Iran's New Anti-missile Defense System to be Deployed in 2015
In February 2014, Iran’s chief air defense commander said that a homegrown air defense system, based on Russia’s highly-regarded S-300 battery, would come online in two years. The highly anticipated Bavar 373 program — “belief” in Persian — has been hampered by setbacks, but Brigadier General Farzad Esmayeeli claimed that the troubles facing development had been solved and the anti-missile defense system would be completed by the end of 2015. The deployment of S-300 batteries in Iran could provide a significant impediment to carrying out a military strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities, a threat which forms the core of Israel’s deterrence policy. [
Source]
Winter 2012, pp. 31-38
Yoaz Hendel,
Middle East Quarterly - While the Obama administration has not reconciled itself to the
futility of curbing Tehran's nuclear buildup through diplomatic means,
most Israelis have given up hope that the international sanctions can
dissuade the Islamic Republic from acquiring the means to murder by the
millions. Israel's leadership faces a stark choice—either come to terms
with a nuclear Iran or launch a preemptive military strike.
The Begin Doctrine
Tehran's "The World
without Zionism" conference, October 26, 2005.
|
When the Israeli Air Force (IAF) decimated Iraq's Osirak
nuclear reactor thirty years ago, drawing nearly universal
condemnation, the government of prime minister Menachem Begin declared
Israel's "determination to prevent confrontation states … from gaining
access to nuclear weapons."
Then-defense minister Ariel Sharon
explained: "Israel cannot afford the introduction of the nuclear weapon
[to the Middle East]. For us, it is not a question of balance of terror
but a question of survival. We shall, therefore, have to prevent such a
threat at its inception"
[1]
Editor's Note: Despite the fact that the Israel's nuclear programme has been an open secret since a disgruntled technician, Mordechai Vanunu, blew the whistle on it in 1986, the official Israeli position is still never to confirm or deny its existence. When the former speaker of the Knesset, Avraham Burg, broke the taboo in December 2013, declaring Israeli possession of both nuclear and chemical
weapons and describing the official non-disclosure policy as "outdated
and childish," a rightwing group formally called for a police investigation for treason. Meanwhile, western governments have played along with the policy of
"opacity" by avoiding all mention of the issue. In 2009, when a veteran
Washington reporter, Helen Thomas, asked Barack Obama in the first month
of his presidency if he knew of any country in the Middle East with
nuclear weapons, he dodged the trapdoor by saying only that he did not
wish to "speculate." [Source]
On December 2, 2014, four Nations —
the United States, Canada, Micronesia and Palau — along with Israel voted "No" to the call for Israel to join the Nuclear
Nonproliferation Treaty, which renounces any possession of nuclear weapons in the Middle East. In addition to calling on Israel to endorse the creation of a nuclear weapons-free zone in the Middle East, the resolution also called on Israel to put its nuclear facilities under the safeguards of the International Atomic Energy Agency. [Source]
This preventive counter-proliferation doctrine is rooted in both
geostrategic logic and historical memory. A small country the size of
New Jersey, with most of its inhabitants concentrated in one central
area, Israel is highly vulnerable to nuclear attack. Furthermore, the
depth of hostility to Israel in the Muslim Middle East is such that its
enemies have been highly disposed to brinksmanship and risk-taking.
Given the Jewish people's long history of horrific mass victimization,
most Israelis find it deeply unsettling to face the threat of
annihilation again.
While the alleged 2007 bombing of Syria's al-Kibar reactor
underscored Jerusalem's willingness to take military action in
preventing its enemies from developing nuclear weapons, its
counter-proliferation efforts have relied heavily on diplomacy and
covert operations. The raid on Osirak came only after the failure of
Israeli efforts to dissuade or prevent France from providing the
necessary hardware. Likewise, the Israelis have reportedly been
responsible for the assassinations of several Iranian nuclear scientists
in recent years.
[2] They reportedly helped create the Stuxnet computer worm, dubbed by
The New York Times "the most sophisticated cyber weapon ever deployed," which caused major setbacks to Iran's uranium enrichment program in 2009.
[3] However, such methods can only slow Tehran's progress, not halt or reverse it.
The Iranian Threat
Tehran has already reached what Brig. Gen. (res.) Shlomo Brom has
called the "point of irreversibility" at which time the proliferator
"stops being dependent on external assistance" to produce the bomb.
[4]
Most Israeli officials believe that no combination of likely external
incentives or disincentives can persuade the Iranians to verifiably
abandon the effort. The Iranian regime has every reason to persevere in
its pursuit of the ultimate weapon. While the world condemned North
Korea's development of nuclear weapons, it was unwilling to apply
sufficient penalties to dissuade Pyongyang from building the bomb.
The regime has an impressive ballistic missile program for delivering
weapons of mass destruction. The Iranians began equipping themselves
with SCUD missiles during the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war.
[5]
Afterward, it turned to North Korea for both missiles and the
technology to set up its own research and production facilities. Tehran
has produced hundreds of Shahab-3 missiles, which have a range of nearly
1,000 miles and can carry a warhead weighing from 500 kilograms to one
ton.
[6]
In 2009, Tehran successfully tested a new two-stage, solid propellant
missile, the Sejil-2, which has a range of over 1,200 miles, placing
parts of Europe within its reach.
There is some disagreement as to how long it will take Tehran to
produce a nuclear weapon. While the government of Israel has claimed
that Iran is within a year or two of this goal, in January 2011,
outgoing Mossad director Meir Dagan alleged that Iran will be unable to
attain it before 2015.
[7]
Iranian Intentions
Much of the debate in Israel is focused on the question of Iranian
intentions. The fact that Tehran has poured staggering amounts of money,
human capital, and industrial might into nuclear development—at the
expense of its conventional military strength, which has many gaps, not
to mention the wider Iranian economy—is by itself a troubling indicator
of its priorities. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and many other
leading Israeli political and security figures view the Islamic Republic
as so unremittingly hostile that "everything else pales" before the
threat posed by its pursuit of nuclear weapons.
[8]
Proponents of this view draw upon repeated threats by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to wipe Israel off the map
[9]
and Iranian support for radical Palestinian and Lebanese groups seeking
its destruction. They also point to Ahmadinejad's radical millenarian
strand of Shiite Islamism.
[10]
Shiites believe that the twelfth of a succession of imams directly
descendant of the Prophet Muhammad went into hiding in the ninth century
and will one day return to this world after a period of cataclysmic war
to usher in an era of stability and peace.
Editor's Note: Iranian government sources denied that Ahmadinejad issued any sort of threat. On February 20, 2006, Iran's foreign minister Manouchehr Mottaki
told a news conference: "How is it possible to remove a country from
the map? He is talking about the regime. We do not recognize this regime legally." Ahmadinejad himself stated that Iran is not a threat to any country, including Israel. At a gathering of foreign guests marking the 19th anniversary of the death of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in 2008, Ahmadinejad said: "You
should know that the criminal and terrorist Zionist regime which has 60
years of plundering, aggression and crimes in its file has reached the
end of its work and will soon disappear off the geographical scene."
The "wiped off the map" translation originated from the state-controlled Islamic Republic News Agency. The original New York Times article about it noted that Ahmadinejad said he
was quoting Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the leader of the Islamic
revolution, but that aspect was largely overlooked. Then, specialists such as Juan Cole of the University of Michigan and Arash Norouzi of the Mossadegh Project pointed
out that the original statement in Persian did not say that Israel
should be wiped from the map, but instead that it would collapse. [Source]
Arash Norouzi also said the statement, "wiped off the map," did not exist in the original speech and that Ahmadinejad directed his comment toward the "regime occupying Jerusalem". Norouzi's translation of the Persian quote reads: "the Imam said this regime occupying Jerusalem must vanish from the page of time." Juan Cole, historian of the Middle East and South Asia, concurs: Ahmadinejad's statement should be translated as, "the Imam said that this regime occupying Jerusalem (een rezhim-e eshghalgar-e qods) must [vanish from] the page of time (bayad az safheh-ye ruzgar mahv shavad)," noting that there is no Persian idiom to wipe something off the map. Shiraz Dossa, a professor of Political Science at St. Francis Xavier University in Nova Scotia, Canada, also believes the text is a mistranslation. "Ahmadinejad was quoting the Ayatollah Khomeini in the specific speech under discussion: what he said was that 'the occupation regime over Jerusalem should vanish from the page of time.' No state action is envisaged in this lament: it denotes a spiritual wish, whereas the erroneous translation — 'wipe Israel off the map' — suggests a military threat. There is a huge chasm between the correct and the incorrect translations. The notion that Iran can 'wipe out' U.S.-backed, nuclear-armed Israel is ludicrous." [Source]
Ahmadinejad appears to believe that this day will happen in his
lifetime. In 2004, as mayor of Tehran, he ordered the construction of a
grand avenue in the city center, supposedly to welcome the Mahdi on the
day of his reappearance. As president, he allocated $17 million for a
mosque closely associated with the Mahdi in the city of Jamkaran.
[11]
Rather than seeking to reassure the world about Tehran's peaceful
intentions during his 2007 address before the U.N. General Assembly,
Ahmadinejad embarked on a wide-eyed discourse about the wonders of the
Twelfth Imam: "There will come a time when justice will prevail across
the globe ... under the rule of the perfect man, the last divine source
on earth, the Mahdi."
[12]
The fear in Israel is that someone who firmly believes an apocalyptic
showdown between good and evil is inevitable and divinely ordained will
not be easily deterred by the threat of a nuclear war. "There are new
calls for the extermination of the Jewish State," Netanyahu warned
during a January 2010 visit to Israel's Holocaust museum, Yad Vashem.
"This is certainly our concern, but it is not only our concern."
[13] For Netanyahu, a nuclear Iran is a clear and present existential threat.
Those who dissent from this view point out that the Iranian people
are not particularly hostile to Israelis; indeed, the two countries
enjoyed close relations before the 1979 Iranian revolution. They argue
that the Iranian regime's militant anti-Zionism is a vehicle for gaining
influence in the predominantly Sunni Arab Middle East but not something
that would drive its leaders to commit suicide. "I am not
underestimating the significance of a nuclear Iran, but we should not
give it Holocaust subtext like politicians try to do," said former
Israel Defense Forces (IDF) chief of staff Dan Halutz, who commanded the
Israeli military during the war in Lebanon in 2006.
[14]
Defense Minister Ehud Barak said in a widely circulated September 2009
interview that Iran was not an "existential" threat to Israel.
[15]
The question of whether Iran is an existential danger is more
rhetorical than substantive. Even if Iranian nuclear weapons are never
fired, their mere existence would be a profound blow to most Israelis'
sense of security. In one poll, 27 percent of Israelis said they would
consider leaving the country if Tehran developed nuclear capabilities.
Loss of investor confidence would damage the economy. This could spell
the failure of Zionism's mission of providing a Jewish refuge as Jews
will look to the Diaspora for safety.
[16] This is precisely why Israel's enemies salivate over the possibility of an Iranian bomb.
Even if the prospect of mutually assured destruction effectively
rules out an Iranian first strike, Tehran's acquisition of nuclear
weapons would still shift the balance of power greatly. Iran projects
its power throughout the Middle East mainly by way of allies and
proxies, such as Muqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi army in Iraq, Hamas in Gaza,
the Assad regime in Syria, and Hezbollah in Lebanon. The Iranian nuclear
umbrella will embolden them. The next time an Israeli soldier is
abducted in a cross-border attack by Hezbollah or Hamas, Jerusalem will
have to weigh the risks of a nuclear escalation before responding. There
is also the possibility that Tehran could provide a nuclear device to
one of its terrorist proxies.
[17]
A successful Iranian bid to acquire the bomb will set off an
unprecedented nuclear arms race throughout the region. Arab countries
such as Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and the United Arab Emirates will
want to create their own nuclear insurance policies in the face of
Tehran's belligerence and regional ambitions. Turkey has passed a bill
in its parliament paving the way for the construction of three nuclear
reactors by 2020.
[18]
Most of Israel's decision-makers believe that Israel cannot afford
the risks of living with a nuclear Iran. Those who publicly differ with
Netanyahu on this score seem mainly concerned that he is exploiting
popular fears for political gain, but they are likely to fall in line
with public opinion at the end of the day.
The large majority of
Israelis support a military strike on Iran's nuclear facilities as a
last resort, and a small majority (51 percent according to a 2009 poll)
favor an immediate strike on Iran as a first resort.[19]
The Military Option
The general assessment is that the IDF has the ability to knock out
some of Tehran's key nuclear facilities and set back its nuclear program
by a couple of years but not completely destroy it—at least not in one
strike.
[20] Several factors make Iran's nuclear program much more difficult to incapacitate than that of Saddam Hussein's Iraq.
Whereas most of Iraq's vital nuclear assets were concentrated at
Osirak, "Iran's nuclear facilities are spread out," notes former IDF
chief of staff Ya'alon,
[21]
some of them in close proximity to population centers. The distance to
targets in Iran would be considerably greater than to Osirak, and its
facilities are better defended. Iran has mastered nuclear technology
much more thoroughly than Iraq and can, therefore, repair much of the
damage without external help.
Of the known Iranian nuclear sites, five main facilities are almost
certain to be targeted in any preemptive strike. The first is the
Bushehr light-water reactor, along the gulf coast of southwestern Iran.
The second is the heavy-water plant under construction near the town of
Arak, which would be instrumental to production of plutonium. Next is
the uranium conversion facility at Isfahan. Based on satellite imagery,
the facility is above ground although some reports have suggested
tunneling near the complex.
[22]
Fourth is the uranium enrichment facility at Qom, which the Iranians
concealed from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) prior to
September 2009 and well after major Western intelligence agencies knew
about it. The facility, which can hold about 3,000 centrifuges, was
built into a mountain, making it difficult to penetrate. Israeli defense
minister Barak called it "immune to standard bombs."
[23]
The fifth and most heavily fortified primary target is the main
Iranian uranium enrichment facility in Natanz. The complex consists of
two large halls, roughly 300,000 square feet each, dug somewhere between
eight and twenty-three feet below ground and covered by several layers
of concrete and metal. The walls of each hall are estimated to be
approximately two feet thick. The facility is also surrounded by
short-range, Russian-made TOR-M surface-to-air missiles.
Military planners may also feel compelled to attack Tehran's
centrifuge fabrication sites since their destruction would hamper the
efforts to reestablish its nuclear program. However, it is believed that
the Iranians have dispersed some centrifuges to underground sites not
declared to the IAEA. It is by no means clear that Israeli intelligence
has a full accounting of where they are.
The Israelis may also choose to bomb Iranian radar stations and air
bases in order to knock out Tehran's ability to defend its skies,
particularly if multiple waves are required. Ya'alon estimates that
Israel would need to attack a few dozen sites.
[24]
The Operation
The Israeli Air Force is capable of striking the necessary targets
with two to three full squadrons of fighter-bombers with escorts to
shoot down enemy aircraft; however, most of the escorts will require
refueling to strike the necessary targets in Iran.
[25] In addition, the Israelis can make use of ballistic missiles and cruise missiles from their Dolphin-class submarines.
The IAF has carried out long-range missions in the past. In 1981,
Israeli F-16s struck the Osirak reactor without midair refueling.
Refueling tankers were activated for Israel's longest-range air strike
to date, the 1985 bombing of the Palestine Liberation Organization's
(PLO) headquarters in Tunis, 1,500 miles away. The IAF's highly
publicized 2009 flyover over Gibraltar was widely perceived as a dress
rehearsal for a strike against Iran.
[26]
In 2009, the IAF instituted a new training regimen that included
refueling planes as their engines were on and sitting on the runway with
fuel nozzles disconnected seconds before takeoff.
The IAF has specialized munitions designed to penetrate fortified
targets, including GBU-27 and GBU-28 laser-guided bunker buster bombs
and various domestically produced ordnance. Israeli pilots are skilled
at using successive missile strikes to penetrate fortifications. "Even
if one bomb would not suffice to penetrate, we could guide other bombs
directly to the hole created by the previous ones and eventually destroy
any target," explains former IAF commander Maj. Gen. Eitan Ben-Eliyahu,
who participated in the strike on Osirak.
[27]
Israel's advanced electronic-warfare systems are likely to be
successful in suppressing Iran's air defenses although these were
significantly upgraded by Moscow during the 2000s.[28]
Moreover, whereas thirty years ago Israeli pilots needed to fly
directly over Osirak to drop their bombs, today they can fly at higher
altitudes and launch satellite or laser-guided missiles from a safer
distance. Nor are Tehran's roughly 160 operational combat aircraft,
mostly antiquated U.S. and French planes, likely to pose a serious
threat to Israeli pilots.
Possible Attack Routes
The main problem Jerusalem will encounter in attacking Iran's nuclear
facilities results from the long distance to the main targets. Since
greater distance always means that more things can go wrong, Israeli
losses and efficacy will likely depend on which of three possible routes
they take to Iran.
The northern route runs along the Turkish-Syrian border into Iran and
is estimated to be about 1,300 miles. This route entails several risks
and would need to take into account Syrian air defenses and Turkish
opposition to violating its airspace. Israeli planes flew over Turkey
when the IAF bombed al-Kibar in 2007 and even dropped fuel tanks in
Turkish territory. However, the recent deterioration in relations
between Ankara and Jerusalem makes it extremely unlikely that the
Turkish government will allow such an intrusion.
The central route over Jordan and Iraq is the most direct, bringing
the distance to Natanz from the IAF's Hatzerim air base down to about
1,000 miles, yet it entails serious diplomatic obstacles. Jerusalem
would have to coordinate either with the Jordanians and the Americans or
fly without forewarning. While Israel has a peace treaty with Jordan,
Amman will not want to be perceived as cooperating with Israeli military
action against Tehran and thus possibly face the brunt of an Iranian
reprisal. Washington may not want to be involved either, as it needs
Tehran's acquiescence to withdraw its forces from Iraq successfully.
While Jerusalem could limit the risk of hostile fire by notifying its
two allies of the impending attack, there would be considerable
diplomatic costs.
The southern route would take Israeli planes over Saudi Arabia and
then into Iran. While this is longer than the central route, there have
been reports that the Saudis have given Jerusalem permission to use
their airspace for such an operation.
[29]
The difficulties also depend on the precise goal of the air strike. A
short-term, financially costly degradation of Iran's nuclear program
can be achieved in one wave of attacks, but Israeli defense analysts
have estimated that a decisive blow could require hitting as many as
sixty different targets with return sorties lasting up to two days.
Estimates in Israel vary regarding the losses the IAF might suffer in such an operation.
[30]
Some estimates claim that with their advanced, Russian-supplied air
defense systems, the Iranians might be able to shoot down a small number
of aircraft. But even just a few pilots shot down and captured by Iran
would be a heart-wrenching tragedy for Israelis. To prepare for this, in
2009 the IAF began increasing mental training for its airmen with an
emphasis on survival skills.
Many former, high-ranking generals and intelligence chiefs have cast
doubt on whether Jerusalem can succeed in decisively setting back
Tehran's nuclear program. Addressing an audience at the Hebrew
University of Jerusalem in May 2011,
Meir Dagan said that the idea of
attacking Iranian nuclear sites was "the stupidest thing" he had ever
heard and that such an attempt would have a near-zero chance of success.[31]
The Fallout
The strategic fallout from an Israeli attack will likely be
significant. Hezbollah will probably initiate hostilities across the
Lebanese-Israeli border. During the 2006 Israel-Hezbollah war, the
Shiite Islamist group fired more than 4,000 rockets into Israel, causing
extensive damage and killing forty-four civilians.
[32]
Today, its arsenal is considerably larger and includes many more
rockets capable of reaching Tel Aviv. Dagan estimates that the Iranians
can fire missiles at Israel for a period of months, and that Hezbollah
can fire tens of thousands of rockets.
[33]
Hamas may also attack Israel with rockets from Gaza. It is not
inconceivable that Syrian president Bashar Assad would join the fight,
if still in power, in hope of diverting public anger away from his
regime.
Iran has also developed an extensive overseas terrorist network,
cultivated in conjunction with Hezbollah. This network was responsible
for two car bombings against the Jewish community in Argentina that left
114 people dead in the early 1990s.
[34]
Last year, Israel distributed gas masks to prepare for the
possibility that Iran or Syria would deploy chemical or biological
weapons
[35]
while the IDF's Home Front Command received an increased budget to
prepare bomb shelters and teach the public what to do in case of
emergency.
[36]
C4I systems were improved between early-warning missile detection
systems and air sirens, including specially designed radars that can
accurately predict the exact landing site of incoming missiles. Since no
one is certain how accurate Iran's Shahab and Sajil missiles are,
Jerusalem began strengthening defenses at its Dimona nuclear reactor in
2008.
[37]
Jerusalem will not sit back and allow its citizens to be bombed
mercilessly. Since Lebanon will probably be the main platform of any
major Iranian attack, Israeli retaliation there is sure to be swift and
expansive. Should Syria offer up any form of direct participation in the
war, it too may come under Israeli attack. The Israelis may go so far
as to bomb Iran's oil fields and energy infrastructure. Since oil
receipts provide at least 75 percent of the Iranian regime's income and
at least 80 percent of export revenues, the political shock of losing
this income could lead the regime to rethink its nuclear stance, as well
as erode its public support, and make it more difficult to finance the
repair of damaged nuclear facilities.
[38]
On the other hand, Tehran may double down by sending its own ground
troops to Lebanon or Syria to join the fight against Israel. This could
draw in the Persian Gulf Arab monarchies, particularly if the
Alawite-led Assad regime is still facing active opposition from its
majority Sunni population.
How long such a war will last is impossible to predict. Israel's
defense doctrine calls for short wars, so it will likely launch a
diplomatic campaign with Western backing to end the war as soon as
possible. However, the Iranians may hunker down for the long haul, much
as they did during the 8-year Iran-Iraq war.
[39]
If a military solution cannot guarantee success at an acceptable
price, some in Israel argue that the best hope for countering the threat
posed by Iranian nuclear weapons is regime change. "The nuclear matter
will resolve itself once there is a regime change," says Uri Lubrani,
Israel's former ambassador to Iran and a senior advisor to the Israeli
defense minister until last year. According to Lubrani, the highest
priority for Israel and the West should be to strengthen the Iranian
masses that rose up in protest following the fraudulent June 2009
elections.
[40]
"A military strike will at best delay Iran's nuclear program, but
what's worse, it will rally the Iranian people to the defense of the
regime," says Lubrani. He argues that it is better to let sanctions eat
away at the regime's legitimacy even if they do not lead to a stand down
on its nuclear program.
[41]
However, it is not clear whether Lubrani is correct in his assessment
that war will benefit the regime. While most Iranians are generally
supportive of their country's nuclear ambitions, devastating Israeli air
strikes may drive home the folly of their government's reckless
provocations just as they did during the later stages of the Iran-Iraq
war. It is unlikely that many are willing to sacrifice their country's
well-being in pursuit of the bomb.
Whether an Israeli attack will unite the public for or against
President Ahmadinejad and Supreme Leader Ali Khamene'i is anyone's
guess. Much will depend on whether the air strikes produce significant
collateral damage. The Bushehr, Isfahan, and Natanz facilities contain
uranium hexafluoride (UF6) and even some low-enriched uranium, the
release of which into the environment would almost certainly raise
public health concerns.
Conclusion
The Israelis will ultimately have to choose between
launching an
attack likely to spark a large-scale regional conflict or allowing Iran
to go nuclear with dire long-term implications. Notwithstanding some
disagreement about the immediacy of the threat and possible
repercussions,
the large majority of Israelis favor military action over
living with the ubiquitous threat of nuclear annihilation.
With a U.N. vote on Palestinian statehood threatening to erode
Israel's international standing still further, attacking Iran could
prove dangerously isolating for Israel even with Washington's
blessing—to proceed without it would be a step into the unknown. Much,
therefore, depends on whether policymakers in Washington will stand by
Jerusalem when push eventually comes to shove.
The American people have increasingly come to recognize the threat to
world peace posed by Iran. Whereas 6 percent of Americans named Iran as
the country that poses the greatest threat to the United States in
1990, in 2006, Iran led the field with 27 percent.
[42]
However, though Washington's official stance is that all options remain
on the table, Obama is unlikely to undertake direct military action to
stop Tehran from building the bomb and may prove reluctant to tacitly
support Israeli action.
That is why the decision will ultimately be left to Israel, or rather
to its prime minister, who will be faced with a Churchillian dilemma,
unprecedented in the Jewish state's history.
