National Security Forum

Colleagues;

The Gods seem to be with us, as they have hyped interest in our NSF seminar tomorrow on “Israel and Iran”.

First, Israeli PM Bibi Netanyahu had a very tense and unproductive meeting with President Obama last week, a failed attempt to mend fences after a series of setbacks in U.S.-Israeli relations. Then we received an unclassified summary of an 8-day wargame at the Brookings Institution that addressed the possibility and ramifications of a surprise Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities. Finally, two respected analysts proffered their views as to how Israel might conduct a nuclear or quasi-nuclear attack on Iran.

First, Bibi’s really bad Washington visit: Here is an abridged report from a left of center Israeli newspaper, sharply critical of Netanyahu:

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. (Emil Salman)

Netanyahu leaves U.S. disgraced, isolated and weaker

Ha’aretz – Thursday – March 25, 2010

Details emerging from Benjamin Netanyahu’s visit to Washington remain incomplete, but the conclusion may nonetheless be drawn that the prime minister erred in choosing to fly to the United States last week. The visit – touted as a fence-mending effort, a bid to strengthen the tenuous ties between Netanyahu and U.S. President Barack Obama – only highlighted the deep rift between the American and Israeli administrations.

The prime minister left America disgraced, isolated, and altogether weaker than when he came.

Instead of setting the diplomatic agenda, Netanyahu surrendered control over it. Instead of leaving the Palestinian issue aside and focusing on Iran, as he would like, Netanyahu now finds himself fighting for the legitimacy of Israeli control over East Jerusalem.

At the start of his visit, Netanyahu was tempted to bask in the warm welcome he received at the AIPAC conference, at which he gave his emotional address on Jerusalem.

His speech was not radical rightist rhetoric. Reading between the lines, one could spot a certain willingness to relinquish West Bank settlements as long as Israel maintains a security buffer in the Jordan Valley.

But at the White House, the prime minister’s speech to thousands of pro-Israel activists and hundreds of cheering congressmen looked like an obvious attempt to raise political capital against the American president.

Knowing Netanyahu would be reenergized by his speech at the lobby, Obama and his staff set him a honey trap. Over the weekend they sought to quell the row that flared up during U.S. Vice President Joe Biden’s trip here two weeks ago.
Just when Netanyahu thought he had resolved the crisis by apologizing to Biden, Secretary Clinton called him up for a dressing down. His arrogant tone underscored the fact that Netanyahu believed that on the strength of his AIPAC speech, he could call the next few steps of the diplomatic dance.

But then calamity struck. At their White House meeting, instead of a reception as a guest of honor, Netanyahu was treated as a problem child, an army private ordered to do laps around the base for slipping up at roll call.

The revolution in the Americans’ behavior is clear to all. The Americans made every effort to downplay the visit. As during his last visit in November, Netanyahu was invited to the White House at a late hour, without media coverage or a press conference. If that were not enough, the White House spokesman challenged Netanyahu’s observation at AIPAC that “Jerusalem is not a settlement.”

The Americans didn’t even wait for him to leave Washington to make their disagreement known. It was not the behavior Washington shows an ally, but the kind it shows an annoyance.

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Next two interesting commentaries on a possible Israeli attack on Iran with nuclear weapons:

A respected Washington think tank(CSIS) has said that low-radioactive yield “tactical” nuclear warheads would be one way for the Israelis to destroy Iranian uranium enrichment plants in remote, dug-in fortifications.  Lead  author Tony Cordesman says that “some believe that nuclear weapons are the only weapons that can destroy targets deep underground or in tunnels”. Cordesman envisages the possibility of Israel “using these warheads as a substitute for conventional weapons” given the difficulty its jets would face in reaching Iran for anything more than a one-off sortie. Ballistic missiles or submarine-launched cruise missiles could serve for Israeli tactical nuclear strikes without interference from Iranian air defences, the report says. “Earth-penetrator” warheads would produce most damage.

Israel is widely assumed to have the Middle East’s sole atomic arsenal. Critics of the report sounded off quickly arguing that the concept of a surgical nuclear strike was pure fantasy, and would lead instead to a regional conflagration.

Another expert, Chet Nagle, argues that Israel could employ an “electro-magnetic pulse.” (EMP).

As Nagle put it recently:   “The easiest solution to the threat of Iran’s nuclear weapons program is an EMP strike.  A nuke detonated 450 kilometers over Tehran at high noon on a sunny day would not even be noticed by the folks on the ground; however, their lights would go out and everything electrical would stop, including those enrichment centrifuges.”  He adds that, “a few aircraft could then drop commando teams in the resulting darkness, chaos and lack of communications and do whatever else needs doing.  Iran then would be living in the late 19th Century.” No radiation; no blast effect.  A dividend could be, former Reagan advisor Peter Hannaford argues, that Iran’s “Greens,” the democratic reformers, would seize power. “If that were to happen, we and our allies could help the country recover from the EMP attack, with the nuclear enrichment facilities permanently shut down.” Sounds good? Maybe, maybe not, as we shall here tomorrow.

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Finally,  David Sanger in yesterday’s NYT, provides a synopsis of what happened in the 8-day wargame  that simulated a surprise Israeli attack on Iran. Metcalf and Hobbs will have much more to say about this, but here is the Sanger article:

New York Times
March 28, 2010
Pg. WK3

Imagining An Israeli Strike On Iran

By David E. Sanger

In 1981, Israel destroyed Iraq’s nuclear reactor at Osirak, declaring it could not live with the chance the country would get a nuclear weapons capability. In 2007, it wiped out a North Korean-built reactor in Syria. And the next year, the Israelis secretly asked the Bush administration for the equipment and overflight rights they might need some day to strike Iran’s much better-hidden, better-defended nuclear sites.

They were turned down, but the request added urgency to the question: Would Israel take the risk of a strike? And if so, what would follow?

Now that parlor game question has turned into more formal war games simulations. The government’s own simulations are classified, but the Saban Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institution created its own in December. The results were provocative enough that a summary of them has circulated among top American government and military officials and in many foreign capitals.

For the sake of verisimilitude, former top American policymakers and intelligence officials — some well known — were added to the mix. They played the president and his top advisers; the Israeli prime minister and cabinet; and Iranian leaders. They were granted anonymity to be able to play their roles freely, without fear of blowback. (This reporter was invited as an observer.) A report by Kenneth M. Pollack, who directed the daylong simulation, can be found at the Saban Center’s Web site.

A caution: Simulations compress time and often oversimplify events. Often they underestimate the risk of error — for example, that by using faulty intelligence leaders can misinterpret a random act as part of a pattern of aggression. In this case, the actions of the American and Israeli teams seemed fairly plausible; the players knew the bureaucracy and politics of both countries well. Predicting Iran’s moves was another matter, since little is known about its decision-making process.

1. Israel attacks

Without telling the U.S. in advance, Israel strikes at six of Iran’s most critical nuclear facilities, using a refueling base hastily set up in the Saudi Arabian desert without Saudi knowledge. (It is unclear to the Iranians if the Saudis were active participants or not.)

Already-tense relations between the White House and Israel worsen rapidly, but the lack of advance notice allows Washington to say truthfully that it had not condoned the attack.

2. U.S. steps in

In a series of angry exchanges, the U.S. demands that Israel cease its attacks, though some in Washington view the moment as an opportunity to further weaken the Iranian government, particularly the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

Telling Israel it has made a mess, Washington essentially instructs the country to sit in a corner while the United States tries to clean things up.

3. U.S. sends weapons

Even while calling for restraint on all sides, the U.S. deploys more Patriot antimissile batteries and Aegis cruisers around the region, as a warning to Iran not to retaliate. Even so, some White House advisers warn against being sucked into the conflict, believing that Israel’s real strategy is to lure America into finishing the job with additional attacks on the damaged Iranian facilities.

4. Iran strikes back

Despite warnings, Iran fires missiles at Israel, including its nuclear weapons complex at Dimona, but damage and casualties are minimal. Meanwhile, two of Iran’s proxies, Hezbollah and Hamas, launch attacks in Israel and fire rockets into the country.

Believing it already has achieved its main goal of setting back the nuclear program by years, Israel barely responds.

5. Iran sees opportunities

Iran, while wounded, sees long-term opportunities to unify its people – and to roll over its opposition parties – on nationalistic grounds. Its strategy is to mount low-level attacks on Israel while portraying the United States as a paper tiger – unable to control its ally and unwilling to respond to Iran.

Convinced that the Saudis had colluded with the Israelis, and emboldened by the measured initial American position, Iran fires missiles at the Saudi oil export processing center at Abqaiq, and tries to incite Shiite Muslims in eastern Saudi Arabia to attack the Saudi regime.

Iran also conducts terror attacks against European targets, in hopes that governments there will turn on Israel and the United States.

6. Iran avoids U.S. targets

After a meeting of its divided leadership, Iran decides against directly attacking any American targets – to avoid an all-out American response.

7. Strife in Israel

Though Iran’s retaliation against Israel causes only modest damage, critics in the Israeli media say the country’s leaders, by failing to respond to every attack, have weakened the credibility of the nation’s deterrence. Hezbollah fires up to 100 rockets a day into northern Israel, with some aimed at Haifa and Tel Aviv.

The Israeli economy comes to a virtual halt, and Israeli officials, urging American intervention, complain that one-third of the country’s population is living in shelters. Hundreds of thousands flee Haifa and Tel Aviv.

8. Israel fires back

Israel finally wins American acquiescence to retaliate against Hezbollah. It orders a 48-hour campaign by air and special forces against Lebanon and begins to prepare a much larger air and ground operation.

9. Iran plays the oil card

Knowing that its ultimate weapon is its ability to send oil prices sky high, Iran decides to attack Dhahran, Saudi Arabia, an oil industry center, with conventional missiles and begins mining the Strait of Hormuz.

A Panamanian-registered, Americanowned tanker and an American minesweeper are severely damaged. The price of oil spikes, though temporarily.

10. U.S. boosts forces

Unable to sit on the sidelines while oil supplies and American forces are threatened, Washington begins a massive military reinforcement of the Gulf region.

11. Reverberations

The game ends eight days after the initial Israeli strike. But it is clear the United States was leaning toward destroying all Iranian air, ground and sea targets in and around the Strait of Hormuz, and that Iran’s forces were about to suffer a significant defeat. Debate breaks out over how much of Iran’s nuclear program was truly crippled, and whether the country had secret backup facilities that could be running in just a year or two.

A reporter’s observations

1. By attacking without Washington’s advance knowledge, Israel had the benefits of surprise and momentum – not only over the Iranians, but over its American allies – and for the first day or two, ran circles around White House crisis managers.

2. The battle quickly sucked in the whole region – and Washington. Arab leaders who might have quietly applauded an attack against Iran had to worry about the reaction in their streets. The war shifted to defending Saudi oil facilities, and Iran’s use of proxies meant that other regional players quickly became involved.

3. You can bomb facilities, but you can’t bomb knowledge. Iran had not only scattered its facilities, but had also scattered its scientific and engineering leadership, in hopes of rebuilding after an attack.

4. No one won, and the United States and Israel measured success differently. In Washington, officials believed setting the Iranian program back only a few years was not worth the huge cost. In Israel, even a few years delay seemed worth the cost, and the Israelis argued that it could further undercut a fragile regime and perhaps speed its demise. Most of the Americans thought that was a pipe dream.