yards the two rearmost vehicles were hit by RPG fire. In the lead tank, the commander, Sergeant Shlomo Arman, reported the ambush and was about to go to their aid when his company commander directed: ‘Negative. Keep moving! They’ll kill you all. Move out of there fast. Out.’ The tank moved off along the darkened road through the swampy salt marshes only to be hit in turn by an RPG. The surviving crew and passengers bailed out and struggled onwards towards Israeli lines. Around midnight the five remaining men saw the outline of Israeli tanks to their front. Sergeant Arman called out: ‘Hey tankers we’re from the forts.’ In an exchange familiar to soldiers across the world, the reply came: ‘Don’t move! Who are you?’ ‘We’re from Orkal.’ ‘Who knows you?’ Arman gave the names of his battalion and brigade commanders. ‘Where in Israel are you from?’ A number of other questions about everyday life followed ending with: ‘What company are you from?’ ‘L Company’ Arman responded. To which came: ‘What company did you say?’ ‘L Company.’ Suddenly a 105mm high-explosive round exploded beside the five men, killing the gallant Sergeant Arman and a fellow crewman and wounding two others. It was a shocking misfortune after such a harrowing ordeal.
As the desperate defence of the Sinai Peninsula continues, an IDF armoured unit moves off as dawn breaks on the third day of the Yom Kippur War, 9 October 1973. That evening just such a unit discovered the gap between the Egyptian Second and Third armies that created the opportunity for the IDF to mount a concerted counteroffensive across the Suez Canal.
One of the leading players in the story of the Bar Lev Line was Major-General Ariel Sharon. After commanding one of the ugdas or divisions that captured the Sinai Peninsula during the Six Day War in 1967, he returned to the Sinai as GOC Southern Command between 1970 and 1973 when he was in charge of the Bar Lev Line. Despite reservations in some quarters, Sharon closed 16 Maozim while constructing a second line of strongholds and extending the road network to allow easier movement of tanks and equipment to the Suez Canal in preparation for any attack into Egypt. The reduction in the number of Maozim allowed the Egyptians to study the configuration of the strongpoints that provided essential intelligence for when they attacked in earnest in October 1973 by when Maj. Gen. Sharon had retired from the army and entered politics. Nevertheless, he returned to duty during the Yom Kippur War in command of 143rd Reserve Armored Division and he is shown here in his M3 command vehicle.
Herein lies the tragedy of the Bar Lev Line. The failure of the IDF high command to define its role in time of general warfare condemned the strongpoints to annihilation and with it the men that manned them and those recklessly despatched to reinforce them. Almost without exception, every assumption made by the IDF prior to the war about Arab intentions and capabilities proved to be erroneous. From the cataclysmic failure of military intelligence, through the containment of the IAF with multiple missile strikes to the inability of the IAC to crush the Arab ‘chiri biri’ or ‘rotten infantry’ under their tracks, Plan Dovecote lay shattered in the burning hulks of tanks in the desert and the battered remnants of the Bar Lev Line. In all, 126 men died defending the forts and 161 others were taken prisoner. But then, perhaps their sacrifice was not in vain. The Egyptians expected to incur 30,000 casualties in the storming of the Bar Lev Line when in fact they suffered just 208 dead. Nevertheless, the delay imposed by the stubborn defence and the time taken to create breaches in the sand ramparts in the Third Army sector meant that the Egyptian bridgeheads were neither as extensive nor contiguous as required by Operation High Minarets. The ensuing operational pause to absorb the early Israeli counterattacks allowed Israeli reserves to be rushed to the front faster than expected but did not allow the bridgeheads to be consolidated. Within days three Israeli armoured divisions were mustered in the Sinai. Furthermore, the failure to form a seamless bridgehead between the Second and Third armies was ruthlessly exploited by General Sharon in his unrelenting quest to take the war into enemy territory.
Ironically, it was the Egyptians that clutched defeat from the jaws of victory. Operations Badr and High Minarets had been an outstanding success and achieved the stated aims of the political leadership by creating a comprehensive Egyptian military presence in the Sinai. At a time when the Israelis were seriously considering a ceasefire in place, President Sadat ordered a general offensive codenamed Granite 2, much to the dismay of his high command, in an attempt to gain the vital passes in central Sinai and supposedly to relieve pressure on his Syrian ally. In an ill-conceived, ill-coordinated armoured thrust on a wide front beyond the umbrella of their SAM defences, the Egyptians allowed themselves to be drawn into the type of manoeuvre warfare in which the IDF excelled. In the space of a few hours over 200 Egyptian tanks were destroyed in the largest armoured encounter since the battle of Kursk at a cost to the Israelis of just over 20 tanks. Arguably, this was the very defensive doctrine that the IDF should have adopted in the first place rather than being stymied by the static Bar Lev Line. Thereafter the initiative passed to the Israelis. The Bar Lev Line had one more service to play when Maoz Matzmed became the hinge for the major counter-offensive across the Suez Canal that allowed the IDF to win a brilliant tactical victory on the battlefield by surrounding the Egyptian Third Army.
A MAOZ UNDER ATACK DURING THE OCTOBER WAR OF 1973
On 6 October 1973, the Egyptian armed forces achieved total strategic and tactical surprise when they launched a massive ground assault against the Bar Lev Line. With just 450 defenders in the Maozim, the Israeli positions were systematically overwhelmed in the coming days. The tenacity of the defenders, and indeed the attackers, varied from Maoz to Maoz but within days all fell to the enemy or were evacuated. Yet the Maozim were never designed to repel a full-scale attack – that was the role of the standing armoured formations in the Sinai Desert and the IAF together with the rapidly mobilized reserves. In the event this is what happened but the sacrifice and loss of the men in the Maozim came as a severe shock to the people of Israel. Many of the defenders fought to the last from their prepared positions such as those shown here with .50-cal. heavy machine guns firing from the prefabricated steel tubs that formed the standard weapons pit. The three-man 81mm mortar crew are serving their weapon in a larger steel tub with its need for greater ammunition storage. Extensive barbed-wire entanglements that incorporated numerous anti-personnel landmines protected every position. However mines were generally ineffective as the shifting sands generally exposed them to the observant eye. Nevertheless the Egyptians were well prepared and the wire entanglements were breached by Bangalore torpedoes, seen at extreme left. Across the canal can be seen the ‘Pyramids’ that dominated the Maozim with direct fire weapons and for observation.
Back to the Purple Line
At the outset of the war, the Israelis on the Golan Heights faced the same vastly disproportionate level of enemy forces as in the Sinai. Like the Bar Lev Line, the fortifications along the Purple Line were intended as well-protected observation posts and fighting positions against minor incursions by enemy patrols. They also acted as artillery fire-control centres when Syrian forces conducted a ‘battle day’ incursion in strength. Each of the ten strongpoints or Mutzavim along the Purple Line had a complement of 12 to 30 men but, unlike the Bar Lev Line, the northern five were manned by infantry of the elite Golani Brigade and the others by regular soldiers of the 50th Paratroop Battalion, as well as intelligence and artillery personnel. Again, each position was to be defended by a platoon of tanks in time of hostilities with elevated firing ramps close by to allow the long-range destruction of enemy armour in well-prepared killing zones. The Syrian offensive on the Golan Heights was conducted by three mechanized and two armoured divisions; a total of almost 1,400 tanks against just 177 Shot (Centurion) MBTs. Displaying a dogged determination and commitment unseen before, the massed ranks of Syrian T-55s smashed into the Israeli lines under the cover of an intense artillery barrage and an extensive SAM umbrella.
The Shot tanks of the 188th ‘Barak’ Brigade rushed forward to the aid of the strongpoints and from their elevated ramps exacted an awful slaughter of Syrian AFVs but still they surged forward. Despite heavy casualties, the Syrians eventually breached the Israeli anti-tank ditch and minefields; the strongpoints were invariably bypassed and suppressed by artillery barrages. Nevertheless, they inflicted numerous casualties on the advancing Syrian units while the artillery spotters brought down accurate fire on concentrations of tanks and vehicles. So effective was their defence that when Major-General Yitzhak ‘Haka’ Hofi, GOC Northern Command, ordered the strongpoints to be evacuated during the evening of 6 October both Colonel Amir Drori, commander of the Golani Brigade, and Major Yoram Yair commanding the paratroop contingent demurred. Such was the value of having regular troops manning the strongpoints. Although most positions were evacuated, some continued to resist such as Mutzavim 116 and Mutzavim 107 to the last until relieved in the general Israeli counteroffensive that regained the Purple Line and thrust into Syria to bring the war to the gates of Damascus.
Major-General ‘Bren’ Adan briefs Minister of Defense Moshe Dayan about the final battle for Suez City two days after the end of the Yom Kippur War. From the outset of the war, Maj. Gen. Adan was in command of the 252nd Armored Division that fought the defensive battle plan as ordained by Operation Dovecote. His division lost numerous tanks and many men in repeated attempts to support the defenders of the Bar Lev Line. Following the decisive holding battle of 14 October, his division spearheaded the Israeli counteroffensive ‘into Africa’ culminating in the isolation of the Egyptian Third Army. As the original architect of the Bar Lev Line, his sheer professionalism in the difficult days of the Yom Kippur War up to victory some three weeks later marked him as the outstanding commander within Southern Command during the war.