FOREWORDxix
But it has never been our intent to accuse our predecessors of such flaws. On the con-
trary, the bulk of their research was made and published when accessible source material
was so limited in scope and character that we can but admire, and build upon, the use
that many of them made of it. This is especially true of those who qualified their conclu-
sions, when appropriate, as reasoned speculation—which we too have sometimes had
to do at the outer fringe of whatever certainty our new sources permitted.
Our only reservation is about the refusal of some established authorities to recog-
nize that the emergence of new evidence may require a revision, and their consequent
rejection of our studies out of hand only because of incompatibility with their theo-
retical models. We, on the other hand, believe that Soviet actions, as they are gradu-
ally being exposed, ought to serve as the basis of the historical record, and it is the
theories that must be reconciled with the emerging facts. As we also anticipate a simi-
lar reaction to this book, we are permitting ourselves an introductory essay on sources
and their evaluation.
The paucity of abiding interest in the relatively uneventful years of 1967–73 meant
that most historiographical treatment of them occurred fairly soon after, when the
available material was still largely limited to official statements, media reports and
similarly open sources. This not only led to an exaggerated emphasis on diplomacy,
in comparison to military or covert operations. Even within the public-policy sphere,
and despite a historian’s training to the contrary, speeches, communiqués and so on
were too often taken at face value—not only in respect of the actual events but in
particular as to intentions and expectations. Declared peace plans were seldom inter-
preted as anything but genuine policy goals; threatened moves were rarely exposed as
having already been made.
Even more treacherous was reliance, for lack of official documentation, on the
contemporary media. The Soviet and Eg yptian media were usually and correctly
treated as just a slightly less binding channel for official statements. But on the other
side of the front, the Israeli press differed more in degree than in substance, and the
issue of Soviet involvement was very much a case in point due to its political sensitiv-
ity. Military censorship excluded certain entirely untouchable areas (such as nuclear
policy or new weapons systems); consensual restraint covered a much wider range,
and the authorities provided much of the information as well as the terminolog y for
presenting it. This was only partially mitigated by transparent codes differentiating
bulletins that were literally dictated to the newsroom from those that a reporter
actively obtained—often from the same sources.^21
But while most historians allowed for these limitations, Western news outlets and
particularly “newspapers of record” were relied upon for objective if not entirely
accurate factual reports and authoritative commentary. This trust we found to be
almost as unjustified as in the Soviet case. For most of the period in question, there
was no American and little Western press presence in Eg ypt; none of either in the
combat zone. Tight censorship was enforced, but was rarely necessary as local string-