Correspondence Louis René Beres Israel and the Bomb Zeev Maoz

Correspondence Correspondence Louis René Beres Zeev Maoz Israel and the Bomb To the Editors: Israeli strategist Zeev Maoz’s controversial article, “The Mixed Blessing of Israel’s Nu- clear Policy,” calls for Israel to disband its nuclear weapons program and join with Arab states in the region to create a “nuclear weapons–free zone.”1 The article, however, ig- nores the history of Israeli-Arab relations, especially the unending Arab call for Israel’s annihilation and the indisputable record of Arab and Iranian noncompliance with international legal obligations. Most ominously, this record includes Iran’s recently revealed pursuit of nuclear weapons while party to the 1968 Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. How little has been learned in some academic quarters. Should Israeli leaders take seriously Maoz’s call to renounce nuclear weapons, they might as well agree to commit national suicide. Deprived of its nuclear deterrent, Israel would be at the mercy of gov- ernments that unambiguously profess genocide against a country half the size of Lake Michigan. Admittedly, it is difªcult to imagine nuclear weapons as anything other than inher- ently evil implements of destruction. Yet there are circumstances wherein possession of such weapons will be all that protects a state from catastrophic war. Moreover, because nuclear weapons may deter international aggression, their possession could also protect neighboring states (friends and foes alike) from war-related or even nuclear- inºicted harm. It follows that not all members of the “nuclear club” need be a menace; rather, some may provide a distinct and indispensable beneªt to world peace and security. An obvious case is the State of Israel. If deprived of its nuclear forces because of mis- conceived hopes for regional cooperation, the Jewish state could become vulnerable to overwhelming attacks. Indeed, even if pertinent Arab states were to abide by the expec- tations of a nuclear weapons–free zone—a presumption unsupported by the region’s history—their combined conventional, chemical, and biological capabilities could even- tually overwhelm the Israeli state. Although Israeli existential vulnerability might be prevented in principle by institut- ing parallel forms of conventional/chemical/biological weapons disarmament among enemy Arab states and Iran, such parallel steps would never occur. As history shows, Louis René Beres is Professor of Political Science at Purdue University. In addition to being the author of many books and articles dealing with nuclear strategy and nuclear war, Beres is Chair of Project Daniel, a private advisory group to Israel’s prime minister, Ariel Sharon, on existential security matters. The group’s ªnal report, “Israel’s Strategic Future,” was hand-delivered to Prime Minister Sharon in January 2003. Zeev Maoz is Professor of Political Science at Tel Aviv University and Visiting Professor of Political Science at the University of Michigan. 1. Zeev Maoz, “The Mixed Blessing of Israel’s Nuclear Policy,” International Security, Vol. 28, No. 2 (Fall 2003), pp. 44–77. International Security, Vol. 29, No. 1 (Summer 2004), pp. 175–180 © 2004 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 175 Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/0162288041762904 by guest on 30 September 2021 International Security 29:1 176 veriªcation of compliance in these matters is exceedingly difªcult and would be especially problematic where several enemy states were involved. Nuclear weapons are not the problem per se. In the Middle East, the problem is a far-reaching and essentially unreconstructed Arab-Iranian commitment to the destruction of the Jewish state. The Palestinian Authority, for example, has never modiªed its 1974 “phased plan” to replace all of Israel with a Palestinian state, nor has it ever com- plied with any of its codiªed legal obligations to Israel concerning the incitement and extradition of terrorists. Faced with this commitment, the Israeli government must al- ready understand that the so-called peace process has never been more than a tempo- rary strategem designed to weaken Israel to the point where it can no longer defend itself. Signiªcantly, this strategem, whether it is called “the Oslo process” or the “road map,” could soon succeed beyond the wildest dreams of Israel’s enemies. Should the “peace process” be augmented by Israeli nuclear disarmament, as recommended by Maoz, and at a time when enemy states (i.e., Iran, Egypt, Syria, and Saudi Arabia) are continuing to expand their own conventional and unconventional weapons activities, Israel’s survival could be placed in doubt. Contrary to the conventional wisdom, at least one Arab state that has signed a formal peace treaty with Israel remains effectively at war with it. There can be little doubt that Egypt, should tactical opportunities arise, would quickly revert to its traditional stance and participate in joint Arab attacks against Israel. Syria, should it one day sign a com- parable peace agreement with Israel, would not hesitate to abrogate that agreement if Damascus perceived an opening for attack. It is important in this regard also to note the growing cooperation between Syria and Iran, which could soon imperil Israel with for- midable combinations of conventional and unconventional threats, including nuclear weapons. With nuclear weapons, Israel could deter enemy unconventional attacks and most large conventional forms of aggression. Moreover, with such weapons, it could launch nonnuclear preemptive strikes against enemy-state hard targets that threaten Israel’s annihilation. Without these weapons, such strikes would likely represent the onset of a much wider war because there would be no compelling threat of Israeli counter- retaliation. Israel’s nuclear weapons therefore represent an impediment to their actual use and to the commencement of regional nuclear war. No examination of Israeli nuclear deterrence and preemption options would be com- plete without consideration of the issue of disclosure. From the beginning, Israel has maintained a policy of nuclear ambiguity. For the future, however, it is unclear whether this policy will continue to meet Israel’s existential security goals, or whether Israel should declare its nuclear capability. Thus, contrary to Maoz’s argument, Israel not only needs its nuclear weapons, but it may even have to jettison its policy of nuclear ambiguity. At ªrst glance, the issue of whether Israel has nuclear weapons may appear con- trived or inconsequential. After all, everyone knows that Israel possesses a nuclear deterrent. Why, then, belabor the obvious? Before answering this question, it must be understood that the purpose of Israeli nuclear disclosure would not be to reveal the obvious. Rather, it would be to heighten prospective enemy perceptions that Israel’s nu- Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/0162288041762904 by guest on 30 September 2021 Correspondence 177 clear forces are fully capable and that Israel would be willing to use these nuclear forces in reprisal for certain ªrst-strike attacks. Although not widely recognized, there are distinct and plausible connections between an openly declared Israeli nuclear weapons capacity and prospective enemy perceptions of Israeli nuclear deterrence. To the extent that an Israeli declaration of nuclear capability would encourage prospective enemy views of an Israeli force that is sufªciently invulnerable to ªrst-strike attacks or is capable of piercing enemy active-defense systems, or both, disclosure could represent a rational and prudent option for the Jewish state. Here the operational beneªts of disclosure would derive from deliberate ºows of information about the dis- persion, multiplication, hardening, speed, and evasiveness of Israel’s nuclear weapon systems and infrastructures, and about some relevant technical features of certain nuclear weapons. Most important, such ºows, which could also refer to command, con- trol, communication, and intelligence invulnerability and possible predelegations of launch authority, could serve to erase prospective enemy doubts about Israel’s nuclear force capabilities. Left unchallenged, these doubts could surely undermine Israeli nuclear deterrence. Israel’s public acknowledgment of a nuclear capability could also heighten enemy perceptions of Israel’s willingness to follow through on speciªed retaliatory threats. For example, by releasing information about its nuclear forces that would identify distinctly usable weapons—weapons, inter alia, that are counterforce rather than countervalue targeted—Israel could reduce or eliminate doubts about its nuclear resolve. Here a prospective attacker, newly aware that Israel could retaliate without necessarily generating intolerably high levels of civilian casualties (possibly because of enhanced radiation or subkiloton nuclear weapons), would be more likely to take seriously Israel’s nuclear threats. This also raises the essential connection between doctrine and deterrence. To the extent that Israel’s strategic doctrine were to identify nuanced and graduated forms of nuclear reprisal—forms calibrating Israeli retaliatory strikes to speciªc enemy actions— disclosure of such a doctrine could contribute mightily to Israel’s nuclear deterrence posture. In this case, of course, Israel’s doctrinal disclosure would be executed in a broad and nonspeciªc fashion. Without such disclosure, Israel’s prospective enemies would

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