A Deadly Race That No One Can Win

"We are grown men playing with dangerous toys." So said one veteran Israeli officer last week, referring to the race for arms in the Middle East, which is now outdistancing the search for peace. Hardly a week passes without the announcement of a new weapons deal somewhere in the region. Initially, the goal of the race was the replacement by Israel and the Arabs of weapons lost during the 1973 October War. But this seems to have triggered a cycle of action and reaction in which each side now strives to better the arsenal of the other. As a result, both sides are not only stronger than before the October War but are also acquiring some of the world's most sophisticated weaponry (see chart). Thus they have raised the potential destructiveness of another Middle East war to chilling new heights.

The Arab arms buildup is particularly worrisome to Israel and its American Jewish supporters. With predictable grumbling from Jerusalem, the U.S. has sold arms to Jordan, Saudi Arabia and other Arab states that played minor roles in the 1973 war. This month, though, Washington announced that it intends to sell six C-130 Hercules military transport planes to Egypt (total cost: $50 million). Fearing that this may merely foreshadow future large-scale arms shipments to the Egyptians, leaders of American Jewish organizations last week warned President Ford they were "strenuously opposed" to the deal, and that any further sales to Cairo might alienate Jewish voters. The Administration, which anticipated the "calculated outrage" of the Jewish community, argues that the sale helps Cairo preserve its independence from the Soviets. It also enables Egyptian President Anwar Sadat to demonstrate to his radical critics that his willingness to make some accommodation with Jerusalem can pay dividends. This is in Israel's interest as much as in America's.

Whether or not war breaks out, the participants--with the possible exception of Egypt--are better prepared than ever. Items:

ISRAEL now has more tanks, armored vehicles and long-range artillery than ever, most of it from the U.S. Next year the Israeli air force will take delivery of the first of 25 F-15 Eagles, the newest, fastest (top speed: Mach 2.5) and most agile U.S. fighter. Israel's other combat planes (principally F-4 Phantoms and the Israeli-designed Kfirs) are being outfitted with the latest electronic gadgets to aid in night flying missions and foil antiaircraft missiles. The Shrike air-to-surface missile has been deployed to knock out the radars on which antiaircraft batteries depend. In addition, Israel is receiving "smart" bombs, which can be guided onto targets. Still on Jerusalem's shopping list are American RPVs (remotely piloted vehicles), which can counter the Arabs' Russian-built SAMs by drawing antiaircraft fire. To bolster its ground forces, Jerusalem is acquiring the TOW antitank missiles, the Cobra helicopter gunship and the most lethal version of the M-60 tank.

SYRIA has replaced and upgraded all the equipment it lost in 1973, thanks to the Soviet Union. Damascus has received hundreds of top-of-the-line T-62 battle tanks, 45 MIG-23 fighter-bombers, unpiloted drone planes and hundreds of antiaircraft missiles. Its 50 Scud surface-to-surface missiles can reach virtually all of Israel's populated areas. To enable Damascus to operate properly all its new, ultrasophisticated military hardware, there are now more than 2,000 Soviet advisers with the Syrian armed forces, while Cubans serve in Syrian tanks and North Koreans and Pakistanis fly some of the MIGS.

JORDAN, which committed only two brigades to the 1973 war and suffered small losses, will get 14 Hawk antiaircraft batteries from the U.S. in 1977. It has also obtained 42 secondhand American-made F-5A jet fighters from Iran and 36 of the newest version of that plane--the F-5E--from Washington. In addition, Amman is busily improving its vintage M48 Patton tanks by installing diesel engines and more powerful guns.

EGYPT is perhaps the only Middle East nation that has not fully replenished its arsenal since 1973. Reason: the chilly Cairo-Moscow relations led to a near cessation of arms deliveries from the Soviet Union. With cash provided by Saudi Arabia and other oil-rich states, President Anwar Sadat has been turning to Western sources of supply: to France for as many as 150 Mirage 5 fighter jets, Britain for up to 80 Jaguar fighter-bombers and 20 Westland Lynx helicopters, and Italy for electronic equipment. With French and British help, Egypt soon hopes to start constructing its own arms-manufacturing plants. If Congress approves the sale of the C-130s to Cairo, it is likely that Washington will then offer Egypt a range of such combat support items as communication equipment and mine detectors.

Middle East states not on the front line in the Arab-Israeli dispute have also expanded their arsenals. Saudi Arabia has bought 300 tanks from the U.S. and Britain, and has an additional 500 on order; it will also soon receive 128 fighter jets from the U.S. and France. Iraq is beefing up its arsenal with orders to the Soviets for 40 MIG-23s in addition to the 30 they already have. Libya last year signed a $2 billion arms deal with the Soviets that includes 24 MIG-23s, 1,100 tanks, 800 armored personnel carriers and 50 batteries of antiaircraft missiles. Since these enormous quantities are well beyond Libya's defense needs, Israeli officials view them as a kind of "Arab weapons-supply depot" accessible to any nation willing to fight Israel. The huge Saudi and Iraqi arsenals could be put to the same use. Compounding Jerusalem's worries about the Arab arms buildup was the creation last year of a joint Syrian-Jordanian military command on Israel's eastern front.

Although the arms balance is heavily stacked numerically in favor of the Arab states, most Western experts still feel that Israel could defeat any combination of its enemies' forces. What gives the Israelis this edge is their superiority in such areas as targeting missiles, electronic countermeasures, helicopter support and the ability to mobilize rapidly 400,000 superbly trained reserves. Israeli military officials agree with this assessment, but they also fear that by 1980 the sheer quantity of the Arabs' arms could cancel Israel's advantage. Privately, some Israeli politicians warn that if the military balance tips against them, they may have no alternative but to develop a nuclear strike force, for which they already possess the materials and technical capability.

Even if that did not happen, another war in the next year or so would be far more costly to both sides than the last one. For Israel alone, according to U.S. intelligence estimates, the next round, if it involved the same combination of states that fought in 1973, might leave 8,000 Israelis dead and 36,000 wounded, compared with 2,527 killed and 6,027 wounded during the October War. Using the same ratio, Arab' losses could soar from 22,000 dead in 1973 to 72,000; the number of wounded could increase from 54,000 to 325,000.

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