Bellum at Ricochet
Just up at Ricochet.com, a response to the latest chatter about the supposedly impending Israeli airstrike on Iran. Bellum senior editor Tristan Abbey writes:
Everybody assumes it’s just a question of Israeli political will. There is something to that, since any operation would be extremely high-risk and we know that the Israelis value their servicemen’s lives extremely highly; after all, they traded 1,027 Palestinian prisoners for a single IDF soldier.
But every sensible analysis of a putative strike comes down to flight path, logistics, and the probability of mission success. Overflight rights are tricky (and actually do matter in the real world), the logistics are near impossible (with Israel’s lack of aerial refueling capability), and the probability of mission success is extremely low (given Iran’s air defenses and the dispersed nature of its nuclear program).