THE SOVIET–ISRAELI WAR, 1967–1973By then, the Dakar should certainly have been aware that its silence had raised the
alarm, and would begin with a reassurance. The messages were not recorded nor their
point of origin triangulated, but a veteran Israeli Navy signalman who monitored one
of them opined that its rhythm differed from the Dakar radioman’s usual speed.
Anyone versed in naval signals could have done it, said Erell. Tracking the submarine
according to its own signals and duplicating them would have been simple, “and I
suspected that someone else was calling us instead of Dakar ... perhaps in order to
delay the search, [or] mislead [us].”^16
Egyptian officers, up to Fawzy, have claimed that their navy sank the Dakar, but
taking credit for Soviet achievements was routine practice, and the location where the
submarine was ultimately discovered was far afield for the Eg yptians at the time.^17
Indeed, Erell ruled out Eg yptian action, as “they have not put out to sea” from
Alexandria. Elimination of all other candidates leaves only the Soviets as suspects for
originating the mysterious signals. What for? Could this have been a ploy to let the
Soobrazitel’nyy or other Soviet craft put distance between them and the Dakar’s
course? The Israeli Navy, Erell reported, shared its suspicions with US colleagues and
asked whether they had picked up any extraordinary radio traffic. No reply was
received, “and I don’t suppose that they will tell us whether they have such a suspi-
cion, or if they know anything. It would be very unpleasant for them to admit that
they knew someone had attacked an Israeli submarine, without saying what they were
going to do about it.”
Replying to explicit questions about a Soviet input, Erell stated there were several
Soviet ships in the general area but the Israelis did not have their specific locations.
However, according to other Israeli accounts, during the submarine’s voyage Israeli
naval units were constantly updated about Soviet movements in the Mediterranean,
including a Kashin-class BPK that was “between [the Syrian port of ] Latakiya and
Cyprus” three days before the submarine went missing.^18 Erell allowed there was “a
possibility that another submarine or a Soviet warship torpedoed” the Dakar. There
was also “some possibility that it unintentionally encountered Soviet forces, and the
Soviets may have feared that it was attacking them. [But] those are merely specula-
t i o n s .”^19 A few days later, Defense Minister Moshe Dayan went as far as stating “it
cannot be ruled out that an Eg yptian or ‘Russian’ ship damaged [the Dakar] and
captured its crew”—a statement criticized by his colleagues as raising false hopes for
the crew’s survival.^20
The recorded efforts of the Soviet Navy to track five new Israeli missile boats on
their way from Cherbourg two years later—with a view to intercepting them—con-
firm that the Fifth Eskadra might have been tasked with shadowing and even engag-
ing the Dakar. The Soviet Navy’s “radio-technic” capability, as already reported in the
Eilat incident, would definitely have sufficed for the deceptive signals. Remarkably,
it may have been assisted in this by the Israelis themselves. As Dayan informed a
Knesset committee, after the Dakar first missed its scheduled signal, “we applied to