10. One of the More Remarkable Instances of Deceit in Modern Warfare
One of the more remarkable instances of deceit to achieve strategic surprise in modern warfare occurred in the run-up to the Yom Kippur War. A surprise attack against Israeli positions in the Sinai Peninsula, it kicked off a war between Israel and a coalition of Egypt and Syria, supported by expeditionary forces from other Arab states. To achieve surprise, the Egyptians resorted to deceptive measures that successfully fooled the Israelis about the timing of the attack, and caught them off guard when the blow fell in the Sinai.
Israel had seized and occupied Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula after its victory in the 1967 Six-Day War. In subsequent years, Egyptian and Israeli forces glared at each other across the narrow Suez Canal, which separated the rivals. Across that waterway, low-intensity warfare simmered for years, comprised in the main of sporadic artillery exchanges, commando raids, and bombing attacks. In the meantime, Egypt sought to regain its lost territory and to wipe out the humiliation of the catastrophic 1967 defeat. It rebuilt, reorganized, and retrained its military for a rematch that all knew would come, sooner or later.
