If Obama wins, Israel wil not survive.

[touchring]

Re: If Obama wins, Israel wil not survive.

But China.......that's where the US would likely get a little bit bunny boiler weird.

Israel, always acting the part that nearly everything is an existential threat to them, could be trying hard to play China off the US.

There's already been a number of military technology transfer allegations by the US against Israel in its relations with China that could justifiably give the US pause.

This makes great sense, as BadJuju has said the US should play a smaller role in international politics. Hence, China will take the place of the US in the Middle East, and China will want to work with Israel and the Saudis.

It makes sense for China to side with the Gulf states since they produce more oil than Iran alone. China will dump Iran if the US withdraws.

[lakedaemonian]

Re: If Obama wins, Israel wil not survive.

I'm confident the US DOE/NEST teams would be able to determine the origin/source of many/most nuclear weapons from the residue.

This assumes US intelligence was able to acquire samples for comparison.

I'm pretty sure that's how it works.

I would also think that back channel diplomacy between Israel and Iran wouldvcommunixate a message that if Israel is nuked from ANY direction or delivery platform that Iran will likely be turned into a self-lit parking lot.

I'm fairly confident that way back when Israel possessed it's earlier generation nuclear delivery systems such as A4/F4/F15A and especially early generation Jericho IRBM that Israel would have let slip to the Soviets that if Israel fell to Soviet backed proxies and nukes were used that at least one warhead had Moscow written on it.

In both cases, the Soviet Union and now Iran, it is in the best interest of both for things to NOT get TOO crazy.

And the two are still connected and intertwined in that regard as I suspect a substantial level of effort by Israel to mitigate Iranian WMDefforts is targeting acquisition rather than just indigenus development.

Huge efforts by the US and others since circa 1992 to secure ex Soviet weapons grade fissionable material is paying off now hopefully.

Israel is a postage stamp.

A single non-multi-stage nuke could easily give the perception that Israel would be uninhabitable, but it's simply not true.

But I could see that perception easily driving things in a particular direction.

As far as the international shipping container shell game.

If you look close enough you will find examples of open water takedowns by specialist VBSS teams.

But the world is a complex place.

Pakistan is broke and could be vulnerable to further proliferation risk by providing "instanuke" capability in exchange for needed cash from the Saudis.

Or maybe the Pakistanis could play Saudi and Iran off of each other.

As well as the US and China who wouldn't be keen to see that happen either, but for what sized cheque?

It is a pretty complex soap opera.

[touchring]

Re: If Obama wins, Israel wil not survive.

A single non-multi-stage nuke could easily give the perception that Israel would be uninhabitable, but it's simply not true.

Would you want to inhabit in a land which can be nuked anytime? It doesn't take a land to be inhabitable only after it has been nuked. The very fact it can be nuked anytime will destroy Israel because no one will dare to invest in such a land and people and capital will start to leave. The moment Israel starts to weaken, the vultures will come. Israel can only survive if it is the strongest in the region, the alternative is failure.

I must repeat that I'm not advocating that the US should get involved. In fact, the US wouldn't want to get involved. Obama is doing the right thing by giving only lip service to Israel with respect to Iran. Of course, Israel will realize this soon and or rather they already know.

[metalman]

Re: If Obama wins, Israel wil not survive.

Would you want to inhabit in a land which can be nuked anytime? It doesn't take a land to be inhabitable only after it has been nuked. The very fact it can be nuked anytime will destroy Israel because no one will dare to invest in such a land and people and capital will start to leave. The moment Israel starts to weaken, the vultures will come. Israel can only survive if it is the strongest in the region, the alternative is failure.

I must repeat that I'm not advocating that the US should get involved. In fact, the US wouldn't want to get involved. Obama is doing the right thing by giving only lip service to Israel with respect to Iran. Of course, Israel will realize this soon and or rather they already know.

romney stuck an iran threat in his acceptance speech...

Every American was relieved the day President Obama gave the order, and Seal Team Six took out Osama bin Laden. But on another front, every American is less secure today because he has failed to slow Iran's nuclear threat.

failed... implying more will be done if romney is elected...

In his first TV interview as president, he said we should talk to Iran. We're still talking, and Iran's centrifuges are still spinning.

obama has failed with diplomacy & sanctions to stop iran's nuke project... other non-diplomatic steps are needed... ie military...

President Obama has thrown allies like Israel under the bus, even as he has relaxed sanctions on Castro's Cuba. He abandoned our friends in Poland by walking away from our missile defense commitments, but is eager to give Russia's President Putin the flexibility he desires, after the election. Under my administration, our friends will see more loyalty, and Mr. Putin will see a little less flexibility and more backbone.

hard line on iran & russia... what does romney mean by 'less flexibility & backbone'?

We will honor America's democratic ideals because a free world is a more peaceful world. This is the bipartisan foreign policy legacy of Truman and Reagan. And under my presidency we will return to it once again.

policies of truman & reagan... truman who nuked japan & reagan who threatened to nuke the soviets...

then again, this is romney talking... mr one day this & the next day the opposite.

if you are israel, what to do?

[touchring]

Re: If Obama wins, Israel wil not survive.

if you are israel, what to do?

What about you? Do you trust Obama?

From an outsider's perspective, Obama is more interested in securing his 2nd term by avoiding difficult decisions than to further US interests.

[c1ue]

Re: If Obama wins, Israel wil not survive.

I agree with what you say, but the Persians are too smart for that. They don't need to use the bomb themselves. They can pass it to some suicidal terrorist group in a truck. After the bomb goes, it will vaporize completely, including the truck, and there will be no trace of it nor evidence who did it. And they could even ship it to port of New York. It doesn't even need to clear customs.

I am only giving examples, these dudes are very imaginative, remember that Steve Jobs is also half Arab. Who would have thought it a million years that they would have hijacked planes and direct them towards the Pentagon?

Seriously - can you get any more incoherent?

Must I remind you that the 9/11 hijackers were Saudis, not Syrians, Iranians, Libyans, or whatever Middle Eastern 'Axis of Evil' you wish to follow US agitprop on?

As for Hussein: invading Kuwait wasn't terribly smart, but then again it was a calculated risk. Saddam clearly thought he could steal away that very small, militarily weak, and oil rich nation and present the world with a fait accompli. He was wrong, he got pushed back, and all was well.

The decade later invasion was pure theater, and a damned expensive bunch of tickets as well.

[vt]

Re: If Obama wins, Israel wil not survive.

The idea that deterrence can work is explored by Charles Krauthammer. Israel is a lot different that the U.S.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/charles-krauthammer-the-deterrence-works-fantasy/2012/08/30/20c0a3ea-f2d8-11e1-892d-bc92fee603a7_story.html

[lakedaemonian]

Re: If Obama wins, Israel wil not survive.

Would you want to inhabit in a land which can be nuked anytime? It doesn't take a land to be inhabitable only after it has been nuked. The very fact it can be nuked anytime will destroy Israel because no one will dare to invest in such a land and people and capital will start to leave. The moment Israel starts to weaken, the vultures will come. Israel can only survive if it is the strongest in the region, the alternative is failure.

I must repeat that I'm not advocating that the US should get involved. In fact, the US wouldn't want to get involved. Obama is doing the right thing by giving only lip service to Israel with respect to Iran. Of course, Israel will realize this soon and or rather they already know.

While I wouldn't WANT to, but if my family HAD to, I'm sure we would pitch in like Japan and the Japanese did post August 1945.

Hiroshima and Nagasaki have both done pretty good ever since.

Yup cancer and other health problems like miscarriage rates and such rise......but it's not "The Day After" or "Threads", again if we are talking about a singe, non-multi-stage(not a hydrogen bomb) weapon.

In no way do I think Israel should take it's security situation anything less than seriously, but I think for Israel the biggest problem with a nuclear armed Iran is not so much in the short term(where Iran possesses a handful of 1st generation nukes and poor delivery system capability outside of the asymmetric), but in the long term(Iran in possession of multi-stage weapons and capable delivery systems) and the strong possibility of further proliferation by the likes of Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Egypt in response to a changing regional geopolitical and security landscape.

If I was prime minister of Israel I would simply tell Iran that if a detonated nuclear weapon directly or indirectly harms Israel that Israel would light Iran on fire from end to end.

But that would probably only work for a limited period of time.

IF/when Iran develops nuclear weapons and eventually reaches the stage of building a multi-stage hydrogen bomb Israel's rather small geographic footprint does put it in a rather awkward and inferior position.

Hence Israel's development of a nuclear triad with it's German built Dolphin submarine fleet that has been rapidly expanding.

One can only assume one of the key reasons for this massive investment by Israel(as well as gift from Germany) is to ensure at least a limited second strike nuclear capability.

So Israel has already spent the better part of a decade or longer developing and deploying a very expensive second strike capability which is probably aimed specifically at Iran.

So it would appear that the IDF has already resigned itself to living with a nuclear armed opponent.

[touchring]

Re: If Obama wins, Israel wil not survive.

So it would appear that the IDF has already resigned itself to living with a nuclear armed opponent.

This is possible, but it appears that iTulip thinks differently.

[lakedaemonian]

Re: If Obama wins, Israel wil not survive.

This is possible, but it appears that iTulip thinks differently.

I'm not a long range aerial interdiction planner, but as I've stated elsewhere on this forum, I disagree a fair bit with EJs and the iTulip community's assessment of the odds of a direct attack by Israel on Iran before the election.

The call is 80% chance before the election, I'm taking the opposite end of that prediction and go with a 20% chance.

However, I would agree with the use of 80% as my guess on whether Israel will pre-emptively strike at Syria, much like Op Orchard that Israel still sort of denies, almost exactly 5 years ago.

The genuine risk to Israel of a destabilized Syria and loss of control regarding Syria's chem/bio weapons is probably of far more short-term immediate concern.

Iran has invested considerable Iranian diplomatic and military effort to shore up the Syrian regime to maintain Syria as an asymmetric attack conduit and ally against Israel via Hezbullah in Lebanon.

An Israeli surgical attack to nullify or seizure Syrian WMDs could be viewed as realistic and understandable by the US as well as a stronger signal directed at Iran.

It would be a logical, and most importantly, far more easily achievable objective than the attempt to nullify Iran's very distant and highly decentralized nuclear development efforts.

I just don't buy a series of Israeli raids on Iran at this stage.

I'll lay out why:

Israel does NOT likely possess covert basing or attack vector options against Iran. Turkey has gone septic towards Israel, the Saudis might look the other way on overflights(due to their leadership's fear of Iran) but forward deployment of IAF aircraft in Saudi would surely be the stuff of fiction, Qatar/Bahrain/Oman...IF allowed to stage out of there, would represent staggering security problem. Shifting a fleet of tactical aircraft to Armenia, Azerbaijan, or Turkmenistan would be impossible from an intelligence/counter-intelligence perspective.

Israel does not possess the organic inflight refueling logistics train required to sustain a high tempo very long range series of interdiction raids. Even thinking outside the square and using buddy tankers the IAF would only be able to place a handful of aircraft over Iran repeatedly.

Israel possesses some ground breaking UAV technology and has used them to great effect since it's destruction of Syrian Air Defense and Air Force with close to zero losses in 1982. But what would be required today would be a large number of very long range UAVs, or more importantly armed UAVs called UCAVs.

Israel would also need to possess a very large stockpile of previously undisclosed very long range, networked precision guided munitions capable of destroying hardened bunkers to achieve the damage required to be worth the risk of attack.

Maybe Israel could have some folks on the ground in places like Iranian Balochistan to provide limited Special Forces Special Recovery and covert Combat Search and Rescue helicopter capability, but the odds of an aircraft loss/malfunction would be quite high, air space almost entirely non-permissive, and capability of recovering downed aircrews would be low.

Israel's navy does not possess the likely ability to launch much in the way of offensive land attack missiles of the quantity/quality it would need in an attack against hardened targets in Iran.

Israel possesses an unknown number of Jericho II and III missiles that could strike Iran. It is unlikely that the use of conventional warheads on the Jerichos to attack hardened targets in Iran would be sufficient to destroy enough of Iran's nuclear infrastructure without risking the loss of a significant portion of Israel's nuclear triad........BUT a premeptive nuclear strike using Jericho by Israel would be sufficient to do so and at no risk to aircrew losses....but that would be crossing a VERY distinct line for Israel to use nuclear weapons to prevent another country from obtaining them.

In this game of chess I think the Iranian advantage of extreme distance, decentralization, and deteriorating relations between Israel and Turkey as serious impediments to a decisive/successful raid.

In closing, while it's within Israel's capability to strike Iran with nuclear and/or conventional weapons on command and at will(however briefly) I think the high geopolitical risk of Israel attacking Iran's nuclear weapons development as well as the high risk of military objective failure far outweighs the reward of possible political/military objective success.

It's like investment isn't it?

In this case, and in my amateur opinion, it's very high risk, low to medium reward.

However a raid, if required, to nullify Syria's WMDs(and maybe on an Iranian presence in Syria) is deemed a serious threat to Israel and worthy of sending a signal to Iran could be argued to be low to medium political and military objective risk, and medium to high political/military objective reward.

Just my 0.20c

[touchring]

Re: If Obama wins, Israel wil not survive.

In this case, and in my amateur opinion, it's very high risk, low to medium reward.

However a raid, if required, to nullify Syria's WMDs(and maybe on an Iranian presence in Syria) is deemed a serious threat to Israel and worthy of sending a signal to Iran could be argued to be low to medium political and military objective risk, and medium to high political/military objective reward.

Just my 0.20c

Yes, there are too many unknown factors for us to determine accurately what may happen, unless we are CIA. But one clue that an attack maybe imminent is if Hillary or Panetta decides to fly to Israel.

[lakedaemonian]

Re: If Obama wins, Israel wil not survive.

Yes, there are too many unknown factors for us to determine accurately what may happen, unless we are CIA. But one clue that an attack maybe imminent is if Hillary or Panetta decides to fly to Israel.

Quite possibly.........but bear in mind that there are many minions working in the background in the US, Israel, and Iran in a number of conflicting directions.

Those in the US who support an Israeli strike on Iran would be trying to prevent any leaks or actions by parties in the US keen to disrupt an Israeli attack on Iran.

The Israelis supporting a strike on Iran would be working overtime to mask/deceive/distract away from any military operational planning/training/preparation. And it's worth noting that there are some with influence and control within Israel who would be opposed to an Israeli strike on Iran.

Then the Iranians would be keen to prevent an Israeli strike on Iran, but it's possible that some may actually passively encourage such a strike.

Imagine for a second that hardline elements in Iran are concerned about long-term regime continuation.....afterall the US/Israel/others have invested substantially in efforts to bring about internal regime change and reform...much like the covert effort to implode the Warsaw Pact in the 80's in places such as Poland where the CIA partnered with the Vatican to effect change in Poland through organizations such as Solidarity.

An attack by Israel on Iran could solidify the hold on Iran by hard line elements such as IRGC and it's Quds Force.

A nuclear armed South Africa disposed of it's WMD programs after political reform.

The Soviets/Cubans/East Germans committed tremendous resources to Southwest Africa, specifically Angola. The Cubans had well over 50,000 military personnel in Angola concurrently. South Africa's apartheid government and military managed to decisively smash them even though they were outmanned and outspent.

Imagine if the Soviets/Cubans/East Germans had been successful?

Would the South African apartheid government collapsed?

Or would they have hardened and further solidified control being painted into a corner?

I strongly believe that it was only after South Africa slaughtered the Cubans and gained some military/security breathing space while always under harsh economic embargo and pressure did they move towards inevitable reform....without that military/security breathing space I don't think the same timeline of political reform and dismantling of their nuclear weapons and WMD programs would have occurred...I think it could have been significantly delayed by hardliner apartheid control.

Something to consider.......an attack on Iran could play into the hands of Iranian hardliners......especially since the odds of an attack on such a distant, decentralized, and hardened target set being a decisive success would be pretty low.

So I'm not trying to get all kinds of conspiracy theory on ya, but every national player in this would likely have multiple competing interests. I would think high level meetings come in many forms.....some to send a very public message.....others that are organized very quietly so as to prevent signalling the enemy.

Ultimately, and I think history backs me up, I think it is FAR simpler and easier to monkey wrench a raid and prevent it from happening or to prevent it from being successful than it is to prevent opponents to it from finding out before the bombs start to drop.

And the US likely holds a form of veto.....while the Mossad is perceived to have the capability of a Jewish James Bond...in reality it's resources are limited.

And US ability to detect raid preparations in Israel would be as close to a guarantee as you can get in this world. There's just no way the Israelis could mask the signature of its training and raid preparation from the US in my opinion. So if the US government REALLY didn't want the raid to occur, they could effectively veto it via a number of means.

The KNOWN military capability side of the house is probably far easier to game/red team than to game/red team the geopolitical side of things.

So I'm comfortable with making some basic amateur analysis/opinion commentary in that regard.

But when it comes to the politicians, players, and agendas in this mess I can only think of one thing:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U_eZmEiyTo0

[Raz]

Re: If Obama wins, Israel wil not survive.

My thoughts on Iran and Israel and regime change are much the same as yours.

I doubt the Israelis (or Americans) could completely wreck the Iranian nuclear program. And politically it would be a disaster that only serves to strengthen the Mullahs.

[touchring]

Re: If Obama wins, Israel wil not survive.

My thoughts on Iran and Israel and regime change are much the same as yours.

I doubt the Israelis (or Americans) could completely wreck the Iranian nuclear program. And politically it would be a disaster that only serves to strengthen the Mullahs.

There are 2 sides to a coin.

You must first understand their mentality. Syrian allawite militias claim that they would rather have a Syria burnt to the ground than to accept a Syria without Assad. The Mullahs will be in control regardless of what happens to the nuclear program. I'm sure the Mullahs will think the same and rather have Iran burnt to the ground, even to the last man, than for the infidels to take over.

Just as we can argue that a military action on the nuclear program will not achieve its aim, one can also argue that the consequence of a military action is a Y2K event - people will forget about it after 6 months.

GW Bush ordered the invasion of Iraq based on false information. 200,000 Iraqis died in the aftermath, is GW Bush in Hague? No. No one even talks about it any more.

Israel has got more reasons (self-defense, Iran's violation of UN resolutions and Iranian leadership multiple threats) to strike Iran than GW Bush invasion of Iraq.

I believe that the possibility of a military action by the end of 2012 is more than 20:80 although I can't say by how much.

[lakedaemonian]

Re: If Obama wins, Israel wil not survive.

There are 2 sides to a coin.

You must first understand their mentality. Syrian allawite militias claim that they would rather have a Syria burnt to the ground than to accept a Syria without Assad. The Mullahs will be in control regardless of what happens to the nuclear program. I'm sure the Mullahs will think the same and rather have Iran burnt to the ground, even to the last man, than for the infidels to take over.

Just as we can argue that a military action on the nuclear program will not achieve its aim, one can also argue that the consequence of a military action is a Y2K event - people will forget about it after 6 months.

GW Bush ordered the invasion of Iraq based on false information. 200,000 Iraqis died in the aftermath, is GW Bush in Hague? No. No one even talks about it any more.

Israel has got more reasons (self-defense, Iran's violation of UN resolutions and Iranian leadership multiple threats) to strike Iran than GW Bush invasion of Iraq.

I believe that the possibility of a military action by the end of 2012 is more than 20:80 although I can't say by how much.

For the record again....

I'd put military action by Israel against Syria(and Iran indirectly) at 80%, but military action against Iran at 20% by the election.

Anything that happens beyond first contact....will become exceptionally harder to predict.

It is a shame there has been such a loss of credibility within senior leadership of the US regarding the WMD intelligence failure in Iraq.

I'm surprised there hasn't been more chatter about movement activity between Iraq and Syria in the lead up to 2003.

Some folks I know who served along and around the border region between Iraq and Syria are convinced it is entirely possible WMDs could have been transported into Syria...and these aren't exactly brainwashed cannon fodder....we're talking about quite cynical and skeptical of everything(including their own) old and broken infantry.

But I'm not going there.......however, just like a lot of stuff unearthed post Qaddafi, I'm keen to learn about this possibility in the future once the dust settles in post apocalypse Syria.

It's certainly not likely to be a boring Northern Hemisphere Fall.

Again, just my 0.02c