RUTHFULLY YOURS

The New York Times report in today’s edition about the missile test site explosions, “Explosion Seen as Big Setback to Iran’s Missile Program” underlines what we had written about Iran’s progress on silo-hardened solid fuel ICBMs, especially the 2,000 KM Shelj-2i and 3,500 KM MB-25 obtained from the North Koreans – see The Iranian Missile Threat.  The report by Timesmen  Messrs. David Sanger and William Broad notes:

The huge explosion that destroyed a major missile-testing site near Tehran three weeks ago was a major setback for Iran’s most advanced long-range missile program, according to American and Israeli intelligence officials and missile technology experts.

In interviews, current and former officials said surveillance photos showed that the Iranian base was a central testing center for advanced solid-fuel missiles, an assessment backed by outside experts who have examined satellite photos showing that the base was almost completely leveled in the blast. Such missiles can be launched almost instantly, making them useful to Iran as a potential deterrent against pre-emptive attacks by Israel or the United States, and they are also better suited than older liquid-fuel designs for carrying warheads long distances.

 While Messrs. Sanger and Broad don’t discuss it, Israeli missile expert Uzi Rubin in our NER article on The Iranian Missile Threat noted that  the alumina powder used for mix of solid fuel propellant was delivered by the Chinese, who, along with the Russians on the UN Security Council objected to revelations about technology transfer.  Along with Gen. Hassan Tehrani Moghaddam the head of Iran’s missile test program and 17 other Iranians killed in the ‘accident’ there have been reports that a number of North Koreans present at the test facility were killed as well.  That is analogous to the IAF 2007 raid on the Syrian nuclear bomb factory when there was documented evidence of North Korean technicians present at the destroyed site.

The implication of the ‘accident’ is that the NIE May 2009 estimate of Iran’s ICBM capabilities was wrong, as Rubin and other experts cited in our report on The Iranian Missile Threat.  That report was used to justify that the Administration’s Missile Defense Shield program that only covered southeastern Europe. Strategically it means that the range of these solid fuel rockets, especially the MB-25 variant being developed by Iran, threatened targets in EU from the UK through Central and Eastern Europe, as well as, Russia.

As to the NYTimes author’s speculation that the missile test site could have been possibly taken out by a weapon launched from a UAV drone with long endurance loitering capabilities, if proven correct, that might also be evidence that the threat of the Iranian solid propellant ICBM program had crossed red lines to those involved in that ‘attack’.  Perhaps, the new variant of Stuxnet, Duqu, might have been able to destabilize the production programs for the solid propellant triggering the ‘accident’.  If the latter is the case, then that would be a remarkable achievement.

This does put a crimp in Iran’s delivery means. The liquid fuel Shahab III missiles require too much set up time,detectable by over the horizon radar, while the solid fuel missiles can be launched from underground silos without much warning time. The explosions at the Iranian missile test site also  call into question the May NIE 2009 assessment that Iran wouldn’t have ICBMs until mid-decade. This is akin to the 2007 NIE assessment about Iran’s stop and re-start of their nuclear program.

Taking out the solid fuel propellant used for the Shejil-2 BM-25 solid fuel missiles would put a real crimp in their missile development program and the deployment of the land-based ICBMs in protected silos around Tabriz to deliver both conventional and nuclear warheads.

                      

Sheljil-2 Solid Fuel Missile                                      NK BM-25 Solid Fuel Missile

Here is what we wrote in the August NER on this aspect of the Iranian Missile Threat:

How dangerous is the Iranian missile threat beyond the Middle East?  Note what Rubin says regarding the range and capabilities of Iran’s long range missiles; the solid-fuel Shejil-2  and the BM-25 that the New York Times reported may have been sold to the Iranians by the North Koreans:

I just want to make it more tangible to the audience by pointing out that at 2,200 kilometers [the estimated range of the Shejil-2], it will take a missile from Tabriz, where the silos are, almost to Belgrade in Serbia. If the range is 2,400 kilometers, that threatens the suburbs of Warsaw, Poland, from Tabriz; 2,600 kilometers will take you all the way from Tabriz to Riga, Latvia. Just to put things in perspective, Moscow is less than 2,000 kilometers from Iran. So the few variations, 200 kilometers here and 200 kilometers there make a tremendous difference.

I’m convinced that the Iranians have the BM- 25 missile, which was finally revealed by North Korea in October of last year.  It was paraded, and the missile that was depicted is an improvement of an old Soviet design. The range could be at least 3,500 kilometers. It can go all the way from Tabriz to London, Paris, Berlin, Brussels and other major cities in Western Europe.

Rubin cites the graphic threat to targets in Europe within range of the missile silos of Tabriz using conventional warheads; reminiscent of the V-2 terror rocket attacks on Great Britain and Allied Europe during WWII.

If you make enough of them, then just think about the shower of 10 or 12 one-ton warheads falling on a city like Paris in the middle of a business day although they are not equipped with nuclear warheads yet.  Even with conventional warheads, think about 10 or 12 one-ton charges exploding in a busy city in daytime. The number of casualties would be frightening and wreak enough destruction without nuclear warheads.

Rubin goes on to estimate the inventory of the large and growing Iranian long range missile threat.

I think it is a viable threat. The numbers now are large and growing. From the WikiLeaks we learned that former Israeli Chief of Staff, General Ashkenazi, disclosed to Members of Congress about two years ago that the Iranians had at that time 300 Shahab-3 missiles already stockpiled. So with that rate of production, who knows how many they have now? It seems that we are talking about hundreds if not thousands of powerful missiles. I think the threat to Europe is real and frightening.

Then there as this on technology transfer and the disinformation campaign of the Obama Administration:

Notwithstanding, Iran’s own impressive missile technology developments, it still follows an aggressive strategy of overt and clandestine technology transfer. We have seen evidence of that in supplies of Russian rocket engines, purchase of North Korean Taepodong liquid fueled and modified BM-25 solid fuel rockets with increased ranges and payloads capable of hitting targets in The Middle East and Europe. We have also witnessed from UN inspector reports evidence of Chinese supply of aluminum powder for solid fuel propellants. Timmerman’s NewsMax.com article also points out objections to these UN disclosures by two members of the Security Council: Russia and China. However, they are not alone; the US under the Obama Administration may be facilitating technology transfer for Iran’s ballistic missile program by issuing visas to Iranian engineers and scientists to attend scientific programs here in the US. There are suspicions that this may be part of a conscientious program of disinformation by the Islamic regime, while acquiring useful leading edge technology developments. Senior State Department Arms Control officials and CIA missile intelligence analysts (see the May 2009 NIE assessment) have issued negative assessments of Iran’s missile development progress. These assessments indicated that the Iranian ICBMs wouldn’t be developed until the period from 2015 to 2020. Moreover these critics suggested that Iran’s missiles could only reach targets as far West as Southeastern Europe. Implicit in those assessments is denial of the informed opinions of experts like Uzi Rubin, Michael Elleman of the UK–based International Institute for Strategic Studies and Russia’s Yuri Solomonov of the Thermal Engineering Institute. Fred Fleitz, a 25 year veteran analyst at the CIA, DIA, State department and U.S. House of Representatives Intelligence Committee staff member noted the danger of denial of the Iran nuclear threat in a Wall Street Journal op-ed,

It is unacceptable that Iran is on the brink of testing a nuclear weapon while our intelligence analysts continue to deny that an Iranian nuclear weapons programs program exists. One can’t underestimate the dangers posed to our country by a US intelligence community that is unable to provide timely and objective analysis of such major threats to US national security-or to make appropriate adjustments when it is proven wrong.

In response to a question on this issue from Livne, Rubin said:

I’d say they’re still dependent on talent from abroad. However, the dependence shifted from complete technologies, complete factories to components and materials. Wikileaks revealed from U.S. diplomatic correspondence attempts of the United States to block purchase of crucial materials in China, one of them, quite surprisingly was carbon fiber used for making advanced rocket motors.

There was a reference not long ago about a shipment of tungsten copper bars caught in a Persian Gulf port destined for Iran; material used for making the control system for ballistic missiles. In the report that the British foreign secretary was alluding to, there was another mention of an instance of a shipment of material that was caught in Italy on its way to Iran that you pour into a rocket motor for either heavy rockets or ballistic missiles.

About six years ago a report of five intelligence agencies of Western European countries revealed that there were at least one hundred cases of Iranian attempts to acquire strategic missile technologies and materials in Europe.

[. . .]

There is, continued inadvertent US support to this technology transfer, although the US has imposed sanctions on Iran.

 I believe the US government may still allow Iranian students to attend US technological institutions and acquire knowledge that facilitates technology transfer.

Even more amazing, the US government allows Iranian scientists to come and present technical papers on missiles at conferences here. I have some copies of that material obtained in 2007, when Iranian scientists spoke of missile technology at a conference in Cincinnati. My friends in America have no explanation why that occurred or continues.