The Redhunter

In short, Israel will need to overfly someone in order to hit Iran. Syria is out of the question, though Turkey remains a good possibility. It is well known that for years Israel has cultivated relations with Turkey, and the two hae engaged in military maneuvers together. But if that doesn't pan out, going through Saudi Arabia would be the next best bet.

Israel doesn't have heavy bombers like the B-52, B-1, or B-2. They rely on F-15s and F-16s. They do have a decent tanker capability, but the range of these fighters is severely restricted when carrying heavy ordinance. I haven't done the calculations, but flying down the Red Sea, through the Arabian Sea, and up to Iran would seem prohibitively far.

Can They Do It?

Israel will get one shot at Iran. The sad fact is that much of the world will go ape after just one strike, and I can't see Saudi Arabia or Turkey allowing Israeli planes through more than one time.

As alluded to above, the capabilities of the AIF are limited. I've seen reports both ways on whether we've allowed them to buy our largest bunker busters, but I think it's really beside the point. The Israelis simply don't have enough aircraft, and the Iranian facilities are at this point too advanced and dispersed for them to be able to effectively do the job.

So Israel will set Iran back a few years but that's it. Note that I'm doing this without benefit of the research I'd usually do but just don't have time. That said, I think I've got it pretty much right.

Only the U.S. can hit Iran and do it right. It would take all of our airpower, and a campaign of two to three weeks, but if we kept at it and were willing to do it periodically we could keep them from getting the bomb.

Should They Do It?

I've written about what I think we should do with regards to Iran at some length, but the short version is that these past several years we should have been working towards regime change rather than counting on the EU-3 (Britain, France, and Germany) to negotiate Iran out of their nuclear program.

Military strikes on Iran would be messy, with the ramifications spreading far and wide. Iran could cause a lot of trouble using asymmetric war capabilities, some of which can somewhat anticipate (instability in Iraq, terrorism), but also in ways that will catch us by surprise.

But we also need to understand that worse than strikes on Iran would be Iran with a nuclear bomb.

The best case scenario for a nuclear Iran is that neither they nor anyone else int he neighborhood, but everyone else in the region goes nuclear. Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Egyptian bombs are a given. Syria and Jordan will be tempted. Either way, you have barely-stable governments staring one another down, and since missile flight times will be only a few minutes, reaction time will be nil, leading to the strong possibility of accidental war. This is to say nothing of the possibility of the sale of nuclear know-how, theft of nuclear bombs/material/plans, and the temptation for jihadist movements such as the Muslim Brotherhood to take control of one or more of these new nuclear powers.

Worse scenarios include nuclear exchanges. 'Nuff said there.

Either way, worse than a strike on Iran is a nuclear Iran.

I don't think we're ready for a strike on Iran yet, but time is running short and we're almost there. It's just possible that Iran might undergo internal changes, though in the past few days that hope is receding. Obama has shown no signs of having any idea what to do other than a mindless attempt at direct talks.

In the end if there has to be a strike as the only way to stop them from getting the bomb the U.S. should do it. Only we can do it right, and Iran is as much our problem as it is anyone else's

We're not there yet, but we're awfully close.

Tuesday Update

Once again it looks like Biden may have run on at the mouth, er, misspoke:

The US has "absolutely not" given Israel a green light for a possible attack on Iran's nuclear facilities, US President Barack Obama said Tuesday.

Obama was qualifying comments Vice President Joe Biden had made Sunday that left the impression the US would not stand in the way of an Israeli action.

"We have said directly to the Israelis that it is important to try and resolve this in an international setting in a way that does not create major conflict in the Middle East," said Obama, currently in Russia, during a CNN interview.