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In 1952, the Israel Atomic Energy Commission (IAEC) was established. In 1964, the Dimona Nuclear Research Center/reactor was secretly completed near Bersheeba in the Negev as a heavy water moderated, natural uranium reactor/plutonium reprocessing plant to make nuclear weapons.
After the 1967 Six Day War, Defense Minister Moshe Dayan ordered full-scale production. It averaged 4 - 12 bombs per year. US presidents since Lyndon Johnson supported the program.
By the early 1970s, Israel had advanced nuclear technology, world class scientists, and several dozen bombs ready to launch. Today it has hundreds and delivery systems able to hit distant targets accurately.
Development was possible through elaborate deception and America's active complicity. US universities trained Israeli scientists. They had access to domestic weapons labs.
Since the early 1970s, advanced technology transfers were made. They included supercomputers able to design sophisticated nuclear weapons and delivery systems. Mordechai Vanunu's mid-1980s documented revelations provided proof.
A longtime nuclear technician, he smuggled out dozens of confirming photos and scientific documents. On October 5, 1986, the London Times said:
"THE SECRETS of a subterranean factory engaged in the manufacture of Israeli nuclear weapons have been uncovered by the Sunday Times Insight team.""Hidden beneath the Negev desert, the factory has been producing nuclear atomic warheads for the last 20 years. Now it has almost certainly begun manufacturing thermo-nuclear weapons." Their yields can destroy entire cities.
Vanunu was named the source. Nuclear experts examined his documents. They called them genuine, and concluded that Israel's sophisticated technology enabled it "to build up a formidable nuclear arsenal."
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