Surviving Amid Chaos: Israel's Nuclear Strategy (Weapons of Mass Destruction)Apr 4, 2016 by Louis René Beres. Hardcover.Rowman & Littlefield Publishers In his new book, Prof. Louis René Beres delves into the complexities of one of the most heated issues in the Middle East and all world politics. As he examines the current nuclear doctrine of the Jewish state, he also suggests that a suitably revised doctrine is in order

Surviving Amid Chaos: Israel's Nuclear Strategy (Weapons of Mass Destruction)Apr 4, 2016

by Louis René Beres. Hardcover.Rowman & Littlefield Publishers

In his new book, Prof. Louis René Beres delves into the complexities of one of the most heated issues in the Middle East and all world politics. As he examines the current nuclear doctrine of the Jewish state, he also suggests that a suitably revised doctrine is in order





This timely and original scholarly book critically examines Israel's rapidly evolving nuclear strategy, a subject with which the author has been authoritatively acquainted for many years. Now facing an unprecedented configuration of existential threats, and, as corollary, a potentially deteriorating "correlation of forces," Israel's leaders must consider such urgent and overlapping survival issues asdeliberate nuclear ambiguity (the "bomb in the basement"); regional nuclear proliferation; Jihadist terror-group intersections with enemy states;rationality or irrationality of state and sub-state adversaries; assassination or "targeted killing;"preemption; and probable effects of "Cold War II" between Russia and the United States. As Professor Beres' new book will explain, these issues underscore the overarching complexity of critical strategic interactions in the Middle East, including more-or-less plausible synergies between Israel's chosen strategic policies, and also the expected reactions of its multiple and often "hybrid" enemies.

Throughout, the author's examination of these issues expressly references pertinent considerations of international law, especially humanitarian international law (the law of armed conflict); terrorist extradition and prosecution; and anticipatory self-defense. Surviving Amid Chaos, therefore, is a book that presents an altogether original synthesis of strategic and jurisprudential factors regarding Israel's nuclear strategy

In the final analysis, as this new book argues convincingly, Israel's nuclear strategy must spring from antecedent nuclear doctrine. What should be the core components of such a doctrine? How has this doctrine actually evolved, from the early days of Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion, to the present moment? What should be the core components of doctrine going forward? To what extent, if any, should these components be made explicit or recognizable? To what extent, if any, should Israel's strategic nuclear doctrine be fashioned on the assumption that there will be endlessly "shifting sands" of friends and foes in the region? To what extent, if any, should Jerusalem construct this doctrine with a view to sharing certain conceptual and operational details with Washington?

Surviving Amid Chaos addresses these distinctly nuanced and interrelated questions.

Israel's emerging strategic nuclear doctrine, we may learn from this book, can never be based upon singular threats. Always, this doctrine must always emerge from a suitably comprehensive consideration of all ascertainable security hazards, a consideration that looks at each particular threat from the much broader and more coherent perspective of vital "correlations" between them. An example would be the Iranian nuclear threat, which is examined here together with the prospect of a Palestinian state. Also discussed by Professor Beres is the role of certain relatively intangible components of enemy force correlations, especially Jihadist belief systems that promise immortality to "martyrs." Here, in the context of examining Israel's nuclear strategy, Surviving Amid Chaos considers a long-neglected source of correlative power in world politics – that is power over death.

Professor Beres' book also looks factually and precisely at different scenarios of regional nuclear proliferation, and at Israel's corresponding obligations and opportunities. Will a newly nuclear Shiite Iran spawn additional nuclear aspirants in Sunni Egypt and/or Saudi Arabia? If so, what would this suggest about possible sub-state nuclear proliferation hazards, to both Shiite (e.g., Hezbollah) and Sunni (e.g., ISIS) terrorist organizations? Should Israel plan to deal with these multiple and intersecting threats with more frequent and more devastating "self-help" resorts to preemption (including assassination and "regime targeting"), or instead by fashioning long-term strategies of deterrence? Moreover, the book inquires, is there a forseeably productive role here for the United Nations and world diplomacy, or do persistently "Westphalian" international relations render moot any such expanded collective security role?

Most importantly, perhaps, Surviving Amid Chaos focuses especially upon the question of "deliberate ambiguity," or the "bomb in the basement." Looking ahead, should Israel's strategy favor a shift to certain potentially useful forms of "disclosure," or should Jerusalem continue with its historic position of "no comment?" As the Chair of Project Daniel (PM Sharon, 2003), and as the editor of Security or Armageddon; Israel's Nuclear Strategy (Lexington Books, 1986) – one of the very first books to consider this question – Professor Beres looks intensely and authoritatively at these particular issues. Among other things, his book will explain why the best argument for ending deliberate nuclear ambiguity has nothing to do with simply re-stating the obvious, but rather with the deterrence-enhancing advantages of undertaking certain limited and incremental disclosures. Iran and other centers of future nuclear threat could be more durably deterred by Israel's nuclear strategy if that strategy suitably expressed the usability, survivability, and penetration-capability of Israel's indispensable nuclear forces.