Raid on Iran?

In his column "No repeat of Osirak," in this weekend's Jerusalem Post, the Editor, David Horowitz, focuses on a book entitled "Raid on the Sun" by Rodger Claire, that is about the Israeli strike on the Osirak nuclear reactor in Baghdad in 1981. Although this book received little publicity when it was published in 2004, nevertheless it is instructive to read it in relation to today's news about Iran and the debate about whether or not Israel and/or the US will be forced in future to attack Iran to stop their development of nuclear weapons. Both Israeli and US spokesmen have been issuing contradictory statements that either enhance and/or reduce the likelihood of an attack, so that now everything is confused, and we are in the "fog of war."
The testing by Iran of several types of missiles last week that could carry nuclear warheads and that could reach Tel Aviv, as well as Eastern Europe and US forces in the Gulf and Afghanistan, heighten this concern. In addition, Pres. Ahmedinejad and other Iranian leaders have specifically threatened "annihilation" of Israel, and have refused to allow international oversight (by IAEA) of their nuclear enrichement program. Everyone says that the sanctions voted by the UN Security Council should be allowed to work first, but the fact is that these or any additional sanctions are unlikely to ever influence Iran's actions. Under these circumstances the possibility of a pre-emptive military attack on Iran by Israeli and/or US forces becomes more likely.
So what are the lessons of the 1981 raid on Osirak, not the ones you might expect. Yes, the Osirak reactor was completely destroyed in what was a pinpoint raid, yes, the IAF bombers were able to reach there over 1,000 km and return home wthout damage. But, when you look at the details of what actually happened it was not the flawless scheme that was portrayed previously (as in books like "First Strike, by Shlomo Nakdimon, 1987) and that perpetuated the image of the IAF pilots as perfect Zionist heroes.
The first thing that went wrong was (1) the last navigational checkpoint before the raid, an island in a lake about 100 km west of Baghdad, did not appear, this confused the lead pilot Amos Yadlin (who is now C-in-C of the IAF) so that he would have missed the target (the explanation was that they used reconaissance photos taken during the dry period, and now in the rainy season the island was submerged!); 2. The second pilot realized the mistake, and decided to underfly his leader and dropped his bombs first, and accurately, but in doing so he could have destroyed the mission; 3. The pilot of the last of the planes had flu, but kept it secret, but was so ill that be actually blacked out over the target, but still managed to drop his bombs and return safely; 4. The Mossad intelligence knew that the whole crew of the Iraqi radar stations took dinner together at a certain time, so the raid was scheduled for then, but they didn't know that the radar systems would actually be switched off during the raid, and that's why no planes were damaged by anti-aircraft shelling and the raid was fully successful.
However, Horowitz points out that these and other terrible errors that occured enforce the maxim that "no plan, no matter how perfect, ever survives contact with the enemy." So not only is there the extra distance (from Iraq to Iran, another 500-1000 km), and the extra number of sites (dispersed throughout Iran), but the sites are not open to the air, but buried below ground. In this case the number of variables is increased greatly and the possibiility for things going wrong are of course also much greater.
However, I don't think Horowitz has chosen the correct maxim, the true one is that with "the more complex the plan the more that can go wrong," and this has nothing to do with the enemy or war, and for instance this is the basis of the mathematician's role in "Jurassic Park" by Michael Crichton, he is specifically included to comment cynically on the breakdown of the complex plan for a commercial venture.
But, we have all moved on, lessons have been learned and developments are not all against the venture of a military raid on Iran, for example : 1. We have improved faster planes with extra fuel tanks so that the extra distance does not represent a serious impediment; 2. The planes are equipped with accurate global positioning systems (GPS), so that they don't need to check a physical site on the ground before attacking; 3. They have missiles that can be accurately aimed at a target without the need to drop large bombs or even cruise missiles without even using planes; 4. With stealth technology, planes can attack targets without worrying about being detected by radar, even if it is fully operational. 5. There are/should be positive checks on both fliers and planes before any operation; 6. There are "bunker buster" bombs that penetrate to great depths that can pancake any undergorund facilities so that they become unusable; 7. The IAF has the best record in terms of turnaround time so that they can carry out hundreds of missions if necessary, as in the case of teh Secodn Lebanon War; 7. This time even the Sunni Arab States are not going to intervene agaisnt Israel; 8. Perhaps most importantly, the IAF controls the skies over the Middle East and no enemy airforce has any chance against them.
Given these facts, the "military option" against Iran does not seem so problematic, even though the same maxim quoted above applies to any complex operation.