Drakon submarine highlights Case 3000 dilemma: Was Netanyahu right for wrong reasons? - analysis

Was it worth it for Israel to purchase the Dragon Submarine and some other Israeli submarines and ships?

Should the purchase have been made in 2012, when it was approved by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, or at some later date, after other items that the Israeli defense establishment was demanding be bought first?

Did the way that Netanyahu concealed the deal from most of the defense establishment endanger national security and foreign relations, and why did he hide the transactions?

These are the questions which the Case 3000 state inquiry has been trying to dissect since 2021 and which have returned to the headlines with the inquiry returning to the final stage of its hearings on November 1 and with the Dragon Submarine arriving in Israel to much fanfare this past Thursday.

Answering question number one seems to exonerate Netanyahu, as the Israeli navy today definitely thinks Israel needs all of the submarines it currently has, including the Dragon.

Navy pressing for more submarine approvals, Netanyahu was forward-looking

It also later ordered more submarines, the Dakar-class, for rolling deliveries starting in 2031.

And now the navy is pressing the government to approve buying two more new submarines, which were not on any list until now.

If the government approves, this will eventually increase Israel's submarine fleet from six to eight, since some of its current submarines need to be retired.

The navy is pressing for more submarines in a playing field where Turkey is jumping to 14 submarines and likely to 18 submarines later, and disputes over the Straits of Hormuz and Bab El Mandeb have become critical geopolitically.

In that sense, Netanyahu can be said to have made a positive forward-looking judgment about the navy and the country's needs, whether he did so for exactly the right reasons or not.

But that is only part of the inquiry.

The fact is that the Israeli navy always wanted more submarines, but it and the broader defense establishment first wanted more armored vehicles to protect soldiers from ambushes in Gaza and Lebanon, and Netanyahu was rejecting those requests at the time.

Arguably, even if Israel's navy eventually needed more submarines, maybe the Israeli defense establishment was right in 2012 that Netanyahu should first approve more armored vehicles.

One potential proof that the Israeli defense establishment was right in this dispute with Netanyahu was that during the 50-day conflict with Hamas in 2014, many of the dozens of IDF casualties came from driving in vehicles which were hit by Hamas rocket-propelled grenades or anti-tank weapons.

Had they been driving armored vehicles purchased in 2012, they may have lived,

Netanyahu did finally approve buying more armored vehicles after the 2014 conflict and public furor over IDF casualties.

This is a complicated picture where Netanyahu could be right that Israel needed submarines, but wrong that buying them should come before buying armored vehicles.

Of course, Netanyahu could argue that if Israel had not locked in deals when he did, Germany might have hiked their prices, or Berlin might have also stopped some of its production.

Some reporting indicates that Netanyahu approved Germany selling submarines to Egypt as a special request because Berlin was saying that without more sales, they might need to shut down certain production sites.

Additional reporting indicates Netanyahu was able to save some hundreds of millions of dollars with the Germans, gaining some discounts by green-lighting their deal with Egypt.

Regrettably, he has not fully come forward to make this case, and may skip doing so even in the state inquiry.

Netanyahu hid motives from defense establishment, opposition

Why did he keep this situation secret in real time from his own defense establishment, and why is he not getting out in front of it in 2026?

There are other twists and turns.

It seems in real time that Netanyahu hid his moves from the defense establishment because he knew they opposed him and was afraid of a bruising political battle, which the defense establishment would often win.

Alternatively, Netanyahu wanted to take sole credit for the glory when the submarine would come in, or he just does not like working with the system and prefers to operate in secret with underlings he controls.

This would be consistent with his hiding the Abraham Accords negotiations from his nominal co-partner and alternate prime minister Benny Gantz in summer 2020 until the deal was basically signed.

Some students of government bureaucracy would praise Netanyahu for cutting through red tape to accomplish major goals. But others would note there can be many downsides when you don't work with your national security team.

When Netanyahu approved Egypt buying submarines from Germany, Hosni Mubarak was the leader in Cairo.

Suddenly, on June 24, 2012, Mohammed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood shocked the world by winning an Egyptian election and taking power. He continued to hold power until  July 3, 2013, and even after that point, there were worries that Egypt could no longer be trusted.

The bottom line is that if Netanyahu publicized his moves after the fact or event today, it could be very embarrassing for him politically. Critics would highlight him as the man who approved submarines for the Muslim Brotherhood, even if Morsi was removed before Egypt was sent the submarines.

That is only one rabbit hole.

Maybe Netanyahu was also trying to hide his economic connections to his cousin Natan Milikovsky, who was involved in aspects of the naval deals.

Maybe he was trying to hide his connections to actions by some of his top associates who were later indicted.

The state prosecution found that they could not build a criminal case on any of these issues, but that does not mean Netanyahu was not worried about it.

Numerous reports over the last decade or so have shown that Netanyahu's concealing his moves from the defense establishment caused problems and inefficiencies for top Israeli officials and the military.

This past weekend, Ronen Bergman went farther in a Yediot Aharonot report, claiming that Netanyahu's actions endangered the lives of multiple Mossad operatives who were sent on missions which would not have been executed had the agency known what Netanyahu was doing.

Multiple officials have testified in a High Court of Justice proceeding that they were investing heavy resources trying to figure out who was acting against Israeli interests with the Germans and the Egyptians, only to learn later from their foreign allies that Netanyahu was "the enemy" actor.

In short, the Israeli navy needs the Dragon Submarine. Netanyahu was certainly right about some important strategic issues. But if he will not defend his actions before the state inquiry, he basically seems to be admitting that how he went about moving the submarine approvals forward in secret was a major problem.

Until Netanyahu gives his full, detailed account, questions and a cloud will also remain about who was right about what the order of the purchase should have been in armored vehicles versus submarines.