Word: tuwaitha
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Begin did not. He meant the French-built Tammuz 1 nuclear reactor at El-Tuwaitha, 10½ miles southwest of Baghdad. Begin straightway launched into his real reason for calling the meeting: to ponder what Israel should do in the event that the attack taking place 515 miles away should fail. Half an hour later, after several options had been considered, a telephone call interrupted the Cabinet meeting. It was Israeli Defense Force Chief of Staff, Lieut. General Rafael Eitan. He tersely informed Begin that the attack had been a total success. For a further 70 minutes, the Cabinet considered...
...winter of 1979, the Israelis began to assemble a "combat file" on the proposed reactor site at El-Tuwaitha. Using the engineering blueprints, Israeli experts pinpointed the exact location of the reactor core within its sheltering cupola. They also measured the size and strength of the cupola and the precise location of a computer installation that would eventually control the reactor's operation. In June 1980, the armed forces asked Prime Minister Begin to authorize a clandestine, infrared survey of the site at El-Tuwaitha. Before the mission, Begin was given an aerial photograph of the area...
...evacuated most of their 150 technicians from El-Tuwaitha, and the Israelis assumed that work on the reactor would be halted indefinitely. But after the war bogged down, the French returned. Another attack date was set for February, but it was canceled after Yadin reiterated his strong objections. A third date, in March, was scrubbed for undisclosed reasons. In May, the ministerial committee authorized Begin to choose his own date for the raid, but strong objections about timing were raised by Opposition Leader Shimon Peres, who had been briefed on the scheme, and the strike was once more postponed...
...train Iraqi scientists and technicians in nuclear technology. A facility was first discussed in 1974 by then French Premier Jacques Chirac and Iraq's Saddam Hussein. The final agreement led to the erection of the 70-MW reactor at the Tammuz nuclear center in the desert at El-Tuwaitha. It was supported by an 800-kW minireactor, separately housed and untouched by the raid, that was used for minor experiments and to prepare radioactive materials...