Foreign Policy In Focus

972Mag devotes itself to reporting and commentary on Israel and the Palestinian territories. On Friday, October 28, one of its columnists, Larry Derfner, posted about the explosive op-ed that Israeli Nahum Barnea, who he calls "the best-connected, most influential  journalist in Israel" recently wrote.

He’s calling out Binyamin Netanyahu and Ehud Barak for cooking up an attack [on Iran], maybe before this winter, maybe afterward, even though the security establishment, foreign governments and  relatively level-headed members of this  government are completely against it. 

Then, on Wednesday, October 2, Derfner wrote:

They’re freaking out in Jerusalem over the shitstorm that Barnea’s “Atomic pressure” column started. “All sorts of systems and people have gone mad. This has no logical explanation or precedent,” [Minister of Foreign Affairs and Deputy Prime Minister Avigdor] Lieberman told IDF Radio. Dan Meridor, the proper, level-headed minister of intelligence and atomic energy, made Ma’ariv’s top story today by saying, “Anat Kamm (just imprisoned for 4-1/2 years for leaking classified IDF documents to a journalist) is nothing compared to what’s happening here. This is really crazy. I don’t think there’s ever been a public discussion like this.”

Consequently, yesterday, October 3, Haaretz reported:

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu instructed Shin Bet [Israel's internal security service] chief Yoram Cohen to begin investigating the information recently leaked to the media regarding Israel's preparations for a military offensive against Iran's nuclear facilities, the Kuwaiti al-Jarida newspaper reported Thursday.

According to the report, former Mossad chief Meir Dagan and former Shin Bet chief Yuval Diskin are those responsible for leaking information to the media regarding an attack on Iran.

"The two recruited prominent journalists in Israel and disclosed false information in order to politically harm Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak," the newspaper quoted an Israeli source.

According to the source, Diskin wanted revenge for not receiving the post of Mossad chief and Dagan was disgruntled since his term as Mossad chief was not extended. [Emphasis added.]

Dagan and Diskin couldn't have had any other reason -- such as keeping Iranian missiles from raining down on Israel with no guarantee that Israel's could knock out Iran's program -- could they? Never mind the security of the Israeli people, along with self-aggrandizement (acting "Churchillian," in the words of his supporters), revenge and disgruntlement may be among the only motives which Netanyahu can understand.

"The 'Israel will bomb Iran' meme has been used so often that it doesn't make much sense to take it serious anymore," writes Bernhard at Moon of Alabama. "So why even discuss when it, as now, comes up again?"

The difference is that the old campaign, via IDF jail guard [Jeffrey] Goldberg in The Atlantic and others in U.S. venues, was supposed to influence the U.S. to do the dirty work.

The new version of the meme is coming through major commentators in the Israeli press and its purpose seems is to publicly warn Israelis about some lunacy Netanyahoo and his defense minister Barak are seemingly committed to.

After citing three of the commentators, Bernhard refers us to "the best-connected, most influential journalist in Israel" -- Nahum Barnea. He links to Tikun Olam, where Richard Silverstein translates and comments on the piece by Barnea, who he calls "the consummate media-political insider."

He also reflects on a dual, conflicted approach within the Israeli policymaking apparatus toward the prospect of war. Many point to previous attacks on Iraq’s and Syria’s nuclear reactors which accomplished their mission without casualties and without negative fallout in the international sphere. [See my recent piece for more on this. -- Ed.] They say attacking Iran is likely to follow the same scenario. Those like Meir Dagan, who argue that Iran is a different matter entirely, find it hard to gain traction because Israel has never endured the type of counter-attack of which the former Mossad chief warns. Thus, it’s hard to get a nation to focus on. … the dangers of an Iran assault. … an outcome it’s never experienced. 

Money quote by Silverstein:

Israelis always seem to be fighting the last war rather than anticipating what may be new in the next one.  

As for Netanyahu, writes Barnea himself, "the popularity that he gained as a result of the Shalit deal hasn’t calmed him: just the opposite, it gave him a sense of power." Is that what Netanyahu craves? Not necessarily; instead, "all his life he’s dreamed of being Churchill. Iran gives him with the chance." He and defense minister Ehud Barak are "two Siamese twins of the Iranian issue."

Twas ever thus. Leaders have long sought out opportunities to fight instead of make use of diplomacy. However, Silverstein writes: 

In the ancient past this may’ve been more common, but today in few countries do leaders think of a good war as their personal political legacy. [Since George W. Bush left office anyway. -- Ed.] Most politicians, when they think of legacies think of treaties signed, edifices erected, laws passed.

Netanyahu may assure himself that he's saving Israel, but even a hint of foresight should tell him that attacking Iran could be the beginning of the end for Israel. As for Barak's motivation, Silverstein again:

This is both his strategy and legacy. … There are those who suspect Barak of having personal motives. … A strike on Iran would be the big bang that would make it possible for [him to] continue to be defense minister.

Silverstein:

It’s an indication of the pathology and impoverishment of latter-day Israel that Bibi and Barak would think in such terms.

(Pictured: Osirak after the attack.)

Israel's 1981 attack on Iraq's Osirak nuclear reactor is, along with other episodes such as the Six-Day War and Operation Entebbe, is the stuff of Israel's military legend. Some are citing it as a precedent for attacking Iran's nuclear-enrichment facilities. As Bennett Ramberg wrote in 2006 for the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (behind a pay wall) about the Osirak attack's applicability to Iran:

"A dramatic military action to prevent nuclear weapons proliferation, the June 7, 1981 strike left a legacy that echoes today in the 'all options are on the table' drumbeat emanating from Washington and Jerusalem. The seemingly straightforward message to Iran and other would-be proliferators: Abrogate nonproliferation pledges in this post-9/11 era and risk being 'Osiraked.'"

But during the course of an issue brief in which he assesses the difficulties of attacking Iran, the Arms Control Association's ace analyst Greg Thielmann writes:

Generally regarded as a spectacular success, the attack did indeed delay Saddam Hussein’s nuclear weapons program. But Iraq’s determination to succeed was strengthened, its commitment of personnel and resources skyrocketed, and its success at hiding its activities from the IAEA and Western intelligence collectors increased.

Meanwhile, at the National Interest in 2006 (also behind a pay wall) Richard Betts won't even concede that the attack delayed Iraq's nuclear-weapons program.

As pressure mounts to reckon with Iran's nascent nuclear program [many] strategists. . . . are pointing to Israel's 1981 air attack on Iraq's Osirak reactor as a model for action--a bold stroke flying in the face of all international opinion that nipped Iraq's nuclear capability in the bud or at least postponed a day of reckoning. This reflects widespread misunderstanding of what that strike accomplished. Contrary to prevalent mythology, there is no evidence that Israel's destruction of Osirak delayed Iraq's nuclear weapons program. The attack may actually have accelerated it. . . . Recall the surprising discoveries after the Iraq War. In 1991 coalition air forces destroyed the known nuclear installations in Iraq, but when UN inspectors went into the country after the war, they unearthed a huge infrastructure for nuclear weapons development that had been completely unknown to Western intelligence before the war. . . . Iraq's nuclear program [abandoned, of course, before the second Iraq War -- RW] demonstrates how unsuccessful air strikes can be even when undertaken on a massive scale.

Finally, Theilmann nicely sums up the other reasons why attacking Iran is inadvisable:

• Military Experts Advise Against
• It Won't Work
• A Complex, Costly Operation
• Little International Support [Israel only]
• Creating All the Wrong Incentives for Iran
• Energy Insecurity [for the West]
• A Third Ground War? [Along with Iraq and Afghanistan]

Israeli President Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak are known to be champing at the bit to bomb Iran's nuclear enrichment facilities. Even though, as the New York Times reported:

. . . former intelligence chief, Meir Dagan. . . . made headlines a few weeks ago when he asserted . . . that a military attack on Iran would be “a stupid idea.” This week Mr. Dagan . . . said that attacking Iran “would mean regional war, and in that case you would have given Iran the best possible reason to continue the nuclear program.”

Israel of course enjoys a non-nuclear program with everything from tactical (battlefield) nuclear weapons to thermonuclear (hydrogen) bombs. To the contrary, it insists, enabled in its charade by the United States. In Iran's case, the International Atomic Energy Agency has yet to find damning evidence of a nuclear-weapons program. In fact, some of the "evidence," such as what's called the alleged studies documents, seemed manufactured and/or planted. Still, those of us most opposed to using force against Iran would make more credible advocates for a negotiated solution if we accepted that Iran most likely seeks weaponless, or "virtual," deterrence (no weapons, but the full-blown capacity to manufacture them).

In Israel's case, though, it's nuclear denial is full of holes large enough to drive a truck through. As far back as 1986, former Israeli nuclear technician Mordecai Vanunu blew the whistle on Israel's program to the British press, for which he served 18 years in Israeli prison.

Iran now has its own Mordecai Vanunu, however much he doesn't realize it. A couple of months ago, Iran watchers were agog when an article appeared on a website run by Iran's Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) that envisioned the day when Iran becomes a nuclear-weapons power. The piece, as Julian Borger reports at the Guardian, begins:

The day after Iran's first nuclear test is a normal day. The day after Islamic Republic of Iran's first nuclear test will be an ordinary day for us Iranians but in the eyes of some of us there will be a new sparkle.

Borger writes:

This strange, hypothetical, article . . . hammers home again and again the message that an Iranian nuclear test will not lead to disaster. On the contrary, life will go as before except that Iranians will feel better about themselves.

Why would the IRGC sanction such a statement? Borger again.

This has the look of a kite being flown, but for whom? It could be intended to get Iranians used to the idea of a nuclear test. . . . It could be a gesture of defiance to the world by hardline elements. . . . The article comes during a period when Tehran's official stance is particularly . . . assertive, announcing today that it will triple its production of 20% enriched uranium and shift it to the underground Fordow site, near Qom.

Borger then quotes Meir Javedanfar, an Iranian-Israeli expert on the Tehran regime, about the article.

It's breaking a major taboo. . . . if this report is followed by others similar to it, then it would signify a major change in the way Iran refers to its nuclear program. 

But such a campaign would likely backfire as it

. . . would be a significant boost for western efforts to isolate Iran [which, along with Iran's] deteriorating economic situation could be more damaging to the regime's top priority, which is its survival, than a military attack by the West.

In fact, if the IRGC author had been more truthful, he would have written:

The day after Iran's first nuclear test will be an ordinary day for us Iranians -- until Israel rains down holy hell on our heads.

Iran needs to tread carefully. You would think it would have learned a lesson from archrival Saddam Hussein, who, in a clumsy form of regional deterrence, behaved as if Iraq possessed nuclear weapons. By foiling United Nations inspectors at every turn, he helped provide fodder for the United States to win support for an attack on the premise that Iraq was a rogue nuclear state.

Iran denies nuclear-weapons aspirations but, for a whole host of reasons from deterrence to status to using the program as a bargaining chip, seems to want the region and the West to think it might one day possess them. In the interim, it could well wind up attacked like Iraq's Osirak reactor was by Israel in 1981. When Iran inevitably retaliates, it would no doubt suffer a devastating second wave of attacks from the United States, which would pitch in when Israel got in over its head. Prevaricating about nukes is a dangerous game to play.