Shlomo Aloni, Yom Kippur War 1973 (Osprey, 2024)
We tend to assume that the Israeli Air Force (ILAF) rules the Middle-Eastern skies, and that they always have. After all, it acts with impunity in current conflicts and famously destroyed the Arab air forces in the 1967 Six Day War. But that has not always been the case. In Yom Kippur War 1973, Shlomo Aloni describes and analyses an Israeli Air Force set up for the wrong war and one that struggled to adapt to changing wartime conditions.
Aloni lays the groundwork with a brief narrative of how the conflict between Egypt and Israel had simmered and flared after the 1967 Six Day War to the Egyptian-Syrian invasion of Israel in October 1973. He then compares the aerial capabilities of the respective combatants. The Egyptians and Syrians had re-equipped their air forces and reorganised their defences to avoid another 1967-style humiliation, but that also limited their offensive options. Opting for ground to air defences along the front supported by the air force in the rear appeared to be their best strategy. Forewarned of Egypt’s plans for war, the Israelis planned accordingly and increased the number and quality of their warplanes. But their planes lacked electronic warfare protection and suitable weapon systems. Aloni considers the strategic objectives for the three combatants and the orders of battle through which they intended to achieve them. He notes that Egyptian and Syrian air forces were predicated on defending initial gains on the ground, while the Israeli air force was offensive rather than defensive.
On 6 October 1973, the Egyptian and Syrians attacked the alerted but still not quite deployed Israelis. Aloni switches to narrating operations as the war unfolded. He tells how the Israelis were caught on the hop, losing valuable time and ground. Aloni argues that the ILAF’s impact was minimal on the first day. On Day 2, the Israelis launched Operation Challenge then Operation Model against the Syrians in a still controversial change of plan. Some argue that Model was a disaster for the ILAF, but Aloni disagrees, contending that it was neither a success nor a failure but was a wasted effort. The ILAF actions against the Egyptians also proved inconclusive. And so, Aloni’s narrative proceeds on a day by day track, with Aloni describing the action in detail and his analysis of events. By Day 7, he notes, the ILAF claimed it had suffered considerable attrition, but in reality, it had not. Nevertheless, the claim sparked a new and final phase of the war that lasted eleven days and swung decisively towards an Israeli victory. In his final analysis, Aloni argues that the ILAF failed to realise its pre-war planning and had to adapt to realities on the ground. Despite that, Aloni contends, the ILAF did not achieve most of its strategic goals even as they changed to suit the situation. But Aloni concludes that the ILAF succeeded in reforming the Syrian and Egyptian air forces and those countries’ strategic aims in the war.
Shlomo Aloni has written an illuminating and sometimes surprising survey of the air war in 1973. His overview of the combatants, including their strengths and weaknesses, lays out an efficient prelude to the action that he narrates in the second half of the book. And, while the narrative is pitched mostly at the operational level, and is therefore sometimes quite dry, Aloni intersperses that with some fascinating accounts from the men who flew the aircraft. He is ably supported by Osprey’s usual high quality maps, artwork, and photographs. However, Aloni’s story is almost exclusively concerned with the ILAF, with all the problems that entails, and it would be interesting to read a companion volume told from the other side. Nevertheless, Aloni’s book will find a ready audience in students of the Arab-Israeli wars and enthusiasts of air warfare in general.
