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Iran: A Bridge Too Far?
by Mark Gaffney - Information Clearing
House October 26, 2004
Last July, they dubbed it operation Summer Pulse: a simultaneous
mustering of US Naval forces, world wide, that was unprecedented.
According to the Navy, it was the first exercise of its new Fleet
Response Plan (FRP), the purpose of which was to enable the Navy to
respond quickly to an international crisis. The Navy wanted to show its
increased force readiness, that is, its capacity to rapidly move combat
power to any global hot spot. Never in the history of the US Navy had
so many carrier battle groups been involved in a single operation. Even
the US fleet massed in the Gulf and eastern Mediterranean during
operation Desert Storm in 1991, and in the recent invasion of Iraq,
never exceeded six battle groups. But last July and August there were
seven of them on the move, each battle group consisting of a
Nimitz-class aircraft carrier with its full complement of 7-8
supporting ships, and 70 or more assorted aircraft. Most of the
activity, according to various reports, was in the Pacific, where the
fleet participated in joint exercises with the Taiwanese navy.
But why so much naval power underway at the same time? What
potential world crisis could possibly require more battle groups than
were deployed during the recent invasion of Iraq? In past years, when
the US has seen fit to “show the flag” or flex its naval muscle, one or
two carrier groups have sufficed. Why this global show of power?
The news headlines about the joint-maneuvers in the South China Sea
read: “Saber Rattling Unnerves China”, and: “Huge Show of Force Worries
Chinese.” But the reality was quite different, and, as we shall see,
has grave ramifications for the continuing US military presence in the
Persian Gulf; because operation Summer Pulse reflected a high-level
Pentagon decision that an unprecedented show of strength was needed to
counter what is viewed as a growing threat –– in the particular case of
China, because of Peking’s newest Sovremenny-class destroyers recently
acquired from Russia.
“Nonsense!” you are probably thinking. That’s impossible. How could a
few picayune destroyers threaten the US Pacific fleet?”
Here is where the story thickens: Summer Pulse amounted to a tacit
acknowledgement, obvious to anyone paying attention, that the United
States has been eclipsed in an important area of military technology,
and that this qualitative edge is now being wielded by others,
including the Chinese; because those otherwise very ordinary destroyers
were, in fact, launching platforms for Russian-made 3M-82 Moskit
anti-ship cruise missiles (NATO designation: SS-N-22 Sunburn), a weapon
for which the US Navy currently has no defense. Here I am not
suggesting that the US status of lone world Superpower has been
surpassed. I am simply saying that a new global balance of power is
emerging, in which other individual states may, on occasion, achieve
“an asymmetric advantage” over the US. And this, in my view, explains
the immense scale of Summer Pulse. The US show last summer of
overwhelming strength was calculated to send a message.
The Sunburn Missile
I was shocked when I learned the facts about these Russian-made
cruise missiles. The problem is that so many of us suffer from two
common misperceptions. The first follows from our assumption that
Russia is militarily weak, as a result of the breakup of the old Soviet
system. Actually, this is accurate, but it does not reflect the
complexities. Although the Russian navy continues to rust in port, and
the Russian army is in disarray, in certain key areas Russian
technology is actually superior to our own. And nowhere is this truer
than in the vital area of anti-ship
cruise missile technology, where
the Russians hold at least a
ten-year lead over the US. The second
misperception has to do with our complacency in general about
missiles-as-weapons –– probably attributable to the pathetic
performance of Saddam Hussein’s Scuds during the first Gulf war: a
dangerous illusion that I will now attempt to rectify.
Many years ago, Soviet planners gave up trying to match the US Navy
ship for ship, gun for gun, and dollar for dollar. The Soviets simply
could not compete with the high levels of US spending required to build
up and maintain a huge naval armada. They shrewdly adopted an
alternative approach based on strategic defense. They searched for
weaknesses, and sought relatively inexpensive ways to exploit those
weaknesses. The Soviets succeeded: by developing several supersonic
anti-ship missiles, one of which, the SS-N-22 Sunburn, has been called
“the most lethal missile in the world today.”
After the collapse of the Soviet Union the old military
establishment fell upon hard times. But in the late1990s Moscow
awakened to the under-utilized potential of its missile technology to
generate desperately needed foreign exchange. A decision was made to
resuscitate selected programs, and, very soon, Russian missile
technology became a hot export commodity. Today, Russian missiles are a
growth industry generating much-needed cash for Russia, with many
billions in combined sales to India, China, Viet Nam, Cuba, and also
Iran. In the near future this dissemination of advanced
technology is
likely to present serious challenges to the US. Some have even warned
that the US Navy’s largest ships, the massive carriers, have now become
floating death traps, and should for this reason be mothballed.
The Sunburn missile has never seen use in combat, to my knowledge,
which probably explains why its fearsome capabilities are not more
widely recognized. Other cruise missiles have been used, of course, on
several occasions, and with devastating results. During the Falklands
War, French-made Exocet missiles, fired from Argentine fighters, sunk
the HMS Sheffield and another ship. And, in 1987, during the Iran-Iraq
war, the USS Stark was nearly cut in half by a pair of Exocets while on
patrol in the Persian Gulf. On that occasion US Aegis radar picked up
the incoming Iraqi fighter (a French-made Mirage), and tracked its
approach to within 50 miles. The radar also “saw” the Iraqi plane turn
about and return to its base. But radar never detected the pilot launch
his weapons. The sea-skimming Exocets came smoking in under radar and
were only sighted by human eyes moments before they ripped into the
Stark, crippling the ship and killing 37 US sailors.
The 1987 surprise attack on the Stark exemplifies the dangers posed
by anti-ship cruise missiles. And the dangers are much more serious in
the case of the Sunburn, whose specs leave the sub-sonic Exocet in the
dust. Not only is the Sunburn much larger and faster, it has far
greater range and a superior guidance system. Those who have witnessed
its performance trials invariably come away stunned. According to one
report, when the Iranian Defense Minister Ali Shamkhani visited Moscow
in October 2001 he
requested a test firing of the Sunburn, which the
Russians were only too happy to arrange. So impressed was Ali Shamkhani
that he placed an order
for an undisclosed number of the missiles.
The Sunburn can deliver a 200-kiloton nuclear payload, or: a
750-pound conventional warhead, within a range of 100 miles, more than
twice the range of the Exocet. The Sunburn combines a Mach 2.1 speed
(two times the speed of sound) with a flight pattern that hugs the deck
and includes “violent end maneuvers” to elude enemy defenses. The
missile was specifically designed to defeat the US Aegis radar defense
system. Should a US Navy Phalanx point defense somehow manage to
detect
an incoming Sunburn missile, the system has only seconds to calculate a
fire solution –– not enough time to take out the intruding missile. The
US Phalanx defense employs a six-barreled gun that fires 3,000
depleted-uranium rounds a minute, but the gun must have precise
coordinates to destroy an intruder “just in time.”
The Sunburn’s combined supersonic speed and payload size produce
tremendous kinetic energy on impact, with devastating consequences for
ship and crew. A single one of these missiles can sink a large warship,
yet costs considerably less than a fighter jet. Although the Navy has
been phasing out the older Phalanx defense system, its replacement,
known as the Rolling Action
Missile (RAM) has never been tested against
the weapon it seems destined to one day face in combat.
Implications For US Forces in the Gulf
The US Navy’s only plausible defense against a robust weapon like
the Sunburn missile is to detect the enemy’s approach well ahead of
time, whether destroyers, subs, or fighter-bombers, and defeat them
before they can get in range and launch their deadly cargo. For this
purpose US AWACs radar planes
assigned to each naval battle group are
kept aloft on a rotating schedule. The planes “see” everything within
two hundred miles of the fleet, and are complemented with intelligence
from orbiting satellites.
But US naval commanders operating in the Persian Gulf face serious
challenges that are unique to the littoral, i.e., coastal, environment.
A glance at a map shows why: The Gulf is nothing but a large lake, with
one narrow outlet, and most of its northern shore, i.e., Iran, consists
of mountainous terrain that affords a commanding tactical advantage
over ships operating in Gulf waters. The rugged northern shore makes
for easy concealment of
coastal defenses, such as mobile missile
launchers, and also makes their detection problematic. Although it was
not widely reported, the US actually lost the battle of the Scuds in
the first Gulf War –– termed “the great Scud hunt” –– and for similar
reasons. Saddam Hussein’s mobile Scud launchers proved so difficult to
detect and destroy –– over and over again the Iraqis fooled allied
reconnaissance with decoys –– that during the course of Desert Storm
the US was unable to confirm even a single kill. This proved such an
embarrassment to the Pentagon, afterwards, that the unpleasant stats
were buried in official reports. But the blunt fact is that the US
failed to stop the Scud attacks. The launches continued until
the last
few days of the conflict. Luckily, the Scud’s inaccuracy made it an
almost useless weapon. At one point General Norman Schwarzkopf quipped
dismissively to the press that his soldiers had a greater chance of
being struck by lightning in Georgia than by a Scud in Kuwait.
But that was then, and it would be a grave error to allow the
Scud’s ineffectiveness to blur the facts concerning this other missile.
The Sunburn’s amazing accuracy was demonstrated not long ago in a live
test staged at sea by the Chinese –– and observed by US spy planes. Not
only did the Sunburn missile destroy the dummy target ship, it scored a
perfect bull’s eye, hitting the crosshairs of a large “X” mounted on
the ship’s bridge. The only word that does it justice, awesome, has
become a cliché, hackneyed from hyperbolic excess.
The US Navy has never faced anything in combat as formidable as the
Sunburn missile. But this will surely change if
the US and Israel
decide to wage a so-called preventive war against Iran to destroy its
nuclear infrastructure. Storm clouds have been
darkening over the Gulf
for many months. In recent years Israel upgraded its air force with a
new fleet of long-range F-15 fighter-bombers, and even more recently
took delivery of 5,000 bunker-buster bombs from the US –– weapons that
many observers think are intended for use against Iran.
The arming for war has been matched by threats. Israeli officials
have declared repeatedly that they will not allow the Mullahs to
develop nuclear power, not even
reactors to generate electricity for
peaceful use. Their threats are particularly worrisome, because Israel
has a long history of pre-emptive war. (See my 1989 book Dimona: the
Third Temple? and also my 2003 article Will Iran Be Next? posted at
< www.InformationClearingHouse.info/article3288.htm
>)
Never mind that such a determination is not Israel’s to make, and
belongs instead to the international community, as codified in the
Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT). With regard to Iran, the International
Atomic Energy Agency’s (IAEA’s) recent report (September 2004) is well
worth a look, as it repudiates facile claims by the US and Israel that
Iran is building bombs. While the report is highly critical of Tehran
for its ambiguities and its grudging release of documents, it affirms
that IAEA inspectors have been admitted to every nuclear site in the
country to which they have sought access, without exception. Last year
Iran signed the strengthened IAEA inspection protocol, which until then
had been voluntary. And the IAEA has found no hard evidence, to date,
either that bombs exist or that Iran has made a decision to build them.
(The latest IAEA report can be downloaded at: www.GlobalSecurity.org)
In a talk on October 3, 2004, IAEA Director General Mohamed El Baradei
made the clearest statement yet: "Iran has no nuclear weapons program",
he said, and then repeated himself for emphasis: “Iran has no nuclear
weapons program, but I personally don’t rush to conclusions before all
the realities are clarified. So far I see nothing that could be called
an imminent danger. I have seen no nuclear weapons program in Iran.
What I have seen is that Iran is trying to gain access to nuclear
enrichment technology, and so far there is no danger from Iran.
Therefore, we should make use of political and diplomatic means before
thinking of resorting to other alternatives.”
( www.aljazeera.com/cgi-bin/news_service/middle_east_full_story.asp?service_id=5051
)
No one disputes that Tehran is pursuing a dangerous path, but with 200
or more Israeli nukes targeted upon them the Iranians’ insistence on
keeping their options open is understandable. Clearly, the
nuclear
nonproliferation regime today hangs by the slenderest of threads. The
world has arrived at a fateful crossroads.
A Fearful Symmetry?
If a showdown over Iran develops in the coming months, the man who
could hold the outcome in his hands will be thrust upon the world
stage. That man, like him or hate him, is Russian President Vladimir
Putin. He has been
castigated severely in recent months for gathering
too much political power to himself. But according to former Soviet
President Mikhail Gorbachev, who was interviewed on US television
recently by David Brokaw, Putin has not imposed a tyranny upon Russia
–– yet. Gorbachev thinks the jury is still out on Putin.
Perhaps, with this in mind, we should be asking whether Vladimir
Putin is a serious student of history. If he is, then he surely
recognizes that the deepening crisis in the Persian Gulf presents not
only manifold dangers, but also opportunities. Be assured that the
Russian leader has not forgotten the humiliating defeat Ronald Reagan
inflicted upon the old Soviet state. (Have we Americans forgotten?) By
the mid-1980s the Soviets were in Kabul, and had all but defeated the
Mujahedeen. The Soviet Union appeared secure in its military occupation
of Afghanistan. But then, in 1986, the first US Stinger missiles
reached the hands of the Afghani resistance; and, quite suddenly,
Soviet helicopter gunships and MiGs began dropping out of the skies
like flaming stones. The tide swiftly turned, and by 1989 it was all
over but the hand wringing and gnashing of teeth in the Kremlin.
Defeated, the Soviets slunk back across the frontier. The whole world
cheered the American Stingers, which had carried the day.
This very night, as he sips his
cognac, what is Vladimir Putin
thinking? Is he perhaps thinking about the perverse symmetries
of
history? If so, he may also be wondering (and discussing with his
closest aides) how a truly
great nation like the United States could be
so blind and so stupid as to allow
another state, i.e., Israel, to
control its foreign policy, especially in a
region
as vital (and
volatile) as the Mid-East. One can almost hear the Russians’ animated
conversation:
“The Americans! What is the matter with them?”
“They simply cannot help themselves.”
“What idiots!”
“A nation as foolish as this deserves to be taught a lesson…”
“Yes! For their own good.”
“It must be a painful lesson, one they will never forget…”
“Are we agreed, then, comrades?”
“Let us teach our American friends a lesson about the limits of
military power!”
Does anyone really believe that
Vladimir Putin will hesitate to
seize a most rare opportunity to change the course of history and, in
the bargain, take his sweet
revenge? Surely Putin understands the
terrible dimensions of the trap into which the US has blundered, thanks
to the Israelis
and their neo-con supporters in Washington who lobbied
so vociferously for the 2003 invasion of Iraq, against all friendly and
expert advice, and who even now beat the drums of war against Iran.
Would Putin be wrong to conclude that the US will never leave the
region unless it is first defeated militarily? Should we blame him for
deciding that Iran is “one bridge too far”?
If the US and Israel overreach, and the Iranians close the net with
Russian anti-ship missiles, it will be a fearful symmetry, indeed…
Springing the Trap
At the battle of Cannae in 216 BC the great Carthaginian general,
Hannibal, tempted a much larger Roman army into a fateful advance, and
then enveloped and annihilated it with a smaller force. Out of a Roman
army of 70,000 men, no more than a few thousand escaped. It was said
that after many hours of dispatching the Romans Hannibal’s soldiers
grew so tired that the fight went out of them. In their weariness they
granted the last broken and bedraggled Romans their lives…
Let us pray that the US sailors who are unlucky enough to be on
duty in the Persian Gulf when the shooting starts can escape the fate
of the Roman army at Cannae. The odds will be heavily against them,
however, because they will face the same type of danger, tantamount to
envelopment. The US ships in the Gulf will already have come within
range of the Sunburn missiles and the even more-advanced SS-NX-26
Yakhonts missiles, also Russian-made (speed: Mach 2.9; range: 180
miles) deployed by the Iranians along the Gulf’s northern shore. Every
US ship will be exposed and vulnerable. When the Iranians spring the
trap, the entire lake will become a killing field.
Anti-ship cruise missiles are not new, as I’ve mentioned. Nor have
they yet determined the outcome in a conflict. But this is probably
only because these horrible weapons have never been deployed in
sufficient numbers. At the time of the Falklands war the Argentine air
force possessed only five Exocets, yet managed to sink two ships. With
enough of them, the Argentineans might have sunk the entire British
fleet, and won the war. Although we’ve never seen a massed
attack of
cruise missiles, this is exactly what the US Navy could face in the
next war in the Gulf. Try and imagine it if you can: barrage after
barrage of Exocet-class missiles, which the Iranians are known to
possess in the hundreds, as well as the unstoppable Sunburn and
Yakhonts missiles. The questions that our purblind government leaders
should be asking themselves, today, if they value what historians will
one day write about them, are two: how many of the Russian anti-ship
missiles has Putin already supplied to Iran? And: How many more are
currently in the pipeline? In 2001 Jane’s Defense Weekly reported that
Iran was attempting to acquire anti-ship missiles from Russia.
Ominously, the same report also mentioned that the more advanced
Yakhonts missile was “optimized for attacks against carrier task
forces.” Apparently its guidance system is “able to distinguish an
aircraft carrier from its escorts.” The numbers were not
disclosed…
The US Navy will come under fire even if the US does not
participate in the first so-called surgical raids on Iran’s nuclear
sites, that is, even if Israel goes it alone. Israel’s brand-new fleet
of 25 F-15s (paid for by American
taxpayers) has sufficient range to
target Iran, but the Israelis cannot mount an attack without crossing
US-occupied Iraqi air space. It will hardly matter if Washington gives
the green light, or is dragged into the conflict by a recalcitrant
Israel. Either way, the result will be the same. The Iranians will
interpret US acquiescence as complicity, and, in any event, they will
understand that the real fight is with the Americans. The Iranians will
be entirely within their rights to counter-attack in self-defense. Most
of the world will see it this way, and will support them, not America.
The US and Israel will be viewed as the aggressors, even as the
unfortunate US sailors in harm’s way become cannon fodder. In the
Gulf’s shallow and confined waters evasive maneuvers will be difficult,
at best, and escape impossible. Even if US planes control of the skies
over the battlefield, the sailors caught in the net below will be
hard-pressed to survive. The Gulf will run red with American blood…
From here, it only gets worse. Armed with their Russian-supplied
cruise missiles, the Iranians will close the lake’s only outlet, the
strategic Strait of Hormuz, cutting off the trapped and dying Americans
from help and rescue. The US fleet massing in the Indian Ocean will
stand by helplessly, unable to enter the Gulf to assist the survivors
or bring logistical support to the other US forces on duty in Iraq.
Couple this with a major new ground offensive by the Iraqi insurgents,
and, quite suddenly, the
tables could turn against the Americans in
Baghdad. As supplies and ammunition begin to run out, the status
of US
forces in the region will become precarious. The occupiers will become
the besieged…
With enough anti-ship missiles, the Iranians can halt tanker
traffic through Hormuz for weeks, even months. With the flow of oil
from the Gulf curtailed, the price of a barrel of crude will skyrocket
on the world market. Within days the global economy will begin to grind
to a halt. Tempers at an emergency round-the-clock session of the UN
Security Council will flare and likely explode into shouting and
recriminations as French,
German, Chinese and even British ambassadors
angrily accuse the US of allowing Israel to threaten world order. But,
as always, because of the US veto the world body will be powerless to
act...
America will stand alone, completely isolated. Yet, despite the
increasingly hostile international mood, elements of the US media will
spin the crisis very differently here at home, in a way that is
sympathetic to Israel. Members of Congress will rise to speak in
the
House and Senate, and rally to Israel’s defense, while blaming the
victim of the attack, Iran. Fundamentalist Christian talk show
hosts
will proclaim the historic fulfillment of biblical prophecy in our
time, and will call upon the Jews of Israel to accept Jesus into their
hearts; meanwhile, urging the president to nuke the evil empire of
Islam. From across America will be heard histrionic cries for fresh
reinforcements, even a military draft. Patriots will demand victory at
any cost. Pundits will scream for an escalation of the conflict.
A war that ostensibly began
as an attempt to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons will teeter on
the brink of their use…
Conclusion
Friends, we must work together to prevent such a catastrophe. We
must stop the next Middle East war before it starts. The US government
must turn over to the United Nations the primary responsibility for
resolving the deepening crisis in Iraq, and, immediately thereafter,
withdraw US forces from the country. We must also prevail upon the
Israelis to sign the Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) and open all of
their nuclear sites to IAEA inspectors. Only then can serious talks
begin with Iran and other states to establish a nuclear weapon free
zone (NWFZ) in the Mid East –– so essential to the region’s long-term
peace and security.
Mark Gaffney’s first book, Dimona the
Third Temple? (1989), was a pioneering study of Israel’s nuclear
weapons program. Mark’s articles about the Mid-East and proliferation
issues have appeared in the Middle East Policy Journal, Washington
Report On Middle East Affairs, the Earth Island Journal, The Oregonian,
the Daily Californian, and have been posted on numerous web sites,
especially Counterpunch.org. Mark’s 2003 paper Will Iran Be Next? can
be viewed at < www.globalsecurity.org/military/ops/iran.htm>
Mark’s newest book, Gnostic Secrets of the Naassenes, was released by
Inner Traditions Press in May 2003. Email <Mhgaffney@aol.com> For more
information go to www.GnosticSecrets.com
(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is
distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest
in receiving the included information for research and educational
purposes. Information Clearing House has no affiliation whatsoever with
the originator of this article nor is Information Clearing House
endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)
www.informationclearinghouse.info/article7147.htm
Also see: A Weapons Analysis of the Iran-Russia-US strategic triangle
www.thetruthseeker.co.uk/article.asp?id=2439
Russia ready to Vaporize Jewish State
www.joevialls.co.uk/myahudi/sunburn.html
Russia Ready to Vaporize Jewish State Part 2
www.joevialls.co.uk/myahudi/sunburn2.html
Last updated 24/03/2005