Friday, December 7, 2012

The Ironclad Rules To Fleece The Unwary


Michael Oren who is Israel's ambassador to the United States wrote a piece that was published in the Wall Street Journal on December 7, 2012. It has the title: “The Iron Dome Military Revolution” and the subtitle: “Historically, defensive measures lag behind offensive capabilities. Not so with Israel's new antimissile system.” Right here you get the sense that he says the Iron Dome is a defensive measure that was developed for an offensive capability that does not yet exist. And you can't wait to see how he articulates this idea.

But after you have read the first few paragraphs in which the idea is supposed to have been articulated, you scratch your head and ask yourself if you missed something, or was it the author who missed something? In fact, the historian that he fancies himself to be, Oren begins the historic demonstration with: “Two hundred years ago...” to reach a point – a few paragraphs later – where he says this: “But today, the attacked in Israel are now trumping their attackers,” without ever developing the idea. And so you exclaim: where's the beef, Michael?

There is no beef. In fact, there is not even a morsel of meat or a bone to chew on. What there is, you begin to realize, is the ordinary Jewish clumsy way to flatter America and mix with the flattery a promise to save the superpower from a looming existential threat. This would be the case because only the genius of God's chosen children encapsulates the ability to detect an existential threat, and the ability to “trump” it. But the Jews of Israel will do that if and only if they get what they want from America which is money, money, money.

Here then is the flattery: “... in the spirit of Old Ironsides and the ironclads [American warships] Israel developed the Iron Dome antimissile system.” This is his way to say to the Americans: We are like you. And this is meant to suggest that “we” and “you” have a common enemy who is not like us. Therefore, there is us versus them, and you must help us defeat them to protect yourselves, something you can do by giving us money, money, money.

Well, if he could not show the beef, he can certainly show the Jewish genius. Here it is: “From drawing board to development … Israel completed the Iron Dome in a mere three years.” Get it? More than three decades after Ronald Reagan's vision of a defensive system called Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), the Americans could still not develop a system that worked. By contrast, God's chosen children did it in a “mere three years.” But they only have 6 batteries now, and they will need 7 more to defend the whole country. This means they will need to get from America more of what is called money, money, money.

To amaze the reader, Oren gets into the technical description of how the system works: “Intercepting supersonic projectiles in midflight is literally rocket science,” he says. Okay, you say: Show me how that is. And he shows you: “Israeli engineers pulled off the feat by combining cutting-edge tracking radar with electro-optic sensors and mounting them on highly, all-weather air-defense systems.” What's that again? Tracking radar? Electro-optic sensors? All-weather air-defense systems? That's electronics but where's the rocket science he promised? Where's the beef, Michael?

There's no beef but let's look at what he says, anyway. He says electro-optic sensors. You want to see an electro-optic sensor, my friend? Go to the nearest elevator, and as soon as the door starts to close, try to get in. The door will reopen so as not to crush you. What did it was an electro-optic sensor, a technology that has been around for 6 decades or more. He also says all-weather air-defense systems. The truth is, you need these things to detect missiles coming above the clouds, which means coming from far away. Gaza is not that far from Israel. And he claims that this is what the Americans could not do since Ronald Reagan?

He goes on to say there is something even more ingenious than that: “Most ingenious, the Iron Dome determines … whether an incoming rocket is headed for an open space or a populated area – and saves its fire for the latter case.” To see why this is nothing more than an exercise in spinning hogwash, you need to know what is involved in intercepting an incoming missile, and hitting it in midflight.

To do that, you can hit the incoming missile directly in which case a bullet from a machine-gun or a shotgun would be enough if you're lucky enough to hit the target dead on. But in this case, hitting the target alone would not be enough because the missile will then fall to the ground with a warhead that can still detonate and destroy what is below. What you need to do is detonate a charge powerful enough at close range to destroy the missile and detonate the warhead inside while it is still in the sky.

How do you do that when the incoming missile and the interceptor are approaching each other at supersonic speeds, meaning at least 2,500 kilometers an hour? Even if the interceptor were so maneuverable that it could be made to head directly toward the incoming missile, it will have only one millisecond to come as close as a meter to it, blow itself up and damage the missile so badly as to blow up the warhead inside. Well, the people who worked on SDI discovered that the best way to detonate an incoming missile carrying a nuclear warhead was to detonate a nuclear bomb not a meter away but a few miles away. Iron Dome is not doing that.

And so, when the onlookers discovered this truth during the last Israeli adventure, the Jewish propaganda machine spun the hogwash about the system being able to determine where the missiles were headed. But the fact is that the Gaza rockets are ballistic missiles that lack a system of guidance. They were used as flares to annoy the Israelis in response to Israel's acts of terrorism.

During the years that the Gazans have used those flares, 85 percent of them fell in unpopulated areas without causing any damage which is why no more than half a dozen casualties occurred in Israel. All the while, the American-made precision guided “smart” bombs used by the Israelis killed Palestinian mothers and their babies in their bedrooms by the thousands. Now that's deliberate terrorism.

Having flattered the Americans and having repeated the hogwash, Michael Oren now makes the closing argument: “Iron Dome … isn't a game-ender … nuclear warheads would pose an existential threat … Israel has developed the Arrow .. and we have tested David's Sling … These innovations will … enhance security for America and its allies world-wide … Yet no air-defense system is foolproof.” Translation: Give us more of what is called money, money, money.

The suckers in the Congress are being nudged again, and no one is there to protect the American taxpayers from the Oren who is there to fleece them yet again.

It is time for money, money, money.