Thinking About the Unthinkable: An Israel-Iran Nuclear War

AmericanThinker ^ | August 23, 2015 | John Bosma

[Ghost of SVR4]

...Israel needs to impart a powerful, disorganizing shock to the Iranian regime that accomplishes realistic military objectives: digging out its expensive underground enrichment plants, destroying its Arak plutonium reactor and maybe Bushehr in the bargain, killing its bomb and missile professionals, scientists and technicians, IRGC bases, its oil production sites, oil export terminals and the leaders of the regime where they can be found.

...its initial strike must move very fast and be conclusive within 1-2 hours, like the Israeli air attack opening the 1967 Six-Day War. The goal is to so stun the regime that Israel controls the first and subsequent phases of the war and its ending. This means that Israel must hit enough critical targets with maximum shock – and be willing to revisit or expand its targets – so as to control blowback and retaliation from Iran's allies. In essence, this involves a very fast-paced Israeli redesign of the Middle East in the course of a nuclear war for survival.

...what is poorly appreciated is that nuclear weapons from 10 to 300 kilotons (KT) – depending on accuracy – can destroy deep hard targets to 200+ meters depth by ground coupling if they penetrate merely 3 meters into the ground (Effects of Nuclear Earth Penetrators and Other Weapons: National Research Council / National Academy Press, 2005, pp. 30-51). Israel could lower bomb yields or achieve deeper target kills by its reported tests of two-plane nuclear attacks in which the first plane drops a conventional HTM like a GBU-28 to open up a channel; the second plane drops its tactical nuclear bomb into that 'soft' channel for greater depth before bursting. This unavoidably

[DiogenesLamp]

One problem with that timetable.

Iran will want to strike before January 22, 2017...

I have no intimate knowledge of Iran's nuclear technology capabilities, but I suspect they won't have anything that functions ready by then.

I also believe Israel has enough information gathering assets in place to give them sufficient warning before any such thing happens.

[DiogenesLamp]

Note that my oath is not to the president or presidency; it is to the Constitution. And it is against ALL enemies, foreign, and domestic.

Yeah, well, I think he's purged all the good ones. We have politically correct drones in much of the Military now.

I would not take bets that they would disobey him.

[okie01]

Two in 1945, one in

You have my rapt attention.

[archy]

We are handing a gun to a fanatic, who intrends to use it against someone in the same room with us, and that intended target is holding a hand grenade with the pin out.

The intended target also has a gun, loaded and aimed at the nutjob, so he might not have to use the hand grenade.

On the other hand, if it gets that far, the idiot handing the gun to the Nut needs to catch some shrapnel.

Concur. Additionally, that intended target has a gun he's used very successfully in 1948, 1956, 1967, 1973, 1982, 2006, 2009 and 2012-2014.

[okie01]

Note that my oath is not to the president or presidency; it is to the Constitution. And it is against ALL enemies, foreign, and domestic.

That is what I hoped to hear. May the current officer corps be composed of like-minded patriots.

P.S. I'm well aware of None Dare Call It Treason. That and Conscience of a Conservative were my reading list in 1963.

[Cold Heat]

Look up Russian peacetime use of nuclear bombs.(Wikipedia)..They have used a couple....one to stop a runaway oilwell, and another for something else that I don’t recall..

[archy]

You have my rapt attention.

I usually got the attention of my kaydetts as well.

HMS Conqueror (nickname "Conks") S48 was a Churchill-class nuclear-powered fleet submarine that served in the Royal Navy from 1971 to 1990. She was built by Cammell Laird in Birkenhead (the only British nuclear fleet submarine not to be built at Barrow-in-Furness). She is the only nuclear-powered submarine known to have engaged an enemy ship with torpedoes, sinking the cruiser General Belgrano with two Mark 8 torpedoes during the 1982 Falklands War.

At 15:57 (Falkland Islands Time)[N 1] on 2 May, HMS Conqueror fired three 21 inch Mk 8 mod 4 torpedoes (conventional, non-guided, torpedoes), each with an 805-pound (363 kg) Torpex warhead. While Conqueror was also equipped with the newer Mark 24 Tigerfish homing torpedo, there were doubts about its reliability. Initial reports from Argentina claim that Conqueror fired two Tigerfish torpedoes on General Belgrano. Two of the three torpedoes hit General Belgrano.The ship began to list to port and to sink towards the bow. Twenty minutes after the attack, at 16:24, The crew was ordered to abandon ship. Inflatable life rafts were deployed, and the evacuation began without panic.

[okie01]

OK, I'm familiar with the Conquerer-General Belgrano incident.

What was the 1967 nuclear event?

[JDoutrider]

Marker

[Pollster1]

"People will curse his name." I already do! Everyday!

If a mere thousand people curse Obama's name three times a day each (a VERY low number for such a shockingly evil and destructive bigot who is wielding so much power over decent people), that is a million times a year. If one percent of the 100 million gun owners in America curse his evil names just three times a day, that's a billion curses a year. That's enough to either warm a decent person's heart or destroy any faith in curses.

[MortMan]

I bet Hamas will be the Iranian agent.

[Ozark Tom]

Fifty years ago Los Alamos was working on a nuclear powered sub-surface tunneling technology, which by some estimates would accomplish 7 miles daily progress. Google search yields fanciful speculation upon the projects fate, at best.

“Sub-Selene” yielded the most informative leads. Wonder if anyone persevered and achieved a practical device? Would be useful for a bottom up, instead of top down bit of demolition.

http://adsabs.harvard.edu/full/1985lbsa.conf..465R

http://www.osti.gov/scitech/biblio/5262838

http://www.google.com/patents/US3693731

[arthurus]

I believe that Sultan Hussein means to give Israel that opportunity. It is coming to praying for a coup in DC. I thought a heart attack might be nice but the Moslem Brotherhood is broadly and deeply enough embedded that it would just precipitate things.

[arthurus]

Right now I don’t think we have until 2017.

[DuncanWaring]

He most likely hasn’t, but at least one of his puppeteers probably has.

[archy]

OK, I'm familiar with the Conquerer-General Belgrano incident.

What was the 1967 nuclear event?

I presume you are familiar with the 08 July 1967 torpedo attack on the USS Liberty by Israeli aircraft, which included machinegunning surviving crew members in their lifeboats?

From a historical standpoint, one has to wonder why the Israelis would do such a stupid, desperate thing. The answer would seem to be in what Israel- and the world- had riding on the outcome of related events.

Cyanide.