16. In Its Eagerness to Save Money, the Israeli Government Blinded Itself to Warnings of Egyptian Attack
The Egyptians played upon Israel’s reluctance to mobilize. Months before the planned attack, the Egyptians tricked the Israelis into believing that an attack was imminent, causing Israel to declare an expensive and disruptive emergency mobilization. No attack came, and the Israeli government ended up with an egg on its face. Thus, when the Egyptians began preparing for the real attack a few months later, the Israeli government, burned once by a false alarm, was reluctant to call another mobilization. A week before going to war, the Egyptians carried out major military maneuvers near the Suez Canal, during which they called up reservists. Israeli intelligence dismissed it as just another drill. To further lull the Israelis, the Egyptians announced the demobilization of the reservists called up for the “military exercise“, two days before launching their attack.
Reluctant to declare another mobilization, the Israeli government ignored dissenting voices sounding the alarm that Egypt was preparing for actual war. So when the Egyptians attacked across the Suez Canal on October 6th, 1973, Israel was caught off guard and wrong footed. The Israeli Defense Forces sustained high casualties as their forward fortifications were swiftly overrun, and the Egyptians secured a beachhead on the eastern side of the canal. The IDF eventually clawed its way back up, encircled an Egyptian army weeks later, and prevailed in the war. However, their early setbacks and high casualties at war were a direct result of the Israeli government’s attempt to save some money.
