Will Iran Strike Israel’s A-Bomb Factory?

Dimona: Israel’s A-Bomb Factory

Officially, Israel does not have nuclear weapons. Unofficially, we know they do. This is the result of their policy of strategic ambiguity. Israel’s formal position is that “Israel will never be the first country to introduce nuclear weapons to the region.” That’s nice and ambiguous. Just like Iran’s formal position is that “Nuclear weapons are contrary to the teachings of Islam.” But both sides will use them if existentially threatened.

Israel has had the support of western countries, particularly the US and France. France provided Israel’s nuclear reactor at Dimona. Prime Minister Golda Meir sat with Richard Nixon and hammered out a secret deal. The US would support Israel’s nuclear program, but neither side would ever own up to the program’s existence because the US was a signatory to the nuclear nonproliferation treaty.

In 1986, a Dimona technician named Mordechai Vanunu left Israel and visited the Sunday Times in London. He brought with him a story, and photographic evidence that Israel was manufacturing A-Bombs. Figure 1 shows the exterior of Dimona. Vanunu’s story is revealed in this BBC documentary, along with some of his photographs of the interior of Dimona: BBC Documentary: Vanunu and Israel’s Bomb.

Vanunu revealed that, at the time, there were six floors deep underground. Those six floors contained the bomb factory. Vanunu’s photographs showed that Israel was manufacturing the spherical fissile cores for implosion-type A-Bombs (see Iran Has Probably Already Built the Bomb for details on the types of A-Bombs). Figure 2 shows a Plutonium core photographed by Vanunu at Dimona. Most nuclear specialists believe the Israelis tested their design, possibly in cooperation with South Africa, during the Vela Incident of 1979 (The Vela Incident of 1979).

British nuclear weapons specialists vetted Vanunu’s story before the Sunday Times published it. In conversations with Vanunu, they estimated that, at the time, Israel had approximately 150 to 200 nuclear bombs. That was 38 years ago. Israel could have six hundred bombs today. They have a nuclear triad: silo-based missiles, gravity bombs, and nuclear-capable cruise missile submarines.

Israel’s Nuclear Weapons and Sites

Israel is a small country, shaped like an hourglass. Fat top, fat bottom, narrow waist. Its population is heavily concentrated in major city centers. The rest of the country is an armed camp. While the nuclear research facility and bomb factory are located at Dimona, there are numerous other nuclear sites. These include launch fields for Israel’s Jericho missiles, armories for gravity bombs (located near airbases for nuclear-capable attack aircraft), and weapons assembly sites.

Israel’s major weapons facilities are shown in Figure 3. We’ve talked about Dimona. Tel Nof Airbase is located close to storage bunkers for gravity bombs. Sedot Mikha is a top-secret facility thought to harbor nuclear-armed Jericho ICBMs. Israel refuses to confirm or deny the purpose of the base or the existence of nuclear weapons there. The base does not even appear on many maps. Haifa is Israel’s main naval base and home to its fleet of German-built diesel-electric submarines. These are armed with nuclear-capable cruise missiles.

Iran’s Program

Iran is a powerhouse of conventional missiles. By some estimates, Iran could plaster Israel with one hundred missiles every hour of every day for a week. Iran Missile Attack Overwhelms Israeli Air Defenses describes the Iranian attack of October 1 and how it struck three Israeli airbases. The key takeaway is that Iran has thousands of conventional ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, and even more drones. However sophisticated, Israeli air defense is not sufficient to stop Iranian swarm attacks. Even more important, the Iranian weapons are accurate enough to hit their targets.

I believe Iran has the bomb. Iran Has Probably Already Built the Bomb details why it is highly likely that Iran already has gun-type atomic bombs built and mounted on IRBMs. They are not as advanced as the implosion-type devices that Israel has, but a single 15-kiloton gun-type bomb planted on Tel Aviv will kill 98,000 people outright and injure a quarter of a million more. Israeli buildings are built to high standards. They all have reinforced stairwells and safe-rooms. These will not help against a nuclear attack. People will be asphyxiated or burned alive in their shelters.

Most estimates indicate Iran has from four to six gun-type nuclear weapons. That is not a lot compared to Israel’s six hundred implosion bombs, but they’re probably mounted on IRBMs and hidden in Iran’s desert and mountains. Fire them by themselves, and Israel will have the opportunity to concentrate its air defense. Slip them into a swarm of two or three hundred conventional IRBMs, and the nukes will get through.

Two nukes on Tel Aviv and two on Haifa will probably kill half a million Israelis and injure up to two million more. That’s what happens when you nuke highly concentrated population centers. Conventional weapons will take care of other targets.

A Conventional Scenario

After the Iranian attack of October 1, Benjamin Netanyahu promised harsh and immediate retaliation. Ten days later, we are still waiting. Israel and its allies once again said the Iranian attack of October 1 was “defeated and totally ineffective.” This, despite videos that showed Iranian missiles raining on Israeli airfields unopposed.

If the Iranian attack had been as ineffective as Israel claimed, I believe Israel would have mounted a retaliatory attack by now.

There is another factor. I believe Israel and the US are conscious that Iran probably has the bomb. The US, in particular, is trying hard to restrain Israel from attacking Iranian nuclear and oil infrastructure.

The most likely scenario is that Israel will launch a conventional attack against Iranian nuclear or oil facilities. If Israel attacks oil facilities, Iran will probably respond with a conventional attack on oil and energy facilities in Israel and the region. It will close the Straits of Hormuz. That will cause an energy price spike, a global recession, and a regional conventional conflagration.

But what if Israel attacks Iran’s nuclear facilities with conventional weapons?

In such a scenario, I believe Iran will do two things. First, it will break out – it will make clear that it has nuclear weapons. That will forestall an Israeli nuclear attack. Second, and this is key – Iran will strike Dimona and possibly other Israeli nuclear facilities with conventional weapons.

A Conventional Strike on Dimona

A conventional strike on Dimona and other Israeli nuclear installations would be proportional to a conventional Israeli attack on Iranian nuclear installations. The question is, could such an attack on Dimona succeed?

Israeli air defense is inadequate when faced with Iranian missile swarms. There’s no question the Iranian missiles can get through. The real question is – are they accurate enough to do the job? We already know not to underestimate Iranian accuracy. Let’s take a closer look.

Let’s examine the Iranian attack on Saudi Arabian oil refineries in 2019. The United States had just pulled out of the JCPOA Nuclear Agreement, and imposed even harsher sanctions on Iran. Rather than strike at the US directly, Iran decided to escalate horizontally by attacking a US ally – Saudi Arabia. Iran launched an attack consisting of drones and cruise missiles. The weapons struck Saudi Arabian oil refineries with devastating effect. Crucial to this discussion is the accuracy of the Iranian missiles.

Examine Figure 4 and look at how the series of four tanks were struck. The points of impact are highlighted with red boxes. Each tank was hit by one missile, in exactly the same place. This is sophisticated precision guidance.

The Iranian drones and cruise missiles are equipped with a form of optical pattern-recognition. The guidance system is programmed with a photograph of the target. A secondary system – like GPS – is used to get the missile close to the target. Once it’s in the vicinity, the weapon’s optical seeker locks onto the image of the target and compares what it sees to the image in its program. The seeker then uses servo-motors to adjust the weapon’s control surfaces to overlap the two images and guide the weapon to its target.

Let’s look at the Dimona reactor. Figure 4 shows the prominent reactor dome.

This is an old photograph, but the layout has not changed much over the years. It is used as an example. Such a photograph would be loaded into the missile’s seeker and guidance would be programmed to home in on the reactor dome. As shown in Figure 3, Iranian missiles easily have the accuracy to hit the target with high precision.

We cannot underestimate the Iranians. Next time the talking heads on the tube tell you the Iranian missiles are junk, remember the videos of IRBMs raining unopposed, and the picture of the Abqaiq oil refinery hit with surgical precision.

The attack might happen this way. The Iranians would launch a first wave of drones. The drones would travel at 150mph, carrying 100lb warheads. This wave might have three hundred drones or more. These are significant payloads and cannot be ignored. They will cause damage and must be engaged. Israeli Iron Dome and Patriot batteries, while ineffective against IRBMs, are very effective against drones and cruise missiles. The Israelis would engage the drones.

Israel has 10 Iron Dome batteries, each with 20 missiles. That’s 200 missiles, and not all of them would be deployed to defend Dimona. Certainly 300 to 400 drones would be enough to saturate Iron Dome and Patriot.

Once the drones have pulled the fangs from Iron Dome and Patriot, a second wave of IRBMs would fall on the target. There might be several hundred of these. Iron Dome is useless against IRBMs falling at Mach 6 or higher. David’s Sling, Patriot and THAAD would be overwhelmed. Even if they shot down 25% of the attacking IRBMs, the rest would get through. There would be nothing left with which to engage the third wave of extremely accurate cruise missiles equipped with pattern recognition guidance.

Similar conventional attacks could be launched against other facilities.

Conclusions

Should Israel launch a conventional attack on Iranian nuclear facilities, the result will be Iran’s breakout as a de-facto nuclear armed state. It might not make a formal announcement, but it will make its capability known. It will then launch a proportional retaliatory attack on Israeli nuclear facilities.

It won’t matter that Israel has five hundred nuclear bombs and Iran has four or six. Those four or six, launched in the midst of swarms of conventional missiles, are certain to get through to their targets. Aimed at Tel Aviv and Haifa, Israeli casualties would be prohibitive.

The point is, we need to treat Iran as a de-facto nuclear-armed state and plan accordingly. No one wins a nuclear exchange. That means Israel must plan for a conventional war against Iran. That means smart planning, husbanding forces, and beating opponents one at a time (that means Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis). Israel must use diplomacy to court allies and isolate enemies. We have to help Israel do that.

About the Author

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Cameron Curtis is the author of the Breed action thriller series, available on Amazon. The stories are adrenaline-fuelled and emotionally engaging. The novels combine credible premises based on current events, technical detail, and propulsive plotting.

Check out his new Breed thriller, BLOWBACK, here: BLOWBACK by Cameron Curtis available for download now. The story involves the theft of a thermonuclear bomb (H-Bomb) that includes a fission device like the ones described in this article.