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Originally Posted by Officer of Engineers
Alot of things wrong with this plan.
1st, the Iranians would most certainly be expecting an attack of some form. At the very least I would be expecting a battalion guarding those sites with a brigade near by.
2nd, what's the point? These are cascades. They're relatively cheap to build and the Iranians know how to build them. Now, if you went after the refined uranium, that might be one thing ... but they don't have that yet.
3rd, what about the Iranian armoured corps? Airborne troops against armour? Even as bad as Iranian armour is, I don't give light infantry much of a chance in a stand up fight.
4th, what about fire support? The Iranians got tons, including artillery. Light infantry out in the open against artillery and armour? Can we say suicide?
5th, just how much explosives are you going to carry? These are concrete bunkers designed to contain radioactivity. More than likely, these are hardened and multi-layered since they're expecting trouble. Commandos are going to carry enough C4 to do the job? I don't think so.
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There are many ways around such number superiority. Quickness and ferocity by numerous small forces can create chaos among Iranian forces. A night time attack can do just that. Numerous diversions can be created to make Iranians think Israelis are going after a target that they aren't really going after to divert those forces there.
Field artillery won't do any good for the IRanians against mobile light vehicle special ops units who by the time they are discovered would be very close to Iranian nuclear sites and could very well be inside and or mixed with light Iranian units. Also just in case the Israeli's can drop a larger dummy force and make sure its seen so if Iranian FAO's are looking for a target they could concentrate their fire on the dummy force.
In regards to how reinforced these concrete facilities are, that is against aerial attack, the more enclosed they are, the more damage specialized explosives can cause. Its just the equipment that Israel needs to destroy. Commandos can even carry timed 2 kiloton nuclear explosives that would destroy everything inside and cause no radioactive fallout which would have the added affect of making the facility to radioactive to repair. This radioactive leak could be blamed on the facility itself rather then the explosives used to cause it.
IN regards to armour I don't have to much faith in the Iranian armoured corps to put it mildly. I don't think they could respond in time. Also Israel has many citizens who are completely fluent in Farsi and can act to divert forces by tapping into frequencies. Israel can even send a unit to seize some tanks and lead their columns with disinformation.
All I stated above is without air cover. If there is air cover then the Iranians may want to do the smart thing and pull back their armour as it would be easily targeted by anti-tank missiles. Anti-Tank infantry with the element of suprise especially if it is an elite unit can lay waste to entire tank columns. And when Iranian or Arab forces start seeing lots of casualties on their side they have a history of displaying everyting but bravery.
Mind you I am not a general or an expert. but if you put 5 experts together along with intelligence that you or I simply don't have access to it is a scenario I would at least bet on is being considered. For every flaw in the plan there is also an answer to be found.
But if the Israeli or US aircover is provided then I think you won't see the Iranian forces committ other then shooting off rounds and shells in confusion and chaos. There would also be no communication between Tehran and the Iranian commanders at the sites as that would certainly be jammed/and or used against them by Israeli disinformation.