Golan Heights: Israel’s Legendary Tank Defence Against Syria | Greatest Tank Battles | War Stories
Israel’s Legendary Tank Defence Against Syria | Greatest Tank Battles | War Stories In 1973, this rocky terrain on the Israeli-Syrian border turns into a killing ground.
– The Golan Heights is Syrian territory.
(artillery booming) (explosions booming) And Syria, cannot, will not concede it.
(artillery booming) – A few hundred unprepared Israeli tankers come face to face with 12,000 Syrian tanks.
(artillery booming) – All I see, from horizon to horizon, the entire Syrian Army starts to drive across from me.
(artillery booming) (explosions booming) – This was a no-holds-barred fight, and neither side backed down from it.
– The Golan Heights, 12,000 square kilometers of the most hotly contested real estate on the planet.
(artillery booming) (explosions booming) – It’s inconceivable.
It’s an inferno.
(artillery booming) (explosions booming) (dramatic music) (artillery booming) (tense music) – The Golan Heights, 12,000 square kilometers of the most hotly contested real estate on the planet.
It’s a barren volcanic escarpment that has been occupied by Israel since the Six-Day Arab-Israeli War of 1967.
Both Israel and Syria claim it as their own.
In the fall of 1973, that border dispute erupts into a sudden, ferocious, and bloody war.
October 6th.
It’s Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement.
Most Israelis are at home repenting for their sins and observing a fast, leaving the frontier of Syria lightly guarded.
The commander of the 74th Israeli Tank Battalion, Lieutenant Colonel Yair Nafshi, begins a routine patrol.
– It was simply to restore peacefulness, and I’m patrolling the positions along my front.
At 12, a commander from the Hermon post calls me and he says, “Yair, the Syrians are taking off “their camouflage nets from their artillery.
” (suspenseful music) And then I act instinctively.
So I turn my jeep around, gather all my men, and say to them, “Look, the scenario is that the Syrian Army “is removing their camouflage screens.
“I don’t know what this means.
” (suspenseful music) And the men stop fasting, mount their tanks, and start to prepare them.
And as we are driving from the lots, the bombardment starts.
(explosions booming) The artillery lands on us, then planes of the Syrian Air Force attack.
(airplane engines roaring) – The Syrians have been planning the attack for nine months.
Israeli intelligence had some clues, but for the men on the front, it’s a complete surprise.
– What the Syrians do, is lull Israel into a false sense of security.
The Israelis have seen the Syrians move all their troops up, get geared up for war, time and again, only to have them all go back to their bases.
And, so, on the 6th of October, when the Syrians don’t go back to their bases, the Israelis are caught completely off guard.
– Israel is a small state.
But they have perfected the art of mobilization.
So it is in the first shots of the war they sought to accomplish as much as possible so as not to bring the bulk of the Israeli Army against you.
(tanks rumbles) (suspenseful music) – The majority of the Israeli forces are reservists who need 20 hours to fully mobilize.
Consequently, Israeli forces on the Golan Height consists of fewer than 6,000 light infantry, 60 artillery pieces, and two under-strength armored brigades with 170 tanks.
In comparison, the Syrians have massed more than 50,000 infantry, 600 artillery pieces, and 1,200 main battle tanks.
(suspenseful music) – This is a huge amount of armor.
And over and above that it was Yom Kippur in Israel.
People were on holiday.
The intelligence services in Israel were lax.
“The Arabs can’t fight.
” And so, as a result, they were in for a very major surprise.
(dramatic music) – I thought to myself, “What’s going on?
” “Who are those pilot?
Crazy pilot, what they are doing?
” And I thought this is Israeli by mistake that are bombing us.
I didn’t realize that in any (indistinct) from Syria can come across the border and start to bomb us.
(explosions booming) And they couldn’t talk after that.
(explosions booming) – I cross through the barrage of shells.
Wave after wave.
(explosions booming) Five minutes, I am finally at the edge of Booster Ridge, viewing over half the Golan Heights.
(dramatic music) At first, it’s small.
And then, like rings of cigarette smoke, it slowly gets closer, bigger and bigger.
(tanks rattling) (suspenseful music) All I see, from horizon to horizon, the entire Syrian Army starts to drive across from me.
– But this is only part of a much larger war.
Egypt and Syria have launched simultaneous attacks on two fronts, splitting Israeli Defense Forces.
Their mission?
To take back territory lost during the Six-Day Arab-Israeli War, including the Sinai and the Golan Heights.
– The Syrian Baltic politic was humiliated, was traumatized.
It is as a result of this that we have the 1973 war.
A war that was made specifically in order to regain this territory that Israel occupied.
(dramatic music) – Over the course of time they developed a campaign plan that was specifically tailored to retake the Golan and repair Syria’s tarnished honor.
– The Syrian battle plan is to use overwhelming force and penetrate the Israeli line at two points.
Then send armored divisions through the gaps to advance across the Golan plateau and seize key bridges over the Jordan River.
(dramatic music) At the spearhead of the Syrian attack are masses of a Soviet-designed T-55 tank.
(bright music) The T-55, at 40 tons, is relatively small for a main battle tank making it hard to hit.
(dramatic music) Its 100-millimeter main cannon has an effective range of just 2,400 meters.
No match for the bigger guns of the Israelis.
But that disadvantage is offset by numbers.
The Syrians attack the Golan Heights with more than 1,200 T-55s.
The defending Israelis with their 170 tanks are outnumbered almost seven to one.
– The Syrians have rehearsed the initial attack on the Israeli positions countless times before that.
But apparently, one thing that they hadn’t quite planned out properly was where to put the bridging equipment.
The Israelis had built a deep anti-tank trench in front of their positions all along the Golan front.
But the Syrians had put their bridging equipment far back in their columns.
And as a result the first thing that happened was you had Syrian tankers who bizarrely drove straight at the Israelis, drove right into the tank ditch, and as a result were picked off like sitting ducks by Israeli tankers sitting up on the Heights overlooking this anti-tank trench.
(dramatic music) – For the Israelis, the tank of choice on the rocky terrain of the Golan, is the Sho’t Kal, an upgraded version of the Centurion main battle tank.
It’s protected by 152 millimeters of frontal armor and equipped with a 105 millimeters rifle cannon, accurate at ranges in excess of 3,600 meters.
The Sho’t Kal is a formidable opponent to the Syrian’s T-55s.
(dramatic music) – When David goes out to fight Goliath, he made the decision to fight him with a slingshot.
And he knew he could defeat Goliath because he won’t enter in range of Goliath’s weapons.
(suspenseful music) And from outside that range, he hits him with a rock and knocks him over.
I am going to be David.
(dramatic music) The Syrians don’t open fire from ranges further than 2,200 meters.
But I, in all my training, can fire and hit targets at about five kilometers.
(dramatic music) (explosion booming) (tanks rumbling) – Israelis understood that in the terrain of the Middle East, where you often had very long fields of fire, being able to kill the other guy before he could kill you was a tremendous advantage.
(explosion booming) And so the Israelis had put a tremendous amount of effort into developing long-range gunnery skills.
(suspenseful music) (explosions booming) (suspenseful music) When the initial Syrian attack in the north floundered, the commanders decided that they would nevertheless try to mount some kind of a night operation to see if they couldn’t get back on schedule.
And so they pushed forward in the darkness.
And at that moment, they had a tremendous advantage.
The Syrian tanks had Soviet night fighting equipment.
The Israelis didn’t.
And as a result, when the Syrians began to push into their lines, the Israelis were at a complete loss as to what to do or how to do it.
(dramatic music) – The hardest comeback was during the night.
It was dark and nobody used any lights.
When you turn on the light, immediately they’ll kill you.
(suspenseful music) (flares whooshing) Really the main problem is during the night they had infrared systems.
– Syrian infrared projectors enabled the T-55s to see through the dark, detecting targets up to 1,200 meters away.
It’s a huge advantage for the Syrians.
The only defense the Israelis have are night vision binoculars that can detect the infrared beam.
– In one situation I was looking to identify them.
And I moved my face down and I saw all the parts of my tank.
I was surprised it was dark.
I moved my binoculars and it’s dark.
I put it again in my face, I see every part.
And I found 200 meter in front of me one projector looked straight to my eyes with the infrared system.
And he identified me.
He was ready to shoot.
(suspenseful music) I scream to my driver, go far away and we move back.
(artillery booming) We shot in the direction they came from just to give them the feeling that we are there waiting for them.
They didn’t know that we are blind.
(suspenseful music) – The Syrians infiltrate Israeli positions through the night and the line between the two tank armies becomes increasingly blurred.
– After observation I saw a tank beside my tank.
10 meter.
This tank looks strange and the stoplight is turned on.
(suspenseful music) It was the platoon leader.
He was close to my tanks.
I said, there is a tank there, use the light, and show me who is this tank.
He didn’t want us, of course, and I convince him.
I order him.
And he put the lights and I saw the 55.
I was in shock.
Of course, I shot him.
(suspenseful music) (explosion booming) From it, when he was on fire, I saw another tank close to me.
I shot him too.
(explosion booming) – After 18 hours of almost continuous combat, the tankers of the 77th and 74th Israeli Battalions have held the line in the North Golan Heights and paid a terrible price.
Hundreds of dead and wounded and 75 of their tanks destroyed.
But for the Syrians, the price is even higher.
The casualties number in the thousands and more than 100 tanks are lost.
(dramatic music) But in the open terrain further south, the Syrian offensive has been far more successful.
They’ve wiped out an entire tank battalion, clearing the way for a push into the Israeli heartland.
– Of course, I was as euphoric as all Arabs were to see images Of Syria advancing into Golan Heights.
(explosions booming) – The future, not just of Israel, but of the whole Middle East, now hangs in the balance.
(dramatic suspenseful music) – October 6th, 1973.
Egypt and Syria attack Israeli forces on two fronts.
(explosion booming) They’re determined to take back all the territory they lost in the Six-Day War of 1967.
(explosions booming) Syrian armored brigades strike at two points on the Golan Heights, throwing 50,000 infantry and 12,000 tanks into the battle.
In the rugged and killing northern sector, Israeli defenders hold the line through the first day of fighting even though they’re outnumbered almost seven to one and take heavy casualties.
But in the more open country further south, the Syrians seem unstoppable.
(explosions booming) – In the south you had two very aggressive Syrian commanders.
They dragged their bridging equipment forward, one of their commanders actually had his infantry fill in portions of the Israeli anti-tank trench by hand.
They crossed over and they were able to mass so much power against these thinned-out Israeli defenses in the southern flank of the Golan that they were able to punch through.
– October 7th.
After a day of fierce fighting, the Israeli southern line falls apart under a massive onslaught of Syrian armor.
By 8:00 a.
m., Syrian forces are advancing across the Golan plateau, driving towards key bridges crossing the Jordan River.
(dramatic music) – The Syrian assumption was that if they could punch through those Israeli lines and drive as fast as they could, grab those bridges, they would effectively be able to prevent the Israeli reserves from mounting a viable counter-attack out of Galilee.
(alarm blaring) (people screaming) – At two o’clock when I heard the alarm, I immediately opened the video.
I heard the BBC announcing that the war started in Israel.
– A heavy battle of armored forces is continuing on the Golan Heights as Syrian armor has been attempting to break the Israeli line and has according to the news here, been checked by Israeli tanks and artillery.
– I called my unit brigade and they told me come immediately there is a war.
The road was empty, I drove like hell.
And the feeling was that they caught us unprepared.
(dramatic music) (people shouting) (Yehuda speaking in foreign language) – In ’73, the tanks were bare of ammunition and equipment.
They had to be loaded with shells and all of the equipment taken out of storage and organized.
– If you have the full call, which are four members, it takes something like four to six hours to prepare it really properly.
But during the rush time, we didn’t really prepare totally the tanks.
– Everybody went to the Golan Heights, doesn’t matter how many tanks he had, if the tanks are completely equipped or not.
They just went.
(dramatic music) – Syrian intelligence estimate it will take Israel 20 hours to mobilize its tank reserves.
But the Israelis do it in 10.
Throughout the night, Israeli reservists make their way to the battlefield, are hastily organized into units, and thrown into the fight against the Syrians.
By the early hours of October 7th, the first tanks reach the Golan Heights.
(Yehuda speaking in foreign language) – In the early morning we advanced towards the enemy already inside the Golan Heights.
(dramatic music) Dawn was beginning to break and I saw lots of tanks.
A mask of sorts came down.
Now we have to do what is necessary.
You don’t think about it too much.
(artillery booming) We opened fire on them but directional alignments are required to measure the barrel of the cannon to the cross of the telescope.
But we didn’t do this because of our hurried exit.
(explosion booming) We didn’t hit them.
It is possible to make better time alignments.
But this is a lot less precise.
But it’s better than nothing.
(dramatic music) We hit a few tanks.
(explosions booming) But not long after this, I saw a very large cloud of dust coming from the southeast.
And when this cloud get closer, it turns out that it was a very large Syrian force with T-62 tanks.
(dramatic music) – It’s the last thing the outnumbered Israelis want to see on the battlefield.
The T-62 is an upgraded version of the T-55.
Those upgrades include 240 millimeters of frontal armor and a bigger 581 horsepower engine.
But the biggest threat is the T-62’s 115 millimeter Molot main cannon.
Its smooth bore design increases muzzle velocity, giving it a range of nearly 3,000 meters.
(explosion booming) (suspenseful music) (Yehuda speaking in foreign language) – And then I honestly started to feel that I was being targeted and shells are falling beside me or behind me.
(explosions booming) And if the first one is long, the next shell will be short.
And then the next will hit me.
So I reverse off the firing ramp and look for a new position.
(explosions booming) We started the battle with maybe five or six tanks against this very large Syrian force.
(explosions booming) All that was left for us to do, was try to fight a stalling battle but they simply pushed us backward.
(tanks rumbling) (explosions booming) – It’s overwhelming.
Four Syrian brigades, 350 tanks, push through Israeli defenders and advance towards the bridges over the Jordan River.
– Before dark, both of them run into very small groups of Israeli infantry.
And even though at this point in time they’re only a couple of kilometers from their objectives, both brigade commanders decide to stop for the evening and with almost nothing standing in their way.
The bridges were sitting there.
They were theirs for the Syrians’ taking.
When they woke up the next morning, they found strong Israeli forces guarding those two bridges.
(dramatic music) – My battalion meet them on the hold from the Beka’a Valley up to the Golan Heights.
(suspenseful music) The first tanks in our column, they didn’t see them.
Only the last tank saw them and he began to shoot.
(explosions booming) The commander shouted at him.
Why are you shooting?
We are in our territory.
He said there’s the Syrians over the hill.
We didn’t believe that they arrive so west.
Their problem was that the T-55 have only five degrees of degradation.
– That means the cannon can’t be aimed very far down.
It’s a disadvantage for a tank on higher ground engaging an enemy approaching from below.
(explosions booming) Beyond that, the Israeli Sho’t Kals have a high degree of elevation making it easier to hit targets above them.
(explosions booming) – They had to expose themselves if they wanted to have enough degradation to shoot at us.
So, when they expose themselves, we shoot them.
(explosions booming) So by that way we succeed to stop them.
(suspenseful music) – The real problem there was simply Syrian junior officers allow small Israeli forces to completely derail the one thing that might have actually secured victory for Syria, the drive to take the Jordan River bridges.
– Israeli reserves from the 39th Battalion stop the Syrian 1st Armored Division at Beka’a Road.
(suspenseful music) But further south, the Syrian offensive remains unopposed as 40 tanks of the 132nd Mechanized Brigade advance towards the small village of El Al.
(Yossi speaking in foreign language) – I received orders to descend to El Al and fill up what is known as the El Al position.
(tanks rumbling) (dramatic music) It’s a position between two deep canyons about two kilometers wide.
He who possesses it, and successfully holds the position, controls all the routes down to the Sea of Galilee.
(tanks rumbling) At around nine o’clock, through my binoculars, I start to identify what we in the armored called masses of dust.
This means that you can see the clouds of dust far before you hear the noise.
And through the binoculars, I notice some movement from a distance of about four kilometers.
– That movement in the distance is an entire brigade of Syrian tanks.
(dramatic music) Their mission is to occupy the western edge of the Golan Heights overlooking the Sea of Galilee.
From here the flat lands of Israel lie almost undefended and at the mercy of the advancing Syrians.
(Yossi speaking in foreign language) – If they are successful and pass us, the Syrians will be at the Sea of Galilee.
And I understand that a loss or even a retreat is not mine alone.
It would be fatal.
(tanks rumbling) (dramatic music) – October 7th, 1973.
It is 20 hours into the Syrian attack on the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.
(explosions booming) And in the rugged and rocky northern sector, two Israeli tank units struggle to hold off the Syrians.
(explosions booming) But in the flatter terrain of the southern Golan, masses of Syrian armor have rolled over the Israelis and are pushing on towards bridges over the Jordan River.
(Yossi speaking in foreign language) – At around nine o’clock, through my binoculars, I start to identify what we in the armored called masses of dust.
This movement ahead becomes clearer and clearer and then we start to identify Syrian tanks.
They are getting closer and are stopping at distances of about 1,500 meters and we start to notice a lot of strikes.
(explosions booming) At the plateau of El Al it’s absolutely flat.
It’s as if they put the tanks on a billiard table and said, “Please, go ahead and play now.
” You can see huge distances, there is nowhere to hide.
And the only thing that can save you is your own capability.
Your own skill and to always be on the move.
(dramatic music) I always make sure that the tank are always moving and not firing more than what’s called a ball to the target which is just two or three shells, one after the other.
We fire one and then adjust.
We fire another and then move to another position.
In order to get a target, you’d have to stop and stand.
Then you bring the turret to a point where it is in line with the enemy tank.
You give the range according to your estimation.
When everyone announces on, I give the command to fire.
(explosion booming) – The Israelis, for their part, maneuvered constantly.
They darted from firing position to firing position.
Most Syrian armored units didn’t maneuver at all.
They simply drove straight at the Israelis.
– And so this is really the big difference between the Syrian and Israeli Army.
The Syrians, when they gain territory, they had gone to the depth which might be good, but is very bad if you need to maneuver.
(explosion booming) – The simple fact is that the Syrian tankers are just no match for the Israeli counterparts.
The Israelis have taken the best shots that Syria has to give and they are now in a position with enough combat strength that they can begin to push back.
– So we started to move unit by unit and I found myself alone in the mountain area.
There was two hills and I was in the cradle of the hills overlooking Hushniya Village.
I saw the regiment getting fueled or rearmed and so on.
And I started to shoot at him.
(explosions booming) And I saw something back there in the hills.
(explosions booming) And I started to hit them one by one because they were standing one next to the other, very, very close.
(dramatic music) – The Syrian tanks are sitting ducks for the Israelis’ Highly Explosive Squash Head or HESH round.
On impact, they squash against the target and explode.
(explosions booming) Creating a shock wave that tears apart the inside of the tank.
– I think I destroy something like seven times before they started to move and to understand that someone is shooting at them.
They shot back.
(explosions booming) Our tank started to burn.
As we evacuate from the tank, after a few meters we heard our tank exploded.
(explosions booming) (dramatic music) (fire crackling) – The outnumbered Israelis fall back and regroup and the Syrians gear up for a final big offensive.
(suspenseful music) By late evening on the 8th of October, they’ve assembled an entire armored division, over 250 tanks in Hushniya.
A tiny hamlet in the south Golan, which is about to become ground zero, in one of history’s greatest tank battles.
(eerie music) (fire crackling) (mournful music) – Hushniya, once a thriving village in the southern Golan Heights, today it’s a scattered collection of ruins.
A grim monument to the ferocity of the 1973 Arab-Israeli war.
Syrian and Israeli tank forces clashed here in an historic encounter, now simply remembered as the battle of Hushniya.
October 9th.
The Syrian advance into the Golan loses steam.
And they assemble an armored division, over 250 tanks at Hushniya in preparation for a final big offensive.
But in the three days, since Syrian attacks on the Golan Heights began, the Israelis have mobilized hundreds of tanks and thousands of reserve soldiers.
Most of them stream towards Hushniya, for a showdown with the Syrians.
– I received an order to cross the oil pipeline and advance and capture Hushniya.
The Syrians held this place as their last stronghold on the Golan Heights.
And for the first time since the war began, there was a plan for an organized attack with artillery and jets.
The artillery started falling on Hushniya.
(explosions booming) And we, in two squads of tanks, started to advance crossing the territory from the oil line towards the village of Hushniya.
It’s dusk, the last light and you can see the entire village blazing, exploding, and the mosque of Hushniya in the middle of this whole thing.
(explosions booming) (dramatic music) We advance with the tanks and the Syrians didn’t escape.
But it’s dangerous because everything is exploding and blazing around us.
It’s Dante.
It’s inconceivable.
It’s an inferno.
And then, from within the village, out burst Syrian tanks and trucks.
They are terrified, trying to escape.
And I see a Syrian tank and it isn’t clear if it is able to get out.
But then, its turret starts moving in my direction.
But my cannon and my turret are further away.
And it’s completely clear that I won’t be able to target him.
He’s going to get a bead on me first and if he does, then I’m a goner.
(suspenseful music) Behind me is one of my battalion officers and he launches a shell and the Syrian tank lights up.
(explosions booming) They are difficult displays to describe.
But the Syrians ran for their lives.
– The Israeli reserves destroy more than 200 tanks, stalling the Syrians big push.
By the afternoon of October 9th, the Israelis have retaken most of the southern Golan.
But on the northern front, they are still struggling to hold off Syrian forces in a place that will soon become known as the Valley of Tears.
– In the north, the remnants of the elite 7th Armored Brigade are still just barely holding back the Syrian 7th Infantry Division.
Syrians tried one last time to blast through the Israeli positions.
They’ve got 200 tanks, half of them T-62s, and the Israelis are down to less than 30 Centurions.
(suspenseful music) (man speaking in foreign language) – They are currently located at the positions that control the Valley of Tears, which we see here in front of us.
And when I arrive from Booster Ridge with six tanks, I realize that I am not going to make it to these positions, which are the best ones and cover the entire width of the Valley of Tears.
(dramatic music) By now unit 7 has retreated back and I find myself alone with six tanks.
And I decide to make a defensive stand on the reverse slope.
(dramatic music) And I stop the six tanks and spread them out along the back slope of the hill that is located behind us.
(dramatic music) And I see the smoke from the exhaust of the Syrian tanks over the hill.
And I tell my men, you see those moving on the other side of the hill?
You, take those three.
You, these two.
You, these three.
And I let the Syrians come right over the hill.
I allow the Syrians to advance and they head towards the top of the hill with the barrel of the cannons pointed upwards.
And I wait for them.
(dramatic music) The battle opens at close range, 300 to 400 meters.
(explosions booming) (suspenseful music) And we stop their advance towards the main road.
But in this battle, after we stop the Syrian army, with had only two tanks left.
(dramatic music) On this side, at the foot of Mount Hermonit, you can see today the same famous valley where the commander of the 77th Battalion, Colonel Kahalani, stood and blocked the Syrian advance through this valley.
(explosions booming) – When I came two kilometers from the hills, he’s so far away.
Israeli tanks on fire.
And other tanks around them were Soviet tanks.
And I move my tanks to the valley.
I was shocked.
I called my commander and said if you have any tanks in the area send them immediately.
(dramatic music) (dramatic music) – October 9th, 1973.
Israeli and Syrian tank forces have been fighting on the Golan Heights for three days with heavy casualties on both sides.
The Syrians outnumber the Israelis and quickly gain the upper hand.
But the Israelis push back with their reserve forces.
Now time is running out for the Syrian army.
They make one last attempt to break through Israeli defenses in the north, throwing an entire armored division into the battle.
– They’ve got 200 tanks, half of them T-62s, and the Israelis are down to less than 30 Centurions.
(tank rumbling) – I knew the main forces is just behind the hill.
If they will come to the top of the hills, nobody can stop them.
They will run all the way to the Galilee.
And I have decided to move forward and to catch the hills and to catch them on the valley.
– It’s a desperate gamble and the only chance the Israelis have.
They must regain their firing positions.
And to do that, they have to cross 800 meters of open ground in the teeth of Syrian fire.
(tanks rumbling) – I ordered to move forward like it was written in the book.
(man speaking in foreign language) Nobody moved.
And I’ve decided to move all of them to my frequency, to my radio.
Every cannon loader, driver and tank commander started listening to my voice.
And I told them, “Look, the Syrian soldiers, how they’re fighting so well.
Look at them.
” (explosions booming) “The motivation of them, what happened to us?
Am I see chicken in my unit?
Start to move!
” (suspenseful music) And I started to move.
Soon another tank join me, and another tank join me.
And I prayed to the God just give me to arrived to the top of the hill and we will catch them.
And suddenly another tank’s arrived to the hills.
(explosions booming) And we arrived.
(dramatic music) The valley was dark with tanks.
And we shot like crazy.
(explosions booming) (dramatic music) The moment that we been on the firing position, and they move on the valley.
This was easier for us to shoot all of them.
(explosions booming) (dramatic music) I fought to survive.
Some of them, they stopped and take shot.
They killed my tanks.
(dramatic music) (explosions booming) So I have around three, four tanks no more than that.
I remember that I was tried to count the tank that we shot all over.
And I couldn’t.
There was so many.
(dramatic music) (explosions booming) – After the battle Israeli observers counted 500 Syrian tanks destroyed in that defile.
And as a result, it came to be called the Valley of Tears, for all of the Syrians killed there.
– Syria’s hope of retaking the Golan Heights ends in the Valley of Tears.
On October 11th, the Israelis launch their own offensive into Syria.
And on the 23rd, the Syrians capitulate.
(dramatic music) (people chattering) The battle for the Golan Heights is finally over.
– This was simply competent Israeli commanders out-thinking, out-moving, out-fighting their Syrian opponents.
But there’s no question that the Syrians fought incredibly hard.
They mounted attack after attack after attack, into the teeth of ferocious Israeli defenses.
In many cases, they died to a man.
This was a no-holds barred fight and neither side backed down from it.
(somber music) – The 1973 Arab-Israeli War lasts just 16 days.
But those days are among the bloodiest in the history of armored warfare.
The battlefields are left littered with the hulks of destroyed tanks.
The Israelis lose between four and 500.
The two Arab countries somewhere between 12 and 2,200.
(explosions booming) But the real tragedy is in the human cost on both sides.
21,000 dead and tens of thousands more wounded.
– Most of my friend I lost during the wars.
They were 19, 20 years old.
No more than that.
And I saw them out there, how they’d fight.
And it’s unbelievable.
I was very proud.
(explosion booming) – The war ended with disappointment but it ended with a solemn promise by Syrians and to Syrians and of Syrians that they will get back the Golan Heights one day.
(somber music) If the Golan Heights is not returned to Syria, I dare say there will not be peace in the Middle East.
(dramatic music) (dramatic music) (tanks rumbling) – The Golan Heights.
In 1973, this rocky terrain on the Israeli-Syrian border turns into a killing ground.
– The Golan Heights is Syrian territory.
(artillery booming) (explosions booming) And Syria, cannot, will not concede it.
(artillery booming) – A few hundred unprepared Israeli tankers come face to face with 12,000 Syrian tanks.
(artillery booming) – All I see, from horizon to horizon, the entire Syrian Army starts to drive across from me.
(artillery booming) (explosions booming) – This was a no-holds-barred fight, and neither side backed down from it.
– The Golan Heights, 12,000 square kilometers of the most hotly contested real estate on the planet.
(artillery booming) (explosions booming) – It’s inconceivable.
It’s an inferno.
(artillery booming) (explosions booming) (dramatic music) (artillery booming) (tense music) – The Golan Heights, 12,000 square kilometers of the most hotly contested real estate on the planet.
It’s a barren volcanic escarpment that has been occupied by Israel since the Six-Day Arab-Israeli War of 1967.
Both Israel and Syria claim it as their own.
In the fall of 1973, that border dispute erupts into a sudden, ferocious, and bloody war.
October 6th.
It’s Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement.
Most Israelis are at home repenting for their sins and observing a fast, leaving the frontier of Syria lightly guarded.
The commander of the 74th Israeli Tank Battalion, Lieutenant Colonel Yair Nafshi, begins a routine patrol.
– It was simply to restore peacefulness, and I’m patrolling the positions along my front.
At 12, a commander from the Hermon post calls me and he says, “Yair, the Syrians are taking off “their camouflage nets from their artillery.
” (suspenseful music) And then I act instinctively.
So I turn my jeep around, gather all my men, and say to them, “Look, the scenario is that the Syrian Army “is removing their camouflage screens.
“I don’t know what this means.
” (suspenseful music) And the men stop fasting, mount their tanks, and start to prepare them.
And as we are driving from the lots, the bombardment starts.
(explosions booming) The artillery lands on us, then planes of the Syrian Air Force attack.
(airplane engines roaring) – The Syrians have been planning the attack for nine months.
Israeli intelligence had some clues, but for the men on the front, it’s a complete surprise.
– What the Syrians do, is lull Israel into a false sense of security.
The Israelis have seen the Syrians move all their troops up, get geared up for war, time and again, only to have them all go back to their bases.
And, so, on the 6th of October, when the Syrians don’t go back to their bases, the Israelis are caught completely off guard.
– Israel is a small state.
But they have perfected the art of mobilization.
So it is in the first shots of the war they sought to accomplish as much as possible so as not to bring the bulk of the Israeli Army against you.
(tanks rumbles) (suspenseful music) – The majority of the Israeli forces are reservists who need 20 hours to fully mobilize.
Consequently, Israeli forces on the Golan Height consists of fewer than 6,000 light infantry, 60 artillery pieces, and two under-strength armored brigades with 170 tanks.
In comparison, the Syrians have massed more than 50,000 infantry, 600 artillery pieces, and 1,200 main battle tanks.
(suspenseful music) – This is a huge amount of armor.
And over and above that it was Yom Kippur in Israel.
People were on holiday.
The intelligence services in Israel were lax.
“The Arabs can’t fight.
” And so, as a result, they were in for a very major surprise.
(dramatic music) – I thought to myself, “What’s going on?
” “Who are those pilot?
Crazy pilot, what they are doing?
” And I thought this is Israeli by mistake that are bombing us.
I didn’t realize that in any (indistinct) from Syria can come across the border and start to bomb us.
(explosions booming) And they couldn’t talk after that.
(explosions booming) – I cross through the barrage of shells.
Wave after wave.
(explosions booming) Five minutes, I am finally at the edge of Booster Ridge, viewing over half the Golan Heights.
(dramatic music) At first, it’s small.
And then, like rings of cigarette smoke, it slowly gets closer, bigger and bigger.
(tanks rattling) (suspenseful music) All I see, from horizon to horizon, the entire Syrian Army starts to drive across from me.
– But this is only part of a much larger war.
Egypt and Syria have launched simultaneous attacks on two fronts, splitting Israeli Defense Forces.
Their mission?
To take back territory lost during the Six-Day Arab-Israeli War, including the Sinai and the Golan Heights.
– The Syrian Baltic politic was humiliated, was traumatized.
It is as a result of this that we have the 1973 war.
A war that was made specifically in order to regain this territory that Israel occupied.
(dramatic music) – Over the course of time they developed a campaign plan that was specifically tailored to retake the Golan and repair Syria’s tarnished honor.
– The Syrian battle plan is to use overwhelming force and penetrate the Israeli line at two points.
Then send armored divisions through the gaps to advance across the Golan plateau and seize key bridges over the Jordan River.
(dramatic music) At the spearhead of the Syrian attack are masses of a Soviet-designed T-55 tank.
(bright music) The T-55, at 40 tons, is relatively small for a main battle tank making it hard to hit.
(dramatic music) Its 100-millimeter main cannon has an effective range of just 2,400 meters.
No match for the bigger guns of the Israelis.
But that disadvantage is offset by numbers.
The Syrians attack the Golan Heights with more than 1,200 T-55s.
The defending Israelis with their 170 tanks are outnumbered almost seven to one.
– The Syrians have rehearsed the initial attack on the Israeli positions countless times before that.
But apparently, one thing that they hadn’t quite planned out properly was where to put the bridging equipment.
The Israelis had built a deep anti-tank trench in front of their positions all along the Golan front.
But the Syrians had put their bridging equipment far back in their columns.
And as a result the first thing that happened was you had Syrian tankers who bizarrely drove straight at the Israelis, drove right into the tank ditch, and as a result were picked off like sitting ducks by Israeli tankers sitting up on the Heights overlooking this anti-tank trench.
(dramatic music) – For the Israelis, the tank of choice on the rocky terrain of the Golan, is the Sho’t Kal, an upgraded version of the Centurion main battle tank.
It’s protected by 152 millimeters of frontal armor and equipped with a 105 millimeters rifle cannon, accurate at ranges in excess of 3,600 meters.
The Sho’t Kal is a formidable opponent to the Syrian’s T-55s.
(dramatic music) – When David goes out to fight Goliath, he made the decision to fight him with a slingshot.
And he knew he could defeat Goliath because he won’t enter in range of Goliath’s weapons.
(suspenseful music) And from outside that range, he hits him with a rock and knocks him over.
I am going to be David.
(dramatic music) The Syrians don’t open fire from ranges further than 2,200 meters.
But I, in all my training, can fire and hit targets at about five kilometers.
(dramatic music) (explosion booming) (tanks rumbling) – Israelis understood that in the terrain of the Middle East, where you often had very long fields of fire, being able to kill the other guy before he could kill you was a tremendous advantage.
(explosion booming) And so the Israelis had put a tremendous amount of effort into developing long-range gunnery skills.
(suspenseful music) (explosions booming) (suspenseful music) When the initial Syrian attack in the north floundered, the commanders decided that they would nevertheless try to mount some kind of a night operation to see if they couldn’t get back on schedule.
And so they pushed forward in the darkness.
And at that moment, they had a tremendous advantage.
The Syrian tanks had Soviet night fighting equipment.
The Israelis didn’t.
And as a result, when the Syrians began to push into their lines, the Israelis were at a complete loss as to what to do or how to do it.
(dramatic music) – The hardest comeback was during the night.
It was dark and nobody used any lights.
When you turn on the light, immediately they’ll kill you.
(suspenseful music) (flares whooshing) Really the main problem is during the night they had infrared systems.
– Syrian infrared projectors enabled the T-55s to see through the dark, detecting targets up to 1,200 meters away.
It’s a huge advantage for the Syrians.
The only defense the Israelis have are night vision binoculars that can detect the infrared beam.
– In one situation I was looking to identify them.
And I moved my face down and I saw all the parts of my tank.
I was surprised it was dark.
I moved my binoculars and it’s dark.
I put it again in my face, I see every part.
And I found 200 meter in front of me one projector looked straight to my eyes with the infrared system.
And he identified me.
He was ready to shoot.
(suspenseful music) I scream to my driver, go far away and we move back.
(artillery booming) We shot in the direction they came from just to give them the feeling that we are there waiting for them.
They didn’t know that we are blind.
(suspenseful music) – The Syrians infiltrate Israeli positions through the night and the line between the two tank armies becomes increasingly blurred.
– After observation I saw a tank beside my tank.
10 meter.
This tank looks strange and the stoplight is turned on.
(suspenseful music) It was the platoon leader.
He was close to my tanks.
I said, there is a tank there, use the light, and show me who is this tank.
He didn’t want us, of course, and I convince him.
I order him.
And he put the lights and I saw the 55.
I was in shock.
Of course, I shot him.
(suspenseful music) (explosion booming) From it, when he was on fire, I saw another tank close to me.
I shot him too.
(explosion booming) – After 18 hours of almost continuous combat, the tankers of the 77th and 74th Israeli Battalions have held the line in the North Golan Heights and paid a terrible price.
Hundreds of dead and wounded and 75 of their tanks destroyed.
But for the Syrians, the price is even higher.
The casualties number in the thousands and more than 100 tanks are lost.
(dramatic music) But in the open terrain further south, the Syrian offensive has been far more successful.
They’ve wiped out an entire tank battalion, clearing the way for a push into the Israeli heartland.
– Of course, I was as euphoric as all Arabs were to see images Of Syria advancing into Golan Heights.
(explosions booming) – The future, not just of Israel, but of the whole Middle East, now hangs in the balance.
(dramatic suspenseful music) – October 6th, 1973.
Egypt and Syria attack Israeli forces on two fronts.
(explosion booming) They’re determined to take back all the territory they lost in the Six-Day War of 1967.
(explosions booming) Syrian armored brigades strike at two points on the Golan Heights, throwing 50,000 infantry and 12,000 tanks into the battle.
In the rugged and killing northern sector, Israeli defenders hold the line through the first day of fighting even though they’re outnumbered almost seven to one and take heavy casualties.
But in the more open country further south, the Syrians seem unstoppable.
(explosions booming) – In the south you had two very aggressive Syrian commanders.
They dragged their bridging equipment forward, one of their commanders actually had his infantry fill in portions of the Israeli anti-tank trench by hand.
They crossed over and they were able to mass so much power against these thinned-out Israeli defenses in the southern flank of the Golan that they were able to punch through.
– October 7th.
After a day of fierce fighting, the Israeli southern line falls apart under a massive onslaught of Syrian armor.
By 8:00 a.
m., Syrian forces are advancing across the Golan plateau, driving towards key bridges crossing the Jordan River.
(dramatic music) – The Syrian assumption was that if they could punch through those Israeli lines and drive as fast as they could, grab those bridges, they would effectively be able to prevent the Israeli reserves from mounting a viable counter-attack out of Galilee.
(alarm blaring) (people screaming) – At two o’clock when I heard the alarm, I immediately opened the video.
I heard the BBC announcing that the war started in Israel.
– A heavy battle of armored forces is continuing on the Golan Heights as Syrian armor has been attempting to break the Israeli line and has according to the news here, been checked by Israeli tanks and artillery.
– I called my unit brigade and they told me come immediately there is a war.
The road was empty, I drove like hell.
And the feeling was that they caught us unprepared.
(dramatic music) (people shouting) (Yehuda speaking in foreign language) – In ’73, the tanks were bare of ammunition and equipment.
They had to be loaded with shells and all of the equipment taken out of storage and organized.
– If you have the full call, which are four members, it takes something like four to six hours to prepare it really properly.
But during the rush time, we didn’t really prepare totally the tanks.
– Everybody went to the Golan Heights, doesn’t matter how many tanks he had, if the tanks are completely equipped or not.
They just went.
(dramatic music) – Syrian intelligence estimate it will take Israel 20 hours to mobilize its tank reserves.
But the Israelis do it in 10.
Throughout the night, Israeli reservists make their way to the battlefield, are hastily organized into units, and thrown into the fight against the Syrians.
By the early hours of October 7th, the first tanks reach the Golan Heights.
(Yehuda speaking in foreign language) – In the early morning we advanced towards the enemy already inside the Golan Heights.
(dramatic music) Dawn was beginning to break and I saw lots of tanks.
A mask of sorts came down.
Now we have to do what is necessary.
You don’t think about it too much.
(artillery booming) We opened fire on them but directional alignments are required to measure the barrel of the cannon to the cross of the telescope.
But we didn’t do this because of our hurried exit.
(explosion booming) We didn’t hit them.
It is possible to make better time alignments.
But this is a lot less precise.
But it’s better than nothing.
(dramatic music) We hit a few tanks.
(explosions booming) But not long after this, I saw a very large cloud of dust coming from the southeast.
And when this cloud get closer, it turns out that it was a very large Syrian force with T-62 tanks.
(dramatic music) – It’s the last thing the outnumbered Israelis want to see on the battlefield.
The T-62 is an upgraded version of the T-55.
Those upgrades include 240 millimeters of frontal armor and a bigger 581 horsepower engine.
But the biggest threat is the T-62’s 115 millimeter Molot main cannon.
Its smooth bore design increases muzzle velocity, giving it a range of nearly 3,000 meters.
(explosion booming) (suspenseful music) (Yehuda speaking in foreign language) – And then I honestly started to feel that I was being targeted and shells are falling beside me or behind me.
(explosions booming) And if the first one is long, the next shell will be short.
And then the next will hit me.
So I reverse off the firing ramp and look for a new position.
(explosions booming) We started the battle with maybe five or six tanks against this very large Syrian force.
(explosions booming) All that was left for us to do, was try to fight a stalling battle but they simply pushed us backward.
(tanks rumbling) (explosions booming) – It’s overwhelming.
Four Syrian brigades, 350 tanks, push through Israeli defenders and advance towards the bridges over the Jordan River.
– Before dark, both of them run into very small groups of Israeli infantry.
And even though at this point in time they’re only a couple of kilometers from their objectives, both brigade commanders decide to stop for the evening and with almost nothing standing in their way.
The bridges were sitting there.
They were theirs for the Syrians’ taking.
When they woke up the next morning, they found strong Israeli forces guarding those two bridges.
(dramatic music) – My battalion meet them on the hold from the Beka’a Valley up to the Golan Heights.
(suspenseful music) The first tanks in our column, they didn’t see them.
Only the last tank saw them and he began to shoot.
(explosions booming) The commander shouted at him.
Why are you shooting?
We are in our territory.
He said there’s the Syrians over the hill.
We didn’t believe that they arrive so west.
Their problem was that the T-55 have only five degrees of degradation.
– That means the cannon can’t be aimed very far down.
It’s a disadvantage for a tank on higher ground engaging an enemy approaching from below.
(explosions booming) Beyond that, the Israeli Sho’t Kals have a high degree of elevation making it easier to hit targets above them.
(explosions booming) – They had to expose themselves if they wanted to have enough degradation to shoot at us.
So, when they expose themselves, we shoot them.
(explosions booming) So by that way we succeed to stop them.
(suspenseful music) – The real problem there was simply Syrian junior officers allow small Israeli forces to completely derail the one thing that might have actually secured victory for Syria, the drive to take the Jordan River bridges.
– Israeli reserves from the 39th Battalion stop the Syrian 1st Armored Division at Beka’a Road.
(suspenseful music) But further south, the Syrian offensive remains unopposed as 40 tanks of the 132nd Mechanized Brigade advance towards the small village of El Al.
(Yossi speaking in foreign language) – I received orders to descend to El Al and fill up what is known as the El Al position.
(tanks rumbling) (dramatic music) It’s a position between two deep canyons about two kilometers wide.
He who possesses it, and successfully holds the position, controls all the routes down to the Sea of Galilee.
(tanks rumbling) At around nine o’clock, through my binoculars, I start to identify what we in the armored called masses of dust.
This means that you can see the clouds of dust far before you hear the noise.
And through the binoculars, I notice some movement from a distance of about four kilometers.
– That movement in the distance is an entire brigade of Syrian tanks.
(dramatic music) Their mission is to occupy the western edge of the Golan Heights overlooking the Sea of Galilee.
From here the flat lands of Israel lie almost undefended and at the mercy of the advancing Syrians.
(Yossi speaking in foreign language) – If they are successful and pass us, the Syrians will be at the Sea of Galilee.
And I understand that a loss or even a retreat is not mine alone.
It would be fatal.
(tanks rumbling) (dramatic music) – October 7th, 1973.
It is 20 hours into the Syrian attack on the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.
(explosions booming) And in the rugged and rocky northern sector, two Israeli tank units struggle to hold off the Syrians.
(explosions booming) But in the flatter terrain of the southern Golan, masses of Syrian armor have rolled over the Israelis and are pushing on towards bridges over the Jordan River.
(Yossi speaking in foreign language) – At around nine o’clock, through my binoculars, I start to identify what we in the armored called masses of dust.
This movement ahead becomes clearer and clearer and then we start to identify Syrian tanks.
They are getting closer and are stopping at distances of about 1,500 meters and we start to notice a lot of strikes.
(explosions booming) At the plateau of El Al it’s absolutely flat.
It’s as if they put the tanks on a billiard table and said, “Please, go ahead and play now.
” You can see huge distances, there is nowhere to hide.
And the only thing that can save you is your own capability.
Your own skill and to always be on the move.
(dramatic music) I always make sure that the tank are always moving and not firing more than what’s called a ball to the target which is just two or three shells, one after the other.
We fire one and then adjust.
We fire another and then move to another position.
In order to get a target, you’d have to stop and stand.
Then you bring the turret to a point where it is in line with the enemy tank.
You give the range according to your estimation.
When everyone announces on, I give the command to fire.
(explosion booming) – The Israelis, for their part, maneuvered constantly.
They darted from firing position to firing position.
Most Syrian armored units didn’t maneuver at all.
They simply drove straight at the Israelis.
– And so this is really the big difference between the Syrian and Israeli Army.
The Syrians, when they gain territory, they had gone to the depth which might be good, but is very bad if you need to maneuver.
(explosion booming) – The simple fact is that the Syrian tankers are just no match for the Israeli counterparts.
The Israelis have taken the best shots that Syria has to give and they are now in a position with enough combat strength that they can begin to push back.
– So we started to move unit by unit and I found myself alone in the mountain area.
There was two hills and I was in the cradle of the hills overlooking Hushniya Village.
I saw the regiment getting fueled or rearmed and so on.
And I started to shoot at him.
(explosions booming) And I saw something back there in the hills.
(explosions booming) And I started to hit them one by one because they were standing one next to the other, very, very close.
(dramatic music) – The Syrian tanks are sitting ducks for the Israelis’ Highly Explosive Squash Head or HESH round.
On impact, they squash against the target and explode.
(explosions booming) Creating a shock wave that tears apart the inside of the tank.
– I think I destroy something like seven times before they started to move and to understand that someone is shooting at them.
They shot back.
(explosions booming) Our tank started to burn.
As we evacuate from the tank, after a few meters we heard our tank exploded.
(explosions booming) (dramatic music) (fire crackling) – The outnumbered Israelis fall back and regroup and the Syrians gear up for a final big offensive.
(suspenseful music) By late evening on the 8th of October, they’ve assembled an entire armored division, over 250 tanks in Hushniya.
A tiny hamlet in the south Golan, which is about to become ground zero, in one of history’s greatest tank battles.
(eerie music) (fire crackling) (mournful music) – Hushniya, once a thriving village in the southern Golan Heights, today it’s a scattered collection of ruins.
A grim monument to the ferocity of the 1973 Arab-Israeli war.
Syrian and Israeli tank forces clashed here in an historic encounter, now simply remembered as the battle of Hushniya.
October 9th.
The Syrian advance into the Golan loses steam.
And they assemble an armored division, over 250 tanks at Hushniya in preparation for a final big offensive.
But in the three days, since Syrian attacks on the Golan Heights began, the Israelis have mobilized hundreds of tanks and thousands of reserve soldiers.
Most of them stream towards Hushniya, for a showdown with the Syrians.
– I received an order to cross the oil pipeline and advance and capture Hushniya.
The Syrians held this place as their last stronghold on the Golan Heights.
And for the first time since the war began, there was a plan for an organized attack with artillery and jets.
The artillery started falling on Hushniya.
(explosions booming) And we, in two squads of tanks, started to advance crossing the territory from the oil line towards the village of Hushniya.
It’s dusk, the last light and you can see the entire village blazing, exploding, and the mosque of Hushniya in the middle of this whole thing.
(explosions booming) (dramatic music) We advance with the tanks and the Syrians didn’t escape.
But it’s dangerous because everything is exploding and blazing around us.
It’s Dante.
It’s inconceivable.
It’s an inferno.
And then, from within the village, out burst Syrian tanks and trucks.
They are terrified, trying to escape.
And I see a Syrian tank and it isn’t clear if it is able to get out.
But then, its turret starts moving in my direction.
But my cannon and my turret are further away.
And it’s completely clear that I won’t be able to target him.
He’s going to get a bead on me first and if he does, then I’m a goner.
(suspenseful music) Behind me is one of my battalion officers and he launches a shell and the Syrian tank lights up.
(explosions booming) They are difficult displays to describe.
But the Syrians ran for their lives.
– The Israeli reserves destroy more than 200 tanks, stalling the Syrians big push.
By the afternoon of October 9th, the Israelis have retaken most of the southern Golan.
But on the northern front, they are still struggling to hold off Syrian forces in a place that will soon become known as the Valley of Tears.
– In the north, the remnants of the elite 7th Armored Brigade are still just barely holding back the Syrian 7th Infantry Division.
Syrians tried one last time to blast through the Israeli positions.
They’ve got 200 tanks, half of them T-62s, and the Israelis are down to less than 30 Centurions.
(suspenseful music) (man speaking in foreign language) – They are currently located at the positions that control the Valley of Tears, which we see here in front of us.
And when I arrive from Booster Ridge with six tanks, I realize that I am not going to make it to these positions, which are the best ones and cover the entire width of the Valley of Tears.
(dramatic music) By now unit 7 has retreated back and I find myself alone with six tanks.
And I decide to make a defensive stand on the reverse slope.
(dramatic music) And I stop the six tanks and spread them out along the back slope of the hill that is located behind us.
(dramatic music) And I see the smoke from the exhaust of the Syrian tanks over the hill.
And I tell my men, you see those moving on the other side of the hill?
You, take those three.
You, these two.
You, these three.
And I let the Syrians come right over the hill.
I allow the Syrians to advance and they head towards the top of the hill with the barrel of the cannons pointed upwards.
And I wait for them.
(dramatic music) The battle opens at close range, 300 to 400 meters.
(explosions booming) (suspenseful music) And we stop their advance towards the main road.
But in this battle, after we stop the Syrian army, with had only two tanks left.
(dramatic music) On this side, at the foot of Mount Hermonit, you can see today the same famous valley where the commander of the 77th Battalion, Colonel Kahalani, stood and blocked the Syrian advance through this valley.
(explosions booming) – When I came two kilometers from the hills, he’s so far away.
Israeli tanks on fire.
And other tanks around them were Soviet tanks.
And I move my tanks to the valley.
I was shocked.
I called my commander and said if you have any tanks in the area send them immediately.
(dramatic music) (dramatic music) – October 9th, 1973.
Israeli and Syrian tank forces have been fighting on the Golan Heights for three days with heavy casualties on both sides.
The Syrians outnumber the Israelis and quickly gain the upper hand.
But the Israelis push back with their reserve forces.
Now time is running out for the Syrian army.
They make one last attempt to break through Israeli defenses in the north, throwing an entire armored division into the battle.
– They’ve got 200 tanks, half of them T-62s, and the Israelis are down to less than 30 Centurions.
(tank rumbling) – I knew the main forces is just behind the hill.
If they will come to the top of the hills, nobody can stop them.
They will run all the way to the Galilee.
And I have decided to move forward and to catch the hills and to catch them on the valley.
– It’s a desperate gamble and the only chance the Israelis have.
They must regain their firing positions.
And to do that, they have to cross 800 meters of open ground in the teeth of Syrian fire.
(tanks rumbling) – I ordered to move forward like it was written in the book.
(man speaking in foreign language) Nobody moved.
And I’ve decided to move all of them to my frequency, to my radio.
Every cannon loader, driver and tank commander started listening to my voice.
And I told them, “Look, the Syrian soldiers, how they’re fighting so well.
Look at them.
” (explosions booming) “The motivation of them, what happened to us?
Am I see chicken in my unit?
Start to move!
” (suspenseful music) And I started to move.
Soon another tank join me, and another tank join me.
And I prayed to the God just give me to arrived to the top of the hill and we will catch them.
And suddenly another tank’s arrived to the hills.
(explosions booming) And we arrived.
(dramatic music) The valley was dark with tanks.
And we shot like crazy.
(explosions booming) (dramatic music) The moment that we been on the firing position, and they move on the valley.
This was easier for us to shoot all of them.
(explosions booming) (dramatic music) I fought to survive.
Some of them, they stopped and take shot.
They killed my tanks.
(dramatic music) (explosions booming) So I have around three, four tanks no more than that.
I remember that I was tried to count the tank that we shot all over.
And I couldn’t.
There was so many.
(dramatic music) (explosions booming) – After the battle Israeli observers counted 500 Syrian tanks destroyed in that defile.
And as a result, it came to be called the Valley of Tears, for all of the Syrians killed there.
– Syria’s hope of retaking the Golan Heights ends in the Valley of Tears.
On October 11th, the Israelis launch their own offensive into Syria.
And on the 23rd, the Syrians capitulate.
(dramatic music) (people chattering) The battle for the Golan Heights is finally over.
– This was simply competent Israeli commanders out-thinking, out-moving, out-fighting their Syrian opponents.
But there’s no question that the Syrians fought incredibly hard.
They mounted attack after attack after attack, into the teeth of ferocious Israeli defenses.
In many cases, they died to a man.
This was a no-holds barred fight and neither side backed down from it.
(somber music) – The 1973 Arab-Israeli War lasts just 16 days.
But those days are among the bloodiest in the history of armored warfare.
The battlefields are left littered with the hulks of destroyed tanks.
The Israelis lose between four and 500.
The two Arab countries somewhere between 12 and 2,200.
(explosions booming) But the real tragedy is in the human cost on both sides.
21,000 dead and tens of thousands more wounded.
– Most of my friend I lost during the wars.
They were 19, 20 years old.
No more than that.
And I saw them out there, how they’d fight.
And it’s unbelievable.
I was very proud.
(explosion booming) – The war ended with disappointment but it ended with a solemn promise by Syrians and to Syrians and of Syrians that they will get back the Golan Heights one day.
(somber music) If the Golan Heights is not returned to Syria, I dare say there will not be peace in the Middle East.
(dramatic music)
