The October 1973 War dealt a critical blow to the Israeli security doctrine, which partially relied on the notion of an unbeatable military and secure borders. These beliefs were shattered when Egypt and Syria decided to engage in war, proving Israel’s assumptions unreliable. The war also highlighted a significant failure in Israeli intelligence, as it was blindsided by the strategic deception plan that concealed the war’s timing from intelligence networks worldwide. Moreover, the 1973 October war stands as a prime example of how enemy intelligence and its collaborators can be effectively neutralized.
Thus, it would be no exaggeration to describe the victory in that historic war as a remarkable achievement from a military strategic perspective, in line with established principles of warfare. The Egyptian army won the majority of the battles and successfully met the war’s objectives, guided by the political-military vision of President Anwar Sadat. That war succeeded in reclaiming the occupied part of the homeland, erasing the shadow of the 1967 defeat—a defeat suffered without a fight—and reopening the Suez Canal, which once again served as a crucial artery for international trade and a vital source of national revenue.
I. Israel’s National Security Doctrine
Israeli national security rests on a series of principles that serve as overarching guidelines for the country’s successive political leadership. Among the most notable of these are the following:
- Adopts a defensive strategy focused on safeguarding Israel’s survival.
- Launching “campaigns between wars” while maintaining peak readiness to secure a decisive victory in times of war.
- Steering clear of war, delaying confrontations, avoiding military engagements, and deferring conflicts whenever feasible.
- Israel’s limited material and human resources, the disparity in capabilities between Israel and its adversaries, and Israel’s disadvantaged position must be offset by achieving qualitative superiority.
- Shifting the battle to enemy territory given Israel’s lack of strategic depth and the growing risk of targeting vital infrastructure and strategic assets concentrated along the coastline.
- Adopting rapid and conclusive war tactics, minimizing the length of fighting and ensuring that the battle’s goals are met in the shortest time frame, given the difficulty of sustaining long-term mobilization.
- Ensuring border defense through fully autonomous security control.
- Achieving qualitative superiority over Arab armies, particularly in areas like armament systems, organizational structure, training, and methods of deploying forces in combat.
- Utilizing combat tactics that allow for swift penetration of enemy defenses and deep territorial incursions, relying on offensive weapon systems such as fighter jets and tanks, while following indirect approaches and operating from internal lines (shifting the battlefront based on the most pressing threats).
- Establishing artificial depth through a network of colonies and settlements developed along its borders, within its territory, and in the occupied Arab territories.
- Forming an alliance with a major international power that backs Israel before, during, and after conflicts, particularly if military outcomes diverge from Israel’s expectations and it faces potential defeat or urgently requires political and military support to restrain its adversaries beyond its own capabilities.
From this, it can be inferred that Israeli national security possesses unique characteristics that set it apart from conventional definitions of national security. It encompasses a wide array of essential activities and events, including military strength, the development of military institutions, and the involvement of all citizens as a reserve army, all while promoting Jewish immigration to Palestine, expanding settlement efforts, limiting emigration abroad, bolstering the national economy, engaging in diplomatic activities to fulfill security needs, enhancing education, and strengthening the home front. Given the lack of strategic depth, Israeli leadership grants significant autonomy to ‘military security’ considerations, allowing the military establishment considerable freedom to utilize its capabilities for objectives that extend beyond mere deterrence, encompassing warning, thwarting, and preemptive strikes.
Former Israeli Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion emphasized that Israeli national security rests on two key principles: the people’s army and the security triad. The first is realized through mandatory conscription, turning all Israelis into reserve soldiers. The second is rooted in three pillars: deterrence, warning, and decisiveness. Deterrence is accomplished by delivering devastating retaliatory strikes that discourage opponents from attacking Israel due to the fear of its response. Early warning is ensured by building a superior intelligence apparatus capable of predicting enemy intentions and disrupting their plans before they materialize. Decisiveness is achieved by delivering a swift, powerful blow that shortens the duration of conflict.
Strategic experts and specialized research centers have revisited the principles and concept of Israeli security. In this context, the 2006 Meridor Committee report outlined nine key principles of Israel’s national security doctrine. These include preventing any security threat; relying on a mix of prevention, deterrence, defense, and offense; maintaining military power; relying on independent national strength; strengthening relationship with the United States; adhering to Israel’s moral and legal foundations, its policy, and legitimacy considerations when using force; maintaining the principle of the ‘people’s army’; promoting the qualitative edge; and achieving balance in the allocation of resources between meeting security needs on the one hand and ensuring economic strength and the welfare of Israel’s citizens and inhabitants on the other.
It can be said that new principles and foundations have been incorporated into Israel’s security doctrine. One such principle is absorption or neutralization, which replaces the concept of defense and involves preventing resistance forces from using their military capabilities for extended periods, thereby limiting potential damage. This is achieved through the Israeli army’s use of advanced air defense systems, coupled with concentrated offensive capabilities that prevent any surprise attacks. Additionally, this principle includes depriving resistance factions of their military strength, particularly missile power. Other key principles include obstruction, which focuses on preventing resistance groups from advancing their qualitative military capabilities; undermining, which entails destroying the enemy’s existing military assets; and incapacitation, which involves making the decision to launch preemptive strikes to neutralize the enemy’s core capabilities.
II. Impact of the October 1973 War on Israel’s National Security Doctrine
The Israeli intelligence services were supposed to deliver a warning at least two days before the war began, allowing the army to call up and mobilize reserve forces and deploy them to the front lines, while also evaluating the need for a preemptive airstrike to disrupt Arab war preparations. In 1972, military intelligence had assured Israeli political leaders that any such warning would come 5-6 days before an attack. Yet, despite information from auxiliary sources and clear intelligence indicators pointing to Arab armies’ significant mobilization, no early warning was provided. The extent of Israeli intelligence’s failure in 1973 remains astonishing even fifty years later, especially as the war coincided with Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Jewish calendar. Over five decades, numerous writings have dissected how and why this failure happened, which dismantled Israel’s security doctrine, leaving Israel reliant on massive emergency supplies of weapons and equipment from the United States to avoid a catastrophic defeat.
The October 1973 war marked the beginning of the collapse of Israeli security doctrine, largely due to the success of the strategic deception plan. The war’s preparation and combat planning were carried out in parallel with a comprehensive deception strategy that operated on political, military, economic, and social levels, both internally and externally. It can be said that the remarkable success of this plan was a key factor in the victory, as the Israeli leadership remained uncertain about the likelihood of a full-scale war until the evening of October 4. At that time, the Director of Aman, Israel’s Military Intelligence Agency, Eli Zeira, submitted a report indicating that, based on advanced eavesdropping operations, the activities near the Suez Canal resembled the May 1973 military maneuvers, recommending precautionary measures, such as raising the combat readiness of parts of the air force.
Egypt’s strategic deception plan was anchored in several calculated moves. These included inviting the Romanian Minister of Defense to visit Egypt on October 8, sending a representative of President Sadat to the United States for discussions, and holding a secret meeting of the Egyptian and Syrian National Defense Councils in Alexandria. The plan also involved concealing the timing of the war even from supportive Arab countries, politically coordinating the closure of the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, delaying the closure of Egyptian airspace until the last moment, and postponing the extinguishing of gas field flames until the war was imminent. Additionally, the plan included importing water pumping machines to breach sand barriers, controlling the information delivered to the enemy, such as broadcasting Hajj and Umrah advertisements for officers, volunteers, and their families at the start of Ramadan, and strategically influencing the press read by Israeli embassies in Europe, particularly in London and Paris. The plan culminated with celebrations marking the return of those who participated in the annual autumn maneuvers from the Liberation Exercises (1), (2), and (3) up until October 1973, among other measures.
The success of the strategic deception plan resulted in Israel losing its elements of surprise, initiative, and rapid military action, forcing it into a protracted conflict that strained its economy. This was primarily due to the exceptionally high level of mobilization in the Israeli army, which reached 16% for males and up to 25% when including females—figures that are the highest in the world compared to the international average of just 1-1.5% of the population. Ultimately, Israel had no choice but to rely on the principle of strong alliance, represented by the political and military support of the United States, which commenced delivering military equipment and supplies to Al-Arish Airport in Sinai starting October 10.
In conclusion, the victories of the October War highlighted the failure of the Israeli security theory, as Israel lost its elements of surprise, initiative, and blitzkrieg, ultimately engaging in a conflict that drained its economic resources. This occurred in the aftermath of the War of Attrition, which had already undermined the foundations of the Israeli security doctrine. Built upon the tenets of psychological, political, and military intimidation, this doctrine proved to be less than an impenetrable shield. Now, in the aftermath of the Al-Aqsa Flood, Israel is actively exploring alternatives to its security doctrine, driven by the collapse of its foundational principles that necessitate the pursuit of a “new model” and the development of a revised security framework.
