00:00It is an all-out war.
00:02That's how Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Dayan describes an invasion of the Golan Heights
00:06and the East Bank of the Suez by Syria and Egypt.
00:10The surprise attacks came early this morning, in the air and on the ground.
00:14The Egyptians apparently have taken control of at least a portion of the East Bank of the Suez.
00:19Dayan says it would take several days to drive them out of there,
00:22attributing the initial Egyptian successes to the thin line of Israeli defenses in that area.
00:28Egypt maintains it has taken control of the entire beach.
00:32On the Golan Heights, Syria claims it has taken some Israeli positions,
00:36but Israel says the Syrian attack now has been brought under control.
00:40As usual, there are conflicting reports on the casualties.
00:44Moshe Dayan called Israeli casualties reasonable.
00:47Egypt announced that it had lost 10 planes, but that it shot down 11 Israeli planes.
00:52Everyone agrees that this is the most serious fighting in the area since the Six-Day War of 1967,
00:59and that it developed rapidly.
01:01David Burrington reports on the mobilization in Tel Aviv.
01:06All day today, Israeli reservists have been heading for their units.
01:11The streets have been full of military traffic.
01:14In fact, the big call-up started last night.
01:17Arab forces have been building up for 10 days,
01:20and intelligence indicated an attack was imminent.
01:26Israel could have stopped first and gained the advantage,
01:29but this time, the Israelis decided to wait.
01:33There's been no panic here, but people were uneasy and angry,
01:37especially angry that Arab armies would attack on this day, Yom Kippur,
01:42the most holy Jewish day.
01:44The youth cast told of heavy fighting, but the tales were hard to come by.
01:48The army did disclose that eight big Egyptian helicopters had been shot down
01:52with more than 200 casualties, fighting very heavy on both fronts.
02:03Throughout Israel, there have been frequent air raid warnings today,
02:07the first time the sirens have sounded more real since the Six-Day War.
02:11Their wailing, in fact, was the first indication the Arabs had attacked.
02:15The sirens set off by Syrian MiGs striking across the Golan Heights.
02:21Generally, Israelis spend this holy day in the synagogue,
02:24but today, many of them spend it in a bomb shelter.
02:27During one of the alerts, the Israeli cabinet was in emergency sessions.
02:33Tonight, Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Dayan agreed
02:36Egypt had gained two beachheads in Sinai,
02:39and that Arab forces would undoubtedly get reinforcements through the night.
02:44Syrian tanks had also crossed the frontier.
02:46But once the Israeli army was up to strength, he said,
02:49the Israeli soldier would push them back.
02:52David Burrington, NBC News, Tel Aviv.
02:55President Nixon has instructed Secretary of State Henry Kissinger
02:58to contact all parties involved in the fighting
03:01and try to arrange for a ceasefire.
03:03The president is keeping track of developments in the Middle East
03:06from his Key Biscayne, Florida home,
03:08and there are now indications that he'll return to Washington tomorrow.
03:11The resumption of the war in the Middle East is a serious setback of plans
03:15the president and Secretary Kissinger had
03:17for developing a new climate of peace in that part of the world.
03:21Richard Valeriani has a report.
03:23Secretary Kissinger had planned to spend a quiet, private weekend in New York,
03:27but the Middle East crisis forced him to rush back to Washington.
03:30He spoke briefly with newsmen as he left.
03:33We've told you everything that we can say.
03:36I'm in close touch with the president.
03:37If we have anything to say later in the day,
03:41we'll say it then, either in Washington or here at the United Nations.
03:47Before leaving, Kissinger called the foreign ministers of Egypt and Israel
03:50to urge them to end the fighting as quickly as possible.
03:53He also called the Soviet ambassador in Washington,
03:56and he sent messages to King Faisal of Saudi Arabia
03:59and King Hussein of Jordan, apparently appealing to them to remain neutral.
04:04Earlier, State Department spokesman Robert McCloskey
04:06acknowledged the fighting caught American policymakers by surprise.
04:10I must say, going back over the conversations
04:15that the secretary has had here in New York
04:18with foreign ministers in the last several days,
04:24we never had any indication from any of the ministers
04:27that there was a military action intended by any of the governments.
04:34Indeed, the entire emphasis, as I'm sure those of you
04:38who have covered our activities here,
04:41the entire emphasis in the area of the Middle East
04:44was one of peaceful intention,
04:46one that emphasized the desire
04:52certainly shared by us
04:53that we hoped that diplomacy would become
04:58a little more active in that area
05:00and that negotiations toward peaceful settlements
05:04might be undertaken.
05:06Up until last night, top-ranking American officials
05:09had figured that a new outbreak of fighting
05:10in the Middle East was virtually impossible.
05:12As one official put it,
05:14the Arabs don't want to commit suicide.
05:16And Kissinger had been working on a new American effort
05:19to bring about a long-range peace agreement
05:21in the Middle East
05:22following the Israeli elections at the end of this month.
05:25But that policy is down the drain now,
05:27and the first priority is simply to get the fighting stopped.
05:31Richard Valeriani, NBC News, in New York.
05:35American military officials insist
05:37that the U.S. 6th Fleet will continue normal operations
05:40in the Mediterranean,
05:41but all shore leaves for the fleet now have been canceled.
05:44Sailors and officers have orders to report back to their ships.
05:47That was described as a precautionary move.
05:50At the Pentagon in Washington,
05:51the fighting is being watched very carefully,
05:53as we learn in this report from John Cochran in Washington.
06:00American officials believe the renewed fighting
06:02was started by the Arabs.
06:03The Pentagon officials are not sure
06:05whether it's really all-out war
06:06or an attempt by the Arabs
06:08to regain a limited part of the territory
06:10they lost in 1967.
06:12Although today's attack came as a surprise,
06:15U.S. officials knew yesterday
06:16that Egypt and Syria were massing their troops.
06:19Also, the Russians appeared to be taking
06:21some of their advisors out of Egypt,
06:23a possible sign that the Russians knew an attack was coming
06:26and did not want to be identified
06:28with another military fiasco like the one in 1967.
06:32Reports on the air and ground battles received here are sketchy.
06:36About the only thing Pentagon officials are confident of
06:38is that the ultimate victor will be Israel.
06:40Although the Russians have supplied the Arabs
06:43with better military hardware than they had in the Six-Day War,
06:46U.S. intelligence estimates still give Israel the decided edge.
06:50And it's still believed here that Israel has better trained men
06:53and better command control.
06:55One Pentagon official said the Arabs have just never quite put it all together.
06:59Still, there are many unanswered questions.
07:02The Pentagon does not know if Egypt got enough of its tanks
07:04across to the east bank of the Suez
07:06to put up a major fight against Israel's armor.
07:10And there are reports of some North Korean pilots in Egypt.
07:13They could be flying some of Egypt's fighter jets.
07:15If so, that might slow Israel's attempt
07:19to reassert its air superiority as quickly as possible,
07:22a strategy Israel has followed in previous encounters.
07:25But despite the ifs and the questions,
07:28the Pentagon still believes that Israel will take command of the air,
07:31and that will mean victory on the ground too.
07:34John Cochran, NBC News, at the Pentagon.
07:37Despite the fighting going on in the Middle East,
07:40the United Nations Security Council was not called into session today.
07:44The fighting broke out during the most important religious holidays of the year
07:48for both Jews and Arabs.
07:49For the Jews, it was Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement.
07:52For the Arabs, it was Ramadan, a month-long religious observance
07:56and the most significant of the Muslim calendar.
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