IAEA nuclear experts visit Iran - but no nuclear sites

Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Martin Dempsey told CNN on Feb. 19 that it would be “destabilizing” and “not prudent” to launch an attack at this time and said the US has so far been unsuccessful at persuading Israel to give up the possibility of an attack on Iran. 

Israel has indicated that if the US wants it to stop making such preparations, the US needs to increase pressure on Iran further. "We made it clear that if we don't increase the pressure on the Iranians now, we might be in a situation in which the question how Iran obtained nuclear weapons would become an issue for commentators and historians," an Israeli official told Haaretz, implying that without more pressure, Iran will achieve weapons capability. 

Yesterday, The New York Times published a story laying out the steps necessary for a successful Israeli attack that made it clear current and former US military officials and exports thought it would be an extremely difficult task, although there were admissions that the US might not have full insight into Israel’s capabilities.

Should Israel decide to launch a strike on Iran, its pilots would have to fly more than 1,000 miles across unfriendly airspace, refuel in the air en route, fight off Iran’s air defenses, attack multiple underground sites simultaneously – and use at least 100 planes.

That is the assessment of American defense officials and military analysts close to the Pentagon, who say that an Israeli attack meant to set back Iran’s nuclear program would be a huge and highly complex operation.

…

“All the pundits who talk about ‘Oh, yeah, bomb Iran,’ it ain’t going to be that easy,” said Lt. Gen. David A. Deptula, who retired last year as the Air Force’s top intelligence official and who planned the American air campaigns in 2001 in Afghanistan and in the 1991 Gulf War.

As one of many steps to increase pressure on Iran, the European Union agreed in January to impose an embargo on imports of Iranian oil, scheduled to go into effect this summer. In retaliation, Iran announced a ban on oil exports to Britain and France this week and said it might extend the ban to other countries unless they agree to “guarantees of payments, long-term contracts, and a ban on unilateral cancellation of contracts by buyers,” the Associated Press reports.

Iranian oil exports are much more critical to countries such as Spain and Italy, which get one-eighth of their oil from Iran, and Greece, which gets one-third of its oil from Iran, than they are to Britain or France, The New York Times notes.

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