An irresponsible debate

Amos Regev

Fleet Admiral William Daniel Leahy was a respected naval officer. Five gold stars adorned his uniform -- the most senior rank in the American military. His wisdom and experience conferred upon him a certain reputation; so much so, that in the midst of the darkest days of World War II, Roosevelt brought him back from civilian life and appointed him chief of staff to the commander in chief, essentially making him the supreme commander of the armed forces. By virtue of his personality, he also become the president's most trusted military adviser, and served as the link between the president and the army's top brass. When Roosevelt died in April 1945, with war still raging in Europe and in the Far East, Leahy continued in the role under the new president, Harry Truman, who until then had served as vice president. One of the first things about which the new president was briefed was the greatest secret of all: the development of the American atomic bomb. Yes, even as vice president, Truman had not been aware of the existence of the Manhattan Project. That is how state secrets are kept. The only ones who know are those who need to know. Even the vice president was out of the picture until he became president and commander-in-chief.

"Mister President," Admirial Leahy, the senior military adviser, told him, "This is the biggest fool thing we have ever done. The bomb will never go off, and I speak as an expert in explosives."

Get the Israel Hayom newsletter sent to your mailbox!

The rest is history.

The decision to drop the atomic bomb was President Truman's, the U.S. army's official history asserts.

"The decision to use the atomic bomb was made by President Truman," writes military historian Louis Morton. "There was never any doubt of that, and despite the rising tide of criticism, Mr. Truman took full responsibility for his action ... Mr. Truman leaned heavily on the advice of his senior and most trusted advisers on the question of the bomb. But the final decision was his and his alone." Some of those advisers supported the attack as the surest way to bring about a quick end to the war, thus saving millions of lives, both American and Japanese. Others objected, among them Admiral Leahy, who not only thought the bomb would not work, but also believed that the use of atomic weapons was immoral.

Furthermore, many of the scientists who, with their own hands, developed the most destructive weapon ever created by mankind, also beseeched the presidents -- first Roosevelt, then, after his death, Truman -- not to use the bomb. Among them were an abundance of Nobel Prize laureates, brilliant people who split the atom and laid the groundwork for the development of nuclear weapons. People like the scientists Niels Bohr and Leo Szilard. "The decision about what to do with the bomb needs to be at the discretion of those who specialize in the subject, those who developed it," they said.

But it was Truman who made the decision. Two atomic bombs dropped on Japan caused enormous damage and cost the lives of hundreds of thousands of Japanese, but also brought about the immediate end of World War II. They also set off the nuclear arms race, just as Szilard had predicted would happen. In hindsight, however, it may be that nuclear weapons also prevented, through mutual deterrence -- "Mutually Assured Destruction," or MAD -- the outbreak of a third world war. Truman's decision cast the shadow of a mushroom cloud over the world, but also changed history, and not necessarily for the worse. It's a matter of interpretation.

Rubbing their eyes in Tehran

What is not a matter of interpretation is the fact that there are state secrets, and that there are some subjects over which it is not correct to hold a "public debate." For the simple reason that if the experts don't always understand the fields for which they themselves are responsible, even more so the average citizen. The experts, at least, are liable to receive intelligence (a problematic matter in its own right); but the citizen is not able to base his opinions on reports from SIGINT (electronic or "signals" intelligence) or HUMINT (human intelligence), computer warfare or a spy planted next to the ear of a decision-maker in an enemy state.

There is no greater secret than the secret that concerns a state's very existence. So why the hell, and with what chutzpah, do some of our media outlets, led by Yedioth Aharonoth, dare initiate a "public debate" on an issue so secret, so important, so existential, as the question of whether we need, or do not need, to attack Iran in order to prevent it from arming itself and using nuclear weapons against Israel? In whose name, and in the name of what, do journalists lacking any knowledge roll their eyes and decisively assert that two crazed people -- a front-page report in Yedioth Aharonoth has asserted that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak have decided between themselves to launch a military attack on Iran's nuclear facilities -- are leading us toward destruction? What do they know, these self-appointed experts, that could lend their claims any special weight regarding such a weighty subject?

The answer is simple: They don't know anything. In their eyes, such is my impression, everything is permissible in the struggle to bring down the current government, led by Netanyahu. The "diplomatic tsunami" didn't work? The social protest didn't succeed? Netanyahu surprised them by releasing Gilad Shalit? Yalla, we'll continue the war by other means. They are not satisfied with Barak as defense minister either, so now we'll play the Iran card. If that involves publicly airing a secret which hitherto had been guarded with utmost secrecy -- so be it. After all, we can always claim that we are doing it in order to prevent a disaster. With holy fervor, we'll disperse the ambiguity, impair deterrence, raise the curtain, gradually expose the secrets, and provide ammunition to our enemies. Day after day -- what does this matter when compared to the single, consecrated aim of getting rid of this government, which is not of our ilk, as quickly as possible. What about the "peace process," anyway?

In Tehran they are certainly rubbing their eyes every morning in disbelief when they see the latest edition of Yedioth Aharonoth, and perhaps they are also buckling over with laughter when they watch several news commentators offer their opinions on Israeli television. They couldn't ask for better gifts than these. Not far away, the centrifuges go on spinning, enriching more and more uranium into fissionable material, the kind that can be used in bombs. Does anyone doubt that this is happening? Take a look at the story that came out Tuesday morning about Syria. According to foreign publications, Israel attacked a reactor there, destroying it and ridding itself of an existential threat. Right? Not exactly. There is another reactor, which intelligence was apparently not aware of. And even if it was, that reactor was not destroyed by anyone. Perhaps this should also be investigated by the State Comptroller, as one respected television commentator suggested on Tuesday, who, completely by chance, also happens to publish a column in Yedioth Aharonoth.

That isn't how things are, people in the know will say. There are certain former senior officials who, until they finished serving out their terms (which were not extended, to their chagrin), were privy to secrets -- and some say that it is "their associates" who are spreading rumors about the attack that is just around the corner, and that they put themselves on the line to prevent it, because if the attack happens we're all finished. So maybe we should trust them, because of who they were, because of their knowledge? And maybe they were tossed out because of their brave stance?

Maybe, or maybe not. Because if supposedly this whole witch hunt flows from a personal wish for revenge, that is an even bigger scandal. A person who is privy to classified information is supposed to keep these things to himself, forever. That is part of the basic trust on which the system is built. At West Point, where the U.S. trains its army officers, every wall is engraved with the slogan "Duty, Honor, Country." Basic values, simple and binding. Even more so when the people holding these positions are bound to preserve and protect the country's very existence. This applies to people in the military, as it does to anyone holding a senior position.

Who guarantees the "balance of terror"?

What do we know about Iran? A new report by the International Atomic Energy Agency is set to be published soon, and one hopes that it will add more details and lift the veil on what Mahmoud Ahmadinajed and his colleagues are preparing. In the meantime, we can assume, on the basis of foreign reports, that the Iranians are continuing to advance their plan for nuclear weapons. Some say they are in no hurry: they are simply preparing, and preparing. This situation is called "a state on the nuclear threshold" -- a state preparing all the necessary elements, putting them on the shelf, and when it feels the moment is right, taking all the pieces of the puzzle and putting together a bomb. And when that happens, it happens fast. Very fast.

The Iranians are not stupid. If they wanted to announce to the world that they have a nuclear weapon, they could have done so. If they wanted to launch wars, they would do so. But since the end of the Iran-Iraq war in 1988, they have preferred to let someone else do the job for them. Thus, they create satellite proxy states: in Lebanon, in Gaza, in Yemen, in Iraq, in east Africa. When they feel like it, they set aside the inter-Islamic hatred and, despite being Shiites, prop up Sunni movements. Such as Hamas, for example, or the Muslim Brotherhood in several Arab states.

Meanwhile, they continue putting more and more pieces on the shelf, more enriched material, more detonators. Until the moment when they decide to assemble the bomb. And by the way, building a nuclear facility is not such a challenge once a large state, with means at its disposal, decides to do so. The technology is quite old, actually. Even putting a bomb on a warhead is more difficult, but not impossible. In military museums in the West, a visitor can look at disassembled missiles, some of them long-range missiles capable of travelling thousands of miles and equipped with nuclear warheads. They are in a museum, because they were in active service more than 50 years ago. What was complicated then is certainly simpler today. Aside from that, Iran some time ago attained plans made by Pakistani scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan, the father of the Pakistani atom bomb. Pakistan not only has bombs, but missiles equipped with nuclear warheads. It's simple enough, in fact, from the moment a decision is made. It is reasonable to assume that in the moment of truth, intelligence will have to deliver the information: Is Tehran already putting the parts together? Nu, does Moishe from Petach Tikva really need to be notified about this intelligence, straight from Mossad headquarters?

Great, say journalists here. So they'll have a bomb, and (according to foreign sources) we have a bomb, so there will be a "balance of terror," and we'll all live in peace with one another. That's how it went in the Cold War, no?

Yes, that's how it was, with one small difference: The U.S. and the U.S.S.R. were rational states. Even the most ardent communist knew that, on Judgment Day, Moscow would be wiped off the map. And when Nikita Khrushchev dared to challenge the U.S. with the most dangerous move ever made -- the positioning of missiles in Cuba -- eventually, in the face of a real nuclear threat, he backed down.

But Ahmedinejad? And the ayatollahs? Does anyone among us really know what they would do? Perhaps we should listen to what they are saying. Many Israeli journalists still believe that what a Muslim leader says about Israel is meant for internal consumption only, for his public, while behind the scenes he speaks differently, more moderately. History does not necessarily back up this interpretation. Perhaps we would do better to listen to their words, and take them at face value? "We will set the Middle East alight with the fires of hell, we'll eliminate the Zionist cancer, and then the Mahdi will come," Ahmedinejad has said more than once. Are statements such as these meant for internal consumption only, or does he really mean what he says?

Unfortunately, it's our problem

It would be better for everyone if the U.S. solved the Iranian problem. It hasn't done so thus far. It would be better if the Iranian people brought down the regime of the ayatollahs and turned toward the West. That hasn't happened either. Thus, we have a problem with Iran, an existential problem. And our leaders will eventually have to make a decision -- possibly alone.

Who are these people who would decide for me, one TV commentator fumed this week. In case he forgot: This is the country's elected government, that's how it is in a democracy. Truman, who was a major in the army and the owner of a small haberdashery shop in Kansas City before becoming a politician and, later, president, is the one who made the historic decision. Here too, the elected government is liable to make the historic decision. Presumably, many of the country's citizens do not like the terrifying headlines with which they have been bombarded recently. Perhaps they would even prefer that the decision-making remain in the hands of this government. In its hands, and not in the hands of journalists. Journalists are allowed to make mistakes. In any case, nobody really bothers to confront them with what they wrote the day before yesterday, and which already turned out yesterday to be wrong, or with what they published today, which will prove incorrect tomorrow. The leader makes the decisions -- and he must live with them, to bear the responsibility, toward his people, and in the eyes of history. It's a shame we can't ask the late Menachem Begin what lesson he learned from his decision to attack the Iraqi reactor in 1981, in the face of internal opposition, and without any "public debate."

The "public debate" over the attack on Iran is irresponsible, and endangers state security. There is no doubt that if, God help us, Iran has a bomb, and if, heaven forbid, they use it against us -- then too, out of the ruins, those same all-knowing and unrestrained journalists will emerge, shake the dust and plaster off their clothes and their hair, and immediately launch into a scathing condemnation: "Why didn't the government do anything?" they will shout, "Failure!" And Yedioth Aharonoth, in a one-page edition, will make this into the lead headline.