Rising more than 3,280ft (1,000m) above sea level, the wind-swept plateau controlled by Israel since the Six-Day War in 1967 offered an uninterrupted view of the farmlands below. The Golan Heights also gave its occupier a valuable advantage: push a little farther northeast and the road to Damascus, the Syrian capital, beckoned. It was for this reason that Hafez al-Assad, a former air force officer who'd seized the Syrian presidency in a violent coup d'etat in November 1970, embraced the Soviet Union in a long-standing alliance. With Soviet assistance the battered Syrian military was rebuilt and re-organised. After a year of consultations with Cairo the war plans were settled, and Mossad's moles tried in vain to warn Israel's leadership of the impending attack. A useful bit of context regarding the Cairo-Damascus alliance was their short-lived experiment with the United Arab Republic (UAR). Even if the UAR did not work in bringing together the two countries there was still a consensus in 1973 that a pan-Arab federation was feasible, perhaps after Israel was defeated in a war of revenge. On the agreed date, 6 October, the Syrians shattered the Israeli Purple Line that served as an unofficial border with an intense artillery barrage.
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة Issue 118 من History of War.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
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هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة Issue 118 من History of War.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك? تسجيل الدخول
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