Yom Kippur to SA-5 Syrians. Israel facing the A2 / AD
Takeoff of an Israeli F 15C. The F 15A used in 1982, equipped with AIM 9L and AIM 7F missiles, demonstrated a clear superiority over Syrian aircraft. (© US Air Force)
In October 1973, Israel found itself in a delicate strategic situation, caught in the face of the combined attack of the Arab forces. To the west, Egyptian troops cross the Suez Canal under the protective umbrella of a tiered anti-aircraft device, using some of the most advanced systems of the time, at the risk of catastrophic attrition.
The context of the outbreak of war between the two countries is well known, knowing also that they have increased opportunities to measure their aviations. The Six Day War of June 1967 was thus followed by a non-linear "attrition war" (1969-1970) (1), alternating between periods of lull and relatively large operations. Israel then set up the Bar-Lev line facing the Suez Canal, all using its air force and commandos for offensive actions (2). The operations were intense enough that from July 1967 to November 1969, the Egyptian air force lost 51 aircraft (34 in aerial combat, 9 because of the DCA and 8 because of missiles MIM-23B Hawk), while Israeli raids caused the destruction of 30 Egyptian SAM batteries. On December 23, 1969,
The war of attrition as a lure of Egyptian capabilities
The continuation of the operations showed the Israeli audacity (3). On January 7, 1970, four Israeli F-4s attacked the Egyptian base at Bilbeis, causing a total surprise. On the 10th of the same month, several Egyptian depots were targeted and, on the 18th, the bases of Hulwan and Watza. The Israeli air force systematically sought to maintain air superiority over the Suez Canal, but also to demonstrate its ability to strike in the depth of Egyptian territory, returning to Israel the war of attrition on which Cairo in order to weaken the moral superiority of Tel Aviv. At this point, the Israelis had not opted for the concentration of their attacks in time, preferring to conduct operations two or three times a week.
However, such operations resulted in Egyptian rearmament with the help of the Soviet Union (70 MiG-21 and as many MiG-17s, Su-7s, as well as SAMs). In reality, the USSR did not at that time have any apparatus equivalent to the F-4 and A-4 aligned by Israel, and held the political position that the Arab forces should be able to defend themselves, but not attack. It itself deployed several of its air defense units - and did not hesitate to engage Israeli aircraft - the first battery of SA-3 was declared operational in 1970. This represented 18 battalions, each with four SA-3 batteries, as well as ZSU-23/4 and SA-7 batteries for their close defense. Pilots have also been sent to Egypt as trainers. Engaged in air battles, many of them were shot. The deployment of electronic countermeasures systems by the United States, but especially the high level of morale and skill of the Israeli pilots, together with the superiority of the equipment at their disposal were such that
in the end , the Egyptians would have suffered from 101 to 113 losses, against 15 or 16 on the Israeli side, the Soviets estimated to have five victories to their credit.
An official cease-fire between the two countries was decreed on August 4, 1970, without, however, resolving the political dispute. It was in this context that the 1973 war, launched by Syria and Egypt, broke out despite warnings from the US and Israeli intelligence services. Several analysts later considered that if Israel had conducted a preemptive operation against Syrian and Egyptian defenses, it could have destroyed up to 90% of SAM batteries. Such action would then have allowed the Israeli Heyl Ha'Avir to conduct operations against opposing ground forces (4).
The shock of Yom Kippur
The Israelis, after being severely shaken by the Suez Canal crossing by Egyptian troops and the Syrian breakthrough on the Golan (5), managed to regain the advantage (6). Israeli air power was considered decisive (7), in air superiority missions - it was estimated that the F-4E Phantom II was the best interceptor in the world -, close air support and interdiction (8). As for the use of MIM-23 Hawk air defense missiles, it made it possible to reach a destruction probability rate close to 100%.
In fine, the Arab air force lost 450 aircraft, including 338 in air combat, against only four for Israel. On October 26, 1973, Israel had rejected Syrians and Egyptians and, after going to the other side of the Suez Canal, was able to circle the 3 th army of Cairo, with positions within 120 km of the Egyptian capital. Success has been achieved - but the situation has been critical.
In fact, the losses of the Israeli Heyl Ha'Avir against the SAM curtains that Egypt had placed along the Suez Canal and those that the Syrians had positioned on the Golan have stunted its air superiority over the area. of battle at first. This had the effect of limiting its close support operations, unlike what happened in 1967 (9). At the beginning of the war, Israel had 380 combat aircraft: 125 F-4s, 185 A-4s, 45 Mirage IIIs and 25 upgraded Super Mysteries (10), 650 pilots and about 80 helicopters. It should be noted that of the 115 combat and support aircraft lost by Israel between 6 and 24 October, 80 were during the first three days - an average of 26.66 aircraft / day (11). At this rate, it was obviously impossible to hold on for a long time. Heyl Ha'Avir lost more than 26% of his combat aircraft during the war. Several factors are behind this setback.
The first is the density of the threat. In preparation for the operation, Egypt had reinforced its air defense with 18 batteries of SA-6 Gainful (three brigades) (12), to which must be added the batteries of SA-2/3 already deployed (a total of 60 batteries along the Suez Canal). Syria, for its part, received 12 batteries of SA-6 and also had older systems. With the Iraqi forces also engaged, the three attackers lined up 180 batteries in total. While Israel's losses are significant, they are to be compared to the estimated 2 100 missiles (13) fired by the Egyptians, and the number of Lebanese air force aircraft being shot down, including when they were equipped with weapons. friend / foe identifiers. Thirty Israeli aircraft were hit by SA-7s,
At the same time, Israeli losses are also attributable to an employment of aviation in attack missions of Egyptian bridgeheads (with little efficiency), which is easily understood. Indeed, Egypt advanced its land forces with strong artillery support, crushing Israeli ground defenses: in the first minutes of the attack, 175 Egyptian shells fell every second on the Bar-Lev line. Attempts to counter-attack Israeli ground units faced a high density of anti-tank weapons. In such a context, the use of aviation as a compensating factor seemed logical, but quickly caused a great deal of attrition. This rationality has, moreover, been based on the belief in the effectiveness of countermeasure systems.
A second factor is Israeli hesitation in conducting the air campaign. If the staff of the Heyl Ha'Avir better anticipated the war than the rest of the forces and the reaction was fast, the first orders were to launch strikes not on the SAM sites, but on the air bases and anti-aircraft artillery positions ("Tagar" operation). The conduct of these operations was in itself costly, the aircraft, which were flying at low altitude, exposing themselves to the SA-7 and especially to the artillery, in particular the ZSU-23/4. Israel then launched Operation Dugman-5, specifically targeting SAM sites, on the Syrian front. But no immediate recognition was made, so that the changes in position of the batteries, even if they were known, did not allow precise location.
In the end , the information, 48 hours old, was of no use and only one battery of the 25 targets was destroyed. Six F-4s were also lost and 10 others seriously damaged, with 11 pilots killed (14). Paradoxically, Israelis had anti-radar ammunition like the AGM-45 Shrike, but did not put themselves in a position to use them.
Considered as worrying - much more than during the Vietnam War - developments in Soviet air defense systems would lead to a vast research movement in the field of electronic countermeasures, in Israel as elsewhere (15). Above all, the Egyptians made the mistake of advancing in Sinai beyond the bubble of protection of their SAM, which had not been moved: the Israeli air force then regained freedom of maneuver. As a result, the Egyptians lost 28 aircraft on the 14th of October alone. Having re-entered, Israeli forces conducted a cons-attack that led them to pass through the Suez Canal and to encircle the 3 th Egyptian army, causing the capture of 12 of the 60 Egyptian SAM batteries, which then helped to intensify the Israeli air operations (65% of the missions carried out from this moment were tactical strikes), before an intervening first and then a second ceasefire. Captured radar systems were shipped to the United States, allowing for the development of the necessary countermeasures and the optimization of anti-radar devices.
In the end , therefore, the threat was mostly dealt with by land, with a "classic" capture of Egyptian positions, artillery treatment, or special operations (16).
The use of US precision emergency ammunition (through Operation Nickel Grass) - AGM-65 Maverick missiles and AGM-62 Walleye - has proved particularly effective, with some reports reporting that 90% of the devices were reaching their targets with precision. General C. Herzog stressed that this episode of cooperation between ground and air forces - bordering on the synergy of forces - had been unprecedented. He added that, in the future, the proliferation of SAM systems - and in particular portable SA-7 systems and their evolution - would force air forces to focus on air superiority and, for strike missions, to the isolation of the battle zone and the destruction of the opponent near it (17). US shipments under "Nickel Grass" also included combat aircraft - at least 100 F-4s and 36 A-4s - taken from US units or stocks. Attrition has been more than compensated.
The lessons that will emerge from the war will be numerous, both in Israel and in the United States. The enslavement of the Israeli air strategy in support of the ground troops has indeed been criticized because of the number of losses that such a posture had generated (18). Similarly, unlike the engagement plans, the air force was used to respond to immediate contingencies, such as the attack on Egyptian pontoons on the Suez Canal or the Syrian armored forces on the Golan Heights. Other problems have been isolated, such as command and control deficits, which have resulted in kinematics where the forces were engaged sometimes against Egypt, sometimes against Syria, but not in a parallel way while the available mass allowed it, however.
The Syrian counterexample
Once learned, the lessons led to a new approach to air operations. When the decision was taken to go to Lebanon in June 1982 to eliminate the PLO, Israeli officials knew they would also face a high density of SAM threats, with Syrians deploying 19 batteries of SA-6 in the plain of Bekaa, in addition to having a large air force likely to intervene over Lebanon. The missiles therefore constrained the ability to provide support to ground forces to advance to Beirut. Heyl Ha'Avir, however, had a new generation of equipment. F-15, F-16 and Kfir now available were controlled from Hawkeye E-2C Advanced Airborne Detection.
On June 9, 1982, Israel launched Operation "Artzav-19" by sending Mastiff drones on which the Syrian radars are locked, while transmitting the image of their position in real time. The SA-6 missiles, 57 of which reportedly targeted drones - confused by Syrians with planes - allowed the E-2 and B-707 electronic warfare to capture and scramble frequencies. It was then that part of the 96 Israeli combat aircraft fired dropped anti-radar missiles and destroyed the launchers with laser-guided and electro-optical weapons. The operation, conducted in fifteen minutes, showed brilliant results: 17 of the 19 SAM batteries had been destroyed, no loss being deplored on the Israeli side. Syria has obviously tried to retaliate, engaging in turn a hundred hunters,
The next day, the Israeli aircraft returned to eliminate the two remaining batteries and impose themselves definitively, slaughtering 35 Syrian aircraft, the Heyl Ha'Havir still recording no loss. On June 10, 21 other Syrian aircraft were shot down: in three days, 82 had been destroyed, which posed a clear problem of attrition in Damascus, which had before the war only a little more than 460 combat aircraft (19). At the end of July 1982, there were 87 aircraft missing from the Syrians, Israel having finally lost some helicopters, an RF-4E reconnaissance and an A-4, destroyed by PLO SA-7 shoulder-fired missiles. Syrian faults could also be highlighted, such as not moving their batteries frequently, not positioning the radars on the high points (20), or have sought to hide their position by smoke screens, actually enhancing their visibility from the air (21). However, the Israeli tactical and technological advantage was very real.
If the disposition of modern weapons systems by the Israelis was quickly highlighted - Syria deploying only older aircraft (MiG-21 Fishbed, MiG-23 Flogger and Su-22 Fitter) - command capabilities and control of the Heyl Ha'Avir have been a decisive advantage. It was indeed the first time that modern AWACS (Airborne Warning and Control System), in this case E-2C Hawkeye, were used in combat. They often detected Syrian aircraft as soon as they took off - an advantage coming from the higher position of the radar, compared to its terrestrial equivalents which, because of the curvature of the Earth, can not "see" aircraft flying too low - and guided to them Israeli devices.
According to some estimates, in 60 per cent of cases, Syrian pilots would have realized the presence of an Israeli aircraft only when it engaged them. In comparison, Syrians still relied on the "Soviet-style" Ground Control Interceptor (GCI) concept, where ground-based radar controllers guide aircraft to their targets (23). Soviet Tu-126 Moss early warning devices were present in the country before operations began, but soon left. Finally, the Syrian C3I system was the subject of intense electronic warfare, while the Israelis avoided similar attacks (24).
Indirect effects with lessons
The success of the Israeli operation has had several consequences in the way of apprehending the threat of SAM in the region, but also elsewhere. The loss of its batteries has led Syria to ask Moscow to position in the country SA-5 Gammon, much longer range. Eight batteries were deployed from 1983, including four around Damascus, handled by Soviets. With 300 km range, the machine was a threat to Israeli airspace - unlike the SA-6. A first Israeli response was to ask Washington for permission to buy Pershing-2 medium-range missiles - all the more accurate as they benefit from terminal radar guidance. The request, in the light of the overall context, was obviously rejected (25). The second Israeli reaction was to reinforce the work around electronic warfare, but also to work on the missile options, with adapted versions of Python-3 and Barak. The research then launched had also been of interest to NATO, whose E-3 AWACS and in-flight refuellers were also threatened by SA-5s, this time in Europe. However, "Artzav-19" has had other consequences, in Israel and elsewhere in the world. With regard to Israelis, " "Artzav-19" had other consequences, in Israel and elsewhere in the world. With regard to Israelis, " "Artzav-19" had other consequences, in Israel and elsewhere in the world. With regard to Israelis, "
it was then that they started to buy Scud (26), "according to General David Ivry, who had commanded the operation.
Elsewhere, if
Krasnaya Zvezda relayed the battle by stating that 67 Israeli aircraft had been shot down, most Soviet observers and the Warsaw Pact were less naïve. While the "second cold war" was in full swing, the air battle took part in the perception of Western technological superiority and seems to have been extensively analyzed by Moscow (27).
De facto , it constituted the realization of the logic related to the
second offset strategy, where technological superiority through precision weaponry and information processing were central. David Ivry also recounts his meeting in 1991 with a Czech general stationed in Moscow in 1982 who believed that the Russian perception of the battle was one of the factors that led to the collapse of the USSR (28).
The observation of Israeli operations has, moreover, fueled the thinking of Russian missiles.
De facto , Moscow has continued to attach great importance to SAM systems, with the effect of seeking longer distances of commitment, while maintaining the principle of a multilayer defense. The evolutions of the different variants of the S-300 and S-400 are to be understood as such, as well as the attention given to the S-300V, for anti-ballistic purpose - but on the principle that the ballistic attacks can target the SAM systems.
Article published in DSI special issue, n ° 56, October-November 2017