Iran: From Regional Challenge to Global Threat A Jerusalem Center Anthology Brig.-Gen. (ret.) Dr. Shimon Shapira (ed.) with Amb. Dore Gold, Maj.-Gen. (ret.) Yaakov Amidror, Maj.-Gen. (ret.) Aharon Ze'evi Farkash, Brig.-Gen (ret.) Yossi Kuperwasser, Dr. Shmuel Bar, Uzi Rubin, Lt.-Col. (ret.) Michael Segall, Dr. Harold Rhode, Col. (ret.) Dr. Jacques Neriah, Amb. Zvi Mazel Published by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs at Smashwords Copyright 2012 Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs Other ebook titles by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs: Israel's Critical Security Requirements for Defensible Borders Israel's Rights as a Nation-State in International Diplomacy Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs 13 Tel Hai Street, Jerusalem, Israel Tel. 972-2-561-9281 Fax. 972-2-561-9112 Email: [email protected] – www.jcpa.org ISBN: 978-1-4657-5950-4 Production Director: Mark Ami-El Cover: Iran Nuclear Facility at Fordow * * * * * Contents Foreword – Shimon Shapira Part I – The Military Threat from Iran The Threat from Nuclear Weapons What Is Happening to the Iranian Nuclear Program? Dore Gold The U.S. National Intelligence Estimate on Iran and Its Aftermath: A Roundtable of Israeli Experts Yaakov Amidror, Aharon Ze'evi Farkash, and Yossi Kuperwasser The Limited Influence of International Sanctions on Iran's Nuclear Program Yossi Kuperwasser Iran Signals Its Readiness for a Final Confrontation Michael Segall Can Cold War Deterrence Apply to a Nuclear Iran? Shmuel Bar Other Iranian Military Capabilities New Developments in Iran's Missile Capabilities: Implications Beyond the Middle East Uzi Rubin The Revolutionary Guards' Qods Force – Mission Accomplished! Michael Segall The Iranian Navy, the Strait of Hormuz, and Beyond Dore Gold Does Iran's June 2011 Military Exercise Signal a New Defense Doctrine? Michael Segall Iran Holds Major Air Defense Drill Amid Tensions with Turkey Michael Segall Part II – Ideology in Islamic Iran The Emergence of Iran's Revolutionary Guards' Regime Dore Gold Is Iran a Role Model for Arab Revolutions? Michael Segall Revolutionary Guards' Influence Grows in Iran as Opposition Falters Michael Segall The Sources of Iranian Negotiating Behavior Harold Rhode Part III – Iran Spreads Its Tentacles Latin America: Iran's Springboard to America's Backyard Michael Segall An Iranian Intelligence Failure: Arms Ship in Nigeria Reveals Iran's Penetration of West Africa Jacques Neriah How Iran Helped Assad Suppress Syria's "Arab Spring" Michael Segall Iran Sees New Opportunity for Regional Domination Despite Turkish Competition Michael Segall Deteriorating Relations between Iran and Turkey Michael Segall Could the Kingdom of Bahrain Become an Iranian Pearl Harbor? Jacques Neriah Why Iran Is Pushing for a Shiite Victory in Bahrain Michael Segall Rising Tension between Iran and the Gulf States Zvi Mazel Part IV – The Iranian Threat on Israel's Northern Border Hizbullah: A Creation of Iran Hizbullah's Veneration of Iranian Leader Ali Khamenei Shimon Shapira Has Hizbullah Changed? The 7th Hizbullah General Conference and Its Continued Ideology of Resistance Shimon Shapira Ahmadinejad in Lebanon Shimon Shapira Countdown to a New Lebanon Crisis: Iran Sends a Signal to Obama through Beirut Shimon Shapira The Fantasy of Hizbullah Moderation Shimon Shapira Iran Changes the Balance of Power in Lebanon Michael Segall Hizbullah Today Hizbullah Discusses Its Operational Plan for War with Israel: Missile Fire on Tel Aviv and Conquest of the Galilee Shimon Shapira Iran Steps Up Arming Hizbullah Against Israel Jacques Neriah Hizbullah's Predicament in Light of Syria's Decline Shimon Shapira About the Authors About the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs * * * * * Foreword Shimon Shapira This anthology of thirty recent studies by eleven leading security and diplomatic experts outlines the Iranian threat to Israel, the Middle East region, and the West. The Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, a major Israeli think tank focusing on Israeli diplomacy and security issues, offers this collection of its most recent published studies to enable policy-makers, opinion-makers, academics, and students to become better informed about the many facets of the Iranian threat to world peace. Over the last decade many books have been written on the challenge posed by Iran to the West as a whole. But today these challenges have become more apparent than ever. Iran's progress in developing nuclear weapons is now openly acknowledged by the International Atomic Energy Agency, the UN watchdog, based in Vienna. Iran's efforts to reach beyond the Middle East in order to penetrate the Western Hemisphere reached new levels when the U.S. disclosed that the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) was seeking to work with a Mexican drug cartel in order to carry out a mass-casualty terrorist attack in the heart of Washington, D.C., aimed at the Saudi ambassador to the U.S. Finally, Iran's repeated threats to close off the Strait of Hormuz, and its naval maneuvers in that area, underlined how Tehran sought to use the dependence of the world on Persian Gulf oil to force the West to adopt new policies. These events together have made an updated analysis of Iranian policies more urgent than ever. Part I – "The Military Threat from Iran" – opens with a section focusing on the threat from an Iran armed with nuclear weapons. Dore Gold, President of the Jerusalem Center and former Israeli Ambassador to the UN, begins with a current description of "What Is Happening to the Iranian Nuclear Program?" He assesses the chances of the West increasing sanctions against Iran in order to deter it from developing nuclear weapons. Three senior Israel Defense Forces (IDF) officers – Maj.-Gen. (ret.) Yaakov Amidror, Maj.-Gen. (ret.) Aharon Ze'evi Farkash, and Brig.-Gen. (ret.) Yossi Kuperwasser follow with a critical look at the November 2007 "U.S. National Intelligence Estimate on Iran and its Aftermath." Farkash notes: "ironically, the NIE opens the way for Iran to achieve its military nuclear ambitions without any interference," while Kuperwasser concludes that the National Intelligence Estimate was "a very poor intelligence product." Kuperwasser, former Head of Research and Assessment for IDF Military Intelligence, then surveys "The Limited Influence of International Sanctions on Iran's Nuclear Program." Kuperwasser finds that "there is no indication that international sanctions can be relied upon as a source of real leverage to force the Iranian government to pull back from its clear intention to complete an advanced nuclear program for military purposes. Unfortunately, the Iranians have exploited the time they have been granted while sanctions were tried to complete most of the technological groundwork for reaching this goal." IDF Lt.-Col. (ret.) Michael (Mickey) Segall writes in "Iran Signals Its Readiness for a Final Confrontation" that since the publication of the November 2011 IAEA report, which explicitly spotlights Iran's plans to build nuclear weapons, senior figures of the Iranian regime and the state-run media have begun to use threatening, defiant, and sometimes contemptuous language toward Israel and the United States. Segall states that, from Iran's standpoint, an ongoing, head-on confrontation with the U.S. and Israel would serve its purposes in the region and build its image as a key actor that stands firm against the West and provides an alternative agenda to reshape the Middle East. Hence, compromise has almost ceased to be an option for Iran. The countries of the Middle East will probably be more predisposed than the Cold War protagonists to brandish their nuclear weapons, not only rhetorically but also through nuclear alerts or nuclear tests, leading to situations of multilateral nuclear escalation, says Dr. Shmuel Bar in "Can Cold War Deterrence Apply to a Nuclear Iran." Bar, who is Director of Studies at the Institute of Policy and Strategy at IDC Herzliya and served for thirty years in the Israeli intelligence community, adds that such multilateral escalation will not be mitigated by Cold War-type hotlines and means of signaling, and the absence of a credible nuclear second-strike capability may well strengthen the tendency to opt for a first strike. Opening a review of other potentially aggressive Iranian military capabilities, Uzi Rubin, who served as head of Israel's Missile Defense Organization between 1991 and 1999, observes in "New Developments in Iran's Missile Capabilities: Implications Beyond the Middle East" that Iran is vigorously pursuing several missile and space programs at an almost feverish pace with impressive achievements. The Iranians have upgraded their ballistic missiles to become satellite launchers. To orbit a satellite is a highly sophisticated endeavor. A space launcher that can orbit a satellite weighing 300 kg can be altered into an ICBM that could drop more than 300 kg on Washington. Michael Segall in "The Revolutionary Guards' Qods Force—Mission Accomplished!" addresses the significance of the revelation of the involvement of the Qods Force (including its senior figures') in the assassination plot on the Saudi ambassador to the U.S. on U.S. soil revealed in October 2011, as part of a pattern of Iranian involvement in international terror. Dore Gold takes a look at Iran's moves to control the Persian Gulf and Iranian threats to the movement of 20 percent of the world's oil trade in "The Iranian Navy, the Strait of Hormuz, and Beyond." In "Does Iran's June 2011 Military Exercise Signal a New Defense Doctrine?" Michael Segall points out that in the midst of the large-scale missile exercise called "Great Prophet 6," underground missile silos were disclosed, large numbers of surface-to-surface missiles (SSMs) of different ranges were fired, and a new radar system was revealed. Segall then assesses the significance of Iran's major air defense drill held in September 2011 in "Iran Holds Major Air Defense Drill amid Tensions with Turkey." The exercise took place in the midst of escalating Iranian rhetoric towards Turkey as a result of Ankara's decision to deploy a radar system in its territory that is part of the NATO anti-ballistic missile system.