WI? Israel Doesn't Hit Iraq's Nuclear Plant in 1981

What if instead of hitting Iraq's sole nuclear plant and destroying its reactor in 1981, Saddam Hussein is allowed to keep it up and running for several years to come. What happens in the future? Does it becomes a peaceful nuclear program to generate nuclear energy for Iraq or does it develop nuclear weapons for use against someone like Iran or Israel?
 
Saddam's probably the type of guy that would try to develop nukes with it. Of course, it's going to be a very long time before he has workable weapons. He'll probably still try to go for Kuwait, in which case it gets the shit bombed out of it by Nighthawks during Desert Storm. If he somehow manages to get close to having workable weapons before that, I can see something like Desert Fox happening during the late 80s, after the Iran-Iraq war ends.
 
Saddam's probably the type of guy that would try to develop nukes with it. Of course, it's going to be a very long time before he has workable weapons. He'll probably still try to go for Kuwait, in which case it gets the shit bombed out of it by Nighthawks during Desert Storm. If he somehow manages to get close to having workable weapons before that, I can see something like Desert Fox happening during the late 80s, after the Iran-Iraq war ends.

Even though the type of reactor in operation was a type that is practically impossible to use for the production of weapons-grade material?
 

James G

Gone Fishin'
Even though the type of reactor in operation was a type that is practically impossible to use for the production of weapons-grade material?

(I'm not anti-American in anyway)
Do you really think that would stop America from levelling the place? The Carter Doctrine, IIRC, was to stop the upsetting of the balance of power in the Middle East. The threat, despite how remote, that Iraq MIGHT be able to make nuclear weapons, with Iraq being an unfriendly country, assures that places destruction.
 
Saddam's probably the type of guy that would try to develop nukes with it. Of course, it's going to be a very long time before he has workable weapons. He'll probably still try to go for Kuwait, in which case it gets the shit bombed out of it by Nighthawks during Desert Storm. If he somehow manages to get close to having workable weapons before that, I can see something like Desert Fox happening during the late 80s, after the Iran-Iraq war ends.

Provided reactor and research facilities don't get shit bombed out of them by IRIAF before war ends. :rolleyes:
 
Someone is bound to bomb it. Saddam was seeking nukes- till the program was stopped in 1995.

In addition, someone else may go up on Columbia in 2003.
 
If they wait too long, that reactor will go live. At that point, destroying it with an air strike is a much more complicated proposition. We aren't talking Chernobyl here - Osirak was only 40 MWth, Chernobyl was a couple of thousand, so it's about two orders of magnitude smaller. But a) it's still a nuclear reactor, b) whatever the actual health consequences, the political impact of bombing a live reactor will be abysmal for the bomber, and c) IIRC, it's against international law, as a "facility holding back destructive forces" (pretty sure I'm getting the formulation wrong, but it's something like that - it's the same reason you're not supposed to bomb dams).
 
BTW, how far was Osirak from the nearest communities or major cities?
Were Bedouins living in the area? (In Israel, they have potassium iodide in various Bedouin encampments near Dimona.)
 
I remember reading about some operations that went on in Iraq following Desert Storm, Dick Cheney discovered that they were relatively close to developing a nuclear weapon (like within a year), and couldn't believe how they managed to drop the ball on it.

Can't remember the source, just remember having come across it in the past.

 
BTW, how far was Osirak from the nearest communities or major cities?
Were Bedouins living in the area? (In Israel, they have potassium iodide in various Bedouin encampments near Dimona.)

Wiki says it's 17 km from Baghdad.

I'm not sure what the actual consequences would be. Osiris reactors seem to be small units that operate at low temperatures, so I suspect that they'd be relatively minimal, more Windscale than Chernobyl, with the danger largely contained to the reactor site. But I don't really know.
 
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I think the Iranians will probably try to bomb it again. If they fail and Iraq gets a nuclear weapon it will probably be used on some sort of Iranian city like Tehran because the two are at war during this time. It would be a waste to use it on Israel because they are not the immediate threat at the time.

I can see Tehran being wiped out and the government of the Ayatollah collapsing in the wake of the chaos. Millions die and a version of the Gulf War sort of begins earlier this time to disarm Iraq.
 
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