Israel Matzav: What to fear from Syria's chemical weapons program

Sunday, June 17, 2012

What to fear from Syria's chemical weapons program

Yaakov Katz has a comprehensive summary of Syria's chemical weapons program and Israeli attempts to stop it.

Israel’s concern focuses on two stark possibilities.

The first is that the weapons will fall into rogue hands – either al-Qaida or Hezbollah, which is believed to already be working to move some of the advanced military systems it has been storing in Syria to Lebanon out of fear that they will be captured by rebel forces. The takeover earlier this week of an air defense base in Syria by rebels underscores that fear.

The second option – considered more unlikely – is that Assad will use the weapons against Israel if he starts to think that his end is near. This way, he will try to divert attention away from the massacres his military forces have been perpetrating throughout Syria and instead have his people rally behind him in a war against Israel.

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It is not known how many times the Syrians were close to using their chemical weapons against Israel. One case, though, was in September 2007, shortly after Israel bombed the Al Kibar nuclear reactor Assad was building covertly along the Euphrates River.

According to a US diplomatic cable from 2008 and published by Wikileaks, Assad had put his mobile missile forces on high alert after the strike but ultimately ordered them not to fire.

“Bashar is no dummy,” then-prime minister Ehud Olmert told a delegation of US congressmen visiting Jerusalem. “That took discipline.”

In recent years, as the explosion in 2007 demonstrated, Iran has played a key role in helping Syria upgrade its chemical weapons and missile capabilities. Israel has also long suspected that Saddam Hussein transferred some of Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction to Syria in the weeks leading up to the US invasion of the country in 2003.

Today, Syria is assessed to have one of the largest chemical weapons arsenals in the world with thousands of bombs that can be dropped from the air alongside dozens of warheads that can be installed on Scud missiles.

In addition, in the late ’90s, the US warned that Syria was also developing warheads that can detonate in midair and disperse smaller bomblets packed with various nerve agents.

While Israel has developed the Arrow missile defense system to protect against Syrian Scuds, the major question is what it will do if intelligence one day shows the chemical weapons beginning to proliferate to rogue actors throughout the region.

Israel makes no secret of its concern or of the fact that it is closely tracking the weapons themselves.

“At this stage, the Syrian regime has firm control over the chemical weapons arsenal, but there are al-Qaida elements in Syria and therefore we are maintaining close scrutiny," Vice Prime Minister Moshe Ya’alon said earlier this week.

Israel is, however, not alone, and last month the US and Jordan held a large multinational military exercise which could have included drills aimed at preparing forces to enter Syria to secure the chemical weapons if and when Assad falls.

The Washington Post revealed that the US was looking into the possibility of establishing permanent bases in Jordan for small units of Marines or special operations troops who could be deployed rapidly throughout the region, including to Syria.