Israel ‘would not be able to destroy Iran’s nuclear programme with pre-emptive air strike’

“This is not going to be one strike and they are out, not like Syria or
Iraq where facilities were not underground, it is much harder than that,”
said Malcolm Chalmers of the Royal United Services Institute.

“And the Iranians are experts in building reinforced concrete because of
their long problems with earthquakes.

“But air strikes could destroy power plants, supply facilities,
communications and the centrifuges themselves would be very sensitive to
blast. They could do quite a lot of damage which would set back the
programme for a period.”

Senior British officials have warned that Israel could catch its allies
offguard with a strike. “We underestimated the things that the Israelis
have done in the past in sheer out-of-the-book daringness,” one said.

Options include a daring special forces strike, something Israel has done
successfully in the past. A commando raid could be launched from a ship
covertly carrying helicopters in the Persian Gulf or from a submarine.

“They have done it before and they are quite capable of doing off the
beaten track operations,” said a former SAS commander. “I wouldn’t
say it was impossible but I would be very surprised if they tried to do it,
it would be pretty high risk.” He added the raid, which would probably
involve the equivalent of a squadron – around 60 men – would only be able to
target one facility, potentially the uranium enrichment site at Fordow which
is under a mountain and difficult to hit from the air.

Other methods could include adapting Jericho nuclear missiles with
conventional warheads or submarine launched cruise missiles.

But Davis Lewin Political director of HJS, the American aligned think tank,
said he was “100 per cent certain” an air attack would succeed
without US assistance.

“One reason is that the Israeli Air Force has been cognisant of the need
for long range strategic bombing for a long time and is extremely adept at
making do with the technology it has in challenging missions.”

Israel appears to be involved in a successful covert assassination programme
targetting nuclear scientists.

Since 2007 there have been seven attempts on Iranian scientists five of which
ended in deaths. There was also a “blast” at a rocket storage
facility last November that killed 17 Revolutionary Guards including Gen
Hassan Moghaddam, a leading figure in the ballistic programme.

An insight into what Israel might attempt comes from an Israeli security
source who said: “Don’t think conventional; we are too smart for that.”

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