Sunday Reflection: Israel will Bomb Iran in 60 days or less

Very good interview this morning on NPR talking about the cost of an Israeli strike on Iran.  Paul Pillar from Georgetown is the expert:

www.npr.org/2012/03/09/148278053/pace-of-irans-nuclear-program-i-overestimated

Not just iranians - put almost any young people from a muslim middle-eastern country with israelis in the same room and they will eventually party hard (i'm israeli, and i partied with syrians a while ago). the problem we have with iran considers its government and fundamental leadership, whom are by all definitions a bunch of psychos - i would be very happy to see that govt overthrown from within, without any outside help or a handful of israeli bombs...

I've been following this subject for some time now and I while I don't doubt that Israel has to bomb a nuclear armed Iran pledged to destroy it I question whether the Israelis have the capability. Iran's nuclear infrastructure is dispersed among many small facilties, many of them under mountains. Some of them are decoy sites. Iran is a closed society, so eye ball gained intelligence is not easy to come by. Isreal has just about enough planes, superb pilots, smart bombs and good planners. From what I can tell, Israel's existing air refueling capability would allow a strike of about just 30 planes to go into Iran. And you can't just buy an air refueling capability, it takes years of planning, maintenance set up, hangers, crew training and logistics to handle brand new planes, let alone retrofit any airliners the Israelis might try to use in place of new ones. Our Defense Sec. Leon Panetta seemed to be trying to spoil any Israeli attack recently by stating that he believed Israel would hit Iran in April, May or June of this year. I don't think Israel can hit Iran's nuclear capability with any success without massive help from us(which I would like to see happen). But I doubt this President will give that kind of help. Hell, Bush didn't and the Israelis specifically asked for it. So I think we have to look in another direction. If Israel does strike, I don't think it will be against Iran's nuclear facilities, but there is something they could hit in Iran that would be far more damaging to the country than blasting her nuke. And I don't think this administration wants to see that happen before the election for reasons that are political rather than strategic.

Saw another great article in Der Spiegel  this one's in English.  "Tehran's last Chance:Israel, Iran, and the Battle for the Bomb."  www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,819312,00.html

Side note: yes I can read French, just don't ask me to speak it!

Before I got married I could order beer and get slapped in 5 languages, like any good squid!

 @LCpl X Just reading Le Monde, guess the Pres is trying to dial back the Israelis?  Wonder how that went over?

wwww.lemonde.fr/proche-orient/article/2012/03/05/barak-obama-les-etats-unis-envisagent-toutes-les-options-face-l-iran_1652210_3218.html

Forgive the typo:

www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/03/02/netanyahu_won_t_attack_iran?page=0,1

Great article on the subject over at Foreign Policy

www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/03/02/netanyahu_won_t_atack_iran?page=0,1

"There’s a reason that most CIA compounds build the bar first, then focus on asset building." 

Since you've isolated that quote like it was something special I'm gonna have to take issue with it. Vespers is right up there with wine tasting, tennis and all other places and activities where we seem to be but the information we need isn't. It's great that every CIA base in Afghanistan has bars, but that guy who blew himself up on Dec 2009 wasn't there to have cocktails.

We don't have enough information on Iran. The Israelis are our only eyes and ears in that region. My point is we are going in blind because when it comes to collecting information we are still using that fucking bar paradigm.

Look I don't know if war will be good or not for us, Iran and the region, it's just not a good way to start another war--deaf, dumb and blind.

Funny, my Mod Western Political Theory professor said the same thing a couple weeks ago. Political Psychologists are a loopy lot though. Good post though, I'll mark my calendar.

I'd hate to be Israel right now. It's always d*mn*d if you do, d*mn*d if you don't for them. I would like to see one or two our 30,000lb MOP's in action though.

 How do you think Russia will fit into this long-term, esp. after Israel strikes? Ya'll have probably heard that Putin was just re-elected.

Book recommendation: Joel Rosenberg has some good thrillers about Israel, Iran, & mid-east in general, "CIA style."

Unstoppable force vs. immovable object scenario? All I can do is prepare myself and my family for worst case scenario. The sleepers in CONUS is my biggest concern, and I don't intend on being asleep when they wake up.

Yes its a complex situation. The fact that Israel and SA are on the same page speaks volumes. But where is all the panic over Pakistan and their nukes? They, I believe, are far more a danger to us then Iran.

Another point to consider is the Israeli's dont have the means to get that one mountain out of commission, in fact there are whispers we may know that we cant even knock it out for too long. So airstrikes commence, the program is only marginally off line and now the hornets nest is stirred and many parts of the region froth about how the Great Satan did it again, the Straits are temporarily closed, the Saudi oil fields may even be hit, oil goes through the roof and what was achieved? Im lost as why people here in the US are so afraid of Iran and their maniac govt when we survived that maniac Kruschev who threatened to wipe us off the map? And we knew he could do it.

We need to keep the focus on Pakistan and their Nukes IMO.

It is more complicated than this. The main differences between Israel and Iran is, as you mentioned in the post, its people. The people of Iran might not agree with what their crazed leaders, specially Ahmadinejad, is doing but there's nothing they can do to stop this. Israel, on the other hand, is a democracy that actually depends on the people and, as past reforms show, the people can decide that a policy is not welcome and that it's the government will have a very hard time functioning if they try to push this through. The Israeli government will not resort to violence the way the Iranian gov, will do to repress people saying what they think. 

While generally I agree that the normal people will get along just fine, I can't see any solution to this since the people in Iran have no saying on anything. Just the crazy religious people leading the country and their puppets.

I am all for the bombing of the nuclear installations. Iran with a bomb is an imminent  threat to everyone.

As much as I agree that this will probably happen, no telling when, before the US election for sure.  We almost feel like holding our breath.  I've mentioned before my wife was very low level MEK sympathizer, was a look out for grafiti painters and such.  

I just think that giving the Mullah's a reason to unleash the dogs is a bad idea.  We know they have sleepers in CONUS, plus the missile transfers that will be arriving in Venezuela.  Iran doesn't need time to develop ICBM's medium range weapons based in Venezuela can strike CONUS.  

Ongoing activity in the triborder area.  Ongoing infiltration of Mexican cartels, even into Austrailia.  We can and need to deal with Iran's proxies soon.

I just can't decide how.