WarSclerotic

DEBKAfile, Political Analysis, Espionage, Terrorism, Security.

Ahmadinejad unveils long-range bomber-drone Karrar

Defense minister Ehud Barak’s snap nomination of OC Southern Command Maj. Gen, Yoav Galant as Israel’s 20th chief of staff was necessary – not just to dispel the climate of intrigue among competing generals, but to pull the high command together in view of the preparations to attack Israel gathering momentum in Tehran, Damascus, Beirut and Ramallah – and even in al Qaeda in Yemen.
(debkafile gave early warning of these preparations on Aug. 20. Click here for article.)

The general expectation of a US-Israeli strike on Iran’s nuclear sites has therefore faded into the background of the threatening stance currently adopted by Tehran’s allies, Syria, Hizballah and the Palestinian Hamas and Islamic Jihad.
According to debkafile‘s military sources, Israel intelligence does not have evidence of concrete plans to make good on these threats, but Jerusalem is extremely concerned by the placing of four hostile military forces on the highest level of war preparedness in the last few days and are asking why.
For example, Syrian prime minister Naji al-Otari and Abbas Zaki, one of Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas’ closest aides, have spoken of a “very imminent” Middle East war; Al Qaeda’s No. 2. commander in Yemen, Saeed al-Shehri, released a videotape last week stating that a war between Iran and Israel is about to erupt. He called on all Arab aviators to contribute to the holy cause by crashing their planes on Israeli city centers as did the Al Qaeda martyrs who attacked New York and Washington on Sept. 11 2001.
The situation being too incendiary to ignore, Israel’s Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister decided the malicious documents traded among the top brass in the last ten days were an indulgence Israel could not afford. They therefore ended the uncertainty over the choice of next chief of staff after Lt. Gen. Gaby Ashkenazi steps down in February 2011. Ehud Barak delivered a surprise notice to the regular cabinet meeting Sunday, Aug. 22 that he had cut short the selection process and named Maj. Gen. Yoav Galant as his candidate for the next chief of staff.
debkafile‘s military sources see five elements with the potential for exploding into a major Middle East flare-up:

1.  Iran has taken US and Israeli passivity over the start-up of its Russian built nuclear reactor at Bushehr on Aug. 21 to mean that it can get away with more muscle-flexing and has already factored the reactor which Washington characterized as not immediately dangerous into its military build-up.
Sunday, Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad unveiled an armed unmanned aerial vehicle called Karrar, claiming its range to be 1,000 kilometers – as far as Israel – and able to deliver four cruise missiles. These claims have yet to be independently verified.
More locally-made advanced weaponry is promised for this week to demonstrate Iran’s independence of outside sources.  Its leaders are bragging that Iran will soon take its place among the world’s top 50 exporters of advanced arms.
2.   The forthcoming Israel-Palestinian peace talks beginning in Washington on Sept. 2 – while generally rated as going nowhere – are nonetheless anathema for Tehran and its radical allies. They are perfectly capable of starting trouble on Israel’s borders with Lebanon, Gaza or even Syria to sabotage even the dimmest prospect of a diplomatic breakthrough.
There is no telling in the Middle East when an isolated incident may not deteriorate rapidly into a major conflict when the climate is as tense as it is at present. It came dangerously close on Aug. 3, when a Lebanese army sniper shot dead an Israeli colonel precipitating a heavy exchange of fire.
3.  Lebanon is on tenterhooks over the nine Hizballah leaders the international court inquiring into the 2005 Hariri assassination plans to summon as suspected perpetrators of the crime. Hizballah’s leader Hassan Nasrallah has given the Beirut government  due notice that if his top people are surrendered to the tribunal, he will plunge the country in a civil conflict.
Hizballah, backed by Damascus, recently began accusing Israel of engineering the murder, so providing themselves with a neat pretext for going to war and avoiding facing the music.
Thursday, Aug. 19, all Syrian homeland defenses and emergency services were placed on the highest war readiness for an outbreak of hostilities without further notice.

4.  The situation on the Israel’s southern borders is as tense as its Lebanese and Syrian frontiers.
5.   Iran is expected to take advantage of the withdrawal of US combat troops from Iraq to make a grab for the oil-rich south and send its allies to carry out operations against Israel as a diversionary tactic.

All these reasons have led military sources to indicate to debkafile that the outgoing Lt. Gen. Gaby Ashkenazy may not stay on until February but hand over to Maj. Gen. Galant as soon as the beginning of the Jewish New Year in the second week of September, 2010.

A Look at The Atlantic’s Debate on Israel, Iran, and the Bomb – International – The Atlantic.

Aug 22 2010, 9:30 AM ET |

Thus she has made a wager with Goldberg, and he has accepted. Wright bets that neither the Israelis nor the United States will have bombed Iran by July of next year. It appears that the stakes are each other’s autographed books — which one hopes they would exchange anyway as a friendly courtesy without need of explosions or bloodshed.

Doomsday Articles Reflect Edginess on Iran – Defense/Middle East – Israel News – Israel National News.

by Gil Ronen

Two articles that appeared in internet news sites Sunday morning appear to reflect an atmosphere of edginess in parts of the Israeli public regarding the possibility of a war with Iran and its proxies. One was written by a person who claims to be part of a forum of experts but uses a pseudonym, and the other was written by Udi Pridan, an advertising executive.

An article signed by Haggai Amos, a pseudonym, appeared in the News1 website, under the headline: “Israel will be Attacked by Lebanon and Syria within the Next Two Weeks.”

Amos is identified as a member of the “Israeli Intelligence Forum,” which includes retired members of the intelligence community and former government officials.

The Russian-Iranian move to open the Bushehr nuclear plant this weekend, Amos opines, was meant to signal to the “declining powers of Europe and the U.S.” that a new front is taking shape: Russia, China, Iran, Turkey, North Korea, Brazil and Venezuela are all lining up against the West.

Iran wants a war to break out between Israel and Lebanon within the next two weeks, the article claims. Lebanon, it warns, will launch missiles against all parts of Israel, especially Tel Aviv. This “first strike” will cause massive casualties and psychological shock in Israel and will be accompanied by missile fire from Hamas in Gaza and by terror attacks in Judea, Samaria and Jerusalem.

This will be followed by a second strike: a chemical weapons attack by Syria that would cause “hundreds of thousands of dead in Israel.” Israel will retaliate “very severely” but only against Iran’s proxies – Syria, Lebanon and Gaza – the article predicts. It does not explain why Syrian President Assad – a secular Alawite Muslim – would be willing to doom his country to annihilation in the service of Iran, a Shi’ite power. It also does not say why Israel would not retaliate against Iran if it knew the attack was initiated by it.

Pridan’s article appeared in Haaretz and is titled “Wake Up!”. It predicts that Israel will take action against the Iranian nuclear program. “Stricken Iran will respond with its remaining strength” following the Israeli attack, the prominent advertiser warns, firing “missiles that can carry a payload of half a ton of explosives or chemical weapons.”

In addition, Hizbullah will fire thousand of rockets. Pridan also believes Tel Aviv will be badly hit, and envisions the IDF Headquarters at HaKiryah, the Akirov Towers where Defense Minister Ehud Barak resides, and the Azrieli Center towers all being reduced to rubble.

“If there will be thousands of dead, we will lick our wounds. Five thousand would be a national trauma. At 20,000 we will use the doomsday weapon against Iran, and then there will really be a new Middle East,” Pridan writes.

Wake up! – Haaretz Daily Newspaper | Israel News.

It is likely the Iranians will not use the bomb they have. There are, however, things that cant be allowed to develop even if the chances they’ll be used is 5 percent. Because even if it is a 5 percent chance, it means 100 percent destruction.

By Udi Pridan

There is an 80 percent probability that between nine months to two years from now, the Israeli home front will absorb 1,000 to 20,000 losses. That is the result of the Iranian nuclear Catch-22 in which Israel is trapped.

There’s something of a secret internal pact in Israel that it will not permit any of its enemies to possess nuclear weapons. The reason is clear. It is likely the Iranians will not use the bomb they have. There are, however, things that cant be allowed to develop even if the chances they’ll be used is 5 percent. Because even if it is a 5 percent chance, it means 100 percent destruction. That is a chance no one will take. Just as no one will get on a flight, even for half fare, if there is a 5 percent chance the plane will crash.

	The Bushehr nuclear power plant, south of Tehran.
	Photo by: Reuters

That’s why Israel will act against the Iranian nuclear program, with or without the Americans. This is the commitment, apparently taken as an oath in some secret ceremony, of every Israeli prime minister, every army chief of staff and every Mossad chief. That is what Menachem Begin did in Iraq. According to foreign sources, that is what Ehud Olmert did in Syria, and that is what Benjamin Netanyahu and Ehud Barak will do in Iran. They will bomb.

The operation will cause losses. They will not be light, but they will be tolerable, given the importance of the matter. What will be intolerable is what will come later. Stricken Iran will respond with its remaining strength: Shihab-3, Shihab-5, Shihab-8 and a Shihab we will only discover at that time, as usual. These are missiles that can carry a payload of half a ton of explosives or chemical weapons.

In addition, Iran’s proxy will be used in the north. Hezbollah has thousands of rockets, much improved over those we experienced in the last war. The one Iron Dome weapons system deployed in the south will become useless in 24 hours.

Hundreds of missiles will fall on the home front in Israel for the first time, mostly in the center of the country. You don’t have to be a ballistics genius to understand what that means. One missile on army headquarters in Tel Aviv, and not only will the chief of staff’s pistol vanish, so will his entire office. One missile on the Akirov Towers, and the defense minister’s piano will be gone. One missile on the Azrieli mall, and the items on sale will become fair game for looters.

Thousands of dead and wounded in the metropolitan Tel Aviv area is an overwhelming number for us. With all due respect to the army’s Home Front Command, Israel does not have emergency and rescue services that can cope with such a situation. We don’t even have firefighting services at a minimal level. There’s no fire truck, no connection to water, and the driver is both cantor and midwife. If there will be thousands of dead, we will lick our wounds. Five thousand would be a national trauma. At 20,000 we will use the doomsday weapon against Iran, and then there will really be a new Middle East.

In the meantime, I can’t understand how we continue to busy ourselves with trivia. Israel in 2010 is in fetal distress, and its parents are tossing back a beer. The foolishness of the state’s behavior is on a level that even Barbara Tuchman, in her book “The March of Folly,” could not have imagined. The ship is sinking, and the captain is getting a manicure. The chief of staff, the defense minister and the army’s top brass are preoccupied with personal survival, while our survival as a state is uncertain. There are dozens of ministers and deputy ministers, and nothing moves without the prime minister. And he prefers not to move. Everything is stuck. And everything is about to explode.

Action must be taken immediately. We must pull ourselves together, stop all the foolishness, recruit the best and the brightest, join hands and together, united and smart, focus on waging the battle for our future.

Because after the commission of inquiry that will be established in 2013, the Agranat Commission will look like child’s play, and that terrible Yom Kippur like Purim.

via DEBKAfile, Political Analysis, Espionage, Terrorism, Security.

Only photo allowed of Bushehr start-up

The Obama administration and Netanyahu government greeted the start-up of Iran’s first nuclear reactor at Bushehr with extraordinary meekness, given the grim military and strategic hazards it represents for the region and Israel in particular. Yet nary a squeak of protest came from Washington or Jerusalem when Russian technicians began loading 162 rods of 82 tons of fuel into Iran’s nuclear reactor – a process that will take two weeks – Saturday, Aug. 21 – notwithstanding US-led sanctions, Israel’s military preparations and international diplomatic posturing.
The State Department said Saturday after the event that Iran’s Bushehr nuclear plant has “no proliferation threat” – a statement that was completely beside the point. debkafile reveals that both the Kremlin and the State Department have joined in concealing the secret deal whereby Russia votes for UN Security Council sanctions against Iran in return for US silent acquiescent to Moscow’s activation of the Bushehr reactor.

The price the Obama administration and the Netanyahu government paid was prohibitive: Vladimir Putin was allowed to jump the Iranian nuclear drive miles forward toward a capacity for producing weapons-grade plutonium. (Moscow claims the rods will be returned, but Iran’s capacity for deception and concealment in the entire last decide s well documented.)

Both Obama and Netanyahu had been beguiled into trusting that President Dmitry Medvedev’s tougher line on Iran would prevail in the Kremlin. But Medvedev was nowhere to be seen last Monday, Aug. 15 when Putin took the risk of ceremonially assigned Sergei Kirienko, head of Rosatom, with shipping fuel to Bushehr within a week and getting the reactor on stream, after years of delays.
The Russian leader got away with showing the Muslim world the worth of Moscow’s backing – upstaging the side show put on in Washington the day before when US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced the onset of direct Israeli-Palestinian peace talks on Sept. 2 – a process which the greenest of Middle East pundits appreciates as having nowhere to go.
The Netanyahu government was supposed to have all its worries swept away by the US assurance that the Iran threat is not imminent but eleven months away, as the New York Times reported Friday, Aug. 20. The next day the London Telegraph mocked this assertion by explaining that US officials were really saying that “the process of converting nuclear material into a weapon that worked would take at least 12 months” – a prospect hardly likely to ease Israel’s concerns.

Omitting any comment on the Bushehr reactor, Prime Minister Netanyahu stated that Israel’s security would be paramount in a deal with the Palestinians. He issued a list of stipulations, such as the demilitarization of territory handed to the Palestinians – only side arms for police; Israel would retain control of the Jordan Rift Valley bordering the Kingdom of Jordan and the mountain ridges forming the spine of the West Bank, they key to defending Jerusalem and Israel’s coastal plain.
Many will recall the prime minister’s solemn reiterations that a nuclear-armed Iran would pose an existential threat to Israel and noticed how fast they have faded.
His “security pledges” regarding a future Palestinian state on the West Bank should therefore be taken with a hefty grain of salt. Indeed, according to debkafile‘s Washington sources, the prime minister may already be listening to a US proposal to assign the policing of the Jordan Valley and West Bank mountain peaks to NATO troops, most of them American.