#93 Make Believe Media

“Of course, the Israelis and US high-tech weaponry were pretty much a match made in heaven. Which other middle eastern country would be able to use those weapons as well and not screw everything up?”

Actually, your point about the Israelis getting the same results with Russian or Chinese hardware is well taken. Because most of the hardware they used to hammer the “United Arab Republic” forces into the sand in 1967 wasn’t American.

The Israeli Air Force was mostly equipped with French Dassault Mirage III jet fighters and Sud Aviation Vautour jet tactical bombers. (The Mirage is pretty well known, but the nearly-forgotten Vautour was a twin-engined swept-wing bomber along the lines of the English Electric Canberra.) Most of the ordnance they dropped was French-made, as well, notably the “concrete dibber” runway-cratering bombs.

The Israeli Army’s primary tank at the time was the M50 Sherman, a modified M4A3 with a French-designed 75mm gun. The even nastier M51 “Isherman” version used a 105mm gun, also French. The heavy elements were British-made Centurion III MBTs, bought directly from the UK, and U.S. M48s with 90mm guns, the latter bought second hand from the West German Bundeswehr, ironically enough.

And the standard rifle was the FN FAL 7.62 NATO- from Belgium.

It wasn’t until the 1973 Yom Kippur War that substantial quantities of up-to-date, state-of-the-art U.S. equipment was used by the Israeli Defense Forces, notably F-4E Phantom multirole fighters, A-4 Skyhawk attack bombers, and M60 MBTs. And a lot of those were rushed to Israel to replace battle losses, directly from U.S. war stocks in Western Europe. The orders for said replenishment coming directly from President Richard Nixon. (One of the few things “Tricky Dick” ever did I wholeheartedly concurred with.)

The Israelis fight effectively with any weapons, from anywhere. I suspect mainly because they are all too aware that the one thing they can never afford- is losing.

cheers

eon