At 10:00 AM on the morning of October 6th 1973, Israeli military intelligence assessed war as a “low probability”. Four hours later 200,000 Egyptian troops were crossing the Suez Canal as the Syrians simultaneously attacked in the north. How was Israel, widely considered to have one of the best intelligence services in the world, so comprehensively fooled?
Abraham Rabinovich was a war reporter during the Yom Kippur War and later set out to write a more comprehensive history of the war. His focus is not the intelligence failure but the complete story of the war. However, if we analyze this history with the Five Whys method of root cause analysis we can understand how this failure happened and how to prevent ourselves from making similar mistakes.
In hindsight there were many signs that war was imminent. The military preparations for the Suez crossing were observed by Israel. The King of Jordan, who technically fought alongside Egypt and Syria, told them about the war a week in advance. A high ranking spy in the Egyptian government gave them the exact battle plan.
But the preparations were dismissed as an exercise and the spy was dismissed as a double agent. Rabinovich explains that Israeli intelligence, led by General Zeira, rejected all of this evidence because they believed in “The Concept”.
The Concept, as Rabinovich puts it, was the following:
The Egyptian leader was prepared to risk war but he would not do so before two conditions were met. He wanted from the Soviet Union fighter-bombers capable of neutralizing the Israeli Air Force by attacking its bases inside Israel—a replay in reverse of Israel’s preemptive strike against Egyptian air bases in 1967 that won Israel its swift victory. He also wanted Scud missiles capable of hitting Tel Aviv in order to deter Israel from air strikes against the Egyptian heartland.
Since it would be irrational for Egypt to go to war without this equipment, any evidence to the contrary could be safely ignored.
The intelligence community was so convinced by this analysis that in some cases they stopped even looking for contrary evidence. Israel had, at great danger and expense, installed wiretaps on Egypt’s major communication lines. Activating these wiretaps risked their detection, but would allow for much greater confidence about Egypt’s plans for war. On October 1st General Zeira, confident in his assessment of war’s impossibility, refused to turn them on, leaving Israel blind to the attack.
“What do these ‘special means’ exist for,” asked an exasperated Ben-Porat, “if not for situations like the one we’re facing?” “The situations you see,” replied Zeira, “are not the ones I see.”
But contrary to “The Concept”, Egypt’s decision to invade was not irrational, although it was ultimately unsuccessful. While they had no way of conquering Israel, or even the entire Sinai desert, they planned to establish a beachhead just a few miles past the Suez Canal and counter Israeli air superiority with existing ground-based air defenses. The goal of this limited offensive was essentially political in nature. A defeat of the Israelis, even a limited one, would be a major political coup and force Israel to the bargaining table. Despite the fact that the Yom Kippur war was a military victory for the Israelis, the shock of the initial assault was enough for Egypt to achieve its political aims.
Phillip Tetlock claims that experts who view the world through a single theory perform worse than those who attempt to synthesize many small pieces of information into a coherent whole. This failure is a good example as to how this occurs. General Zeira and his organization were unable to incorporate new information, because doing so would require uprooting their theory and replacing it with a new one. Any single piece of contrary information could be, and was, explained away to avoid this paradigm shift. A less theory-based view of the world can adapt to contrary evidence more easily and accurately.
Another failure was that “The Concept” was heavily based on the assumption of Egyptian rationality. As long as they could “prove” that it was irrational for Egypt to attack, they did not need to consider any other evidence. It feels correct to assume that other agents will attempt to act in their best interests and avoid irrationally harming you, but this is a dangerous assumption, even if they are in fact rational. The rationality you assume will always be based on the strategic theories you can attribute to others - but it is axiomatically impossible to consider strategies that you haven’t thought of. Treating others as somewhat irrational forces you to build slack into your plans and allows you to adapt when others behave unexpectedly.
It is not uncommon for organizations to become irrationally enamored with a theory. But there were many points where General Zeira could have backed down, or at least tried to explore other possibilities. Instead he resolutely held firm in his belief until the very end.
In May 1973 very similar evidence was observed and General Zeira, in his first major test as Head of Intelligence, stood firm against mobilization. He was overruled and the reserves were called up, but no attack came.
Half a year after Zeira took over the intelligence branch, his analytical abilities and nerves were put to the test. Unprecedented movement was detected of Egyptian forces to the canal front. Generally reliable intelligence assets reported Sadat’s intention to go to war in mid-May. As the date approached, Cairo placed its army on alert and expeditionary forces arrived from Iraq, Algeria, and other Arab countries. Libya sent a squadron of Mirages capable of reaching Israeli air bases. The IDF went onto alert status—code-named Blue-White.
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Zeira emerged from the Blue-White episode with his reputation, and his self-confidence, greatly enhanced. With alarm bells going off all around him and the nation’s fate at stake, he had coolly maintained throughout the crisis that the probability of war was “very low.” Even senior analysts on his staff challenged his assessment but he stuck to it, unperturbed.
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Zeira had proven right but for the wrong reasons. Sadat [Egypt’s leader] had indeed been ready to go to war but Assad [Syria’s leader] asked for a postponement in order to await armaments from the Soviet Union, particularly new T-62 tanks and SAM-6 missiles.
This was reasonable evidence against war later in the year, but General Zeira took it much further. His successful prognostication was used as a way to dismiss contrary opinions.
Information accumulated by Ben-Porat in the coming hours increased his suspicion that the Egyptians were up to something even though the exercise did not seem to be developing into a cross-canal attack this day. Failing to get Zeira on the phone, he spoke to Shalev [Zeira’s deputy] and voiced his belief that the warning was significant. Shalev reminded him that he said the same thing during the Blue-White alert in the spring. “You’re wrong this time too,” Shalev said.
However, the larger problem was that General Zeira started to see his role as the voice against mobilization.
“Yoel, listen well. I don’t permit you to think about mobilizing even a fraction of a reservist. It is intelligence’s job to safeguard the nation’s nerves, not to drive the public crazy, not to undermine the economy.”
Seeing himself in that role impacted his analytic capabilities as an intelligence leader. His analysis was presented as predigested bullet points rather than explaining the entire chain of reasoning.
Eli Zeira’s assessments, by contrast, were punchy but often short on relevant background. “From a logical point of view it would be a mistake for Egypt to launch a war,” was one of his standard lines, without spelling out what Sadat’s logic might be. “We know with certainty that he [Sadat] is afraid [of war].” “Assad knows what his limitations are and the Syrians are aware of Israel’s strategic superiority.”
As a leader of the “no war” faction, he went so far as to mislead others to protect his position.
Twice during the week he [the Chief of Staff] asked Zeira if the “special means” had been activated. He was given to understand that they were. In fact, they weren’t. Zeira had rejected pleas from his own staff to activate the listening devices and he did not hesitate to mislead the chief of staff about it. Zeira was acting as if he, not Elazar [the Chief of Staff], was the ultimate decision maker. His extraordinary behavior meant that the “special means,” which had been devised as a wake-up call in the event of an enemy attack, were being used instead to put the IDF to sleep.
On a personal level, Zeira’s failures illustrate what Julia Galef calls the “soldier mindset”, where you seek to defend your preconceived position, as opposed to the “scout mindset” where you diligently search for the truth. A “scout” would be eager to surface contrary evidence, along with their rationale for discounting it. A “soldier” would try and hide these inconvenient facts out of fear of losing the debate.
It is impossible to completely avoid “soldiers” in your decision-making process, but there are ways to mitigate the damage done to a collaborative process.
One way is to limit the factionalization which can intensify this problem. Israeli high command had to go from a spectrum of opinion on Egypt’s readiness for war, to a single decision about mobilizing the reserves. Once that binary question was placed, it divided the decision makers into opposing camps and contributed to some of this “soldier” mindset. This is a potential danger of “making beliefs pay rent”. This view says that theories about the world should be subjected to falsifiable tests early on. Things like prediction markets should be valorized while the vague blather of pundits like Thomas Friedman should be derided. However, premature predictions can also be dangerous. Early theories, based on limited evidence, are likely to be incorrect in various ways. An early predictive failure can cause a largely correct, but unrefined, theory to be discarded, while a lucky guess can cause a bad theory to gain unfair prominence. There is a trade-off here: a wishy washy worldview which never makes predictions is useless, but a rigid theory which predicts a few things and then goes off the rails can be actively dangerous.
Even if you strike the right balance and avoid premature decisions you will still reach a point where you must make the choice. After the war Israel set up a unit to act as a Devil’s advocate and question the accepted dogmas. This team can simulate the benefit of “scouts” by acting as “soldiers” for finding flaws in the prevailing consensus.
Rabinovich does not discuss why General Zeira and Israeli intelligence were so enamored with this theory and obviously any explanation is speculative. “The Concept” had three key features which could have contributed to its popularity.
Put together, “The Concept” hit the key emotional notes of a successful argument; Your deepest fears are well-grounded, but you are strong and powerful enough to overcome them, and if these fears do come to pass it won’t be your fault.
The natural tendency is to search for flaws in those theories which are most emotionally dissonant while seeking to defend those which align with your emotional inclinations. It is hard, but necessary, to introspect and do the exact opposite.
Even with the Egyptian attack coming as a complete shock it shouldn’t have been so devastating to Israel.
In the Six Day War, Israel captured the Sinai desert which added an extra 150 miles of distance between Egypt and Israel. Rabinovich argues, echoing claims of some Israeli leaders at the time, that this could have been used as a buffer zone to alleviate the pressure of a shock invasion. Israel could have engaged Egyptian forces deeper into the Sinai desert with room for maneuver. Since large-scale troop movements into the Sinai would be an inarguable act of war, mobilization could take place while Egypt was bogged down crossing the Sinai.
Instead Israel aimed to prevent an Egyptian advance across the Suez Canal. A series of forts, called the Bar Lev line, would stop any Egyptian advance, with tank and air support if necessary to clean up any units which made it through.
This decision was rooted in the culture of Israel’s military. By necessity, they had an ethos of giving no ground and rapidly taking the fight to the enemy. This makes sense when the enemy border is only a few miles from your major cities but makes less sense when there is a vast desert separating the two countries.
As Rabinovich puts it
“The debate over the Bar-Lev Line reflected the paradox of Israeli military planning. Because of Israel’s narrow boundaries, it was basic IDF doctrine before the Six Day War that in the event of war the fighting must be carried swiftly onto enemy territory. That war had pushed the cease-fire line into Sinai, 150 miles from Israel’s border, but doctrine had not been changed to reflect this fact.
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But by drawing a political line in the sand at the farthest edge of Sinai, Israel was waiving the major military asset it had won in the Six Day War—strategic depth. With a broad desert to fall back into, the “no enemy gain” formula meant that the Israeli forces on the canal would be fighting with the same back-to-the-wall stubbornness as if defending Israel’s heartland.”
By refusing to adapt their culture to the new strategic realities Israel was keeping itself in the same dangerous position it had been in before the Six Day War. These forts ended up being ineffective and in the early days of the war Israel suffered many casualties trying to rescue their surrounded garrisons.
There were rational military and political reasons behind the decision on the Bar-Lev line. There were reasons to explain how the strategy which fit the existing doctrine happened to also be the best strategy for the new strategic reality. However, these rationales were not the actual reason for the strategy. Instead the existing, deep-rooted culture was exerting its influence on the decision making. You see this happen often in the business world. Large companies try to imitate the agility of startup competitors but are undermined by a deep seated bureaucratic culture; startups try to enter regulated spaces but are undermined by their “move fast and break things” mentality.
Plans which seek to go against the prevailing culture need to recognize this fact and actively work to subvert the culture to its aims. Plans which ignore culture instead find themselves undermined in strange and mysterious ways.
Finally we can ask the question of why Israel was unable to adapt their culture to the new strategic realities. The Six Day War had vastly changed the landscape of the region, but Israel’s strategy remained the same but more so.
In 1973, Israel viewed the Arab armies as fundamentally incompetent and incapable of doing any damage and so felt no need to adapt. For example, when confronted with evidence that Egyptian commandos were infiltrating behind their lines, they were dismissive:
They examined the footprints and concluded that they had been made by standard Israeli army boots. “If I were an Egyptian scout, I would use that kind of boot,” said Ashkenazi. The trackers laughed. “Do you think they’re that clever?” “Why not?” asked Ashkenazi. Twice more in the coming days he would find footprints along the route.
Another illustration of this complacency was the Israeli military’s plan for a preemptive strike. The established doctrine was that Israeli intelligence would give advance notice before a war, and Israel would launch an air strike to disrupt the initial assault. This strategy had worked brilliantly during the Six Day War and the military saw no reason to change it. Despite the failures of the intelligence community, they still had enough time before the Yom Kippur War to strike first. The civilian leadership, under pressure from the Americans, rejected the plan. The Six Day War had fundamentally changed their position in the region. Instead of being a tiny nation under imminent existential threat, they were a regional power trying to hold on to territorial gains. The political leeway which existed six years earlier was now gone, and the military had failed to adapt with it.
Learning from failure is difficult but learning from success can be nearly impossible. After the Six Day War the Egyptians learned lessons and adapted their war aims to more achievable goals. Israel was only able to adapt after the initial shock of the Yom Kippur War.
Understanding that success breeds complacency should fundamentally change the way you make plans. As Mike Tyson famously said “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth”. Getting punched is inevitable and true adaptation can only happen once the punch happens.
If the initial punch can be blunted the organization can survive the initial shock. If it isn’t, the organization may collapse before it can properly react.
While reading there were some stories from the war which did not fit neatly into the five whys analysis but were too interesting to leave out.
Egypt’s war plans required convincing Israel that no attack was coming, but it had the opposite problem with its Syrian ally:
Sadat’s most brazen deception was of his ally, Syria. A two-front war against Israel was basic to any Arab strategy. However, Sadat and Syrian leader Hafez al-Assad had different goals. Assad aimed at taking back the Golan by force. But he would not risk war unless assured that Egypt would wage a campaign that would tie down most of Israel’s military. Sadat, however. planned only a limited campaign.
A consequence of this deception was that Syria, which was under attack in the north, asked Egypt to actually execute the offensive they had promised. Egypt’s initial attack had been much more successful than anticipated and so they agreed. This advance exposed them to the Israeli air force and ended up leading to their eventual defeat.
One of the days within the optimal crossing period in October was Yom Kippur. It struck the Egyptian planners as fortuitous. Israeli reservists, they knew, were mobilized during emergencies by having unit code names broadcast on radio. On Yom Kippur, however, radio and television in Israel were shut down. The selection of D-day would be left to Sadat and Assad but the planners put a circle around October 6, Yom Kippur, noting its special advantage.
Yom Kippur, however, was the worst possible Arab choice. In the absence of radio, Israel had other ways of mobilizing its reserves—couriers, for instance. Unlike any other day in the year, it is certain on Yom Kippur where virtually every reservist in the country can be found—at his home or at a synagogue in walking distance. The total absence of traffic on this day would enable couriers to speedily reach the reservists and the reservists themselves to quickly reach their bases.
Ashraf Marwan became a billionaire businessman based in London. When his identity was revealed in a book published in England in 2002, which echoed Zeira’s contention that he was a double agent, Marwan was hailed in Egypt as a national hero who had fooled Israel. Ex-Mossad chief Zamir threatened to bring Zeira to court for violating a basic code of the intelligence community by revealing Marwan’s identity to journalists. When the matter was brought to a retired Supreme Court judge for arbitration, he ruled in Zvi Zamir’s favor, indirectly confirming that Marwan was an Israeli spy, not a double agent. Shortly afterward, Marwan fell to his death from the balcony of his luxury apartment in London. A witness reported seeing two men “of Mediterranean appearance” looking down from a balcony at the body. Israeli historian Uri Bar-Joseph, who would write a book on the Marwan episode, suggests that the finding by an Israeli judge of repute meant that Egyptian authorities could no longer avoid the conclusion that Marwan had indeed been an Israeli spy. British police would make no finding about whether his death was a suicide or murder.
Jordan desperately wanted to avoid the war but politically could not stay completely out of it. The compromise, carefully coordinated with the Americans and Israelis, was that they would send a token force of tanks in a support role.
Kissinger asked Israel not to attack the brigade. The unit, he said, would not fight “but just stand there.” In his memoirs, Kissinger would write that “only in the Middle East is it conceivable that a belligerent would ask an adversary’s approval for engaging in an act of war against it.”
