2RHPZ
04-19-2005, 11:26 AM
Superpower showdown in the Mediterranean, 1973
by Goldstein, Lyle J, Zhukov, Yuri M
U.S., Soviets Nearly Clash at Sea as Israeli, Arab Forces Slug it Out Ashore
Thirty years ago this month the 1973 Arab-Israeli conflict spawned the most severe naval crisis of the Cold War. On Oct. 24 Soviet leader Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev threatened to enforce a cease-fire through unilateral intervention. By that time Soviet naval forces in the Mediterranean had swelled to 80 ships and counting, including 47 combatants capable of launching at least 40 cruise missiles in a first salvo. Seven airborne divisions in the southern area of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (U.S.S.R.)-a total of 150,000 troops-had also been placed on alert. Adm. Sergei Gorshkov, commander in chief of the Soviet Navy, gave orders for an amphibious troop landing on the east bank of the Suez Canal, where Israeli forces had encircled the Egyptian 3rd Army.
Even after Israeli forces halted their advance the next day, Moscow launched intense anti-carrier exercises in the eastern Mediterranean. Soviet battle groups were using the actual U.S. aircraft carriers in the area as virtual targets, an act comparable to holding a cocked pistol to an adversary's temple. Adhering to a kamikaze-like, "battle of the first salvo" doctrine, the Soviet force of 96 ships was poised to launch approximately 13 surface-to-surface missiles (SSMs) at each task group in the U.S. 6th Fleet deployed in the Mediterranean. U.S. Adm. Elmo Zumwalt, then chief of naval operations, recalled a Washington Special Action Group meeting at the peak of the crisis, during which Adm. Thomas Moorer, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, estimated: "[W]e would lose our [expletive] in the Eastern Med [if war breaks out]."
Until the late 1950s, the U.S.S.R. had no Mediterranean squadron. It maintained only a token presence in the sea until 1967. In the following six years, however, the so-called 5th Eskadra, or squadron, became sufficiently powerful to pose a grave threat to each 6th Fleet task force deployed to the eastern Mediterranean during the October 1973 war.
Newly available evidence from Russia, obtained through cooperation with the Central Naval Museum in St. Petersburg, allows us to reappraise this gravest of Cold War maritime crises. This often forgotten episode of superpower brinksmanship demonstrates that maritime threats from continental powers can emerge quickly, even in theaters of traditional U.S. naval dominance.
Link (http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3738/is_200310/ai_n9325538)
by Goldstein, Lyle J, Zhukov, Yuri M
U.S., Soviets Nearly Clash at Sea as Israeli, Arab Forces Slug it Out Ashore
Thirty years ago this month the 1973 Arab-Israeli conflict spawned the most severe naval crisis of the Cold War. On Oct. 24 Soviet leader Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev threatened to enforce a cease-fire through unilateral intervention. By that time Soviet naval forces in the Mediterranean had swelled to 80 ships and counting, including 47 combatants capable of launching at least 40 cruise missiles in a first salvo. Seven airborne divisions in the southern area of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (U.S.S.R.)-a total of 150,000 troops-had also been placed on alert. Adm. Sergei Gorshkov, commander in chief of the Soviet Navy, gave orders for an amphibious troop landing on the east bank of the Suez Canal, where Israeli forces had encircled the Egyptian 3rd Army.
Even after Israeli forces halted their advance the next day, Moscow launched intense anti-carrier exercises in the eastern Mediterranean. Soviet battle groups were using the actual U.S. aircraft carriers in the area as virtual targets, an act comparable to holding a cocked pistol to an adversary's temple. Adhering to a kamikaze-like, "battle of the first salvo" doctrine, the Soviet force of 96 ships was poised to launch approximately 13 surface-to-surface missiles (SSMs) at each task group in the U.S. 6th Fleet deployed in the Mediterranean. U.S. Adm. Elmo Zumwalt, then chief of naval operations, recalled a Washington Special Action Group meeting at the peak of the crisis, during which Adm. Thomas Moorer, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, estimated: "[W]e would lose our [expletive] in the Eastern Med [if war breaks out]."
Until the late 1950s, the U.S.S.R. had no Mediterranean squadron. It maintained only a token presence in the sea until 1967. In the following six years, however, the so-called 5th Eskadra, or squadron, became sufficiently powerful to pose a grave threat to each 6th Fleet task force deployed to the eastern Mediterranean during the October 1973 war.
Newly available evidence from Russia, obtained through cooperation with the Central Naval Museum in St. Petersburg, allows us to reappraise this gravest of Cold War maritime crises. This often forgotten episode of superpower brinksmanship demonstrates that maritime threats from continental powers can emerge quickly, even in theaters of traditional U.S. naval dominance.
Link (http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3738/is_200310/ai_n9325538)