Cordesman/Wilner, Iran & The Gulf Military Balance
AHC 6/3/12
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Israeli officials has since had to deal with growing warnings from the President, the Secretary of Defense, and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs that the US oppose an Israeli preventive strike. This led to a new series of conflicting statements by Israeli senior political figures, officials and officers, and made preventive strikes a key issue in Prime Minster Netanyahu’s visit to Washington in March 2012. One the one hand it led to uncertain press reports of detailed Israeli strike plans, claims Iran was developing ICBMs to attack the US, and that Israel would not notify the US if its did launch a preventive strike. On the other hand, it led a senior statesman like Israel’s President Shimon Peres to state that an Israeli strike might be necessary and that, 72 We need a total and clear commitment that the catastrophe of Iran will not create an impossible situation.. If you can achieve it by economic and political measures, yes, that’s the best way to start. But in order that the Iranians will take it seriously, you have to say, ‘Gentlemen, we’ll try the way which may be the best, but all the other options are on the table…You have to be decisive…You have to make a choice.”
All of these Israeli statements are hard to put in context. Like the US, Israeli experts and officials have never provide public statements revealing their estimates of what Iran’s ultimate force goals are, how many weapons it will have of what yield, and the progress it will have made in delivery systems. This means there is no unclassified basis for understanding the degree to which Israeli leaders and defense planners feel a combination of Israel’s undeclared nuclear forces, missile and air defenses, and support from the US in the form of additional missile defenses and an as yet undefined US extended regional deterrent could safely contain an Iranian threat and deter nuclear and missile attacks. Israeli Public Opinion Figure IV.72 through Figure IV.77 reflect Israeli public opinion regarding an Israeli strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities, as well as the potential aftermath thereof. These data show that there is no unified public opinion regarding such a strike, and that there is a wide range of disparate views among Jewish and non-Jewish Israelis alike.
FigureIV.72: Israeli Public Opinion Regarding a Strike on Iran’s Nuclear Facilities -1
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Jodi Rudoren, “Peres Says U.S. Must Put All Iran Options on Table,” New York Times, March 1, 2012, http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/02/world/middleeast/peres-says-us-must-put-all-iran-options-ontable.html?_r=1
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