91bd8922454d…

That was pretty much my point. The Israelis would have to be pretty darn sure of what was at the target site before committing. Perhaps you are confused about what swipes are for: their purpose is to extract small amounts of materials for analysis. The implicit assumption is that much more such material exists at the location. For example, if a large but unknown shipment arrives, and later one can determine with reasonable confidence that the shipment contained nuclear materials [of a specific type, which the swipes might reveal], then the operative assumption would be that much larger quantities of the materials are present.

Israel would hardly risk war with Syria to go after a nominal target.

doriangrey on September 23, 2007 at 2:06 AM

I think its important to remember that Syria has very few original thoughts and its one natural resource is as a proxy for violence at Iran’s behest.

As a mercenary nation its reasonable to think that the first nuclear threats towards Israel would emanate from there and as they do Israel no doubt will methodically take them out.

The methodology of the threat and the response to that threat is going to be very wide ranging and ongoing not to mention evolution or escalation of such threats.

It would be very interesting to have a big picture view of the action but that’s not likely.

Syria is certainly guilty, Israel would not have expended the considerable effort they did arbitrarily.

We just won’t be privy to the details.

To reiterate:

Who would want to queer the denuclearizing process?

We cannot, cannot let extremist get weapons of mass destruction, whether they be a small group nor a country bent on self destruction like Iran.

Our future generations of Americans cannot be held to a nuclear hostage – remember they use their weapons – this isnt MAD of the 60′s its a new MAD of religious zealotry

Syria is really Israel’s problem, not ours. Likewise, in the short term, Iran is Israel’s problem. Long-term is a different matter.

The Times of London reports that prior to the Israeli air raid on Syria’s secret military compound near Dayr az-Zawr, Israeli commandos seized samples of nuclear material and laboratory analysis confirmed that the material was North Korean in origin. …

The Times of London purports to report on the details of the Israeli raid into Syria including a new “detail” that Israel seized some nuclear material. But as Hot Air and Israel Matzav point out, the reporter has been known for flights of fancy. (via…

Plus the facility might not have been much of a threat without the isotope, so why go to no small effort bomb it?

Of course its all supposition at this point and may always be.

Speakup on September 23, 2007 at 12:56 AM

Making a nuclear weapon is quite a bit harder than Hollywood has lead many people to believe. It isn’t just a matter of having the U235, there is quite a bit of special tooling involved.

Plus the radiation that the U235 puts off plays hell with electronics, makes them very unreliable. If NK was the source of Syria’s Fissile material just getting rid of the fissile material would not have been enough to prevent Syria from producing a bomb.

If NK transfered fissile material to Syria they find themselves in a very awkward position. As long as the world in general doesn’t know, the Syrians basically can blackmail the NK into continuing to provide them with fissile material.

Hence the need for Israel to destroy any Syrian facility involved in the assembly aspect of a nuclear device. Israel has certain security concerns it must address before it can show the world that they have caught Syria and NK in illegal nuclear technology proliferations.

They pretty much need to make sure that Syria doesn’t have another facility up and running that is also producing a bomb. They obviously think Syria does and they want to take it out as well.

What is quite telling is that Syria is more or less confirming that they do by the extremely limited manner in which they have responded to Israel destroying this facility. Syria obviously doesn’t want anyone asking them really pesky questions at this specific moment in time.

Or far more likely is the Israeli’s went in and stole the U235 and then bombed the facility where Syria was constructing their bomb and the missile that was to carry it.

doriangrey on September 22, 2007 at 11:20 PM

That being entirely possible though who knows how much material the Syrians had and the ability to move the isotope could have required heavier transportation than would be normal for a Commando team that was in a hurry on hostile ground.
I would bet that there may not have been casualties in the bombing raid but there probably were a lot of pointy things flying through the air when the Israeli S.O. came calling.
Plus the facility might not have been much of a threat without the isotope, so why go to no small effort bomb it?

Of course its all supposition at this point and may always be.

One wonders what would have happened if this ship had gone directly to Iran ?

William Amos on September 22, 2007 at 9:32 PM

Can we be one hundred percent sure another ship hasn’t?

Is it possible the NoKo-Syria shipment was a diversion from a NoKo-Iran shipment?

Judging from a stellar Israeli history in these matters, I hesitate to ask, but…

Could the Israelis have fallen for it?

They seized a snuke, probably meant for Nancy Palosium.

BDavis on September 22, 2007 at 11:30 PM

HA!

I can’t see Mossad running around Panmunjom.

Egfrow on September 22, 2007 at 9:23 PM

And that’s what makes them so effective.

;>

And the Syrians claimed there were no casualties?
The Israeli Commandos wouldn’t necessarily care if the Syrians found out they had taken Nuke material to begin with and maybe the Syrians then did hide it (buried in the desert?) and that’s where the air raid occurred, thus no casualties.

Speakup on September 22, 2007 at 11:06 PM

Or far more likely is the Israeli’s went in and stole the U235 and then bombed the facility where Syria was constructing their bomb and the missile that was to carry it.

lest it force Syria into a response and queer the North Korean denuclearization process.

Who would want to queer the denuclearizing process?

xit question: If it’s true, how did the Israelis access what must have been a very closely guarded compound and escape with nuke material without Syria knowing? And if Syria did know, or suspected, that they’d done so, why on earth did they keep shipping material in there instead of moving the nuclear storehouse somewhere else?

And the Syrians claimed there were no casualties?
The Israeli Commandos wouldn’t necessarily care if the Syrians found out they had taken Nuke material to begin with and maybe the Syrians then did hide it (buried in the desert?) and that’s where the air raid occurred, thus no casualties.