Israels Nuclear Option Behind the Scenes Diplomacy Between Dimona & Washington

by Shalom, Zaki

• ISBN13: 9781845190132
• ISBN10: 1845190130
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2005-04-01
• Publisher: Liverpool University Press

Summary

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-à-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. [Also available in paperback (ISBN 1845190149), priced £16.95]

Author Biography

Zaki Shalom is a senior researcher at the Ben-Gurion Research Institute, Ben-Gurion University.

Table of Contents

Historical background	p. 1
The Kennedy administration's "low profile" policy	p. 11
The volte-face in American policy	p. 33
The Eshkol-Kennedy dialogue	p. 46
Launching a dialogue with the Johnson administration	p. 69
The enhanced US-Israel chemistry	p. 80
The road to the American-Israeli memorandum of understandings	p. 98
The monitoring dispute	p. 120
The challenge of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty	p. 147
Israel's nuclear option : an assessment	p. 168
Postscript : Israel's current nuclear policy	p. 174
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