The Iran Sanctions That Aren't - State Department Give Waivers to 11 Countries

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced today that the State Department is exempting 10 European countries and Japan from penalties for doing business with Iran's central bank:

"I am pleased to announce that an initial group of eleven countries has significantly reduced their volume of crude oil purchases from Iran -- Belgium, the Czech Republic, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Poland, Spain, and the United Kingdom. As a result, I will report to the Congress that sanctions pursuant to Section 1245 of the National Defense Authorization Act for 2012 (NDAA) will not apply to the financial institutions based in these countries, for a renewable period of 180 days," Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said in a Tuesday statement. "The actions taken by these countries were not easy. They had to rethink their energy needs at a critical time for the world economy and quickly begin to find alternatives to Iranian oil, which many had been reliant on for their energy needs."

Of course, Mrs. Clinton didn't mention that Iran has already announced it would no longer sell crude to France and the United Kingdom, so they're getting a waiver based on Iran's actions,not theirs. And the other EU countries have already announced they will phase out all purchases of Iranian oil by July 1st. However, at this point it really doesn't matter. Without barring countries from dealing with Iran's Central Bank the oil sanctions are almost meaningless.

Let me explain to you why. Oil is fungible, and as we saw with the UN's Oil for Food scandal involving Saddam Hussein and Iraq, it's easily transferable, can easily be moved through other hands to disguise its origin and can be swapped via third parties for other items. The US could even end up buying Iranian oil if it was shipped to say, Venezuela and reflagged. But take away the ability of buyers to pay Iran for it directly by isolating Iran's central bank and it becomes a much more difficult and costly matter.

One of the few effective things President George W. Bush did in the period after 9/11 to fight Islamist terrorism was to identify the banks used to bankroll it and a number of questionable individuals and organizations who held accounts in otherwise legitimate institutions. Aside from freezing all suspect assets here in America and blocking US financial institutions from having any dealings with the suspect accounts and organizations, President Bush successfully got foreign financial institutions to cooperate by ordering US financial institutions not to deal with banks overseas handling accounts for places like the Islamic Cultural Center in Milan, Italy, Al Taqwa Construction in Dubai and the Revival of Islamic Heritage Society(RIHS) in Kuwait, all al-Qaeda and Hamas fronts. Since the world's banking system is wired through New York, most countries complied, which led to something like $79.9 million in terrorist assets being seized.

If President Obama was actually serious about stopping Iran's nuclear weapons program and ending Iran's financing of terrorism, he'd do something similar and make all of Iran's banks including Iran's central bank persona non grata in the world's financial systems using the same tools. Even countries like China and India might decide that forgoing Iranian oil was better than having their ability to perform financial transactions here in America compromised or curtailed.

But then, that was never going to happen with this president. I've become fairly convinced that President Obama isn't particularly exercised about whether Iran goes nuclear or not. He might just take a wag the dog option to pull off a strike on Iran if he's lagging in the polls come October, but failing that, he appears to be fine with it.

Either he's simply clueless and doesn't see the danger, is too preoccupied with his domestic agenda and his re-election bid,or feels that America needs to be taken down a peg. Or perhaps a combination of all three.

The Iran Sanctions That Aren't - State Department Give Waivers to 11 Countries

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced today that the State Department is exempting 10 European countries and Japan from penalties for doing business with Iran's central bank:

"I am pleased to announce that an initial group of eleven countries has significantly reduced their volume of crude oil purchases from Iran -- Belgium, the Czech Republic, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Poland, Spain, and the United Kingdom. As a result, I will report to the Congress that sanctions pursuant to Section 1245 of the National Defense Authorization Act for 2012 (NDAA) will not apply to the financial institutions based in these countries, for a renewable period of 180 days," Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said in a Tuesday statement. "The actions taken by these countries were not easy. They had to rethink their energy needs at a critical time for the world economy and quickly begin to find alternatives to Iranian oil, which many had been reliant on for their energy needs."

Of course, Mrs. Clinton didn't mention that Iran has already announced it would no longer sell crude to France and the United Kingdom, so they're getting a waiver based on Iran's actions,not theirs. And the other EU countries have already announced they will phase out all purchases of Iranian oil by July 1st. However, at this point it really doesn't matter. Without barring countries from dealing with Iran's Central Bank the oil sanctions are almost meaningless.

Let me explain to you why. Oil is fungible, and as we saw with the UN's Oil for Food scandal involving Saddam Hussein and Iraq, it's easily transferable, can easily be moved through other hands to disguise its origin and can be swapped via third parties for other items. The US could even end up buying Iranian oil if it was shipped to say, Venezuela and reflagged. But take away the ability of buyers to pay Iran for it directly by isolating Iran's central bank and it becomes a much more difficult and costly matter.

One of the few effective things President George W. Bush did in the period after 9/11 to fight Islamist terrorism was to identify the banks used to bankroll it and a number of questionable individuals and organizations who held accounts in otherwise legitimate institutions. Aside from freezing all suspect assets here in America and blocking US financial institutions from having any dealings with the suspect accounts and organizations, President Bush successfully got foreign financial institutions to cooperate by ordering US financial institutions not to deal with banks overseas handling accounts for places like the Islamic Cultural Center in Milan, Italy, Al Taqwa Construction in Dubai and the Revival of Islamic Heritage Society(RIHS) in Kuwait, all al-Qaeda and Hamas fronts. Since the world's banking system is wired through New York, most countries complied, which led to something like $79.9 million in terrorist assets being seized.

If President Obama was actually serious about stopping Iran's nuclear weapons program and ending Iran's financing of terrorism, he'd do something similar and make all of Iran's banks including Iran's central bank persona non grata in the world's financial systems using the same tools. Even countries like China and India might decide that forgoing Iranian oil was better than having their ability to perform financial transactions here in America compromised or curtailed.

But then, that was never going to happen with this president. I've become fairly convinced that President Obama isn't particularly exercised about whether Iran goes nuclear or not. He might just take a wag the dog option to pull off a strike on Iran if he's lagging in the polls come October, but failing that, he appears to be fine with it.

Either he's simply clueless and doesn't see the danger, is too preoccupied with his domestic agenda and his re-election bid,or feels that America needs to be taken down a peg. Or perhaps a combination of all three.

More 'Diplomacy ' With Iran As Obama And The EU Team Up To Fend Off An Israeli Strike

After taking a couple of weeks studying yet another proposal from the EU and the Obama Administration to enter talks on Iran's illegal nuclear program, the mullahs decided they had nothing to lose and only time to gain, so they sent an offer to EU foreign policy chief Lady Catherine Ashton, who promptly accepted it.

Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei welcomed the EU and President Obama's support for the new effort.

"This talk is good talk and shows an exit from illusion," AFP reported Khamenei as saying. However, Khamenei also made it plain that Iran was not going to give up it's nuclear program and that the sanctions would not budge him.

"The US president continued saying that he wants to make the Iranian people kneel through sanctions, this part of this speech shows the continuation of illusion in this issue," he said.

Of course, the actual target of this latest offer of diplomacy is Israel, not Iran. For the countries Lady Ashton the main point is that while these negotiations are ongoing, Israel is highly unlikely to make a preemptive strike to take out an Iranian nuclear program that represents an existential threat.

In President Obama's case, the idea is simply to tie Israel hands until after the election. The Israeli newspaper Ma'ariv reported today that President Obama attempted to bribe Israeli PM Netanyahu with a gift of advanced weaponry including the latest in bunker-busting bombs and more tanker refueling planes provided he agreed to pledge not to strike Iran until 2013.

This has advantages for President Obama. It assures him of a 'wag the dog' option to strike Iran himself come October if he's not doing well in the polls, and it ties Israel's hands until it's likely to be too late to do anything. Fortunately, Netanyahu reportedly just reiterated that Israel would retain freedom of action.

The talks themselves are in the 'talks about talks' stage. Following the usual pattern with Iran, they will delay things as much as possible, throwing an inconsequential bone at the West to keep things going. For instance, one thing Iran has apparently agreed to is to allow IAEA inspectors to look at Iran's Parchin military base outside Tehran, where the IAEA and outside observers have long suspected that Iran is developing nuclear weapons.

While talks about talks are going on, the IAEA has noticed a flurry of suspicious activity around Parchin...the Iranians are busily purging the site of anything they don't want the IAEA to see and cleaning up nuclear waste!



Israeli officials have been pretty blunt about their their skepticism over this latest diplomatic circus. Shabtai Shavit, a former director of the Mossad, was quoted as saying yesterday in an interview with Israel Radio:

In the past, every time the Iranians agreed to talk, the reason for their agreeing was in order to buy time in order to advance the development of their nuclear program. They didn’t invent this ruse, they learned it from the North Koreans.

And PM Benyamin Netanyahu, being interviewed on FOX essentially echoed these comments, albeit in far more diplomatic fashion:



It's the height of naïvete to the Iranians have anything else in mind besides stalling as long as possible to get closer to an operable nuclear weapon.

There's something absolutely creepy as well in the West's willingness to go along with the charade, especially with Israel, who has the most to lose directly closed out of the loop.It recalls the 1938 Munich Agreement on the edge of WWII, when the Czechs were locked out of the room and forbidden to participate while Czechoslovakia's western 'allies' and the Nazis negotiated on the fate of their small country.

However, there is a bright spot amidst all this.

This new round of talks is going to show exactly how futile the 'window of diplomacy' really is. The threats of an oil embargo and tighter sanctions have already been put on the table, and when the Iranians play the West for fools again, as they almost certainly will, there is a lot less leeway than there was before, simply because Israel is not Czechoslovakia nor is it willing to be, and there is a limit to how long the Israelis will allow the usual dance to continue. This time, when things get bogged down, it's going to be game over and the failure will show that those of us who said sactions and diplomacy were useless in this case were right all along. Any further delays will be seen as simply an excuse to avoid confronting the Iranian threat.

When the Iranians return to the old pattern - stalling its Western dupes for a few more months and then using another gambit to keep things going just when it appears the talks have fallen apart - they may surprised to find that the Israelis are likely to jump on the next failure of diplomacy to justify a preemptive strike. And given President Obama's rhetoric about not allowing a nuclear Iran, there's not going to be much he can say, especially with an election going on.

Iran invented the game of chess. But this time, they may very well have opened up an avenue for themselves to be checkmated once and for all.

More 'Diplomacy ' With Iran As Obama And The EU Team Up To Fend Off An Israeli Strike

After taking a couple of weeks studying yet another proposal from the EU and the Obama Administration to enter talks on Iran's illegal nuclear program, the mullahs decided they had nothing to lose and only time to gain, so they sent an offer to EU foreign policy chief Lady Catherine Ashton, who promptly accepted it.

Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei welcomed the EU and President Obama's support for the new effort.

"This talk is good talk and shows an exit from illusion," AFP reported Khamenei as saying. However, Khamenei also made it plain that Iran was not going to give up it's nuclear program and that the sanctions would not budge him.

"The US president continued saying that he wants to make the Iranian people kneel through sanctions, this part of this speech shows the continuation of illusion in this issue," he said.

Of course, the actual target of this latest offer of diplomacy is Israel, not Iran. For the countries Lady Ashton the main point is that while these negotiations are ongoing, Israel is highly unlikely to make a preemptive strike to take out an Iranian nuclear program that represents an existential threat.

In President Obama's case, the idea is simply to tie Israel hands until after the election. The Israeli newspaper Ma'ariv reported today that President Obama attempted to bribe Israeli PM Netanyahu with a gift of advanced weaponry including the latest in bunker-busting bombs and more tanker refueling planes provided he agreed to pledge not to strike Iran until 2013.

This has advantages for President Obama. It assures him of a 'wag the dog' option to strike Iran himself come October if he's not doing well in the polls, and it ties Israel's hands until it's likely to be too late to do anything. Fortunately, Netanyahu reportedly just reiterated that Israel would retain freedom of action.

The talks themselves are in the 'talks about talks' stage. Following the usual pattern with Iran, they will delay things as much as possible, throwing an inconsequential bone at the West to keep things going. For instance, one thing Iran has apparently agreed to is to allow IAEA inspectors to look at Iran's Parchin military base outside Tehran, where the IAEA and outside observers have long suspected that Iran is developing nuclear weapons.

While talks about talks are going on, the IAEA has noticed a flurry of suspicious activity around Parchin...the Iranians are busily purging the site of anything they don't want the IAEA to see and cleaning up nuclear waste!



Israeli officials have been pretty blunt about their their skepticism over this latest diplomatic circus. Shabtai Shavit, a former director of the Mossad, was quoted as saying yesterday in an interview with Israel Radio:

In the past, every time the Iranians agreed to talk, the reason for their agreeing was in order to buy time in order to advance the development of their nuclear program. They didn’t invent this ruse, they learned it from the North Koreans.

And PM Benyamin Netanyahu, being interviewed on FOX essentially echoed these comments, albeit in far more diplomatic fashion:



It's the height of naïvete to the Iranians have anything else in mind besides stalling as long as possible to get closer to an operable nuclear weapon.

There's something absolutely creepy as well in the West's willingness to go along with the charade, especially with Israel, who has the most to lose directly closed out of the loop.It recalls the 1938 Munich Agreement on the edge of WWII, when the Czechs were locked out of the room and forbidden to participate while Czechoslovakia's western 'allies' and the Nazis negotiated on the fate of their small country.

However, there is a bright spot amidst all this.

This new round of talks is going to show exactly how futile the 'window of diplomacy' really is. The threats of an oil embargo and tighter sanctions have already been put on the table, and when the Iranians play the West for fools again, as they almost certainly will, there is a lot less leeway than there was before, simply because Israel is not Czechoslovakia nor is it willing to be, and there is a limit to how long the Israelis will allow the usual dance to continue. This time, when things get bogged down, it's going to be game over and the failure will show that those of us who said sactions and diplomacy were useless in this case were right all along. Any further delays will be seen as simply an excuse to avoid confronting the Iranian threat.

When the Iranians return to the old pattern - stalling its Western dupes for a few more months and then using another gambit to keep things going just when it appears the talks have fallen apart - they may surprised to find that the Israelis are likely to jump on the next failure of diplomacy to justify a preemptive strike. And given President Obama's rhetoric about not allowing a nuclear Iran, there's not going to be much he can say, especially with an election going on.

Iran invented the game of chess. But this time, they may very well have opened up an avenue for themselves to be checkmated once and for all.

In Honor Of Purim, A Modern IDF Magillah Reading...

For the non-initiated, during tonight's reading in synagogues of the Megillah, the Book of Esther, it's customary for member of the tribe to boo, make noise and shake noisemakers whenever the evil Persian tyrant Haman's name is mentioned...

Purim Sameach!

(Hat tip to Asher, the resident cartoonist at the Jewish Press)

In Honor Of Purim, A Modern IDF Magillah Reading...

For the non-initiated, during tonight's reading in synagogues of the Megillah, the Book of Esther, it's customary for member of the tribe to boo, make noise and shake noisemakers whenever the evil Persian tyrant Haman's name is mentioned...

Purim Sameach!

(Hat tip to Asher, the resident cartoonist at the Jewish Press)

A Scenario On What Israelis Could Expect An After Iran strike - And Why It's Dangerously Wrong

Today in YNET, Yair Lapid has an op-ed (todah, Snoopy at Simply Jews) that presents an interesting look on what Israel might expect after an Iran strike:

“Let’s assume we bomb in Iran,” the senior source told me. “What do you think will happen the next day?

I repeated what everyone else has been saying: We can expect blood, fire and smoke; hundreds of missiles will be fired at Israel.

“That’s not the real scenario,” he said. “The problem is not that they would fire 300 missiles at us in two days, but rather, that they would do the opposite – fire only five or six missiles each month, but keep doing it for two years.”

And what would happen then? I asked.

“Israel’s airspace would be closed down,” the senior source said. “Airplanes will not be taking off, ships carrying goods will not be arriving at Israel’s ports, life here would grind to a halt, and our economy would be paralyzed.”

A few problem with Lapid's scenario.

One,if nothing is done, if Israel does nothing, the missiles are eventually going to come anyway, and they're going to be nuclear and chemical weapons. Unlike what our 'intelligence chief' James Clapper says, all the evidence shows that assuming the Iranians are rational actors is extremely foolish.

Two, if the IDF hits the oil fields and oil infrastructure ( as I described in my article last week), the Iranians are going to be far too occupied with their internal problems to waste much time and money trying to hit Israel...assuming they still even have the capacity after the raid.They're far more likely to try and attack US, Saudi and UAE targets and shut down the Persian Gulf, in which case I trust the US Navy to make them very sorry they did.

Three, the chief danger to Israel is from Hezbollah and Hamas and 'soft' Jewish targets overseas. I spelled out in last week's submission why there's a decent chance that in terms of missiles Hamas and Hezbollah's response will be mainly confined to rhetoric, especially when it comes to Hamas. If there is such a response, the Israelis need todeal with it ruthlessly, even to the point of tactical nukes - especially since they're going to be labeled as Nazis and warmongers by the usual suspects anyway. Old American proverb: "I'd rather be judged by 12 than carried by 6."

Four, as you may have noticed,when dealing with the Muslim mindset, it's frequently a case of at your feet or at your throat. A strong, decisive Israeli response against Iran would do much to dissuade others from repeating the Mullah's error and could even be a major deterrent to illegal proliferation and an impetus for peace.

Five, if Iran actually does launch missiles at Israel, again a full on, disproportionate response would certainly make Iran or other bad actors in the region think twice about doing it again. Since neither Israel or any other country would be able to exist under the conditions Lapid describes, such a response would not only be imperative but entirely justified.

Make no mistake, Israel and the West are going to reap a certain amount of cost for allowing Iran to develop its rogue nuclear program and terrorist proxies as much as it has. But the cost is going to be infinitely greater the longer it's delayed...especially for Israel.

"If you will not fight for the right when you can easily win without bloodshed, if you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not too costly, you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a small chance of survival. There may even be a worse case: you may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than to live as slaves."

- Sir Winston Churchill, 1938

A Scenario On What Israelis Could Expect An After Iran strike - And Why It's Dangerously Wrong

Today in YNET, Yair Lapid has an op-ed (todah, Snoopy at Simply Jews) that presents an interesting look on what Israel might expect after an Iran strike:

“Let’s assume we bomb in Iran,” the senior source told me. “What do you think will happen the next day?

I repeated what everyone else has been saying: We can expect blood, fire and smoke; hundreds of missiles will be fired at Israel.

“That’s not the real scenario,” he said. “The problem is not that they would fire 300 missiles at us in two days, but rather, that they would do the opposite – fire only five or six missiles each month, but keep doing it for two years.”

And what would happen then? I asked.

“Israel’s airspace would be closed down,” the senior source said. “Airplanes will not be taking off, ships carrying goods will not be arriving at Israel’s ports, life here would grind to a halt, and our economy would be paralyzed.”

A few problem with Lapid's scenario.

One,if nothing is done, if Israel does nothing, the missiles are eventually going to come anyway, and they're going to be nuclear and chemical weapons. Unlike what our 'intelligence chief' James Clapper says, all the evidence shows that assuming the Iranians are rational actors is extremely foolish.

Two, if the IDF hits the oil fields and oil infrastructure ( as I described in my article last week), the Iranians are going to be far too occupied with their internal problems to waste much time and money trying to hit Israel...assuming they still even have the capacity after the raid.They're far more likely to try and attack US, Saudi and UAE targets and shut down the Persian Gulf, in which case I trust the US Navy to make them very sorry they did.

Three, the chief danger to Israel is from Hezbollah and Hamas and 'soft' Jewish targets overseas. I spelled out in last week's submission why there's a decent chance that in terms of missiles Hamas and Hezbollah's response will be mainly confined to rhetoric, especially when it comes to Hamas. If there is such a response, the Israelis need todeal with it ruthlessly, even to the point of tactical nukes - especially since they're going to be labeled as Nazis and warmongers by the usual suspects anyway. Old American proverb: "I'd rather be judged by 12 than carried by 6."

Four, as you may have noticed,when dealing with the Muslim mindset, it's frequently a case of at your feet or at your throat. A strong, decisive Israeli response against Iran would do much to dissuade others from repeating the Mullah's error and could even be a major deterrent to illegal proliferation and an impetus for peace.

Five, if Iran actually does launch missiles at Israel, again a full on, disproportionate response would certainly make Iran or other bad actors in the region think twice about doing it again. Since neither Israel or any other country would be able to exist under the conditions Lapid describes, such a response would not only be imperative but entirely justified.

Make no mistake, Israel and the West are going to reap a certain amount of cost for allowing Iran to develop its rogue nuclear program and terrorist proxies as much as it has. But the cost is going to be infinitely greater the longer it's delayed...especially for Israel.

"If you will not fight for the right when you can easily win without bloodshed, if you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not too costly, you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a small chance of survival. There may even be a worse case: you may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than to live as slaves."

- Sir Winston Churchill, 1938

Israel And Iran - Dancing With Armageddon

In the past few days, there have been major high level efforts by the Obama Administration and the British government to talk Israel out of pre-emptive strike on Iran's rogue nuclear facilities.

President Obama's National Security Adviser Tom Donilon failed in three days of talks with Israeli PM Netanyahu, Israeli Defense Minister Barak Ehud and IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Benny Gantz to convince them to give sanctions and negotiations more time to work.

British Foreign Secretary William Hague delivered the same message to Israel. In a BBC interview, he said Britain was focusing on pressuring Iran through diplomatic means.

"I don't think a wise thing at this moment is for Israel to launch a military attack on Iran," he said. "I think Israel like everyone else in the world should be giving a real chance to the approach we have adopted on very serious economic sanctions and economic pressure and the readiness to negotiate with Iran."

The back story is very different.

The Israelis are livid over what they see as President Obama's betrayal in starting - again- to engage with Iran in back channel diplomacy in exchange for the U.S. and the EU postponing sanctions until July, with the likelihood of further postponements in exchange for more talks. The Israelis had already agreed to hold off to give sanctions time to work, only to find out later that President Obama was using the waiver Congress gave him in the sanctions legislation to postpone any meaningful action.

This movie has played out many times before in the over 7 years or so the West has known about Iran's nuclear program, with 'talks' spinning into months while the regime simply buys time. The Iranians have no intention of seriously being diverted from making nuclear weapons, because they know that's where the regime's ultimate security lies. They've taken note of how differently President Obama has reacted to Kim Il Sung North Korea and Moamar Khaddaffi in Libya.

The new proposal the Iranians are now taking their time to study allows them to continue enriching uranium to 5% in any quantity, provided they promise not to build an Iranian nuclear weapon.

While they're studying the matter, the mullahs are upgrading and greatly expanding the number of centrifuges at Iran's Fordo underground facility near the city of Qom to allow them to to convert their 5% uranium to weapons grade uranium in a matter of days.

This was the backdrop behind PM Netanyahu's remarks in Cyprus on February 15, where he blasted both Iran and by extension, the Obama Administration, saying that sanctions “haven’t worked” and that a regime which attacks diplomats having nuclear weapons “is something of enormous concern for the United States and for Israel.”

According to what I'm hearing from several sources, the discussions with Donilon were fairly strained. The Israelis see this new back channel proposal to Iran from the Obama Administration as a clear violation of guarantees made to Israel regarding Iran and sanctions, especially since it allows Iran to continue nuclear enrichment as well as the hardening and dispersal of its nuclear facilities. Once the talks are underway, the Israelis understand that they can again be spun out for months, and that there would be no way of stopping Iran's progress towards weaponization during the negotiations until it was too late for Israel to do anything about what they correctly regard as an existential threat.

Netanyahu is headed for the United States to meet with President Obama on March 5th to discuss the matter further.Given that it's election time in America, Netanyahu isn't going to be deliberately insulted like he was the first time he came here, but I doubt Netanyahu has any illusions about President Obama's feelings about him and about Israel. Aside from trashing previous agreements with Israel, demanding they retreat to indefensible borders, telling them they have no right to their religious shrines , threatening an aid cutoff, and instituting what amounted to a de facto arms embargo during the early part of President Obama's term, they've watched as the Obama Administration has actively encouraged and enabled the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and Libya.

While both men will attempt to keep things civil, especially when the cameras are on them, the meeting is not likely to be an amicable one.

Netanyahu has absolutely no reason to trust anything President Obama says, and he has that in common with many of our allies, who have their own reasons to regard this president as weak and unreliable.

Could the Israelis pull off a strike? As I've discussed on this site several times, there no doubt that they could. And the damage to Iran's nuclear capabilities would likely be far more than merely putting things off for a couple of years if it's done properly.



The obstacles frequently cited are the sheer distance involved, the amount of planes needed, the need for mid-air refueling, the tough Iranian air defenses and the danger of retaliatory strikes from Iran and from Iran's proxies Hezbollah and Hamas.

A couple of years ago I analyzed what an Israeli strike on Iran might look like, and it was interesting to see an echo of some of that thinking recently from Hans Rühle, a leading German security expert who was head of the planning department of the German Defense Ministry between 1982-1988.

In an article in Die Welt, Rühle stated that in his opinion, a well planned Israeli attack could significantly set back Iran’s nuclear weapons program by perhaps a decade or more.

I personally see that as a bit optimistic, but at least five years is a certainty and a much longer time is certainly possible depending on what gets hit.

Rühle and I agree that rather than a huge air armada of over a hundred planes, the Israelis would use smaller groups of 25 or 30 planes, each armed with two GBU-28 bunker busters. I think the Israelis would likely proceed a strike with a cyber attack to blind and confuse Iran's radar and missile defenses as they did in Syria. Even though the Syrians had something Iran doesn't, the advanced Russian S - 300 missile defense systems, the Israelis were able to blind and baffle them easily. The Israelis might even possibly mount an EMP attack using a Jericho III missile, which would destroy Iranian communications, computer networks and electronic controls.

The Israelis have one large advantage in an air attack they didn't have before. The most direct route planes would likely take to their targets in Iran is over Saudi Arabia and Iraq. The Iraqis have no air defenses at this time and now that U.S. forces have withdrawn from Iraq, the U.S. has no part in defending Iraq's air space, so the road is wide open.

As for the Saudis, they would have no objections whatsoever to Israel taking out Shi'ite Iran's nuclear program. They've already signaled as much.

Using a smaller number of planes would allow greater flexibility in mid air refueling from Israel's fleet of 9 U.S. made tankers, and also allow attacks to be made in waves against specific targets while other planes refuel. Rühle suspects that the Israelis have configured additional planes as tankers. I know for a fact that Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) is currently working on converting a recently-acquired Boeing 707 for use as a super tanker, with delivery scheduled to the IDF by mid year. Never underestimate the Israeli genius for improvisation.

Nor is Israel's arsenal limited to F-15's and F-16's armed with bunker busters. The Israelis have state-of -the art drones available like the jumbo jet sized Eitan, which can carry a one ton payload and fly for 48 straight hours, their fleet of nuclear-capable Dolphin subs, each capable of firing Jericho II and III missiles with great precision and their land based Jericho III's with a range capable of reaching Iranian targets.

Rühle sees the primary nuclear targets as the nuclear plant at Natanz, the conversion facility in Isfahan, the heavy water reactor at Arak and the major weapons and munitions sites in Parchin. In addition, he notes the deep underground enrichment facility at Fordow near Qom and Iran’s nuclear plant at Bushehr, on the Persian Gulf:

Rühle writes that surveillance “information about Natanz is solid,“ adding that the “project has been observed from satellites and from the location from 'Israeli tourists.'”

He added that Israel strongest bunker buster bombs GBU-28 could destroy the roof of the facility. If the damage is not sufficient, a second GBU-28 could be launched to complete the aim of destruction.

According to Rühle, Israel’s successful obliteration of the Syrian nuclear reactor in 2007 laid an important precedent. He writes that “many experts believe “ that strikes against Iran’s nuclear operations could set back the program 10 years, or possibly longer, based on present knowledge.

The fighter plane requirement would entail 20 F-15 machines each accompanied with two GBU-28s. He estimates that Israel’s air force has over 87 F-15 planes at its disposal. The conversion Nuclear Technology Center of Isfahan, which is largely vulnerable to attack because its buildings are not underground, could be eliminated with GBU-27 bombs. Isfahan converts the yellow cake process into uranium.

The least difficult challenge for Israel’s air force is the heavy-water reactor Arak, observes Rühle. The above-ground facility could be razed with 10 GBU-10 bombs, wrote Rühle. The strike would require 10 F- 16 fighter jets.

According to Rühle, the most difficult obstacle to destroy is the underground Fordow enrichment plant. He notes that special team forces would have to attack the facility.

The alternative would be to strike the tunnel openings with GBU-28 bombs to plug the entry points for a period of time.

The complex Parchin site remains beyond the International Atomic Energy Agency inspections and it is unclear how many bombs it would take to destroy the over 100 buildings, many of which are buried underground. Nuclear warheads are believed to be worked on in the Parchin plant.

Most people I've talked to in a position to know these things agree with Rühle's analysis of the targets involved. I would also add that the use of tactical nukes would make sites like Parchin and Fordow uninhabitable,let alone unusable for quite some time. And a strike on Iran's refineries and oil infrastructure along the Persian Gulf and especially at the oil terminus at Kharg Island would insure a long period of freedom from an Iranian threat because it would eliminate Iran's abilities to finance these sort of toys for many years, and perhaps even involve regime change as Iran's economy goes into free fall. Call it the ultimate 'sanction' if you like.

Would Iran retaliate? Certainly they would. But there's a better than even chance their retaliation would be limited to targets in the Gulf. As I've discussed previously, Hezbollah and Hamas have their own compelling reasons why they might choose not to attack Israel at this time on Iran's orders. Hezbollah in particular might choose to hold its fire so as not to bring on itself the sort of loss of political capital it experienced in Lebanon after the last war from an Israeli retaliation. In 2006, the Israelis largely held off from hitting Lebanese targets in areas not controlled by Hezbollah, but now that Hezbollah is a controlling element in Lebanon those restrictions aren't going to apply in the future, as the Israeli government has already made quite plain. Hamas might also not want to endanger its Gaza fiefdom for Iran, especially since relations between Hamas and Iran aren't what they once were since Hamas decided not to send fighters to Syria to back Assad against their fellow Sunnis.

The chief area of Iranian retaliation would likely be attempts to destroy shipping and close off the Persian Gulf.The U.S. has already made it quite clear that any attempt by Iran to do so with be a red line and bring America's Navy into the picture, with fairly drastic results for Iran.

Iran does have Shahab missiles capable of hitting Israeli territory with conventional warheads, but there are doubts about whether their expertise in targeting these missiles is sufficient to do major damage to Israel. In any event, there's sufficient reason for Israel not to wait until Iran's technology improves. Whatever the cost now, it would be infinitely greater with an Iranian regime armed with nuclear weapons.

What Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu will likely relay to the president when they meet early next is a message that if the U.S. doesn't do something to curtail Iran's ongoing nuclear weapons program, Israel will.

There's no doubt in my mind they have the capability of doing so.

Israel And Iran - Dancing With Armageddon

In the past few days, there have been major high level efforts by the Obama Administration and the British government to talk Israel out of pre-emptive strike on Iran's rogue nuclear facilities.

President Obama's National Security Adviser Tom Donilon failed in three days of talks with Israeli PM Netanyahu, Israeli Defense Minister Barak Ehud and IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Benny Gantz to convince them to give sanctions and negotiations more time to work.

British Foreign Secretary William Hague delivered the same message to Israel. In a BBC interview, he said Britain was focusing on pressuring Iran through diplomatic means.

"I don't think a wise thing at this moment is for Israel to launch a military attack on Iran," he said. "I think Israel like everyone else in the world should be giving a real chance to the approach we have adopted on very serious economic sanctions and economic pressure and the readiness to negotiate with Iran."

The back story is very different.

The Israelis are livid over what they see as President Obama's betrayal in starting - again- to engage with Iran in back channel diplomacy in exchange for the U.S. and the EU postponing sanctions until July, with the likelihood of further postponements in exchange for more talks. The Israelis had already agreed to hold off to give sanctions time to work, only to find out later that President Obama was using the waiver Congress gave him in the sanctions legislation to postpone any meaningful action.

This movie has played out many times before in the over 7 years or so the West has known about Iran's nuclear program, with 'talks' spinning into months while the regime simply buys time. The Iranians have no intention of seriously being diverted from making nuclear weapons, because they know that's where the regime's ultimate security lies. They've taken note of how differently President Obama has reacted to Kim Il Sung North Korea and Moamar Khaddaffi in Libya.

The new proposal the Iranians are now taking their time to study allows them to continue enriching uranium to 5% in any quantity, provided they promise not to build an Iranian nuclear weapon.

While they're studying the matter, the mullahs are upgrading and greatly expanding the number of centrifuges at Iran's Fordo underground facility near the city of Qom to allow them to to convert their 5% uranium to weapons grade uranium in a matter of days.

This was the backdrop behind PM Netanyahu's remarks in Cyprus on February 15, where he blasted both Iran and by extension, the Obama Administration, saying that sanctions “haven’t worked” and that a regime which attacks diplomats having nuclear weapons “is something of enormous concern for the United States and for Israel.”

According to what I'm hearing from several sources, the discussions with Donilon were fairly strained. The Israelis see this new back channel proposal to Iran from the Obama Administration as a clear violation of guarantees made to Israel regarding Iran and sanctions, especially since it allows Iran to continue nuclear enrichment as well as the hardening and dispersal of its nuclear facilities. Once the talks are underway, the Israelis understand that they can again be spun out for months, and that there would be no way of stopping Iran's progress towards weaponization during the negotiations until it was too late for Israel to do anything about what they correctly regard as an existential threat.

Netanyahu is headed for the United States to meet with President Obama on March 5th to discuss the matter further.Given that it's election time in America, Netanyahu isn't going to be deliberately insulted like he was the first time he came here, but I doubt Netanyahu has any illusions about President Obama's feelings about him and about Israel. Aside from trashing previous agreements with Israel, demanding they retreat to indefensible borders, telling them they have no right to their religious shrines , threatening an aid cutoff, and instituting what amounted to a de facto arms embargo during the early part of President Obama's term, they've watched as the Obama Administration has actively encouraged and enabled the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and Libya.

While both men will attempt to keep things civil, especially when the cameras are on them, the meeting is not likely to be an amicable one.

Netanyahu has absolutely no reason to trust anything President Obama says, and he has that in common with many of our allies, who have their own reasons to regard this president as weak and unreliable.

Could the Israelis pull off a strike? As I've discussed on this site several times, there no doubt that they could. And the damage to Iran's nuclear capabilities would likely be far more than merely putting things off for a couple of years if it's done properly.



The obstacles frequently cited are the sheer distance involved, the amount of planes needed, the need for mid-air refueling, the tough Iranian air defenses and the danger of retaliatory strikes from Iran and from Iran's proxies Hezbollah and Hamas.

A couple of years ago I analyzed what an Israeli strike on Iran might look like, and it was interesting to see an echo of some of that thinking recently from Hans Rühle, a leading German security expert who was head of the planning department of the German Defense Ministry between 1982-1988.

In an article in Die Welt, Rühle stated that in his opinion, a well planned Israeli attack could significantly set back Iran’s nuclear weapons program by perhaps a decade or more.

I personally see that as a bit optimistic, but at least five years is a certainty and a much longer time is certainly possible depending on what gets hit.

Rühle and I agree that rather than a huge air armada of over a hundred planes, the Israelis would use smaller groups of 25 or 30 planes, each armed with two GBU-28 bunker busters. I think the Israelis would likely proceed a strike with a cyber attack to blind and confuse Iran's radar and missile defenses as they did in Syria. Even though the Syrians had something Iran doesn't, the advanced Russian S - 300 missile defense systems, the Israelis were able to blind and baffle them easily. The Israelis might even possibly mount an EMP attack using a Jericho III missile, which would destroy Iranian communications, computer networks and electronic controls.

The Israelis have one large advantage in an air attack they didn't have before. The most direct route planes would likely take to their targets in Iran is over Saudi Arabia and Iraq. The Iraqis have no air defenses at this time and now that U.S. forces have withdrawn from Iraq, the U.S. has no part in defending Iraq's air space, so the road is wide open.

As for the Saudis, they would have no objections whatsoever to Israel taking out Shi'ite Iran's nuclear program. They've already signaled as much.

Using a smaller number of planes would allow greater flexibility in mid air refueling from Israel's fleet of 9 U.S. made tankers, and also allow attacks to be made in waves against specific targets while other planes refuel. Rühle suspects that the Israelis have configured additional planes as tankers. I know for a fact that Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) is currently working on converting a recently-acquired Boeing 707 for use as a super tanker, with delivery scheduled to the IDF by mid year. Never underestimate the Israeli genius for improvisation.

Nor is Israel's arsenal limited to F-15's and F-16's armed with bunker busters. The Israelis have state-of -the art drones available like the jumbo jet sized Eitan, which can carry a one ton payload and fly for 48 straight hours, their fleet of nuclear-capable Dolphin subs, each capable of firing Jericho II and III missiles with great precision and their land based Jericho III's with a range capable of reaching Iranian targets.

Rühle sees the primary nuclear targets as the nuclear plant at Natanz, the conversion facility in Isfahan, the heavy water reactor at Arak and the major weapons and munitions sites in Parchin. In addition, he notes the deep underground enrichment facility at Fordow near Qom and Iran’s nuclear plant at Bushehr, on the Persian Gulf:

Rühle writes that surveillance “information about Natanz is solid,“ adding that the “project has been observed from satellites and from the location from 'Israeli tourists.'”

He added that Israel strongest bunker buster bombs GBU-28 could destroy the roof of the facility. If the damage is not sufficient, a second GBU-28 could be launched to complete the aim of destruction.

According to Rühle, Israel’s successful obliteration of the Syrian nuclear reactor in 2007 laid an important precedent. He writes that “many experts believe “ that strikes against Iran’s nuclear operations could set back the program 10 years, or possibly longer, based on present knowledge.

The fighter plane requirement would entail 20 F-15 machines each accompanied with two GBU-28s. He estimates that Israel’s air force has over 87 F-15 planes at its disposal. The conversion Nuclear Technology Center of Isfahan, which is largely vulnerable to attack because its buildings are not underground, could be eliminated with GBU-27 bombs. Isfahan converts the yellow cake process into uranium.

The least difficult challenge for Israel’s air force is the heavy-water reactor Arak, observes Rühle. The above-ground facility could be razed with 10 GBU-10 bombs, wrote Rühle. The strike would require 10 F- 16 fighter jets.

According to Rühle, the most difficult obstacle to destroy is the underground Fordow enrichment plant. He notes that special team forces would have to attack the facility.

The alternative would be to strike the tunnel openings with GBU-28 bombs to plug the entry points for a period of time.

The complex Parchin site remains beyond the International Atomic Energy Agency inspections and it is unclear how many bombs it would take to destroy the over 100 buildings, many of which are buried underground. Nuclear warheads are believed to be worked on in the Parchin plant.

Most people I've talked to in a position to know these things agree with Rühle's analysis of the targets involved. I would also add that the use of tactical nukes would make sites like Parchin and Fordow uninhabitable,let alone unusable for quite some time. And a strike on Iran's refineries and oil infrastructure along the Persian Gulf and especially at the oil terminus at Kharg Island would insure a long period of freedom from an Iranian threat because it would eliminate Iran's abilities to finance these sort of toys for many years, and perhaps even involve regime change as Iran's economy goes into free fall. Call it the ultimate 'sanction' if you like.

Would Iran retaliate? Certainly they would. But there's a better than even chance their retaliation would be limited to targets in the Gulf. As I've discussed previously, Hezbollah and Hamas have their own compelling reasons why they might choose not to attack Israel at this time on Iran's orders. Hezbollah in particular might choose to hold its fire so as not to bring on itself the sort of loss of political capital it experienced in Lebanon after the last war from an Israeli retaliation. In 2006, the Israelis largely held off from hitting Lebanese targets in areas not controlled by Hezbollah, but now that Hezbollah is a controlling element in Lebanon those restrictions aren't going to apply in the future, as the Israeli government has already made quite plain. Hamas might also not want to endanger its Gaza fiefdom for Iran, especially since relations between Hamas and Iran aren't what they once were since Hamas decided not to send fighters to Syria to back Assad against their fellow Sunnis.

The chief area of Iranian retaliation would likely be attempts to destroy shipping and close off the Persian Gulf.The U.S. has already made it quite clear that any attempt by Iran to do so with be a red line and bring America's Navy into the picture, with fairly drastic results for Iran.

Iran does have Shahab missiles capable of hitting Israeli territory with conventional warheads, but there are doubts about whether their expertise in targeting these missiles is sufficient to do major damage to Israel. In any event, there's sufficient reason for Israel not to wait until Iran's technology improves. Whatever the cost now, it would be infinitely greater with an Iranian regime armed with nuclear weapons.

What Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu will likely relay to the president when they meet early next is a message that if the U.S. doesn't do something to curtail Iran's ongoing nuclear weapons program, Israel will.

There's no doubt in my mind they have the capability of doing so.

Dancing With Armegeddon

In the past few days, there have been major high level efforts by the Obama Administration and the British government to talk Israel out of pre-emptive strike on Iran's rogue nuclear facilities.

President Obama's National Security Adviser Tom Donilon failed in three days of talks with Israeli PM Netanyahu, Israeli Defense Minister Barak Ehud and IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Benny Gantz to convince them to give sanctions and negotiations more time to work.

British Foreign Secretary William Hague delivered the same message to Israel. In a BBC interview, he said Britain was focusing on pressuring Iran through diplomatic means.

"I don't think a wise thing at this moment is for Israel to launch a military attack on Iran," he said. "I think Israel like everyone else in the world should be giving a real chance to the approach we have adopted on very serious economic sanctions and economic pressure and the readiness to negotiate with Iran."

The back story is very different.

The Israelis are livid over what they see as President Obama's betrayal in starting - again- to engage with Iran in back channel diplomacy in exchange for the U.S. and the EU postponing sanctions until July, with the likelihood of further postponements in exchange for more talks. The Israelis had already agreed to hold off to give sanctions time to work, only to find out later that President Obama was using the waiver Congress gave him in the sanctions legislation to postpone any meaningful action.

This movie has played out many times before in the over 7 years or so the West has known about Iran's nuclear program, with 'talks' spinning into months while the regime simply buys time. The Iranians have no intention of seriously being diverted from making nuclear weapons, because they know that's where the regime's ultimate security lies. They've taken note of how differently President Obama has reacted to Kim Il Sung North Korea and Moamar Khaddaffi in Libya.

The new proposal the Iranians are now taking their time to study allows them to continue enriching uranium to 5% in any quantity, provided they promise not to build an Iranian nuclear weapon.

While they're studying the matter, the mullahs are upgrading and greatly expanding the number of centrifuges at Iran's Fordo underground facility near the city of Qom to allow them to to convert their 5% uranium to weapons grade uranium in a matter of days.

This was the backdrop behind PM Netanyahu's remarks in Cyprus on February 15, where he blasted both Iran and by extension, the Obama Administration, saying that sanctions “haven’t worked” and that a regime which attacks diplomats having nuclear weapons “is something of enormous concern for the United States and for Israel.”

According to what I'm hearing from several sources, the discussions with Donilon were fairly strained. The Israelis see this new back channel proposal to Iran from the Obama Administration as a clear violation of guarantees made to Israel regarding Iran and sanctions, especially since it allows Iran to continue nuclear enrichment as well as the hardening and dispersal of its nuclear facilities. Once the talks are underway, the Israelis understand that they can again be spun out for months, and that there would be no way of stopping Iran's progress towards weaponization during the negotiations until it was too late for Israel to do anything about what they correctly regard as an existential threat.

Netanyahu is headed for the United States to meet with President Obama on March 5th to discuss the matter further.Given that it's election time in America, Netanyahu isn't going to be deliberately insulted like he was the first time he came here, but I doubt Netanyahu has any illusions about President Obama's feelings about him and about Israel. Aside from trashing previous agreements with Israel, demanding they retreat to indefensible borders, telling them they have no right to their religious shrines , threatening an aid cutoff, and instituting what amounted to a de facto arms embargo during the early part of President Obama's term, they've watched as the Obama Administration has actively encouraged and enabled the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and Libya.

What Netanyahu will likely relay to the president is a message that if the U.S. doesn't do something to curtail Iran's ongoing nuclear weapons program, Israel will. While both men will attempt to keep things civil, especially when the cameras are on them, the meeting is not likely to be an amicable one.

Netanyahu has absolutely no reason to trust anything President Obama says, and he has that in common with many of our allies, who have their own reasons to regard this president as weak and unreliable.

Could the Israelis pull off a strike? As I've discussed on this site several times, there no doubt that they could. And the damage to Iran's nuclear capabilities would likely be far more than merely putting things off for a couple of years.



The obstacles frequently cited are the sheer distance involved, the amount of planes needed, the need for mid-air refueling, the tough Iranian air defenses and the danger of retaliatory strikes from Iran and from Iran's proxies Hezbollah and Hamas.

A couple of years ago I analyzed what an Israeli strike on Iran might look like, and it was interesting to see an echo of some of that thinking recently from Hans Rühle, a leading German security expert who was head of the planning department of the German Defense Ministry between 1982-1988.

In an article in Die Welt, Rühle stated that in his opinion, a well planned Israeli attack could significantly set back Iran’s nuclear weapons program by perhaps a decade or more.

I personally see that as a bit optimistic, but at least five years is a certainty and a longer time is certainly possible depending on what gets hit.

Rühle and I agree that rather than a huge air armada of over a hundred planes, the Israelis would use smaller groups of 25 or 30 planes, each armed with two GBU-28 bunker busters. I think the Israelis would likely proceed a strike with a cyber attack to blind and confuse Iran's radar and missile defenses as they did in Syria. Even though the Syrians had something Iran doesn't, the advanced Russian S - 300 missile defense systems, the Israelis were able to blind and baffle them easily. The Israelis might even possibly mount an EMP attack which would destroy Iranian communications, computer networks and electronic controls, using a Jericho III missile.

The Israelis have one large advantage in an air attack they didn't have before. The most direct route planes would likely take to their targets in Iran is over Saudi Arabia and Iraq. The Iraqis have no air defenses at this time and now that U.S. forces have withdrawn from Iraq, the U.S. has no part in defending Iraq's air space, so the road is wide open.

Using a smaller number of planes would allow greater flexibility in mid air refueling from Israel's fleet of 9 U.S. made tankers, and also allow attacks to be made in waves against specific targets while other planes refuel. Rühle suspects that the Israelis have configured additional planes as tankers. I know for a fact that Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) is currently working on converting a recently-acquired Boeing 707 for use as a super tanker, with delivery scheduled to the IDF by mid year. Never underestimate the Israeli genius for improvisation.

Nor is Israel's arsenal limited to F-15's and F-16's armed with bunker busters. The Israelis have state-of -the art drones available like the jumbo jet sized Eitan, which can carry a one ton payload and fly for 48 straight hours, their fleet of nuclear-capable Dolphin subs, each capable of firing Jericho II and III missiles with great precision and their land based Jericho III's with a range capable of reaching Iranian targets.

Rühle sees the primary nuclear targets as the nuclear plant at Natanz, the conversion facility in Isfahan, the heavy water reactor at Arak and the major weapons and munitions sites in Parchin. In addition, he notes the deep underground enrichment facility at Fordow near Qom and Iran’s nuclear plant at Bushehr, on the Persian Gulf:

Rühle writes that surveillance “information about Natanz is solid,“ adding that the “project has been observed from satellites and from the location from 'Israeli tourists.'”

He added that Israel strongest bunker buster bombs GBU-28 could destroy the roof of the facility. If the damage is not sufficient, a second GBU-28 could be launched to complete the aim of destruction.

According to Rühle, Israel’s successful obliteration of the Syrian nuclear reactor in 2007 laid an important precedent. He writes that “many experts believe “ that strikes against Iran’s nuclear operations could set back the program 10 years, or possibly longer, based on present knowledge.

The fighter plane requirement would entail 20 F-15 machines each accompanied with two GBU-28s. He estimates that Israel’s air force has over 87 F-15 planes at its disposal. The conversion Nuclear Technology Center of Isfahan, which is largely vulnerable to attack because its buildings are not underground, could be eliminated with GBU-27 bombs. Isfahan converts the yellow cake process into uranium.

The least difficult challenge for Israel’s air force is the heavy-water reactor Arak, observes Rühle. The above-ground facility could be razed with 10 GBU-10 bombs, wrote Rühle. The strike would require 10 F- 16 fighter jets.

According to Rühe, the most difficult obstacle to destroy is the underground Fordow enrichment plant. He notes that special team forces would have to attack the facility.

The alternative would be to strike the tunnel openings with GBU-28 bombs to plug the entry points for a period of time.

The complex Parchin site remains beyond the International Atomic Energy Agency inspections and it is unclear how many bombs it would take to destroy the over 100 buildings, many of which are buried underground. Nuclear warheads are believed to be worked on in the Parchin plant.

Dancing With Armegeddon

In the past few days, there have been major high level efforts by the Obama Administration and the British government to talk Israel out of pre-emptive strike on Iran's rogue nuclear facilities.

President Obama's National Security Adviser Tom Donilon failed in three days of talks with Israeli PM Netanyahu, Israeli Defense Minister Barak Ehud and IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Benny Gantz to convince them to give sanctions and negotiations more time to work.

British Foreign Secretary William Hague delivered the same message to Israel. In a BBC interview, he said Britain was focusing on pressuring Iran through diplomatic means.

"I don't think a wise thing at this moment is for Israel to launch a military attack on Iran," he said. "I think Israel like everyone else in the world should be giving a real chance to the approach we have adopted on very serious economic sanctions and economic pressure and the readiness to negotiate with Iran."

The back story is very different.

The Israelis are livid over what they see as President Obama's betrayal in starting - again- to engage with Iran in back channel diplomacy in exchange for the U.S. and the EU postponing sanctions until July, with the likelihood of further postponements in exchange for more talks. The Israelis had already agreed to hold off to give sanctions time to work, only to find out later that President Obama was using the waiver Congress gave him in the sanctions legislation to postpone any meaningful action.

This movie has played out many times before in the over 7 years or so the West has known about Iran's nuclear program, with 'talks' spinning into months while the regime simply buys time. The Iranians have no intention of seriously being diverted from making nuclear weapons, because they know that's where the regime's ultimate security lies. They've taken note of how differently President Obama has reacted to Kim Il Sung North Korea and Moamar Khaddaffi in Libya.

The new proposal the Iranians are now taking their time to study allows them to continue enriching uranium to 5% in any quantity, provided they promise not to build an Iranian nuclear weapon.

While they're studying the matter, the mullahs are upgrading and greatly expanding the number of centrifuges at Iran's Fordo underground facility near the city of Qom to allow them to to convert their 5% uranium to weapons grade uranium in a matter of days.

This was the backdrop behind PM Netanyahu's remarks in Cyprus on February 15, where he blasted both Iran and by extension, the Obama Administration, saying that sanctions “haven’t worked” and that a regime which attacks diplomats having nuclear weapons “is something of enormous concern for the United States and for Israel.”

According to what I'm hearing from several sources, the discussions with Donilon were fairly strained. The Israelis see this new back channel proposal to Iran from the Obama Administration as a clear violation of guarantees made to Israel regarding Iran and sanctions, especially since it allows Iran to continue nuclear enrichment as well as the hardening and dispersal of its nuclear facilities. Once the talks are underway, the Israelis understand that they can again be spun out for months, and that there would be no way of stopping Iran's progress towards weaponization during the negotiations until it was too late for Israel to do anything about what they correctly regard as an existential threat.

Netanyahu is headed for the United States to meet with President Obama on March 5th to discuss the matter further.Given that it's election time in America, Netanyahu isn't going to be deliberately insulted like he was the first time he came here, but I doubt Netanyahu has any illusions about President Obama's feelings about him and about Israel. Aside from trashing previous agreements with Israel, demanding they retreat to indefensible borders, telling them they have no right to their religious shrines , threatening an aid cutoff, and instituting what amounted to a de facto arms embargo during the early part of President Obama's term, they've watched as the Obama Administration has actively encouraged and enabled the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and Libya.

What Netanyahu will likely relay to the president is a message that if the U.S. doesn't do something to curtail Iran's ongoing nuclear weapons program, Israel will. While both men will attempt to keep things civil, especially when the cameras are on them, the meeting is not likely to be an amicable one.

Netanyahu has absolutely no reason to trust anything President Obama says, and he has that in common with many of our allies, who have their own reasons to regard this president as weak and unreliable.

Could the Israelis pull off a strike? As I've discussed on this site several times, there no doubt that they could. And the damage to Iran's nuclear capabilities would likely be far more than merely putting things off for a couple of years.



The obstacles frequently cited are the sheer distance involved, the amount of planes needed, the need for mid-air refueling, the tough Iranian air defenses and the danger of retaliatory strikes from Iran and from Iran's proxies Hezbollah and Hamas.

A couple of years ago I analyzed what an Israeli strike on Iran might look like, and it was interesting to see an echo of some of that thinking recently from Hans Rühle, a leading German security expert who was head of the planning department of the German Defense Ministry between 1982-1988.

In an article in Die Welt, Rühle stated that in his opinion, a well planned Israeli attack could significantly set back Iran’s nuclear weapons program by perhaps a decade or more.

I personally see that as a bit optimistic, but at least five years is a certainty and a longer time is certainly possible depending on what gets hit.

Rühle and I agree that rather than a huge air armada of over a hundred planes, the Israelis would use smaller groups of 25 or 30 planes, each armed with two GBU-28 bunker busters. I think the Israelis would likely proceed a strike with a cyber attack to blind and confuse Iran's radar and missile defenses as they did in Syria. Even though the Syrians had something Iran doesn't, the advanced Russian S - 300 missile defense systems, the Israelis were able to blind and baffle them easily. The Israelis might even possibly mount an EMP attack which would destroy Iranian communications, computer networks and electronic controls, using a Jericho III missile.

The Israelis have one large advantage in an air attack they didn't have before. The most direct route planes would likely take to their targets in Iran is over Saudi Arabia and Iraq. The Iraqis have no air defenses at this time and now that U.S. forces have withdrawn from Iraq, the U.S. has no part in defending Iraq's air space, so the road is wide open.

Using a smaller number of planes would allow greater flexibility in mid air refueling from Israel's fleet of 9 U.S. made tankers, and also allow attacks to be made in waves against specific targets while other planes refuel. Rühle suspects that the Israelis have configured additional planes as tankers. I know for a fact that Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) is currently working on converting a recently-acquired Boeing 707 for use as a super tanker, with delivery scheduled to the IDF by mid year. Never underestimate the Israeli genius for improvisation.

Nor is Israel's arsenal limited to F-15's and F-16's armed with bunker busters. The Israelis have state-of -the art drones available like the jumbo jet sized Eitan, which can carry a one ton payload and fly for 48 straight hours, their fleet of nuclear-capable Dolphin subs, each capable of firing Jericho II and III missiles with great precision and their land based Jericho III's with a range capable of reaching Iranian targets.

Rühle sees the primary nuclear targets as the nuclear plant at Natanz, the conversion facility in Isfahan, the heavy water reactor at Arak and the major weapons and munitions sites in Parchin. In addition, he notes the deep underground enrichment facility at Fordow near Qom and Iran’s nuclear plant at Bushehr, on the Persian Gulf:

Rühle writes that surveillance “information about Natanz is solid,“ adding that the “project has been observed from satellites and from the location from 'Israeli tourists.'”

He added that Israel strongest bunker buster bombs GBU-28 could destroy the roof of the facility. If the damage is not sufficient, a second GBU-28 could be launched to complete the aim of destruction.

According to Rühle, Israel’s successful obliteration of the Syrian nuclear reactor in 2007 laid an important precedent. He writes that “many experts believe “ that strikes against Iran’s nuclear operations could set back the program 10 years, or possibly longer, based on present knowledge.

The fighter plane requirement would entail 20 F-15 machines each accompanied with two GBU-28s. He estimates that Israel’s air force has over 87 F-15 planes at its disposal. The conversion Nuclear Technology Center of Isfahan, which is largely vulnerable to attack because its buildings are not underground, could be eliminated with GBU-27 bombs. Isfahan converts the yellow cake process into uranium.

The least difficult challenge for Israel’s air force is the heavy-water reactor Arak, observes Rühle. The above-ground facility could be razed with 10 GBU-10 bombs, wrote Rühle. The strike would require 10 F- 16 fighter jets.

According to Rühe, the most difficult obstacle to destroy is the underground Fordow enrichment plant. He notes that special team forces would have to attack the facility.

The alternative would be to strike the tunnel openings with GBU-28 bombs to plug the entry points for a period of time.

The complex Parchin site remains beyond the International Atomic Energy Agency inspections and it is unclear how many bombs it would take to destroy the over 100 buildings, many of which are buried underground. Nuclear warheads are believed to be worked on in the Parchin plant.

Iran Ends Crude Oil Sales To UK And French Companies

The Iranian regime has formally announced that it is cutting off all oil sales to French and British companies.

The ban is in retaliation for EU sanctions on buying Iranian oil, set to go into effect on July 1st of this year.

"Exporting crude to British and French companies has been stopped ... we will sell our oil to new customers," spokesman Alireza Nikzad was quoted as saying by the Ministry of Petroleum website. For 'new customers', read India and China.

The European countries had already cut back their purchases of Iran oil in anticipation of the sanctions, with major players like French company Total, Royal Dutch Shell and Spain's Cepsa and Repsol either cutting back sharply on Iranian crude or ceasing to buy it altogether.The EU accounted for close to 18% of Iran's imports.

The Europeans say they have reserves for about 120 days, and there are additional sources available like Russia, South America,Libya, the U.S.and European North Sea Oil. In addition, the Saudis and Gulf States have already pledged to make up any shortfall. That could lead to fireworks if the Iranians decide to try close off the Strait of Hormuz to stop the Persian Gulf Oil from reaching Europe.

The idea behind the sanctions is to force Tehran into giving up its illegal nuclear weapons program. I see the Iranian regime as trying something much more dramatic rather than giving up their nukes.

Iran Ends Crude Oil Sales To UK And French Companies

The Iranian regime has formally announced that it is cutting off all oil sales to French and British companies.

The ban is in retaliation for EU sanctions on buying Iranian oil, set to go into effect on July 1st of this year.

"Exporting crude to British and French companies has been stopped ... we will sell our oil to new customers," spokesman Alireza Nikzad was quoted as saying by the Ministry of Petroleum website. For 'new customers', read India and China.

The European countries had already cut back their purchases of Iran oil in anticipation of the sanctions, with major players like French company Total, Royal Dutch Shell and Spain's Cepsa and Repsol either cutting back sharply on Iranian crude or ceasing to buy it altogether.The EU accounted for close to 18% of Iran's imports.

The Europeans say they have reserves for about 120 days, and there are additional sources available like Russia, South America,Libya, the U.S.and European North Sea Oil. In addition, the Saudis and Gulf States have already pledged to make up any shortfall. That could lead to fireworks if the Iranians decide to try close off the Strait of Hormuz to stop the Persian Gulf Oil from reaching Europe.

The idea behind the sanctions is to force Tehran into giving up its illegal nuclear weapons program. I see the Iranian regime as trying something much more dramatic rather than giving up their nukes.

US Poll - Only 5% Of Americans Oppose Israeli Strike On Iran

Apparently the average American has a lot more common sense than some of the media elites or the White House.

According to the latest Pew poll, only 5% of Americans believe the U.S. should oppose an Israeli strike on Iran's nuclear facilities. Over 39% believe America ought to actively support it:

Broken down along party lines, Republican support for an Israeli strike was clearly stronger than Democrats and independent voters. A strong 62% majority of Republicans said Washington should support Israeli military action, while only one-third of Democrats and independents answered similarly.

Although the answers about support for an Israeli strike varied when broken down by the gender, education, political affiliation and religion, one consistent position was that very few think the US should oppose Israeli action. In total, only five percent of Americans oppose such a move.

Put into the context of whether military action will be required to stop Iranian nuclear proliferation, a majority of Americans do not believe that increased sanctions against Tehran will work. That belief was held by Republicans, Democrats and independents, although Republicans were most cynical of sanctions deterring Iranian from developing nuclear weapons, the survey found.

Asked whether Iran should be prevented from developing nuclear weapons, even if doing so requires military action against the Islamic Republic, a majority of those polled answered affirmatively.

Nearly two thirds of Republicans said it was more important to stop Tehran's nuclear proliferation even at the cost of war, while a mere 16 percent said it was more important to avoid military conflict even if that resulted in a nuclear-armed Iran. Half of Democrats answered that it was more important to stop a nuclear Iran, while 38% said priority should be placed on avoiding military conflict.

A number of particularly silly op-eds have been written recently about why the US ought to oppose and Israeli strike from the usual suspects. The usual claim is that the consequences would be too dangerous and that the price of oil would spike.

I'm curious how bearable these people think the consequences and the price of oil are going to be like after Iran obtains nuclear weapons?

The Israelis for their part may to be be preparing for something:

If Israel strikes Iranian nuclear facilities, Tehran has three major targets: the atomic reactor at Dimona, Haifa’s port and refineries, and the area of Zakariya, where Israel stored its missile arsenal. Eyal Eisenberg, head of the Home Front Command, recently declared, “Haifa will be flooded with 12.000 missiles.” Israel’s army estimates that Hamas and Hezbollah have 1,600 rockets capable of hitting targets with high precision. In the words of former Minister Matan Vilnai, in the event of such a war, Israel’s Defense Ministry building “will not remain standing.”

But Israel is no stranger to missile fire. Since 1948, the year of the founding of the state, more than 60,000 rockets have fallen on Israel. In 2006 during the second Lebanon war when Hezbollah rained missiles down on the north of the country, one million Israelis were forced to live in shelters for more than a month. There are estimated to be 200,000 missiles pointed at the country today. The situation is such that, according to a survey conducted by Tel Aviv University, 30 percent of those Israelis with a foreign passport are willing to leave the country. A few days ago, Yediot Ahronot, Israel’s largest circulation newspaper, published a list of “cities of refuge” where it is better to live “in case of emergency.”

Tel Aviv, where 60 percent of Israel’s population reside, is now facing Iran’s “judgment day.” Many security drills are termed “NBC:” nuclear, biological and chemical threats.

Syria is the “most advanced Arab country in the production of chemical weapons,” according to a report by the Center for Strategic Studies at Bar Ilan University. Though Syria’s government is preoccupied with the rebellion against the Assad regime, it is still an ally of Iran and might decide that joining in an attack on Israel would be a good way to divert public anger against the massacres of dissidents. Syria has produced hundreds of tons of chemical weapons and bombs filled with sarin and another lethal gas, VX. The idea is that botulinum, anthrax and other lethal pathogens can be used in conjunction with explosives. Just 100 grams of mustard gas would be enough to kill 500 Israelis.

With this sort of threat in view, Israel is preparing its bomb shelters. This week, the Foreign Ministry gave the embassies a list of bunkers available for the diplomats. Only Tel Aviv has as many as 240 bunkers. The Jerusalem railway station is able to accommodate 5,000 people. Even theaters, like Habima in Tel Aviv, will host thousands of people. In Safed, the first hospital-bunker for children is being prepared. Evacuation plans are ready for Ramat Gan, the populous suburb of Tel Aviv hit by Saddam Hussein’s rockets in 1991.

While many Israelis may take shelter in the Negev, up to half a million could take refuge in the Jewish settlements of Samaria. The commander of the Home Front, General Yair Golan, declared that “cities can be transformed into a battlefield” and that masses of people will be forced to flee to a “national refuge” in Samaria in the West Bank. The hospitals have emergency plans. The most important industries, such as the banks and the Bezeq phone company, are preparing alternative technologies in case of national collapse.

Meanwhile, in southern Israel, where Gaza-based terrorists have rained down thousands of missiles in recent years, bulldozers are hard at work building new shelters for the expected next round of shelling. In Sderot, the town that has been hardest hit by Hamas missile fire, virtually every street is already dotted with concrete huts. The government has promised to put a missile-proof security room in every home. Five thousand shelters are planned for a place with just 20,000 inhabitants.

In addition to the shelters, a new alarm system, located in the Negev desert, can calculate the exact trajectory of a missile. The plan is to use this information to alert all the mobile phones in the area via SMS, audio alert and display lighting.

Given the level of preparation for these attacks, these days the State of Israel looks like a bunkered Western outpost threatened with destruction by Iran. The countdown for war may have already begun. But as Israelis start thinking about heading to shelters, the question in their minds is: once the assault on their nation begins, will the West come to their aid?

My gut feeling is that there's a strong liklihood Hezbollah and Hamas would not risk striking Israel,although it's certainly possible. Hamas is still recovering from Cast Lead, Iran is not funding them at this point and they likely realize that a strike at Israel would be treated as an act of war for which their could only be one ending. Hezbollah is more likely to get involved, but an attack would again be treated as an act of all out war and Hezbollah might be unwilling to risk their political position in Lebanon by bringing on a heavy Israeli counterstrike.Unlike the last time, the gloves would be off and all Lebanon would be fair game.

If I were the Israelis,I would not count on the West coming to their aid,especially not an America under President Obama's control.The best Israel could hope for is some low level aid and a posture in the UN that uses America's veto to prevent any major anti-Israel resolutions passing. And that's a best case scenario.

If worst comes to worst, the idea of Judea and Samaria becoming the Israeli haven might not be the worst thing that could happen. A great many Israelis who now feel that appeasing the 'Palestinians' by trading Israel's heartland for yet another false 'peace' might feel differently about the matter afterwards.

What an irony if it ends up being tiny Israel that saves the West from its folly.