Intelligence estimates by the United States and European sources indicate that Iran could be as little as a year away from producing a nuclear bomb. Additionally, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the United Nation’s nuclear watch agency, has uncovered evidence of Iran trying to produce highly enriched uranium for nuclear weapons for more than 25 years. Given that Iran is run by an Islamist government that supports terrorist activities around the world and that its current leader, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has said that the state of Israel should be “wiped off of the map,” the U.S. government is obviously very concerned with this development. A decision will have to be made in the near future about how to handle this threat.
In light of these developments it is useful and interesting to look back on how Israel handled a nuclear threat from another one of its enemies, Iraq in the 1980s. When Iraq, under Saddam Hussein, tried to get nuclear weapons in the late 1970s and early 1980s the Israelis reacted by bombing their reactors at al-Tuwaitah.
HISTORY
In the late 1970s it became clear to the international community that Iraq was trying to acquire nuclear weapons under the guise of buying nuclear reactors for power generation. At the time, Iraq had expansionist ambitions and animosity toward what it called, “the Zionist entity,” Israel. The response of the world was alarm and some limited action. In April of 1979 the core of one of the Iraqi reactors was blown up, as it was awaiting shipment from France to Iraq, by Mossad agents. Over the next 15 months, a number of key nuclear scientists from Iraq and other Arab countries were assassinated by Israeli agents while the scientists were visiting western Europe. The spate of suspicious deaths, including throat cuttings, hit-and-run automobile accidents, sudden flu-like illnesses, and virulent ‘food poisoning,’ greatly slowed the pace of research on Iraq’s nuclear program.
The next blow to Iraq’s nuclear efforts came nine days after the start of the Iran-Iraq War, on Sept 30, 1980, when Iran sent two Iranian Phantom F-4-E jets to attack several targets, among them the uncompleted nuclear reactors at al-Tuwaitha. The Phantoms fired two rockets. One did not explode, and the other hit the housing of one of the reactors, damaging the dome and cooling system, but causing no significant destruction. Hundreds of French and Italian technicians and engineers working at the facility were evacuated, however, and work at al-Tuwaitha ground to a standstill.
Over the course of the following year, Israel, led by Prime Minister Menachem Begin considered various options, including attacking Iraq’s reactors. Such a move entailed major concerns, including probable adverse world reaction, the distance from Israel to Iraq (over 1,100 miles to the target and back), and concern that even though Iraq was in a war with Iran, it might counter attack Israel as well. More important, Begin was concerned about the reaction of Egyptian President Anwar Sadat of Egypt, who had brokered a separate peace treaty with Begin at Camp David in 1979. While an attack would not violate Israel’s treaty with Egypt, which called for Israel to pull out of the Sinai in April 1982, Sadat’s reaction was still unpredictable.
Begin weighed the risks and decided that a nuclear-armed Iraq was too dangerous for Israel to accept and that a preemptive strike was worth any possible aftereffects. He felt that a relatively swift attack was the best option, particularly when Iraq was weakened by its ongoing ground war with Iran. And since the reactor was not yet in operation, an attack would not result in any kind of nuclear fallout over the city of Baghdad. By the end of March 1981, Mossad reported that foreign workers were returning to al-Tuwaitha, and that construction had resumed on the Osirak nuclear reactor. Begin and his advisors finalized plans for a surgical air strike on the Iraqi facility in early May.
THE ATTACK
The attack, codenamed Operation Opera, took place on June 7, 1981. According to the Israeli governments official statement after the strike, it occurred on a Sunday, “on the assumption that the 100 to 150 foreign experts employed at the reactor would be absent on the Christian day of rest.” Additionally, a late-afternoon attack would give the Israeli Combat Search and Rescue Team (CSAR), riding in CH-53 helicopters, all night to search for any downed pilots. At 3:00 pm, the CH-53s took position, hovering at 100 feet just west of the Jordanian border. The crews were not told what the mission was—just that if a plane went down they had permission to violate any sovereign airspace to pick up the pilots. At 4:00 pm eight of Israel’s American built F-16 fighter jets took off from Etzion airbase in the Sinai desert, carrying extra 370-gallon fuel tanks to increase their range.
Due to weight considerations, the F-16s were stripped of two of their four air-to-air Sidewinder missiles and jamming devices for protection against Iraqi MiGs and SAM-6 radars. Despite attempts to get their weight as low as possible, they still took off at a weight that exceeded nearly twice the planes’ design specifications. They were equipped with special racks which carried two 2000-pound MK-84 iron “dumb” bombs, called dumb because they used gravity only in targeting. The idea was to make the bombing process as simple as possible. They were escorted by eight F-15 fighter interceptors for protection from Arab aircraft, to provide jamming of Iraqi radar over al-Tuwaitha, and to act as communications relay stations to a Boeing 707 command post that would be orbiting over Israel.
The fighters had to fly over or circumvent seven separate Arab airfields along their route of attack. This meant danger of aerial interception from Jordanian F-5-Es and Iraqi Mirage-4000s, MIG-23s and MIG-25s. At Tuwaitah itself, the fighters would face antiaircraft artillery (AAA) batteries and SAM-6s.
The route of the attack from take off in the Sinai was east across the Gulf of Acaba, then through the northern part of Saudi Arabia very near the border of Jordan, where Israel believed it had discovered some radar blind spots. Additionally, the Israelis had intelligence that the Saudis would only have one of their American-supplied Advanced Warning and Control System (AWACS) intelligence aircraft in the air at the time of the attack and that it would be overlooking the Persian Gulf. Radio communication, only to be made at five checkpoints, would be single words in English, the international language of aviation, so that if overheard the communication might be mistaken for a commercial flight.
The formation flew low, about 100 feet, and fast, about 360 knots, again to avoid detection. Once the formation was across Saudi Arabia, it turned towards Baghdad. The first bombers reached their target 12 miles past Baghdad. Once on scene, the attack took place in a matter of minutes. The F-16s swept across the sky in pairs of two, reaching 5000 feet in four seconds and then diving at the target, sending their bombs towards the sides of the reactor, as they had practiced for months in the Sinai. The first bombs hit the side of the reactor, opening holes for the second set of bombs, which found and destroyed the reactor inside. A French worker who witnessed the Israeli attack called the precision of the Israeli bombing “stupefying.”
Within about two minutes the attack, timed for sunset, was complete and the larger Tammuz I (or Osirak) reactor was destroyed. The smaller Tammuz II reactor’s sensitive equipment and foundation were ruined. Iraqi antiaircraft unit personnel were eating when the attack occurred, which was another reason for the timing of the bombing, and had turned off their radars. As a result, there was a fatal delay in their reaction time, and no SAM-6s were fired at the Israeli planes. As predicted, the Saudi AWACS aircraft was facing the Persian Gulf and did not detect the Israeli aircraft. The attack squadron landed safely back at Etzion at 7:00 pm, having faced no enemy aircraft on the return flight.
WORLD REACTION
The world universally condemned Israel’s action, including the United States. The Reagan administration, normally a staunch ally of Israel, criticized the attack. The French called it “unacceptable.” The British decried Israel’s actions as “a grave breach of international law.” A New York Times editorial railed, “Israel’s sneak attack on a French-built nuclear reactor near Baghdad was an act of inexcusable and short-sighted aggression.” A United Nations Security Council resolution denouncing Israel’s raid was passed unanimously. However, Israel was never struck in reprisal and no UN sanctions were put in place against it (as a result of a threatened US veto).
CONCLUSION
So, will this happen again? The Israeli’s have continued to show a willingness to destroy nuclear facilities in countries that are enemies. On September 6, 2007 Israel destroyed a partially built Syrian nuclear reactor, allegedly constructed with help from North Korea. There was no military response from Syria.
A couple of factors would have to be resolved, however, before a strike on Iran could be made. First, Iran is a greater distance from Israel then Iraq was. Additionally, Iran has dispersed its nuclear sites and reportedly put some of its nuclear facilities underground and in cities which makes an attack much more difficult. Another important factor is thatIranis not caught up in a war against its neighbor likeIraqwas so it might counter attack. Iran has already threatened to attack Israel’s reactor at Dimona if Israel attacks Iran’s nuclear sites. Finally, the U.S. satellite photography that helped the Israelis prepare for their raid is no longer being shared. Outrage over the CIA’s intelligence sharing with Israel led to restrictions on sharing intelligence about countries that were “an immediate threat or were on Israel’s border.”
What to do about a nuclearIranis a key question that theUnited Stateswill need to answer in the next couple of years. Looking at Israel’s raid on Iraq’s reactors provides insight into one of several possible responses.
So readers—what do you think Israeli and/or the United States will do vis-à-vis the Iranian’s nuclear sites? Will there be an attack or will Israel and the United States let Iran go nuclear? Given that an Iranian nuclear scientist was killed by a car bomb in January 2012 and that three others were killed in explosions over the past two years is there a possible third way in the works to end Iran’s nuclear ambitions? Will it work?