Professor McNamara and Albert Weeks have criticized my view that Nasser
wanted war and attempted to provoke an Inraeli attack. Professor McNamara
holds the popular view that Nasser merely "blundered" into war. Before
addressing this in some detail, let me mention the issue that brought all
this up in the first place: Egypt's use of poison gas in Yemen in 1966.
Two defectors from the Egyptian air force and the International Red Cross
confirmed Egypt's gassing of Yemenis. (NYT, June 6, July 28, 1967;
September 3, 1968; Mideat Mirror, January 14, 1967). The importance of
the gassings will be seen later in this response.

I believe that the vast weight of historical evidence supports the
propostion that Nasser sought to provoke a war with Israel because he was
certain the Arabs would win such a war. The following points will be made

1.Prior to 1967 Nasser's policy was that Arabs would not fight Israel
until they were ready. In 1967 he stated, for the first time, they were
ready because he believed objective evidence showed the Arabs would win.

2. The pretext for Nasser's action that led to war, an alleged Israeli
military buildup against Syria on May 12 1967 was known by Nasser not to
have occurred.

3. There is some evidence to show that as early as January 1967 Nasser
was seeking a pretext to fight Israel.

4. Nasser knew that he was placing Israel in a position where it had no
choice but to attack.

5. Nasser believed that the Soviets would prevent the U.S. from
intervening in the war on the side of Israel.

6. The real Arab goal was the exterminatrion of every Israeli.

The above issues will now be addressed.

1..Prior to 1967 Nasser's policy was that Arabs would not fight Israel
until they were ready. In 1967 he stated for the first time they were
ready because he believed objective evidence showed the Arabs would win.

In a March 1965 speech Nasser stated that the Arabs would enter Palestine
"on a ground stained with blood" but cautioned that the Arabs would first
have to build up their defenses. Similarly, in May 1965 he linked the
liberation of Palestine to Arab unity. Egyptian newspapers such as Ruz el
Yusef and Al Akhbar emphasized that the Arabs would not allow themselves
to be pushed into a premature war and that Arab unity was a precondition
for any action against Israel. (Arab Political Documents, 1965, 97,
220-228; Chronology of Arab Politics, 1963, 369; 1965, 153. See also APD,
1963, 506; 1964, 57; Walter Laqueur, Israel Arab Reader (1969), 139-140.

This position changed radically in May 1967. In a speech on May 25 Nasser
now stated that 'we are ready for war." On the following day he warned
that if Israel took any agressive action against Syria it would mean
total war that would end in Israel's annihilation. He then made the
important point that he could not have said this two years earlier but
that now the armed forces were ready to face Israel. On May 29 he stated
that preparations had already been made and "We are now ready to confront
Israel."

Unfortunately, Nasser's change of attitude from caution to confidence has
been ignored by many researchers. This leads to the question: Was
Nasser's confidence justified? In retrospect, Nasser looks foolish. But
there is good reason to believe that the circumstances at the time
favored optimism. Prior to June 1967 Ahmed Khalidi, an Arab military
expert, surveyed the military situation and found that it strongly
favored the Arabs. ("Atlas", March 1967) Two years later an official
publication of the Palestine Liberation Organization reached the same
conclusion. (Ahmed Elkashef, "United States Policy Towards the Arab
Israeli Arms Race", 95) Nasser made the same point in his "resignation"
speech of June 9. In a May 26 news conference Egyptian Major General Saad
Shazli, a veterean of the Yemen campaign, stated that the speed of
Egypt's military buildup in the Sinai Peninsula surprised even
professional soldiers like himself. He also stated that offensive action
by Egypt was possible. (Mideast Mirror, May 27, 1967) Even Hanson
Baldwin, military expert for the NYT (May 24, 1967) gave reasons for the
Arabs to be optimistic. On June 1 the NYT correspondent in Cairo reported
that those who knew Egypt were saying that never before had the Egyptians
been so confident.

Richard B. Parker, who spoke with many Soviets some years after the war,
wrote that the upper echelons in Moscow believed "that Egypt was strong
enough to confront Israel militarily." (The Politics of Miscalculation in
the Middle East, 29)

2. The pretext for Nasser's action that led to war, an alleged Israeli
military buildup against Syria on May 12 1967, was known by Nasser not to
have occurred.

The actions whcih led to war were Nasser's closing of the Gulf of Aqaba
and Sharm el Sheikh to ships bound for Israel, kicking the United Nations
Emergency Force out of the Sinai Peninsula, and re militarizing the Sinai
Peninsula with thousands of Egyptian troops. The pretext for these
actions was an alleged Israeli military buildup along the Syrian border
that threatened an attack against Syria. The Soviets had told Nasser that
such a buildup had taken place. It is now agreed by nearly everyone that
no such buildup took place. Given the nature of the Syrian - Israeli
border, it would have been impossible conceal such a buildup. The real
question is whether Nasser believed these reports.

In 1968 Shams Badran, Egypt's Minister of War, stated that on May 15,
1967 Egypt's General Fawzi was sent to Syria to check out the alleged
Israeli buildup. When Fawzi returned to Egypt he stated: "The Syrians
must be mad ' and the Russians "must have had hallucinations." (Winston
Burdett, "Encounter With the Middle East", 214-215) Similarly, Egypt's
General Murtagi later wrote that Egyptian intelligence very soon came to
realize "that the crisis was the product of a fabricated plan and advised
waiting for more certian information." (Parker,95) The lack of buildup
was also confirmed by the UN.

In fact, allegations of an Israeli military buildup along the Syrian
border had been propagated by the Soviets constantly since 1966. (Menahem
Mansoor, Political and Military History of the Arab World, 1900-1967, May
5, 7, 1966; Middle East Record, 1967, 170; Walter Laqueur, Road to War,
88; International Documents on Palestine, 1967, 472; Tass, Feb. 2, 1967
in Summary of World Broadcasts.) Moreover, in January 1967 the Syrians
had even claimed that Turkey was massing a buidup along their border.
(Jewish Observer and Middle East Review, January 20, 1967)

Therefore, Nasser had no real reason to believe these reports now. The
principal change, as noted in number 1 above, is that now he believed
Egypt was ready to confront Israel.



3. There is some evidence to show that as early as January 1967 Nasser
was seeking a pretext to confront Israel.

Shortly after the Six Day War ended, David Nes, Deputy Chief of the
American Diplomatic Mission in Cairo, stated that as early as January
1967, Nasser had been planning a major confrontation with Israel and the
west. Nes stated that he conveyed this information to Senator William
Fulbright, chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. (Theodore
Draper, Israel and World Politics, 105-106) Confirmation for Nes's
assertion later came from Egypt's Minister of War, Shams Badran, who in
1968 revealed that the idea of closing the Gulf of Aqaba to Israeli bound
shipping and instituting a blockade had arisen as early as December 1966
or January 1967. (Burdett, 214)

My personal opinion - for which I have no evidence - is that Nasser
cooked up the whole scenario of a fabricated Israeli military buildup
with the Syrians well before May 12 in order to go to war. (See point 2
above)

4. Nasser knew that he was placing Israel in a position where it had no
choice but to attack.

Nasser knew full well that closing the Gulf of Aqaba to Israeli bound
shipping would lead to war. Israel had fought Egypt over this issue in
1956. In fact, the Israelis issued a number of warnings as Nasser's moves
became bolder throughout May. (NYT May 14, 23, 27, 29, 31; Israel Radio,
May 26 in SWB)

Nasser's confidant and editor of Egypt's most influential newspaper,
Hassanain Heikal, usually reflected Nasser's thinking. He wrote in Al
Ahram on May 26 that Israel had been undergoing economic difficulties and
that Egypt's blockade of the Gulf was important because this is where
Israel received its oil. He went on to note that "the needs of security,
of survival itself, make acceptance of the challenge of war inevitable."
However, he anticipated that Israel would strike the first blow.

Captured documents during the war show that an Egytian battle order dated
June 2, 1967 stated that Israel would not be economically able to
maintain the burden of military preparedness caused by the blockade and
the moving of Egypt's troops into the Sinai. The order states that the
blockade "has already paralyzed iIsrael's economy " and that Israel would
be forced to launch an attack within two weeks. (David Kimche and Dan
Bawly, The Six Day War, 109-110)

In his "Revolution Day" speech of July 23, 1967 Nasser admitted as much.
He recounts a meeting of May 22 where he stated there was a 50% chance of
war. and another meeting where he stated that the chance of war was 80%.
"Then came the changes in Israel at the beginning of June, after which
there was a 100% chance of war." In this same speech he relates that at a
meeting on June 2 he stated that Israel would attack within 48 to 72
hours. In fact, Israel attacked on June 5. Richard B Parker confirms
that, according to a number of sources, at the June 2 meeting the
military and political leadership stated that Israel would attack on
either June 3 , 4 or 5. (Politics of Miscalculation, 57)

Sudan's Prime Minister later wrote in "Democracy on Trial" that Nasser
told him in July 1967 that he knew Israel would attack on June 4 or 5 and
had ordered 1/3 of his air force to be kept in the air. This was done on
June 3 and 4 but, for some inexplicable reason, not on June 5. (Jerusalem
Post Weekly, May 29, 1974). Shams Badran stated that the Americans had
warned Egypt that Israel would attack on June 5. (MER, 1968, 782)
Jordanian sources also gave Nasser similar warnings. (Theodore Draper in
Commentary, Dec. 1973, 35; Edgar O'Ballance, The Third Arab - Israeli
War, 34-35; See also NYT May 28, 1967))

5. Nasser believed that the Soviets would prevent the U.S. from
intervening in the war on the side of Israel.

Professor McNamara wrote that Nasser would did not want war because he
feared Western intervention on the side of Israel in the event of an Arab
victory. This brings up the issue as to whether the Soviets guaranteed
Nasser that it would block any American intervention in the event of war.
The exact nature of the Soviet guarantee to Egypt in the event of war has
been disputed. However, it has been fairly well established that whatever
the guarantee, Nasser truly believed that the Soviets would not let the
Americans deprive the Arabs of victory. (Parker, 26 - 33).

In his speech of May 29, Nasser states that Shams Badran had informed him
that Soviet Premier Alexi Kosygin had given assurance that the Soviet
Union would not allow the intervention of any country After the war, the
French publication Le Nouvelle Observateur quoted an anonymous high level
Soviet official that the Soviet Union was only obligated to neutralizing
American intervention. (Atlas, August 1967, 17-19) This was confirmed by
the Soviet news agency Tass on July 19 which stated that Moscow had
warned that it would not enter unless the U.S. did so. (MER, 1967,14)

Therefore, at least in his own mind, Nasser had no reason to fear that
U.S. intervention on the side of Israel would deprive the Arabs of
victory

6. The real Arab goal was the exterminatrion of every Israeli.

This now brings us to the overall Arab goal during the Six Day War.
Professor McNamara does not see throwing Jews ino the sea as a viable
option for Nasser.

The Israelis captured documents which showed that the Arab goal was to
exterminate the Israelis. The Arabs claimed that the documnets were
forgeries. Many academics have assured us that Arab threats about
throwing Jews into the sea are just so much hyperbole which should not be
taken seriously.

Long overlooked are Egyptian radio broadcasts that were monitored by the
BBC and published in "The Summary of World Broadcasts, Part IV". It has
long been known that early on during the war the Arabs believed they were
winning. What then did the offical Egyptian news media tell its troops on
how to conduct the victory?

Shortly after the war broke out on June 5, Radio Cairo instructed its
troops that Tel Aviv was their target. "Remove from existence the crime
of the Jews... Go to Tel Aviv and raze it the ground..." A Hebrew
broadcast the same day directed at the Israelis stated that the Arab
armies were carrying out their duties and destroying Israeli towns and
villages and would completely destroy their leaders. Keep in mind that
this was really believed by the Egyptians at the time. Later on that day
Cairo said: "We will conquer it in the air and destroy it forever." On
June 7 Radio Cairo stated the goal to its soldiers: " God will shame the
Jews... God will torture them at your hands." The following day it told
its troops: "on to more destruction" in order "to wreak vengeance - a
cruel and terrible vengeance."

The above are contemporaneous broadcasts to troops on a situation that
the official Egyptian news media and Nasser believed existed at the time
they were made. It is difficult to interpret the reality of these
broadcasts as anything less than their actual contents.

Ahmed Shukary, the leader of the Palestine Liberation Organization, would
later address the issue of throwing Jews into the sea in his memoirs. He
wrote; "Admittedly, I frequently called on the Arabs to liquidate the
state of Israel and throw the Jews into the sea." However, he also noted
that he had consulted with Nasser and received his approval before making
these statements. (New Middle East, July 1971, 6)

The fact that - as noted at the very beginning of this essay - Nasser was
very willing to gas Yemini Arabs is a very good indication that he would
hardly be more lenient towards the hated Jews. Anyone interested in the
context in which the extermination orders were given to Egyptian troops
should consult Dafna Alon's 1969 study on "Arab Racialism."

John C Zimmerman

University of Nevada, Las Vegas

Humanities & Social
Sciences Online

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