Schematic plan · Arab-Israeli War, 1973 (October War)

First Battle of Mount Hermon

7 October 1973
Syria
Victory for Israel

All battles The event in the chronicle Wikipedia

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.

Syria (Syr 1st Armd Div, 12,500 men under Col Juhni) attacked Israel (Is 79th Armd Bde(+), 6,946 men under Col Or) in Syria. The CAA Database of Battles records 17.3 hours of fighting on a front of 7 km, a frontal attack against hasty defense, and that Israel held. Losses: Syria 500 (4%), Israel 250 (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

Syria

Col Juhni

Unit	Arm	Men
Syria left wing	Infantry	2,363
Syria centre	Infantry	3,150
Syria right wing	Infantry	2,363
Syria reserve	Infantry	1,969
Syria artillery (71 guns)	Artillery	1,065
Syria armour (318 tanks)	Armour	1,590
Col Juhni	Commander	—
In this plan		12,500

Israel

Col Or

Unit	Arm	Men
Israel left wing	Infantry	1,405
Israel centre	Infantry	1,874
Israel right wing	Infantry	1,405
Israel reserve	Infantry	1,171
Israel artillery (36 guns)	Artillery	540
Israel armour (110 tanks)	Armour	550
Col Or	Commander	—
In this plan		6,945

What the sources report

	Syria	Israel
Strength, this plan	12,500	6,946
Losses, this plan	500	250

In the CAA Database of Battles

CDB90 no. 589, “Nafekh”, compiled for the US Army to study what decides battles. These are the figures a what-if engine can be calibrated against.

Fighting: 17.3 hours
Winner: the defender
Terrain: Rugged, Bare
Weather: Dry, Sunny, Temperate, Autumn, Temperate
Defender’s posture: Hasty defense
Front width: 7 km (attacker), 7 km (defender)

Force	Strength	Losses	Horse	Guns	Plan and outcome
Syriaattacker	12,500	500	0	71	Frontal attack; Penetration; Repulse; Withdrew
Israeldefender	6,946	250	0	36	Defensive/offensive plan; Frontal attack; Penetration; Pursued

Attacker’s advantages momentum +1 · initiative +1 · surprise +2

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. 589 · ODC-BY-1.0Strengths, losses, front widths, hours of fighting, tactics and outcome.
Wikipedia contributors, First Battle of Mount Hermon · CC-BY-SA-4.0

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.