WarSclerotic

Opinion: On the matter of Israel’s bomb and Iran – Bennett Ramberg – POLITICO.com.
By: Bennett Ramberg
January 6, 2012 04:31 AM EST

During the GOP debates, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich raised a specter that no U.S. or Israeli public official dare mention — the plausibility that Israel would use its atomic arsenal to halt Iran’s nuclear weapons program.

“If my choice was to collaborate with the Israelis on a conventional campaign or force them to use their nuclear weapons,” Gingrich said, “it will be an extraordinarily dangerous world if, out of a sense of being abandoned, they went nuclear and used multiple nuclear weapons in Iran. That would be a future none of us would want to live through.”

Though some might take Gingrich’s remarks as political theater, the fact remains that we don’t know how far the Jewish state will go to fulfill the “all options are on the table” threat.

So does Gingrich’s concern, repeated in several debates, have any basis in reality? History says no. But Israel never confronted an emerging nuclear adversary quite like Iran. While Jerusalem’s bomb may be the last arrow in its quiver, when it comes right down to it, the country remains an atomic enigma that raises questions how far it would go to stop Tehran.

Israel is the most unusual of nuclear armed nations. Unlike others, it never mentions, publically plans, parades or visibly deploys the arsenal. It doesn’t acknowledge testing a device — despite reports that it detonated at least one weapon in the Indian ocean off South Africa. Nor does it disclose the number of weapons it possesses.

Israel’s nuclear behavior (or non-behavior) adds to the puzzle. Consider when the country faced the most dire circumstances—the 1967 and more challenging 1973 war. It never even issued a threatening peep to intimidate or deter.

Applying secrecy to discourage regional copy-cats dictated Israel’s use of force, rather than deterrence to stem nuclear rivals. The result — the 1981 attack on Iraq’s Osirak reactor and the 2007 strike on Syria’s secret Al-Kibar plant.

However, Israel responded differently to Iran. Despite its repeated statements that , “all options are on the table” and posturing in military exercises, timidity substituted for action. The international community stepped into the void. The International Atomic Energy Agency has repeatedly sought to coax Iran to fess up and halt suspect nuclear activities. The European Union offered economic and diplomatic incentives. The Security Council applied multiple rounds of political and economic sanctions. All failed.

Israel, possibly in coordination with the U.S. and others, decided to tear a page from the run-up to its bombing of Osirak. It applied assassination of scientists and disruption of nuclear exports to stop Baghdad. Along with allies, it seems to have added computer viruses and, possibly, sabotage of Iranian nuclear and missile development plants.

But success would buck history. In Iraq, international inspectors with authority to destroy weapons of mass destruction after the 1991 Gulf War shut Baghdad’s program. In South Africa. peaceful regime change proved the key. In South Korea and Taiwan, Washington exercised overwhelming political and military leverage.

Only with Libya, in 2003, did we see isolation, sanctions and, in the end, diplomacy move a regime then worried about its own survival following the fall of Iraq.

In contrast, North Korea, Israel, India and Pakistan overcame impediments. And Iran appears on the way.

This pessimistic backdrop suggests international efforts to stop Iran’s nuclear effort is tread milling. Yes, we can still hope new sanctions and covert action will move Tehran’s Mullahs. But it remains a slim bet.

This leaves the Osirak template — a conventional military strike on Iran’s nuclear program. But unlike the Iraqi or Syrian reactors that Israel destroyed, Iran has multiple key sites, some presumably undisclosed and others, like the recently opened Fordow nuclear enrichment plant, hardened in the interior of a mountain. Without international inspectors with authority to ferret out remaining nuclear contraband and prevent reconstruction, these facts suggest an assault would delay but not terminate Iran’s efforts.

Conventional attack raises other complications. Were the international economy to slip into dramatic decline — as a result of possible oil shocks — Israel could find itself a global pariah. Isolated, Gingrich’s nuclear scenario becomes more compelling – especially if Israel were to fear its conventional strikes wouldn’t stop nuclear reconstruction by a vindictive Iran.

This scenario should prompt Washington to consider next possible steps. If sanctions and covert actions fail to stop the Mullahs, should Washington use force to make good its repeated declaration it will not allow Iran to become a nuclear weapons state? Or should we put resources toward dramatically boosting its gulf military presence to intimidate Iran?

Would offering Jerusalem a military alliance to defend Israel against Iran reduce its anxieties and the temptation to preempt? Or, given the blood and treasure the U.S. has spent across the Middle East and Southwest Asia, should Washington let the region fend for itself — perhaps with extra U.S. material aid?

Now—not the cusp if crisis—is the time for the American public to consider if and how far the country ought to go

Bennett Ramberg served as a policy analyst on the Bureau of Politico-Military Affairs during the George H.W. Bush administration. His books include, “Nuclear Power Plants as Weapons for the Enemy.”

This entry was posted on January 6, 2012 at 1:50 PM and is filed under Uncategorized. You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments. You can comment below, or link to this permanent URL from your own site.