Israel's plan to use a nuclear weapon during the Six Day War

[MillCreek]

https://www.wilsoncenter.org/publication/the-1967-six-day-war

http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/06/05/israels-secret-plan-to-nuke-the-egyptian-desert-215228

They had planned a demonstration detonation in the Sinai desert.

[RevDisk]

General gist seemed to be, detonate a stationary nuclear device and bluff that you have a working nuclear arsenal.

Israel's current policy of denying they have nuclear weapons apparently pretty much due to German policy. Germany gave them the industrial equipment necessary to make nukes, essentially under the proviso that they don't become an official nuclear country which would invoke non-proliferation concerns. If Israel is officially a non-nuclear country, well, obviously non-proliferation is not a concern. Israel also buys German subs and allegedly maintains their operational nuclear arsenal at sea.

The Germans weren't stupid, they just needed a fig leaf and obviously felt a moral obligation. I will say this. Good for Germany for quietly making up for the sins of recent past.

Excellent series on the subject:
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/israel-deploys-nuclear-weapons-on-german-built-submarines-a-836784.html


The only part I don't get is why people have any questions about the circumstances. The Arab and Islamic countries around them want them destroyed. Either as a country, or as a people. Or both, of course. Israel does not want to go through another genocide. Shocking that. Only nuclear weapons are a pretty good guarantee that Arabic and Islamic countries won't invade in terms large enough to commit genocide. If said countries do not commit genocide against Israel, there seems to be no issue. I don't think anyone seriously believes Israel will intentionally pursue an unprovoked first strike policy.

Some folks are worried about the rest of the ME getting nukes. Now that's a valid worry. Israel is very unlikely to use nukes first and without cause. Other countries in the ME, who knows. Pakistan and India so far haven't nuked each other. Iran still stencils "Death to Israel" on their conventional missiles, so perhaps not a good gamble there.


 

[MillCreek]

^^^Ooh!  I just spend many interesting minutes reading Der Speigel article series.  So the Israelis will be using a cruise missile to deliver their seaborne nuclear weapons.

[RevDisk]

^^^Ooh!  I just spend many interesting minutes reading Der Speigel article series.  So the Israelis will be using a cruise missile to deliver their seaborne nuclear weapons.

Yeah. I mean, ballistic missiles are large and hard to build. Cruise missiles are expensive but easier (ish). Plus you can test them without freaking out the world.

If they were land base, the Palestinians would be trying to bomb the hell out of the silos.

It's not like Israel needs to nuke China or Canada. Sane countries are mostly fine with Israel keeping a handful of nukes in order to toast anyone coming to wipe them off the map. As long as they keep a low profile and don't do anything stupid, the status quo won't change.

[HankB]

Interesting read.

I wasn't aware of Israeli nuke plans in 1967, but I remember seeing a story that Israel considered - seriously - using a nuke in 1973 during the Yom Kippur war when there was some doubt as to whether or not IDF would be able to stop the Egyptians who were attacking through the Sinai.