Ordered a decade ago, the Rahav will be Israel’s fifth Dolphin-class submarine, joining the INS Tanin, Tekuma, Leviathan and Dolphin at the Haifa naval base when it arrives next month.
Rahav is the Hebrew name for the Greek god of the seas, Neptune, and has been used for other naval ships in the past, but it can also mean haughtiness or arrogance in modern Hebrew.
The submarine, built by the German Howaldtswerke-Deutsche Werft shipbuilding company, was unveiled in April 2013, but required an additional year and a half of work to make it fully operational. The diesel-powered sub is over 220 feet (67 meters) long and weighs more than 2,000 tons. It will be staffed by a crew of approximately 50 sailors, the Israel Navy official said.
The vessel’s air-independent propulsion system, which operates through a fuel cell instead of using louder, oxygen-dependent sources, allows the submarine to remain underwater without surfacing for potentially weeks at a time, the source said.
“The fifth submarine greatly enhances the Israel Navy’s submarine flotilla and provides us with another state-of-the-art tool to aid and defend Israel against numerous threats,” the Navy official said, but refused to specify to what exact dangers he was referring.
The INS Rahav cost Israel a reported $2 billion (NIS 8 billion), but the Navy officer was loath to discuss its price.
“We’re not speaking about the cost,” he said.
The price tag, seen by some as exorbitant, of the Rahav was offset by a considerable discount from Berlin that is rooted in a contentious 1953 reparations agreement between Germany and Israel for the Holocaust.
The controversial agreement, which significantly boosted Israel’s economy during the early days of its independence, has brought billions of dollars of military and economic aid to Israel throughout its history and was further invoked to purchase the new line of naval vessels.
The Rahav is equipped with state-of-the-art surveillance systems to track other ships and countermeasures to allow it to avoid detection by enemy craft, as well as satellite communications capabilities and other systems for electronic warfare, the Israel Navy officer said.
Last year, the INS Tanin — crocodile, in Hebrew — arrived in Israel. The nuclear-capable submarine, similar in most ways to the new Rahav, came equipped with 10 torpedo tubes, capable of holding a variety of missiles, according to Defense News.
Israel Navy commander Ram Rothberg salutes as the INS Rahav, Israel's newest submarine, sets off from the German port of Kiel towards Haifa, where it is set to arrive next month, on December 17, 2015. (IDF Spokesperson's Unit)
Israel Navy commander Ram Rothberg salutes as the INS Rahav, Israel’s newest submarine, sets off from the German port of Kiel towards Haifa, where it is set to arrive next month, on December 17, 2015. (IDF Spokesperson’s Unit)
Submarines, unmatched in their ability to hide from enemy navies, have long been a major facet of Israel’s defense policy. “Submarines are a strategic tool in the IDF’s defense arsenal. Israel is prepared to act at any time in any place to ensure the safety of Israel’s citizens,” Netanyahu said in 2013, when the Rahav was first unveiled in Germany.
Israeli submarines are allegedly armed with cruise missiles topped with nuclear warheads, affording the tiny Jewish state “second strike” capabilities — although the government will not officially acknowledge these nuclear weapons.
Israel also purchased a sixth submarine from Germany in 2013, which is expected to be completed in a few years. It is not yet clear if it will join the current fleet or replace one of the older vessels.
“Let’s talk about that in three or four years,” the military official said.
TonyGosling wrote:
DANGER: Germans financing Nazis in Kiev & supplying nuclear armed Dolphin class subs to Israel. Got war bug again?
German Holocaust Reparations
World War II ended sixty-six years ago, but Germany is still paying reparations to Israel for the Holocaust. According to Strategy Page, Israel's purchase of German Dolphin-class submarines has been subsidized by Germany as part of ongoing Holocaust reparations.
Germany has agreed to pay 20 percent of the cost of a sixth Dolphin class submarine for Israel, which was ordered earlier this year. Two more are under construction, and will arrive in the next two years. ... The first two Dolphins were paid for by Germany, as was most of the cost of the third one. This is more of German reparations for World War II atrocities against Jews.
It's interesting that Holocaust reparations are helping pay for a key strategic force that helps ensure that Israel will not suffer a new holocaust.
The Israelis have developed a cruise missile, which is has a range of 1,500 kilometers and carries a 200 kiloton nuclear warhead. The objective of deploying nukes on subs is to further enhance deterrence to any nation launching a nuclear strike against Israel.
http://unreligiousright.blogspot.co.uk/2011/07/german-holocaust-repara tions.html
In an address to the UN Security Council, OSCE chief monitor Alexander Hoog accused both Kiev and pro-Russia fighters of violating the terms of the mid-February Minsk truce agreement. Hug further said that the OSCE monitors were in many cases banned from entering conflict zones.
He noted that such actions hindered efforts to monitor the implementation of the Minsk agreement. The UN Security Council convened in the wake of a new wave of fighting which broke out in recent days. Washington and its western allies accuse Moscow of trying to create a sphere of influence in Ukraine’s volatile east. The Kremlin denies the allegations.
Transnistria shapes up as next Ukraine-Russia flashpoint
Neil Buckley Author alerts
| Jun 03 12:55 | 75 comments | Share
Keep an eye on Transnistria, the pro-Russian breakaway state in Moldova. On Monday, Dmitri Trenin, one of Russia’s best-known foreign policy analysts and a man with good Kremlin antennae, tweeted: “Growing concern in Moscow that Ukraine and Moldova will seek to squeeze Transnistria hard, provoking conflict with Russia.” On Tuesday, a columnist in the pro-Kremlin Izvestia newspaper warned that Russia “seriously faces the prospect of a repeat of the [2008] situation” – when it went to war with Georgia – “this time around Transnistria”.
What sparked the tensions was a May 21 vote in Ukraine’s parliament to suspend military co-operation with Russia. That included a 1995 agreement giving Russia military transit rights across Ukraine to reach Transnistria, which borders Ukraine’s Odessa region.
Russian peacekeepers have been deployed in the unrecognised statelet since its brief war for independence from ex-Soviet Moldova in 1992, and Russia has a base there with about 1,350 soldiers and heavy weapons. Losing access via Ukraine means Russia must resupply its base by air through Chisinau, the Moldovan capital, and across Moldovan territory.
http://blogs.ft.com/the-world/2015/06/transnistria-shapes-up-as-next-u kraine-russia-flashpoint/
Germany Provides Dolphin Class Nuclear Powered Submarines to Israeli, Armed with ICB Nuclear Missiles
Global Research, April 09, 2015
The fact is that Chancellor Merkel of Germany has already altered the balance of power in the Middle East and of Europe by supplying Israel, without any prior consultation with the EU, five Dolphin Class nuclear powered submarines – with a sixth due for delivery – that have already been converted by the Israeli navy to being armed with ICB nuclear missiles. This has given the Israeli state ‘deep sea dominance’ that is now virtually irreversible. This nuclear-armed fleet, assumed to be already patrolling the Mediterranean unseen, is powerful enough to destroy not only Britain but virtually the whole of Europe.
Giving a Middle East country, which is in a permanent state of war, the power to dominate Europe, with a second strike capability, is an abdication of national security by the EU in respect of all its 28 member states of half a billion people.
It could properly be termed political and military negligence on a scale never before experienced in European history.
http://www.globalresearch.ca/germany-provides-dolphin-class-nuclear-po wered-submarines-to-israeli-armed-with-icb-nuclear-missiles/5441929
Der Spiegel says National Security Council approves deal on condition it can be cancelled if corruption allegations are proven.
Read more related articles
As police probe advances, Israel and Germany consider nixing submarine deal
Germany’s National Security Council has approved the sale of three advanced submarines to Israel, Der Spiegel reported Friday.
Israel will receive three more Dolphin submarines in a €1.5 billion deal with German conglomerate Thyssen- Krupp, in addition to the one already being built under the shadow of corruption allegations.
In April, Israel agreed to a request by Germany to insert a clause into the contract via a memorandum of understanding.
The clause gives Germany the right to cancel the deal if any improprieties or criminal offenses are proven as a result of an Israeli police investigation that is under way.
Israel currently has three Dolphin-class submarines and two Dolphin-2 class submarines (another one is expected to be delivered in 2018). The additional three Dolphin 2-class submarines, which are not expected to reach Israel for another decade, are set to replace the older Dolphins at a cost of combined price of €1.5b., a third of which will be subsidized by Berlin.
In November, questions began to be asked about the 2014 submarine contract when Channel 10 reported that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s personal lawyer, David Shimron, worked for the Israeli representative of ThyssenKrupp.
ThyssenKrupp itself has been accused of involvement in bribing officials across the world to promote its submarines.
According to Düsseldorf- based financial newspaper Handelsblatt, Thyssen- Krupp opened an internal investigation into suspicions that employees of its former London-based joint-venture Marine Force International had bribed officials in Greece, Turkey, South Korea, Pakistan and Indonesia.
Shimron had pushed for the multi-billion-shekel acquisition over the objections of the defense establishment, including then-defense minister Moshe Ya’alon, who only found out about the deal when it was leaked to the media. Ya’alon succeeded in stopping the planned purchase, but after he stepped down as defense minister, Netanyahu renewed the negotiations with Berlin.
Ya’alon has testified to police investigators in this affair, Case 3000, offering the details about the contacts Netanyahu held with German officials regarding the acquisition of three submarines and several other warships, all of which happened without the knowledge of the security establishment.
Ya’alon continues to voice his opposition to the deal and accuses Netanyahu of being corrupt. At an event in Beersheba last week, Ya’alon said it was the first time he had considered the prime minister to be corrupt.
“This was the straw that broke the camel’s back regarding Netanyahu,” he said.
“I had never suspected that he was corrupt. But then he went behind the back of the [IDF] chief of staff and the head of the navy to sign the deal with [German Chancellor Angela] Merkel, when the whole professional consensus – from the navy to the Defense Ministry – was that we needed five submarines, not six.”
Attorney-General Avichai Mandelblit opened an initial probe of the allegations in February, which has since been elevated into a criminal investigation.
While Netanyahu is not a suspect in the affair, on Thursday Zionist Union MK Erel Margalit said police now believe the prime minister is connected to the submarine deal.
Margalit spoke after police questioned him about the affair at the Lahav 433 National Crime Unit headquarters in Lod.
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Martin Van Creveld: Let me quote General Moshe Dayan: "Israel must be like a mad dog, too dangerous to bother."
Martin Van Creveld: I'll quote Henry Kissinger: "In campaigns like this the antiterror forces lose, because they don't win, and the rebels win by not losing."
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