Prof. Ted Postol: Israel’s Air Defense in TOTAL COLLAPSE

Professor Postol asserts that Israel's air defense system is fundamentally ineffective against ballistic missiles, describing it as a 'fiction' that has never truly functioned. He claims this represents a 'gigantic fraud' perpetrated by the US and Israeli governments on their citizens, who have paid enormous sums for systems that do not work against the primary ballistic missile threat. While effective against aircraft and drones, the core ballistic missile defense capability is compromised.

Postol states, 'I think the air defense doesn't exist. I mean, it's a fiction. It's been a fiction from the beginning.' He elaborates, 'This is a gigantic fraud that has been perpetrated by the US government and the Israeli government on American and Israeli citizens... for air defense systems that do not work against ballistic missiles.'

Iran is increasingly leveraging highly accurate drones and more modern ballistic missiles to inflict significant damage. Postol notes that drones can be programmed from thousands of kilometers, home in on targets, and were used to destroy Israeli missile defense radars early in the conflict. He observes a shift from older, less accurate ballistic missiles to newer models with more stable trajectories and reliable warheads, indicating a strategic depletion of Israeli interceptors on less effective threats.

Postol highlights that 'the drones are extremely accurate. They can be programmed from thousands of kilometers range... and they essentially can run into the targets.' He also notes a shift where 'the accuracy of those missiles were less. They were not as accurate as the missiles we're now seeing' in earlier attacks, suggesting a tactic to 'use up their interceptors on the older missiles.'

Postol identifies the US withdrawal from the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) by the Trump administration, and the subsequent inaction by the Biden administration, as a direct cause of the current conflict. He describes the JCPOA as an 'exceptionally constraining agreement' for Iran, indicating Iran's lack of intent to build nuclear weapons at that time. The US failure to uphold its commitments and Biden's attempt to 'renegotiate' destroyed diplomatic trust, pushing Iran towards its current stance of 'war for survival.'

Postol states, 'Trump of course withdrew from the agreement saying it was inadequate. There's no way that agreement was inadequate. It was a tremendously constraining agreement.' He adds, 'It all falls on Mr. Trump and and his reckless behavior. Incidentally, a lot of it falls on Biden, too. Because when Biden took over... he sat on his buttocks and did nothing to bring that agreement back in.'

Postol warns that a nuclear attack on Iran would 'almost certainly' be met with a nuclear attack on Israel. He explains that Iran, if attacked, could convert its existing uranium hexafluoride into 10-11 low-yield atomic bombs. As a former nuclear weapon attack planner, Postol details how Iranian military planners could optimize these weapons to maximize death and destruction in Tel Aviv, spacing them to create coalescing firestorms over a vast urban area.

Postol asserts, 'A nuclear attack on Iran will almost certainly be answered by an attack on Israel on a nuclear attack on Israel. Iran has the capacity to do this.' He describes how Iran 'can sit in those tunnels... and convert them to 10 or 11 atomic bombs,' and how a planner would 'lay them down in a pattern on the most densely populated areas of... Tel Aviv' to create 'larger areas of fire.'

Postol provides a grim, detailed account of the effects of low-yield nuclear weapons on a city like Tel Aviv. He describes immediate blast and prompt radiation, followed by massive firestorms that coalesce, raising air temperatures above the boiling point of water, generating hurricane-force winds, and producing 'black rain' filled with radioactive and toxic soot. He stresses that a 20-25 square kilometer zone would be completely incinerated, with no survivors, and the area would be inaccessible for days due to extreme heat and toxicity.

Postol details, 'The whole city will be towering infernos even at the edge of the fire zone... everything will just become a gigantic fire zone.' He explains that 'the air temperature will rise to above the boiling point of water in this giant zone of maybe 20 or 25 square kilometers.' He further notes, 'The black rain is radioactive. It contains toxic materials.'