Q&A – How Long Can Israel Sustain Military Operations? – Driven By Braman Motorcars
Each day I feature a listener question sent by one of these methods.
Email: brianmudd@iheartmedia.com
Social: @brianmuddradio
iHeartRadio: Use the Talkback feature – the microphone button on our station page in the iHeart app.
Today’s Entry: Brian- a couple of questions that came to mind re: Israel-Iran. Anytime we’ve seen Israel use the Iron Dome I’ve always wondered how long they can keep it up before they run out of munitions? Also, with Israel on both the offensive and defensive, how long can that be maintained without new supplies? I don’t trust the UN or even many of our allies to step up to support Israel so it seems as though it would be up to the US to do it.
Bottom Line: Great note...there’s a lot of unpack here amid the ongoing military operations by Israel aimed at disabling Iran’s nuclear program and key figures behind it. I’ll take the questions in the order you presented them – starting with the Iron Dome.
For obvious reasons, Israel doesn’t advertise its supply of munitions for the Iron Dome, Arrow defense system or David’s Sling system. What we know is that since the onset of these Israeli defense systems in 2011 – they've always been able to respond to incoming threats with success rates ranging from 90% to greater than 99% based on the situation. The highest number of intercepts by Israel’s defense systems within a 12-month period is 52,400 – and that was what Israel defended against during the first year following the October 7th terror attack by Hamas.
As of Sunday, in the current conflict with Iran, Iran had fired over 270 ballistic missiles and approximately 100 drones at Israel, with 22 missiles evading Israeli defenses, for a success rate of 94%.
The Iron Dome is best at combating short range rockets; David’s Sling is most effective at combating ballistic missiles and drones; Arrow is designed to intercept long range missiles outside of our atmosphere.
Also, while on topic, Israel has been developing, and is soon expected to add, what’s known as the Iron Beam system that uses fiber laser technology to intercept threats. It holds the potential replace the Iron Dome as the most important defense system in Israel’s extensive operation. It’s also incidentally, the system President Trump is interested in developing across our country.
As for where Israel’s supplies come from given your expressed concern about the UN and theoretical allies perhaps being unwilling to step in to assist with Israel’s military needs, there are only three countries that are in play that way – the United States and Germany and Italy.
Over the prior five years here’s where Israel’s munitions have come from:
- United States: 69%
- Germany: 30%
- Italy: 1%
So yes, overwhelmingly, Israel is dependent on what we supply them with Germany being a particularly important second player. In the current landscape, Italy is still a reliable partner for Israel in addition to the United States – however over the past year there were concerns Germany might cave to calls for an embargo. In late May, Germany announced they would continue to supply Israel with weapons – so it appears that Israel’s sources for its military needs will continue to be met regardless of what happens with the U.N. or posturing by other countries that don’t factor into this conversation.
What remains unclear is how long Israel’s current operation will continue to take place. Yesterday President Trump had this to say: Iran and Israel should make a deal, and will make a deal, just like I got India and Pakistan to make, in that case by using TRADE with the United States to bring reason, cohesion, and sanity into the talks with two excellent leaders who were able to quickly make a decision and STOP! However, on Fox News Sunday, Israel’s ambassador to the U.S. said: We are going to deal with the nuclear program as best we can. We still have a few surprises up our sleeve. I think we've proven that over the past couple of days. We're determined to get this done. At this point, what we've requested from our ally, our greatest ally, the United States, is defensive posture. They're helping protect our civilians through defensive missile systems. And that's our ask at this point, whether or not they join in the battle to ensure a total dismantlement of Iran's nuclear program is a decision the administration will have to take.
It’s possible, if not even likely, that President Trump may be saying one thing publicly, perhaps for optics and effect, while being supportive of Israel’s precision work that’s been crimpling the Iranian regime. There’s no doubt that not only is Israel a far safer place if Iran’s nuclear program is brought to an end – but the entire world given that Iran is the world’s top state sponsor of terrorism.