Israel Atomics I.

This is coolbert:

Does Israel possess nuclear weapons?

This is a question that has never been categorically answered, at least in the generally accepted term of the word answered.

A lot of speculation has been made in this area over the decades, but no definitive answer seems to be forthcoming.

I guess the consensus opinion of the "experts" is that Israel does possess a pretty good arsenal of nuclear weapons, numbering in the hundreds of deliverable bombs, even perhaps thermonuclear [H-bomb] variety.

And weapons systems to deliver them at potential antagonists. But to this date, Israel has repeatedly said that it will not be the "first" to "introduce" nuclear weapons into the Mideast. Whatever that means?

There are a lot of accounts that one can read over the years about this alleged capability. And these I would call mostly apocrypha style accounts. Cannot be confirmed or denied, but usually are not beyond belief, and for the most part probably contain a pretty good degree of truth about them.

Chronologically, over the decades, here is what one can glean from what is often called "open source" material: [obviously there is a lot of this stuff out there. I have mentioned just some of what has known over the years].

1. In the early fifties [1950's], the renowned scientist J. Robert Oppenheimer lost his security clearance.

 

This was very controversial at the time, as Oppenheimer had been the director of the Manhattan Project, the U.S. project to build the first atomic bomb, and was a highly respected member of the scientific establishment.

In most circles, this pulling of Oppenheimer's security clearance was seen as a result of paranoid, anti-communist, Mc Carthyite hysteria.

But there may have been more to it than that.

It was reputed by the journalist Seymour Hersh in his book, "The Samson Option", that during that same time, Oppenheimer had paid a visit to Israel, where he supposedly was offered a position where he would be given carte blanche authority to head a program to develop Israel's own atomic bomb.

 If this is true, and this information came to the attention of U.S. authorities, those same authorities would have been perfectly within their rights to pull Oppenheimer's security clearance, in the fear that he would emigrate from the U.S. to Israel, taking a lot of nuclear secrets with him.

This would also indicated that from the almost the inception of the State of Israel, the Israelis wanted to build an a-bomb in the worst possible way.

2. Israel was able to acquire a nuclear reactor from France, also during the late fifties [1950's] or early sixties [1960's].

Israel was also a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

Signatories to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation treaty, as a result of signing, would in return for promising not developing nuclear weapons, would be provided a nuclear reactor from the U.S. [Israel did get their reactor from France], for scientific research and energy purposes only.

From the onset, this treaty was criticized as it was realized by some that this treaty might have the opposite effect from what was intended.

Any country possessing a nuclear reactor, no matter how small the reactor is, then possesses the capability to produce plutonium, and has therefore at it's disposal one of the fissionable materials available necessary to build a bomb, if that country is clever enough to know how process and machine the plutonium.

Having the nuclear reactor, even the small one that Israel now had, did allow it to get it's hands on plutonium, plutonium that if obtained in sufficient quantity, could be manufactured into bomb material.

In addition, the theoretical knowledge of bomb making is so wide spread in the world that a bomb can be build, and assembled, and the builders can know with certainty it will work without even testing the weapon!!!

To be continued.

coolbert.