Secrets of Electronic Warfare in the glorious October War

[The SC]

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Exclusive translation for PDF:


Ahmed Abu Baybars wrote:


Contents:

- A general concept of e-warfare, its role and function on the battlefield.
- What is the role of electronic warfare in the process of great transit and the opening of war ..
- Electronic jamming and its impact on the success of the first air strike focused on October 6
- What about the most prominent investments of electronic warfare in the field of air defense
- How did the Egyptian air defense professors succeed in deceiving the latest types of American missiles?
- How the enemy has repeatedly tried to overcome the missile wall with its planes through complex tactics in the skies of battle
- To what extent was our forces able to limit the maritime superiority of the enemy rocket launchers of the price model .. ???
- Has Israel resorted to dangerous, non-lethal methods to blow Syrian rockets into the Mediterranean?
- A look at the achievements of electronic warfare in espionage and reconnaissance and influence the actions of fighting the enemy during the ground battles
- What is the secret of the injury of General Abraham Adan deafness and addressing his leaders .. ??
- Did General Abraham Mandler fall victim to successful electronic warfare on the battlefield ???
- Sargir unknown .. Because of the intensified Egyptian EW confusion Israeli pilots cried inside their cabins on October 14 .. !!!!
- Electronic warfare and loopholes ...
- The texts of General Sharon's calls with the letter pass through the ears of the Egyptian Signal and electronic warfare Force.
- Thanks to the effective penetration of the wireless enemy network, our forces managed to hit the Israeli bridge to the west
- How did the enemy's forces manage to broadcast reports of demoralization through the 23rd mechanised brigade communications to its men before the destruction of its tanks on the morning of 18 October 1973?
- What is the most dangerous American weapons transported through the airlift used by Israel against our forces .. ?? To what extent have we succeeded in nullifying its influence and overcoming it ... ??
- Who are the most prominent martyrs of the electronic war ... ??
- And finally ... what did they say about electronic warfare ... ???


Before the responses to all the questions and the above items, there is an introduction that must be:

In this article we will discuss aspects of the grand concept of the role of electronic warfare in the glorious October War through the pens of military writers and editors of high weight, such as General Adel Khalil, author of the book of electronic warfare and Edgar Oplance famous British military expert and both the military editor Abdu Mubasher and Mohammed Abdel Moneim and senior Egyptian air defense officers and others ...

Until the early 1960s, there was no integrated organization of electronic warfare except in the United States of America and the former Soviet Union. The rest of the developed countries established sub-units in some of their main branches, especially their air and naval forces.

Israel preceded us in the introduction of electronic means of warfare, and the impact of this appeared in the June 1967 war..

The Egyptian political leadership, after the end of the June war, secured Egypt's entry into the field of electronic warfare. The Egyptian electronic warfare weapon was established under the pressure of fighting in early 1968 as an electronic counter-work branch of the Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces. (20 January 1970) and immediately began planning to manage the first electronic war in its comprehensive concept to secure and assist the forces in the implementation of their tasks in the glorious October war .

The war of attrition on the Egyptian front ended on 8 August 1970 with comprehensive developments in the field of electronic warfare for Egypt. In that year, the electronic warfare administration was established as a complete weapon in defiance of the Israeli electronic superiority that has continued since the June 1967 war.

The Egyptian Air Defense Wall was built in June 1970 with heavy sacrifices and succeeded in damaging and shooting down scores of Zionist enemy planes..(51 planes) between destruction and damage, according to US sources.

This was an honorable conclusion to the war of attrition on the Egyptian front and ended with a series of decisive victories for Egypt, the most important of which was the construction of the Egyptian missile wall and its push on the front, overcoming the hostile electronic measures and establishing a new reality that imposed itself as a prominent challenge to the Israeli air superiority and very difficult to overcome, as well as enable the Egyptian air defense geniuses to find an effective way to shoot down the Israeli Phantom aircraft, which was considered a "safe flight".

Egyptian electronic victories have been confirmed by new victories in the field of air defense, which is considered one of the most prominent field of electronic warfare. The Israeli spy and reconnaissance plane was shot down in September 1971 with Egyptian surface-to-air missiles, A missile intercepted the American missile attack on the Egyptian radar network by Phantoms without letting the Israeli Air Force despite having a great advantage of doing anything.

It is worth noting that the role of electronic warfare has become increasingly important and effective for both warring parties. For those who wanted to read more details about the rise of electronic warfare in the battle of attrition, see the previous article (The Role of Electronic War in the June 1967 War and the War of Attrition 1970). The subject makes it easier to take a brief look at the idea of electronic warfare in war..

ECCM counter-hostile electronic warfare procedures:

(ECCM), which is the use of a number of electronic procedures to resist and respond to hostile electronic surveillance through the implementation of the highest degrees of electronic insurance in electronic systems and methods, and the most important procedures in this method of systems protection, electronic monitoring of electromagnetic friendly radiation .

The combat operations of our forces in the field of electronic warfare during the October war aimed at:

1- Enabling our units for the technical and tactical exploitation of our electronic equipment fully and maintain the good performance of this equipment during combat operations to prevent the enemy from succeeding in affecting them by any usual means..

2- To deprive the enemy of the use of electronic means to influence the actions of our forces as we know that the enemy was ahead of us in this area and boasting by benefiting from the experiences of the Vietnam War, which is provided by America on a plate of gold, and we were able to surprise him during the war with a stream of radiation Which was not known before the war and it took a long time during which the experts of electronic warfare in Israel and behind them of experts more knowledgeable and capable of analyzing these radiation and measurement of lengths and frequencies so that they can devise means to counteract the work of our aircrafts and missiles and devices to take control over our units that were flowing eastward..

3- Egyptian forces were able to achieve superiority in the field of war on the enemy during the early days of the battle and this superiority was due to equipment we possessed but is mainly due to the enemy's underestimation of our potential.

The aim of enemy's electronic warfare in the war:

- The inevitability of the use by Israeli forces of the elements of electronic warfare at various levels (Adaptive/operational and tactical methods) in order to confuse and mislead reconnaissance to exercise the same measures against its forces.

- The establishment of electronic jamming centers with special and large capabilities in the implementation of electronic warfare at all levels (operational / tactical / strategic) for espionage on communications and jamming of means of air defense..

- Implementation of an electronic aircraft to work over the borders to jam all the radars and survey their properties and their frequencies by the Stratocruiser planes.

- The Israeli Air Force keeps abreast of global concerns in the use of UAVs in any future operations against Arab EW. It is difficult to monitor and trace and does not need the necessary geo-logisticstic elements as manned aircrafts.


On October 6, 1973, the joint Arab forces in Egypt and Syria carried out the surprise attack on Israel on the day of their celebration of Yom Kippur. While most of the Israelis were on the same day at their homes, at 1405 hours Sukhoi and Mig attacked Israeli defenses in Sinai and the Golan, in Arab's biggest air strike on Israel, as an opening to the glorious Ramadan war ..

While about 4000 pieces of field artillery and rockets of different calibre shells shelled the defenses of the Barlev line..

The attack was accompanied by a total wireless obstruction of Israel's wireless communications that led to a major failure in the exercise of their command and control and hindered access to orders.

At the same time, the communication centers and sites of the radar stations in Sinai were destroyed by elements of storm troops, Al Saika (lightning) and air force..

On the Syrian front, the air strikes were aimed at destroying all defenses in the Golan and isolating roads and axes of progress to the Golan Heights.

The role of electronic warfare in the success of the first air strike:

This dazzling success was not to be seen in this brilliant panorama in the opening of the war without the role of Egyptian electronic warfare and the electronic boot, which can not be overlooked in the success of the first air strike, which gave the first signs of great victory and the powerful preliminary artillery firefight. The General Command presented an electronic map of the positions of the enemy's command and control centres, radar control stations, guidance centers and Hawk anti-air missile batteries. It also carried out electronic jamming actions against hostile means of communications to reduce the enemy's ability to direct its aircraft to intercept our air attacks ..

The Egyptian air attacks on command and control centers in Umm Qasim and Umm Khashib was a plan to destroy the huge electronic centers in Sinai that the enemy has planted as the largest electronic centers for espionage, jamming and eavesdropping on Egyptian communications. And the relative proximity of the Suez Canal was a serious risk to the work of the Egyptian forces. This fact gave the Israelis enough confidence in their ability to say that they (can read the ideas in God's head). So These sites have been on the list of targets for the first air strike. These missions were assigned to the Topolev 16 bombers with heavy KH air-to-ground missiles to insure that they were crushed on the ground and the rest of the Egyptian aircrafts hit 10 other sites of the US Hawk land to air missiles..

We have been able to determine the location of the enemy's radar, types and frequencies and degree of efficiency, and from here we were able to draw the itinerary of our aircraft when directing the focused air strikes deep in the enemy's defences..
To shed some light on this complex operation; Radar stations emit in the atmosphere and when processing special receivers we were able to detect the frequencies of these stations and their nationalities also, for example:

- US stations operate at a frequency of 200 to 360 NIS and 300 to 400 NIS
- The English stations are 250 to 270 NIS and from 220 to 550 NIS
- The French stations are from 270 to 270 cyclones and from 400 to 700 cyclones
- The antenna rotation speed of the radar stations shall be from 4 to 6 rpm
- Fighter guidance stations reach up to dozens of cycles per minute
- Height measurement radars (measurement of the height of aircraft flying in the atmosphere) The speed of rotation of their antennas is irregular in the angle of 4 degrees
- The speed of rotation of fixed radar station antennas is generally lower than in mobile stations

This had a great impact during the operations of our air forces against them by avoiding detection and the enemy's reactions to our aircrafts and then it was easy to attack these stations themselves and we have all heard about the hit on Umm Qasim and Umm Khashib but we did not hear that next to these sites, other important ones also were hit by our aircrafts like Tassa and silver Tala, all vital sites that were detected by the Egyptian electronic survey and defined as vital centers containing complex electronic devices for reconnaissance and obstruction and guidance operations for Israeli fighters to intercept our fighters and our combat bombers.

Where air strikes were carried out by the Israeli enemy electronically without human intervention or guided by land; electronic processors (minds) made by the US Hughes company determined the location of the targets, the number, the height and speed and then gave orders electronically to the most appropriate Israeli air base to complete the process of interception and after the take-off of their fighters, the electronic minds feed a certain screen in front of the Israeli pilots with all the information to be followed (Speed, direction and altitude) so that our aircraft can be intercepted in the most appropriate time and place ..

After the destruction of these vital sites, the so-called technical disruption of the Israeli air defense network has occurred, and the effectiveness of their air defense has been greatly reduced. The enemy had a huge air defense network of the latest air defense networks in the world, unlike what was known, they had hundreds of Hawk anti-air defence missiles sites in the Sinai, Anti-aircraft artillery and radar networks. In short, as the military editor, Mohamed Abdel Moneim, says, "We used to see them and they couldn't see us" ...

In the aftermath of the war, the electronic warfare units denied the Israeli warplanes from receiving orders and information to carry out their missions. Some Israeli pilots were crying in their communications apparatus from the frustration and feeling that they were isolated from their commanders and other support when they tried to attack Egyptian air force in the Delta and Mansoura on 14 October 1973, which was known as the massacre of Israeli aircraft where the enemy lost 17 aircrafts in the longest and largest air battle in history that lasted 53 minutes..

Radar range difference between the F-4 (190 km) and the Mig-21 (21 km)

Electronic Warfare in Air Defense

The Air Defense Force is the most practical field of electronic warfare and the most crowded with its systems, methods and means. When thinking about the electronic warfare, radar stations and anti-aircraft bases come to mind..

After several hours of the Egyptian air strike, some 800 Egyptian tanks crossed the Suez Canal using the crossings and the encampments and took the Israelis by surprise and took their defenses in the Barlev line, one after the other, and Israel tried to catch up with the situation and hastily prepared a defensive plan based primarily on their superior air forces, Its predominant formation is based on Phantoms, Hawks and Mirage aircraft in the second line.

The Israelis believed that their aircraft equipped with the latest electronic monitoring and jamming equipment can abort the attack and guarantee their superiority. But this self-confidence has turned into a great tragedy. Instead of Israeli pilots listening to the famous "Sam.Song" song that they are used to hearing (meaning the rhythm of avoiding the Egyptian Sam missiles translated into a musical tone in the cockpit of the Israeli pilot) New songs were played on them completely when they were unable to escape and lost a large number of aircrafts in the first three days of the fighting, so it became clear to them that there has been a major change in the Egyptian electronic system and their airborne electronic equipment has become without effectiveness The first manifestation of this change was their discovery that radar-guided devices used in some types of ground-to-air missile units had higher frequencies than usual and using a new missile guidance tactic differed significantly from the SAM-2 and SAM-3 missile-guided tactics. That the Egyptian tanks forces are providing protection for the system at every movement of highly advanced missiles and found them to be the SAM / 6 loaded on tracked vehicles as well as large numbers of Soviet anti-air artillery self-propelled Shilka 23 mm quadrilateral..Sam/7 Strella was also provided to armored forces Which was called by the Egyptians (the snake) because of its winding path in the air with infrared radiation to defend against low-flying aircrafts, Israeli pilots have called it (burning cigarettes) .. Besides, the forces were operating east of the Canal under the cover of a network of Sam / 2 and Sam 3 Pechora mobile networks west of the canal, making the penetration of this network very difficult

But the real force of the air defense network was not the power of armament that characterized it or any kind of other force, the real reason was primarily due to the systems used in the guidance, which also constituted a great surprise to the great Western countries.

The SAM / 6 radar used CW (Continued Waves) waves, unlike the SAM / 2 and SAM / 3 systems, which used the Pulse Wave system. The target was illuminated by a continuous wave radar and the missile was directed to the target. At that time, Israeli radar was designed to receive only pulse waves and was unable to capture continuous waves which made it more difficult to detect the missile; a SAM 6 could approach the aircraft without prior warning because the radar did not capture the pulse of the missile guidance station.

The radar of the Shilka anti-aircraft artillery system used a very high-frequency radar. At the same time, the radar receivers of Israeli aircraft could only pick up the pulses at frequencies up to 12 000 megahertz while the Shilka radar had a frequency of 16,000 megahertz ... !!

On the other hand, the shoulder-fired Strella missile operated with the infrared targeting the engine exhaust. All these systems, in addition to the SAM / 2 Edvina and Sam / 3 Pechora systems, operated as an integrated air defense system. Israeli aircraft, could not avoid the interception by one of the means of this system; when the Israeli pilots were flying at high altitudes they faced the Sam / 2 Edvina and Sam / 3 Pechora that easily hit them and when flying at low altitudes they had to deal with SAM /7 Strella missiles and anti-aircraft artillery from the 23 mm Shilka ..This forced the Israeli leadership to give orders to their air force to stop its support of the ground forces..

The situation became very critical for the Israelis on both fronts. Alongside the increasing losses of their aircrafts in the early days of the war, their tanks losses also increased to a large extent when they were easy targets for the Sagger, Sniper and RPG anti-tank missiles with the Egyptian and Syrian infantry units. It launches from close distances with high accuracy. And especially the Sagger missile which was a surprise new warfare for the Israeli enemy that destroyed hundreds of their tanks in Sinai..

This had forced Israel to take immediate action to develop the electronic system in their aircrafts and to use infrared means for anti-missile. Hence the United States provided them with large quantities of (Shaff) used to block the interference in what is known as (passive disability), a method of electronic warfare to counter The interference of radar was used long ago in the Second World War and the Vietnam War. Before we talk about it, we should know that the electronic jamming of radars is divided into two types, according to the brilliant military writer Abdu Mobashir in his book "The Electronic Warfare" published in 1978.

- The first type is an active interference ... it is done in two ways; jamming by distortion, and jamming by deception..

1) Jamming by distortion:
Which is an interference with rays of a jamming device that appear as radiation rays on the radar screen and obstructs the soldier working on the radar to determine the target signal
A- confusion at the spot:
This type of jamming can blur the appearance of the target signal on the radar screen completely and can be overcome by changing the working frequency of the radar to another frequency
B- Jamming interference:
This kind of jamming of the complete radar frequency space at the same time so as to prevent the workers on the radar to change the frequency from time to time.This type avoids the interference defects of the previous confusion at the spot.
C - Distortion at the spot on different frequencies:
Here, the spot jammer is used with frequency change at a very high rate for the radar frequency limits. This method can use the high density of impedance in spot interference for a short period on all frequencies that are likely to be used by the radar.

2) Phishing:
It is the most complex type of jamming. It is based on confusing the radar factor by producing counterfeit targets on the screen of the device that can not be distinguished from the real targets nor knowing the distance or direction of the real target amid the deceptive signals that appear on the radar screen. This complicated type of electronic interference is conducted by generators of false targets..

The second type is the passive jamming..

This method is called passive impedance because it is done by means of not relying on interference on hostile radar devices via other interference devices and electronic interference directly, such as the active method of the previous types, but this method is done by the enemy aircraft throwing small pieces of aluminum from the hollow called the metal chips and the deployment of these segments In large amounts in the air when the aircraft carrying it is in the range of radar detection, the deployment reflects signals on the radar screen stronger than the feedback from the target plane itself. It distracts radar workers in an attempt to distinguish the real signals from false signals for a not long period of time. When these flying chips begin to fall slowly on the ground, the radar detects the real targets. By Then the aerial bombing begins without the radar being able to detect the attacking aircrafts..

For example, during the Second World War, the 8th US Air Force alone dropped about 10 million pounds of metal chips over Europe and was used not only for interference, but also to cause interference and intimidation to the German Air Defense Forces with false air strikes.

In general ... there is information that can only be obtained during the penetration by aircrafts into the airspace and is on its way to its objectives, and without this information one can not perform electronic blinding or electronic jamming..

The electronic reconnaissance in the pre-process stage is important for the implementation of electronic encryption/blinding or electronic jamming.

These are the methods used for electronic jamming on enemy radars, which the Israeli enemy did not neglect to follow any one of them. And they were all countered by Egyptian means of electronic warfare..

As for the passive means of the suspension of the metal sheets, the only new in this use was the design of aluminum foil to work against the frequencies operating in the Egyptian air defense. The chips were placed in capsules inside the special (PODS) in the aircraft and fired by the pilot. In addition, the Israelis used Infrared flares to fool Sam / 7 Strylla missiles so that to guide them to the flares instead of the aircraft and this method has achieved some success at first and enabled the Israeli aircraft to penetrate the Egyptian air defense network..

In addition to this development in the electronic warfare, the Israelis used several other methods and tactics that relied primarily on attacking the surface / air missile systems first before performing any other tasks

Despite all of this, the TV-bomb, the thermal missile and the ant-radiation missiles Shrek registered triple failure of the latest American weapons provided to Israel..

And even the corner reflectors provided by the United States to Israel in its aircrafts and other means of deception of the latest US arsenal to deceive our radar devices and the depletion of our arsenal of missiles and artillery so that other waves of fighter jets can attack and control our units in the critical period of reconstruction and replenishment, has failed. They came reassured to take advantage of the electronic deception that preceded it, and were surprised by a torrent of fire they did not expect, the result was the fall of more Israeli fighter jets, because of the ability of the heroes of the air defense to distinguish between the real signals and false signals broadcasted by enemy EW devices..

To demonstrate this, Air Defense Officer Hasan al-Qarmani, a general of the War Corps, asked a radar officer on October 8, 1973 about how he was affected by the hostile electronic disability. He replied simply, "It's nothing, we've been trained on what is much more complicated than this".

According to Edgar Oplans British military expert specializing in the study of wars in the Middle East, the reasons of that Egyptian success in the field of military electronics is when the departure of Russian experts from Egypt occurred in 1972, the Egyptians introduced some modifications to SAM missiles, radar equipment and electronic countermeasures that the Israelis did not know about at that time..That was another advantage wrapped in extreme secrecy while the Israelis and others lean in heavy down Egyptian capabilities for radar and electronic equipment.

Among the attempts of the enemy in the field of electronic warfare is to resort to the use of drones, a prominent mean of electronic warfare was considered a technological marvel at the time was used in the war in October 1973, the first use in operations, but despite the complexity of the electronic warfare, the enemy attempts failed and 3 were shot down, two of these were Ryan Firbe 1 and one Chocar, and a similar aircraft was shot down on the Syrian front.

In the aerial reconnaissance, the Americans used the giant SR- 71, which greatly affected the results of their battle survey and sent immediate survey reports on the situation of the Egyptian and Syrian forces to Israel. It was difficult to shoot down the plane with its mach 3 speed and its altitude of 30 kilometers, from which Israel knew the readiness of our forces to carry out the development of the attack on October 14, 1973 and reported that the 4th and the 21st armored brigades left their positions to divert the Israeli attacks on Syria, which paved and encouraged the Israeli enemy to carry out the gap attack to the west of the canal.

In the end, the Egyptian success achieved in the field of electronic warfare is measured at the end of battles when it was confirmed that 60 to 75 Israeli planes were shot down by SAM 6
And about 16 other Israeli aircraft were shot down by SAM 7. And 121 other aircrafts with SAM-2 and SAM-3 missiles, except what was shot down by anti-aircraft artillery, combat ground forces and the lightning units or by paramilitary fire..

Electronic Warfare in the maritime conflict:

While air force battles and air defence battles were raging, several other naval battles took place.

The Gabriel missile was considered technically highly efficient but was short-range (2.5 km), which was the operational range of the Soviet B-15 Stykx before Israeli boats could fire their missiles. Therefore, they had to find a suitable tactic to attack the Egyptian navy. The Israelis did not find the solution to reach another type of longer range missiles. They found that the solution stems from the special capabilities of electronic warfare and electronic countermeasures.

The first procedure was to supply all missile boats with interference and deception devices, and most of their marine parts were painted with a coating capable of absorbing the electromagnetic radiation of the radar and using absorbable materials that have the ability to convert electromagnetic radiation to another type of energy source, mainly thermal energy that can be dispersed by water or air rather than bounce off of reflective surfaces. It has also been decided that the best means of attack is head on approaching of the Arab maritime radar in the Egyptian and Syrian boats to reduce the surface exposed to radiation ..

Our naval forces have also developed their performance. For example, television cameras have been used to reduce the reliance on the radar system in the detection of targets, making these new methods used during the October War a landmark in naval history on the development of marine weapons and tactical uses..

Electronic warfare in land battles:

During the first days of the October War, the electronic warfare units directed radio impediments to hostile command and control centers at all levels, depriving the Israeli southern command of control of its various units, as stated by Israeli General Abraham Adan, one of the leaders of the Israeli armored divisions in the October war, where he said in his book (on the banks of the Suez Canal) in his own words "contact with the leadership of the southern region, such as talking with the deaf". It has also intervened in confusion of networks of leadership at the tactical level, he also said: "It was almost 4:30 when I met Gabe and Natak. When I took off the headset and jumped out of the command armored vehicle and looked at the map on the soft sand, I was surprised to find that the sound of the explosions around us was lighter on the ears than the sound of the signal on the communication device, which lasted for several hours ..."

One of the most prominent victories of the Egyptian electronic forces in the field of ground warfare is to locate the famous Israeli General Abraham Mandler commander of the Israeli armored forces in the front followed by an air raid of the Egyptian air force during which the Israeli commander was killed on 13 October 1973..

Another innovation that the Electronic Warfare forces resorted to is to secure the Egyptian leadership's wireless communications through the use of the Nubian language, an ancient Egyptian language of the Nuba people used in the Egyptian military correspondence, a language that the Israeli enemy does not know. Even if it succeeds in eavesdropping on Egyptian military radio communications, And thus contributed to the confusion between the leaders of the Israeli enemy ..

The October war also showed that the Egyptian armed forces had absorbed the electronic lesson well as a result of their experiences from the days of the 1967 war and the war of attrition and developed their equipment, prompting the American electronic warfare machine to provide all its assets to the Israeli side, otherwise it would have suffered an overwhelming defeat like it was never known before.

Robert Hetz, a former Air Force officer, is the editor of Aviation Week magazine, the most famous American magazine specializing in aviation, space, rockets and electronics, said:
"The various foreign circles have agreed that the Egyptians are highly skilled in the field of electronics."

Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Dayan on the eve of the October war:
On October 9, 1973: "Our air force is unable to penetrate the Egyptian air defense network without incurring heavy losses."
On October 14, 1973, "Israel is fighting a war that it has never fought before, whether in 1956 or in the Six-Day War of 1967. This is a difficult war, the battles of armored vehicles are fierce, and the air battles are bitter. It is a heavy war with its days and heavy with its blood."

Hence, the great importance of electronic warfare in the modern battle led to the two superpowers, the United States of America and the old Soviet Union at that time to a comprehensive study of the war of October 1973 to complete the development and research, no doubt that this war has been used as a test field from the two countries to develop their latest Weapons and equipment.


Sources:
6 books and collection of 7 articles

 

[WarKa DaNG]

It's undeniable that EW can change the course of a battle