Mohamed Abdel Ghani el-Gamasy

Mohamed Abdel Ghani el-Gamasy (Arabic: محمد عبد الغني الجمسي‎, 9 September 1921 – 7 June 2003) was an Egyptian Field Marshal (Mushir) and the Commander in Chief of The Armed Forces.[1][2] He has been called "one of the architects of the 1973 War."[3]

Mohamed Abdel Ghani el-Gamasy
(Arabic: محمد عبد الغني الجمسي)
Field Marshal Mohamed Abdel Ghani el-Gamasy, Minister of Defence and Military Production, c.1977
Minister of Defence of Egypt
In office
1974–1978
PresidentAnwar El-Sadat
Prime MinisterAbd El Aziz Muhammad Hegazi
Mamdouh Salem
Preceded byAhmad Ismail Ali
Succeeded byKamal Hassan Ali
Personal details
Born9 September 1921 (1921-09-09)
Batanoon, Monufia Governorate, Egypt
Died7 June 2003 (2003-06-08) (aged 81)
Cairo, Egypt
Awards24 Order, Medal and Ribbon from Egypt and other countries
Military service
AllegianceEgypt
Branch/serviceArmy
Years of service1941–1978
Rank Field Marshal
Unit1st Cavalry
CommandsCommander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces
Chief of Military Operations
Second Field Army
14th Infantry Division
Battles/warsWorld War II
Suez Crisis
Six-Day War
October War

Early life

El Gamasy was born on 9 September 1921 in Batanoon, Monufia Governorate, Egypt. He was one of two brothers and five sisters. After high school, El Gamassy joined the Egyptian Military Academy and was commissioned in 1941 as a reconnaissance officer in the Cavalry (1st Cavalry Regiment) As a Major, he was GSO-II of a cavalry battalion during the 1948 War.

October War

During the War of Attrition, on March 1969, then-President Gamal Abdel Nasser appointed el-Gamasy as commander of the Second Field Army. His appointment was part of a process of rooting out former general commander Abdel Hakim Amer's mostly incompetent loyalists with capable commanders, including Abdul Munim Riad, Saad el-Shazly and Ahmed Ismail. El-Gamasy later wrote that Nasser should have deconstructed Amer's autonomous web of control in the armed forces following the Egyptian military failure during the Suez Crisis in 1956.[4]

El-Gamasy was well known for being the Chief of Operations for all Ground Forces participating in the 1973 October War. He was also appointed by Anwar Sadat as the head of the group that participated in the disengagement talks on 28 October, at "Kilometer 101". Reportedly, he was sad for the lost souls at the war when the American secretary of state Henry Kissinger announced that the president Sadat agreed to pull the main part of the Egyptian forces from the east side of the Suez Canal in exchange of the withdrawal of Israeli forces from the west side of the Suez Canal and retreat back into the depth of Sinai.

Death

On 7 June 2003, El Gamasy died in a hospital in Cairo after a long battle with illness.

Honors
  • Honor Military Star.
  • 1952 Liberation decoration.
  • 1958 United Republic decoration.
  • El-Gamsy was chosen as one of the best 50 military leaders in the world military history.

Works
  • The October War (Cairo, 1993)
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References
  1. Arthur Goldschmidt; Arthur Jr Goldschmidt (2000). Biographical Dictionary of Modern Egypt. Lynne Rienner Publishers. pp. 94–. ISBN 978-1-55587-229-8.
  2. Arthur Goldschmidt Jr. (10 October 2013). Historical Dictionary of Egypt. Scarecrow Press. pp. 219–. ISBN 978-0-8108-8025-2.
  3. Joseph Sassoon (24 February 2016). Anatomy of Authoritarianism in the Arab Republics. Cambridge University Press. pp. 16–. ISBN 978-1-107-04319-0.
  4. Kandil, Hazem (2012), Soldiers, Spies and Statesmen: Egypt's Road to Revolt, Verso Books, p. 86 and 92, ISBN 978-1-84467-962-1
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