Tuwaitha, June 7, 1981: a short memoir

On the 7^th of June 1981, during the
Iraq-Iran war, the Israeli Air Force bombed the Iraqi nuclear site. Many
tried to justify this act. (For example, one commentator wrote, “America
and the coalition forces might have faced a nuclear-armed Iraq during the

Persian Gulf War
in 1991, and again during the U.S. invasion
of
Iraq
in 2003, had Israel not destroyed Iraq’s nuclear
reactor in 1981.”) But the majority of Iraqis judged that it was a crime
and a terrorist act sponsored by state of Israel.

The attack raised a number of questions of interpretation
regarding international legal concepts. Was it an act of legitimate self-defense
justifiable under international law under
Article 51
of the charter of the United Nations (UN)?
I wonder what the reactions would be if Israel’s neighbours used the same
argument, claiming that Israeli nuclear power represented a threat to them
also!

Let’s start with the Iraqi defence and military
arrangements for The Al Tuwaitha Nuclear Centre in 1981.

The site was protected by 50 meter
high earth ramparts all around it. This was this to force any planes to fly higher
before approaching the site so that the Iraqi air-defense radar stations
would detect them.

The Al Tuwaitha Nuclear Centre had its own air
defense station, combined of anti-aircraft guns and surface-to-air missiles.
On the top of earth ramparts there were many AA guns set to open fire in
event of any warning so they would make a ring of fire around the site. Also
there was a radar station to detect planes if it approached the site.

All around the site there were also balloons
filled with gas connected with cords to the ground so they kept over the
site at an altitude higher than the earth ramparts.

The city of Baghdad was protected by
Russian type SAM-2 and SAM-3 Air Defence missile networks with two different
killing zones (technology of the late 1950s).

Also around Baghdad on top of most high building
there were AAA guns: all had orders to open fire to protect the sky over
Baghdad city in any event of warning.

On the borders there was early warning radar
stations. Ttheir mission was to give early warning if any plane pass the
border or approached it. But at the time
the Iran war was going on on the Eastern
borders, so most of the attention was toward the East Borders.

During that time all SAM sites were working from
dawn till sunset. During the night-time the crews were on alert.

The Iraqi Air force also kept a daily patrol
flying over Baghdad, on the edge of the city from dawn till sunset. All
fighters would land by sunset time, but the crews remained on alert at all
the times.

On Jun 7 shortly after the time when all the
batteries of SAM2&3 had just been turned off, and the Iraqi fighter air
patrol had just landed at the end of the day-long mission, there came the
sound of explosions and shortly after that the sky was filled with the
flashes of exploding rounds from all the guns set up around…

It’s important to note here that there was severe
electronic interference moments prior to the Israeli strike and before the
explosion. The TV broadcasting was cut off for a short time. (There was
no picture on the screen; just noise). In t
“A very strong jamming on a wide range
of frequencies.“ This was also mentioned
in Peter Scott Ford’s study “Israel’s attack on Osiraq: a model for future
preventive strikes”. He wrote that:

“
Approaching the initial point, where the F-16s would make final preparations
to strike the target, the final two F-15s climbed away from the strike formation
and turned on their radars and external electronic counter-measure pods.
These aircraft served the dual purpose of protecting the F-16s from hostile
aircraft as well as hostile search radars”

After 5min the guided Radars for SAM2 detected
the Israeli fighters 60km south-west toward Saudi borders far from the site
which is out of killing zone of any other SAM sites around Baghdad.

When and How Iraq Detected there were Israeli
Fighters

The Iraqi command structure first learned about the Israeli fighters from
a military officer who was in an Early Warring Radar Site in the desert of
south Iraq, in Ara’r area close to Saudi borders.

Peter Scott Ford’s study mentioned that king Hussein of Jordan did warn
Iraqis there was an Israeli attack.

King Hussein of Jordan
was vacationing in Aqaba during
the attack. Seeing the planes pass over his head, he immediately notified
the Iraqis to warn them that they may be the targets of an Israeli attack.
It appears that Iraq never got the message as communication errors prevented
the message from reaching Iraq.

I think either this was a false statement or
the call was somehow intercepted/jammed by the Israelis’ systems.

Back to the Iraqi military officer. At this
time of the year the weather is hot (40-50C), especially in the desert,
and normally people stay out of their tents or shelters as soon as the sun
goes down. This officer was preparing himself for sunset prayers when he
felt many fighters passing at such a low altitude that the sands in the
dust moved. And they had the IRAQI FLAG painted on them!!!

(Twenty-three years ago, Israeli
fighter pilots whistled relaxingly in the relative calm of the 100-foot low-level
ingress, “(
ISRAEL’S ATTACK ON OSIRAQ: A MODEL FOR FUTURE PREVENTIVE STRIKES? By Peter
Scott Ford)

The Iraqi officer rushed to his commander and
informed him. The commander passed the information to the high military
command in Baghdad, but unfortunately the top commanders asked him to check
once again with that officer regarding what he saw. This process took so
long forward and backwards that it let the Israeli fighters reach and hit
the target and flee without any interception by Iraqi Air Force or any surface-to-air-missiles
“SAM missiles”.

Reaction and Conclusion after the hit

After this crisis an investigation was started to dicover what had gone
wrong. A team of investigators started visiting the sites and checking.

We all felt very worried about our lives because
it was a very depressing time.

After the team visited all the sites in the end
they concluded there had been a five minute delay in reporting the alert
to the SAM sites, which give relief to all of us, and we felt safer.

What are calculations the Israeli planners
used?

1. The sunset time definitely was a good choice
   of timing as in addition to it being the landing time of the Iraqi fighters,
   also the SAM sites would then shut down after their day of operations.

“The sun position which is west
/ South with the sun setting behind them to make it harder for Iraqi anti-aircraft
gunners to see them. Makes the operator of Artillery harder to looks with
the red light of the sun during the sunset.”

2. The timing: Iraq was busy with the Iran
   war and most of the attention was shifted to the Eastern boarders.
3. The reactors were not in working condition
   at that time as many references from Israeli noted. That was to minimise
   any pollution by radiation materials after the destruction of the site.

According to Israeli intelligence,
the summer of 1981 would have been the last chance to operate against the
reactor, without putting the population of Iraq in danger of nuclear fallout,
since by then, the reactor wasn’t operational and was not loaded with it’s
nuclear fuel.

4. The French technical team was in the midst
   of enjoying a summer holiday back to France at the time. I think this was
   not a coincidence as many Israeli sources noted. In fact some people think
   the accuracy of the bombing required very specific technical information
   regarding the building, the location etc., which raised questions about who
   was the link in all of this with Israelis.

—————-

Postscript from ‘
No Military Options
‘ by Joseph Cirincione, Jan. 19, 2006

Back in June of 1991, then-Defense Secretary Cheney gave a photograph of
the Iraqi nuclear reactor at Osirak to the man who had commanded the Israeli
air force during the raid on the site in 1981. “With thanks and appreciation
for the outstanding job he did on the Iraqi Nuclear Program in 1981,” Cheney
wrote, “which made our job much easier in Desert Storm.” Cheney may have
forgotten that the Reagan administration condemned the raid when it took
place, as did most nations. And he may not be aware that the Israeli raid,
far from crippling Iraq’s nuclear program, actually accelerated it.
The raid was a tactical success but a strategic failure.”

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* Guest-writer Salah Yacoub served his military
service as a radar engineer at Iraqi Air Force/Air-Defence Systems around
Baghdad in June 1981.