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The Iranian Nuclear Challenge
Wednesday, March 27th, 2013 @ 6:20AM
Understanding the Current State of the Iranian Nuclear Challenge
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| The Iranian Nuclear Challenge
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To produce its first atomic bomb from 20 percent enriched uranium, Iran would need a stockpile of 225 kilograms, which upon further enrichment to the weapons-grade level would yield the 25 kilograms of uranium metal for a nuclear warhead. Since it began enriching 20 percent uranium, Iran had produced 280 kilograms of this material – well above the Israeli red line drawn by Prime Minister Netanyahu. But it had removed a total of 112.6 kilograms of this 20 percent stockpile, leaving itself with a net total of 167 kilograms of 20 percent enriched uranium. This changed the entire timeline of the Iranian bomb, pushing it off from the fall of 2012 to a later date.
▪ In May 2011, the IAEA raised concerns about the “possible existence” of seven areas of military research in the Iranian nuclear program, the last of which was the most alarming: “the removal of the conventional high explosive payload from the warhead of the Shahab-3 missile and replacing it with a spherical nuclear payload.” In November 2011, material that the IAEA presented pointed clearly to the fact that Iran wanted to develop a deliverable nuclear weapon. The planned warhead design also underwent studies that investigated how it would operate if it was part of a missile re-entry vehicle and had to stand up to the stress of a missile launch and flying in a ballistic trajectory to its target. The IAEA concluded that “work on the development of an indigenous design of a nuclear weapon including the testing of components” had been executed by the Iranians.
▪ Iran is not a status quo power. A few years after he assumed the position of Supreme Leader of Iran, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei gave a revealing interview to the Iranian daily Ressalat, in which he asked a rhetorical question: “Do we look to preserve the integrity of our land, or do we look to expansion.” He then answered himself, saying: “We must definitely look to expansion.” This world view is still sustained to this day. Khamenei’s senior adviser on military affairs, Major General Yahya Rahim Safavi, who was the previous commander of the Revolutionary Guards, described Iran in 2013 as “the regional superpower” in the Middle East.
▪ In the meantime, Iran has substantially increased the number of centrifuges that it installed for uranium enrichment. It also introduced its more advanced centrifuges into its nuclear facilities and it is making progress on its heavy water reactor that will allow it to produce plutonium. Iran, so far, has been careful not to cross the Israeli red line, but that hasn’t prevented it from moving ahead on other aspects of its program. Indeed, just after the last P5+1 talks in Kazakhstan, Tehran announced it was building 3,000 advanced centrifuges that it intended to install at Natanz.
▪ Thus, if proposals are to be made that protect the international community as a whole from the threat of Iranian nuclear weapons, they must address other aspects of the program which might become fully operational in the years to come: the plutonium program, weaponization, delivery vehicles, and continuing upgrade of Iran’s centrifuge technology. If negotiations only halt one aspect of the Iranian effort to reach nuclear weapons, while letting the other parts of the program go forward, they may preclude an immediate crisis, but the world will still face a new Iranian challenge in the years ahead.
Over the last decade, a clear international consensus has slowly emerged that Iran was not just pursuing a civilian nuclear program, as Tehran argued, but rather was seeking nuclear weapons. True, the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty guarantees the right of signatories, like Iran, to use nuclear energy for peaceful purposes, but that did not include a right to enrich uranium in order to produce indigenous nuclear fuels that could be employed for nuclear weapons.
Many countries with nuclear power infrastructures, like South Korea, Finland, Spain, and Sweden, actually received their nuclear fuels from abroad.1 Even in the U.S., 92 percent of the uranium used in 2010 by nuclear power plants was of foreign origin.2 But unlike these other cases, Iran chose to establish its own uranium enrichment infrastructure at Natanz and suspiciously kept it totally secret from the world until 2002, when it was revealed by the Iranian opposition. A second secret enrichment facility, near Qom, buried deep inside a mountain, was disclosed in 2009.
Because of the way Iran proceeded with its nuclear program, international suspicions of its purpose only increased. The official Iranian line that its nuclear infrastructure was for the production of electricity lost all credibility over time, especially in light of its enormous oil and gas reserves which were a far more economical source of energy. In February 2006, French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy bluntly stated that “it is a clandestine military program.”3
Even the Russians could no longer protect what Iran was doing by saying that it was for purely civilian purposes. Thus, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev frankly admitted in July 2010, “We are not indifferent to how the military components of the corresponding [nuclear] program look.”4 Using careful language, James R. Clapper, President Obama’s Director of National Intelligence, reported to the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence on March 12, 2013, that Iran’s technical advancements “strengthen our assessment that Iran has the scientific, technical, and industrial capacity to eventually produce nuclear weapons.” For Washington, it was no longer a question of whether Iran wanted a nuclear bomb, but rather when it would decide to build it.
The Israeli View
In successive public appearances during the month of September 2012, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu laid out what he believed was the timeline for Iran to cross the nuclear threshold and acquire an atomic bomb. In a September 16 interview with CNN’s Candy Crowley, he stated that the Iranians were moving into the final phase of their nuclear work, saying that they were entering a “red zone” in which they were coming extremely close to achieving their goal. He specified during the interview that this meant that within six months the Iranians will have accumulated a sufficient quantity of uranium at a level of enrichment that is 90 percent of the way to completing an atomic bomb.
The prime minister restated this same idea during his address to the UN General Assembly on September 27, when he said that after this 90 percent point, what he characterized as the final phase of enrichment would only require “a few months, possibly a few weeks.” Looking at the trends in the Iranian nuclear program as a whole, he warned during his address: “the hour is getting late, very late.” For that reason, he declared that a clear red line needed to be drawn in front of the leadership in Tehran before the Iranian program entered into this final phase of enrichment and was still within the second phase of enrichment.
To understand the phases of the Iranian program to which Prime Minister Netanyahu referred, it is important as background to recall that nuclear scientists have long explained the levels of enrichment as follows. Uranium comes in several isotopes: U-235, which can undergo nuclear fission, thereby releasing the explosive energy of an atomic bomb, and U-238, which is not usable for this purpose. But natural uranium is made up of only an infinitesimal amount of the potentially explosive U-235, approximately 0.7 percent, and a much larger proportion of U-238, approximately 99.3 percent. Enrichment involves increasing the percentage of U-235 isotope in uranium, usually by spinning uranium as a gas in thousands of centrifuges, and taking away the less useful U-238.
What did the prime minister mean when he said that Iran had reached level of enrichment with its uranium that is 90 percent of the way to a bomb? When uranium is enriched to the 3.5 percent level, in the first phase of enrichment, it is called low-enriched uranium and is mainly a suitable fuel for a civilian nuclear reactor producing electricity. Given the low starting point of U-235 in natural uranium, the amount of energy required to reach even this first level of low-enrichment is about 70 percent of the total energy needed to get to weapons-grade uranium. In other words, when Iran enriches uranium to the 3.5 percent level it has essentially advanced 70 percent of the way to the weapons-grade level.
More alarmingly, when Iran reaches the second level of enrichment, meaning 20 percent enriched uranium, it is essentially advancing 90 percent of the way to weapons-grade uranium. By beginning the last sprint to weapons-grade uranium from feedstock that is already at the 20 percent level, Iran could cut in half the time needed to undertake the same enrichment if it started with only 3.5 percent uranium. In short, a stock of 20 percent enriched uranium is ideally suited for what security experts call “nuclear breakout” – a rapid move by a state with what it declares to be a civilian nuclear industry if it wants move to a nuclear weapon, in violation of its commitments to the international community.
In his UN address, Prime Minister Netanyahu was saying that the international community must warn Iran that it will not be allowed to complete the production of enough 20 percent enriched uranium for its first atomic bomb. Like in his CNN interview, he stated during his UN address that Iran might cross this threshold by next spring or at the latest by next summer, but he carefully conditioned this assessment on the assumption that Iran maintains its current enrichment rates, leaving open the possibility that they could be accelerated.
For example, if Iran outfitted its uranium enrichment facilities with large numbers of more advanced centrifuges, like the IR-2M, that operate at four or six times the speed of the current IR-1 model they mostly use, then the rate of Iranian enrichment could be dramatically accelerated. Iran formally notified the IAEA on January 23, 2013, that it was going ahead and installing the IR-2M centrifuges. Alternatively, if Tehran installed and began to operate many more IR-1 centrifuges, then the volumes of uranium that the Iranians could process would also increase substantially.
The Failure of Past International Pressures on Iran
The world was not supposed to be in this kind of position at present. Since 2002, when the Iranian clandestine nuclear program was first revealed by the Iranian opposition, the main diplomatic assumption held across the international community was that a mixture of international sanctions and negotiations would force Iran to give up its military nuclear program. Subsequently, it was also thought that the threat of the use of force would compel Iran to halt its nuclear work.
Iran’s concealment of its nuclear activities, particularly its work on uranium conversion, uranium enrichment, and plutonium separation constituted outright breaches of its international obligations under its 1974 Safeguards Agreement that had been concluded in accordance with the 1968 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Attention was particularly drawn at this time to the large uranium enrichment facility at Natanz.5
Iran’s violations of its treaty obligations were serious. As a result, diplomatic pressures were placed on Iran that appeared to be impressive. From 2006 onward, six UN Security Council resolutions were adopted that called on Iran to halt all uranium enrichment activity. Moreover, just like the resolutions adopted against Iraq under Saddam Hussein in the 1990s, these resolutions against Iran were adopted under Chapter VII of the UN Charter making them binding international law.
Yet this global effort against Iran clearly failed, for the resolutions plainly had no impact on Iranian decision-making. After UN sanctions were first imposed under Resolution 1737, in late 2006, the Iranians began enriching uranium anyway in February 2007 in ever growing quantities. It was also at this time that, despite UN pressures, Iran constructed a second secret enrichment facility, which was dug deeply into the side of a mountain at Fordow, near the city of Qom.
By 2009, Iran’s stocks of low-enriched uranium first went above 1,500 kilograms – the minimal amount for producing the quantity of weapons-grade uranium needed for a single atomic bomb. A little less than a year later, in February 2010, despite ongoing UN sanctions, Iran for the first time produced uranium at its Natanz facility enriched to the 20 percent level, which, as noted earlier, could be converted to weapons grade uranium in half the time in comparison with uranium at the low-enriched level. The Iranians began to enrich uranium to the 20 percent level at their Fordow facility in December 2011.
The Iranian regime also used these years to unilaterally alter the rules affecting the involvement of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in its nuclear program in order to erode some of its most important restrictions. For example, Iran is required to notify the IAEA that it has decided to construct a new nuclear facility the moment such a decision is taken. In other words, even when construction begins for a new nuclear facility, the IAEA should be fully informed. In the technical jargon of the IAEA this obligation is known as “modified Code 3.1″ and was formally accepted by Iran in an exchange of letters between Iran and the IAEA in February 2003.6
But in March 2007, Iran suddenly declared that it was suspending its acceptance of this obligation and going back to earlier IAEA rules that only required Tehran to declare a new nuclear facility six months before it receives nuclear material for the first time. This was not just a technicality. For having loosened the IAEA’s restrictions, the Iranians then argued that their formerly secret enrichment facility at Fordow, which was revealed in 2009, did not violate their legal obligations to the IAEA. Clearly the pressures placed on Iran by the UN Security Council during 2006 and 2007 were insufficient to prevent Tehran from taking such actions.
Then Tehran came up with the excuse that it needed 20 percent uranium for manufacturing medical isotopes at the Tehran Research Reactor. But the quantities of 20 percent uranium produced have by the admission of Iranian officials themselves exceeded their own domestic requirements for this purpose. Indeed, in an August 2011 interview published by the Iran News Agency, Fereydoun Abbasi-Divani, the head of the Iranian Atomic Energy Organization, admitted that the quantities of 20 percent enriched uranium produced “already exceeded the required amount for the Tehran Research Reactor.” The latest transparent excuse for further enrichment has been an Iranian proposal that they might have to enrich up to 90 percent uranium for powering nuclear reactors for future nuclear submarines.
Enriched uranium was not the only fuel that the Iranians planned to use for assembling a nuclear bomb. Since the first revelations about their nuclear program in 2002, it was known that Iran was building a heavy-water production plant at Arak, as well as a heavy-water nuclear reactor. Iran could extract plutonium fuel rods from the heavy-water reactor and reprocess them for producing weapons-grade material. The uranium route to an atomic bomb would still be shorter for Iran than the plutonium route, since Tehran will only first begin to operate its Arak reactor during the first three months of 2014, according to notification it gave to the IAEA.7
Time Line to an Iranian Bomb
If the countervailing pressures of the international community against Iran do not get it to halt its 20 percent enrichment, then when is it likely to obtain sufficient quantities of uranium at this level of enrichment that allow it to move quickly to the weapons-grade level and subsequently assemble its first nuclear bomb? According to the August 2012 IAEA report, Iran had already produced at that point a total of 189.4 kilograms of 20 percent uranium since it began to enrich to this level in February 2010.
To produce its first atomic bomb from 20 percent enriched uranium, according to the Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS), Iran would need a stockpile of 225 kilograms, which upon further enrichment to the weapons-grade level would yield the 25 kilograms of uranium metal for a nuclear warhead.8 In professional circles a “bomb’s worth” of high-enriched uranium is called a “significant quantity.” Iran should have been able to accumulate an adequate quantity of 20 percent uranium for one bomb by the end of October 2012, assuming it maintained its recent rate of production of 14.8 kilograms per month, using both of its enrichment facilities at Natanz and Fordow. Thus, the Iranians should have hit Prime Minister Netanyahu’s red line this past fall.
However, between December 2011 and August 2012, Iran drew down from its 20 percent stock by 96.3 kilograms, which it used to manufacture other uranium products, like uranium oxide powder for fuel plates. As a result, the net stock of 20 percent uranium fell to 91.4 kilograms. This changed the entire timeline of the Iranian bomb. According to the recent February 2013 IAEA report, Iran indeed continued its dual track approach to uranium enrichment in the first months of the year: it produced more 20 percent uranium and at the same time removed some of its 20 percent stock in order to produce other uranium derivatives that were not immediately useful for the eventual production of weapons-grade uranium. ISIS concluded on the basis of the February report that since it began enriching 20 percent uranium, Iran had produced 280 kilograms of this material – well above the Israeli red line drawn by Prime Minister Netanyahu. But it had removed a total of 112.6 kilograms of this stockpile, leaving itself with a net total of 167 kilograms of 20 percent enriched uranium.
Assuming Iran maintains its recent rate of production of 14.8 kilograms per month, and does not divert more 20 percent uranium for other uses, it should accumulate enough 20 percent uranium for a single bomb by the summer of 2013. For this reason, it is possible to project that Iran might hit the Israeli red line at that time. As stated earlier, this could happen even earlier if Iran manages to increase the rate of enrichment, especially if it utilizes centrifuges that have been installed but are not yet operational.9
For example, Iran installed 1,076 centrifuges in its Fordow facility between May and August 2012, bringing the number of centrifuges in Fordow alone to 2,140. Of that total only 646 centrifuges were actually operating. But Iran could substantially accelerate its production of 20 percent uranium in the months ahead if it decides to utilize all the new centrifuges it is in the process of installing. This would cut the time needed in half to produce enough 20 percent uranium that could be further enriched to the weapons-grade level.
Of course, Iran could reconvert its uranium oxide powder back to uranium gas for injecting into its centrifuges for further enrichment. Moreover, Iran also has a huge stock of 3.5 percent enriched uranium, which according to the February 2013 IAEA report reached 5,974 kilograms (after subtracting the uranium that was enriched to 20 percent). This stock alone could provide enough weapons-grade uranium for at least 3 to 4 atomic bombs, after further enrichment. But enriching from the 20 percent level would be the fastest way for the Iranians to break out and establish a fait accompli.
It is important to note that there are further steps that Iran must undertake to reach a nuclear weapon, whenever it amasses enough 20 percent uranium for its first bomb and enriches that stock to the weapons-grade level. Most estimates of the time needed to make this leap to weapons-grade uranium are between two and four months. All uranium enrichment requires uranium in a gaseous form: by spinning the gas at high speeds in a centrifuge the heavier U-238 can be separated from the lighter U-235, which is needed for a fission bomb. But once Iran has weapons-grade uranium as a gas, it needs to convert it into a metal for fashioning a nuclear warhead, which takes additional time.
The problem with precisely calculating time lines is also made complicated by the size of the weapon that Iran decides ultimately to make. As noted earlier, the IAEA established that further enrichment of this uranium must yield 25 kilograms of weapons-grade uranium for a nuclear explosive device. Yet critics charge that this number should be far lower. Even 15 kilograms of weapons-grade uranium would be sufficient for a bomb (historically, the U.S. conducted a nuclear test in 1951 with only six kilograms of high-enriched uranium).10
The Iranian timeline to an atomic bomb would thus be influenced by whether they seek to produce 25 kilograms of weapons-grade uranium or decide to settle on an initial device with less nuclear material and a smaller nuclear explosive yield. This difference could bring Iran much closer to crossing the nuclear red line much sooner.
Nuclear Warhead Design
There are, of course, three dimensions to any nuclear weapons program: enriched uranium, ballistic missiles, and nuclear warheads. The latter issue also grew in importance for the IAEA. This began to become evident in February 2008 when Olli Heinonen, then IAEA deputy director-general, gave a highly classified briefing to representatives of more than 100 states. According to a description of the meeting reported by David Sanger of The New York Times, Heinonen displayed original Iranian documents that he stressed came from several member states of the IAEA, and not just from the U.S.11 In June 2010, the German newspaper Der Spiegel reported that the material came from a joint operation by German and American intelligence agencies. The IAEA had the international standing to authenticate U.S. intelligence reports for those who doubted their veracity. When the IAEA said they were true, many more states were willing to accept them.
The Iranian documents detailed how to design a warhead for the Shahab-3 missile, which has been operational in the Iranian armed forces since 2003. While the Iranian documents made no reference to a nuclear warhead, they did show the arc of a missile’s flight and that the warhead of the missile had to be detonated at an altitude of 600 meters. To the IAEA experts, a conventional explosion at that altitude would have no effect on the ground below. But 600 meters was the ideal altitude for a nuclear explosion over a city. As Sanger points out, it was in fact the height of the Hiroshima explosion. Despite the substance of his presentation, Heinonen did not yet say that the Iranians were producing nuclear weapons, but he left his audience in Vienna with many questions they had not asked before.
By May 2011, the IAEA became far more explicit in its report on Iran than Heinonen had been in 2008. Its report raised concerns about the “possible existence” of seven areas of military research in the Iranian nuclear program, the last of which was the most alarming: “the removal of the conventional high explosive payload from the warhead of the Shahab-3 missile and replacing it with a spherical nuclear payload.”
Yet, the IAEA was not ready to say it had reached any conclusions. It only sought “clarifications” about its suspicions.
The most important of the IAEA reports on Iran was released in November 2011 and proved to be significant in a number of ways. First, it showed that the IAEA no longer had “suspicions” about the Iranian weaponization program – it had what it called “credible” intelligence. The appendix of the report, moreover, devoted a whole section to the “credibility of information.” It was not relying on the Iranian laptop that was at the heart of Heinonen’s 2008 presentation, but also on a much larger volume of documentation. The report states that the agency has more than 1,000 pages of material to substantiate its claims. In case there were suspicions that this material came from U.S. intelligence agencies alone, the report makes sure to clarify that the sources involved “more than 10 member states.”
Second, the material that the IAEA presented pointed clearly to the fact that Iran wanted to develop a deliverable nuclear weapon. The Iranians had sought to obtain uranium for a secret enrichment program that would not be under IAEA safeguards. The uranium that would come out of this clandestine program would be further processed to produce the uranium metal required for a nuclear warhead. The planned warhead design also underwent studies that investigated how it would operate if it was part of a missile re-entry vehicle and had to stand up to the stress of a missile launch and flying in a ballistic trajectory to its target. The IAEA concluded that “work on the development of an indigenous design of a nuclear weapon including the testing of components” had been executed by the Iranians.
Why Does Iran Persist with Its Nuclear Drive?
Iran’s audacity in violating its international obligations has surprised many in the West. The Iranian government has paid a steep economic price in terms of international sanctions, but nevertheless continues its drive to obtain nuclear weapons. It is impossible to separate Iran’s determination to acquire nuclear weapons from its broader ambitions to become the preeminent power in the Middle East.
For Iran is not a status quo power. A few years after he assumed the position of Supreme Leader of Iran, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei gave a revealing interview to the Iranian daily Ressalat, in which he asked a rhetorical question: “Do we look to preserve the integrity of our land, or do we look to expansion.”12 He then answered himself, saying: “We must definitely look to expansion.” In essence, he was reflecting what is written in the Constitution of the Islamic Republic, which calls for the “continuation of the Revolution at home and abroad.”13 Khamenei is the commander-in-chief of the Iranian armed forces and hence his definitions of Iranian national strategy are essential to follow.
This world view is still sustained to this day. Khamenei’s senior adviser on military affairs, Major General Yahya Rahim Safavi, who was the previous commander of the Revolutionary Guards, described Iran in 2013 as “the regional superpower” in the Middle East.14 He asserted that a “new global power is emerging in the Muslim world.” He explained that Washington was trying to prevent this from happening.
In the last five years, Iranian spokesmen close to Khamenei have voiced expansionist goals for the Islamic Republic, insisting that Bahrain is an Iranian province and reminding the other Arab Gulf states that they used to be part of Iranian territory. Moreover, on the ground, Khamenei uses the Qods Force of the Revolutionary Guards, under the command of Major General Qassam Suleimani, throughout the Middle East in order to export its revolutionary agenda.
Two years ago, The Guardian reported that a senior Iraqi politician gave General David Petreaus a text message in 2008 from Suleimani that read: “General Petraeus, you should know that I, Qassem Suleimani, control the policy for Iran with respect to Iraq, Lebanon, Gaza, and Afghanistan.”15 This story was partly verified this January, when the Iranian news agency ISNA reported that in a speech about Lebanon and Iraq, Suleimani asserted: “These regions are one way or another subject to the control of the Islamic Republic of Iran and its ideas.”16 Also in January, Iran admitted for the first time that the Quds Force had been deployed in both Lebanon and Syria.
In terms of the Iranian nuclear program, the distinction that Khamenei made between defensive goals for the Islamic Republic, which he did not adopt, and the offensive doctrine that he appeared to embrace, means that an Iranian nuclear weapons capability would not be for the purpose of deterrence alone, as with many other regimes, but for serving its drive to achieve regional hegemony and improve its power position vis-à-vis its Arab neighbors and the U.S. Ali Larijani, who once served as the National Security Advisor of Iran and as its chief nuclear negotiator, made this very point, asserting that “if Iran becomes atomic Iran, no longer will anyone dare challenge it because they would have to pay too high a price.” In short, nuclear weapons secure Iran’s status as a great power that does not have to accept the demands of any other power.17
Larijani’s remark is important for understanding another feature of Iran’s drive to cross the nuclear threshold. Recent history demonstrates that once a state like North Korea conducted its first nuclear test, then the U.S. and its Western allies became reluctant to challenge its nuclear status. In contrast, once Libya gave up its nuclear weapons program, the U.S. and its NATO allies felt free to back the revolt in 2011 against the regime of Muammar Gaddafi. Thus advances in the Iranian nuclear program could put it in a position in the near future to be able to deter even the U.S. from taking action against its nuclear facilities because of the risks involved.
Clearly, there are a number of benchmarks that Iran must traverse on its way to a full nuclear weapons capability. First, there is the completion of the minimal quantity of 20 percent enriched uranium needed for manufacturing an atomic bomb after it is enriched further to weapons-grade uranium. Second, there is the manufacture of uranium metal that is used in a nuclear warhead. Third, there is the production of the warhead itself and it being outfitted on a ballistic missile, like the Shahab-3, that can strike Israel, Saudi Arabia, or Turkey, as well as Western forces deployed in those countries. The November 2011 IAEA report on Iran concluded that Iran had worked on a nuclear warhead. A top Israeli official specified that Tehran had already undertaken activities “to integrate a payload on a Shahab-3 missile.”18
The Final Stages of the Iranian Nuclear Program
As Iran advances in its nuclear program, it undoubtedly acquires a great degree of deterrence even before it has a fully operational weapon. Looking at the example of North Korea, it removed IAEA surveillance equipment and evicted its nuclear inspectors in December 2002, while telling U.S. officials that it had nuclear weapons in April 2003. The North Koreans only conducted their first nuclear test in 2006 and a second test in 2009. From their experience, the North Koreans probably raised concerns in the West about their having an impending nuclear weapons capability even before their first nuclear test. Two U.S. analysts have written that the U.S. already began adjusting its military planning on North Korea in the late 1990s when intelligence analysts concluded that North Korea was capable of assembling a nuclear weapon. The point is that rogue states began acquiring strategic advantages from nascent nuclear programs even before they make the final assembly of a nuclear warhead for their missiles.19
How would this work in the case of Iran? As the indications mount in 2013 that Iran is making its final preparations to cross the nuclear threshold and become a nuclear weapons state, there will be a renewed debate in the West over the question of the use of military force. But that debate will be clouded with the question of whether Iran already has nuclear weapons. Presumably those who will assert that Iran already has nuclear weapons will argue that any preventive strike will be too risky at this point in time. The main problem is that at this stage intelligence agencies will be operating largely in the dark.
This point has been made occasionally even by senior levels in the U.S. Appearing on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” on April 11, 2011, former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates made this very point: “If they – if their policy is to go to the threshold but not assemble a nuclear weapon, how do you tell that they have not assembled? So it becomes a serious verification question, and I, I don’t actually know how you would verify that.” Gates’ assessment was particularly significant given the fact the he served as the Director of the CIA in the 1990s and understood better than most officials the true limits of Western intelligence agencies when it comes to the detection of weapons of mass destruction programs.
This explains the enormous risks of letting the Iranian nuclear program progress to its final stages, when Western knowledge about how far Iran has progressed will be problematic. Indeed, Prime Minister Netanyahu made this very point during his UN address. He noted that the Iranian enrichment facilities containing thousands of spinning centrifuges were “very big industrial plants.” That meant they were both visible and vulnerable. However, he added that once the Iranian weapons program has moved on to the next stage involving the production of a nuclear detonator, then it would no longer be reliant on large plants but rather could be completed in a small workshop that is the size of a classroom. At the very final phase of Iran’s nuclear activity, it would be far less visible to Western surveillance and hence it would be far less vulnerable.
It is for this reason that Israel has had to draw its red line on Iran’s drive for nuclear weapons on the enrichment phase of the program and not wait for the weaponization phase which would be too late. In summary, it is difficult to say with precision when Iran will acquire enough 20 percent uranium that can be enriched further to the weapons-grade level for the manufacture of an atomic bomb. But what is clear is that this moment in time is fast coming close and Iran must be halted well before it arrives. In the meantime, according to the latest IAEA report, Iran has substantially increased the number of centrifuges that it installed for uranium enrichment. It also introduced its more advanced centrifuges into its nuclear facilities and it is making progress on its heavy water reactor that will allow it to produce plutonium.20
In the present negotiations between the P5+1 and Iran, the West will undoubtedly be cognizant of Israel’s focus on uranium enrichment to the 20 percent level and the red line drawn by Prime Minister Netanyahu. Iran, so far, has been careful not to cross the Israeli red line, but that hasn’t prevented it from moving ahead on other aspects of its program. Indeed, just after the last P-5 plus 1 talks in Kazakhstan, Tehran announced it was building 3,000 advanced centrifuges that it intended to install at Natanz. Thus, if proposals are to be made that protect the international community as a whole from the threat of Iranian nuclear weapons, they must address other aspects of the program that were discussed here and which might become fully operational in the years to come: the plutonium program, weaponization, delivery vehicles, and continuing upgrade of Iran’s centrifuge technology. If negotiations only halt one aspect of the Iranian effort to reach nuclear weapons, while letting the other parts of the program go forward, they may preclude an immediate crisis, but the world will still face a new Iranian challenge in the years ahead.
Notes
This article is based on a briefing paper prepared for a meeting with the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School and the Middle East Initiative at the Harvard Kennedy School on March 4, 2013.
1. Therese Delpech, Iran and the Bomb: The Abdication of International Responsibility (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007).
2. U.S. Energy Information Administration, “Today in Energy,” July 11, 2011.
3. “France: Iran’s Program Military,” CNN, February 16, 2006.
4. “Russia to Iran: Explain Military Components of Your Program,” Reuters, July 15, 2010.
5. International Atomic Energy Agency, “Implementation of the NPT Safeguards Agreement in the Islamic Republic of Iran,” Report by the Director General, November 15, 2004.
6. James M. Acton, “Iran Violated International Obligations on Qom Facility,” Proliferation Analysis, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, September 25, 2009.
7. James Kirkup, David Blair, Holly Watt and Claire Newell, “Iran’s ‘Plan B’ for a Nuclear Bomb,”
Telegraph, February 26, 2013;http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/iran/9896389/Irans-Plan-B-for-a-nuclear-bomb.html
8. David Albright and Christina Walrond, “Iranian Production of 19.75 Percent Enriched Uranium: Beyond its Realistic Needs,” Institute for Science and International Security, June 15, 2012.
9. David Albright, Christina Walrond, Andrea Stricker, and Robert Avagyan, “ISIS Analysis of IAEA Safeguards Report,” Institute for Science and International Security, August 30, 2012.
10. Thomas B. Cochran and Christopher E. Paine, “The Amount of Plutonium and Highly-Enriched Uranium Needed for Pure Fission Nuclear Weapons,” Natural Resources Defense Council, Washington, D.C., revised April 13, 1995. For a comparison of Iranian timelines regarding the production of 15 kilograms of high-enriched uranium versus 25 kilograms of high enriched uranium, see Maseh Zarif, “The Iranian Nuclear Program: Timelines, Data, and Estimates,” American Enterprise Institute, September 2012.
11. David Sanger, The Inheritance: The World Obama Confronts and the Challenges to American Power (New York: Harmony Books, 2009), pp. 86-94.
12. Manoucher Ganji, Defying the Iranian Revolution: From a Minister to the Shah to a Leader of the Resistance (Westport, Conn: Praeger, 2002), pp. 82-83.
13. “Iran Constitution,” http://www.princeton.edu/lisd/projects/PORDIR/research/Iran%20Constitution.pdf
14. “Iran is Superpower of the Region;” New Axis of Power in Islamic World is Now Being Formed,” Iran Daily Brief, February 7, 2013, http://www.irandailybrief.com/2013/02/07/iran-is-superpower-of-the-region-new-axis-of-power-in-islamic-world-is-now-being-formed/
15. Martin Chulov, “Qassem Suleimani: The Iranian General ‘Secretly Running’ Iraq,‘ The Guardian, July 28, 2011, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/jul/28/qassem-suleimani-iran-iraq-influence
16. Saud Al-Zahid, “Chief of Iran’s Quds Force Claims Iraq, South Lebanon Under His Control,” Al Arabiya News, October 11, 2012, http://www.alarabiya.net/articles/2012/01/20/189447.html
17. Ray Takyeh, “Introduction: What Do We Know?” in Robert D. Blackwill (ed.), Iran: The Nuclear Challenge (New York: Council on Foreign Relations, 2012), p. 10.
18. Herb Keinon, “Israel’s Nuclear Chief: Jerusalem Can Defend Itself,” Jerusalem Post, September 19, 2012, http://www.jpost.com/IranianThreat/News/Article.aspx?id=285579
19. Michael Makovsky and Blaise Misztal, “Hot Debate Over Red Lines,” Weekly Standard, September 14, 2012.
20. Olli Heinonen and Simon Henderson,”Iran’s Nuclear Clock and World Diplomacy,” Policy Watch 2046, Washington Institute for Near East Policy, March 15, 2013. http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/view/irans-nuclear-clock-and-world-diplomacy
10. Thomas B. Cochran and Christopher E. Paine, “The Amount of Plutonium and Highly-Enriched Uranium Needed for Pure Fission Nuclear Weapons,” Natural Resources Defense Council, Washington, D.C., revised April 13, 1995. For a comparison of Iranian timelines regarding the production of 15 kilograms of high-enriched uranium versus 25 kilograms of high enriched uranium, see Maseh Zarif, “The Iranian Nuclear Program: Timelines, Data, and Estimates,” American Enterprise Institute, September 2012.
11. David Sanger, The Inheritance: The World Obama Confronts and the Challenges to American Power (New York: Harmony Books, 2009), pp. 86-94.
12. Manoucher Ganji, Defying the Iranian Revolution: From a Minister to the Shah to a Leader of the Resistance (Westport, Conn: Praeger, 2002), pp. 82-83.
13. “Iran Constitution,” http://www.princeton.edu/lisd/projects/PORDIR/research/Iran%20Constitution.pdf
14. “Iran is Superpower of the Region;” New Axis of Power in Islamic World is Now Being Formed,” Iran Daily Brief, February 7, 2013, http://www.irandailybrief.com/2013/02/07/iran-is-superpower-of-the-region-new-axis-of-power-in-islamic-world-is-now-being-formed/
15. Martin Chulov, “Qassem Suleimani: The Iranian General ‘Secretly Running’ Iraq,‘ The Guardian, July 28, 2011, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/jul/28/qassem-suleimani-iran-iraq-influence
16. Saud Al-Zahid, “Chief of Iran’s Quds Force Claims Iraq, South Lebanon Under His Control,” Al Arabiya News, October 11, 2012, http://www.alarabiya.net/articles/2012/01/20/189447.html
17. Ray Takyeh, “Introduction: What Do We Know?” in Robert D. Blackwill (ed.), Iran: The Nuclear Challenge (New York: Council on Foreign Relations, 2012), p. 10.
18. Herb Keinon, “Israel’s Nuclear Chief: Jerusalem Can Defend Itself,” Jerusalem Post, September 19, 2012, http://www.jpost.com/IranianThreat/News/Article.aspx?id=285579
19. Michael Makovsky and Blaise Misztal, “Hot Debate Over Red Lines,” Weekly Standard, September 14, 2012.
20. Olli Heinonen and Simon Henderson,”Iran’s Nuclear Clock and World Diplomacy,” Policy Watch 2046, Washington Institute for Near East Policy, March 15, 2013. http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/view/irans-nuclear-clock-and-world-diplomacy
* Ambassador Dore Gold is the President of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs. He is the author of the best-selling books:
The Fight for Jerusalem: Radical Islam, the West, and the Future of the Holy City (Regnery, 2007), and The Rise of Nuclear Iran: How Tehran Defies the West (Regnery, 2009).
Sunday, March 24, 2013
wanted.... Identify these people.
WANTED
URGENT - RESEARCH AND IDENTIFY THESE PEOPLE.
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| IDENTIFICATION |
We need to identify these people.
It is unacceptable that human beings (if it can be called) do you photograph with those smiles and faces moron in front of the poor carcass of dog.
These people must be persequitate by the competent authorities
Make sure that this request travel the world.
dr. Roberto Polastro.
Saturday, March 23, 2013
Marine Corps’ first operational F-35B conducts initial Vertical Landing.
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| Headquarters Marine Corps |
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| Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 121 conducted its first F-35B Lightning II short take off and vertical landing at Marine Corps Air Station Yuma, Ariz., March 21, 2013. VMFA-121 is the Marine Corps' first operational F-35B squadron which is currently building its operational capabilities to include 16 total aircraft and up to 300 personnel. (Photo by Staff Sgt. Jessica Smith ) |
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| Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 121, the Corps' first operational F-35B Lightning II squadron, prepares for flight operations aboard Marine Corps Air Station Yuma, Ariz. March 21, 2013. VMFA-121 conducted the Marine Corps' first Short Take Off, Vertical Landing operations outside of a testing environment on the same day. (Photo by Cpl. Ken Kalemkarian) |
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| Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 121 F-35B Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter prepares to make a vertical landing aboard Marine Corps Air Station Yuma, Ariz., March 21, 2013. This marks the first vertical landing of a Marine Corps F-35B outside of a testing environment. (Photo by Cpl. Ken Kalemkarian) |
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| Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 121 F-35B Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter prepares to make a vertical landing aboard Marine Corps Air Station Yuma, Ariz., March 21, 2013. This marks the first vertical landing of a Marine Corps F-35B outside of a testing environment. (Photo by Cpl. Ken Kalemkarian) |
MARINE CORPS AIR STATION YUMA, Ariz. -- Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 121 watched in amazement and satisfaction as the Corps’ first operational F-35B Lightning II squadron conducted its first Short Take Off, Vertical Landing operations aboard Marine Corps Air Station Yuma, Ariz. March 21, 2013.
Maj. Richard Rusnok, an F-35B Lightning II test pilot, conducted VMFA-121’s first short landing and takeoff as well as the Corps’ first F-35B hover and vertical landing outside of a testing environment in BF-19.
VMFA-121 is the first F-35B squadron to join Marine Aircraft Group 13 which is currently composed of four AV-8B Harrier squadrons a Marine wing support squadron and a Marine aviation logistics squadron.
Rusnok was accompanied by VMFA-121's commanding officer, LtCol. Jeffrey Scott, flying a second F-35B as a chase aircraft.
"The first STOVL flight for an F-35B outside of the test environment was another milestone achieved by the Marine Corps and the Green Knights today here at MCAS Yuma," stated Scott. "The F-35 program and specifically the F-35B have made significant progress to make this possible."
As the squadron expands its operations and end strength, they will continue revolutionizing expeditionary Marine air-ground combat power in all threat environments through the use of MCAS Yuma training ranges in Arizona and California. VMFA-121 will be home to approximately 300 Marines and is expected to receive additional F-35s throughout the next 8 to 12 months, with a total of 16 aircraft scheduled to arrive by late 2013.
Differently from previous fixed wing capabilities across the Department of Defense, the integration of U.S. Air Force, U.S. Navy, U.S. Marine Corps and coalition F-35 Lightning II aircraft on a common platform will provide the dominant, multi-role, fifth generation capabilities needed across the full spectrum of combat operations to deter potential adversaries and enable future aviation power projection.
Specific to the Marine Corps, consolidating three aircraft, the AV-8B Harrier, the F/A-18 Hornet and the EA-6B, into one is central to maintaining tactical aviation affordability and serving as good stewards of taxpayer dollars.
VMFA-121 will continue to set the pace for the F-35 program based on a common platform. The U.S. Air Force and Navy can now integrate best practices from VMFA-121 in preparation for the future operational basing of the F-35A and F-35C.
Font:By Capt. Staci Reidinger
Thursday, March 21, 2013
" I due marò torneranno subito in India ".
VERGOGNA! IL GOVERNO RIMANDA I MARO' IN INDIA!
Figuraccia storica!
Il Governo ha fatto il classico fuoco francese e ritirata spagnola, prima fa la voce grossa con l'India e dice di voler trattenere i Marò, poi, davanti alla reazione dell'India che praticamente ha arrestato l'ambasciatore, li rimanda di corsa dagli Indiani!
E la fanno passare per una vittoria, perché pare che abbiano avuto rassicurazioni sul trattamento che riceveranno!
Ma ci fidiamo di gente che non rispetta nemmeno il trattato di Vienna sulle prerogative diplomatiche?
Né tutti gli altri trattati, da quello sulle acque internazionali alle regole di ingaggio per la lotta alla PIRATERIA.
VERGOGNA! VERGOGNA! VERGOGNA!
How Many Rockets Did Iron Dome Shoot Down?
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President
Obama with an Iron Dome
battery,
Image Bank
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A number of articles published recently in Israel
The report claims that Iron Dome was able to intercept only 5 percent of all the rockets fired at Israel during Operation Pillar of Defense in November 2012, a far cry from the 87 percent success rate boasted by Israel
The report's claims appear puzzling, to say the least, particularly the contention that Iron Dome did not succeed in causing the rocket’s warhead to explode. This claim is reminiscent of claims from the 1991 Gulf War, directed then at the Patriot missiles, which in fact were not successful in hitting the Scud warheads, for the simple reason that the Patriot was designed to intercept and shoot down planes, not missiles. It appears that criticism of Iron Dome draws on claims made against US missile defense systems and pasting them on to the Israeli system, while ignoring the clear differences between the systems and between the different strategic situations.
Indeed, a Grad rocket is not a Scud, let alone an intercontinental ballistic missile. Its warhead is not that of a one-ton missile. Professor Postol claims that he knows exactly what happens when an Iron Dome Tamir interceptor explodes next to a pipe several meters long with a 20 kilo warhead. However, the fact is that the defense establishment has understandably not published this information, and therefore we can only guess what actually occurs.
The report's findings are based on an analysis of dozens of video clips. These clips were not filmed during sophisticated trials; they were taken by civilians who photographed them using their smartphones and uploaded them to YouTube. In general, it is not possible to know where they were filmed or the direction in which the person filming was looking. It could be that the dozens of clips on Youtube belonged to a single interception and were filmed by different people from different directions. It is very difficult to conduct precise analyses, and it is generally difficult to learn from the film about the geometry of the missile’s flight. The researchers also looked for double explosions and failed to find them. This is not surprising, since such explosions are very close to each other both in distance and in time – less than a thousandth of a second. There is no way that a smartphone camera could distinguish between a double and a single explosion.
It is also important to remember that not all the rockets that fell in built-up areas were failures of Iron Dome, for the simple reason that not all cities in Israel
As for the police reports, it is not clear what they indicate. The critics see them as proof that the defense establishment is lying: 109, not 58. However, the Israel Police reports on calls from citizens, and these include reports on falling fragments, rocket parts, and duds. How many of the reports were really about rockets? It is difficult to know (beyond the fact that out of 1,500 rockets launched, 109 falling in built-up areas is a not inconsiderable achievement in and of itself).
It is even less possible to make conclusions from the Property Tax Authority’s reports. Clearly some of the claims are very significant (consider the pictures of the apartment in Rishon Lezion). But how many claims does one rocket hit produce? Certainly more than one. A rocket hit is likely to shake foundations and cause damage to a number of buildings, and any such building is likely to have a number of apartments. Even a person whose window was broken at a distance of fifty meters from the rocket hit is likely to submit a claim. How many of the 3,200 claims are for minor damage? It is difficult to tell, but it is doubtful that the researchers know.
It appears, then, that critics are happy to disparage the Iron Dome system and belittle the lessons from Operation Pillar of Defense, using only dubious research without access to credible data. Debating various aspects related to Israel Israel
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[1] Reuven Pedatzur How Many Rockets has Iron Dome Really Intercepted? Haaretz , March 9, 2013,
http://www.haaretz.com/opinion/how-many-rockets-has-iron-dome-really-intercepted.premium-1.508277. Original article in Hebrew at www.haaretz.co.il/opinions/1.1954176, See also Richard Silverstein, Tikun Olam blog, “Iron Dome System Failed Miserably," posted on March 8, 2013,
http://richardsilverstein.com/2013/03/08/iron-dome-system-failed-miserably/; and Jonathan Marcus, “Israel's Iron Dome: Doubts over Success Rate," BBC News Middle East, March 12, 2013,
[2] Israeli Police website summary of 8 days of fighting, http://www.police.gov.il/articlePage.aspx?aid=877.
Tuesday, March 19, 2013
A New Reality in U.S.-Israeli Relations.
U.S. President Barack Obama is making his first visit to Israel. The visit comes in the wake of his re-election and inauguration to a second term and the formation of a new Israeli government under Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Normally, summits between Israel and the United States are filled with foreign policy issues on both sides, and there will be many discussed at this meeting, including Iran, Syria and Egypt. But this summit takes place in an interesting climate, because both the Americans and Israelis are less interested in foreign and security matters than they are in their respective domestic issues.
In the United States, the political crisis over the federal budget and the struggle to grow the economy and reduce unemployment has dominated the president's and the country's attention. The Israeli elections turned on domestic issues, ranging from whether the ultra-Orthodox would be required to serve in Israel Defense Forces, as other citizens are, to a growing controversy over economic inequality in Israel.
Inwardness is a cyclic norm in most countries. Foreign policy does not always dominate the agenda and periodically it becomes less important. What is interesting is at this point, while Israelis continue to express concern about foreign policy, they are most passionate on divisive internal social issues. Similarly, although there continues to be a war in Afghanistan, the American public is heavily focused on economic issues. Under these circumstances the interesting question is not what Obama and Netanyahu will talk about but whether what they discuss will matter much.
Washington's New Strategy
For the United States, the focus on domestic affairs is compounded by an emerging strategic shift in how the United States deals with the world. After more than a decade of being focused on the Islamic world and moving aggressively to try to control threats in the region militarily, the United States is moving toward a different stance. The bar for military intervention has been raised. Therefore, the United States has, in spite of recent statements, not militarily committed itself to the Syrian crisis, and when the French intervened in Mali the United States played a supporting role. The intervention in Libya, where France and the United Kingdom drew the United States into the action, was the first manifestation of Washington's strategic re-evaluation. The desire to reduce military engagement in the region was not the result of Libya. That desire was there from the U.S. experience in Iraq and was the realization that the disposal of an unsavory regime does not necessarily -- or even very often -- result in a better regime. Even the relative success of the intervention in Libya drove home the point that every intervention has both unintended consequences and unanticipated costs.The United States' new stance ought to frighten the Israelis. In Israel's grand strategy, the United States is the ultimate guarantor of its national security and underwrites a portion of its national defense. If the United States becomes less inclined to involve itself in regional adventures, the question is whether the guarantees implicit in the relationship still stand. The issue is not whether the United States would intervene to protect Israel's existence; save from a nuclear-armed Iran, there is no existential threat to Israel's national interest. Rather, the question is whether the United States is prepared to continue shaping the dynamics of the region in areas where Israel lacks political influence and is not able to exert military control. Israel wants a division of labor in the region, where it influences its immediate neighbors while the United States manages more distant issues. To put it differently, the Israelis' understanding of the American role is to control events that endanger Israel and American interests under the assumption that Israeli and American interests are identical. The idea that they are always identical has never been as true as politicians on both sides have claimed, but more important, the difficulties of controlling the environment have increased dramatically for both sides.
Israel's Difficulties
The problem for Israel at this point is that it is not able to do very much in the area that is its responsibility. For example, after the relationship with the United States, the second-most important strategic foundation for Israel is its relationship -- and peace treaty -- with Egypt. Following the fall of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, the fear was that Egypt might abrogate the peace treaty, reopening at some distant point the possibility of conventional war. But the most shocking thing to Israel was how little control it actually had over events in Egypt and the future of its ties to Egypt. With good relations between Israel and the Egyptian military and with the military still powerful, the treaty has thus far survived. But the power of the military will not be the sole factor in the long-term sustainability of the treaty. Whether it survives or not ultimately is not a matter that Israel has much control over.The Israelis have always assumed that the United States can control areas where they lack control. And some Israelis have condemned the United States for not doing more to manage events in Egypt. But the fact is that the United States also has few tools to control the evolution of Egypt, apart from some aid to Egypt and its own relationship with the Egyptian military. The first Israeli response is that the United States should do something about problems confronting Israel. It may or may not be in the American interest to do something in any particular case, but the problem in this case is that although a hostile Egypt is not in the Americans' interest, there is actually little the United States can do to control events in Egypt.
The Syrian situation is even more complex, with Israel not even certain what outcome is more desirable. Syrian President Bashar al Assad is a known quantity to Israel. He is by no means a friend, but his actions and his father's have always been in the pursuit of their own interest and therefore have been predictable. The opposition is an amorphous entity whose ability to govern is questionable and that is shot through with Islamists who are at least organized and know what they want. It is not clear that Israel wants al Assad to fall or to survive, and in any case Israel is limited in what it could do even if it had a preference. Both outcomes frighten the Israelis. Indeed, the hints of American weapons shipments to the rebels at some point concern Israel as much as no weapons shipments.
The Iranian situation is equally complex. It is clear that the Israelis, despite rhetoric to the contrary, will not act unilaterally against Iran's nuclear weapons. The risks of failure are too high, and the consequences of Iranian retaliation against fundamental American interests, such as the flow of oil through the Strait of Hormuz, are too substantial. The American view is that an Iranian nuclear weapon is not imminent and Iran's ultimate ability to build a deliverable weapon is questionable. Therefore, regardless of what Israel wants, and given the American doctrine of military involvement as a last resort when it significantly affects U.S. interests, the Israelis will not be able to move the United States to play its traditional role of assuming military burdens to shape the region.
The Changing Relationship
There has therefore been a very real if somewhat subtle shift in the U.S.-Israeli relationship. Israel has lost the ability, if it ever had it, to shape the behavior of countries on its frontier. Egypt and Syria will do what they will do. At the same time, the United States has lost the inclination to intervene militarily in the broader regional conflict and has limited political tools. Countries like Saudi Arabia, which might be inclined to align with U.S. strategy, find themselves in a position of creating their own strategy and assuming the risks.For the United States, there are now more important issues than the Middle East, such as the domestic economy. The United States is looking inward both because it has to and because it has not done well in trying to shape the Islamic world. From the Israeli point of view, for the moment, its national security is not at risk, and its ability to control its security environment is limited, while its ability to shape American responses in the region has deteriorated due to the shifting American focus. It will continue to get aid that it no longer needs and will continue to have military relations with the United States, particularly in developing military technology. But for reasons having little to do with Israel, Washington's attention is not focused on the region or at least not as obsessively as it had been since 2001.
Therefore Israel has turned inward by default. Frightened by events on its border, it realizes that it has little control there and lacks clarity on what it wants. In the broader region, Israel's ability to rely on American control has declined. Like Israel, the United States has realized the limits and costs of such a strategy, and Israel will not talk the United States out of it, as the case of Iran shows. In addition, there is no immediate threat to Israel that it must respond to. It is, by default, in a position of watching and waiting without being clear as to what it wants to see. Therefore it should be no surprise that Israel, like the United States, is focused on domestic affairs.
It also puts Israel in a reactive position. The question of the Palestinians is always there. Israel's policy, like most of its strategic policy, is to watch and wait. It has no inclination to find a political solution because it cannot predict what the consequences of either a solution or an attempt to find one would be. Its policy is to cede the initiative to the Palestinians. Last month, there was speculation that increased demonstrations in the West Bank could spark a third intifada. There was not one. There might be another surge of rockets from Gaza, or there might not be. That is a decision that Hamas will make.
Israel has turned politically inward because its strategic environment has become not so much threatening as beyond its control. Enemies cannot overwhelm it, nor can it control what its enemies and potential enemies might do. Israel has lost the initiative and, more important, it now knows it has lost the initiative. It has looked to the United States to take the initiative, but on a much broader scale Washington faces the same reality as Israel with less at stake and therefore less urgency. Certainly, the Israelis would like to see the United States take more aggressive stands and more risks, but they fully understand that the price and dangers of aggressive stands in the region have grown out of control.
Therefore it is interesting to wonder what Obama and Netanyahu will discuss. Surely Iran will come up and Obama will say there is no present danger and no need to take risks. Netanyahu will try to find some way to convince him that the United States should undertake the burden at a time suitable to Israel. The United States will decline the invitation.
This is not a strain in the U.S.-Israeli relationship in the sense of anger and resentment, although those exist on both sides. Rather it is like a marriage that continues out of habit but whose foundation has withered. The foundation was the Israeli ability to control events in its region and the guarantee that where the Israelis fail, U.S. interests dictate that Washington will take action. Neither one has the ability, the appetite or the political basis to maintain that relationship on those terms. Obama has economics to worry about. Netanyahu has the conscription of the ultra-Orthodox on his mind. National security remains an issue for both, but their ability to manage it has declined dramatically.
In private I expect a sullen courtesy and in public an enthusiastic friendship, much as an old, bored married couple, not near a divorce, but far from where they were when they were young. Neither party is what it once was; each suspects that it is the other's fault. In the end, each has its own fate, linked by history to each other but no longer united.
Font: George Friedman
Monday, March 18, 2013
Israel's Incoming Defense Minister and the Hundred-Day Grace Period.
Although it is often claimed that a new minister does not have a single day to "learn the job," incoming Defense Minister Lt. Gen. (ret.) Moshe (Bogie) Yaalon will in fact have 100 days of grace. Accordingly, it is important that he devote this period to an in-depth study of the significant – and at times existential – challenges he will confront as Defense Minister. Minister Yaalon understands the importance of constantly studying the issues. As a member of his General Staff, I was a participant in his weekly brain trust, a small and intimate forum that allowed the chief of staff to conduct a multidimensional, in-depth inquiry that offered him different perspectives and helped him formulate an appropriate and up-to-date policy in the face of a changing situation. The Defense Minister heads and manages the defense establishment, the largest institution in the public sector, but he is also a senior member of the political-security cabinet, where fateful decisions will be made in the coming years. Minister Yaalon will be the minister with the richest military-defense experience in the cabinet, where some members lack familiarity and experience with crucial issues of national security, and this situation places a heavy responsibility on him.
Dozens of important issues await a decision by the new Defense Minister. Many people will try to advance the issues they deem critical and will attempt to persuade the Minister to hold discussions on particular subjects, from the border of the Golan Heights to the border with Egypt Israel
The new Defense Minister has at least 100 days before he must decide what his recommendation is to the government on the issue of stopping Iran Iran Iran is less dangerous than an Iran Iran
- All the other alternatives for stopping
- The Israeli operational plan will cause a significant delay in
- The United States and Israel are acting on the basis of a joint strategic platform that leads to operative cooperation, or at least similar understandings of the strategic situation – on the day of the action, in the conflict that will take place after it, and even in the coming decade, when it will be necessary to continue to stop Iran with a coordinated joint strategy.
In this context, it is important to preserve the Defense Minister’s special ties with the upper echelons of the US
Having served as chief of staff, Minister Yaalon well knows that decisions on force development will affect the ability of the IDF decades into the future. Discussions on the budget will force the new minister to make decisions. There is no doubt that a process of streamlining and reexamination will be needed in the defense establishment. But even here, it is preferable to engage in a learning process and not to be dragged into decisions prematurely under pressure dictated by budgetary discussions. It is important for the Minister to start a professional public debate on the achievements required of the IDF. The public’s expectation of a “crushing victory in six days without damage to the civilian routine” is not realistic. The necessary cuts in the IDF budget will require decisions that will perforce offer only partial solutions to many security issues. It is important to continue to maintain generic and versatile operational capabilities that provide a response to all types of expected conflicts: terrorism, the threats from traditional armies, nuclear programs in third tier countries, and hybrid threats that combine advanced state capabilities such as surface-to-surface missiles and advanced air defense with non-state terrorist activity. The budget of the defense establishment and the IDF will also be a function of the decision whether to attack
The third topic is perhaps the most important, but here too it is worthwhile taking at least 100 days to deliberate the shape of the borders of the State of Israel as a secure and legitimate Jewish democratic state. Minister Yaalon is known for his lack of trust in the Palestinians and their readiness to reach a peace agreement that would include “an end to the conflict and an end to all claims,” and the rejection of the “right of return.” Even if Minister Yaalon is correct in his assessment, the Palestinians must not be allowed to foil the two-state solution, and Israel Gaza Samaria
Font: המכון למחקרי ביטחון לאומ
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