[GOP_1900AD]

Disinfo from the Kremlin? Who'd a thunk it!

[DannyTN]

Too long. Quit reading. What was the point?

[ModelBreaker]

My eyes crossed about half way thru. The author has a lot of info but the writing style is turgid and very hard to follow.

[Andy from Beaverton]

Only 153 footnotes???

[Paleo Conservative]

This article is so convoluted, it's hard to figure out anything more complicated than the Soviet Union wanted to provoke what became the Six Day War to destroy Israel. I've never figured out why it was that the Soviet Union wanted to destroy Israel, but it is consistent with their later actions in 1973.

[mmercier]

yikes, i broke my mouse.

in any case, if the kgb did instigate the war it appears they miscalculated on a rather grandiose scale.

nothing like taking a proactive action to prove to the world that your military hardware is nothing more than battlefield debris waiting to happen.

putting it in the hands of illiterate third world savages is always helpful in the extreme too...

[Publius6961]

Long read, but worth the time for those not intellectually inert.
Saving most of it to read later over a glass of sherry.

One nagging feeling persists, after reading the first thousand words or so:

Granted, muslims are not known for rational thoughts and deed, and modern Egyptians are certainly not the sharpest tools in the drawer.
Nevertheless, the Syrians had possession of the Golan heights, it would have been effortless for them actually to walk over and look for themselves if "11 to 13 brigades" were amassed on their border.
Even in 1967, there was a plethora of means of communications, enabling Egypt to verify the astounding claim. Mindles reaction to an easily verifiable indication of major hostilities is a bit much to accept even from the incompetent Egyptian military.

So what's going on here? I hope to learn more after reading the remainder of the article, but I am not optimistic of a satisfying explanation.

[Jimmyclyde]

ping

[FreedomCalls]

Bump.

[Convert from ECUSA]

Ping!

[SJackson]

If you'd like to be on this middle east/political ping list, please FR mail me.

[Grampa Dave]

Fascinating reading. Would suggest you use the speed reading skills you have and were taught.

[Steelerfan]

bump for a (much later) read

[SunkenCiv]

a "Breshnev was a brain-dead loser" ping. ;') The '67 war showed Sadat that the USSR couldn't be trusted, and what was worse, couldn't deliver better arms than those available to Israel. The defeat led to the '73 war, which was Sadat's way to maneuver out of a permanent hostility situation, kick the Soviets out, and develop the country with aid from the US.

Of course, other steps he had to take to accomplish this led to his own assassination...

[SaltyJoe]

A Fistful of Ruble Theory

How Many Soviet troops were actually committed to any foreign battles during the Cold War (Afghanistan not included)? If there was a measure of belief in ideologies between Western nations and the former Soviet Union, who really was committed to their ideas?

I doubt that Soviets had a genuine love for Jews, but would Soviets really bind themselves to Arabs and Egyptians to be later accused of hating Jews as much as Hitler's Nazis? The Soviets in charge then were all associated in no small way with the Great Patriotic War against Hitler. The Soviet Army also liberated concentration camps. I'm guessing, but I think that Soviets hated Nazis so thoroughly, that hating Jews would have put them on the same level as Nazis. This would have been repulsive to Soviets. I don't think that the Soviets trusted any religion, but they spared a few to the end (if you can call being imprisoned in Siberian Gulags as being "spared"). If Stalin hadn't died when he did, he would have persecuted what religions remained in the USSR.

Stalin's successors were never true believers in Communism. They were criminals who thought like criminals. I think that Soviet interest in the Middle East was to raise money by selling weapons. The Soviets saw any foreign power or ideas as a gangster business competitor (ironically, maybe that's how the Kennedy's could understand and deal with the Cuban Missile Crisis).

How different was Soviet support in the Middle East than what they gave to the Korean peninsula and PLA? Yes, there were Soviet pilots flying those MIGs, but where there other Soviet troops raising hell on a separate border against the same ideological enemy? Other than intel officers and weapons specialists (SAM missiles) in Vietnam, were there Soviet ground troops deployed to Southeast Asia? Of course they'd be ejected from the UN, but what stopped them from rejecting the UN first? Would it have been all the money they were raking in from the criminal businesses they were investing in (include also the rising drug culture)?

The Soviet expansion could not install any 100% obedient puppet outside its borders. China would never kowtow to Moscow as Mao walked his own path. Perhaps the next most influential thing that the Soviets could push was war itself. Revolutions in the Middle East dismantled pro-Western influence. But the reigning governments were nationalists. A failed war may put the Soviets in a better position to install politically favorable leaders friendly and obedient to Moscow. Otherwise, they made a killing on selling off their old military equipment and raised R&D money for new weapons systems. Whatever war being fought against the West (particularly the U.S.), Soviets were sure to send agents to collect intelligence.

I'll bet one ruble and one shekel that the Soviets were playing all sides to make money for themselves. Considering the numbers of Russian Jews in the Soviet Union and that Islam had always been a traditional enemy in Russia, I wonder if Soviets had actually informed Israelis of enemy equipment troops movements (all at a cost, of course).

Perhaps a notable statistic: were there any ex-Russian weapons dealers that sought and won asylum in Israel? Was it to repay invaluable favors?