Iran, Israel, America: A Lovers' Quarrel

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/18/opinion/18morris.html

This is a fairly plausible take on the situation as far as I can tell (lacking all the information on Iranian and Israeli capabilities). The qualification that occurs to me is that even Israeli nuclear strikes might fail to stop the Iranian program, unless the Israelis have adequate intelligence to work with on the key locations of the program. Perhaps the gravest threat posed by Iran’s strategy of nuclear escalation is the first strike incentive each side will perceive once the Iranians go nuclear.

Mossad clearly has the "advantage" of operating under a pressure of necessity that our intelligence services do not experience. They have long known, not just in an abstract sense, but in an absolutely visceral sense with whom they have to deal. I willingly grant that Mossad is more intelligent, superior technologially, more experienced, and, when required, just as ruthless as their foes--hell, they're ruthless enough to spy on us. But, Mossad also played a low-profile, and not particularly commendable, role in the intelligence gathering and analysis that led to the Iraq war. Their intel was wrong: Saddam bluffed the Israelis along with the rest of the world. Yet now they are expected not only to know the status of the Iranian nuclear program, but also to have precise information on its multiple locations, the defensive precautions at each location, the key operatives of the program, etc? This much I do not believe. Nor do I deem it inconceivable that they may find themselves in the position of knowing so little of the program as to render an attack counterproductive. Short of a major nuclear strike, I think the Israelis could delay the program for a few years at best. Given this, perhaps the most probable scenario is an Israeli strike (of limited efficacy) followed by Iranian counterstrikes that would enable the U.S. to sell, for purposes of international PR, its immediate intervention as a defensive measure provoked by Iran. This would give us some diplomatic cover, while ensuring that the Iranian program suffers a more serious setback than the Israelis could inflict themselves. To achieve more than a setback would necessitate regime change at a minimum, possibly a full-blown, old-school occupation (see WWII, multi-year occupations of Germany and Japan).