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The Tech Innovator Who Almost Killed Saddam Hussein
(Forbes) Nathan Vardi - In 1992, a year after Saddam Hussein rained down Scud missiles on Israel during the first Gulf war, Doron Kempel led Israel's secret mission to kill Saddam Hussein and alter the course of history. The decision was made to kill Hussein in his hometown near Tikrit at the expected funeral of his dying uncle. Kempel was to sneak up on the funeral and communicate the exact location of Hussein to the nearby branch of his team that would fire guided missiles at the Iraqi dictator. The first two rehearsals for the mission in the Israeli desert went off without a hitch. Kempel's team of 30 men had been preparing and planning this exercise for six months. The team's main force was armed with camera-guided missiles secretly developed for the mission. Then an explosion rocked the desert. Five soldiers died in the final rehearsal for the mission. As the mission's leader he took full responsibility for the tragedy. Kempel wound up in the U.S., where he now builds technology companies backed by the biggest names in venture capital. The people Kempel works and partners with don't know the details of his military career. He never talks about it and his involvement in the plot to kill Hussein is unknown outside of Israel. Prior to the accident that ended his military career he conducted dozens of missions, the vast majority of them behind enemy lines. Those missions are largely classified, but certain things are known. In the early 1980s, for instance, Kempel led an assault team that stormed the front door of an Israeli bus that armed Arab militants had hijacked, rescuing the passengers. On two other occasions Kempel helped to track down and kill terrorists who had crossed into Israel. His team was once ambushed in a hostile country and Kempel led them in a fight through the trap, using silenced submachine guns and not alerting adjacent enemy forces.