THE SOVIET–ISRAELI WAR, 1967–1973directly to the surviving Eg yptian units.” This urgency dictated a substantive upgrade
in the status of the Soviet personnel who accompanied the hardware. “Together with
the technical materiel, our officers were sent to these units as advisers (mustasharun)
who were intended to improve the fighting morale and combat capability of the
Eg yptians opposite the enemy dug in on the eastern bank of the Suez Canal.”^28
The transition from “specialists” (hubara) to “advisers”—that is, from technical ser-
vices to operational supervision—would prove as significant as the addition of a third
category, askaryun Suvyet (Soviet soldiers) would become two years later.^29 With the
airlift still in progress, Brezhnev already referred to a fait accompli: the advisers were
being directed “to all sub-units,” that is, they would function at the field level and not
only at headquarters or training facilities. On 11 July, Brezhnev already gave their num-
ber for Eg ypt, Syria and Algeria as 1,069, “plus 261 other specialists.” The separate
number of “military specialists for aircraft assembly” alone came to 514.
The Soviet ground crews reassembled the fighter planes on the runway, a process
that took six hours per craft. Then the planes had to be test-flown, and Soviet pilots
were on hand to do it. Even when the larger intervention plan backfired, pilot-
instructors who were supervising the induction of newly supplied Su-7s apparently
flew them on several combat missions during the war. Vybornov’s team was also still
in Eg ypt when “Podgorny visited us,” that is, at least until 21 June. In addition, Soviet
pilots were tasked at Algeria’s request to ferry the fighters that it loaned to Eg ypt as a
stopgap in the first days after the Israeli raids.^30
“Working day and night, from 8 June to 26 July 1967 our officers assembled and
test-flew some 200 combat aircraft that arrived from the USSR in kits.”^31 Cairo-
West’s location adjoining the international airport meant that the test flights took
place in full view of any observer in town. This was the origin of reports from Western
newsmen, such as a UPI correspondent who flew out of Cairo on 16 June, when
non-Eg yptian airliners were first allowed in to evacuate foreigners.^32 His Greek plane
“was one hour late because five brand-new MiG fighters, apparently flown in from
Russia, landed on the main runway. The new Soviet MiGs have been flying in over
Cairo since Thursday [15 June].”^33 His AP colleague, who also left for Athens, was
closer to reality: “Soviet Antinov [sic] transports have been flying into Cairo airport
since the end of the war. They are believed to have delivered between 50 to 80 MiG
jets ... In ones and twos [the MiGs] make almost daily flights over the capital.” Besides
test flights, he considered that “Eg ypt is getting the maximum propaganda out of the
MiGs ... probably in a bid to convince Eg yptians their air force is intact.”^34
The suggestion that the MiGs flew in on their own power exemplifies the wide-
spread misconceptions in the Western press, most of whose reporters were sent to
Cairo only after the outbreak of the crisis in mid-May. It also accentuates this press
corps’ subsequent departure from Eg ypt. Nearly all the US correspondents had been
rounded up along with hundreds of other Americans when Eg ypt severed diplomatic
relations on 8 June and were shipped out of Alexandria the same night.^35 Most of the