WASHINGTON -- Israeli leaders are having a “serious conversation” about carrying out a unilateral attack on Iran should that nation continue to develop a suspected nuclear-weapon capability, one U.S. journalist said Wednesday following an investigative reporting trip to the Middle East (see GSN, Aug. 14).
(Oct. 23) -
Technicians work at Iran's Isfahan uranium conversion facility in 2005. Top Israeli officials are seriously considering taking military action against Iranian nuclear sites if Tehran presses forward with suspected nuclear-weapon activities, a U.S. journalist said this week (Getty Images).
Washington Post national intelligence reporter Joby Warrick spent time in Israel in recent weeks where he talked with members of the Israeli intelligence community.
“The Israelis are trying to calculate could they absorb a [retaliatory] big blow from Iran if they blow up their nuclear sites,” Warrick said in a presentation of his findings at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. “These are real conversations that are going on among the Israelis. It’s a very serious conversation.”
Tehran last month disclosed that it was constructing a second uranium enrichment facility in Qum. The enrichment process can produce both nuclear power plant fuel and nuclear-weapon material; Israel, the United States and other nations fear that Iran’s intention is the latter.
The International Atomic Energy Agency has pitched a plan to have much of Iran’s low-enriched uranium shipped to other nations for additional refinement so it can be used to power a medical research reactor in Tehran. Tehran today appeared to reject the proposal (see related GSN story, today).
Israeli officials have said they reserve the right to take action against Iran. However, a military strike on the country’s nuclear infrastructure would face a number of challenges. The number and location of Iranian atomic sites is not fully known, and some key facilities are underground to protect them from attack. Observers also warn that the use of force would only postpone Iran’s nuclear advancement by a few years. Tehran, meanwhile, warned of swift retaliatory strikes should it be attacked.
“If Israel did bomb these facilities, there’d be some clapping and cheering going on behind closed doors in some of these neighboring Arab nations,” Warrick said.
Warrick’s September and October reporting trip, funded by the International Reporting Project, included stops in Egypt, Jordan and the United Arab Emirates. While there, he surveyed commonly held assumptions and perceptions of Middle Eastern countries on the Iranian nuclear threat.
Israel – today the only nation in the Middle East believed to possess nuclear weapons -- is hardly alone in fearing a nuclear-armed Iran. The threat has nations around the region alarmed, Warrick said.
“There’s the consensus in the region that Iran has to be stopped. You can’t just contain the Iranians. It has to be a way that people feel secure that there’s not a secret nuclear weapon that the Iranians are sitting on,” he said, “How you do that is another question.”
While Iran has claimed that it is not seeking nuclear weapons and only wants nuclear energy for peaceful commercial purposes, its neighbors are deeply skeptical.
“Everybody thinks it’s hogwash,” Warrick said. “Everyone thinks that Iran wants to have a nuclear weapon. It’s a question of whether or not they’re going to show their hand or they’re just going to do it quietly.”
None of the intelligence officials that Warrick spoke with had a concrete idea of when Iran could develop a weapons capability, but their estimates averaged out to about 2012, Warrick said. He said Jerusalem believes Iran could develop a bomb in as little as a year if the government orders it done.
Commonly shared perceptions about Iran’s intentions, right or wrong, are already producing developments in the region. An arms race is looming, albeit a quiet one, Warrick said.
“[Intelligence officials] always couch it in the sense that ‘We’re not going to, but down the road, the Egyptians, the Saudis, they’re going to have the bomb. The Turks, they definitely will,’” Warrick said.
These assumptions -- that everyone in the region believes their neighbors are pursuing a strategic capability -- are creating their own momentum, the reporter said.
“There are suddenly a ton of countries that want to have nuclear power and that’s how it’s all being described. It’s not a weapons program, it’s nuclear capability,” Warrick said.
Security concerns are not the only thing on the minds of Arab nations. International bragging rights and cultural pride are also on the line as historic rivalries between the fractious states come into play.
The pursuit of a civilian nuclear power capability is a widely accepted right of states under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. However, such a program can also be a stepping stone to the development of nuclear weapons, which is why the push by Middle Eastern nations to develop atomic energy comes with some concerns.
Wealthy Gulf states are collectively and individually pursuing nuclear technology, Warrick said, adding, “There is always the whispered threat that some of these countries, particularly the Saudis, will just buy a bomb” (see GSN, July 30).
The United Arab Emirates has plans to bring multiple nuclear power plants online by 2017 and has achieved widespread international support for its “proliferation proof” plan.
France recently signed an agreement to help Egypt develop its civilian nuclear power capability. “They’re on their way,” Warrick said (see GSN, June 18).
Jordan has announced its intentions to mine uranium for export and has signed nuclear trade agreements with China, Canada, Russia, France and the United Kingdom (see GSN, July 28).
Even Yemen, “arguably the poorest, least stable country in the region,” has plans to pursue a nuclear capability and has budgeted $15 billion in pursuit of that goal, Warrick said (see GSN, Nov. 1, 2007).