19. The Surprise Attack That Kicked Off the Six-Day War
A jet fighter or bomber is among the deadliest weapons ever invented. On the ground, however, it is utterly useless and defenseless. That was the logic of Mivtza Moked, or Operation Focus, the preemptive airstrikes launched by Israel to destroy the Egyptian, Syrian, and Jordanian air forces on the ground and disable their airbases at the start of the Six-Day War, on June 5th, 1967. Israel’s quick victory in that conflict largely stemmed from the success of that raid, an all-out attack by nearly all of Israel’s 196 warplanes. In total radio silence, the Israelis headed westward over the Mediterranean, and flew low beneath the enemy radar, then turned south towards Egypt.
The Egyptian Air Force was surprised by the sudden and simultaneous appearance of Israeli combat aircraft over eleven of its airfields at 7:45 AM that day. That time was chosen because the Egyptians habitually went on high alert at dawn to guard against surprise attack, but by 7:45 AM the alert was usually over, the airplanes returned to their airfields, and the pilots disembarked to eat breakfast. In addition to surprise, success was due to the first wave of attackers’ deployment of a new prototype of penetration bombs on the Egyptian runways. They used accelerator rockets to drive the warheads through the pavement before they detonated, and the result was a crater atop a sinkhole.