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Egypt The June 1967 War
In the eleven years leading up to the June 1967 War (also seen
as the Arab-Israeli War and the Six-Day War), the military had been
intensively trained for combat and outfitted with new Soviet
weapons and equipment. Despite these preparations, the war proved
to be a debacle for Egypt. Although there had been many indications
that an attack was imminent, the Israelis still took Egypt by
surprise on June 5, when their aircraft approached from the
Mediterranean at low altitudes to avoid detection by radar and
attacked the Egyptian air force while it was still on the ground.
Within three hours, the Israelis had destroyed 300 Egyptian cokmbat
aircraft, including all of Egypt's 30 long-range bombers. Israel
focused its ground attack on the heavily fortified Sinai road
junction of Abu Uwayqilah as it had done in 1956. After a fierce
battle, the Israelis overwhelmed Egyptian forces in fewer than
twelve hours. The devastating air attacks and initial Israeli
ground successes panicked Egyptian commander in chief Field Marshal
Abdul Hakim Amir into withdrawing army units from Sinai to the west
bank of the Suez Canal. Staff officers later persuaded Amir to
rescind his order, but by that time all the main elements of the
four frontline divisions had already begun retreating westward. At
several points, rearguard actions delayed Israeli advances, but
Israeli forces managed to block bottlenecks in the Giddi Pass and
the Mitla Pass and at Bir al Jifjafah and prevented the escape of
Egyptian troops and equipment. The Israeli air force bombed and
strafed thousands of Egyptian tanks, guns, and vehicles caught in
the bottleneck.
After four days of intensive fighting, Israel controlled the
entire Sinai Peninsula up to the east bank of the canal. Egypt
acknowledged that of approximately 100,000 troops in Sinai, 10,000
soldiers and 1,500 officers were casualties. Observers estimated
that about half of the dead had succumbed to thirst or exhaustion
in the desert. A further 5,000 soldiers and 500 officers were
captured, many of whom were wounded. Israel also destroyed or
captured about 700 of Egypt's 930 tanks. Popular support for the
military subsided rapidly after the June 1967 War, and morale
within the forces plunged to its lowest level since before the
military takeover of 1952. Although individually and in some cases
as units the Egyptians often performed bravely, the Israeli army
again demonstrated the self-reliance of its unit leaders, its
better training, and the superior use of its armor.
Data as of December 1990
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