Donald Neff, Warriors for Jerusalem (NY: Linden Press 1984) p.246. See also, Brig. Syed Ali El-Edroos, The Hashemite Arab Army, 1908–1979 (Amman, Jordan: The Publishing Committee 1980) p.269; James Lunt, Hussein of Jordan (London: Macmillan 1989) pp.99–100; Samir Mutawi, Jordan in the 1967 War (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 1987) pp.128, 142.

Emanuel Wald, The Wald Report: The Decline of Israeli National Security Since 1967 (Boulder, CO: Westview 1992) pp.88–91, 94–7, 107–10. See also, Anthony H. Cordesman and Abraham R. Wagner, The Lessons of Modern War: Volume I, The Arab-Israeli Conflicts, 1973–1989 (Boulder, CO: Westview 1990) pp.52–64; Ariel Sharon with David Chanoff, Warrior: The Autobiography of Ariel Sharon (NY: Simon and Schuster 1989) pp.303–305.

For a recent example, see Lt. Col. David K. Edmonds, USAF, ‘In Search of High Ground: The Airpower Trinity and the Decisive Potential of Airpower’, Airpower Journal XII/1 (Spring 1998) p.13. Air Force historian Richard Hallion has written that the Six-Day War was the first that ‘came close to being a decisive victory for air power alone’. Richard Hallion, Storm Over Iraq: Air Power and the Gulf War (Washington, DC: Smithsonian 1992) p.2.

Author's interview with General Uzi Narkiss, Sept. 1996. Narkiss was the commander of Israel's Central Command during the war, the front responsible for conquering the West Bank from Jordan.

The American-led invasion of Iraq relied far more heavily on ground forces for much of the fighting. Indeed, US ground operations were unquestionably the decisive element of the campaign. Consequently, those who argue that air power can be decisive in its own right have generally not employed it as evidence to support this claim.

For a sample of the strategic air power debate, see Bernard Brodie, Strategy in the Missile Age (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press 1959); Daniel L. Byman, Matthew C. Waxman and Eric Larson, Air Power as a Coercive Instrument (Santa Monica, CA: RAND 1999); Mark Clodfelter, The Limits of Air Power: The American Bombing of North Vietnam (NY: Free Press 1989); Eliot A. Cohen, ‘The Mystique of Air Power’, Foreign Affairs 73/1 (Jan./Feb. 1994); Malcolm Cooper, The Birth of Independent Air Power: British Air Policy in the First World War (London: Allen and Unwin 1986); Giulio Douhet, Command of the Air, translated by Dino Ferrari (NY: Coward-McCann 1942); Robert Futrell, Ideas, Concepts, Weapons: Basic Thinking in the United States Air Force, (Maxwell Air Force Base, AL: Air University Press 1989); Gian P. Gentile, How Effective is Strategic Bombing?: Lessons Learned from World War II to Kosovo (NY: NYU Press 2001); David MacIsaac, ‘Voices from the Central Blue: The Air Power Theorists’, in Peter Paret (ed.), Makers of Modern Strategy: From Machiavelli to the Nuclear Age (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press 1986) pp.624–47; Robert A. Pape, Bombing to Win (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press 1996); Alexander P. de Seversky, Victory Through Air Power (NY: Simon and Schuster 1942); Michael S. Sherry, The Rise of American Air Power: The Creation of Armageddon (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press 1987); Air Chief Marshall Sir John Slessor, ‘Air Power and World Strategy’, Foreign Affairs (Oct. 1954) pp.43–53; John A. Warden III, ‘Employing Air Power in the Twenty-First Century’, in Richard H. Schulz Jr. and Robert Pfalzgraff Jr. (eds), The Future of Air Power in the Aftermath of the Gulf War (Maxwell Air Force Base, AL: Air University Press 1992) pp.57–82; Edward Warner, ‘Douhet, Mitchell, Seversky: Theories of Air Warfare’, in Edward Mead Earle (ed.), Makers of Modern Strategy: Military Thought from Machiavelli to Hitler (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press 1943) pp.485–503; Lt. Col. Barry D. Watts, USAF, The Foundations of U.S. Air Doctrine: The Problems of War (Maxwell Air Force Base, AL: Air University Press 1984).

For other work on this topic, see, e.g., M.J. Armitage and R.A. Mason, Air Power in the Nuclear Age (Champaign, IL: University of Illinois Press 1983); Lt. Col. Prince T. Bingham, USAF (Ret.), ‘The United States Needs to Exploit its Airpower Advantage’, Airpower Journal VII/3 (Fall 1993) pp.62–71; Edward Luttwak, ‘Air Power in U.S. Military Strategy’, in Schultz and Pfaltzgraff, pp.17–38 ; MacIsaac (note 6); Pape (note 6); Reina Penington, ‘A Commentary: Prophets, Heretics, and Peculiar Evils’, Airpower Journal X/2 (Summer 1996) pp.65–7; Col. Richard Szafranski, USAF, ‘Interservice Rivalry in Action: The Endless Roles and Missions Refrain’, Airpower Journal X/2 (Summer 1996) pp.48–59; W.W. Rostow, Pre-Invasion Bombing Strategy (Austin, TX: University of Texas Press 1981).

For good accounts of the Israeli counter-air operations, see Col. Eliezer Cohen, Israel's Best Defense, trans. by Jonathan Cordis (NY: Orion Books 1993); Col. Trevor N. Dupuy, Elusive Victory, third edn. (Dubuque, IA: Kendall Hunt 1992); Eric Hammel, Six Days in June (NY: Scribner's 1992); Chaim Herzog, The Arab-Israeli Wars (NY: Random House 1982); Neff (note 1); Lon Nordeen, Fighters over Israel (London: Greenhill Books 1991); Lon O. Nordeen and David Nicole, Phoenix Over the Nile: A History of Egyptian Air power, 1932–1994 (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press 1996); Edgar O'Ballance, The Third Arab-Israeli War (Hamden, CT: Archon Books 1972); Wald (note 2); Ehud Yonay, No Margin for Error: The Making of the Israeli Air Force (NY: Pantheon Books 1993).

Cohen, Israel's Best Defense (note 8) pp. 193–217; Dupuy (note 8) pp.245–7; Hammel (note 8) pp.165–71; Herzog, The Arab-Israeli Wars (note 8) pp.151–3; Samuel M. Katz, Soldier Spies: Israeli Military Intelligence (Novato, CA: Presidio 1992) p.191; Neff (note 1) pp.32, 202–203; Nordeen (note 8) p.67; Nordeen and Nicole (note 8) p.212; Yonay (note 8) pp.202–13, 231–44; author's interviews with senior IAF officers, Sept. 1996.

Cohen, Israel's Best Defense (note 8) pp.220–221; Dupuy (note 8) p.247; Hammel (note 8) p.392.

Cohen, Israel's Best Defense (note 8) pp.218–20; Dupuy (note 8) p.247; Hussein of Jordan, My ‘War’ with Israel, as told to and with additional material by Vick Vance and Pierre Lauer, trans. by June P. Wilson and Walter B. Michaels (NY: William Morrow and Co. 1969) pp.66–7; Nordeen (note 8) p.67; O'Ballance, The Third Arab-Israeli War (note 8) p.70; Yonay (note 8) pp.250–53.

Nordeen (note 8) pp.77–82, 148.

For good accounts of the Israeli offensive against Egypt in Sinai, see Randolph S. Chuchill and Winston S. Churchill, The Six Day War (London: Heinemann 1967); Moshe Dayan, Diary of the Sinai Campaign (NY: Harper and Row 1965); Dupuy (note 8); Abdel Magid Farid, Nasser: The Final Years (Reading, UK: Ithaca Press 1994); Field Marshal Abdel Ghani el-Gamasy, The October War: Memoirs of Field Marshal El-Gamasy of Egypt trans. by Gillian Potter, Nadra Marcos and Rosette Frances (Cairo: American University in Cairo Press 1993); George Gawrych, ‘The Egyptian Military Defeat of 1967’, Journal of Contemporary History 26 (1991); George W. Gawrych, Key to the Sinai: The Battles for Abu Ageilah in the 1956 and 1967 Arab-Israeli Wars (Fort Leavenworth, KS: US Army CGSC 1989); Hammel (note 8); Herzog (note 8); Israel Ministry of Defense, The Six-Day War (Israel  : Israel Press 1967); Samuel M. Katz, Fire and Steel: Israel's 7 ^th Armored Brigade (NY: Pocket Books 1996); S.L.A. Marshall, Swift Sword: The Historical Record of Israel's Victory, June 1967 ([town of publication and US state code?] US: American Heritage Publishing Co. 1967); Nordeen and Nicole (note 8); Wald (note 2); Sharon (note 2); Shabtai Teveth, The Tanks of Tammuz (NY: Viking Press 1968); Various authors, in Avrahaim Shapira (ed), The Seventh Day: Soldiers Talk About the Six-Day War (London: Andre Deutsch 1970).

Gawrych, ‘The Egyptian Military Defeat of 1967’ (note 13) p.279; Hammel (note 8) pp.44, 145; Herzog, The Arab-Israeli Wars (note 8) p.152; Israel MoD (note 13) p.52; Neff, Warriors for Jerusalem (note 1) p.193; Nordeen and Nicole (note 8) pp.193, 199–200; O'Ballance (note 8) p.99.

Dupuy (note 8) pp.242–4; Hammel (note 8) pp.149–61; Wald (note 2) pp.82–3.

For good accounts of the Israeli campaign against Jordan on the West Bank, see Churchill and Churchill (note 13); Dupuy (note 8); El-Edroos (note 1); Lt. Gen. Mordechai Gur, The Battle for Jerusalem (NY: Popular Library 1974); Hammel (note 8); Herzog (note 8); Lunt, Hussein of Jordan (note 1); Israel MoD (note 13); Robert J. Moskin, Among Lions: The Definitive Account of the 1967 Battle for Jerusalem (NY: Arbor House 1982); Mutawi, Jordan in the 1967 War (note 1); Lt. Gen. Uzi Narkiss, The Liberation of Jerusalem (London: Valentine Mitchell 1983); Neff (note 1); O'Ballance (note 8); Abraham Rabinovich, The Battle for Jerusalem (Philadelphia, PA: The Jewish Publication Society 1987); Wald (note 2); Brig. Peter Young, The Israeli Campaign, 1967 (London: William Kimber 1967).

El-Edroos (note 1) pp.353–5; 373–83; Hammel (note 8) pp.149–50; 284–7; Young (note 16) p.51.

Dupuy (note 8) pp.284–5; El-Edroos (note 1) pp.353–5; Narkiss (note 16) p.87; O'Ballance (note 8) p.223.

History Branch, Israeli Air Force, correspondence with the author, 10 Sept. 1997.

For good accounts of the Israeli offensive against the Syrians on the Golan, see Churchill and Churchill (note 13); Dupuy (note 8); Hammel (note 8); Herzog (note 8); Israel MoD (note 13); Neff (note 1); O'Ballance (note 8); Patrick Seale, Asad of Syria (London: I.B. Tauris and Co. 1988); Wald (note 2).

Dupuy (note 8) pp.318–9; Hammel (note 8) pp.388–9; Herzog (note 8) p.186; J.M. Moreaux, ‘The Syrian Army’, Defence Update 79 (July 1986) p.38; Seale (note 20) p.117.

Dupuy (note 8) p.319; Hammel (note 8) pp.394–5; Nordeen (note 8) pp.83–4; author's interviews with senior IAF officers, Sept. 1996.

The campaign against Syria really did not begin until 9 June; however, having crushed the much larger Egyptian armed forces and the much better-trained Jordanian armed forces in just three days, Israel's ability to defeat Syria thereafter was never really in doubt. The Israelis were very confident, and the Syrians began the war demoralized. Consequently, the decisive campaigns were those against Egypt and Jordan.

History Branch, Israeli Air Force, correspondence with the author, 10 Sept. 1997; Historical Evaluation and Research Organization, A Historical Analysis of the Effectiveness of Tactical Air Operations Against, and in Support of Armored Forces, hereafter referred to as HERO, (McLean, Va: NOVA Publications 1980) p.36.

Author's interview with Lt. Gen. Mordechai Hod, IAF (Ret.), Sept. 1996.

HERO (note 24) p.89.

History Branch, Israeli Air Force, correspondence with the author, 10 Sept. 1997.

Compare Mutawi (note 1) p.133 with Gur (note 16) pp.56, 60–155; and Narkiss (note 16) pp.158–9, 164. Elsewhere, Mutawi argues that ‘Most Arab and Western commentators believe that Israeli air supremacy was the most important military factor which led to the defeat of the Arabs’ (Mutawi [note 1], p.128). In the footnote to this statement, Mutawi cites two Arab authors and two Western authors, and one of the authors – Col. Trevor Dupuy – makes no such claim on the pages cited by Mutawi, or anywhere else in his book. (The pages in question are Dupuy [note 8] pp.246–7.) The other source sited is the Churchills' book The Six-Day War (note 13) which does claim that Israeli air supremacy was vital to Israel's victory over Jordan. However, the Churchills also note that Israeli airstrikes ‘were not particularly effective against the Jordanian armour’, and helped mainly by interdicting Jordanian movements through the hills of the West Bank (Churchill and Churchill [note 13] pp.144–6.] It is also worth noting that the Churchills' book is among the least reliable accounts of the fighting and is prone to considerable exaggerations.

Lunt (note 1) pp.99–100.

Dupuy (note 8) p.299; Hammel (note 8) pp.315–20, 335–6; Herzog (note 8) p.176; Moskin (note 16) pp.289–90; Narkiss (note 16) pp.192–3, 200, 211–13; O'Ballance (note 8) pp.192–3; author's interviews with senior IDF officers, Sept. 1996. For a Jordanian source claiming air power decided this battle, see El-Edroos (note 1) pp.379–80.

For confirmation that neither the 75-mm high velocity gun on the Israeli M-51 nor the 76-mm gun on most of the Israeli Super Shermans could effectively penetrate the frontal armor of the Jordanian Pattons, see Joint Technical Coordinating Group for Munitions Effectiveness [JTCGME], Special Report: Survey of Combat Damage to Tanks, 3 Volumes (Washington, DC: Defense Intelligence Agency, 1 Nov. 1970) pp.105–21. Some Israeli Super Shermans mounted a French 105-mm gun, but none of these were at Tel al-Ful.

Dupuy (note 8) p.299; Hammel (note 8) pp.315–20, 335–6; Herzog (note 8) p.176; Moskin (note 16) pp.289–90; Narkiss (note 16) pp.192–3, 200, 211–13; O'Ballance (note 8) pp.192–3; author's interview with Lt. Gen. Uzi Narkiss, IDF (Ret.), Sept. 1996.

O'Ballance, The Third Arab-Israeli War (note 8) pp.182–3, 190, 220.

S.L.A. Marshall has observed that the psychological impact of airstrikes tends to fade within ten minutes of the attack unless repeatedly reinforced. S.L.A Marshall, ‘The Devil and the Sea’, in Donald Robinson (ed.), Under Fire: Israel's 20-Year Struggle for Survival (NY: W.W. Norton and Co. 1968) p.148. For similar conclusions regarding the duration of psychological trauma from airstrikes, see Ian Gooderson, ‘Allied Fighter-Bombers Versus German Armour in North-West Europe 1944–1945: Myths and Realities’, Journal of Strategic Studies 14/2 (June 1991) pp.210–31; Ian Gooderson, ‘Heavy and Medium Bombers: How Successful Were They in the Tactical Close Air Support Role During World War II?’, Journal of Strategic Studies 15/3 (Sept. 1992) pp.367–99.

Churchill and Churchill (note 13) p.112; Dupuy (note 8) pp.263–4; Hammel (note 8) pp.223–6; Israel MoD (note 13) pp.67–8; O'Ballance (note 8) pp.135–6; Nadav Safran, From War to War (New York: Pegasus 1969) pp.342, 346; Wald (note 2) p.84; and author's interviews with IDF military personnel, Jan. 1994 and Sept. 1996.

HERO (note 24) pp.35–9; JTCGME (note 31) esp. pp.1–18.

Dupuy (note 8) pp.263–4; Hammel (note 8) pp.223–6; Israel MoD (note 13) pp.67–8; O'Ballance (note 8) pp.135–6; Safran (note 35) pp.342, 346; Wald (note 2) p.84; and author's interviews with IDF military personnel, Jan. 1994 and Sept. 1996.

Dupuy (note 8) pp.310–11; El-Edroos (note 1) pp.386–8; Hammel (note 8) pp.369–81; Herzog (note 8) p.179; Israel MoD (note 13) p.104; Mutawi (note 1) p.137; O'Ballance (note 8) pp.203–207; author's interviews with senior IDF officers, Sept. 1996. Jordanian accounts of the battle claim that the 40th Armored Brigade was virtually obliterated by the IAF in place on the ridgeline, and the Israeli ground forces merely swept its remnants off the ridge after the battle was over. I have several reasons for disregarding this version. Although it is clear that the IAF was an important element of the Jordanian defeat at Qabatiyah crossroads, the speed of the final Israeli victory suggests that air power was not the only element of Jordan's defeat. The Israelis allowed only 15–30 minutes (accounts vary) for air strikes and artillery bombardment prior to their ground assault at dawn on 7 June. Even if the entire IAF had participated in the attack, it is almost inconceivable that 100–120 Jordanian armored vehicles camouflaged and dug in along a wooded, rocky ridgeline could have been destroyed by the IAF in the dark in just half an hour. In the best of circumstances, against exposed Jordanian columns moving during the day along the narrow roads of the Judean hills and unable to flee or hide, Israeli airstrikes appear to have achieved an armored-fighting-vehicle-kill-per-sortie rate of no better than 0.5 (and probably closer to 0.3). It is extremely unlikely that the IAF could have achieved a similar ratio against the 40th Armored Brigade in its positions at Qabatiyah crossroads. For the sake of argument, however, let us assume the IAF achieved a kill-per-sortie ratio of 0.5 and that it only killed 60 Jordanian tanks and APCs, causing the rest to flee. To accomplish this, the Israelis would have had to have flown 120 attack sorties just against Qabatiyah crossroads. Because half an hour was too short a time even for Israeli jets to conduct an attack on dug-in armor, return to base, refuel and rearm, return to the battlefield and conduct another strike, the Israelis would have had to have committed 120 aircraft to this mission. The entire IAF at the start of the war was only 207 operational aircraft, and by 7 June it was down to about 160–170. One would expect that if the Israelis had pulled nearly all of their aircraft off other missions to make a massive attack on Qabatiyah crossroads someone might have mentioned it, but none of the accounts of the Six-Day War or the histories of the IAF do, nor did any of the senior IAF officers I interviewed remember devoting the lion's share of their assets to this target. Instead, by all accounts, the air effort against Qabatiyah, while significant, did not necessarily receive more attention than the constant Israeli air effort against Jordanian forces retreating from the West Bank or those against the Egyptian army retreating from Sinai. Moreover, the Israelis flew only 233 air-to-ground sorties against Jordan on 7 June, and again, if the majority of these had gone against Qabatiyah crossroads, I would expect this to have been mentioned in IAF accounts of the war or stuck in someone's memory. Of course, the Israelis found after the war that, in fact, they generally had achieved an armored vehicle kill-per-sortie rate of no better than 0.2 – which is also more in tune with historical norms (see HERO [note 24] pp.36–42). There is no reason to believe that the IAF strikes on the 40th Armored Brigade achieved better than this average and, given the disposition of the Jordanians (dug-in and dispersed), the terrain (wooded hills) and the time of day (before dawn), if anything, the IAF probably did worse than average here, probably closer to 0.1 armor kills-per-sortie. Consequently, to have inflicted even 25 per cent casualties on this brigade, a far cry from the Jordanian claims, would have required the Israelis to have flown roughly 300 sorties if the more accurate kill-per-sortie rate of 0.1 is used. Of course, with only 160–170 operational aircraft, it would have been physically impossible for the IAF to have generated so many sorties in half an hour, and we know for a fact that they only flew 233 air-to-ground sorties against all targets on the West Bank all day on 7 June. If the Israelis had flown every single ground-attack sortie that went against the West Bank on 7 June against Qabatiyah crossroads, they probably would have killed no more than 20–25 Jordanian armored vehicles given their actual armored vehicle kill-per-sortie rate. Assuming that the Israelis probably flew 50–75 sorties against Qabatiyah crossroads on the morning of 7 June, we could have expected them to have destroyed 5–8 Jordanian tanks and APCs, and no more than 15 tanks and APCs even if the IAF was able to achieve a 0.2 kill-per-sortie rate. This figure is entirely in keeping with the experience of other Arab armored forces under air attack during the rest of the war, and would hardly constitute the obliteration of 40th Armored Brigade by the IAF. It also accords well with the official US survey of damaged tanks after the war, which found that less than two per cent of Arab tanks destroyed during the war were destroyed by airstrikes. Consequently, it seems highly unlikely that the IAF alone could have mauled the 40th Armored Brigade given how little evidence there was of armored vehicles being destroyed by airstrikes (see JTCGME [note 31] esp. pp.1–17). As a final note, Nordeen also argues that the Israeli ground forces played the key role in defeating the 40th Armored Brigade at Qabatiyah. Nordeen's book is generally sympathetic to the IAF, and so if he claims that the IAF's role was secondary to the ground forces at Qabatiyah, there is strong reason to believe him (see Nordeen [note 8] p.79).

Gamasy (note 13) p.57; Hammel (note 8) p.244. Sadat claims that Nasser was told about the destruction of the Air Force around noon (p.175), while Nordeen and Nicole (note 8) state only that the EAF commanders were ‘slow to report the true extent of the defeat’ (p.211).

Author's interviews with former senior Egyptian military officers, Dec. 1997.

The survey team examined 203 destroyed Israeli and Arab tanks. Of these 176 were Arab tanks. Since all three Arab armies combined probably had 500–600 tanks destroyed in the fighting, this represents roughly 30 to 40 per cent of all Arab tanks destroyed. The tanks examined were all of the Arab tanks that in 1970 (the year of the US study) remained in the condition in which they had been found at the end of the war. All other tanks that had been both destroyed and captured by the Israelis had either been repaired and put into service with the Israeli army or used for target practice and thus were no longer reliable for the survey. There is no reason to believe that this sample represented anything but a random sampling: many of the tanks examined were slated to be used for target practice or refurbishment, hence it was not the case that the Israelis left the worst damaged tanks (or the least damaged) for last. See JTCGME (note 31) pp.1–16.

JTCGME (note 31) p.1.

HERO (note 24) pp.35–9, 41–2, 56, 89.

See for instance, Dupuy (note 8) pp.263–78, 304–305, 325–6; El-Edroos (note 1) pp.386; Gamasy (note 13) pp.64–5; Hammel (note 8) pp.246, 260–79, 374–5, 382–3, 418–24; Herzog (note 8) pp.160–65, 188; Israel MoD (note 13) pp.138–9; John Keegan, World Armies (London: Macmillan 1979) p.687; Moskin (note 16) p.351; Mutawi (note 1) 139–40; O'Ballance (note 8) pp.142–65, 250–58; Safran (note 35) p.342; Sharon (note 2) pp.198–203; Wald (note 2) pp.84–5; Young (note 8) p.112; author's interviews with senior IDF officers, Sept. 1996.

HERO (note 24) p.36. It is worth reiterating that, at least with regard to armored vehicle kills, Israeli pilot claims were two to four times greater than actual numbers as revealed in postwar assessments.

If IAF claims regarding destruction of trucks was even half as badly exaggerated as their claims regarding the destruction of armored fighting vehicles, then there is reason to believe the IAF may have destroyed no more than 400–500 trucks in Sinai. Of course, IAF claims may not have been as badly exaggerated with regard to thin-skinned vehicles. One reason for the discrepancies between IAF claims and actual kills of tanks and APCs was that many of the aerial munitions, particularly the 20- and 30-mm ammunition in the cannons on IAF fighter-bombers, could not penetrate tank armor. However, they could tear up a truck or jeep. Similarly, near misses from bombs or rockets were found to have had little impact on armored fighting vehicles, but could have destroyed trucks, cars and jeeps.

On the psychological impact of airstrikes on ground forces, see e.g. Ian Gooderson, ‘Allied Fighter-Bombers Versus German Armour in North-West Europe 1944–1945: Myths and Realities’, Journal of Strategic Studies 14/2 (June 1991) pp.210–31; Ian Gooderson, ‘Heavy and Medium Bombers: How Successful Were They in the Tactical Close Air Support Role During World War II?’, Journal of Strategic Studies 15/3 (Sept. 1992) pp.367–99; Stephen T. Hosmer, Psychological Effects of U.S. Air Operations in Four Wars, 1941–1991: Lessons for Commanders (Santa Monica, CA: RAND 1996); Group Capt. P.N. Lambert, RAF, ‘Shattering Impact: The Psychology of Air Attack’, in Richard P. Hallion (ed.), Air Power Confronts an Unstable World (London: Brassey's 1997) pp.83–109; Barry D. Watts and Thomas A. Keaney (eds), Gulf War Air Power Survey, Volume II, Part 2: Effects and Effectiveness (Washington, DC: GPO 1993) esp. pp.202–205, 221–26.

Dupuy claims that the head of the IAF History Branch told him that Israel flew 300 ground attack sorties against this unit (HERO [note 24] p.89). Given that the IAF flew only 549 ground-attack sorties against Jordan in the entire war (according to the IAF History Branch), it is ludicrous to claim that the IAF would have flown over half of all its ground attack sorties against Jordan on one day against one target.

HERO (note 24) p.89; Lunt (note 1) p.103; Narkiss (note 16) pp.242–3. IAF accounts claim that the Jordanian 2nd Regiment was destroyed in this action. However, other evidence indicates that, as with so many Israeli airstrikes, the actual damage inflicted was far less than claimed. In this case, the 60th Armored Brigade managed to retreat back to the east bank of the Jordan with 40 intact tanks on 7 June. The vast majority of these were from the 2nd Armored Regiment, which began the war with about 40 tanks, indicating that the Israeli airstrikes during the night of 6/7 June may have been terrifying, but did not destroy many Jordanian tanks (see Lunt [note 1] p.103). Again this finding brings what otherwise would have been a significant statistical outlier back in line with the conclusions of the Israeli and American postwar assessments which found that few armored vehicles were actually destroyed in airstrikes and that actual physical damage from airstrikes had been greatly exaggerated. Note that the HERO account, drawing as it does on the official IAF historian, incorrectly claims that it was an entire Jordanian armored brigade mauled on the Edom ascent. Because by the time this event occurred, two battalions of the 60th Armored Brigade had already been smashed at Tel al-Ful, and the 40th Armored Brigade was then slugging it out at Qabatiyah crossroads, this could only have been the last battalion of the 60th Brigade, moving to reinforce Jerusalem which it was ordered to do after the defeat of the rest of its brigade earlier in the day. The eyewitness account in Narkiss also makes clear that the force was a battalion in strength, not a brigade.

Hammel (note 8) p.344; HERO (note 24) p.89; Narkiss (note 16) pp.242–3.

This was suggested in an interview with former IAF Commander, Lt. Gen. Binyamin Peled, IAF (Ret.), in Sept. 1996.

Nordeen and Nicole (note 8) pp.208–212.

Anwar el-Sadat, In Search of Identity (NY: Harper and Row, 1997) pp.174–5.

Gamasy (note 13) pp.52–60; Sadat (note 53) pp.174–5.

Gamasy (note 13) p.56.

See in particular on this point, George Gawrych, ‘The Egyptian Military Defeat of 1967’ (note 13) pp.277–305.

Mutawi (note 1) p.139.

For a more thorough discussion of the tactical incompetence of all three Arab armies during the Six-Day War, see Kenneth M. Pollack, The Arabs at War: Arab Military Effectiveness, 1948–1991 (Lincoln, NB: University of Nebraska Press, 2002).

Narkiss (note 16) p.113.

For a concurring assessment, see Hosmer (note 47).

This is also an important lesson for military intelligence personnel and other military experts who must try to gauge the effectiveness of air attacks: if the effect of an airstrike is measured simply by the number of tanks, APCs or artillery destroyed, the analyst will greatly underestimate the actual impact of the attack.

For a good argument that these new weapons could radically improve US air capabilities, see David A. Ochmanek, Edward R. Harshberger, David E. Thaler and Glenn A. Kent, To Find and Not to Yield: How Advances in Information and Firepower Can Transform Theater Warfare (Santa Monica, CA: RAND 1998).

Tim Weiner, ‘Pentagon Loses Fight to Keep Report on Gulf War Secret’, The New York Times, 29 June 1997, p.20; Tim Weiner, ‘Smart Arms In Gulf War Are Found Overrated: Pentagon's Reliance On High-Tech War Questioned in Review’, International Herald Tribune, 10 July 1996, p.1. In Kosovo, precision-guided munitions achieved an accuracy of 70 per cent hitting their aim points – see William Arkin, ‘Smart Bombs, Dumb Targeting?’ The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 56/3 (May/June 2000) pp.46–53.

During Operation ‘Desert Storm’, Coalition air forces flew over 41,000 ground-attack sorties against Iraqi forces in the Kuwaiti Theater of Operations (KTO): Eliot A. Cohen (ed.), The Gulf War Air Power Survey, Volume V, Part I: Statistical Compendium, hereafter referred to as GWAPS These 41,000 sorties eventually may have destroyed as many as 1,000 Iraqi tanks and 600 Iraqi APCs, producing an AFV-kill-per-sortie rate of 0.039. Accurate numbers of Iraqi equipment destroyed by airstrikes during the Gulf War remain elusive. We may never know precisely how many vehicles were killed in the air campaign because the Iraqis did not keep kept accurate records themselves (debriefs of unit commanders and records captured during the Gulf War are extremely spotty: some units kept very accurate counts of destroyed equipment, others did not). I arrived at these numbers in the following manner. First, according to the most accurate assessment of Iraqi strength – a CIA equipment count using U-2 imagery of the entire theater taken immediately after the war – the Iraqis had 3,475 tanks and 3,080 APCs in theater at the start of the war (E. Cohen (ed), The Gulf War Air Power Survey, Volume II, Part I: Operations, p.254). Second, the CIA found that of the 2,665 tanks in the 12 heavy divisions Iraq deployed to the KTO, 1,135 (43 per cent) did not move to fight or flee during the ground war. Likwise, of the 2,624 APCs in these same 12 divisions, 827 (32 per cent) did not move during the ground war. (See Central Intelligence Agency, Operation Desert Storm: A Snapshot of the Battlefield In addition to the tanks and APCs in the 12 armored and mechanized divisions in the KTO, the Iraqis also deployed 810 tanks and 456 APCs in independent brigades and battalions, as well as battalions attached to some of the 39 infantry divisions deployed in the KTO (CIA, Operation Desert Storm). The air campaign clearly destroyed some of these too. In fact, air power probably destroyed a greater percentage of these vehicles than those in the Iraqi heavy divisions. The Coalition flew more sorties and had much longer loiter times with its deadliest tank-killing aircraft – the A-10 Thunderbolts – against the frontline infantry divisions and their supporting armor in the south of the KTO, than against the heavy divisions farther north (GWAPS, Volume II, Part I: Operations, pp.268–82). Moreover, both the CIA study and anecdotal accounts from Iraqi personnel captured during the war also indicate that tanks and APCs attached to frontline infantry divisions suffered more than those in the heavy divisions. See CIA, Operation Desert Storm; Richard Hallion, Storm over Iraq (Washington DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1992) p.217; US Department of Defense (DoD), Conduct of the Persian Gulf War These rough estimates produce a total number of armored vehicles probably destroyed by the Coalition air campaign of 983 tanks (28 per cent) and 596 APCs (19 per cent). As a final note, the largest US survey of Iraqi armor captured during the war found that only 10–20 per cent had been destroyed by air attack. Although this survey examined only six per cent of all Iraqi tanks destroyed during the war, and then only those in a small part of the KTO, it nonetheless indicates that while my numbers may not be precise, they are probably not off by much and, if anything, probably overstate the amount of physical destruction caused by airstrikes. See, United States General Accounting Office, Operation Desert Storm: Evaluation of the Air Campaign The tank kills-per-sortie ratio for Coalition air forces in the Gulf may seem strange given the complete air superiority and sophisticated munitions of the US Air Force. However, there were several factors that mitigated against killing Iraqi tanks. First, only a small percentage of the munitions dropped on Iraqi ground forces were precision munitions. Second, the Coalition high command largely insisted that airstrikes be conducted from medium altitudes where aircraft were not vulnerable to Iraqi anti-aircraft guns or man-portable surface-to-air missiles. Third, the Iraqis were able to disperse, camouflage, berm and dig-in their armor during the coalition air campaign. Because of the extensive Iraqi passive defenses, really only precision-guided munitions were able to destroy dug-in Iraqi armor, and even for PGMs, their accuracy was considerably degraded by the need to stay at medium altitudes. See GWAPS, Volume II, Part II: Effects and Effectiveness, pp.202–30.

During Operation ‘Allied Force’, NATO aircraft flew 3,400 ground attack sorties against Serb ground forces in Kosovo and claim to have destroyed 246 Serb tanks and other armored fighting vehicles. See Department of Defense, Report to Congress: Kosovo/Operation Allied Force After Action Report (Washington, DC: DoD 2000) p.86; Ivo H. Daalder and Michael E. O'Hanlon, Winning Ugly: NATO's War to Save Kosovo (Washington, DC: Brookings 2000) p.154. This works out to an AFV-kill-per-sortie rate of 0.07, slightly lower than the historical average found by the HERO study of 0.1 to 0.3 (HERO [note 24] pp.36–42, 59). On the other hand, this figure is nearly double the 0.039 rate Coalition forces appear to have achieved during the 1991 Gulf War. This increase probably reflects the impact of the new munitions, but may also in part be attributable to the fact that KLA pressure on the Serb army forced them to concentrate forces, making them more vulnerable to airstrike. Whereas, the vast majority of Coalition airstrikes against Iraqi armor occurred before the Coalition ground offensive, and so the Iraqis were able to remain in their bermed positions (Daalder and O'Hanlon , pp.153–4, 200–202).

Richard Norton-Taylor, ‘How the Serb Army Escaped Nato’, The Guardian, 9 March 2000, available at < http://www.guardian.co.uk/Kosovo/Story/0,2763,193539,00.html > (accessed July 2001).