CAIRO -

Only a few months passed since the war of June 5, 1967 - known in Egypt as the setback and which changed Arab geography since then - until the Egyptian navy responded to the Israeli occupation with a painful blow that had a wide global resonance, and represented an important point in the course of the Arab conflict. Israeli.

On October 21, 1967, the Egyptian Navy destroyed, with two naval missiles, the Israeli destroyer "Eilat", one of the most powerful pieces of Israeli war at the time, whose wreckage is still lying at the bottom of the Mediterranean, off the coast of Port Said Governorate, and military personnel have previously suggested the possibility of extracting and transforming it. to a military museum.

Operation Eilat was a new stage in the development of naval weapons and naval combat in the world, and this day has become a holiday for the Egyptian Navy, according to what was said in his memoirs by Field Marshal Mohamed Abdel Ghani Al-Gamsi, the last minister of war (currently defense) in Egypt, and head of the Operations Authority during the war. 1973 between Egypt and Israel.

In recent years, the Egyptian navy has witnessed huge development operations that have placed it in seventh place in the world, according to the latest classification of the American "Global Firepower" website, which specializes in assessing military power, issued last May.

The Egyptian army owns a naval fleet consisting of 316 pieces, including two helicopter carriers, 9 frigates, 8 submarines, 50 patrol ships and 23 minesweepers.

Destroyer Eilat

It is a British-made destroyer, which participated in World War II and the tripartite aggression (Britain, France and Israel) against Egypt in 1956, and had a role in seizing the Egyptian destroyer "Ibrahim I", which Israel later changed its name to Haifa.

The destroyer was tasked with patrolling along the northern Sinai shores, and a month after the 1967 war, it sank two Egyptian torpedo boats, in an incident described by the Hebrew media as "a clear violation of the cease-fire resolution", and the only achievement achieved by the Israeli navy during the War of Attrition (1967-1973).

Egypt was not in a hurry to respond to the targeting of its two naval vessels, at a time when Israel went further inside Egyptian waters, and at a moment of intelligence failure, specifically on the evening of October 21, 1967, the commander of the destroyer Eilat stood terrified as he watched a missile coming from the direction of Port Said base.

However, it seems that the observer on the back of Eilat did not realize the truth of what he was looking at, as it was not just one missile, but 4 Russian "Stix" missiles, each of which weighs a ton of explosives.

200 crew members and trainees were on board the destroyer at the time of its detonation, 47 were killed and 100 others were injured, while others died later due to the slow rescue process, according to Hebrew media.

The Eilat operation caused a great shock in Israel, and its officials said that they did not imagine this superior Egyptian skill in launching rockets, and it still has a painful effect in Israel, and it commemorates its dead every year.

new stage

Field Marshal Al-Jamsy says in his memoirs about the sinking of "Eilat", that the enemy destroyer continued to enter the territorial waters for a while, then moved away to the sea, and this was repeated several times in a provocative manner and in clear harassment to show the inability of our navy to confront it.

As soon as instructions were given to destroy it when it entered the territorial waters, two missile launchers exited from the Port Said base to carry out the mission. The first launcher attacked by firing a missile that hit it directly, so it began to lean on its side, and after launching the second missile it was drowned inside Egyptian territorial waters, about a nautical mile, according to Al-Gamsi.

The Israeli response

According to Al-Jamsi, Israel asked the international monitoring forces to rescue its soldiers who had fallen into the water when the destroyer sank, and Egypt responded by not interfering with the operation, which took place in light of the torches thrown by the planes.

Israel responded violently to the flooding of Eilat. After 3 days of the operation, it bombed refineries and oil depots in the Suez Governorate, as well as the cities of Ismailia and Suez, forcing Egypt to displace about one million citizens from the cities and villages of the Canal.

Beyond Eilat

Former Egyptian officer Samir Farag says - in an article in Al-Ahram newspaper - that the military Navy's thinking after the operation changed in the whole world, explaining that all countries stopped building large naval pieces, such as aircraft carriers, cruisers and destroyers, and gradually turned to relying on small-sized frigates and missile launchers with Developing marine radars to detect targets from a height of 4 meters above sea level.

In his book "Dumping Eilat", journalist and writer Abdo Mubasher - the former head of the military department of Al-Ahram newspaper - explains that the success of the Port Said naval battle (Eilat operation) was the beginning of the age of missiles, which was not a secret at the time, but the world discovered how dangerous small armed naval units are. Surface-to-surface guided missiles.

As a result of the battle, development in the field of naval weapons began to proceed - according to a direct - in two directions:

  • The first:

    working to ward off this danger, by finding weapons and methods that ensure an efficient response to the vessels carrying guided missiles, which have a proven and superior destructive power.

  • Second:

    Working to raise the efficiency of these vessels and to find the means that guarantee them to overcome the means of resistance and deception, which a large marine unit can resort to to prevent its danger.

Eilat and the war pier

In the famous movie “The Road to Eilat” (1993 production), the filmmakers confused the destruction of the destroyer Eilat with the destruction of the war berth of the port of Eilat and combined them in one operation, which is not true. Then came the movie “Dignity Day” (Production 2004), which dealt with The process of sinking the destroyer alone, but he did not receive the fame of the first.

According to identical statements by members of the frogmen in the Egyptian navy, which participated in some of those operations, the sinking of the destroyer Eilat preceded the destruction of the port of Eilat with 3 successful operations, with an interval of 3 months between one and the other:

  • The first was in November 1969 with the destruction of the ships "Dalia" and "Hydroma".

  • The second was in February 1970, with the destruction of the tank carrier "Beit Sheva" and the troop carrier "Bat Yam".

  • The third was in May 1970 with the complete destruction of the military pier in Eilat.

Capacity Development

In an interview with local newspapers, including Al-Ahram - yesterday, Wednesday - Lieutenant-General Ahmed Khaled, Commander of the Naval Forces, said - on the occasion of the "Navy Day" - that the sinking of the destroyer Eilat is "the first naval missile battle in the world, which confused the enemy and stunned the world."

Speaking about his country's efforts to develop its military capabilities, Khaled touched on the challenges of maritime security in the Middle East and the multiplicity of conflicts resulting from international and regional changes in the region, and their impact on Egyptian and Arab national security.

According to official reports, Egypt has worked in recent years to develop its marine capabilities through major purchase and joint manufacturing deals, including:

  • Mistral helicopter carriers.

  • The FREMM-class multi-role frigate.

  • German-made class 209/1400 submarines.

  • The field of joint military manufacturing resulted in the manufacture of 3 frigates, coastal traffic boats, and dozens of naval vessels.

  • Establishing more naval bases, including "Bernice" (southeast), "3 July" (Northwest), and "East Port Said" (northeast).

  • Several joint exercises and maneuvers with several countries, including Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain, Jordan, France, Greece, Russia and Cyprus.

  • Securing ports and gas fields.