Operation Opera

On the afternoon of June 7, 1981, Etzion Airbase, a military airfield in Eastern Israel near the Jordanian border, roared to life with the thunder of 8 F-16A and 6 F-15A strike aircraft. Each F-16A carried two 2000 lb bombs destined for the newly acquired nuclear reactor Osirak near Baghdad in Iraq. This airstrike would become known as Operation Opera, and was at the time the first and only successful airstrike on a nuclear reactor.

In the mid-1970’s, Saddam Hussein had developed nuclear aspirations for the nation of Iraq. According to many accounts, and from Hussein himself, the Iraqi nuclear program would be a peaceful one, strictly for energy production, and would voluntarily follow the peaceful nuclear energy guidelines set forth by the IAEA. However, while declaring the need for a peaceful nuclear Iraq, Hussein would also make threats to Israel, one of which published in Iraq’s national newspaper, threatened to wipe Israel off the face of the Earth. This could have been just more strong anti-Jewish rhetoric, as was common in the Middle East since the inception of the Jewish state, and still common today. This time though, the Israeli government began to see the possibility of the threats to annihilate the Jewish state as credible, given a nuclear Iraq. It should be noted too, that the name of the Iraqi nuclear facility was Osirak, and the reactor itself was named Tammuz, after the month in 586 B.C. in which King Nebuchadnezzar began his war against the Jewish.

It seemed as though Israel was the only nation concerned about a nuclear Iraq, and with good reason. Whether or not the Iraqi nuclear program would have been peaceful or not (The French-designed Osiris type reactor did have the capability to produce small amounts of weapons-grade plutonium)is still up for debate, with only Saddam Hussein himself knowing what the true purpose of the nuclear program. Fearing for its survival, and to prevent another possible holocaust, the decision was made by Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin to put into motion, a plan that would ensure that Iraq did not become a nuclear power.

The Israeli response to the threat of a nuclear Iraq would include action by the Israeli secret service, the Mossad, which included the sabotage of parts shipments of reactor components destined for Iraq and the assassination of top nuclear scientists tasked with bringing the Iraqi reactor online. The much storied Israeli Air Force was also tasked with putting together a plan to strike the Iraqi nuclear facility in the case the Mossad could not effectively halt the progress of the reactor. On June 5, 1981, construction on Osirak was complete. The mission to prevent a nuclear Iraq now fell to the Israeli Air Force.

The Israeli strike package consisted of 8 F-16A Fighting Falcons armed with 2 2,000 pound bombs each and 6 F-15A Eagles as an escort. The Israeli Air Force had just recently acquired the F-16s, originally bound for Iran before the 1979 Islamic Revolution. Although the pilots chosen for this mission were considered to be the best the Israeli Air Force had, they were still untested and had little flight time in the new, state-of-the-art aircraft. By the time the airstrike was give the go ahead, the pilots had little flight time outside of type training in the United States and a few training missions in Israel. The mission itself would prove to be a test for not only the pilots, but the aircraft themselves.

On the afternoon of June 7, 1981, the tarmac at the secret Israeli airbase Etzion, deep in the Sinai desert, was alive with activity. Potentially the fate of Israel and the Jewish people in the Middle East was now in the hands of 14 of Israel’s best pilots. Loaded with as much fuel as the planes could possibly carry along with the 2 2,000 lb bombs destined for the Iraqi nuclear reactor, rumbled down the runway. Over the recommended operational weight, the F-16’s lumbered one by one into the afternoon sky with feet of runway to spare. Operation Opera was now underway.

The flight path would take the strike group over the southern part of Jordan, across the north of Saudi Arabia, and into Iraq approaching Baghdad from the west. All of these countries were hostile to Israel, which meant the strike group would have to maintain an altitude of less than 500 feet in order to avoid radar contact for the duration of the 600 mile flight to Baghdad. In a stroke of unfortunate luck, like something out of a movie, the flight path of the strike group took them directly over the Gulf of Aqaba, in which King Hussein of Jordan just happened to be on vacation on his yacht. The flight of 14 Israeli aircraft passed just hundreds of feet over the yacht, close enough for King Hussein to make out the distinctive blue Star of David markings on the aircraft. It did not take long for King Hussein to deduce, given the size of the flight, the nationality of the aircraft, the bombs under the wings, and the direction of the flight that Israel was in the middle of an operation to take out the Iraqi nuclear facility. Frantically, King Hussein tried to get word to Baghdad about the impending strike, but would ultimately fail to warn the Iraqi government before it was too late.

At a little after 6:00 pm local time, the Israeli Strike group crossed the Euphrates river, signaling the start of the bombing run. 4 pairs of F-16s climbed to 4,000 feet and punched up the throttles, rapidly accelerating to over 500 miles per hour, while the F-15s began their Combat Air Patrol on the outskirts of Baghdad, ready to eliminate anything with wings that would threaten the mission. The first Israeli F-16 would find that he was not properly set up on the bomb run and had to abort, leaving his wingman as the lead strike aircraft in the group. Target in sight and in a fast dive, the Israeli pilot released his bombs with perfect accuracy right into the dome of the Tammuz reactor. The rest of the strike package and their combined 32,000 lbs of bombs all hit the same target, and only the target, leaving the reactor itself completely destroyed beyond repair while leaving neighboring buildings completely intact. Mission completed, the strike group screamed back west towards Israel at rooftop level. Mission Complete, they just had to make it home now.

Although the Osirak facility was heavily defended with anti-aircraft guns and surface to air missiles, the mission was planned so that the strike group would arrive during the nightly shift change. The first pair of Israeli planes to hit the reactor met no anti-aircraft fire. The following pairs met anti-aircraft fire, which had no effect in deterring the strike or damaging any of the aircraft. Even on the return to Israel, it was expected that the strike group would encounter the Iraqi Air Force, but they never did. All 14 aircraft would return to Israel with some having less than 1,000 lbs of fuel left in their tanks.

As was previously stated, the only country in the world at the time that was concerned about a nuclear Iraq was Israel, until the successful strike on the Iraqi nuclear reactor. Israel was reprimanded by the United Nations, although no sanctions were ever levied on them. Even the United States strongly condemned the Israeli airstrike but did nothing to punish them. The success of Operation Opera effectively eliminated any thought of a nuclear Iraq. Just 10 years later, Saddam Hussein would invade Kuwait and kick off the first Gulf War. If it had not been for Operation Opera and the perceived threat to the state of Israel, the geopolitical landscape of the Middle East might have looked very, very different than what it is today.