THE COMING
WAR AGAINST ISRAEL
Louis Rene Beres
Major unconventional war will almost certainly break out in the Middle East before the end of the millennium, possibly even before the end of this year. The most likely onset of this conflagration will involve coordinated
Syrian, Iraqi and Iranian missile attacks against Israel.
Carefully planning their aggressions before Israeli anti-tactical ballistic missile (ATBM) defenses are in place, Damascus, Baghdad and Teheran (Cairo, too, perhaps)
will perceive a "window of opportunity" they shall not want to miss. What is more, these massive attacks will be timed to coincide with multiple and substantial Palestinian uprisings on both sides of Israel's Green Line.
Israel's Arab and Islamic enemies understand Israel's grave security vulnerabilities. Aware that Jerusalem's "Arrow" ATBM program is still years away from deployment, and that the Jewish State is unlikely --especially in the course of a U.S.-dominated "Peace Process" --to undertake preemptive attacks against enemy hard targets, Syria, Iraq, Iran and the Palestinians (and possibly others) will want to strike while the iron is hot.
Of course, there is always the extraordinary cost of Israeli nuclear retaliations to consider, but this cost might be judged manageable so long as Israel's nuclear weapons remain land-based. It is also plausible that Israel's enemies could expect to deter the deterrer, seeking to prevent Israeli nuclear reprisals with compelling threats of chemical and/or biological counter-retaliations.
Israel's enemies assuredly recognize a promising synergy between external and internal attacks upon the Jewish State. Realizing that simultaneous Palestinian uprisings and ballistic missile attacks by enemy states would be mutually reinforcing, potentially immobilizing Israel's capacity to man its essential defensive and deterrent forces, Syria, Iran, Iraq and the Palestinians could reason that they will soon be in a position to win the hoped- for jihad.
And all of this assumes an altogether rational consideration of prospective costs and benefits. Should any of Israel's state enemies, particularly Iran, begin to calculate outside the bounds of normal strategic rationality, it might launch devastating attacks against Israeli populations in spite of expecting massive nuclear retaliations.
Here, the undeterred aggressor state would resemble the individual Hamas or Islamic Jihad suicidal terrorist in macrocosm, animated not by an extraordinary willingness to die (the usual popular misunderstanding) but rather by an all-consuming drive for immortality.
Recently Israel warned Syria that it had at its disposal certain military means many times more destructive than the lethal VX nerve gas Damascus is producing. Although this is certainly correct, the intended deterrent effect upon Damascus could be undermined by several factors, especially if Syria were to doubt Israel's willingness to retaliate with nuclear weapons. In this connection, it is time for Israel to reconsider its long-
| |
standing policy of "deliberate ambiguity," as keeping the bomb "in the basement" may diminish the required credibility of its unconventional threat.
Today Israel's survival is entirely contingent upon its nuclear weapons, but merely possessing these weapons is no assurance of workable deterrence. Under certain conditions, a carefully-coordinated "bolt-from-the-blue" attack by capable enemies against Israel's pertinent military targets could conceivably render Israel's reprisal "acceptable."
And even if these enemies were mistaken in their calculations --i.e., the net effect of their planned aggression would actually not turn out to be gainful-- the "victory" for Israel would be entirely moot.
This means that Israel must now, immediately, do whatever is needed to ensure successful nuclear deterrence, including the articulation of necessary strategic doctrine and the appropriate sea-basing of certain missiles.
It is also clear that Israel cannot base its very survival upon nuclear deterrence. The Jewish State must now also reaffirm its historic commitment to self-defense, including the sort of anticipatory self- defense operations expressed so persuasively in June 1967 and, later, in June 1981.
Although the destruction of Baghdad's Osiraq reactor on June 2, 1981 was likely a singular event, one not easily capable of replication anywhere, the tactical option of preemption cannot be ruled out altogether. For the future, such an option would most likely be directed at Iran, but it would also have to be undertaken collaboratively with the United States.
Is such collaboration a reasonable prospect? Not at all --especially as Washington continues to be flim-flammed by the "Peace Process," a Trojan Horse that not only makes war against Israel increasingly likely, but is in fact the indispensable precondition (because of needed intra-Israel Palestinian
(Continued on p.12)
PLEASE NOTE
Americans For a Safe Israel (AFSI)
has moved its national headquarters to:
1623 Third Ave. (at 92nd St.) - Suite 205
New York, NY 10128
Please also note our NEW
telephone and fax numbers:
phone: 212-828-2424
fax: 212-828-1717
Our e-mail and web site addresses remain:
e-mail: afsi@interport.net
web site: http://www.afsi.org/afsi
Please contact us at our new home.
Your comments, suggestions, and
questions are always welcome.
|
|
