Schematic plan · Arab-Israeli War, 1967 (Six-Day War)

Battle of Bir Hamma-Bir Gifgafa

7 June 1967
Egypt
Victory for Israel

A schematic plan, generated from the statistics of the CAA Database of Battles: the armies' size and width, the hours of fighting, the plan of attack and the outcome are as recorded; the ground and the positions are not.

Israel (Is Tal Div, 10,200 men under Bg Tal) attacked Egypt (Eg 3rd Inf Div & 4th Armd Div(-), 13,500 men under Mg Ghoul) in Egypt. The CAA Database of Battles records 3 hours of fighting on a front of 10 km, a single envelopment, left rear against delaying action, and that Israel won. Losses: Israel 75 (1%), Egypt 550 (4%).

This plan is generated from those figures. It shows the shape of the battle the database describes: the size and width of the armies, the plan of attack and the outcome. It does not show where the units actually stood.

The armies

Israel

Bg Tal

Unit	Arm	Men
Israel left wing	Infantry	1,925
Israel centre	Infantry	2,566
Israel right wing	Infantry	1,925
Israel reserve	Infantry	1,604
Israel artillery (72 guns)	Artillery	1,080
Israel armour (220 tanks)	Armour	1,100
Bg Tal	Commander	—
In this plan		10,200

Egypt

Mg Ghoul

Unit	Arm	Men
Egypt left wing	Infantry	2,861
Egypt centre	Infantry	3,814
Egypt right wing	Infantry	2,861
Egypt reserve	Infantry	2,384
Egypt artillery (48 guns)	Artillery	720
Egypt armour (172 tanks)	Armour	860
Mg Ghoul	Commander	—
In this plan		13,500

What the sources report

	Israel	Egypt
Strength, this plan	10,200	13,500
Losses, this plan	75	550

In the CAA Database of Battles

CDB90 no. 562, “Bir Hamma-Bir Gifgafa”, compiled for the US Army to study what decides battles. These are the figures a what-if engine can be calibrated against.

Fighting: 3 hours
Winner: the attacker
Terrain: Flat, Desert
Weather: Dry, Sunny, Hot, Summer, Temperate
Defender’s posture: Delaying action
Front width: 10 km (attacker), 10 km (defender)

Force	Strength	Losses	Horse	Guns	Plan and outcome
Israelattacker	10,200	75	0	72	Single envelopment; Left rear; Penetration
Egyptdefender	13,500	550	0	48	Defensive plan; Withdrew with heavy losses

Attacker’s advantages leadership +1 · training +1 · morale +1 · momentum +1 · initiative +1 · air superiority +1 · combat effectiveness +1

CDB90 (US Army Concepts Analysis Agency, 1990), tidy edition by Jeffrey B. Arnold; data under ODC-BY 1.0.

Notes

On this reconstruction

Generated automatically from the statistics in CDB90. Frontages, depths, distances, the order of events and the terrain are schematic: they follow the recorded strengths, front widths, hours of fighting, tactical plan and outcome, not maps or accounts of the battle. The sources give no hours; the timing is conjectural.

Sources

US Army Concepts Analysis Agency; tidy edition by Jeffrey B. Arnold, CAA Database of Battles (CDB90), no. 562 · ODC-BY-1.0Strengths, losses, front widths, hours of fighting, tactics and outcome.

Facts gathered from Wikidata (CC0), Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0) and Wikimedia Commons (licence per file); the plan and its text are timeastra’s own.