THE SOVIET–ISRAELI WAR, 1967–1973B. The Shilkas arrive as the next component of Kavkaz
One division was already on its way. Nasser was back on his feet in time to greet the
first seaborne elements of a Soviet Air Defense division, which would be formally
constituted only later. Gennady Shishlakov, a former noncommissioned officer,
related in 2006 that as the crew leader of a state-of-the-art Shilka (ZSU-23–4) self-
propelled anti-aircraft cannon, he was sent to Eg ypt in the vanguard of Kavkaz in
October 1969. When their ship docked in Alexandria, “because we were the first
among the entire Soviet forces group ... there was a small ceremony, and Abdel Nasser
spoke.” As Shishlakov relates that his outfit was fielded only after the crewmen were
screened by the KGB and underwent specialized training, the process must have
begun considerably earlier.^28 “October 1969” is also the starting date for “Soviet
combat operations” in Eg ypt, according to an official military publication in 1989.^29
A Politburo decision enabling the SAM division’s dispatch thus had to be made
long before January. It was impossible to pretend that this was a gesture to placate
Nasser, as he had already witnessed its implementation. The post-Soviet history of the
Russian Air Force states that in December 1969, Grechko issued the formal order to
activate operation Kavkaz, under a previous, secret Politburo resolution that was
“based on understandings with the Eg yptians to establish in UAR territory an opera-
tional group of Soviet forces.”^30 As already seen about the Fifth Eskadra, the formal
incorporation of the command structure followed, rather than preceded, the forma-
tion’s practical creation and even its deployment.
Nasser was not always present, but the Soviet regulars were routinely welcomed—
and indoctrinated—by the top Soviet brass in Eg ypt. Chief military adviser
Katyshkin “personally met every ship that brought Soviet personnel, told them con-
fidentially about the situation” and warned that “in the Eg yptian armed forces, up to
the very top echelon, Israeli and US agents were operating. He also informed his
compatriots that among the IAF personnel there were more than a few originating in
the United States and Europe, as well as mercenaries”—one of the earliest appear-
ances, and possibly the source, of this tenacious canard.^31
Was the “mercenaries” fabrication originated by the Soviets or the Eg yptians? In
June 1967, the Eg yptian “big lie” that US and British carrier-based aircraft took part
in Israel’s preemptive air strike was echoed by the Soviet media. It was dropped (but
not denied) after the Fifth Eskadra, which was monitoring the Sixth Fleet, reported
that there had been no such US activity.^32 As Katyshkin’s statements are not precisely
dated, it is hard to determine whether they preceded or followed an interview that
Eg yptian Defense Minister Fawzy gave to a Polish newspaper on 9 December 1969.
He charged there that some 120 Americans, including electronics and radar experts
as well as airmen, had changed their names and come to Israel.^33 Badry’s 1974 book
on the war of the previous October, written while criticism of the United States was
still politically correct in Eg ypt, alleges that US support for Israel included “numer-