Israel was a nuclear power well before 67
"One expert postulated, based on unnamed sources, that the French nuclear test in 1960 made two nuclear powers not one—such was the depth of collaboration." The full article is an exellent read
THE THIRD TEMPLE'S HOLY OF HOLIES:
ISRAEL'S NUCLEAR WEAPONS
Warner D. Farr, LTC, U.S. Army
The Counterproliferation Papers
http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/israel/nuke/farr.htmsnip
snip
II. 1948-1962: With French Cooperation
In 1949, Francis Perrin, a member of the French Atomic Energy Commission, nuclear physicist, and friend of Dr. Bergmann visited the Weizmann Institute. He invited Israeli scientists to the new French nuclear research facility at Saclay. A joint research effort was subsequently set up between the two nations. Perrin publicly stated in 1986 that French scientists working in America on the Manhattan Project and in Canada during World War II were told they could use their knowledge in France provided they kept it a secret.<8> Perrin reportedly provided nuclear data to Israel on the same basis.<9> One Israeli scientist worked at the U.S. Los Alamos National Laboratory and may have directly brought expertise home.<10>
After the Second World War, France's nuclear research capability was quite limited. France had been a leading research center in nuclear physics before World War II, but had fallen far behind the U.S., the U.S.S.R., the United Kingdom, and even Canada. Israel and France were at a similar level of expertise after the war, and Israeli scientists could make significant contributions to the French effort. Progress in nuclear science and technology in France and Israel remained closely linked throughout the early fifties. Israeli scientists probably helped construct the G-1 plutonium production reactor and UP-1 reprocessing plant at Marcoule.<11> France profited from two Israeli patents on heavy water production and low-grade uranium enrichment.<12> In the 1950s and into the early 1960s, France and Israel had close relations in many areas. France was Israel's principal arms supplier, and as instability spread through French colonies in North Africa, Israel provided valuable intelligence obtained from contacts with sephardic Jews in those countries.
The two nations collaborated, with the United Kingdom, in planning and staging the Suez Canal-Sinai operation against Egypt in October 1956. The Suez Crisis became the real genesis of Israel's nuclear weapons production program. With the Czech-Egyptian arms agreement in 1955, Israel became worried. When absorbed, the Soviet-bloc equipment would triple Egyptian military strength. After Egypt's President Nasser closed the Straits of Tiran in 1953, Israeli Prime Minister Ben-Gurion ordered the development of chemical munitions and other unconventional munitions, including nuclear.<13> Six weeks before the Suez Canal operation, Israel felt the time was right to approach France for assistance in building a nuclear reactor. Canada had set a precedent a year earlier when it had agreed to build a 40-megawatt CIRUS reactor in India. Shimon Peres, the Director-General of the Defense Ministry and aide to Prime Minister (and Defense Minister) David Ben-Gurion, and Bergmann met with members of the CEA (France's Atomic Energy Commission). During September 1956, they reached an initial understanding to provide a research reactor. The two countries concluded final agreements at a secret meeting outside Paris where they also finalized details of the Suez Canal operation.<14>
For the United Kingdom and France, the Suez operation, launched on October 29, 1956, was a total disaster. Israel's part was a military success, allowing it to occupy the entire Sinai Peninsula by 4 November, but the French and British canal invasion on 6 November was a political failure. Their attempt to advance south along the Suez Canal stopped due to a cease-fire under fierce Soviet and U.S. pressure. Both nations pulled out, leaving Israel to face the pressure from the two superpowers alone. Soviet Premier Bulganin and President Khrushchev issued an implicit threat of nuclear attack if Israel did not withdraw from the Sinai.
On 7 November 1956, a secret meeting was held between Israeli foreign minister Golda Meir, Shimon Peres, and French foreign and defense ministers Christian Pineau and Maurice Bourges-Manoury. The French, embarrassed by their failure to support their ally in the operation, found the Israelis deeply concerned about a Soviet threat. In this meeting, they substantially modified the initial understanding beyond a research reactor. Peres secured an agreement from France to assist Israel in developing a nuclear deterrent. After further months of negotiation, agreement was reached for an 18-megawatt (thermal) research reactor of the EL-3 type, along with plutonium separation technology. France and Israel signed the agreement in October 1957.<15> Later the reactor was officially upgraded to 24 megawatts, but the actual specifications issued to engineers provided for core cooling ducts sufficient for up to three times this power level, along with a plutonium plant of similar capacity. Data from insider reports revealed in 1986 would estimate the power level at 125-150 megawatts.<16> The reactor, not connected to turbines for power production, needed this increase in size only to increase its plutonium production. How this upgrade came about remains unknown, but Bourges-Maunoury, replacing Mollet as French prime minister, may have contributed to it.<17> Shimon Peres, the guiding hand in the Israeli nuclear program, had a close relationship with Bourges-Maunoury and probably helped him politically.<18>
Why was France so eager to help Israel? DeMollet and then de Gaulle had a place for Israel within their strategic vision. A nuclear Israel could be a counterforce against Egypt in France's fight in Algeria. Egypt was openly aiding the rebel forces there. France also wanted to obtain the bomb itself. The United States had embargoed certain nuclear enabling computer technology from France. Israel could get the technology from America and pass it through to France. The U.S. furnished Israel heavy water, under the Atoms for Peace program, for the small research reactor at Soreq. France could use this heavy water. Since France was some years away from nuclear testing and success, Israeli science was an insurance policy in case of technical problems in France's own program.<19> The Israeli intelligence community's knowledge of past French (especially Vichy) anti-Semitic transgressions and the continued presence of former Nazi collaborators in French intelligence provided the Israelis with some blackmail opportunities.<20> The cooperation was so close that Israel worked with France on the preproduction design of early Mirage jet aircraft, designed to be capable of delivering nuclear bombs.<21>
French experts secretly built the Israeli reactor underground at Dimona, in the Negev desert of southern Israel near Beersheba. Hundreds of French engineers and technicians filled Beersheba, the biggest town in the Negev. Many of the same contractors who built Marcoule were involved. SON (a French firm) built the plutonium separation plants in both France and Israel. The ground was broken for the EL-102 reactor (as it was known to France) in early 1958.
Israel used many subterfuges to conceal activity at Dimona. It called the plant a manganese plant, and rarely, a textile plant. The United States by the end of 1958 had taken pictures of the project from U-2 spy planes, and identified the site as a probable reactor complex. The concentration of Frenchmen was also impossible to hide from ground observers. In 1960, before the reactor was operating, France, now under the leadership of de Gaulle, reconsidered and decided to suspend the project. After several months of negotiation, they reached an agreement in November that allowed the reactor to proceed if Israel promised not to make nuclear weapons and to announce the project to the world. Work on the plutonium reprocessing plant halted. On 2 December 1960, before Israel could make announcements, the U.S. State Department issued a statement that Israel had a secret nuclear installation. By 16 December, this became public knowledge with its appearance in the New York Times. On 21 December, Ben-Gurion announced that Israel was building a 24-megawatt reactor “for peaceful purposes.”<22>
Over the next year, relations between the U.S. and Israel became strained over the Dimona reactor. The U.S. accepted Israel's assertions at face value publicly, but exerted pressure privately. Although Israel allowed a cursory inspection by well known American physicists Eugene Wigner and I. I. Rabi, Prime Minister Ben-Gurion consistently refused to allow regular international inspections. The final resolution between the U.S. and Israel was a commitment from Israel to use the facility for peaceful purposes, and to admit an U.S. inspection team twice a year. These inspections began in 1962 and continued until 1969. Inspectors saw only the above ground part of the buildings, not the many levels underground and the visit frequency was never more than once a year. The above ground areas had simulated control rooms, and access to the underground areas was kept hidden while the inspectors were present. Elevators leading to the secret underground plutonium reprocessing plant were actually bricked over.<23> Much of the information on these inspections and the political maneuvering around it has just been declassified.<24>
One interpretation of Ben-Gurion's “peaceful purposes” pledge given to America is that he interpreted it to mean that nuclear weapon development was not excluded if used strictly for defensive, and not offensive purposes. Israel's security position in the late fifties and early sixties was far more precarious than now. After three wars, with a robust domestic arms industry and a reliable defense supply line from the U.S., Israel felt much more secure. During the fifties and early sixties a number of attempts by Israel to obtain security guarantees from the U.S. to place Israel under the U.S. nuclear umbrella like NATO or Japan, were unsuccessful. If the U.S. had conducted a forward-looking policy to restrain Israel's proliferation, along with a sure defense agreement, we could have prevented the development of Israel's nuclear arsenal.
One common discussion in the literature concerns testing of Israeli nuclear devices. In the early phases, the amount of collaboration between the French and Israeli nuclear weapons design programs made testing unnecessary. In addition, although their main efforts were with plutonium, the Israelis may have amassed enough uranium for gun-assembled type bombs which, like the Hiroshima bomb, require no testing. One expert postulated, based on unnamed sources, that the French nuclear test in 1960 made two nuclear powers not one—such was the depth of collaboration.]25] There were several Israeli observers at the French nuclear tests and the Israelis had “unrestricted access to French nuclear test explosion data.”<26> Israel also supplied essential technology and hardware.<27> The French reportedly shipped reprocessed plutonium back to Israel as part of their repayment for Israeli scientific help.
Printer-friendly format
Email this thread to a friend
Bookmark this thread
(1000+ posts)
Send PM |
Profile |
Ignore
