The Hidden Factors that Turned the Tide: Strategic Decision-Making and Operational Intelligence in the 1973 War

Key takeaways

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Reading notes

• The October 1973 war was the most intensive and complicated short military confrontation in the history of the Arab-Israeli conflict. Numerous factors, such as the quality of the war planning in Egypt and Israel, the level of professionalism and morale of the fighting forces and their commanders, the efficiency of the weapon systems, and the amount of military and diplomatic support the superpowers extended to their clients, played a major role in deciding the war’s outcome. But with the hindsight of 40 years, two factors seemed to have been critical in the Egyptian-Israeli theater: The quality of the decision-making process on both sides of the Canal, and the quality of the intelligence available to both sides.

• The Egyptian preparations for the first stage of the war were carried out by an apolitical-military leadership that ‘functioned with both unity of command and purpose’

• When Sadat isolated himself from his generals and insisted on renewing the offensive despite their professional estimate that this would be likely to end in defeat and therefore endanger the war achievements, he broke the most fundamental principles of a high quality decision-making process. He acted impulsively, avoided obtaining sufficient information and advice, and refused to accept indications signaling that the chosen alternative would not work.

• The opposite was true with regard to the Israelis. Before the war their decision-making process suffered from a major weakness in the form of an unrealistic estimate regarding the likelihood of the war. After the war had started, their decision making became far more effective and the political and military leadership convened regularly, sometimes two or three times a day, to openly estimate the situation and make the necessary decisions.

• Before and during the war Israel’s policy-makers and military commanders enjoyed better intelligence information than their Egyptian counterparts. However, due to certain pathologies in AMAN’s estimation process, they were unaware that the war estimation they had received did not properly reflect the gravity of the available warning indicators. AMAN’s failure in general, and DMI Zeira’s personal failure in specific, led to an immediate erosion in AMAN’s status and privileged the Mossad and its chief, Zamir, whose personal last minute warning saved Israel from a worse disaster.

• The Egyptian generals, on the other hand, lacked the necessary intelligence information about IDF deployment prior to carrying out the 14 October offensive. This lacuna, according to their own testimonies, was the main cause of the EAF defeat in this offensive, which ultimately denied Egypt a clear military victory in the war.