Israel's Nuclear Option: Behind The Scenes Diplomacy Between Dimona And Washington [Paperback]

Zakai Shalom (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 1845190149 | ISBN-13: 978-1845190149 | Publication Date: September 22, 2005

In the early 1950s, Israel secretly launched a project designed to achieve a nuclear option. Initially supported by France, this daring project stood to engineer a dramatic change in Israel's strategic position vis-a-vis its neighboring Arab states and the wider international community. A nuclear program was driven by the firm conviction of David Ben-Gurion that Israel's existence could be guaranteed only with the aid of such a deterrent. The ensuing nuclear defense strategy was upheld by successive Israeli governments. Adamantly opposed to America's request to allow external supervision of its nuclear activity, Israel labored to avert a potentially disastrous rift with its one superpower ally. Israel's Nuclear Option recounts the dialogue and related diplomatic activity that took place during the Kennedy and Johnson administrations and the Ben-Gurion and Eshkol premierships. The intense and often difficult discussions, which pitted Israel's security concerns against the United States' determined goal to stem nuclear proliferation, eventually produced a set of formal and informal strategic understandings regarding Israel's nuclear deterrence.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Zaki Shalom recounts the US -- Israel dialogue on Israel's nuclear project, and delineates the limitations a superpower faces when trying to impose its security agenda on a regional ally. Shalom's book is an important contribution to our understanding of the Israeli nuclear project, and the diplomacy of arms control." -- Prof. Yair Evron, The School of Government and Policy, The Security Studies Program, Tel Aviv University. "In recent years much of the vaunted 'opacity' of Israel's nuclear weapons status has been stripped away by scholars and critics. In this context, Zaki Shalom contributes a thorough, painstakingly documented blow-by-blow account of the diplomatic dimension of the process by which Israel, unbidden, penetrated the nuclear club. Shalom's work is exemplary archival research, refreshingly old-fashioned in its assiduous attention to multiple primary sources, showing the strengths of a documentary focus even on such a 'sensitive' topic. As an established scholar of David Ben-Gurion he is particularly effective in underlining how Ben-Gurion's audacity was key to the decision to push ahead; put simply, there was nothing preordained or certain, in the 1950s and 1960s, about Israel's seemingly quixotic pursuit of nuclear capability." -- Alan Dowty, Kahanoff Chair Professor of Israel Studies, University of Calgary.

About the Author

Zaki Shalom is a senior researcher at the Ben-Gurion Research Center, Ben-Gurion University. His main fields of study are the Arab-Israeli conflict and Israel's defense policy. He has published several books and numerous articles dealing with various aspects of these topics. His previous book, David Ben-Gurion, the State of Israel, and the Arab World, 1949-1956, is also published by Sussex Academic Press.

Product Details

• Paperback: 220 pages
• Publisher: Sussex Academic Pr (September 22, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1845190149
• ISBN-13: 978-1845190149
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 6 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,694,737 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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