Aḥmad Ismāʿīl

Aḥmad Ismāʿīl (born 1917, Cairo, Egypt—died December 25, 1974, London, England) was an Egyptian field marshal who was Egypt’s defense minister and commander in chief when he planned the attack across the Suez Canal that surprised Israel on October 6, 1973, and began the Yom Kippur War (see Arab-Israeli wars).

Ismāʿīl graduated from the Cairo Military Academy in 1938, saw service with the Allies in the Western Desert during World War II (1939–45), and fought as a brigade commander in the first Arab-Israeli war (1948–49). He later trained in Britain, fought the Franco-British-Israeli forces during the Suez operation of 1956, undertook further training in the Soviet Union, and was a divisional commander in the Six-Day War of 1967. He was made chief of state in March 1969 but was dismissed by President Gamal Abdel Nasser in September as a scapegoat for successful Israeli raids. New president Anwar el-Sādāt, however, named him chief of intelligence in September 1970. In October 1972 he accompanied Prime Minister ʿAzīz Ṣidqī on a visit to Moscow and on his return stifled a coup against the president. That same month he replaced the anti-Soviet general Muḥammad Ṣādiq as minister of defense and commander in chief and was promoted to full general. His skill as a strategist and his success in reviving the morale of the Egyptian army became evident in the October 1973 war. Ismāʿīl was made a field marshal in November 1973.

(Read Britannica’s 1980 interview with Anwar Sadat.)