Russia offered Israel $1 billion for drone technologies to cancel deal to supply Iran with S-300 missiles

PanARMENIAN.Net - Russia offered Israel $1 billion for advanced drone (automatic aircraft) technologies, and in addition offered to cancel the deal to supply Iran with S-300 missiles, according to an official cable published Sunday via WikiLeaks.

The cable was sent by U.S. Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security Ellen Tauscher after meeting Director of Policy and Political-Military Affairs at the Defense Ministry Amos Gilad.

The American diplomatic documents leaked to the website Wikileaks and published in France’s Le Monde suggest that Russia’s attitudes to Iran were “mysterious,” as written in a memo from November 2009. The cable was sent one year before the Kremlin announced it would cancel its deal to supply Iran with the missiles. The Israelis are very concerned about the need to act more forcefully to get Russia to join diplomatic efforts against Iran, the document says. In a number of cables from December 2009, Israelis expressed their fears on this issue to the U.S. government.

Behind the scenes, there was extensive correspondence on this issue, and on December 1, 2009 Tauscher sent a cable to the secretary of state, saying that Gilad had said Moscow has asked Israel for advanced drones in exchange for canceling the S-300 deal. Gilad said the Russians are aware they are behind in these technologies, and that they are ready to pay $1 billion in return for Israeli technologies.

Gilad, the document says, emphasized that Israel would not supply Russia with its most advanced technologies because it would quickly end up in China’s hands. On the same day, Foreign Ministry Director-General Yossi Gal met Tauscher, and said the time had come to impose sanctions which would paralyze Iran. He compared sanctions to an urgent medical prescription for antibiotics, which must be taken every day otherwise it would have no effect, Ynet reported.