2:59AM
Abizaid repeats the call I’ve offered back in 2005 on Iran’s nuke effort
Friday, October 17, 2008 at 2:59AM PERISCOPE: “Israel: Iran Nukes: Out of Reach,” Dan Ephron, Newsweek, 29 September 2008.
Retired Army general and previous CENTCOM boss John Abizaid, speaking at Marine Corps University (I last spoke there on the day of Art Cebrowski’s funeral in 2005) “appeared to echo the thinking of at least some in the upper echelons of the U.S. military: Israel is incapable of seriously damaging Iran’s nuclear program.”
Abizaid previously stated, also in my vein, that Israel and the West could handle a nuclear Iran with the usual deterrence strategy.
Naturally, I continue to view Abizaid as a very smart and realistic observer.
Reader Comments (3)
I recently was given an explanation why Iran would like nukes. Far from using these to drive Israel into the sea, it would enable it to strengthen the Shiite brand in the Arab world by bullying Israel.
However, if and when it miniaturised nuclear weapons (I understand this is difficult), they would then use non-state proxies (say offshoots of Hez'ballah) to attack Israel (eg. suitcase nukes in Tel Aviv or whatever) to give itself plausible deniability. Namely, it would be very unlikely that Iran would launch a ballistic missile based nuclear attack on Israel (given Israel's deterrent capability). Rather Iran's leadership would prefer to attack Israel "deniably".
How would the deterrent strategy work if this scenario occurred?
Doesn't matter what anyone else in the world thinks or how it might play out in a court of law, Israel would turn Iran's major cities into rubble and then make the rubble bounce.
We aren't talking about if the president can lie here or if a secretary of state can parse words in the UN. If millions die in Israel from a suitcase bomb, kiss Iran goodbye. And Iran knows it.
We make this sort of thing clear all the time in discussions with people, but the reality is that our bombs would arrive late, compared to Israel's.
The delivery method isn't the key, it's the inevitability of the reply. Simple concept that's ruled the world for decades now.