Review: The Lion's Gate by Steven Pressfield

[khamneithang]

I'm not particularly fascinated about war but the Six Day War was an altogether different story. It began with the closure of the Straits of Tiran by Egypt followed by the UN leaving Sinai. What was apparently thought to be a one-sided war with initial reports of massive damage being inflicted on the Israelis soon assumed frightening proportions with Israel wagging its tail and turning the tide of the war. The conquest of the Sinai peninsula, the West Bank and the Golan Heights are the stuff legends are made of. Six days after the war erupted, the Arab forces lay in tatters, brutally annihilated with its machines and engines scorched beyond repair across the hot deserts. What is an entirely different story is how the entire Arab forces were decimated, with soldier fleeing their posts, and many of them never heard of again.

The Lion's Gate: On the Front Lines of the Six Day War by Steven Pressfield is unmatched and unparalleled in its depiction of the Six Day War and is a must-read for history buffs. In this totally absorbing and thrilling book, Steven Pressfield writes about how a how force outnumbered 40-to-1 prevailed against overwhelming odds and snatched victory from the jaws of defeat. The book is particularly fascinating as it is narrated through the ruminations and recollections of those who actually fought the war. The title of the book The Lion's Gate is a reference to an entrance into the Old City of Jerusalem through which the all-conquering Israeli army took possession of the most holy of sites.

A war as significant as The Six Day War demands much more than the 448 pages inside which Pressfield squeezed in the story. While it covers the entire war and much more, Pressfield has done a commendable job in presenting watershed/defining moments of the war in chronological order. To this end, he tracked down sixty three military personnel who actually participated in the battle for control of Sinai, Jerusalem, and the Golan Heights and allowed them to tell their own stories.

Through these participants, you will revisit the Six Day War as men and women met in the war-room and drew up plans for offensive and defensive tactics. You will get to meet many leaders who have since died but were prominent leaders of the time. This is a gripping book about The Six-Day War fought between June 5th and June 10th, 1967 with a tiny Israeli nation of 2.7 million facing the might of three Arab nations - Syria, Jordan and Egypt. Through The Lion's Gate: On the Front Lines of the Six Day War, Steven Pressfield takes you back in time to revisit an epochal event in world history the final chapter of which is yet to be written.