Spies Against Armageddon (54 page)

Barak argued against those suspicions, saying his true concern was that Olmert made hasty and unreliable military decisions.

Dagan, however, lost all faith in Barak. And that would make a difference in future crises.

The decisive factor regarding whether to bomb the reactor was the question of Syrian retaliation.

Israeli intelligence knew that Syria’s powerful missiles were always on standby, and if an order were given, they could hit any target they chose in Israel. Destinations, it was believed, were pre-set: from the Dimona reactor, to the Kirya military headquarters in Tel Aviv, to the Knesset in Jerusalem, as well as air bases, power stations, and other key facilities.

If Israel believed there was a likelihood of Syrian retaliation, then preparation of the home front would normally be necessary. That would require mobilization of reservists and civil defense workers, which would be detected by the Syrians. That could lead to a miscalculation. Syria might even pre-emptively strike Israel, and an all-out war could result.

That lethal scenario almost happened in 1996, and the man responsible was a faker within the Mossad.

Yehuda Gil was considered a living legend within the spy agency. Born in Libya and fluent in Italian, Arabic, and other languages, he became a role-model case officer who recruited Palestinian agents to fight terrorism and Arab military officers to spy on their own countries. In addition, as an instructor in the Mossad academy, he shared his lifetime of experience and escapades, training new generations of up and coming case officers.

Gil was considered a star katsa: embodying all the skills of that job in locating, contacting, persuading, then running a foreign agent. In 1974, he was tasked with recruiting a Syrian general who was on a trip to Europe. That was shortly after the Yom Kippur War, and Israel desperately needed a new crop of agents in Arab countries. The general proved to be irresistibly corruptible.

Gil, operating with the Mossad tradecraft of false-flagging, introduced himself as an Italian working for a corporation with close ties to the NATO alliance. He started showering the general with gifts, including a refrigerator that was imported for him from the United States.

The general was requested to provide some information, as a test of his willingness to go along. Very quickly, it was clear that while he was greedy he was not treacherous. He agreed to give some data that might be helpful to a corporation, but he refused to betray his country’s big secrets.

Gil was faced with a dilemma. Being proud of his track record, he did not want to return to headquarters in Israel as a failure. He started writing reports based on his own speculation, imagination, and knowledge he gained from reading newspapers. Gil certainly knew what his bosses would expect to hear from a senior Syrian general.

As for the money he was supposed to pay to the agent, Gil kept that at home under his mattress.

Luckily for him, the general was not able to leave Damascus too often: maybe once a year, to visit his daughter in Europe. Gil did not have to invent too many reports. Since the general was considered a high-quality agent, Mossad headquarters expected great stuff—but not too often.

There were authentic meetings, and they continued even after the general retired. The Syrian still refused, however, to reveal significant secrets. He also rejected Gil’s offers of money and did not seem to feel that he was a spy in any sense. The meetings petered out.

Gil also retired, but the Mossad employed him part-time to run the senior Syrian source. Gil kept stuffing his reports with made-up details, even as he kept stuffing money into his mattress.

Whenever it was suggested that he be accompanied by another case officer or by a military specialist from Aman who could ask more precise questions, Gil refused to permit that. He argued that the Syrian general would not meet anyone but him.

In 1996, 22 years into the bogus operation, Gil fabricated his most dangerous report. Advised by Aman that he should ask about certain movements of Syrian military units, he answered with one of his imaginative, intelligent guesses.

That report set the Israeli military on fire. Aman analysts concluded—based on Gil’s false information—that Syrian forces planned a quick invasion to grab part of the Golan Heights. In response to that chimera, Israel’s army was mobilized in the north, preparing for war.

Luckily, the Syrians did not miscalculate, and their reaction was mild. There was no war by mistake.

Red flags about Yehuda Gil went up in both the Mossad and Aman. After several internal investigations, the organizations concluded that he was probably inventing things. At one point, he was followed on a supposed mission by a Kidon tracker—using the best, since Gil knew how to detect and avoid surveillance. It was apparent that Gil was not meeting with anyone.

Back in Israel, he was arrested and put on trial. Gil was sentenced to five years in prison.

Now, in the summer of 2007, with a looming nuclear threat in Syria, the fear of miscalculation was even greater. Israel, after all, was about to do something quite provocative—and likely to be considered an act of war prompting a Syrian response.

The decision required on the part of Olmert and his cabinet seemed momentous. Ministers spoke of the possibility of the Israeli people facing thousands of retaliatory missiles flying in from Syria and from Hezbollah in Lebanon. Some might even carry chemical weapons.

Despite those dark thoughts, the inner cabinet voted, 13 to 1, in favor of an attack. Even Barak voted yes. The only no was cast by the former Shin Bet director, Avi Dichter, now a cabinet minister, who feared the bloody toll that might be inflicted on Israeli civilians by Syrian retaliation.

Despite all the deliberations, meetings, and up to 2,500 Israelis involved in planning, the secret was not leaked or even hinted—quite astounding for a talkative society.

Everyone trusted with knowledge about the plan was required to sign a special secrecy pledge, even those who already had the highest security clearances, such as cabinet ministers and heads of intelligence agencies. The only one exempted was Prime Minister Olmert.

On the night of the attack, September 6, Olmert was in the “Bor” (the Pit), the IDF’s situation room, flanked by a few assistants and military generals. Eight F-16s took off from a base in northern Israel, flying westward, northward, and then eastward into Syria.

Unlike the “stupid” heavy bombs dropped in the Osirak attack in 1981, this time Israel used “smart” weapons. Shortly after midnight, the pilots fired precision missiles from a safe distance. Within two minutes, the attack was over.

To keep the Israelis safe, their advanced electronics jammed and blinded Syria’s air-defense system. This time, on top of what Israel had accomplished before, the electronic warfare was raised to a new level. The Syrian radars seemed to be working, just fine, even when they were not. Syria’s defense personnel had no idea that their system, which detected absolutely nothing, was down.

The Israeli pilots adhered to radio silence and communicated with headquarters only after about 30 minutes. Olmert, other top politicians, and generals were relieved and delighted to hear that the target was destroyed.

Despite their analysis that Syria would not retaliate, they could not rule out the possibility. To minimize the chance, a firm decision was made to keep the entire affair secret. If President Assad were not publicly humiliated, he would probably decide to do and say nothing. Indeed, Israel still has never publicly confirmed that it hit Syria that night.

A war of misinformation would follow. The Syrians apparently did not know what to make of Israel’s silence. Fearing that Israel might announce it first and embarrass them, the Syrians declared they had repelled an Israeli air incursion. Later, they said that Israel had bombed a deserted military structure. They also pointed to the one mistake the Israeli air force made as evidence of the incident: One of the pilots released an auxiliary fuel tank from his F-16, on the way home. The tank was found in a field in Turkey; it had Hebrew markings on it. Deniability would now be more difficult.

After Syria’s government started talking about an Israeli attack, word leaked from Israel that the target had been a nuclear facility. Syrian officials adamantly denied that. They refused, for months, to let the International Atomic Energy Agency visit the site; in the meantime, the Syrians cleared away all the rubble and replaced the soil. Finally, when international inspectors were allowed there, they detected a few traces of uranium. Syria claimed these were from uranium-tipped Israeli missiles, but the IAEA did not believe that fiction.

The inspectors concluded that the structure, now gone, had contained a North Korea-type nuclear reactor. This finding was bolstered by a fairly complete report made public by the CIA. Intelligence agencies discovered that dozens of people were killed when Israel bombed the building, both Syrians and North Koreans. North Korea never said a word about it.

Israeli intelligence prepared files to be sent to foreign government leaders and friendly intelligence agencies. The cooperative relationship that meant the most was with the United States. Olmert spoke by phone with President Bush, and Dagan flew to Washington to give briefings—even meeting the president at the White House. Both sides seemed comfortable with the fact that Israel had not informed the Americans, in any detailed way, before the bombing raid. Deniability was preserved.

Intelligence professionals at the CIA and in the Pentagon praised Israel for having precise information and for being decisive and leak-proof.

While Israel proved to the Middle East that the Begin Doctrine worked for a second time, the mission was incomplete for Dagan and his Mossad.

On August 1, 2008, President Assad’s close aide, General Suleiman, was felled by one bullet. He was sitting on the terrace of his villa on the Syrian coastline, enjoying the Mediterranean breeze while entertaining guests for dinner. They apparently did not notice that an Israeli naval vessel was anchored offshore, with an expert sniper on deck. The ship was bobbing on the sea, of course. Yet one shot, at a great distance, did the job.

The general was killed, but his guests were unharmed.

No less impressive was the precision of the information gathered about Suleiman’s party: what time it would start, and where he would be sitting.

The mission, thus accomplished, was to send a message to his master, the president: Don’t mess with us. Another objective was getting rid of a powerful official who worked on Syria’s very special relations with both Hezbollah and Iran.

Chapter Twenty-five

Into the Future

There always seemed to be an immediate challenge or crisis for Israel’s intelligence agencies, and none seemed more important than the multi-pronged covert offensive aimed at sabotaging—or at least retarding—Iran’s nuclear program.

Israeli leaders monitored the issue extremely closely, knowing that they might feel compelled to unleash their country’s military muscle to combat the Islamic Republic’s nuclear capability. Thanks to significant delays, for which former Mossad director Meir Dagan claimed credit, the fateful year for a decision was changed from 2010 to 2011 and then to 2012, and likely beyond that.

Yet, even as Dagan was replaced at the end of 2010, after eight highly active years, by his deputy Tamir Pardo, there was a need to look ahead to the next, seemingly inevitable crises.

Reviewing the past, it becomes clear that Israeli intelligence always has had its eye on the future. It consistently has tried to be on the cutting edge in utilizing human and technological resources. The Mossad, Aman, and Shin Bet pride themselves on being innovative; and they hope and believe that they are ahead of their peers—the other espionage and security agencies, large and small, worldwide.

Israel’s was one of the first intelligence communities to introduce computers, as early as the 1950s, long before other governments used them for any function at all.

Israel was the first nation to take advantage of drones, for pilotless intelligence gathering and for striking enemies.

Israel was the sixth country to join the nuclear club, although doggedly refusing to confirm that fact, and one of only a handful of nations to launch satellites.

Israel is a leading country in the new virtual battlefield of cyberwarfare. Increasingly and by necessity, spy agencies are expanding from the physical world to the digital world.

Cyberspace has largely been a blessing for Israel and its intelligence agencies. It is becoming less relevant that the Jewish state is so physically tiny, because in technology it is the giant of the Middle East.

Vastly increased reliance on computers elevated Aman’s role within the community, since the conduct of cyber-activities is in that military agency’s hands. Aman has immersed itself in a new dimension where bloodless wars are waged. Many objectives can now be fought over, without soldiers or machinery ever clashing face to face.

Three forms of cyber-activity are useful, relevant, and exploited by the military: intelligence gathering, offensive steps, and defensive moves.

For collecting information and for operations, cyber-based methods are not eliminating human intelligence, an area at which the Israelis have excelled. Technology, however, is now invaluable in helping humint—offering a wealth of useful shortcuts. Almost every human activity today is linked with computers, is recorded by them, and leaves tracks on a network that can be found and penetrated by cyber-espionage.

It would be foolish for anyone using a computer in any manner to think that privacy and secrecy exist anymore. If Israeli intelligence agencies believe that some needed data resides in the computer networks of almost any foreign government, military, company, or individual, Israel’s ability to ferret out the data and to undetectably procure it is far above average.

Smart use of cyberspace obviates the need for old-fashioned shots in the dark, including fishing expeditions for information in the real world that burn up travel budgets and put operatives at risk. Like other intelligence communities, Israel’s became expert at break-ins; yet those, in a physical sense, are less important in our era of networked computers and the internet.

Information is much more available, and data more obtainable than ever. Israeli software and hardware developers, including many who learned their skills in the military’s Unit 8200, invented much of the networking equipment used around the world. They know all the “back door” entrances, and they are adept at cracking all types of computer code.

Intelligence agencies can also use chat rooms, social networks, e-mail exchanges, and other websites to identify important information very far from home, and to dig deeper to learn more—all from a safe distance.

A katsa, or case officer, might find it necessary to establish personal contact a few times with agents employed abroad. Psychological factors are still strong, and the reasons that a foreigner is supplying secrets about his or her own country need to be understood. Yet, for routine and follow-up meetings, there is less need for an Israeli to enter enemy lands—the “target” countries—or to bring their agents to the neutral “base” countries.

Compared with ages past, there is far less need to arrange a clandestine rendezvous with an agent, with laborious coding and decoding of messages by hand. Elaborate signals, such as “dead letter drops” for leaving packages and messages under false rocks in the woods, have become relics of the past displayed in spy museums.

Because the internet leaves a lot of room to the imagination, there are new opportunities for “false-flag” recruitment. You can introduce yourself as something entirely different than you are. It used to be that if an Israeli operative were pretending to be Belgian, for example, he would have to be someone selected to credibly pass himself off as a Belgian. On the internet, such disguises are relatively simple.

United States intelligence agencies have also learned that technology in the hands of terrorists can be turned against them. Anytime an enemy of America or Israel uses a telephone—and especially a smartphone, with its mobile connection to the internet—an intelligence agency has a very good chance of detecting where he is and intercepting his messages. Not surprisingly, al-Qaeda and other terrorist groups gave up using telephones and depend only on couriers who carry messages in medieval style.

Israel has developed offensive capabilities that could be unleashed against enemy nations that have modern infrastructure. The United States is very advanced in this category of warfare, but the fact is that large and small countries—America and Israel, for instance—can be nearly equal in their power to stage cyber-attacks that could cripple a foe.

It is possible for most any nation with terrific technology experts to shut down electricity, water supplies, and the aviation system of the enemy without endangering a single one of its own soldiers. Specialists can take destructive action, while sitting comfortably at control panels and in situation rooms thousands of miles away.

A modern nation could theoretically be brought to a halt, if one country decides to bring chaos to another’s society.

Intelligence agencies have also developed the ability to feed false information into the enemy’s computer-based systems. Planting the Stuxnet worm in Iran’s nuclear computers was just one example of the limitless possibilities in offensive cyberwar. Israel was also able to blind the Syrian anti-aircraft defense system, when the nuclear reactor in Syria was destroyed in 2007.

However, these weapons are double-edged swords. The more a country is technologically advanced—certainly including Israel—the more it is vulnerable, because it inevitably has much of its own vital information in computer networks that might be pierced.

Israel and its intelligence agencies devote increasing resources to defending themselves from cyber-assaults. They invent and activate virus detectors and firewalls, and—of course—they make sure not to connect the public websites of the Mossad and many other sensitive institutions to the important intranets used by agency employees.

The problem is that a country must defend not only its
real
military and strategic installations, but also its entire
virtual
home front. Traffic lights are controlled by computers, as are sewers, hospitals, and myriad other civilian systems. Cyberwar turns every individual in the country into someone who could be hit by the enemy and could suffer.

There is also the somewhat troubling fact that the enemy need not be a state. Terrorist groups can hack into databases with various levels of skill—from the rudimentary to the surprisingly complex. Some hackers often change their locations and their modes of entry into computer networks. Israel, to defend its infrastructure and hit back, may have to go through the frustration of punching at a moving target.

The future for Israel and its intelligence community may be full of double-edged swords. Almost anything that Israel has acquired or developed, its enemies are also aiming to get.

The one thing that the opponents cannot match—at least, not so far—are Israel’s humint assets. Analysts at Aman and the Mossad know the neighboring countries very well; and many Israelis speak a wide variety of languages, often thanks to the origins of their own parents and grandparents.

Meantime, the espionage and security agencies of Israel’s enemies seem to focus nervously on pleasing their masters; and that often means telling an authoritarian ruler precisely what he wants to hear. Be they Iranians, Lebanese radicals, Egyptians, or other Arabs, the rival security services consistently have failed to understand Israeli society. In simple terms, hardly any of them ever met a Jew.

They mainly come from dictatorships and cannot imagine the workings of a society that is open and democratic. They tend to judge Israel’s every move according to their own core values and experiences.

That has given Israel a genuine qualitative edge over the years. But Israeli society is changing. It is becoming less educated on average, less productive, more introverted, less attuned to the world’s opinions, and increasingly torn by tensions between rich and poor.

The secret agencies, it is true, are peopled by exceptional individuals. Yet, Israel’s intelligence community has always been a reflection of the entire nation. It cannot be better than the society in which it resides.

In fact, coming from a free and open country, Israelis find it quite challenging to assess the intentions of the surrounding dictatorships. The ideal piece of intelligence would be knowledge of exactly what is going on between the ears of only one man—the leader. Despite all of Israel’s technological advances, no machine can read minds and intentions.

When longtime Arab rulers were toppled in the pro-freedom uprisings of 2011, Israel was taken by surprise. Intelligence analysts contended—when looking at their largest neighbor, Egypt—that they predicted the possibility of an anti-Israel, Islamic regime in Cairo; but only after the eventual death of President Hosni Mubarak. He had been, practically, an ally for Israel and certainly for the United States. Israeli strategists wished that he could still be around, but changing the course of history is beyond the capabilities of even the best espionage agencies.

Israel’s analysts did all they could to keep up with a rapidly changing set of Arab governments, and intelligence professionals shunned simplistic questions, such as, “Is it good for us?” Yet top politicians wanted to know how their country would be impacted by popular movements, hope mixed with violence, and a demand for freedom in Arab lands that could lead to an honest desire for peace. Events could also lead to hatred of Israel being stirred up by new leaders.

Israelis genuinely felt threatened by Iran’s radicalism and its growing power. When leaders in Jerusalem warned that they would not tolerate a nuclear-armed Iran, they emphasized that they could not take the risk that the mullahs might one day use the world’s most potent weapons. The Mossad and Aman could not claim to know what today’s Supreme Leader, or tomorrow’s, might do.

Iran’s nuclear program, combined with its support of terrorism, is currently at the heart of Israel’s most urgent concerns; but crisis management has become part of life for Israelis. This is certainly not their first crisis, and it will not be their last.

As usual, there are many options for attempting to resolve it. Elected officials, military chiefs, and, indeed, the people of Israel naturally want to have the best possible information—and they have enjoyed the fruits of a very impressive intelligence community. Now, the leaders must decide. Israel should not expect the secret agencies to be more than they have proved to be: an excellent example of what a small nation with meager resources can do by using them to the utmost. The community’s history has demonstrated both the maximal achievements and the inescapable limitations of intelligence.