The lessons of the Six-Day War of 1967 pointed to the fact of the weak airborne and heavy armor capabilities of the Syrian Military. There was a perceptible lack of expertise in combined arms operations involving a combined deployment of armoured, artillery and airborne infantry units. Top Syrian military commanders and Hafez al Assad recognized the need to create a powerful and operationally self-sufficient Divisional command that would incorporate all the elements of modern combined arms. Also the political instability of the preceding decade in Syria pointed to the necessity of having a large and well-equipped body of highly loyal soldiers with strategic responsibilities of dealing with threats to the Baathist regime. From 1968 onwards many Alawite officers and soldiers from the regular