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On The Banks Of The Suez: An Israeli General's Personal Account of the Yom Kippur War
Personal account of the Israeli military response to the Egyptian attack launched across the Suez Canal in 1973, elaborating upon strategy, logistics, and the human intensity of involvement.
480 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1979
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
July 18, 2023
Bren was a very experienced armored soldier and served as the commander of the IDF division that would penetrate deeply into Egypt in the 1973 war. It's an interesting perspective, especially if you like tank battles.
January 10, 2023
So good that I am compelled to downgrade Duel For the Golan (another great book) to a 4.
Adan goes into meticulous detail on the fighting in the Sinai between October 6–24, focusing almost exclusively on his own division although he does at times provide a broader context. What is very enjoyable about the book is that Adan does an excellent job holding his readers' hands through the battle, explaining the various doctrines of defense and attack, going into the terrain and how it influenced the battles, and describing almost every detail you can think of in ample — but not overbearing — detail. Being the commander of the division that bore the brunt of the fighting in the Sinai, and a very seasoned commander who had fought since the 1948 War of Independence, he's obviously an expert in his craft and you can tell by how well he explains everything despite, admittedly, his not-always-good writing.
The book also has its fair share of political drama. After the war, there was an investigation into the performance of the Israeli Defense Forces, its leadership, and the country's leadership. A lot of fingers pointed in a lot of directions. Adan's book, and the author is quite open about it, is a defense of the performance of the IDF. Not just that, but Adan often delves into the performance of other commanders, including Generals Gonen (head of Southern Command for the first part of the war) and Sharon. Sharon had his eye on a political career and so many of his actions during the war were political in nature, and it's interesting to read Adan throw so much shade in his direction.
Keep in mind that men like Adan and Sharon had fought in elite units. Adan had fought in the Palmach. Sharon was known for founding Unit 101, a special forces unit. These were alpha men who were at the age of retirement (Adan ought to have retired in October 1973 and Sharon had already retired), and placed under the command of an inexperienced general (Gonen). What do you expect putting men full of themselves under someone who wasn't ready to fight a war like the Yom Kippur War of 1973? Obviously the book is written by Adan, so you get a biased point of view, but that's what makes it interesting.
It makes you think about the context of books like Caesar's history of the Gallic wars. Who were the personalities he was trying to influence against back in Rome?
I also found the discussion on maneuvering after the ceasefire interesting. It provides some insight into the grey zone within the battlefield after a UN-declared ceasefire. What's acceptable? How forceful can your response to enemy shelling be? If the enemy has soldiers to your rear, how is the frontline defined by the ceasefire? Apparently, "mopping up" forces within your lines is okay. Likewise, it was interesting to read about the challenges suffered by a small country like Israel in maintaining its forces during the ceasefire. The bulk of the Israeli army was made up of reservists, so these were people who couldn't work and produce. The economic consequences were severe. All the while, Israel had to maintain its forces on the field to keep the Egyptian Third Army severed and separated from the rest of the Egyptian military.
It was also stimulating to read on how Adan and his commanders evolved their approach against different contingencies. For example, during the days of stalemate and Egyptian probes against the Israeli line in the Sinai, Adan realized that many of his tank forces were away from their frontline positions to resupply and refuel. He found that when platoon commanders withdrew, the other tanks in the platoon would often follow them because they figured they should do what their platoon commander did. So he positioned resupply and repair points closer to their frontline positions, and this approach was ultimately adopted at the battalion level.
On the Banks of the Suez is 99% a military history. Its detail is almost entirely operational. So know that going in. All the same, I think if you like to read about how people think and adapt to changing conditions, this is a great book with a lot of insight.
Adan goes into meticulous detail on the fighting in the Sinai between October 6–24, focusing almost exclusively on his own division although he does at times provide a broader context. What is very enjoyable about the book is that Adan does an excellent job holding his readers' hands through the battle, explaining the various doctrines of defense and attack, going into the terrain and how it influenced the battles, and describing almost every detail you can think of in ample — but not overbearing — detail. Being the commander of the division that bore the brunt of the fighting in the Sinai, and a very seasoned commander who had fought since the 1948 War of Independence, he's obviously an expert in his craft and you can tell by how well he explains everything despite, admittedly, his not-always-good writing.
The book also has its fair share of political drama. After the war, there was an investigation into the performance of the Israeli Defense Forces, its leadership, and the country's leadership. A lot of fingers pointed in a lot of directions. Adan's book, and the author is quite open about it, is a defense of the performance of the IDF. Not just that, but Adan often delves into the performance of other commanders, including Generals Gonen (head of Southern Command for the first part of the war) and Sharon. Sharon had his eye on a political career and so many of his actions during the war were political in nature, and it's interesting to read Adan throw so much shade in his direction.
Keep in mind that men like Adan and Sharon had fought in elite units. Adan had fought in the Palmach. Sharon was known for founding Unit 101, a special forces unit. These were alpha men who were at the age of retirement (Adan ought to have retired in October 1973 and Sharon had already retired), and placed under the command of an inexperienced general (Gonen). What do you expect putting men full of themselves under someone who wasn't ready to fight a war like the Yom Kippur War of 1973? Obviously the book is written by Adan, so you get a biased point of view, but that's what makes it interesting.
It makes you think about the context of books like Caesar's history of the Gallic wars. Who were the personalities he was trying to influence against back in Rome?
I also found the discussion on maneuvering after the ceasefire interesting. It provides some insight into the grey zone within the battlefield after a UN-declared ceasefire. What's acceptable? How forceful can your response to enemy shelling be? If the enemy has soldiers to your rear, how is the frontline defined by the ceasefire? Apparently, "mopping up" forces within your lines is okay. Likewise, it was interesting to read about the challenges suffered by a small country like Israel in maintaining its forces during the ceasefire. The bulk of the Israeli army was made up of reservists, so these were people who couldn't work and produce. The economic consequences were severe. All the while, Israel had to maintain its forces on the field to keep the Egyptian Third Army severed and separated from the rest of the Egyptian military.
It was also stimulating to read on how Adan and his commanders evolved their approach against different contingencies. For example, during the days of stalemate and Egyptian probes against the Israeli line in the Sinai, Adan realized that many of his tank forces were away from their frontline positions to resupply and refuel. He found that when platoon commanders withdrew, the other tanks in the platoon would often follow them because they figured they should do what their platoon commander did. So he positioned resupply and repair points closer to their frontline positions, and this approach was ultimately adopted at the battalion level.
On the Banks of the Suez is 99% a military history. Its detail is almost entirely operational. So know that going in. All the same, I think if you like to read about how people think and adapt to changing conditions, this is a great book with a lot of insight.
January 8, 2024
Read this book a few months ago, but recently reengaged with it for a research paper.
Of the many books and memoirs written in the first decade after the October 1973 Yom Kippur War, this is the best (written in 1980). Exciting, eminently authoritative, accurate, detailed, and deeply insightful on what warfare is like for soldiers and commanders.
Avraham "Bren" Adan was a soldier's soldier. He was handsome, extraordinarily brave, and deeply compassionate towards his men--with whom he shared all the many small and large hardships of warfare. He was a prototypical armor commander, a tanker who loved and believed in the power of the tank, and a consumate military professional who applied himself to his military duty as a student of theory and an innovator of execution.
Banks of the Suez benefits from all Adan's personal strengths of leadership and character, as well as his perspective as one of three primary divisional commanders on the Sinai front. Foremost among those benefits is that this war narrative is fully intelligble, because it tells you who the characters (and their organizations) are, and exactly where they are doing whatever they're doing.
The reader knows who the characters are because the inner cover of the book has an organizational chart of all the Israeli commanders brigade-and-up on the Sinai front--chef's kiss. Like a list of dramatis personae, the reader can easily reference names from Adan's narrative (which is important because the Israeli army most often refered to units by their commander's name, first or last, rather than unit number).
The reader knows exactly where events are happening because this book contains the best maps of any book I have read on the Yom Kippur War. This must be because commanders like Adan, if apparently not historians, know that military conflicts are indecipherable if the reader cannot locate places with precision. Every geographic location, every commander, and every unit that Adan describes appears on a map--Adan's is (embarrassingly) the only Yom Kippur War history to achieve this.
Finally, Adan's narrative is deeply authoritative and insightful because it sticks faithfully to Adan's perspective. Major General Adan describes theater-level strategy as he experienced it when he was in the theater command bunker contributing to how those decisions were made. He describes plans for his division's operations in narrative form, telling the reader how he gathered his brigade commanders on the sand dunes next to his APC, how, kneeling over a paper map at four in the morning after six days of ceaseless fighting, they decided how they were going to flank the Egyptians from the east. He describes how an artillery shell exploded a few meters in front of him, how his driver sounded when he got to speak to his son on the radio for the first time in ten days, and how he felt when he learned a close family friend had been killed.
Adan describes his division's war in the Sinai with detail that only an experienced military professional who was there could. And, because of his position as a divisonal commander, that perspective is so comprehensive that Banks of the Suez really serves as a history of the entire front.
One final note on Banks of the Suez as a "political" memoir: in the Sinai, Israelis were plagued by uncharictaristic and bitter infighting among three or four top military leaders. At the center of these acerbic and unhelpful dynamics was the relationship between the extraordinarily arrogant and self-serving future prime minister Ariel Sharon, and his "boss" who had previously been Sharon's subordinate, the inexperienced and incompetent Shmuel Gonen. This toxic relationship spiraled out to fracture Adan's relationship with both men, and nearly the entire Israeli war effort also. Despite this, Adan's memoir is admirably restrained. He is circumspect and respectful in his criticism of both men, and when he does accuse one of mistakes he provides significant evidence and analysis to explain his point of view. Given the bitter and mortal consequences of their conflict, this book is truly a model of professionalism and restraint.
Overall, I highly, highly recommend this book to anyone interested in the Sinai front of the Yom Kippur War, armored warfare, or leadership generally.
Of the many books and memoirs written in the first decade after the October 1973 Yom Kippur War, this is the best (written in 1980). Exciting, eminently authoritative, accurate, detailed, and deeply insightful on what warfare is like for soldiers and commanders.
Avraham "Bren" Adan was a soldier's soldier. He was handsome, extraordinarily brave, and deeply compassionate towards his men--with whom he shared all the many small and large hardships of warfare. He was a prototypical armor commander, a tanker who loved and believed in the power of the tank, and a consumate military professional who applied himself to his military duty as a student of theory and an innovator of execution.
Banks of the Suez benefits from all Adan's personal strengths of leadership and character, as well as his perspective as one of three primary divisional commanders on the Sinai front. Foremost among those benefits is that this war narrative is fully intelligble, because it tells you who the characters (and their organizations) are, and exactly where they are doing whatever they're doing.
The reader knows who the characters are because the inner cover of the book has an organizational chart of all the Israeli commanders brigade-and-up on the Sinai front--chef's kiss. Like a list of dramatis personae, the reader can easily reference names from Adan's narrative (which is important because the Israeli army most often refered to units by their commander's name, first or last, rather than unit number).
The reader knows exactly where events are happening because this book contains the best maps of any book I have read on the Yom Kippur War. This must be because commanders like Adan, if apparently not historians, know that military conflicts are indecipherable if the reader cannot locate places with precision. Every geographic location, every commander, and every unit that Adan describes appears on a map--Adan's is (embarrassingly) the only Yom Kippur War history to achieve this.
Finally, Adan's narrative is deeply authoritative and insightful because it sticks faithfully to Adan's perspective. Major General Adan describes theater-level strategy as he experienced it when he was in the theater command bunker contributing to how those decisions were made. He describes plans for his division's operations in narrative form, telling the reader how he gathered his brigade commanders on the sand dunes next to his APC, how, kneeling over a paper map at four in the morning after six days of ceaseless fighting, they decided how they were going to flank the Egyptians from the east. He describes how an artillery shell exploded a few meters in front of him, how his driver sounded when he got to speak to his son on the radio for the first time in ten days, and how he felt when he learned a close family friend had been killed.
Adan describes his division's war in the Sinai with detail that only an experienced military professional who was there could. And, because of his position as a divisonal commander, that perspective is so comprehensive that Banks of the Suez really serves as a history of the entire front.
One final note on Banks of the Suez as a "political" memoir: in the Sinai, Israelis were plagued by uncharictaristic and bitter infighting among three or four top military leaders. At the center of these acerbic and unhelpful dynamics was the relationship between the extraordinarily arrogant and self-serving future prime minister Ariel Sharon, and his "boss" who had previously been Sharon's subordinate, the inexperienced and incompetent Shmuel Gonen. This toxic relationship spiraled out to fracture Adan's relationship with both men, and nearly the entire Israeli war effort also. Despite this, Adan's memoir is admirably restrained. He is circumspect and respectful in his criticism of both men, and when he does accuse one of mistakes he provides significant evidence and analysis to explain his point of view. Given the bitter and mortal consequences of their conflict, this book is truly a model of professionalism and restraint.
Overall, I highly, highly recommend this book to anyone interested in the Sinai front of the Yom Kippur War, armored warfare, or leadership generally.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews