National Experiences - British Commission for Military History

168 ai r p o w e r in 20 t H Ce n t u ry do C t r i n e s a n d em p l o y m e n t - nat i o n a l ex p e r i e n C e s
to take part in containing the ground invasions from day one, so the operation plans
did not come to a test.
Despite the fact that the achievements at the end of the war were impressive, the
IAF felt bad. This feeling was expressed by former IAF Commander Ezer Weizmann,
later minister of defense and President of Israel: “The missile bent the wing of the
fighter plane”.
This resulted in a certain grinding in the strong status of the IAF, which had an
impact on the distribution of budget and preference in allocation of manpower; i.e.,
the ground forces were considerably favored.
In October 1977, I took the position of IAF Commander and replaced M/G Benny
Peled – a charismatic commander who began a revolution, in the organizational
structure and a more technological approach to answer operational problems.
In November 1977, President Sadat arrived in Israel for a visit to Jerusalem, the
beginning of a process of strategic importance that led to the signing of a peace treaty
and retreat from Sinai in March 1979.
Nevertheless, war against hostile activity continued in the north. In March 1978
we find ourselves in the midst of the Litani operation, a military operation that tried
to push back terrorist presence from the border deep into Lebanon, following the
killing of civilians by terrorists who penetrated from Lebanon.
After the Litani operation in March 1977, UNIFIL entered south Lebanon, but
they did not prevent the terrorists from moving south and harassing the northern settlements.
So we had to operate almost daily from the air against terrorist targets in
south Lebanon. At the beginning interception aircraft were sent from Syria (MiG 21
and MiG 23) in order to disturb our air activity; however, after a few encounters –
many of them planned by us – they suffered accumulating losses in air combat, and
usually remain to patrol in Syria without penetrating Lebanon. One could say that
towards the Lebanon War of 1982 we achieved full freedom of air power in Lebanon,
which was very significant to the IAF pilots’ esteem and air control.
The Syrians, who understood that they are not a match to the IAF in air combat,
transferred three SA-2, SA-3 and SA-6 surface to air missile divisions to the Lebanon
Beka’a for protection against the IAF. This narrowed somewhat the air freedom of
power on the Lebanese eastern side, thus reaching 1982.
Attack on the surface-to-air missiles in the Beka’a in june 1982
On Wednesday, 9 June 1982, at 14:00, the attack on the surface-to-air missiles
during the Lebanon war began. This chapter deals with one of the greatest successes
in air warfare, in which the dense surface-to-air missile defense was destructed –
SA-2, SA-3, SA-6 missiles that were deployed in the Lebanon Beka’a valley and
along Lebanon’s eastern border.
The surface-to-air missile defense was a Soviet war doctrine, with a seperate