Israel's preemptive strategy endangers global peace

Having shown its thumbs for decades to the UNSC Resolutions 242 and 338 that demanded unconditional Israeli withdrawal from all territories occupied in the 1967 war, Israel chose a strategy to spread the conflict beyond its borders.

The attack on Syria also comes on the heel of Israel's failure in stemming the tide of the Palestinian Intifada and the US-UK stagnation in Iraq. The US-UK-Israel act in concert in the Middle East and the attack could not have taken place without US' nod, as was seen from the US' stand following Syria's request to condemn the attack in the UNSC.

Tap here to add The Daily Star as a trusted source

The strategy behind this escalation is simple; Iraq decapitated, Syria and Iran remain the two other nations to stand by the Palestinians. While the IAEA has begun to tighten nooses against Iran, Israel sought to draw Syria into the fray to spark a major conflagration in the Mid-East to prolong US-UK presence in Iraq.

Before the First and Second World Wars, high stake escalation games of this nature were played to sort out major geopolitical ambitions of militarily superior nations by turning small irritations into major conflicts. The Mid-East seems to be heading inexorably toward the end of such a dreadful precipice.

Evolution of a 'blackmail strategy'

Israel had used its fusion prowess to intimidate and blackmail neighbours since the late 1970s. Simon Peres, former Israeli Prime Minister, confessed that, "In 1979, during the peace talks with Egypt, one of Anwar Sadat's assistants admitted to the Israeli deputy prime minister, Yoga Yaldin, and to then defence minister (later president), Ezer Weizman, that Egypt's decision to talk peace had definitely been influenced by the Dimona Project." The Dimona project contains Israel's nuclear research hub.

A favourite notion in the evolution of nuclear strategy is that the best way to dissuade an enemy from using an obnoxious weapon is to preserve an option of reprisal in kind. The fear of reprisals encouraged restraint over the use of gas during Second World War.

Israel knows that monopoly in a particular type of terror weapon dower an added advantage against an adversary not equipped with such firepower. The West used this stratagem over the last half-a century while dealing with weaker nations.

This strategic advantage propelled Israel in 1967 to wipe out the airforces of neighbouring states in a series of preemptive attacks. In 1982, another preemptive Israeli strike destroyed Iraq's Osirak reactor. And, by invading Lebanon in the same year, Israel managed to get the US involved in the Lebanese conflict. The US withdrew from Lebanon the same year only after 261 marines died from a single suicide bomb attack.

Consequently, despite the importance of nuclear deterrence having waned considerably at the end of the Cold War, many weaker nations developed worrisome sensibilities against the US and the Israeli excesses in a global system devoid of any credible balance of power.

During the Cold War, militarily weaker nations were shielded by a stable balance of power, which the so-called unipolarity had eluded them. The weaker nations' threat perception heightened further since the early 1990s.

In 1991, Iran declared in the OIC meeting that, ' Since Israel continues to possess nuclear weapons, we the Muslims must cooperate to produce an atom bomb.' The theory had a familiar ring with the Pakistani rationale that sought an 'Islamic bomb' to counter the twin threats emanating from the Jewish and the Hindu bombs possessed by Israel and India respectively.

Syria endorsed the Iranian scheme, only to be listed by the US as a 'rouge state' along with Iran. However, the fallout of this expressed Iranian intent echoed with a bang in the Western capitals. Some Western scholars even went to the extent to say, "Islam would end up playing nuclear Russian roulette with Hinduism in South Asia, and with Zionism in the Middle East."

Credible deterrence

A popular perception in the developing world is that the US backtracked from attacking North Korea due to the latter's possession of nuclear deterrence while Iraq was attacked due to it's inability to hit back the US.

The same rationale is said to have prevented a major conflagration between India and Pakistan since 1971 despite Pakistan being much weaker in conventional military power. While such an assertion remains to be probed, the nuclear strategy has evolved within a 'balance of terror' paradigm, that, ' any first strike by an adversary will be reprised in kind, making the anticipated gains from such attacks costlier and meaningless.'

An understanding of Arab political dynamic can be misplaced unless the Palestinian conflict is used as a yardstick to gauge the convoluted proclivities of Arab nation-states governed by regimes ranging from the ultra left Arab Baathist to the fanatical Islamic fringes.

The post-Shah Iran became so attached to the Palestinian cause that the very first foreign guest to visit Tehran after the 1979 Iranian revolution was Yaser Arafat. Iran also aids the Hizbollah guerrillas to prevent Israeli occupation of Lebanon, as does Syria. Israeli excesses compelled these two diverse ideological trends to act in unison.

Syria is not known for harbouring a nuclear ambition. But, Iran's quest for such a deterrence dates back to the 1980s; after Egypt's Arab leadership was crushed by the Camp David treaty of 1978, leaving a void to be filled by some one else.

The post-Camp David Middle East was thus left in the lurch for decades to mourn over its strategic imbalance with Israel. And, following Iraq's defeat in the 1980-88 war with Iran, and Iraq's 1991 invasion of Kuwait having ended in further disaster, Iran took the lead to emerge as a regional power. The Iranian revolution being anti-US in its intent and manifestation, presence of US troops in the Mid East posed a major threat to the Iranian political leadership from the outset.

Israel's nuclear stockpile

Viewed from the trends of Israeli militarisation, the Iranian ambition to go nuclear seems a reactive one. Soon after the 1973 Arab-Israel war, Israel armed its MGM-55C Lance missiles with nuclear warheads. And, by the early 1980s, Israel had 12 Lance-transporter-erector launchers and at least 36 missiles armed with nuclear warhead. The technology came from the US army's W-70 nuclear variety.

Israel also armed a number of battlefield weapons, including 175 and 203 mm cannons, with nuclear artillery. Israel's nuclear artillery capability includes enhanced radiation variants, which are forbidden for use by the laws of war. In the early 1980s, Israel equipped its Jericho surface- to- surface missiles with 1,000-1,500 pound nuclear warheads. While the IAEA and the US now squeeze Iran to stay away from the nuclear course, the US is yet to say a word about the Israeli stockpile of about 200 plutonium weapons.

Over the decades, Israel had perfected its nuclear research to boost the yield of its fission weapons in excess of 100 kilotons and achieved a capability to build a fusion weapon of its own. The IAEA is aware of Israel's clandestine WMD programme, but feels handicapped to confront the Jewish state due to the US' unqualified backing for it.

Since the early 1990s, Israel's Jericho-2 missiles became capable of hitting targets 1500 km away, with a 1500 kiloton payload. The Jericho-3 was tested in 2000. It traveled 2,500 km with 100 kg payload. Even the Mediterranean city of Tripoli is under its effective range.

It's only natural amid such a strategic imbalance that someone would strive to catch up with Israel in bringing about some sort of symmetry in the regional balance of power. And, unless that expected balance is restored, peace in the Middle East will remain ever elusive.

The nuclear frenzy also has a lot to do with the US' physical intervention in the Mid East, and, having scoured Iraq unsuccessfully to locate the WMD, the US is buying the Sharon theory that 'Iraq's WMD is hidden in Syria.' This seems to offer a plausible reason as to why Israel chose to attack Syria 30 years after the conclusion of the 1973 war.

Does Iran too have a bomb?

A commonly observed tactic in the West is to splash intelligence reports in the media to test waters and mallow-up public opinion. Although most of the reports later get discarded as being hyped- up, fabricated and concocted, they do help create demons out of some one the US and Israel loathe.

Of the victims of such media onslaught, Colonel Nasser (in the 1960s), Gaddafi (in the 1970s), Arafat (in the 1980s), Khomeini (in the 1990s) and Saddam (in recent years) top the list. A non-state actor, Osama Bin Laden, is the latest 'malefactor' to have earned the US' wrath.

The Iraqi WMD case proved how sinisterly the Western media behave under the influence of their intelligence services. Iran, Libya and Syria have been on the receiving end of such Western propaganda for decades. And, ever since President Rafsanjani signed a nuclear collaboration pact with China during his Beijing visit in September 1992, the US and the UK launched an unsavoury media and diplomatic offensive to prove Iran's nuclear capability.

Reports claimed that China supplied nuclear technology and information to Iran, trained Iranian scientists and engineers and provided Iran with a calutron- enriching- device to produce bombs.

North Korea then agreed, claimed such reports, to supply Iran with 600-mile range Nodong-1 missile in 1993. In 1995, after sustained US pressures, China suspended the sale of two 300-MW reactors, but the North Koreans shipped Scud missiles and aided Iran in building its own capability to produce the same.

Indigenous Iranian missiles are now capable of hitting Tel Aviv, say the reports. If the reports were true, why did Iran sign a protocol in 1995 with the Russian federation to conduct peaceful nuclear researches? Heaven perhaps knows better.

Subsequent revelations also had it that Iran possessed a small 27 kilowatt Chinese supplied neutron source research reactor and subcritical assemblies with 900 grams of highly enriched uranium at its Esfahan Nuclear center. The center also contains a heavy water zero-power reactor, a high water subcritical reactor and a graphite subcritical reactor. Besides, the University of Tehran is reported to house a 5 megawatt, high water reactor that Iran purchased from Argentina.

Rumours also abound, as they did with respect to Iraq, that Iran might have a bomb or two in the basement. Hence the hurry-scurry by the IAEA to find excuses to launch preemptive attacks against Iran too.

Impact on Asia

The Israeli strain of preemptive attack is dangerous for world peace due to the precedent it creates to endanger many weaker nations having disputes with the nuclear armed ones. Precisely due to that, China took a principled stand not to allow nuclear monopoly to the West until its signing of the NPT in 1992. The North Korean bomb was allowed to sprout under such a liberalised Chinese attitude.

India too sought to deprive the West of a nuclear monopoly. The 'meeting of minds' on this particular issue between China and India prompted China to help India (with which it fought a war in 1962) with 130-150 metric tons of heavy water (D20) between 1982-87 and Low Enriched Uranium (LEU) and uranium enrichment services for Tarapur nuclear project in 1995.

The latter deals were concluded under the IAEA safeguard while the D20 was not. India possesses an impressive array of nuclear stockpile; consisting Agni-1, Agni-2 and the Surya missiles, each capable of hitting targets as far away as 1500, 2000, 3250 km, respectively. Each of these missiles can carry a payload of, respectively, 1000, 1000 and 1500 kg.

Pakistan's missile technology is even superior to India and there is a reason for it. The Pakistani deterrence is designed to shield the Arabs in the instance Israel threaten its Arab neighbours with nuclear strike. The first $36 million contribution for the Pakistani bomb came from Libya.

Today, Islamabad holds in its armoury the Shaheen-2 and Gauri-3 missiles, each with an effective ranges of 2500 and 3500 km respectively. Pakistan is working to replicate the Nodong- 3 variety of North Korea that can hit targets 4,000 km away. As it is, the Pakistani missiles can hit Tel Aviv and Haifa.

The above scenarios highlight the magnitude of dangers involved should the Mid East conflict spin out of control to degenerate into a major war. Hence, the UNSC should strive to compel Israel to comply with all the resolutions it had flouted over the decades to ensure a semblance of fair play in the precarious global order.

Author and columnist M. Shahidul Islam is a Senior Assistant Editor of The Daily Star.