Yves here. I hope reader will circulate this important and well-documented post on Israel’s nuclear weapons development, which includes details such as the fact that Israel has used Gaza as a nuclear waste dump. It would be poetic justice, in the unlikely event that Trump’s redevelopment scheme goes forward, for those living on a mass grave to be exposed to radiation.
By Kevin Kirk, who has worked all over the world, first as an engineer, then a visiting university Professor and finally as a diplomatic trainer. He mourns the loss of what could have been in Israel if Jews and Arabs had lived in peace together
Ever since Israel came into being in 1948 – by a vote of 33 in favour (with 13 countries voting against it and with 11 abstentions) by United Nations resolution 181, which also included a fully autonomous Palestinian state – Israel has sought a nuclear deterrence. Indeed, it was stated by the first prime minister, David Ben-Gurion, that: “Science could compensate us for what Nature has denied us.” He believed it would show his commitment to Zionism, the political ideology that underpins the state of Israel.
It was considerably aided by the fact that many of the leading scientists that worked on the Manhattan Project were Jewish and some were enticed into relocating to and supporting the new state. France also wanted access to these scientists and so entered into a pact with Israel to jointly produce nuclear weapons. To this end Israeli scientists were given full and unhindered access to the French nuclear research centre at Marcoule, where they also helped to build the G1 plutonium production reactor and the UP1 reprocessing plant. In return they were allowed to observe the development of France’s nuclear deterrent and were provided full access to the data obtained from France’s nuclear weapons tests. This was confirmed years later by the ‘father’ of France’s nuclear weapons, Francis Perrin.
In 1956, France (under the extremely pro-Zionist and Anglophile prime minister, Guy Mollet) agreed to build a 24 megawatt EL-102 heavy water nuclear reactor at Dimona, capable of producing plutonium, in the Negev desert area of Israel, in return for Israel’s assistance during the Suez crisis. The French also provided the designs for the separation technology for spent nuclear fuel. Ben-Gurion described the reactor as being for entirely peaceful purposes as it was going to be used to power desalination plants so the Negev could be used to grow crops. French technicians were brought in, although their presence there was officially denied – even going so far as to send their personal mail via South America to disguise their actual location. Thousands of Sephardic Jews were forcibly transported from Morocco, via Marseilles, in order to provide the manual laborers under Operation Yachin. When questioned by the US, after the construction was observed by US spy planes, Ben-Gurion stated that they were building a furniture factory. At least half of the money ($80 million – around $1 billion in today’s dollars) for the construction came, according to Ben-Gurion, from wealthy Jewish donors based overseas, with the majority originating from the US.
France was not alone in providing nuclear materials and technology. In particular, in order for a reactor to run on natural uranium (like the CANDU reactor in Canada) it needs heavy water. For years it was assumed that Norway supplied the heavy water to Israel as a Norwegian company, Noratom, had supplied at least 20 tons of it to Israel. It later leaked out that it was, in fact, Great Britain that had supplied it, using Noratom as a front company (for which they got a 2% commission). A 2006 Newsnight (BBC political affairs) program revealed that not only did Britain (who had their own nuclear weapons arsenal) supply the material but it also supplied equipment, designs, chemicals used for separation, technology and research data. Moreover, in the mid-1960s, when France, under De Gaulle, decided not to supply any more uranium to Israel, they started buying their natural Uranium from Britain. Britain also supplied Uranium 235 and plutonium so they could be used directly in nuclear weapons. British officials stated that they had obtained assurances from Israel that it was purely for peaceful purposes despite the fact that the intelligence agencies warned about the real intentions. Argentina also supplied 100 tons of yellowcake, uranium oxide, which was also used to fuel the reactor.
One of the most significant collaborators was South Africa. For example, in 1965, South Africa supplied a further 10 tons of yellowcake supposedly under the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Safeguards Agreements as Israel was a signatory of the Atoms for Peace initiative started by Eisenhower. This nuclear relationship between the two countries was allegedly initiated by the, then South Africa based, Zionist Lubner family. This family founded Belron, which is now based in the UK, which owns automobile glass companies around the world, such as Safelite in the US and Autoglass in the UK. The current scion, Gary Lubner, is one of the main donors to the UK Labour party (along with Trevor Chinn, who was also the prime mover of the removal of Jeremy Corbyn and the installation of Keir Starmer) and donated over £70,000 to David Lammy, the deputy prime minister, ‘for his office’.
The nuclear collaboration deal between South Africa and Israel was subject to yearly inspections by the South African Atomic Energy Board. But the inspections only lasted until 1976, when South Africa agreed to remove the safeguards. Soon afterwards, Israel obtained 500 tons of uranium specifically for plutonium production in Dimona’s reactor in exchange for 30 grams of tritiumfor South Africa’s nuclear weapons program.
Israel also conducted a nuclear test off the coast of South Africa (Vela Incident), which the US tried to cover up saying it was a typhoon or the satellite wasn’t on station at that time,. However, President Jimmy Carter wrote in his diary, “We have a growing belief among our scientists that the Israelis did indeed conduct a nuclear test explosion in the ocean near the southern end of Africa.” That broke the strategic ambiguity agreement that had been in force since Nixon (more on that below).
Belgium also supplied yellowcake to Israel, albeit unknowingly, for the reactor. In 1968, Israel, acting through MOSSAD, purchased 200 tons of yellowcake from the Belgian company Union Minière, who obtained it from their mines in the Congo. The basis of this operation, known as Operation Plumbat, was for the Belgian company to ship the uranium from Antwerp to its legal destination of Genoa in Italy, but the shipment was intercepted at sea and the uranium was transferred to another vessel and sent to Israel.
During the late 50s and early 60s some US officials were concerned about the construction of the reactor; indeed, the CIA produced a report highlighting the dangers but the Eisenhower administration suppressed it. President Kennedy, on the other hand, was very alarmed about Israel acquiring nuclear weapons and demanded thorough inspections of what was taking place on the site. He was in the final process of setting up the inspection regime and possibly shutting down the production of nuclear weapons in Israel when he was assassinated.
After Kennedy’s assassination, the Johnson administration cancelled the thorough inspection program but did, under pressure, allowed limited inspections of certain parts of the site. The inspectors were barred from inspecting the sensitive areas, where the plutonium was produced, for ‘safety reasons’ and they were required to provide substantial warning before an inspection was due to take place and the Israelis could cancel the inspections with no notice. This was, according to US security analysts at the time, to allow plutonium production to take place between visits.
Prior to Kennedy’s assassination, Ben-Gurion’s’ successor, Levi Eshkol, told Kennedy: “If you want it, there will be no nuclear weapons. But give us something else which will deter the Arabs.” Kennedy was extremely reluctant to provide Israel with what would effectively be a carte blanche for Israel to do what it wanted in the Middle East with full American backing. Kennedy concerns were that it would undermine his balanced policy between the Arabs and Israelis as it would seem to the Arabs that the US was taking Israel’s side in every conflict they undertook. The State Department even issued a statement on the matter saying: “Each matter arising in our relationship with Israel, is carefully weighed in terms of its effect on our policy of impartiality as between Israel and the Arabs and of its effect on Israel’s security. If the United States were to align itself more closely with Israel it would constitute a direct challenge to the Arabs by the US and would destroy growing Arab confidence in our impartiality.” Fortunately for Israel, Kennedy’s removal also removed US impartiality from then on, something that the Gulf Arab states have had demonstrated to them in the last few days.
It was during Johnson’s tenure at the White House, that the NUMEC affair took place. This involved the alleged theft of 200–600 pounds (91–272 kg) of highly enriched Uranium from a nuclear reprocessing plant in the Pittsburgh suburbs of Apollo and Parks Township, Pennsylvania, called NUMEC, which was owned by a staunch Zionist called Zalman Shapiro. This uranium was thought to have found its way into Israel’s nuclear program. Subsequent investigations under the auspices of the FBI, the CIA and the Department of Energy were stonewalled and eventually petered out after pressure from the White House. No arrests were ever made nor findings published. A General Accounting Office study of the investigations was declassified in May 2010, which stated “We believe a timely, concerted effort on the part of these three agencies would have greatly aided and possibly solved the NUMEC diversion questions, if they desired to do so.”
Reactions by other US presidents have been weak, concerned by the intelligence from Israel that the USSR would supply nuclear weapons to the Gulf Arab states, or at least help them to build their own, if they got wind of Israel’s nuclear ambitions. For example, Nixon had qualms about the nuclear program and he asked Henry Kissinger about how he should approach the problem. Kissinger then came up with the strategy of ‘strategic ambiguity’, where the US would neither confirm or deny the existence of Israel’s nuclear weapons. This policy led to a meeting between Nixon and Golda Meir, the then Israeli prime minister, in September 1969, where it was agreed that Israel could pursue its nuclear ambitions without any interference by the U.S. with the only conditions being that Israel would refrain from testing its nuclear devices and going public about their possession. In exchange, the U.S. would not press Israel to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). The documents giving the details of this meeting were kept secret until they were declassified, in 2014, by the Obama administration. Note, it was during that meeting that the US agreed to Israel having ballistic missiles as long as they were not nuclear tipped.
The weapons program progressed rapidly after that; so, that by the time the Yom Kippur war started, Israel had enough warheads mounted on French supplied missiles that discussions were held in Israel as to whether nuclear strikes should be undertaken against Syria and Egypt. In the end Golda Meir decided that Israel wasn’t in existential danger and so the strikes didn’t go ahead.
Little was known about the actual number of warheads Israel had produced until Israeli whistleblower, Mordechai Vanunu, revealed to the British Press (Sunday Times – followed by a BBC documentary) that Israel had produced dozens of kilograms of plutonium in Dimona each year between 1980 and 1986 and that Israel possessed between 100-200 nuclear weapons at that time. They were also producing materials like exotic isotopes of Lithium (such as Lithium-6) and Tritium for boosted fission or fusion weapons He also took a series of photographs inside Dimona.
It is currently estimated that Israel has up to 400 warheads and have produced over 900kg of plutonium in the facility.
Safety Issues
Judging by the amount of fuel being consumed by the reactor it is being run at two to four times its rated capacity, which is obviously creating a huge amount of nuclear waste. So, what does it do with this waste given that it is not a signatory to the NPT and can’t, legally (if that still means anything anymore) ship it overseas? So where is it going?
According to Israel TV Channel Two, two of the four main waste dumps are in Palestinian territory, primarily in Gaza such as the area east of the Al Bureij refugee camp and the town of Deir El Balah. One example is where Israel removed the fertile topsoil and carted it off to Israel and replaced it with 50,000 tons of toxic waste. 30-meter-deep unlined pits were dug (1,000s of meters across) and the waste was simply dumped into them.
In addition, radioactive waste is being imported from overseas such as the reports of 2,500 tons of radioactive (4x safe limits) toxic waste which was sent from Italy, which was also disposed in Gaza. The question is, do the customers for the Trump version of ‘Dubai in the Med’ know that they’ll be living on a nuclear waste dump that will undoubtedly be disturbed when the foundations are being dug for the sparkly new skyscrapers, he and his fellow property moguls are envisaging, particularly as environmental health monitoring is strictly forbidden in Gaza?
Other dump sites in Palestinian territory are in the Eastern hills of the West Bank. For example, 80 barrels of Israeli waste were physically uncovered in the city of Hebron with another 120 found in the town of Al Ezareya, just outside Jerusalem. Palestinian health authorities in the West Bank grew increasingly alarmed after their monitors detected massive radioactive, pesticide and other toxins leaching into the water supply. The IDF responded by smashing the sensors and raiding their offices, where they destroyed the data then threw all of the equipment out of a 5th floor window. They also blew up the environmental monitoring laboratories in Hebron and Ramallah. The Palestinian Authority was not allowed to carry out any monitoring from that point on. Understandably, Israel takes great pains to ensure that the dumps are not located anywhere near aquifers that supply Israel proper or its West Bank settlements.
Israel also dumps its waste on the Egyptian and Jordanian borders after ensuring that the prevailing winds will carry the radioactive dust out of Israeli territory. This is creating health problems for people living in those areas. For example, in the Al Tafila governorate of Jordan, downwind of the waste dumps on the Jordanian border, cancer rates, particularly amongst children, are up to five times more prevalent than anywhere else in the country.
More concerning is the state of the reactor itself, particularly in light of the amount of fuel it is consuming (estimated at 1,400 tons p.a), suggesting that it is being run at many times more than its designed capacity. An inspection back in 2016 revealed 1,537 unfixable, major defects in the aluminum core of the reactor, caused by decades of heat and radioactive bombardment. In addition, there are visible cracks in the concrete containment structure leading to leaks of radioactive material into the local environment.
The Israeli authorities know about these leaks and have, since the turn of the century, supplied Iodine tablets to Israelis in the area, but they don’t appear unduly concerned as most of the surrounding villages are populated by Bedouins, who the government feels shouldn’t be in Israel anyway. When the villagers protested, Israel responded by bulldozing the villages.
The reactor cooling system has also come under scrutiny with Professor Uzi Leven, an ex-Knesset member and former worker at the facility, sounding the alarm by saying that the 60 year old cooling system hadn’t been upgraded and even a minor failure could cause a catastrophic meltdown.
Despite all of these serious safety concerns, Israel has just recertified the reactor to run for another 40 years. A meltdown would smother the Middle East, particularly the gulf states, in radioactive particles; however, they would be carried away from Israeli territory so it was considered to be a risk worth taking. Professor Leven recommended, back in 2010, that the reactor should be shut down and Israel should build a new reactor. But, in order to do that they’d have to sign the NPT and agree to IEAE inspections, which Israel is loath to do.
It is not only safety issues that affect the surrounding area but there is also evidence of a lack of a safety culture within the complex itself such as the failure to provide suitable safety equipment (like hazmat suits) and numerous fires and accidents. This has led to a large number of workers contracting cancers as well as suffering other injuries (such as serious burns). The Israeli government has censored this but it came to light when the families of 5 workers (Ze’eiv Schforn, Simon Dray, Moshe Zegori, Yousif Cohen and an unnamed worker who was still alive, but undergoing extensive treatment when the case was filed) at the plant dying from cancer, sued the government over their deaths in Tel Aviv central court.
Naturally, the Israeli government is keeping these details from the Israeli public. Just as they did when an Iranian missile destroyed the IIBS biological weapon research laboratory in Ness Ziona (just outside Tel Aviv) during the 12-day war. The explosion released a substantial amount of extremely dangerous biological agents into the environment on a day when the prevailing wind blew it straight into Tel Aviv.
Delivery Systems
Originally, the weapons were delivered solely by aircraft (F4 Phantoms), but Israel now has three types of delivery systems.
The central system consists of the Jericho series of ballistic missiles all of which were primarily designed in conjunction with the French company Dassault. These are:
Jericho 1: A short range missile with a range of 310 miles. Jericho 1 missiles were housed in Zekharia, located in caves southeast of Tel Aviv, but are no longer believed to be in service.
Jericho 2: After the US refused to supply longer range missiles, Israel together with the Shah’s Iran jointly developed this 1,100-mile range missile. According to ex-secretary of State, Colin Powell, these have all (approximately 200 missiles) been pointed at Tehran.
Jericho 3: This missile, which is capable of carrying a 400-kiloton nuclear warhead, has an estimated range of up to 4,000 miles, bringing most of Europe (including Moscow and St Petersburg) within range. In a stunning example of “Capitalists will sell you the rope to hang them with”, it was co-designed by Dassault who also sold them parts and is within range. It entered service in 2010. It is said to be primarily aimed at Pakistan. Many of these missiles are housed in deep, first strike proof silos around Israel. It was one such silo that was targeted when an Iranian missile hit Beit Shemesh, where Israel accused them of deliberately targeting a Synagogue.
Jericho 4: This officially unannounced version of the missile, also believed to have been co-designed by Dassault, is capable of reaching anywhere in the continental United States, even Mar A Lago, as Bibi is wont to say. The Israeli government hasn’t disclosed why they need such a missile.
The majority are stored at the Sdot Micha airbase in nuclear proof bunkers built, in partnership with the US, into limestone bunkers with huge blast doors that can resist everything short of a direct nuclear strike. This base is protected by Arrow 3 air defense missiles, which are in turn controlled by the Green Pine radars. These radar systems are currently being targeted by the IRGC as they form an important part of the early warning system for the whole country.
The second line of delivery is via aircraft like the F15 and the F35. The bombs are said to be stored at Sdot Micha and the aircraft themselves are located at the nearby Tel Nov airbase.
The triad of delivery systems includes an uprated version of the Popeye ACLM cruise missile, which is launched via the torpedo tubes of Dolphin Class submarines, supplied by Germany and has a published range of around 200 miles but has been observed by the US navy as being able to hit a target over 1,000 miles away. Now that Egypt has allowed Israeli warships to transit the Suez Canal, these submarines have been observed transiting the canal on their way to the Indian ocean. It is believed that these are capable of carrying warheads with a yield of 200 kilotons and were specifically designed to target Iran from a safe distance. They can also be launched from F15 aircraft. The tests of the air launched version were conducted by launching a completely unprovoked attack against Syria in 2014. One missile (out of 4) was brought down by a Syrian BUK2 air defense missile. Non-nuclear tipped versions were also used to target the port in North Yemen last year.
Are The Nuclear Warheads Likely To Be Used and What Would Be the Effect?
According to analysis undertaken by the Belorussian military, BELTA, the likelihood of a nuclear strike being undertaken against Iran by Israel is, in their opinion, extremely low. This is because of the Iranian threat to completely destroy Dimona (on a day when the wind blows to the north) and a massive missile attack that would destroy all of the vital services needed for everyday life in Israel, like desalination plants, power stations, ports and refineries. Iran also threatened to destroy ALL of the energy infrastructure in the Middle East, threatening worldwide energy supplies for years to come. It is definitely not in the USA’s best interests, nor Israel’s, because it would achieve the opposite effect of what this war is purportedly about: the elimination of another nuclear power in the Middle East, because Iran would undoubtedly either build a bomb or acquire one from elsewhere. North Korea (DPRK) has already developed (and tested) a bomb for Iran back in 2012. Iran paid for its development and given the passage of time it is more than possible that Iran already has nuclear weapons (two can play the strategic ambiguity game). Given how small Israel is, in that one 400 kiloton weapon dropped on east Tel Aviv could, essentially, destroy the whole country then it would reduce Israel’s chances of long-term survival to resort to nukes, if Iran either already had one or was likely to acquire one of their own in short order.
However, Israel is noted for going for showy short-term tactical victories over long-term strategy; so, it is entirely feasible that an increasingly beleaguered Netanyahu may order a strike to stop the current destruction in Israel. The USA could do little to nothing to stop them and, under the current Trump administration, it is unlikely to want to as the destruction of Iran would solve the intractable morass, he now finds himself it.
Behind the scenes there are whispers in diplomatic circles that Russia may offer protection under its nuclear umbrella.
A nuclear strike on Iran would likely kill 100,000s of people and would create fall out that would definitely impact Southern Russia (another reason that has been put forward as to why Russia may offer nuclear protection). It would also create a rush for every other country to develop their own bombs, which, perversely, would lead to more peace around the world. Would Trump have undertaken his adventure in Caracas if they’d threatened to nuke Florida if they tried. The NPT would also be completely dead.
It would also turn Israel into more of a pariah state than it currently is, particularly among young people in the US, who are dead set against this war as it is.
And it would create a massive global economic depression.
In short, it would be a catastrophe.
Closing Thought:
Back in 63 BC, a very wealthy property mogul, politician and a member of the ruling Triumvirate in Rome, Marcus Licinius Crassus, decided to attack Parthia (Iran) because the presumed easy military victory and the immense wealth it would bring, would help with his re-election chances. At his command was the might of the world’s biggest military super power; namely, the power of the combined Roman empire. He marched with 7 of the best legions of Roman infantry, equipped with the very best weapons paid for by Crassus himself, expecting an easy victory.
Roman military doctrine at that time was geared towards putting down insurgencies and was resistant to change. It consisted of massed ranks of infantry, supported by cavalry on the wings, smashing through any opposition arrayed against them. The relatively small size of the Parthian army of around 10,000 men, against 40,000 or so Romans, also augured well for a stunning Roman victory because they’d be overwhelmed in a direct clash.
Except…
When the two sides did clash, in the battle of Carrhea, the Parthians, under General Surena, had no infantry and so he adopted a mosaic strategy, where small groups of archers acting under their own volition and mounted on fast horses, swooped in for lightning attacks on the ponderous squares of Roman infantry, shooting blizzards of arrows before racing off when the Roman cavalry closed in on them. These archers were trained extensively in shooting both forwards while attacking and backwards while fleeing and this caused the Roman cavalry to back off, at which point the Parthians swooped back in to attack the main body again. These Parthian arrows were heavy enough to pierce both Roman shields and body armor thus pinning the shields irretrievably to the soldiers. As this battle of attrition unfolded, the Roman strategy was to hunker down and wait until their adversaries had run out of missiles before they proceeded on their planned ground assault on Parthia. Unfortunately for Crassus, Surena had arranged for huge convoys of weapons to be brought in from the East (by caravans of camels in those days – the equivalent of a direct railway line, say between China and Iran, today).
The end result was a crushing defeat for Rome who lost over 30,000 soldiers (20,000 killed and 10,000 captured) and Crassus, himself, was killed. The Parthians on the other hand lost, according to some estimates, less than 100 men.
Lesson to be learned: never underestimate Iran.
75 comments
Comments are closed.
The great irony of the nuclear weapons story is that the technology of precision guided missiles is rendering them obsolete. Iran’s newest missiles are effectively unstoppable, and thus can destroy anything above ground in Israel. Thus any country that can afford a large missile arsenal can effectively have a strategic deterrent. This will ultimately reduce the ability of big military powers to intimidate their smaller neighbors. Israel’s nuclear arsenal has become a dangerous and useless relic that only makes Israel less secure.
If they are dangerous they are not useless if in the hands of Armageddon obsessed religious fanatics. Oh wait.
Thanks for the article which one would definitely never find in the NY Times. It should be spread widely
Nuclear weapons are anything but obsolete.
The key is their application. From the very beginning, i.e. Hiroshima, nuclear weapons were found to be not very efficient, especially in terms of relative cost, in taking out specific targets, like bridges. Cold War era planners would literally allocate one nuke per bridge, which was incredibly wasteful unless you had thousands of the weapons already sitting in storage doing nothing. On the other hand, nukes are spectacularly effective at taking out large soft targets, i.e. cities, as well as at destroying large swathes of humanity through secondary effects (fallout, disruption of logistical networks, nuclear winter, etc.; in the god-let’s-hope-not event of a nuclear war between the US and Russia, a majority of deaths are estimated to be from starvation, not the bombs themselves).
You have to launch a lot, a lot of conventional explosive missiles at Tel Aviv to do the equivalent damage of a single 1-megaton nuke. Even if you’re using Oreshniks. I mean, look at how many bombs the Isralis have dropped on Gaza, and for how long, and still a majority of the Palestinian population survives, and I would argue by now the casualties from hunger and disease are at least comparable to those from the bombs themselves. But – if you want to take out a specific bridge in Tel Aviv, or a Defense Ministry office, or a power plant, or whatever, that’s when conventional missiles have the efficiency advantage.
The key is not crossing the line between “degrade your ability do do thing X” and “destroy your civilian population”. The Iranians have been – in my estimation – trying to limit the escalation before it gets to that point, not the least to keep the option in their back pocket. This is also, I think, why to date they have not taken out Israel’s power plants, water reserves, etc. That’s their deterrent to Israel potentially using nukes. Because however many conventional bombs and missiles the Epstein Coalition lobs into Iran, they will, realistically, not be able to cause tens of millions of casualties (again, half due to hunger and fallout rather than direct effects), whereas 20-30 nukes launched at Iran’s biggest cities most surely will.
Lots that is new to me here: UK involvement, the theft at NUMEC, Dimona safety issues and waste…Israeli missiles all being French designed (and probably built – lots of French binationals there). Our worst nightmare would be for them to use the damned things.
Thank you for this very informative piece.
One thing to remember is that Marcel Dassault, who founded the famous French aeronautics firm, descended from ashkenazi and sepharad families and was born Marcel Bloch. During WWII, he was arrested several times, and ended up deported at Buchenwald — but curiously as a “political” not as a “Jewish” prisoner. He had his name changed after WWII.
This being said: what were the French, British, Americans, Germans, etc, thinking when they helped Israel develop its entire chain for producing and deploying atomic weapons?
I think Bloch/Dassault was in the same section of Buchenwald as Leon Blum, the former Prime Minister? Bloch was already a significant figure before the war, as a famous aircraft designer/manufacturer and as a political figure (his brother was a general also) so not someone to be handled lightly even as a prisoner.
Bugs: Same here. UK involvement, though: Quelle surprise!
It seems that from early on Israel was regarded by the English and the French as a beachhead in the Levant. Keep in mind that the French were soon to be / began to be embroiled in the dirty war in Algeria, which had been their chief colony in the Arab world.
The French had also granted independence to Lebanon and Syria. The U S of A had already started diddling Syria and was involved in attempted coups d’etat as early as the second year of Syrian independence.
I searched in Italian for information about that illicit dumping of radioactive waste in Gaza. I can’t find much coverage in Italy — this is another story that would make the estimation of Israel among the Italian public hit a new bottom. Hmmm.
And there’s this: “More concerning is the state of the reactor itself, particularly in light of the amount of fuel it is consuming (estimated at 1,400 tons p.a), suggesting that it is being run at many times more than its designed capacity. An inspection back in 2016 revealed 1,537 unfixable, major defects in the aluminum core of the reactor, caused by decades of heat and radioactive bombardment. In addition, there are visible cracks in the concrete containment structure leading to leaks of radioactive material into the local environment.”
Why are they running it into the ground? Can’t the Israeli government get another? What does that say about the state of the weapons program? Something doesn’t add up if we consider the ramifications of that paragraph.
“The French had also granted independence to Lebanon and Syria.”
They had been “convinced” to do it, as the Syrians and Lebanese had made it very clear they no longer wanted to be ruled by the French.
Furthermore, in 1956, the year the French government agreed to basically build Dimona, France also had to concede independence to Tunisia and Morocco — also after the natives had made it unambiguously clear that they no longer suffered the rule of their French “protectors”.
vao:
I was working on something recently with a friend and discovered that into the 1920s the French were still trying to “subdue” Morocco. So the French Empire, on which le soleil never set, either, was a fictitious thing.
And “Westerners” wonder why the Arabs and the Persians are so darn cranky…
In the 1920s the French and the Spaniards had to join forces to put down the Rif revolt led by Abd El Krim (and they sustained humiliating defeats in that long campaign). Overall, Morocco was “pacified” only in 1934. Well before that, the Moroccans repeatedly fought the Spanish occupiers in wars starting in 1859, 1893, and 1909, and they would do so again in 1959.
In the case of Algeria, Vietnam, or Indonesia, one knows about the very last, successful war that led each of those countries to independence, but all the repeated, sometimes massive uprisings that preceded them is an often forgotten part of colonial history.
DJG, from above article– “Professor Leven recommended, back in 2010, that the reactor should be shut down and Israel should build a new reactor. But, in order to do that they’d have to sign the NPT and agree to IEAE inspections, which Israel is loath to do.”
Butch: thanks
I don’t know how I managed to skip that whole paragraph.
It seems pretty clear that a good chunk of the country of Israel has been made into a very dangerous nuclear waste dump, either places that were actually used as a waste dump, or places where nuclear facilities have been operated for decades without the slightest regard for safety and containment. This area will of course be unusable for hundreds of thousands of years. The fact that environmental inspection has been rigorously prohibited for decades explains a lot: if it were allowed, everyone would instantly flee to somewhere comparatively safe, like Chernobyl or Fukushima.
This seems like a parable of Israel and the Israelis in a nutshell: try to create something for yourself and exclude everyone else, and in the process render it figuratively or literally uninhabitable for human or animal life.
Seconded – great article. I’d never heard of the NUMEC theft either. I can only wonder why such an important incident goes largely unmentioned to the point that even news junkies like the NC commentariat are unfamiliar with it. Seems pretty clear that if the “thieves” (are they really thieves if they were allowed to take it?!!?) were not affiliated with the Zionist entity, someone would have cared a little more where all this fissile material wound up.
I will just add to the closing thought that Crassus, who got rich via a privatized fire department and was suspected of starting many fires himself, allegedly perished after his capture when the Persians poured molten gold down his throat. One hopes for a similar fate for those modern would-be conquerors with a propensity for gilding everything in an attempt to cover up and compensate for their own black and filthy souls.
“Thirded” – great article! And I find lyman’s last paragraph very inspiring ;-)
I won’t have to worry about constipation for the forseeable future.
The radioactive waste-dumping habits of the Zionists are really repugnant. If they would have shut up about the Nazis and the holocaust and had not inflicted bad consciousness on everybody because of the WWII and screaming “antisemitism” as soon as you righfully critcize their horror inflicted on Palestinians over decades, I would not have been so thoroughly disgusted. The Belgians in Kongo, the Brits on Ireland, the Europeans spreading diseases in the new world, the Japanese in China etc.etc.etc. have done unspeakable stuff to others, so it seems to be a human tradition. But the Zionists took Nazi-Germany not as an example of what not to do but as a product manual. https://x.com/haaretzcom/status/1597281415753760769
A question to Kirk or anyone who knows: how about the rupture and the coming of the Messiah? Is that a factor to take into account? Do they really believe this or do they believe it as long as somebody else’s world goes under? Will they send the atoms of peace so they can have the long-awaited afterwork with the Messiah?
The entire essay, like many others, was an eye opening horror show. We set things in motion which we have no capability of controlling or predicting the consequences of. And by ‘we’, I mean us who have sold the rope which will be used to hang ourselves
So, we were useful idiots?
Treating minorities and neighbors terribly is not a human tradition – it’s a tradition of human societies with a ruling class. Societies without a ruling class aren’t necessarily kind to outsiders, but have a much stronger track record of kindness as well as integrity. I’ve collected hundreds of example showing this distinction.
Ruling classes act with deep selfishness and train the people in their societies for selfishness in very deep, disturbing ways, which explains why corruption and greed is so common in these societies. In healthy nations in traditional times – what most people call native or indigenous nations in traditional times – you actually see how humans evolved to live, where generosity, integrity, and other qualities are simply baseline expectations within the nation. These societies do not have class systems, privilege, or unaccountable leaders which would lead to troubles like the Belgians, Israelis, Brits or Americans consistently demonstrate.
So long as we’re trapped with a ruling class, we will never “learn the lessons we need to learn”. How could the Israelis act like the Nazis after what the Jews went through in WWII? How could other nations keep letting genocides continue? The reality is that ruling classes act with profound selfishness and low integrity and encourage these qualities in their people, rewarding the most selfish and low-integrity people with wealth and political influence. This is a way of life of people in unfree, unhealthy nations and leads to the same kinds of deep social troubles continuing endlessly. And it sadly explains why Israel acts so terribly – Israelis have the same way of life as the Belgians, Russians, Chinese, Americans, or any other unhealthy nation.
When people are not allowed to choose their law nor enforce their laws, but have to obey the laws they’re given – this is the way of life with a ruling class. People are not allowed to confront injustice as that’s the police’s job to enforce the law, but they have to follow orders. Widespread superficiality and cowardice result. The ones who confront injustice are imprisoned or killed, such as Jesus Christ, MLK Jr, and those opposing the genocide currently.
This is not how humans evolved to live. It’s not the way of life in healthy nations in traditional times, including the Ashaninka, Cherokee, Apache, Nootka, Haudenosauenee, and many others. I have studied dozens of such nations and produced a free video series and book – learn their stories. Learn what healthy nations are like. Learn what actual freedom is like, where everyone ensures the laws work for everyone. Everyone takes personal responsibility to uphold the laws and confront injustice so that justice becomes normal.
The stories are profoundly beautiful, and when you know what healthy nations are like, you’ll see why the same terrible patterns of corruption and greed continue endlessly in unhealthy nations with a ruling class. And you’ll see what it would take to stop these troubles – co-creating a new healthy nation. That’s what the book and video series are about.
I will check that out. I had left a somewhat related comment about Edward Goldsmith’s essay, “The Religion of a Stable Society” in response to KLG’s essay on growth. I found Goldsmith’s book, The Way: an Ecological Worldview, to be quite good.
The rapture is a narrative derived from the New Testament of the Christian bible and does nor figure in Jewish thought, only the return of the Messiah, and even that is only believed by a minority in modern day Israel.
Paul talks very briefly about a “rapture” to the Thessalonians in I Thessalonians 4:13-18. Paul preached about the imminence of Jesus’s return with such enthusiasm when he was in Thessalonica that the Thessalonians were agonizing over any of their community who died, thinking they had missed out on the Second Coming. Paul’s first letter to them served as a corrective:
I Thessalonians 4:13-17 (NRSVU)
Note the order: 1) the dead are raised; 2) the living join them and are “raptured” to the clouds. This would necessarily be a post-Tribulation rapture since it takes place after the dead are raised.
The Darbyite heresy switches the “rapture” entirely. Instead of occurring at the climactic moment after Jesus’s return, it takes place secretly before the Tribulation, seven years before Jesus’s return.
And you are absolutely right, there is no such idea in the Hebrew bible.
Thank you for providing the backstory history of Israel’s acquisition of nuclear weapons. It’s an alarming piece, with many accomplices. The author leaves out the “knock-on” effect of a nuclear exchange: the prospect of nuclear winter. Since there seems little to stop a nuclear strike by Israel from escalating, it is in everyone’s interest to prevent an initial strike. Both Russia and China (IMO) have demonstrated more awareness and sanity on this issue than the US, which has undone treaty after treaty on nuclear weapons, and pursued the reckless expansion of NATO. Whether Trump and the Zionist/deep state coalition that controls US foreign policy can or will come to their senses in time to stop what now seems ever more possible, is the question.
Great read. Kennedy’s assassination now has a different twist in my mind, after reading the disturbing link on NC the other day:
The No World Order: Meir Kahane, Netanyahu, Trump, and the war beyond Iran. Sarah Kendzior (Lucy K). Important.
https://sarahkendzior.substack.com/p/the-no-world-order
The good news is that there is no God, so neither Iran, Israel nor the US has God on their side.
Important to strip Faith out of the equation. Like volatile food and energy prices from inflation, but different.
Bad analogy.
God help us? The Epstein Bazillionaire class surely will not.
I have a really dim view of a very limited future for the earth. TOFU TACO futures are down.
As a Darwin-thumping materialist who rejects supernatural explanations out of hand, I am no atheist. If god is love and love is a transitive verb then we create god in our works of love and this god is strong if the community instantiating it is big, cohesive, and purposeful in its works of love.
More tentative in this materialist theology, it could therefore follow that those engaged in works of hate towards supremacist outcomes, as Sarah Kendzior documented, would be instantiating something like an opposite of god. If so, what should we call that kind of messiah? Trump!
I also linked Kendzior’s article in a comment below (in moderation for now). It’s so dark.
I note the extra o into God reads Good, and God spelt backwards reads Dog.
These linguistic glances always made me suspect it was all a literature thing, especially when I found out about the Dog Star (Sirius) is the brightest star in the night sky, I sensed that literary shimmer probably goes back to the ancient Egyptians…
People are good, so there is no need to attribute the good to God.
God is simply free, unrestrained by morality
In those terms, god is the intersubjective good. Intersubjectivity can be a powerful thing.
The CT crowd on the web have lately been very much pushing the Mossad killed Kennedy line (with help from some in the CIA).
Not just the CT crowd. Jeffrey Sachs has walked up to the line of saying that:
Aaron Good has been theorizing about this for a little bit, academically. Specifically, the “Who killed JFK” section about half way down. It’s very dense, much like his mentor Peter Dale Scott.
https://americanexception.substack.com/p/james-angleton-mossad-the-syndicate
I don’t think credible researchers on the subject would claim “the Mossad killed Kennedy.” But there is credible evidence that (1) Kennedy represented a definite threat to Israel’s own perceived interests, including its development of nuclear weapons; and (2) Israel had definite ties to those in the US intelligence, criminal, and Cuban exile communities who were most likely to have been involved.
Distorting or ignoring Kennedy’s significant differences on Israel from his predecessors or successors is yet another major disservice of the Chomsky/Hersh version of “leftist” US history. In this perspective, Kennedy was just another imperial war-monger like those who came before or after him, so his death (however it occurred) really didn’t matter. Leaving aside debate over the assassination itself, each revelation that has trickled out over the decades reinforces the argument that Kennedy’s death mattered greatly in a great many areas. Israel was certainly one of them.
The commentariat has probably heard this one, but here goes anyway: what’s the difference between a religious fundamentalist Zionist and a liberal, secular Zionist?
The fundamentalist knows that the God he believes him gave him the land, and the liberal knows that the God he doesn’t believe in gave him the land.
Yesterday I finished reading The No World Order – Meir Kahane, Netanyahu, Trump, and the war beyond Iran by Sarah Kendzior that was in Links recently and it’s such a good companion to this article that I want to link it again.
https://sarahkendzior.substack.com/p/the-no-world-order
Apparently, the Oreshnik destroyed a Soviet nuclear proof bunker. Does Iran have one or two for Dimona?
This is an excellent but horrifying piece. I’m honestly speechless. Are we going to see worldwide nuclear devastation on account of these psychos? And the bit about Dimona, Jesus Christ! Is there no one sane in israel?
I am puzzled by a statement about the Dimona plant:
“the reactor [..] is being run at two to four times its rated capacity”
What does this mean? Is it even physically possible to double or quadruple the volume of rods of fissile material that can be brought into the core? Can one reduce the moderator to just a quarter of its effect without inducing some Chernobyl-like runaway fission and core meltdown?
This is a 60 year old reactor with a defective core, it should only be rated at a few megawatts not the 40 Mw it was originally rated at. Judging by the recertifation they are running it at fill throttle
Hi Kevin Kirk. Thanks and congrats on this article. The section on safety was, for me, especially dispiriting.
What are they running that reactor hard for? To produce more material for more bombs?
I agree. If it was 20%, I could believe that but to think the pipes and pressure and everything could be pushed 4x seems highly unlikely.
Unless it was built initially way oversized in which case it wouldn’t be 4x but running at capacity.
After trying to dig into the reactor info it was the 2nd one they built, the first just for power. Originally sized at 27MW, then within 1-2 years after starting was increased to roughly 70MW so about 2.5X. Those numbers might be wrong, but it’s all I can find.
No where can I find if the reactor was modified or if they were running it at reduced power for the first 1-2 years. Its would be logical to operate your brand new reactor at reduced capacity for a while until you were very sure it was totally stable before you went to full power.
Running so over-powered means there must be an enormous demand for tritium to keep Israel’s many fission/fusion nukes boosted to full yield.
As a reminder, Nukemap shows the outcome on a target of your choice. 400 and 40 kt yields are relevant here.
It’s worth following the link to the photos from the whistleblower – the warhead assembly plant areas look like a total mess. I don’t know exactly how I imagined an operation like that to look, but it seems very untidy for a place where they are manufacturing atom bombs designed to kill millions. White Sands it ain’t. More like a clandestine murder factory in a horror flick.
The US plants were all a mess too, if you read about Oakwood and Hanford etc. UK probably the same judging by the reprocessing plant at Sellafield (there’s very little in the public domain about warhead manufacturing at Aldermaston).
Very good read, but the article is at https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2026/03/immigration-bane-or-boon.html which would be confusing for people posting the link elsewhere.
There were “because reasons” factors at work.
The URL has now been corrected to https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2026/03/armageddon-now-israels-nuclear.html
And the older URL redirects to this one.
I wonder what the “Israel has a right to defend itself” chorus would say about slathering Gaza and the West Bank with nuclear waste. The post-holocaust zeal for nuclear weapons is almost understandable as a post-traumatic madness, if you ignore the settler colonialism. But knowing, deliberate irradiation of Untermenschen? That’s a pretty good working definition of evil.
I gather that Netanyahu’s father was a scholar of Jewish history in Spain, particularly the Inquisition, often focusing on the idea that Jewish history is marked by recurring “holocausts.” Touching to see a son work so hard to prove his father’s thesis right, albeit maybe not quite in the way he meant it.
I got a chuckle out of seeing Argentina among the suppliers for Israel’s nuke program.
I’ve only seen the Beatles’ Yellow Submarine once, way back in the early ’70s but this clip has stuck in my brain for some reason:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FeUCYdzaths
“The end result was a crushing defeat for Rome
[…]
Lesson to be learned: never underestimate Iran.”
The Romans never learned the lesson, and for the next 680 years, both empires fought each other in massive campaigns — that often ended up in Roman defeats as crushing as Carrhae (notably Edessa, Misiche, Barbalissos), with three Roman emperors perishing in their attempts to subdue Persia.
If history serves as a precedent, then it is an ominous one: a perpetual state of hostility between Iran and the USA/Israel, with war rekindling ever so often.
When I went to Iran several years ago, my first day was to be spent in Bishapur an archeological site not far from Shiraz. Unfortunately my flight was delayed, but my guide explained what I had missed.
He explained to me that there had been three wars with the Romans. The Romans were defeated in the first. They agreed to pay ransom for their release. But the Roman Senate reneged on the deal.
In the second, it was the same story: Roman defeat, agreement, and failure to follow through.
In the third battle, the Iranians defeated the Romans led by Caesar Valerian, but Shapur, the “King of Kings” decided to just keep the soldiers and put them to work building the city of Bishapur, which became one of the capitals of the Sasanian Empire, which lasted about 400 years, outlasting Rome.
Of course, I had never heard any of this in discussions detailing the glorious history of Rome (quelle surprise!) The Wikipedia entry on Bishapur confirms much of the story.
Obviously Iranians consider it highly significant, true or false! Will history somehow rhyme?
I have trouble believing the article.
To say Iran has bomb/s seems completely unbelievable. And given the link to oil price it gives me zero confidence it’s true.
Why? If they his guy knows then all of the intelligence agencies around the world know. And if they know then this would have been used as the reason to bomb Iran, not only now but a decade ago.
There is no way Trump wouldn’t be yelling at the top of his lungs about the proof that Iran has the bomb, not only now but his last administration.
No way BIBI would have done nothing for over a decade.
And if you have a bomb and for some miracle no one knew, it doesn’t do you any good as deterrence. For MAD to work everyone has to know. And you need enough bombs to make sure it works.
You are straw manning KK, which is a violation of our site Policies. And then you are using that bogus foundation to denigrate him and the entire piece. I take even more offense when this is done to a guest poster than to me. He said no such thing. He said it was “more than possible” which is way short of saying they have one.
In addition, this comment is a classic example of the cognitive bias called halo effect, of needing to see things as all good or all bad. I regularly run article that I generally regard as valuable but quibble with some small issues.
That is an aside in an article about the Israel program. Even if the remark is an overreach, that has nothing to do with the thrust of the piece.
According to the article they paid for them. It is quite possible that the DPRK still have them, ready to send.
@ KK —
Are you familiar with laser isotope separation (LIS)? Back in 2005 to 2007, when Israel was busy assasinating Iranian nuclear physicists, it was all guys who were LIS experts.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomic_vapor_laser_isotope_separation
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molecular_laser_isotope_separation
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Separation_of_isotopes_by_laser_excitation
I bring it up because it’s a demanding technology that only a few nations have had the expertise to get anywhere with. If Iran had and has scientists of that level of capability, they’ve the capability to develop nuclear weapons very quickly if they decide to.
In any case, they’ve already enough 80 percent enriched U-235 for a gun-type atomic bomb, although God knows how they’d deliver it.
Also: great piece of work!
As someone that thinks Iran does have a minimal credible deterrent, I think you have to remember one subtlety: for deterrence, only the inner decision makers within a rival government need to know about it.
At the same time, the public-facing parts of Western governments today (and people like Grossi at the IAEA) rely on constant image management. They’ve also staked much of their foreign policy on “stopping Iran from getting the bomb”. To admit they already failed totally would collapse what little narrative control they have and be personally humiliating, across the political class.
If you go with my hypothesis, Iran has cleverly been able to rely on Western governments, purely out of their own narcissism and careerism, to do the cover-up. Defense and intel agencies would still know not to escalate beyond certain lines though because Iran nurses an economical second-strike behind legalistic ambiguities in Khamenei Senior’s fatwa.
Yes, very informative. Thanks.
Some super FUBAR operators back then (and still one may speculate/presume) with the nuclear stuff.
A few questions.
Kevin, are you suggesting that Kenedy’s assassination was related to the inspection program he was about to implement, or merely a coincidence, of sorts? Not that I read everything on the JFK assassination, but I never heard that scenario before now. Just asking.
,
Also, on a related matter, I heard from colleagues, the rumour-mill etc, that the expected main blob of corium has not been found from the Chernobyl reactor disaster site in 1986. This presumes someone took out the material just before the meltdown, or it was being falsified and skived routinely?
Do you or anyone have the inside kipp on those speculations? If so, that could correlate to conflicting reports that the surrounding fauna and flora seem not to be growing 3 eyes, two heads, or bark inside out straight away.
I can’t say how i know this, for my own protection and the safety of people involved, but there’s a source of U in the Sinai that the author omitted. I haven’t visited the place myself but have interacted with the ore samples with my own eyes, hands, and geiger counter. This source shared maps, photos, etc. over a period of several months and I have a hard copy of their excellent paper in a box somewhere. The samples were gorgeous, the photos alarming. This paper isn’t, for fairly obvious reasons, available online.
The burning bush tale in Exodus might not be fiction. As thorough as this post is, the situation appears to be worse.
Thanks for your tidbit but expecting a writer to be omniscient is not reasonable. You could have added this very helpful information without dissing the author.
Not my intent as this is an excellent, well researched document. I apologise.
I would love to share my info with Mr. Kirk but it would have to be in person. I know the what and the where.
Shocking stuff, yet still somehow unsurprising.
Future history books (assuming there’ll be enough of a future to have “history” or “”books”) they will ask how 9 billion people let a tiny group of settler genocidaires get so out of hand.
There’s one important element of context which is missed out at the beginning. In the 50s and 60s it was widely assumed that nuclear weapons were simple and easy to construct, and that they would find their way into the arsenals of most nations before too long. When the NNPT was first discussed, it was assumed that by the 1970s 50-60 nations might have nuclear weapons. (Tom Lehrer’s 1965 song was not entirely satire.) Given that this list would have included at least Egypt, it becomes clearer why nuclear cooperation with Israel started when it did.
Israel played an important role in South Africa’s nuclear weapons programme. SA actually constructed 6-7 weapons, later dismantled, for use against a hypothetical Soviet/Cuban invasion of the country through Angola and Namibia, which was the nightmare of the apartheid state in the 1980s.
re: origins of the “Samson option”
from:
Middle East Diplomacy: Continuities and Changes
Noam Chomsky
Z Magazine
December, 1991
“(…)
If US interests are reassessed and Washington decides to press Israel beyond what its leadership would accept, Israel does have certain options, despite its extreme dependency on the United States. The nature of these options has been the topic of considerable discussion within Israel. Writing about the matter almost 10 years ago, I quoted Aryeh (Lova) Eliav, one of Israel’s best-known doves, who deplored the attitude of “those who brought Samson complex’ here, according to which we shall kill and bury all the Gentiles around us while we ourselves shall die with them.” Others too regarded the greatest danger facing Israel as the “collective version” of Samson’s revenge against the Philistines, recalling Prime Minister Moshe Sharett’s diary entries from the 1950s, in which he recorded the “preaching” of high-level Labor party officials “in favor of acts of madness” and “the diabolical lesson of how to set the Middle East on fire” with “acts of despair and suicide” that will terrify the world as “we go crazy,” if crossed. Israel’s nuclear power, well-known to US authorities for many years, renders such thinking more than empty threats. Writing in 1982, three Israeli strategic analysts observed that Israel’s nuclear capacity included missiles able to reach “many targets in southern USSR,” a threat — real or pretended — that may well be aimed primarily at the United States, putting US planners on notice that pressures on Israel to accede to an unwanted political settlement could lead to an international conflagration. The reasoning was explained further in the Labor party journal Davar, reporting Israel’s reaction to the Saudi peace plan of August 1981, with the “signs of open-mindedness and moderation” that the government of Israel regarded as a serious threat. Israel’s response was to send military jets over the oil fields, a warning to the West of Israel’s capacity to cause immense destruction to the world’s major energy reserves if pressed towards an unwanted peace, Davar reported. The world has changed since, but Israel’s “Samson option,” as Seymour Hersh calls it in a recent book, remains alive.
(…)”
https://chomsky.info/199112__/
It is interesting, and ironic, to read your comment here. I just finished posting a comment above criticizing Chomsky and Hersh for contributing to the “left’s” distorted understanding of Kennedy, and by extension of postwar US history. But I do not write off all of their work because of this. Much of it was valuable; you’ve just illustrated this here in the Chomsky passage which also cites Hersh’s book.
All the more reason to be frustrated or puzzled with those cases where their work did more to obscure than enlighten.
😉
If you are willing to spare 15 or so minutes I recommend the last passage of the interview Briahna Joy Gray did with Chris Hedges 3 weeks ago, touching on Chomsky too, whom Hedges knows very well of course (you might have read Hedges´s condemning piece re: Epstein/Chomsky).
She asks him about Rockhill´s and others´ criticism of Chomsky that he is some kind of asset one way or the other (which he is not, I have been reading the man for several decades.)
Hedges recalls that e.g. in US legacy media, NYT, WaPo, you name them, it was forbidden to either mention the name Chomsky or print anything by him. They didn´t even print letters which he would send as a reader. So I would urge to make a very huge difference between Hersh and Chomsky in this regard.
(Hersh we must consider however paid a certain price for pissing off the CIA and they threatened his family and friends. So he could as well have cut out the work for himself in a much more comfortable way.)
Btw Hedges puts Chomsky, Parenti, West, Zinn etc. into the same basket as their significance to us as a movement is concerned. We should never play them off against each other (sorry for sounding like a broken record.)
My addition:
I can only stress that millions of people have taken up the fight for the just cause due to Chomsky´s incessant labour on this front.
Unlike Hedges, I do believe that Chomsky in regard of Epstein was naive and sticking to certain standards of how to treat people who are persecuted, prosecuted, or even convicted. He does treat everyone the same way and initially offers people all generosity. I have had a professor in my own area who I learned a big deal from who had the same admirable principle to treat all humans the same way.
And very likely the corrective in these instances due to Chomsky´s shortcomings in executing suspicion, Chomsky´s first wife, Carol, was gone.
What I don´t find improbable that rather his family took a certain toll for his principled way of managing things. If you do this in such obsessive manner as he does (answer hundreds of letters per month over decades for instance, give hundreds of talks all over the place) someone has to pay the price for your absence…
People should also keep in mind this “media phenomenon” Chomsky came up only very late in his life by the 2000s mainly due to the rise of alternative media. By then he was well into his 70s) born 1928).
TC: 53:50
https://chrishedges.substack.com/p/epstein-chomsky-and-the-politics
p.s. some speculation which I usually try not to practice: Chomsky´s second wife Valeria might have been overwhelmed by the status Chomsky had and how he was treated. Some people find it difficult to deal with such circumstances and react in surprising ways (I mean you have to deal with it 24/7). This might lead to exaggerated loyalty instead of acting as independent counterpoint and critique. She, perhaps, was not up to that not least because it was not her intention to make his life more difficult since she only came to accompany him because he lost his longtime companion. It would be fair to grant her the benefit of exaggerated caring or over-protectiveness. By any means it´s not necessarily an easy spot to find yourself in despite all the understanding and willingness to help. And if you by way of accepting Epstein´s invitations would benefit once too, that´s not abnormal a reaction…in how far who did not know what and who did know I would be less sure than Hedges. When Valeria wrote the open letter she would have been condemned whatever path she would choose. She could only fail: Either the victims, or the public, or Noam Chomsky himself or the colleagues or relatives.
I appreciate your arguments. As I say, I have benefited a lot from Chomsky’s work over the years. I do not think he was a CIA asset. But my problems with his work also go back a long way. I would argue that his work has at times served a limited hangout function, whether intended or not. His perspective on Kennedy is only one example. Most relevant here was his book ‘Rethinking Camelot.’ That it was published in 1993 is noteworthy. Oliver Stone’s ‘JFK’ produced a tremendous public furor for release of long-withheld records on the assassination. But it also pushed a heterodox view of Kennedy’s plans for Vietnam among other policy issues. Both of these were anathema to the official narrative, and there was tremendous push-back by the Establishment. 1993 was the 30th anniversary of the assassination, and there was going to be a *lot* of discussion about Kennedy. There was a massive offensive to defend the orthodox view. Books, articles, and TV shows were commissioned toward this end. Chomsky’s book was one of these – easily the most important one for the “left.” Chomsky set out to crush this revisionist view of the Kennedy administration. Was he acting as an “agent” of the CIA or Israel? No, I don’t think so. The book is scholarly, backed by facts and evidence. But we all know that historical evidence can be selected or omitted in a variety of ways. Intended or not, Chomsky’s book reinforced the establishment perspective on Kennedy, and also defined an “accepted” orthodoxy for “leftists” that prevented them from understanding some deeper truths about that historical period. As more documents were declassified and more information emerged that tended to back up the revisionists Chomsky stubbornly doubled down, dismissing them derisively as delusional.
There are many such examples of this over the years. I don’t want to hijack this thread with a long discussion of Chomsky – though I think the Kennedy example is relevant to the topic at hand. Here are a few critics who consider some of the other problems with Chomsky’s work over the years (the latter is a comparison with Parenti):
https://joeemersberger.substack.com/p/assessing-chomsky
https://www.greanvillepost.com/2020/06/03/the-mainstream-and-the-margins-noam-chomsky-vs-michael-parenti/
For me, the problems with Chomsky go much deeper than an aging icon’s bromance with Epstein.
I cannot think of anything more useless than the Western, or anglophone left. There isn’t even a coherent anti-war movement. Much of that is Chomsky’s doing. Maybe he wasn’t a CIA collaborator, but the effect is the same. He may have influenced millions of people, but none of them know how to channel their desire for justice.
Here is the link to a paper I wrote in 2012 about Israel’s nuclear program for the UAE Annual Energy Conference. Over 10,000 words & 150 footnotes.
https://hiroshimapeacecommittee.net/?page_id=206
How cool is that!
Thank you for this. Very detailed informative.
#TYVM
Well, I guess now we know how Israel is so well-informed about the routes by which Iran might acquire and develop nukes. They know it’s possible because it’s how they did it.
I get tired of saying this, but Every Accusation is a Confession (EAiaC)
Allow me to add a tidbit from personal knowledge.
After that suspicious 1976 radiation signature in the Indian Ocean suggesting an Israeli-South African nuclear test, As a DC-based reporter, I attended a background briefing the Carter Administration hosted with top science officials. (It was 40+ years ago, so I don’t remember any names.) The experts acknowledged that the technical details did look exactly like a nuclear blast, but they basically said, It wasn’t. They called it a “zoo incident,” which apparently means something weird that can’t be explained. That was crazy, but the reaction of the assembled scribes was crazier: they just nodded and said, Okay right. And wrote it up that way.
Thank you for this guest post. I come here, to NC, to learn from thee bright bulbs. No pun. Appreciate my virtual community. Times are Moving faster and faster, 7th decade approaches… hum…
I appreciate this article. I was definitely in a more anxious place about this confrontation going nuclear last week. I am somewhat less so after reading this.