Insight: Has Iran ended Israel's Begin Doctrine?

Menachem Begin did not pull his punches. In 1981, as work neared completion on an Iraqi nuclear reactor that Israel believed would produce plutonium for warheads, the Israeli prime minister dispatched eight F-16 bombers to destroy the plant. Begin later said that the raid was proof his country would "under no circumstances allow the enemy to develop weapons of mass-destruction against our people".

The event defined a strategy that became known as the "Begin Doctrine" and is best summed up by the phrase "the best defense is forceful preemption."

Israel's message is now more guarded. In a civil defense drill of unprecedented scale last June, sirens summoned schoolchildren to shelters, radars searched the skies for computer-simulated missile salvoes, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's cabinet descended into the Jerusalem foothills to inaugurate a nuclear bunker with a mock war-session.

Why would a country that has long vowed to stop its foes attaining nuclear weapons need a nuclear bunker? The question highlights a new, reluctant restraint that has quietly infused Israeli decision-making in recent years as regional threats have grown more complex and sapped the applicability of classic force of arms. Nowhere is this felt more than in the Netanyahu government's posture toward Iran.

The spin of the Islamic republic's uranium centrifuges stirs mortal fear in the Jewish state. In defiance of western pressure to curb the project's bomb-making potential, Iran has pushed on with its nuclear program, saying it has no hostile designs. The International Atomic Energy Agency will say this week that Iran now has the ability to build a nuclear weapon, the Washington Post has reported. Israeli officials have long hinted they may launch a preemptive strike.

The Iranians are the wiliest, most insidious bunch of rogues, rapscallions, ne'er do-wells in memory having managed to extend their power and influence on the world stage far greater than it would otherwise warrant. They are reviled, feared by Saudi Arabia, throughout the Arab world, it's bent on emerging as uncontested military power, acquisition of nuclear weaponry is causing sleepless nights within political, military establishments like nothing in memory.

Where Iran has been most successful is the area in which it threatens Israel more and more each day, Iranian strategies of which have proven hugely problematic for Israel. Israel hadn't, hasn't developed any real effective military option in dealing with Hezbollah's missile attacks during the recent war against Lebanon. Another aspect of the way Iran has pigeon-holed Israel is in the quality of fierce very-well fighting men, the implementation of highly successful tactics in arm-to arm combat had inflicted such huge losses on the Israel infantry, a one day-loss of over 200 men had Israel call off the land campaign they called off their land campaign. Israel is very much aware of Iran's ability to inflict terrible damage and knows they're not to be trifled with. Israel, their intelligence agencies, Mossad, Shin Beth, are known to get their man, to always take action against attack on Israel to ensure it never happens again. But in the aftermath of the Iranian bombing of Israel's facilities in Argentina, no response from Israel, Mossad was made and that's because Iran is not one to be trifled with.

And so now imagine the scenario if, when Israel does attack Iran. The repercussions of an Israeli attack on Iranian nuclear facilities, even if they prove to be 100% effective in destroying them all,it will no doubt initiate an chain of events on a global scale unprecedented in history.

Taking the myriad of consequences that such an attack would wreak out of the discussion, merely contemplating one single aspect of just such an attack, the price of oil, you've got enough doomsday scenarios to keep you quivering under your bed for quite some time.

Once the attack on Iran begins, Nasrallah, Iranian backed Hezbollah leader I assure you will not be demonstrating any restraint on launching his stockpile of 15,000+ rockets he says is n his possession.

The reality of what will occur after just such an attack are probably worse than we could contemplate.

"...merely contemplating one single aspect of just such an attack, the price of oil,..."

Not a problem.

U.S. Energy Information Administration
"How dependent are we on foreign oil?
The United States imported about 49% of the petroleum,1 which includes crude oil and refined petroleum products, that we consumed during 2010. About half of these imports came from the Western Hemisphere. Our dependence on foreign petroleum has declined since peaking in 2005."

Besides, the oil for invading, occupying and denazifying Iran is all ready--that and much more.

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