Well before 1967, Israel had been targeted by the KGB’s Foreign Intelligence (First) Directorate as a theatre of operations during a larger East-West conflict. During 1964-66, according to documents supplied by the defecting KGB archivist, Vasili Mitrokhin, Israel was one of the countries where caches of arms and radio equipment were prepositioned for such operations. Mitrokhin claims some of these were booby-trapped and may be in place to this day.

The Soviet Union played a central role in escalating Middle East tensions to the brink of war in 1967, and evidence is accumulating that it actually instigated the conflict. In his recently published memoirs, Nikita S. Khrushchev asserts that the USSR’s military command first encouraged high-ranking Egyptian and Syrian delegations, in a series of "hush-hush" mutual visits, to go to war, then persuaded the Soviet political leadership to support these steps, in the full knowledge they were aimed at starting a war to destroy Israel.

The Soviet Ambassador in Tel Aviv, Dmitri S. Chuvakhin, declined an Israeli invitation to see for himself that the charges of troop concentrations were baseless. General Muhammad Fawzi, the Egyptian Chief of Staff, did go to Syria to see for himself and reported that "there was no sign of Israeli troop concentrations and the Russians must have been having hallucinations." But the KGB is reported, by a defector, to have planted agents among Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser’s closest advisers, and he apparently chose to believe them — or simply stuck to a plan agreed upon previously with the Soviets.

The Soviet press, including Pravda’s Cairo correspondent Yevgeny Primakov (later Russia’s SVR [Foreign Intelligence] chief, foreign minister and premier) contributed inflammatory allegations about Israel’s aggressive intent. For the first time, Moscow sent much of its Black Sea and Northern Fleets into the Mediterranean and discreetly backed Nasser when he demanded the removal of the UN force from Sinai and blocked Israeli shipping through the Gulf of Aqaba to the port of Eilat.

In Moscow several days later, Thompson asked a "well-informed" Soviet source "point blank whether Soviets knew in advance of Egyptian action in closing Gulf of Aqaba. He was obviously embarrassed...and after a long pause said he thought Nasser had acted on his own." At the UN, where Soviet Ambassador Nikolai Fedorenko was stalling proposals to lift the blockade, his Canadian and Danish colleagues told him they had "a nasty feeling [the] USSR [was] playing [a] game of allowing crisis to build to force Israel to act."

Ex-KGB General Oleg Kalugin, then the agency’s deputy "resident" [station chief] for political intelligence in Washington, recalls that "no one in Moscow had any doubt" that Israel would be quickly defeated. When the war did erupt, the Soviet ambassador in Jordan said to his American counterpart "in a perfectly matter-of-fact way ‘you know, our estimate is that if the Israelis do not receive large-scale outside assistance...we think the Arabs will win the war, if [it] is allowed to be fought to the finish’."

On May 18, with the situation rapidly escalating, Israeli Foreign Minister Abba Eban handed Walworth Barbour, the US Ambassador, a letter to President Lyndon B. Johnson stating, "There may be an impression in Cairo and Damascus that Soviet support...is assured, and that therefore they have no need of restraint." He asked for "an emphatic clarification by the United States to the Soviet Union of the American commitment to Israel … I can hardly exaggerate the importance and urgency of such an approach." The same day, Undersecretary of State Eugene Rostow expressed to Soviet Chargé d’Affaires Chernyakov "concern...over Israeli-Syrian tensions and told him of Syrian Government rumors...that Syria had been promised unlimited military and political support by USSR," of which Chernyakov said he was unaware.

On May 19 the State Department informed the main U.S. embassies "that if conflict occurred in the Middle East, the USSR would be in [a] difficult spot. Russian temptation would be to aid Egypt and Syria, but [the] USSR was reluctant to promote hostilities in [the] Arab world as means to exert pressure on US over Vietnam. The USSR realised [a] Middle Eastern War would be hard to control. They would make at least unilateral efforts to stop it."

In Washington on May 20, Israeli Ambassador Avraham Harman called "urgently" on Undersecretary Rostow to report full details of Eban’s "disturbing" conversation with Chuvakhin: "[The] latter asserted [that] terror incidents on Syrian border [were the] work of [the] CIA, adding, ‘We have warned you. You are responsible.’"

On May 24, Deputy Undersecretary of State Raymond L. Garthoff had one of his frequent appointments with Boris N. Sedov, "KGB officer and second secretary of the Soviet Embassy" as Garthoff later described him. "Sedov left the general impression that if the United States were to become directly involved militarily in the escalating Middle East conflict, the Soviet Union, too, would have to become involved. But he was vague and noncommittal as to the way it would become involved."

In Moscow on May 26, newly appointed KGB Chairman Yuri V. Andropov briefed the Central Committee of the Soviet Communist Party on the Middle East situation, referring to a report prepared by his agency. The day before, he stated, "at a meeting of Israel’s propaganda services’ chiefs, Propaganda Minister [Israel] Galili declared that the government of Israel had decided to commence military operations against [Egypt] in two or three days. This data...is confirmed by reports received from Israeli military circles. The Eshkol cabinet has completed its war preparations." The KGB report assessed that American military intervention was likely, especially to open the Gulf of Aqaba.

The next day — Saturday — Chernyakov requested an urgent meeting with Secretary of State Dean Rusk and presented a letter from Kosygin. The note warned, in line with the KGB report, that "Israel is actively engaged in military preparations and evidently intends to carry out armed aggression … Israeli militant circles are attempting to impose...an ‘adventurist’ action...[and] may cause an armed conflict." Kosygin warned that "if arms should be used this could be the beginning of far-reaching events. Should Israel commit aggression and military operations begin, then we will render assistance to those countries that are subject to aggression." Rusk took this seriously enough to urgently inform allied leaders and urged Johnson — then at his Texas ranch — to relay Kosygin’s message to Eshkol immediately, with a warning against pre-emptive action "which would make it impossible for friends...to stand by you." Johnson did so but toned down the warning.

Ambassador Thompson, before coming to Washington, had cabled from Moscow on May 28 about a warning from the Egyptian Embassy’s political counsellor that "Nasser has [a] larger commitment from [the] Soviets than anyone (presumably including the source) had realised … [The] Soviet objective is to transform Arab-Israeli struggle into showdown between Communists and anti-Communists for control of Middle East, and Soviets are succeeding."

Secretary of Defence Robert S. McNamara recounted recently that when the line rang at 7:15 am, he awoke Johnson. "The president comes on the line and says, ‘What in the hell are you calling for at this hour?’" McNamara told him. Within fifteen minutes they, along with Rusk, had begun what became a nearly continuous conference in the White House Situation Room.

A total of 20 messages were exchanged. "The president watched with great care" this material, according to Johnson’s adviser, McGeorge Bundy. At the outset, the Americans were "mainly concerned with the awful shape we would be in if the Israelis were losing. We didn’t know anything about the situation on the ground … It was in a way reassuring when it became clear that the fighting was the Israelis’ idea and the idea was working."

Although the Soviet side made no explicit threat to use force over the hotline, hints were dropped elsewhere. Soviet Ambassador Chuvakhin told his German counterpart in Tel Aviv, Rolf Pauls, "In [an] unusually serious vein," as Pauls related to his American counterpart, "If now Israelis become quite drunk with success and pursue their aggression further the future of this little country will be a very sad one."

Then, on June 10, the Soviet premier weighed in with a stern warning over the hotline: Israeli forces, after routing Egypt and Jordan, were according to Kosygin "conducting an offensive toward Damascus," the Syrian capital. The Americans no longer had a manned embassy in Damascus and — incredibly — no independent assessment of the Israeli offensive on the Golan Heights. This was true despite a dispatch from Ambassador Barbour two days earlier, stating that in conversations with other diplomats "We have already taken steps to calm what I believe is exaggerated impression of Israeli military ambitions. We have [the] impression [that] 25 kilometres will be [Israel’s] maximum penetration [of] Syria." Kosygin’s message went on:

This hasty translation was read to President Johnson and his seven aides present. Thompson was asked to double-check that the original Russian text indeed threatened military action by the USSR. It did. "In effect," says McNamara, "it said: ‘Mr President, if you want war, you’ll get war.’ That’s how tense the situation was."

Anatoly F. Dobrynin, then Soviet Ambassador in Washington, now claims not to have been privy to Kosygin’s message of June 10. In a recent interview he insisted that the USSR never meant to intervene militarily and never even threatened it. Confronted with Kosygin’s words, he persisted:

"I don’t see any direct military intervention here. That’s your interpretation and it doesn’t arise directly from Kosygin’s text … That’s diplomatic language which is used to permit certain variations and leave room for future negotiation ... He might have wanted to leave some uncertainty, that’s what you call diplomacy."

McNamara, on the other hand, states now: "We did not have any specific intelligence on [a Soviet plan to intervene]. But we were fearful that Syria might call on the Soviets for support to attack Israel, and Israel’s very existence would be at stake."

As early as May 11, Soviet Arabic-language interpreters stationed in Egypt were summoned to the Soviet Embassy in Cairo. One of them later recounted to journalist Aleksandr Khaldeev that they were told war between Egypt and Israel was inevitable. Later they were taken to Alexandria and informed they would be posted to the ships of the Black Sea Fleet, now cruising off the Israeli shore. "One of the interpreters...said he knew for sure that we would be attached to a ‘desant’ (MEANING=descent, landing) force that would be landing in Haifa or slightly northward." The interpreters were to handle liaison with Israel’s Arab population, "who were longing for us."

This backs up an eyewitness account received recently from a participant in the putative landing. Yuri N. Khripunkov was in June 1967 a young gunnery lieutenant on board a new BPK (large anti-submarine ship), then the fastest, most advanced model in the Soviet Navy. It was part of a large reinforcement force for the Mediterranean flotilla which arrived from the Black Sea base of Sebastopol in early May, shortly after Brezhnev demanded the withdrawal of the Sixth Fleet. At least one more detachment - including four destroyers, two "hydrographic vessels" (a cover name for intelligence ships) and even one "icebreaker" — went through the Turkish straits on May 31.

Khripunkov relates how on June 5 his captain ordered him to raise and command a 30-man detachment of "volunteers" for a landing on the Israeli coast. Similar parties were being assembled on all the 30-odd Soviet surface vessels in the Mediterranean, for a total of some 1000 men. The assignment for Khripunkov’s platoon was to penetrate Haifa port.

The Russian military historian Col. Valery A. Yaremenko confirms that such a directive was issued. "But the order was rescinded almost immediately as unrealistic." In a comment unconfirmed as yet by any other source, Yaremenko adds that "There were minor incidents between Soviet ships and Israel patrol craft, which fortunately ended peacefully."

Khripunkov was told that in addition to the improvised landing parties "there was also one BDK [large amphibious ship] with about 40 tanks and maybe a battalion of infantry."

Dobrynin maintains that "there was no … intention on the part of the Soviet government [to intervene]. There were rumors, but there could be any kind of rumors. But there was no real intention on the part of the government. This I know for sure." Still, he admits, "[Generals] have their own considerations...They plan all kinds of variations that may or may not be realised."

According to one account, Acting Defence Minister [later full Minister] Andrei A. Grechko and Andropov were "pressing for the immediate dispatch of Soviet forces to the Middle East. They were supported by [Nikolai G.] Yegorichev, party boss for the city of Moscow, who suggested a landing on the isthmus of Sinai [perhaps the land spit between the Bardawil lagoon and the Mediterranean] to start a march on Tel Aviv;" Yegorichev now denies making any such recommendations.

A retired Soviet air force lieutenant general, Yuri V. Nastenko, confirmed recently that bomber and fighter/reconnaissance units, the latter comprising MiG-21s under his command, were put on full operational alert on the evening of June 5, and he was convinced this was in preparation for "real combat … The command was working on the assumption that we would land at Syrian bases, and thus would have to overfly a neutral country such as Turkey. The Soviet government was deliberating what to do if this passage was denied, since breaking through anyway might mean war! Common sense finally prevailed, the units were returned to base and the all-clear was given."

On June 10, Garthoff was again invited to lunch by Sedov. Sedov "expressed very great concern over Israeli intentions to take Damascus … He sought to elicit the American reaction if the Soviet Union sent troops to Syria. I said that would be ‘a new war’ … I emphasised it would be extremely unfortunate and dangerous if the Soviet Union should intervene in Syria."

Dobrynin responded angrily when confronted by the present writer with this report, belittling Sedov as just one of many embassy staffers. "I know he [Sedov] wasn’t authorised to ask this question."

But Sedov’s inquiry was far from hypothetical. On June 8, the U.S. ambassador in Turkey reported that he had been contacted, late the previous night, by senior Foreign Office official Ilter Turkmen (later foreign minister). Turkmen informed him that on June 6, the "Iraqi government through [the] Turk[ish] Ambassador in Baghdad had requested [the government of Turkey] to grant overflight rights to MiG-21s which Iraq was receiving from USSR … Turks were replying … [that] they would be unable to grant request because of [the UN] Security Council cease-fire resolution and questions regarding Turkish security."

McNamara says the Soviet preparations for an invasion were unknown to him at the time, but "[Israel’s] intelligence services, ours, [and] the British all had information that Nasser was going to attack Israel and literally destroy the country ... There was a great risk that if Egypt attacked [Israel and that if Israel] defeated Egypt, that the Soviets would [intervene] in support of Egypt. We wanted … to be in a position to apply our military force in [Israel’s] support to prevent [its] being annihilated by a combination of Egypt, Syria and the Soviet Union. And we feared that if [Israel] pre-empted … and … then needed U.S. military support, our people would say ‘Dammit, why the hell should we support them, they started the war.’ So we tried to persuade [Israel] and we thought we had persuaded [it] not to pre-empt." But after Israel did attack and succeeded, "Johnson and I were wondering … What will Syria do? And what will the Soviet Union do, with Egypt — their client — being severely weakened?"

McNamara refuses to this day to discuss the still-controversial USS Liberty incident, and dismisses the ironic possibility that Israel’s attack on the intelligence ship prevented an early warning of the Soviet action. The Liberty, a U.S. navy intelligence-gathering ship, had taken Russian and Arabic-speaking experts on board and according to survivors among its crew was deployed to monitor Soviet activities. Israel’s initial explanation for its attack on the Liberty was the appearance on Israeli radar screens of "a large number of blips approaching … from the west that might have indicated an all-out Egyptian naval attack … Later it was established that the blips...had been echoes from unusual cloud formations." Or was this the Soviet flotilla?

There is, on the other hand, a suggestion that Israel’s attack on the Liberty had a direct bearing on Soviet operational decisions. According to an official Russian military publication, the Soviets considered — like the Liberty survivors — that Israel attacked the ship deliberately in order to obstruct its monitoring Israeli preparations to use "nuclear and chemical weapons, whose existence had never been denied officially by Tel Aviv." In response, this as yet uncorroborated account asserts that a Soviet naval squadron armed with nuclear weapons was sent into Egyptian waters in the Red Sea.

Meanwhile, in the Mediterranean, "for five or six nights we awaited the order [to land]," says Khripunkov. "We were moving constantly, sailing from the region north of Alexandria and the Suez Canal toward Cyprus and Crete, keeping 50 to 100 miles from the Israeli coast." The zero hour for landing was repeatedly postponed. Even Khrushchev, who felt in retrospect that the Soviets had been wrong to support Nasser’s designs on Israel, also considered it had been a mistake to leave him in the lurch.

The Soviets finally made their explicit threat over the hotline only when Syria, too, appeared to be on the verge of defeat by Israel. Defence Minister Moshe Dayan had delayed responding to Syrian shelling of Israeli towns from the Golan mainly out of fear that the Soviets would act, and Chief of Staff Yitzhak Rabin noted in his memoirs that Dayan’s warning to the cabinet "managed to sow a sense of grave disquiet among the ministers." Dayan related years later that he changed his mind and ordered the assault on Syria only after seeing Israel complete its victory over Egypt without the Soviets intervening. One can only speculate whether Dayan’s misgivings would have been overcome had he known of the Soviets’ actual preparations, and their greater readiness to assist the Syrians.

After Kosygin’s menacing message was received, Undersecretary of State Nicholas Katzenbach was dispatched from the Situation Room to "call in the Israeli ambassador and put pressure on the Israelis to accept a cease-fire." The Israelis, presumably informed of the Soviet threat, soon did — after completing their conquest of the Golan. The Situation Room team learned of this by watching the televised proceedings of the Security Council.

According to the version that filtered down to Khripunkov’s crew, "[Communist Party First Secretary Leonid] Brezhnev and the president got on the phones and realised that half an hour after we landed the world would be in ruins. And that was that." His ship, which had at last been ordered to head for the Israeli coast, was turned back after coming within 30 to 40 miles of the beach. The landing was aborted.

Dr Isabella Ginor is a specialist on the USSR and its successor states for the Israeli newspaper, Ha’aretz, and a correspondent for the BBC World Service and the Australian SBS network in Russian. A longer version of this paper first appeared in Middle East Review of International Affairs, Vol. 4, No. 4, December 2000. Copyright MERIA Journal. For a free subscription, send to besa@mail.bui.ac.il. To see all MERIA materials, visit http://meria.biu.ac.il.