Israeli F-15 Eagle Units in Combat

LEBANON WAR

On the evening of 3 June 1982, three Arab men approached Israeli Ambassador to the United Kingdom Shlomo Argov as he left a banquet at the Dorchester Hotel, on Park Lane, in the West End of London. One drew a pistol and shot Argov in the head, critically wounding him. In a coma for three months, the ambassador survived the attack, although he would remain paralysed for the rest of his life. The would-be assassins were members of PLO splinter group Fatah-Revolutionary Council, led by notorious terrorist Abu Nidal. Upon discovering the identity of the Arab gunmen, Israel launched a series of retaliatory air strikes against PLO targets in Lebanon within 24 hours of the assassination attempt having taken place.

These air strikes were viewed by the Palestinians as a violation of the July 1981 ceasefire agreement, and they responded by firing dozens of unguided Katyusha rockets at Israeli towns and villages along the Israeli-Lebanese border. Over the next 48 hours, the exchange of fire continued to escalate, resulting in the IDF mobilising reserve units and deploying several armoured divisions along the border. On 6 June, the divisions rumbled north into Lebanon, thus initiating a full-scale invasion.

The IDF immediately announced that the aim of its military action was to establish a 40-kilometre buffer zone inside Lebanon that moved Israeli towns and villages beyond the range of the PLO’s artillery and rockets, thus ensuring peace for the country’s Galilee region. However, Israel willingly broadened the aims of its offensive following a request for help from its Christian allies in Lebanon. The true objectives of the operation were to cut the Beirut-Damascus highway in the east, capture Beirut in the west, expel the PLO from Lebanon and hand over control of the country to the Christians. The IDF realised that in order to achieve such far reaching goals, it would have to fight Syrian forces in Lebanon.

At first Syria acted with extreme caution, as its government tried to ascertain whether the Israeli offensive was a limited action against the PLO in southern Lebanon or a full-scale war against its occupying forces. And even if the Israeli invasion was exclusively aimed at the destruction of the PLO’s infrastructure, Syria had publicly committed itself to the defence of the Palestinians. The SyAAF was duly placed on alert on 4 June, and Syrian fighters flew CAP missions over Lebanon later that day.

During the conflict, the Double Tail Squadron would exclusively fly air-to-air sorties protecting strike aircraft hitting targets located outside the SAM umbrella provided by the Syrian IADS in Lebanon. Baz CAPs were usually flown in four-ship formations, with additional pairs of jets sat at various states of readiness ready to scramble from Tel Nof - up to eight F-15s could man the alert duty in the interception HAS complex.

While the Syrians were busily trying to ascertain the scope of the Israeli offensive, the IDF was struggling to conceal the true objectives of the invasion. Both sides, therefore, were keen to avoid air combat in the early stages of the offensive, and this remained the case until the afternoon of 7 June 1982. Despite military leaders from Syria and Israel doing their level best to avoid an immediate escalation in the fighting, it was only a matter of time before there was a clash between SyAAF and IDF/AF pilots conducting operations in the limited airspace over southern Lebanon. This finally occurred at 1500 hrs local time on the 7th, and Baz pilot Offer Lapidot found himself in the thick of the action;

‘We were on a CAP south of Beirut. The Syrian IADS was still intact, and it covered all the area from the Lebanese-Syrian border in the east up to the ridge of the Lebanon Mountains in the west. This meant that in order to stay outside of the IADS’ engagement envelope, yet still provide cover for the strike aircraft, we had to patrol over the coast. We received plenty of warning about SyAAF aircraft both from our fighter controllers and the radar screens in our jets. A threat got too close to our attack aircraft and we were vectored in to protect them. The weather was cloudy below us, and we stayed above the undercast throughout the mission.

‘For some reason that I cannot now recall, my four-ship formation – in which I was No 4 – lost the target aircraft that we had initially been vectored onto. When we reached the boundary of the IADS engagement envelope we turned back. Just as I completed my turn to the west, I visually acquired a MiG-23 at a range of between five and seven miles. The jet was clearly visible against the clouds behind it, and I could see that the MiG’s wings were not swept back. We turned from south to west and the Syrian pilot turned from west to north. I locked my radar onto the MiG-23 and stated over the radio that I had a positive identification, and that I was about to launch an AAM. I duly fired an AIM-7F seconds later.

‘The greatest problem facing my squadron during the war was the correct identification of aircraft that we encountered north of the border. The informal order that we obeyed within the unit was that no one was to open fire without first achieving a positive identification of the target. This was just as well, for later in the war I intercepted a jet and the GCU cleared me to fire an AAM, but I chose not launch the missile. This was a wise move, as it turned out that my “target” was an IDF/AF aircraft!

‘The Sparrow failed to hit the MiG-23, despite it meeting all the required acquisition parameters that included the target being well within its engagement envelope. By the time I realised that I had missed, I was within Python 3 range of the jet. I therefore fired a single WVR AAM at a distance of 1.5 miles whilst flying at an altitude of 1000-2000 ft in a look-down position on the MiG, which made it more difficult for the missile to track its target. Soon after firing the weapon I turned sharply to the east in order to avoid any SAMs, or an engagement with the MiG-23’s wingman. This in turn meant that I did not see the AAM hit the target. Other pilots in my formation saw the kill, however.’

Double Tail Squadron EP pilot Offer Lapidot was flying Baz 658 when he claimed the first aerial kill of the Lebanon War. Two days later, Baz 658 would be credited with its second victory, and on 11 June Offer Lapidot claimed his second kill, which ultimately proved to be the last aerial victory credited to the Double Tail Squadron during this conflict. Sandwiched between Lapidot’s kills were 31 victories for the Baz.

On 8 June IDF/AF strike aircraft began a systematic bombing campaign that targeted Syrian troop emplacements in Lebanon, with the sites that were attacked being specifically chosen because they were located outside the engagement envelope of the Syrian IADS. However, this escalation in the fighting triggered an immediate response from the SyAAF, which began utilising audio communication jamming equipment to disrupt IDF/AF F-15s and F-16s that were attempting to vector onto Arab jets sent to intercept Israeli attack aircraft.

The Baz pilots reacted by minimising their audio communication, releasing chaff and splitting the customary four-ship CAP formations in half once the GCU order to engage was received – two pairs of F-15s operating independently of one another were harder for the Syrians to track than a single formation of four jets.

Overall, the Israeli tactics worked better than those employed by their opponents during two of the five engagements between F-15s and Syrian aircraft on 8 June. The first of these encounters took place in the morning, when a two-aircraft Baz CAP operating with the call-sign ‘Palace’ was vectored onto SyAAF jets detected in the Beirut sector. Flying east of the Lebanese capital, ‘Palace 2’ (Yoram Hoffman in Baz 686) locked onto a target flying at a lower altitude 15 miles east of the city.

Obeying the instruction that all interceptions should be WVR rather than BVR, the ‘Palace’ formation continued to close on the SyAAF jets. Finally, at a range of less than five miles, Shaul Schwartz in ‘Palace 1’ (F-15B 957, with navigator Reuven Solan in the back seat) acquired the enemy aircraft within his HUD Target Designation Box (TDB). It appears that the MiG-21 pilots may very well have detected the F-15s at this point, as they made a sharp banking turn to the left and headed south, only to be followed by the ‘Palace’ jets. Both Baz pilots fired a single AIM-7F at a range of two miles as the enemy aircraft attempted to accelerate away. Seconds later both MiG-21s fell in flames.

The second Baz interception on 8 June came several hours later when Shaul Simon (in Baz 818) shared a MiG-23 kill with his wingman Dedi Rosenthal (in Baz 832), both pilots having simultaneously launched single AIM-7Fs at the jet.

That same day, Netz pilots had been credited with three kills between the two Baz engagements.