50

Tel Aviv, Israel

The PM’s motorcade arrived at the Defense Ministry.

Flanked by an enhanced security detail, Asher Naphtali and Levi Shimon made their way to the strategic planning center, five levels down. Even more than the White House Situation Room, the IDF’s “war room” was a high-tech wonder, looking more like a television network control room than a corporate boardroom. Some two dozen midsize video monitors and electronic maps lined the side walls, while large flat-screen plasma monitors were mounted at either end of the room. A control panel at the head of the table allowed whoever was running the meeting to transfer images from any of the individual monitors to the larger screens and to manage secure videoconferences with live feeds from every Israeli military base in the country and any Israeli diplomatic facility around the world.

Upon entering the room, they found the Security Cabinet already assembled and waiting. In addition to the PM and the defense minister, this typically included the vice prime minister, the minister of foreign affairs, the minister of internal security, the finance minister, the minister for strategic planning, the justice minister, and the chief of staff of the Israeli Defense Forces. That morning, it also included the directors-general of Shin Bet and the Mossad and the prime minister’s military secretary, as well as senior commanders from the army, the air force, and the navy.

Naphtali took his seat at the head of the table and began immediately. “At present we face a moment unlike any other in the modern history of the State of Israel. This is not comparable to 1948 or ’67, or even ’73. This is 1939, and we are on the brink of annihilation.

“As you know, we have confirmed that Iran has eight nuclear warheads. Our latest intelligence indicates that at least several of these warheads have been attached to high-speed ballistic missiles and that this madman, the Twelfth Imam, intends to launch these warheads at us in the next few days, by Monday at the latest. I don’t have to tell you, gentlemen, that if he authorizes such an attack, he could do in about six minutes what it took Adolf Hitler nearly six years to do, and that is to kill six million of us.

“The difference between then and now is that we have a state. We have an air force, and we have strategic weaponry; our parents and grandparents did not. History will never forgive us, my friends, if we do not act with courage and foresight before it is too late.

“Now, I am sorry to say that our assessment of the Jackson administration is that they do not seem to understand the gravity of the situation. I have had lengthy personal conversations over recent months and even in the last week with President Jackson. Levi and I have had extensive conversations with the president’s most-senior national security advisors, including CIA director Allen. Some of them understand the stakes, but it is clear to Levi and me that the president does not. I think our foreign minister here can attest to the fact that most of the leaders of NATO and the United Nations don’t see the crisis clearly and are not ready to take decisive action.”

The foreign minister, already stricken with a grave countenance, nodded.

“So we are at a moment of decision, one we must not take lightly,” Naphtali continued. “As you know, from the moment I took office, I instructed all of you to be working on a comprehensive war plan that we have code-named Operation Xerxes. It is time for us to put this plan into motion. I have asked Levi here to brief us on some of the final operational details.

“First, however, let me say this is not the first time the Jewish people have been faced with the threat of annihilation by the leaders of Persia. In the Ketuvim, we read the story of Hadassah and Mordecai facing the wicked Xerxes, king of the Medo-Persian Empire, and his arguably more wicked deputy, Haman, Persia’s president or prime minister at the time. We read in the ancient text that our ancestors faced a very dark hour. They faced certain destruction of the entire Jewish race. To whom, then, did they turn? To the American president? To NATO? To the UN Security Council? No. They turned to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob through prayer and fasting, and they mobilized other Jews to do the same. And though the name of the Lord is never mentioned in the entire book, we can see His fingerprints everywhere. For clearly the God of Israel heard and answered their prayers. Xerxes changed his mind. Haman was hanged. The regime was fundamentally changed. The war still came. The Jews still had to fight. But the Lord was with them, and they prevailed in one of the most spectacular victories recorded in the Tanakh.”

Naphtali looked around the room and leaned forward in his seat.

“We have been praying for a miracle, for a regime change, for Hosseini to change his mind and Darazi to die, or some combination thereof. Thus far, those specifics have not happened, but I am confident that the God of Israel is still with us and that He is answering our prayers in ways that we do not yet see. One thing is clear: it is time for us to fight. Indeed, we have run out of time for anything else if we intend to survive. And, gentlemen, that is my intention. This will not be easy. In fact, I believe it will be the most difficult mission our nation and our armed forces have ever undertaken. Israel will suffer. The region will suffer. The Iranian people will suffer. But I see no other way, and in the end, I believe good will triumph over evil, and I hope to God that you do too.”

* * *

Natanz, Iran

Jalal Zandi took the urgent call in his office.

Having been up most of the night overseeing the missile technicians, he was bleary and bloodshot and had just poured himself another large cup of thick, black coffee.

“Missing?” he asked between sips. “How long? . . . Gunshots? You’re absolutely certain? . . . No, you’ve done the right thing. . . . What? . . . No, get this thing contained—I’ll let the leadership know. . . . Yes, absolutely. . . . Okay, call me the minute you know more.”

Zandi hung up the phone in disbelief. Tariq Khan was gone. Dead bodies were all over the scene. What did that mean? Who had done it? And were they coming for him next?

* * *

Tel Aviv, Israel

Naphtali turned the meeting over to his defense minister.

“Thank you, Mr. Prime Minister,” Shimon began. “As you know, gentlemen, we have multiple assets inside Iran who are feeding us detailed information. We are hopeful that in the next twenty-four to forty-eight hours, we will have precise targeting information to take out those eight warheads. But I must stress that I am advising the prime minister that we must be willing to attack by the beginning of Shabbat at the latest even if we do not have this information, or we will lose the initiative and, most importantly, the element of surprise.

“Surprise, of course, is a relative term. There is much concern inside Iran and around the world that we may be preparing for a strike. We have, therefore, been doing everything we can to make final preparations as discreetly as possible, as per our discussions here in this room over the last few months.”

Shimon directed the attention of the Security Cabinet to the large flat-screen monitors as he walked them through a highly classified PowerPoint presentation on Operation Xerxes.

“We recently ran an exercise in which we sent some four hundred planes on a practice bombing run to Greece, given that Greece is roughly the same distance from Israel to the west as Iran is from us to the east,” Shimon continued. “This was the second such exercise of its kind, though the first one involved only about a hundred planes. The purpose of this exercise was severalfold, but let me focus on two critical elements. First, we needed to see if we really could pull off such a massive air attack. I’m pleased to report that while we had numerous glitches, all of them have been fixed, and the IDF and I believe the answer is now yes, we could, if we were so asked. Second, we needed to get the Iranians—and the rest of the world—thinking that we are planning for a much larger-scale air attack than they had previously considered. This was done to confuse our enemies and our friends alike, to have them watching for grander preparations. But the truth is, we believe a smaller strike force is prudent. Let me explain.”

For the next thirty minutes, the defense minister provided a detailed picture of what the IDF and IAF were preparing to unleash. Using satellite photos, maps, and pictures taken by assets on the ground, he identified sixteen Iranian facilities that would be targeted, ranging from nuclear research-and-development facilities and missile-production-and-launch facilities, to the Iranian Defense Ministry and the regime’s intelligence headquarters in downtown Tehran. He noted that fourteen of the targets had been subjected to extensive surveillance and detailed attack planning for nearly eighteen months. Two, however, were new in the last few days—the Iranian naval flotilla steaming through international waters in the Mediterranean, and something called the Qaleh, the Supreme Leader’s mountain retreat center, only recently uncovered by a Mossad asset within the regime.

“Rather than send a massive armada of four hundred planes that could be detected by every intelligence agency in the region the moment it left the ground,” Shimon explained, “the idea is to send small squadrons taking different routes to attack each of the individual sites. We’ll also need additional fighter jets for security to accompany those carrying the bombs, as well as refueling tankers, electronic warfare planes, and so forth, but the pilots have been practicing for months, and we feel confident that they can move with little or no notice, once the prime minister gives the word.”

The questions came fast and furious.

“What is the total number of aircraft you plan to use?” the foreign minister asked.

Shimon explained that they were looking at using between 116 and 168 planes, depending on the final targets chosen. In the low-end scenario, he said, they would deploy fifty-two fighter jets if each jet were dropping two bunker-buster bombs on its target. These would be guarded by an additional fifty F-16I fighter jets for air escort and fighter sweep missions and to suppress enemy air-defense systems. In addition, they’d be using twelve KC-130 and KC-10 refueling tankers, plus two Gulfstream 550 electronics jets.

In the high-end scenario, he explained, they would need to deploy 104 fighter jets, if each jet carried a single bunker-buster bomb to its target. These would need a similar assortment of support aircraft.

“What kind of attrition rate are you projecting?” the finance minister asked.

“Between 20 and 30 percent.”

“You’re planning for losing up to 30 percent of our planes?”

“Planning for it? Yes,” Shimon replied. “Expecting it to actually happen? No. I believe our pilots are better than that, but war, as you well know, is unpredictable, and I’m trying to be conservative.”

“So at the low end, you’re saying that losing between twenty-three and thirty-five planes is acceptable?” the justice minister asked. “And at the high end, you are okay with losing between thirty-three and fifty planes, each of which cost about $20 million without ordnance, fuel, or electronics upgrades?”

“Compared to losing six million citizens? Yes.”

Shimon noted that the war plan also included measures to minimize the loss of Israeli pilots. They would, for example, deploy fifteen UAV drones, each armed with two Hellfire missiles. In addition, they anticipated firing roughly two dozen cruise missiles from Israeli submarines as well as numerous torpedoes to take out key Iranian naval vessels.

“And when our boys go down in enemy territory, what’s the plan to get them back?” the vice prime minister asked.

“We have twenty search-and-rescue helicopter teams on standby,” Shimon explained, putting some of the data up on the screens. “About a month ago, we pre-positioned quite a few of these teams in Azerbaijan. They are very well trained. They are highly motivated. I have reviewed these teams personally, and I am confident they can get the job done.”

At that, the prime minister stepped back into the conversation. “Just after the first of the year, as you’ll recall, I went to see my friend Jilan Kazarov, the president of Azerbaijan,” Naphtali said. “We met in his gorgeous villa in Baku, on the shores of the Caspian Sea. He was very gracious. He has seen the Iranian threat for a long time. He understands it. I gave him my list of requests, including more electronic listening posts near the Iranian border and the ability to pre-position these SAR teams, and he gave me everything I asked for.”

Naphtali paused briefly. He waited for people to stop jotting notes or looking at the video monitors and for all eyes to be back on him.

“Levi and I and the IDF chiefs have looked at this thing a thousand different ways, gentlemen, and we’ve concluded that hitting these targets isn’t the hardest part. It’s going to be very hard—extremely hard—don’t get me wrong. But it’s not the hardest part. The real problem is after our planes get home and the full-scale retaliation begins. The Iranians have at least a thousand ballistic missiles, most of which are aimed at us. Hezbollah in the north has at least fifty thousand rockets and missiles aimed at us. The Syrians have theirs. Hamas has theirs. Succeeding with our first strike isn’t what worries me. Riding out their first wave is.”