Israel’s Secret Iran Attack Plan: Electronic Warfare
Eli Lake The Daily Beast Nov 16, 2011 6:28 PM EST
Israel has been building stealthy, multibillion-dollar electronic weapons
that could be deployed if Israel attacks Iran's nuclear sites, U.S.
intelligence officials tell Eli Lake.
For much of the last decade, as Iran methodically built its nuclear program,
Israel has been assembling a multibillion-dollar array of high-tech weapons
that would allow it to jam, blind, and deafen Tehran's defenses in the case
of a pre-emptive aerial strike.
A U.S. intelligence assessment this summer, described to The Daily Beast by
current and former U.S. intelligence officials, concluded that any Israeli
attack on hardened nuclear sites in Iran would go far beyond airstrikes from
F-15 and F-16 fighter planes and likely include electronic warfare against
Iran’s electric grid, Internet, cellphone network, and emergency frequencies
for firemen and police officers.
For example, Israel has developed a weapon capable of mimicking a
maintenance cellphone signal that commands a cell network to “sleep,”
effectively stopping transmissions, officials confirmed. The Israelis also
have jammers capable of creating interference within Iran’s emergency
frequencies for first responders.
In a 2007 attack on a suspected nuclear site at al-Kibar, the Syrian
military got a taste of this warfare when Israeli planes “spoofed” the
country’s air-defense radars, at first making it appear that no jets were in
the sky and then in an instant making the radar believe the sky was filled
with hundreds of planes.
Israel also likely would exploit a vulnerability that U.S. officials
detected two years ago in Iran's big-city electric grids, which are not
“air-gapped”—meaning they are connected to the Internet and therefore
vulnerable to a Stuxnet-style cyberattack—officials say.
A highly secretive research lab attached to the U.S. joint staff and
combatant commands, known as the Joint Warfare Analysis Center (JWAC),
discovered the weakness in Iran’s electrical grid in 2009, according to one
retired senior military intelligence officer. This source also said the
Israelis have the capability to bring a denial-of-service attack to nodes of
Iran’s command and control system that rely on the Internet.
Tony Decarbo, the executive officer for JWAC, declined comment for this
story. The likely delivery method for the electronic elements of this
attack would be an unmanned aerial vehicle the size of a jumbo jet. An
earlier version of the bird was called the Heron, the latest version is
known as the Eitan. According to the Israeli press, the Eitan can fly for 20
straight hours and carry a payload of one ton. Another version of the drone,
however, can fly up to 45 straight hours, according to U.S. and Israeli
officials.
Unmanned drones have been an integral part of U.S. wars in Iraq,
Afghanistan, and Pakistan, gathering intelligence and firing missiles at
suspected insurgents. But Israel's fleet has been specially fitted for
electronic warfare, according to officials.
“They would have to take out radar and anti-aircraft. They could also attack
with missiles and their drone fleet.”
The Eitans and Herons would also likely be working with a special Israeli
air force unit known as the Sky Crows, which focuses only on electronic
warfare. A 2010 piece in The Jerusalem Post quoted the commander of the
electronic warfare unit as saying, “Our objective is to activate our systems
and to disrupt and neutralize the enemy’s systems.”
Fred Fleitz, who left his post this year as a Republican senior staffer who
focused on Iran at the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence,
said in his meetings with Israeli defense and intelligence officials, they
would always say all options were on the table.
"I think Israel has the capabilities with their air force and mid-air
refueling to take on these sites," said Fleitz, who is now managing editor
of Lignet.com. "They would have to take out radar and anti-aircraft. They
could also attack with missiles and their drone fleet."
Whatever Israel ultimately decides to do about Iran’s program, one mission
for now is clear. A senior Israeli official told The Daily Beast this month
that one important objective of Israel's political strategy on Iran was to
persuade Iranian decision makers that a military strike against their
nuclear infrastructure was a very real possibility. "The only known way to
stop a nuclear program is to have smashing sanctions with a credible
military threat. Libya is the best example of this," this official said.
At the same time, if past practice is any guide, the Israelis would not
likely strike at the same moment that their officials are discussing the
prospect in the press. In other words, if Israel is openly discussing a
military strike, it is unlikely to be imminent.
But if Israel goes radio silent—like it did in when it attacked a suspected
nuclear site in Iraq in 1981—that may be an early warning sign that a strike
is nearing.
When Sam Lewis was U.S. ambassador to Israel during the transition from the
Carter to Reagan administrations, he warned the new administration there was
a chance then-Prime Minister Menachem Begin might bomb the Osirak nuclear
reactor in Iraq.
“I had given a full alert to the new administration about the dangers,”
Lewis recalled in an interview. “We’d been having discussions with the
Israelis about how they wanted to stop the project, there was a lot of news
and then it all dried up.”
Lewis and his staff had moved on. Then without warning on June 7, 1981, in
something called Operation Opera, Israeli jets flew in the dead of night via
Jordanian air space and incinerated the nuclear facility that was under
construction southeast of Baghdad. “I did feel after the fact that we should
have assumed this bombing was going to take place,” Lewis said. “After it
was over, I was not surprised, I was annoyed by having been misled by the
quiet as it were.”
There may be a lesson for the Obama administration as it tries to calibrate
what Israel will do on Iran. Since taking office, the president has made
major efforts to avoid any surprises in the relationship with Israel,
particularly on the issue of Iran. Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu, for example, tasked their first national security advisers to
establish an unprecedented system for regular consultation between the two
countries, featuring regular video-teleconferences.
They formed a standing committee on Iran as well, to check the progress of
sanctions, share intelligence, and keep both sides informed. Despite all of
this, Netanyahu has refused to give any assurance to Obama or his top
cabinet advisers that he would inform or ask permission before launching an
attack on Iran that would likely spur the Iranians to launch a terrorist
attack on the United States or Israel in response, according to U.S. and
Israeli officials familiar with these meetings. The Telegraph first reported
the tension over the weekend.
Defense Secretary Leon Panetta "expressed the desire for consultation on any
contemplated future Israeli military action, and [Ehud] Barak understood the
U.S. position,” said one official familiar with the discussions.
The Israelis may be coy this time around because of the experience of
then-Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. In 2007, the Israelis presented
what they considered to be rock-solid evidence that Syria was building a
covert nuclear facility at al-Kibar. They asked President Bush to bomb the
facility, according to the new memoir from Condoleezza Rice.
“The president decided against a strike and suggested a diplomatic course to
the Israeli prime minister,” she wrote. “Ehud Olmert thanked us for our
input but rejected our advice, and the Israelis then expertly did the job
themselves.”
One American close to the current prime minister said, “When Netanyahu came
into office, the understanding was they will not make the same mistake that
Olmert made and ask for something the president might say no to. Better to
ask forgiveness than to ask permission.”
===============
Eli Lake is the senior national-security correspondent for Newsweek and the
Daily Beast. He previously covered national security and intelligence for
the Washington Times. Lake has also been a contributing editor at The New
Republic since 2008 and covered diplomacy, intelligence, and the military
for the late New York Sun. He has lived in Cairo, Egypt, and traveled to war
zones in Sudan, Iraq, and Gaza. He is one of the few journalists to report
from all three members of President Bush's axis of evil: Iraq, Iran, and
North Korea.
For inquiries, please contact The Daily Beast at editorial@thedailybeast.com
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