FLEXING MUSCLES WHILE OFFERING A PULLBACKinsisted first that if the plane fell west of the canal it must have been flying there; then
he quoted “our experts” that the plane had not crossed the middle of the canal.^8 This
provided additional proof that Soviets were closely involved, but by then they had
already initiated a spectacular retaliation. On 17 September, Ambassador Vinogradov
met Sadat “to discuss a working paper drawn up by Soviet and Eg yptian specialists
on Eg ypt’s military position,” and Sadat, in a speech, reiterated that he would not be
bound by the ceasefire. The same day, a SAM-2 brought down an Israeli Boeing 377
Stratocruiser transport converted into an advanced electronics platform, which was
“executing angular photographic surveillance of the Eg yptian missiles” from east of
the canal. As the Soviets in Eg ypt were told, “on board were some 30 intelligence
officers, captains or majors, half of them American.”^9
This coup is still cited by the Eg yptians as proving how their “proper planning
enabled the Air Defence Forces to shoot down” a prize target.^10 Chief of Staff Shazly,
characteristically, claimed in his memoirs that “I determined to stop this [the
Stratocruiser flights]. In early September 1971, I gave permission to prepare an
ambush.”^11 When his version appeared in Russian translation, several former advisers
were outraged. Still, as one of them related,
we kept silent both then and later. ... Only recently [in 2010], a group of veterans from the
Eg yptian war addressed the Speaker of the Federation Council (the upper house of the
Russian parliament), and related the true history. At last the name was stated of the hero
who commanded this audacious operation.After an investigation by the speaker’s aide, a statement in the official Rossiskaya
Gazeta named the hero as Viktor Petrovich Kopylov, “who sadly died two years ago,”
and detailed his accomplishment. “The Stratocruiser was shot at from a location
where in theory the Eg yptians could not have had SAM launchers.” Kopylov, who
served from March 1970 as the adviser to a SAM-2 divizyon that “went on to shoot
down a Phantom,” was “a determined, resourceful man who was always ready to argue
with his superiors if the cause required it.” Under his guidance, “the missilemen man-
aged, undetected by the omnipotent Israeli intelligence, to set up its radar” in a date-
palm grove on the very bank of the Great Bitter Lake—in effect repeating Popov’s
feat a year earlier, but with an Eg yptian outfit. Although Kopylov “received authori-
zation” to attack the Israeli plane, his comrades complained that
the Stratocruiser incident drew an ambiguous response from the leadership. Kopylov, after
a conflict with the adviser to the commander of Eg yptian Air Defense, was instructed to
return to the USSR before the [scheduled] end of his tour, but ultimately he was decorated
with the [Order of ] the Red Star.^12Whether or not the Soviets approved of Kopylov’s exploit, they were well prepared
for the Israeli response. Once the Shrike radar-homing missiles had arrived in Israel,
after the ceasefire, IAF chief Hod proposed to use them immediately against the