Almost exactly 40 years ago, Israel’s cabinet, then led by Prime Minister Menachem Begin, decided to destroy Iraq’s nascent nuclear program. After three-and-a-half years of planning, a single Israeli squadron destroyed six years of Iraqi nuclear efforts in just 90 seconds.
Unconventional means of delaying the Iraqi program—sabotage, assassination, and diplomacy—had failed. With those options exhausted, a hawkish government coalition carried out the strike, urged on by a sense of abandonment by the international community and the very recent and real memory of the Holocaust. The strike was a success: Iraq’s nuclear program was almost completely destroyed, and Israel emerged militarily and diplomatically unscathed.
