US Army Confirms Israeli Nukes

[annabanana]

Source: Military.com

The Army has let slip one of the worst-kept secrets in the world -- that Israel has the bomb.

Officially, the United States has a policy of "ambiguity" regarding Israel's nuclear capability. Essentially, it has played a game by which it neither acknowledges nor denies that Israel is a nuclear power.

But a Defense Department study completed last year offers what may be the first time in a unclassified report that Israel is a nuclear power. On page 37 of the U.S. Joint Forces Command report, the Army includes Israel within "a growing arc of nuclear powers running from Israel in the west through an emerging Iran to Pakistan, India, and on to China, North Korea, and Russia in the east."

The Israeli newspaper Haaretz, in a March 8 article on the report, observed: "It is virtually unheard of for a senior military commander, while in office, to refer to Israel's nuclear status. In December 2006, during his confirmation hearings as Secretary of Defense, Robert Gates referred to Israel as one of the powers seen by Iran as surrounding it with nuclear weapons. But once in office, Gates refused to repeat this allusion to Israel, noting that when he used it he was ‘a private citizen.' "



Read more: http://www.military.com/news/article/March-2009/us-army-confirms-israeli-nukes.html?col=1186032369115

[Why Syzygy]

1. And, the play the American citizen for a dupe game continues.

We are really ignorant, aren't we? Imagine what it would be like to be informed.

[Jester Messiah]

10. Willfully, aggresively ignorant in some cases.

The way some people avoid the truth you'd think it was poison.

[Why Syzygy]

11. I forgot this

:sarcasm:

[ixion]

2. I wasn't aware that this was a 'secret'... I thought it was common knowledge

but, then, I abstain from Kool-Aid® drinking. ;)

[meuniermr]

32. This is REALLY OLD news.

[WillParkinson]

3. OMG....

Perhaps we should invade them.

[Platypus]

4. No accident

This is clearly a deliberate change in policy. The obvious question is why. The obvious answer is to intimidate Iran. There was never a policy to hide this fact so much as an intention to wait until a moment when it would be strategically useful to acknowledge it.

[tbyg52]

18. I think you're right, and it scares me.

Of course, *Israel* scares me! (The government and the fact that it has nukes, not the people.)

[Amonester]

22. Iran is intimidated by this since a long time.

Didn't have to be said "officially" ...

They've been intimidated long ago by the anglo-s_axis_of_ev_oil imperialist plutocrats of which the BFEE has always been a "commanding" force...

Apparently, Iran is looking for nuclear power to produce energy, and since they have no test sites for h-bombs (like North Korea have/had, for example), and since sattelite spies in space haven't photographed any such testing sites, why should anyone believe the lies of the propagandist right-wing media?

[lynnertic]

33. Huh, and I was sitting here thinking it was a change in policy to speak the truth,

for once.

[Mr. Hyde]

5. and in other news, it has been confirmed that the earth is actually round.

who knew?

[Soylent Brice]

6. water is wet. sky is blue. grass is green.

[underpants]

7. 'Sometimes a show of strength by one side can really clarify things

http://www.ontheissues.org/Archive/Price_of_Loyalty_George_W__Bush.htm

On Foreign Policy: Tilt back toward Israel
President Bush echoed the view: 'We're going to correct the imbalances of the previous administration on the Mideast conflict. We're going to tilt back toward Israel." Bush continued, 'If the two sides don't want peace, there is no way we can force them.' Colin Powell said, 'a pullback by the US would unleash Sharon and the Israeli army.' ; Bush added, 'Sometimes a show of strength by one side can really clarify things
Source: The Price of Loyalty, by Ron Suskind, p. 71-72

[shadowknows69]

8. Ruh Roh Raggy!

[Kalyan]

9. help needed - why is US pro-Israel?

can someone explain why US citizens/politicians are so sensitive on any topic related to Israel? Why does US always have to carry Israel's agenda? In the UN, US has veto-ed quite a few anti-Israel motions.

[loveandlight]

12. good question

I've never understood that either. It can't just be about the Holocaust and supporting a Jewish state, there has to be more to it and I've never quite understood why it is so intense.

[Kalyan]

15. not rhetorical

my question wasn't rhetorical. i am not a US citizen and hence am amazed at the distance that US goes to support Israel (for most part, i agree)

[truebrit71]

19. Because Israel is the only "friend" the US has in the region...

...at least, that's the official rationale...

[Kalyan]

20. not true ...

Jordan has always been pro-US. In fact, US added Jordan to the list of it's "Major Non-NATO allies". Egypt also has the same status (1989 - received it along with Israel). Bahrain (2002) and Kuwait (2004) have been recent additions.

So, major non-NATO allies are not friends, huh?

According to the definition - Major non-NATO ally (MNNA) is a designation given by the United States government to exceptionally close allies who have close strategic working relationships with American forces but are not members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

[truebrit71]

21. Jordan has never been as "pro-US" as Israel...

...hence the "special relationship"...plus the US hasn't given/sold nukes to Jordan...

[Selatius]

24. The US never sold nukes to Israel. The Israelis had a clandestine program to make it themselves. nt

[mbperrin]

25. Brits helped.

http://archive.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2005/8/4/91522.shtml
BBC: How Britain Helped Israel Get the Bomb
NewsMax.com Wires
Thursday, Aug. 4, 2005
LONDON -- Britain secretly sold Israel a key ingredient for its nuclear program in the 1950s, according to official documents uncovered by the British Broadcasting Corp.

The BBC's Newsnight program, broadcast late Wednesday, said government papers held at the National Archive show Britain shipped 20 tons of heavy water to Israel in 1959. The program said the water was vital for the production of plutonium at Israel's secret Dimona nuclear reactor in the Negev desert.

<snip>
In 1986 former technician Mordechai Vanunu gave information and pictures of the Dimona facility to London's Sunday Times. On the basis of his revelations, experts concluded that Israel has the world's sixth-largest stockpile of nuclear weapons, consisting of hundreds of warheads. Vanunu was freed in April after spending 18 years in prison for espionage and treason for divulging that information.

Because it has resisted international pressure to sign the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, Israel does not formally have to declare itself as a weapons state or agree to any curbs on its nuclear activities.

<more at the link>

[Megahurtz]

29. LOL n/t

[shadowknows69]

27. Shot in the dark here...Religion or resources

All conflicts and the peripheral alliances of that conflict usually comes down to one or the other, and many times both.

[RaleighNCDUer]

28. Originally, because it was the only democracy in the region.

It was our anti-Soviet proxy.

Now it is simply reflexive habit - kind of like mission drift. The original intent is lost and we actively work against democratic forces, both in the general region and in Israel itself, to protect its favored status.

[Thothmes]

34. Just a guess

what is the Jewish population of the United States vs. the Palestinian population of the United States. What would the electorial fall out to an administration the dumped a pro-Israel stance for one of pro-Palestinian.

[wackywaggin]

13. IT seems to me that this cat was let out of the bag

on purpose. Some propeganda war has been brewing between the US and Israel for some unknown reason. I think this controversy is all about Iran, as I think Israel would like to hit Iran unjustly and by suprise,ballistically with limited nuclear warheads, but the US is saying no because the economic and political instabilities of doing this are too great. Imagine what a full blown war with Iran would do to oil prices at a time when many are struggling here in the US, not to mention the humanatarian loss and ethical considerations of an
Israeli attack.

:smoke:

[iamthebandfanman]

14. ummm people didnt know this ? n/t

[Sandrine for you]

16. Bomb bomb bomb Israel .

[tbyg52]

17. Oopsie.... Well, I guess Helen's question is answered! ;-> nt

[K8-EEE]

23. i don't understand the whole "Israel can do whatever they want" thing

Especially when we use fake "WMD" crap to do what we did to Iraq.

[Purveyor]

26. "By law, the U.S. would have to cease providing billions of dollars in foreign aid to Israel..."

From the article:

By law, the U.S. would have to cease providing billions of dollars in foreign aid to Israel if it determined the country had a nuclear weapons program. That's because the so-called Symington Amendment, passed in 1976, bars assistance to countries developing technology for nuclear weapons proliferation.

Given the U.S.'s long history of selective blindness when it comes to Israeli nukes, it's unlikely that the Joint Operating Environment 2008 report compiled by the Army amount to much more than a minor faux pas.

[Oak2004]

30. How then are we providing aid to our "friend" Pakistan? nt

[Zhade]

31. Mordecai Vanunu is a hero.

NT!

[peace_to_world]

35. Everbody knows that

I have a question: Iran's nuclear program is questioned very much by US but not Israel's why?