Jeffrey Lewis (aka Arms Control Wonk):
Why am I so unimpressed by these strikes? Israel and the US have failed to target significant elements of Iran's nuclear materials and production infrastructure. RISING LION and MIDNIGHT HAMMER are tactically brilliant, but may turn out to be strategic failures.Lewis says that so far as we know, Iran's store of highlly enriched uranium (60%) was in tunnels at a site that hasn't been attacked yet, but it may well have been moved, so right now we have no idea where it is. It still needs further refinement to get it to bomb grade, but Iran may have more centrifuges in other buried sites, so that isn't a major barrier. But the hardest thing about making a bomb isn't anything physical, it's knowledge. It's hard to bomb knowledge, and once a program is set up, you no longer need those top famous scientists, just a lot of skilled techs.
Let's say Iran decides to rush a bomb. Iran can install ~1.5 cascades a week. In six weeks, it could have 9 cascades of IR-6 machines. It would take those machines about 60 days to enrich all 400 kg to WGU. Altogether that's about five months.
I largely agree with Jeffrey here, and the same logic applies to the Iranian missile program. It appears Israel and US believed that Iran was at the cusp of deploying ICBMs (per @DefenseIntel) and large numbers of missiles, enough to overwhelm Israel.
So Israel has been targeting critical linkages in Iranian missile production, like mixing facilities to destroy difficult to make industrial planetary mixers. But these facilities can always be rebuilt, and sanctions can always be evaded.
Once the tech has been figured out, there is nothing stopping Iran from rebuilding everything that Israel has destroyed in five years - perhaps now with a more aggressive, North Korean style quick-launch missile posture.
Those who are defending the strike basically fall back on the "mow the grass" scenario:
They can also be hit again. It’s a mistake to view this as a one off campaign.To which Eveleth responds:
But that is my point. Israel seems willing to lock itself into a forever war they can never really win.
Which is why, I guess, Israel is hoping for Iranian regime change; because they don't see any other way to end the violence.
Since October 7, Israel has imposed major losses on three of its main military opponents: Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran, plus the Assad regime was overthrown by its own people (with Turkish help). Their military should feel good about their accomplishments.
But how much better is their political situation? The problem of the Palestinians remains, despite millions of Israelis praying every day that they will simply disappear. The Netanyu government would love to ethnically cleanse them out of Gaza, but that would mean finding someplace for them to go. Israel's successful belligerence has reinforced the admiration that fans of successful belligerence have long felt for them. But others are increasingly exasperated with them, and though the Trump administration may be trying hard to clamp down on pro-Palestinian protests, the anti-Israel sentiment is still common, including among some of Trump's biggest supporters. So far as I can tell, in the US at least antisemitism really seems to have gotten worse over the past decade.
No doubt Iran's military has been heavily damaged. Hundreds of missiles may have been destroyed. Perhaps its bomb program has been set back months or years. But I can't see how the attack on Iran has radically improved Israel's strategic situation. I also don't know what the strike has done for the US. Ok, we showed off our stealth bombers and our big bombs, and did a solid for our Israeli friends. But if Trump is serious about wanting to stop all Iranian enrichment, this is only one step and many more will be required. That would involve negotiations, as Trump himself has said many times. Have we made those negotiations harder or easier? Beats me.
2 comments:
Very interesting post and quite right, I think. Unless and until somebody somewhere like Farzan Sabet gets their way ("end this nauseating show, sign a humiliating peace, and be done with it"), this forever war is looking, well, pretty forever.
The problem of the Palestinians remains, despite millions of Israelis praying every day that they will simply disappear. The Netanyu government would love to ethnically cleanse them out of Gaza, but that would mean finding someplace for them to go.
They don't need to "go" anywhere. They just all need to die, and Israel "wins".
This is precisely why Netanyahu is actively waging a starvation campaign on Gaza. No one gets in, no one gets out. No food gets in. No humanitarian aid is allowed in. Israel is conducting a literal genocide via blockade, in a move that ANY other country would be unable to get away with in the international community - but which Israel can pull off entirely thanks to tacit American approval of the genocide, and subsequent military protection. It's a total siege.
And the dead are piling up like cordwood, in a population that is already roughly 50% children and minors, due to Israel's decades of indiscriminate bombing.
In a matter of months, every last Gazan will be dead.
This is an intentional act. This is a war crime. This is a crime against humanity. And the United States is willfully complicit in it.
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