Robert Kaplan asks the question “Will Israel attack Iran?” and comes up, at substantial length and, I think, with slightly foggier reasoning, with the same answer that I’ve been giving to the question for some time now: No. Israel doesn’t have the capability to take out Iran’s nuclear development capability with one master stroke and, moreover, they don’t have the ability (as I noted three years ago) to do it without a by-your-leave from the U. S. which in all fairness Mr. Kaplan takes note of.
Advocates of the notion that either Israel or the United States will attack Iran before the end of the year from among President Bush’s political opponents point to their detestation of the George W. Bush and all his works as support; hawks point to the possible costs of Iranian nuclear weapons and the benefits of such an attack without taking note of the certain costs of the attack. However much either we or the Israelis wish there were some simple easy solution to the problems posed by Iran there isn’t any.
Next question, please.
Dave, it occurred to me a few days back that Israel DOES have the capability to destroy Iran’s nuclear program. The catch is that to do so Israel would have to use their own nukes. I admit that I was somewhat disturbed by the notion. I don’t think they would use them, but on the other hand, if Israel DOES view a nuclear Iran as an existential threat they have no reason not to use them.
That’s occurred to me, too, however I see no way to reconcile Israeli first use of nuclear weapons against Iranian population centers (all of Iran’s nuclear development facilities are in population centers) with the idea of “never again”. I just don’t think it’s politically possible for Israel to do that unless they’ve got a lot more evidence than anybody has produced to date.
Dave, I think the key point to “Never Again” for the Jews is that they aren’t going to rely on the good will of others to keep themselves alive. (And the key point of “Never Again” for the rest of the world is that we don’t want to be bothered.)
If it came down to an “Us or Them” situation I’m sure the Israelis would vote for “Them” to take the hits. (I believe that is true of everyone, just to be clear.) As one of the Ayatolloahs said a few years ago, the Muslim world can take several hits and survive. A few bombs would be all it takes to destroy Israel.
But the real problem for Israel is that if they nuked Iran they would essentially be declaring war on the world. The economic tumult that would result would leave them with few if any allies, not to mention the horrorified reaction of the world community to the use of muclear weapons. So I don’t REALLY think they’ll do it.
Hi Dave,
Happened to see Kaplan’s piece in my daily meanderings.
You may find this interesting.
Or hey, maybe not!
I agree with Outis to the extent that what never again means to the Israelis is that they are never going to depend on the good will of the world when their survival is at stake. They won’t be victims again.
Having six million of your compatriots, men women and children wiped out in a particularly organized and horrendous fashion simply because they were Jews while most of the world stood by and watched at best has a way of making you take
certain threats seriously when they come your way.
It’s important to remember that it is Iran that is consistently threatening to annihilate Israel, not the other way around. We’re not talking about rational actors here, and the Israelis have absolutely no reason to doubt that Khamenei and Ahmadinejad mean exactly what they say.
When the rubber meets the road, trust me: if the Israelis feel like their backs are to the wall, they’re all alone and they’re facing genocide, they’re going to react…especially if Barack Obama is the president elect.They simply don’t have the luxury to dither.
And yes, I’m pretty certain they have the capacity to retard Iran’s nuclear weapons program by a decade or so more or less if they need to.
Of course, if the current occupant of the White House had manned up and dealt with this in a decisive fashion instead of wasting time in Iraq, we might not be facing this prospect.
He still may, and there’s no doubt in my mind that the US could do a much more complete job of curbing the mullahs than Israel can..but I seriously doubt if that’s on President Bush’s agenda these days.
We’ll see….
Take care,
ff