Follow up Lt. Col. Eli Dekel (ret): why does Egypt have 13 military bridges
on full
alert at Suez Canal?
Dr. Aaron Lerner - IMRA 9 October 2015

When Lieutenant Colonel Eli Dekel (ret) , who commanded the Field
Intelligence Branch of Military Intelligence during the First Lebanon War
recently presented his findings of a study of the Egyptian military
deployment in Sinai at the Alfredo Seminar on the Next War asked why there
are now 13 military bridges positioned on the Suez Canal.
[His lecture starts at minute 38 on this YouTube video:
https://youtu.be/wGdNR3a1tnA ]

In a follow up telephone conversation with IMRA today, he explained that
the 13 military bridges are composed of floating sections that are connected
together to form bridges.

Google Earth satellite photographs from this year show that there are 3 such
bridges in the water ready to deploy in a matter of minutes plus another 10
bridges in sections on the banks of the Suez Canal that could be deployed on
around an hour.

Keeping the bridges in the water, Dekel explains, subjects the bridges to
corrosion and also structural damage from the waves.

Dekel also notes that these bridges are not relevant to supplying transport
needs for Egyptian forces operating against their enemies in Sinai as
conventional civilian bridges and tunnels able to readily handle tanks and
other heavy equipment provide throughput magnitudes greater than the
floating bridges can provide.

Dr. Mordechai Kedar told IMRA that Egypt believes that in the event of
conflict with Israel that Israel will quickly destroy the civilian bridges
and tunnel spanning the Suez Canal and thus keeps the military bridges at
the ready.