Some while ago, Rashid Khalidi suggested that what is loosely referred to as the 'Israel Lobby' was really a means by which the US ruling class maintained internal discipline, over a wide range of issues not strictly limited to foreign policy. It's a curious relationship: the American government pays for Israel to sustain itself as a garrison state based on supremacy over the Arabs, with nuclear weapons and hawk fighters and so on; and in return, Israel takes some of its enormous subsidies and uses it to discipline the Western media and political classes through officially encouraged lobbies, thus allowing this tiny country in the Levant to be seen to be controlling matters. The two responses that take this appearance at face value are reformism, and antisemitism: the former says there's nothing essentially wrong, but some deformities are introduced into the system by extremists with well-funded political agendas; you can guess what the latter says at various registers.

So, when Israel threatens to use nuclear weapons against Iran (mimicking the 'preemptive strike' doctrine), guess how they word it? Well:

Israeli military commanders believe conventional strikes may no longer be enough to annihilate increasingly well-defended enrichment facilities. Several have been built beneath at least 70ft of concrete and rock. However, the nuclear-tipped bunker-busters would be used only if a conventional attack was ruled out and if the United States declined to intervene, senior sources said.

[continues]

***

NUCLEAR STRIKES ON IRAN planned by Israel

Posted by Kebz on January 7, 2007, 9:21 am
User logged in as: Kebz

The righteous nation of Israel is apparently considering illegal military action on a sovereign nation using NUCLEAR weapons. Unbelievably the Independent says that Israel FEARS FOR ITS SAFETY after the remark Ahmadinejad did not make about wiping Israel off the map. The Sunday Times also makes this claim. Can propaganda get much more blatant than this?....Perhaps this was the reason the media have been repeating this lie was to build up anti-Iran feeling specifically for this purpose.

Israel 'has plan for nuclear strike on Iran'
By Marie Woolf, Political Editor
Published: 07 January 2007

Israel has drawn up secret plans to use low-yield nuclear weapons to knock out Iran's uranium enrichment facilities, it was claimed last night.

According to a report in The Sunday Times, two Israeli air force squadrons are training to use nuclear "bunker busting" bombs to demolish Iran's heavily guarded enrichment programme. Israeli military commanders are said to believe that conventional strikes may not be sufficient to wipe out Iran's enrichment facilities, some of which are built beneath 70ft of concrete and rock.

Under the plans conventional laser-guided bombs would open tunnels into the targets and then mini nuclear weapons would be fired, exploding deep underground. The nuclear-tipped, bunker-busting bombs would only be used if a conventional attack was ineffective, or if the US, which also wants to halt Iran's nuclear programme, fails to act. The leaking of the "plans" may well be designed to apply pressure on the US.

Israel has already made it clear that it does not want to allow Iran to develop nuclear weapons. It fears for its own safety after the Iranian President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, said: "Israel must be wiped off the map."

Israel is said to have identified three prime targets south of Tehran, including Nantanz, where facilities are being installed for uranium enrichment underground. Israeli pilots are believed to have flown to Gibraltar recently to train for the 2,000-mile round trip to Iran.

A spokesman for the Israeli embassy in London said last night that Israel preferred to use diplomatic means to end Iran's nuclear enrichment programme. "We have an unchanged policy position on the Iranian nuclear issue. Israel prefers this issue to be resolved through diplomatic channels," he said. "We cannot comment on any other scenario."

[take note of the repeated lies about what Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said]


Revealed: Israel plans nuclear strike on Iran
Uzi Mahnaimi, New York and Sarah Baxter, Washington
ISRAEL has drawn up secret plans to destroy Iran’s uranium enrichment facilities with tactical nuclear weapons.

Two Israeli air force squadrons are training to blow up an Iranian facility using low-yield nuclear “bunker-busters”, according to several Israeli military sources.
Robert Gates, the new US defence secretary, has described military action against Iran as a “last resort”, leading Israeli officials to conclude that it will be left to them to strike.

Israeli pilots have flown to Gibraltar in recent weeks to train for the 2,000-mile round trip to the Iranian targets. Three possible routes have been mapped out, including one over Turkey.

Air force squadrons based at Hatzerim in the Negev desert and Tel Nof, south of Tel Aviv, have trained to use Israel’s tactical nuclear weapons on the mission. The preparations have been overseen by Major General Eliezer Shkedi, commander of the Israeli air force.

Sources close to the Pentagon said the United States was highly unlikely to give approval for tactical nuclear weapons to be used. One source said Israel would have to seek approval “after the event”, as it did when it crippled Iraq’s nuclear reactor at Osirak with airstrikes in 1981.

Scientists have calculated that although contamination from the bunker-busters could be limited, tons of radioactive uranium compounds would be released.

The Israelis believe that Iran’s retaliation would be constrained by fear of a second strike if it were to launch its Shehab-3 ballistic missiles at Israel.

However, American experts warned of repercussions, including widespread protests that could destabilise parts of the Islamic world friendly to the West.

Colonel Sam Gardiner, a Pentagon adviser, said Iran could try to close the Strait of Hormuz, the route for 20% of the world’s oil.

Some sources in Washington said they doubted if Israel would have the nerve to attack Iran. However, Dr Ephraim Sneh, the deputy Israeli defence minister, said last month: “The time is approaching when Israel and the international community will have to decide whether to take military action against Iran.”


The attack would be the first with nuclear weapons since 1945, when the United States dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The Israeli weapons would each have a force equivalent to one-fifteenth of the Hiroshima bomb.

Under the plans, conventional laser-guided bombs would open “tunnels” into the targets. “Mini-nukes” would then immediately be fired into a plant at Natanz, exploding deep underground to reduce the risk of radioactive fallout.

“As soon as the green light is given, it will be one mission, one strike and the Iranian nuclear project will be demolished,” said one of the sources.

The plans, disclosed to The Sunday Times last week, have been prompted in part by the Israeli intelligence service Mossad’s assessment that Iran is on the verge of producing enough enriched uranium to make nuclear weapons within two years.

Israeli military commanders believe conventional strikes may no longer be enough to annihilate increasingly well-defended enrichment facilities. Several have been built beneath at least 70ft of concrete and rock. However, the nuclear-tipped bunker-busters would be used only if a conventional attack was ruled out and if the United States declined to intervene, senior sources said.

Israeli and American officials have met several times to consider military action. Military analysts said the disclosure of the plans could be intended to put pressure on Tehran to halt enrichment, cajole America into action or soften up world opinion in advance of an Israeli attack.

Some analysts warned that Iranian retaliation for such a strike could range from disruption of oil supplies to the West to terrorist attacks against Jewish targets around the world.

Israel has identified three prime targets south of Tehran which are believed to be involved in Iran’s nuclear programme:

# Natanz, where thousands of centrifuges are being installed for uranium enrichment

# A uranium conversion facility near Isfahan where, according to a statement by an Iranian vice-president last week, 250 tons of gas for the enrichment process have been stored in tunnels

# A heavy water reactor at Arak, which may in future produce enough plutonium for a bomb

Israeli officials believe that destroying all three sites would delay Iran’s nuclear programme indefinitely and prevent them from having to live in fear of a “second Holocaust”.

The Israeli government has warned repeatedly that it will never allow nuclear weapons to be made in Iran, whose president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has declared that “Israel must be wiped off the map”.

If I was the President of Iran, I wouldn't be making statements about Israel's demise.
If I were the President of Israel, Iran would be a sheet of glass by now.

From Wes Pruden at the Washington Times:

"Contingency plans" are best served with lots of salt, but the Iranians are taking the latest tale about Israeli "plans" to take out Tehran's nuclear sites with red pepper.

No one doubts that the Israelis have drawn up such plans, to use low-yield nuclear weapons to destroy the Iranian nuclear threat once and for all, or at least until next time. Somewhere deep in the bowels of the Pentagon there are no doubt contingency plans for invading Scotland, laying siege to Liechtenstein and for accepting the surrender of France. When you need a contingency plan, you need it now.

Nevertheless, the destruction of the Iranian nuclear sites is taken very seriously indeed by Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the seriously creepy president who insists that Israel must be destroyed and who has more or less dared the West to do something about it. He sent his Foreign Ministry spokesman out to bluster in the wake of the latest report, in London's Sunday Times, that Israel has nuclear bombers idling on the runway, waiting for the tower to clear them for takeoff.

"Now this will convince the international community that the main threat to the world ... is the Zionist regime," he said, and not only that, it proves that Israel has nuclear weapons. Prudent men assume that Israel has such weapons and have done so since long before the Israeli prime minister hinted -- in a slip of the tongue that might not have been a slip at all -- that Israel was "among the world's nuclear-equipped nations."

In Israel, Mark Regev, the spokesman for the Israeli Foreign Ministry, fell back on convenient diplomatic argle-bargle, neither confirming nor denying the speculation. Israel is focused on diplomacy, he said, "and if diplomacy succeeds, the problem can be solved peaceably." And so it can. But if diplomacy does not succeed in assuring Israeli security, and there's no reason to think it will since it never has, what then?

The rest of the West, which is mostly interested in making sure that nobody disturbs nap time, has always assumed that if the Americans don't do the deed, the Israelis will. The Jews will have no choice; survival is the only game they're allowed to play.

By the London account, two Israeli air force squadrons have been training for months to drop low-yield nuclear "bunker busters" on an enrichment plant near the town of Natanz, a heavy water facility at Arak and the uranium conversion plant at Isfahan. Laser-guided conventional bombs would soften the targets, boring tunnels leading to the core of the facilities, and nuclear warheads would then be inserted to explode deep underground, minimizing fallout.

The detail of the plans is impressive, so impressive in fact that it raises questions about why a well-informed Israeli source would talk so irresponsibly to a newspaper correspondent. Anyone with so much information would be confidently relied on to keep his mouth tightly shut. The Sunday Times reported earlier that Israel, at the direction of Ariel Sharon, was ready with a combined air-ground attack to destroy the Iranian nukes.

The most obvious explanation is that the story is a carefully constructed ruse, intended to warn President Ahmadinejad that creep or not he had better shape up if he knows what's good for him. "It's possible that this was a leak done on purpose," says Reuven Pedatzur, a private defense analyst in Jerusalem, "as deterrence, to say 'Someone better hold us back, before we do something crazy.' " Ephraim Kam, an analyst at Tel Aviv University, agrees: "No reliable source would ever speak about this."

Or it may be a ruse not directed at the Iranians, but at anyone in the West still listening. The Sunday Times account suggests that Israel may be attempting to pressure the United States to stiffen its on-again, off-again diplomatic offensive, with credible threats of something more persuasive to come, and to warn the Europeans, wet as always, to shut up and get out of the way. A London newspaper would be just the right voice to send the message. With salt -- and pepper, too.

Pretty hard to take Sunrise's post seriously when he pastes a blogger's article.

Does Israel have nuclear weapons?

It's interesting that although the media falsely reported, and continues to falsely report, what the Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said. That false reporting is taken as a real and genuine threat to the existence of Israel, although Iran is known to have no nuclear weapons and no such capability to threaten Israel (much like Iraq was no threat).

And on the other hand, there's talk from the Israeli prime minister about Israel having nuclear weapons, something that most consider to be a reality anyway (there is so much evidence). And theres often talk from Israel about bombing Iran, and now a report about preperations for said bombing that has been talked about and threatened, and thats all said to be oh so much bluster from Israel.

Iran can not and does not threaten Israel.

Israel can and does threaten Iran.

One is to be taken seriously and the other not.


Go figure.

BTW, i bet Iran doesnt have contingency plans for laying siege to Israel, nevermind invading Scotland.

Israel does have nuclear weapons, they stole them from us.

quote:

Originally posted by Agent11:
Israel does have nuclear weapons, they stole them from us.

They do indeed have them. I don't think they were stolen, I think we sold them.
Our allies in Israel have our complete support.

I'm surprised that Israel hasn't lobbed a few tactical nukes at the whack neighbors they have.
Good for them for keeping their cool.

Right, so Israel threatenes Iran, not the other way around.

(Didnt the British supply the heavy water, didnt Israel supply apartheied South Africa?)

***

Escalation Against Iran

The Pieces Are Being Put in Place

By COL. SAM GARDINER

The pieces are moving. They’ll be in place by the end of February. The United States will be able to escalate military operations against Iran.

The second carrier strike group leaves the U.S. west coast on January 16. It will be joined by naval mine clearing assets from both the United States and the UK. Patriot missile defense systems have also been ordered to deploy to the Gulf.

Maybe as a guard against North Korea seeing operations focused on Iran as a chance to be aggressive, a squadron of F-117 stealth fighters has just been deployed to Korea.

This has to be called escalation. We have to remind ourselves, just as Iran is supporting groups inside Iraq, the United States is supporting groups inside Iran. Just as Iran has special operations troops operating inside Iraq, we’ve read the United States has special operations troops operating inside Iran.

Just as Iran is supporting Hamas, two weeks ago we found out the United States is supporting arms for Abbas. Just as Iran and Syria are supporting Hezbollah in Lebanon we’re now learning the White House has approved a finding to allow the CIA to support opposition groups inside Lebanon. Just as Iran is supporting Syria, we’ve learned recently that the United States is going to fund Syrian opposition groups.

We learned this week the President authorized an attack on the Iranian liaison office in Irbil.

The White House keeps saying there are no plans to attack Iran. Obviously, the facts suggest otherwise. Equally as clear, the Iranians will read what the Administrations is doing not what it is
saying.

It is possible the White House strategy is just implementing a strategy to put pressure on Iran on a number of fronts, and this will never amount to anything. On the other hand, if the White House is on a path to strike Iran, we’ll see a few more steps unfold.

First, we know there is a National Security Council staff-led
group whose mission is to create outrage in the world against Iran. Just like before Gulf II, this media group will begin to release stories to sell a strike against Iran. Watch for the outrage stuff. The Patriot missiles going to the GCC states are only part of the missile defense assets. I would expect to see the deployment of some of the European-based missile defense assets to Israel, just as they were before Gulf II.

I would expect deployment of additional USAF fighters into the bases in Iraq, maybe some into Afghanistan.

I think we will read about the deployment of some of the newly arriving Army brigades going into Iraq being deployed to the border with Iran. Their mission will be to guard against any Iranian movements into Iraq.

As one of the last steps before a strike, we’ll see USAF tankers moved to unusual places, like Bulgaria. These will be used to refuel the US-based B-2 bombers on their strike missions into Iran. When that happens, we’ll only be days away from a strike.

The White House could be telling the truth. Maybe there are no plans to take Iran to the next level. The fuel for a fire is in place, however. All we need is a spark. The danger is that we have created conditions that could lead to a Greater Middle East War.

Sam Gardiner is a retired colonel of the US Air Force. He has taught strategy and military operations at the National War College, Air War College and Naval War College.