John Wohlstetter - Sleepwalking with the Bomb

Saddam likely would have had the bomb well before launching his August 1990 invasion of Kuwait had Israel not moved. After the Gulf War, arms inspectors discovered that Iraq was at most a year or two away from having a bomb.

Israel repeated this strategy in destroying Syria’s nascent reactor in 2007. In his memoir former President George W. Bush recounted how Israel’s then–prime minister, Ehud Olmert, telephoned and asked him to have the U.S. Air Force bomb the Syrian facility. Bush declined, preferring to pursue a combination of diplomacy and threat of force, but kept mum while Israel acted. Bush said that the 2007 intelligence finding that Iran had suspended its nuclear weapons program undermined his military option.

Targeting Iran’s underground facilities is far more complex. Conventional-warhead cruise missiles are accurate enough, but cannot penetrate the hundreds of feet of rock or concrete that shelter Iran’s deepest facilities. Missile payloads likely would have to be nuclear to do the job, and neither the U.S. nor Israel is willing to resort to this choice, unless an Iranian nuclear attack takes place. Warplanes can achieve pinpoint accuracy, but in the absence of U.S. or Russian heavy bombers to carry massive penetrating bombs, smaller planes might have to drop several smart bombs into the same path to dig deep enough. An air attack would miss any undiscovered facilities. At best, the program could be delayed rather than ended. But on the other hand, a few years’ delay can buy precious time for sanctions or aid to the opposition to sink the regime.

There is another option against deeply buried facilities that, due to the deeply-ingrained taboo against nuclear use, Israel will forgo: according to the late American bomb designer Ted Taylor, a one-kiloton bomb if properly molded into a shaped charge could bore a ten-foot wide hole 1,000 feet into solid rock.

One dangerous consequence of the 2003 WMD intelligence debacle is that it establishes (for practical political purposes) a de facto standard of proof beyond a shadow of a doubt before the world’s governments might support military action. Closed societies conceal their programs and use periodic diplomatic “charm offensives” to cloak their intentions with ambiguity and raise hopes of peaceful resolution. Rejecting such hopes appears nearly impossible for Western societies, who value peace so highly that they assume all others must as well.

In effect, ruthless proliferators have taken Western societies hostage in the past, and continue to do so. In a diplomatic version of the Stockholm Syndrome—the condition of hostages who come to sympathetically identify with their captors—advanced societies reflexively shrink from the unpleasant task of confronting hostile states pursuing nuclear weapons.

Given how stark the military options are, and uncertain the prospects for success, it is understandable that the West recoils. But a nuclear Iran, even short of war, will ignite a nuclear arms race, shift the balance of power, and supplant the U.S. as potentially the preeminent Mideast regional player.

AS THIS book goes to press the air is rife with speculation as to whether Israel will strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities. It seems increasingly apparent that President Obama will not do so, unless one of two contingencies comes to pass: Iran mines the Strait of Hormuz, or Iran attacks America—either its interests abroad or the American homeland. Israel clearly understands that it is alone.

In an address to the American-Israeli Public Affairs Committee, Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu crisply summed up the absurdity of those questioning Iran’s commitment to build a nuclear weapon, noting that underground facilities and ICBMs are not designed to deliver medical isotopes:

The Jewish state will not allow those seeking our destruction to possess the means to achieve that goal. A nuclear-armed Iran must be stopped. Amazingly, some people refuse to acknowledge that Iran’s goal is to develop nuclear weapons. You see, Iran claims that it’s enriching uranium to develop medical research. Yeah, right. A country that builds underground nuclear facilities, develops intercontinental ballistic missiles, manufactures thousands of centrifuges, and absorbs crippling sanctions—is doing all that in order to advance… medical research. So you see, when that Iranian ICBM is flying through the air to a location near you, you’ve got nothing to worry about. It’s only carrying medical isotopes.

The prime minster put his position plainly: “As prime minister of Israel, I will never let my people live in the shadow of annihilation.”

As to the likelihood of Iranian retaliation, perhaps ironically the severe response that Iran’s regime threatens is more likely if Israel fails than if Israel succeeds. In the Mideast, an adversary’s strength is grudgingly respected, while weakness earns contempt and incites retaliatory violence.

The comparative histories of powers that choose to disarm versus those that scorn disarmament underscore the Tenth Lesson of nuclear-age history: DISARMING HOSTILE POWERS CANNOT BE DONE BY NEGOTIATIONS ALONE.

AWORST-CASE NUCLEAR NIGHTMARE SMALL-POWER ATTACK SCENARIO is not a terrorist nuke exploding in a big American city. Such an attack would be a catastrophic event, killing hundreds of thousands and erasing trillions of dollars in economic value, while undermining social cohesion and plunging the nation—and the world—into unprecedented crisis.

But there is a more devastating catastrophe, one that could end America’s status as a world power: an esoteric phenomenon generated by a nuclear explosion, known as “electromagnetic pulse” (EMP). If an adversary detonated a single nuclear warhead over the country’s midpoint at high altitude, the explosion would generate a series of powerful pulses that would break through surge protectors. In a worst case it could take down all or nearly all of America’s electric grid and communications fabric. In a few days, as backup power ran out, America would be returned to its energy status of 1875, with several times as many people to support. The Eleventh Lesson of nuclear-age history, then, is this: NEVER ALLOW SINGLE OR LOW-NUMBER POINTS OF CATASTROPHIC VULNERABILITY.

SHOULD AN EMP attack not only disable America’s power grid but also, in parallel attacks, disable the grids of allies who might aid us, in a worst case an estimated 90 percent of Americans could perish within one year —mostly from starvation and disease. America could never recover, as William Fortschen vividly describes in his 2009 novel, One Second After .

Some scientists, among them physicist Howard Hayden, have sharply questioned the total-collapse scenario. They point to relatively limited damage suffered in early EMP incidents. Even if they are right, it does not take an attack of worst-case outcome to inflict horrific casualties and societal damage. Suppose that only 1 percent of Americans lose all vital life services for a year. In such event some 3 million people might perish within that period. That is roughly twice the 1.34 million total U.S. fatalities in all American wars from 1775 to mid-2012.