THE SOVIET–ISRAELI WAR, 1967–1973this sparse but very important information. After each session or lesson I would return
to my bunker to write and sketch from memory everything I could retain and
understand.”^3
Even before this data could be put to use, Nastenko notes proudly—and cor-
rectly—that the Soviet air presence persuaded Israel to discontinue the deep-pene-
tration bombing raids.^4 After Operation Priha- 21 on 13 April, the Israelis stopped
flaunting their domination of Eg yptian skies, even though no Priha raider was ever
brought down by the Soviet interceptors or missiles. This was five days after the
school bombing caused forty-seven immediate fatalities, “one of the greatest tragedies
of the War of Attrition,” but the official IAF account holds that this second disaster
was not the main motivation for the Israeli climbdown. Rather, “the Israeli Cabinet
resolves at this stage to avoid provoking the combat squadrons manned by Soviet
pilots, in the hope that the Soviets would not intervene in the fighting.”^5
Shortly afterward, an Israeli colonel, while claiming that the depth raids had pre-
vented an all-out Eg yptian attack, also admitted “now the situation has changed
again. With Soviet pilots and rocket technicians actively protecting the interior of
Eg ypt, we have been forced to curtail our activities.”^6
When exactly did “this stage” end? As already seen, the arrival of Soviet-manned
SAM-3s was detected on 17 March, but according to Heikal the Soviet-piloted MiG-
21s were successfully camouflaged—as Brezhnev had demanded—until 18 April, when
they had their first brush with Israeli planes. “The Russians pursued [the Israelis], all
communications between them going out ... in Russian.” This led the Eg yptian editor
to question the Soviets’ aversion to publicity. “Nasser ... was puzzled. How did this
square with all the talk about the need for secrecy? My own theory was that ... it was a
signal to the Americans that the Russians had arrived.”^7 One of Eg yptian Vice-President
Sabry’s visits to Moscow, in April 1970, has been credited with persuading Brezhnev
and Defense Minister Grechko to send Soviet pilots into combat in the canal zone.^8
However, as Sabry was officially in Moscow to attend the celebration of Lenin’s centen-
nial, which took place on 22–3 April, and his return was reported on the 26th, this
attribution is uncertain at best.^9
Intentionally or not, the 18 April incident did give the Israelis, and through them
the Americans, their first indication that Soviet-flown aircraft had entered the fray. A
new IDF sigint unit, codenamed Masregah (knitting needle) and staffed with
Russian-speaking servicemen and women, was created early in 1970. It was based at
MI’s main listening post, next to the IDF Southern Command’s forward headquar-
ters at Umm-Hashiba, on a ridge overlooking the canal. The unit’s initial assignment
was to track the Soviet advisers. During the initial phase of Kavkaz, the “Grechkos”—
as the monitors were nicknamed—picked up nothing that betrayed the appearance
of Soviet regulars. At a recent reunion, they recalled a lot of free time that permitted
vodka-and-music parties and practical jokes such as fabricated intercepts of com-
plaints by Soviet naval advisers about the quality of Port Said women (the earlier,