The imperatives are plain. Whatever the trajectory of wars in the region, Israel has a law-based obligation to keep Iran non-nuclear. [1] Immediately and incrementally, therefore, Jerusalem will need to ensure “escalation dominance” during periods of competitive risk-taking. This overriding responsibility concerns both Iran’s sub-state proxies (especially Shiite Hezbollah and Sunni Hamas) [2] and Iran directly.
What are the pertinent particulars? Though Iran remains pre-nuclear, there are variously complex scenarios in which Israel could still feel compelled to cross the nuclear conflict threshold. In extremis, this would mean an “asymmetrical nuclear war.” [3]
Israel’s Iran problem lies in the details, in tactical and strategic particulars. At this point, the calculable odds of any Israeli preemption against Iran [4] – a singular act of “anticipatory self-defense” [5] under international law [6] – are plausibly low. [7] While Israel could plan on certain law-based acts of nuclear asset sabotage against Iran (e.g., actions along the lines of Israel’s earlier Stuxnet interventions and its cyber-attacks against Iran’s Natanz reactor enrichment processes), any such piecemeal strategy would be (1) perilously ad hoc; and (2) continuously subject to adversarial intra-war modifications.
Primacy of “Mind” in Israel’s Nuclear Strategy
At the conceptual heart of Israel’s evolving strategic policies are exceedingly complex elements of nuclear deterrence. To wit, Israel should promptly shift from its traditional stance of “deliberate nuclear ambiguity” (the “bomb in the basement”) to “selective nuclear disclosure.” The rationale for this immediate shift would not be to reaffirm the obvious (i.e., that Israel is an operational nuclear power), but to underscore that the Jewish State could respond to enemy provocations (state and sub-state) at all possible points of the armed conflict continuum. In turn, such a critical doctrinal emphasis would be served by a more expressly decipherable “Samson Option,” an option not to “die with the Philistines” (the apocalyptic objective in the biblical Book of Judges), but to enhance strategic dissuasion.
Counterintuitively, one major ingredient of a clarified Samson Option would be to underscore that Israel’s nuclear weapons are not too destructive for actual warfighting. At the same time, Jerusalem should continuously bear in mind that its nuclear ordnance is intended for deterrence ex ante, not revenge ex post. [8] In the time-urgent case of Iran, Israel’s nuclear deterrent could have no plausible use against jihadist proxies such as Hamas, Hezbollah, Houthi or Fatah (Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades), [9] but only against Iran directly.
What about enemy irrationality, both state and terrorist sub-state? For assorted reasons concerning national and international politics, the Islamic regime in Tehran would likely calculate in roughly the same value-maximizing fashion as any other rational state decision-makers in prioritizing national survival. [10] Initially, there was greater reason for Israel to fear Iran as a potential “suicide bomber in macrocosm,” [11] but this fear is no longer the most problematic. [12] Even a fully rational Iranian adversary could become subject to accident, misinformation or miscalculation.
How should Israel plan for law-based existential security amid its current wars? In part, and prospectively most bewildering, Israel will need to make appropriate preparations for long-term co-existence with a nearly-nuclear Iran. Prima facie, Israel will have to continue with its historically-impressive developments in offensive missile technologies and ballistic missile defense (BMD), but there will always be a correlative need and legal expectation for diplomacy. [13]
A specific “lesson” should be drawn from the October 7, 2023 Hamas terror-aggression and resultant Gaza conflict. It is that Israel ought never over-rely on technological superiority. What has been obvious from October 7 onward is that even a technologically inferior sub-state adversary can produce overwhelming Israeli harms. In principle, at least. this core lesson could have been learned at much lower cost if Israeli planners had looked more closely at American military failures in Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan.
Oftentimes, Israeli leaders should be reminded, the past can be prologue, but the future can also be without precedent.
There is more. The precise rudiments of Israeli nuclear deterrence are important to identify. By forcing an Iranian attacker to calculate and recalculate the dense requirements of “assured destruction,” Israeli strategies could make it unrewarding for Tehran to strike first.
Knowing that its capacity to “assuredly destroy” Israel’s nuclear retaliatory forces with a first-strike attack could be blocked by Israeli ballistic missile defenses and trigger unacceptable Israeli retaliations, Iran would likely calculate that any such considered aggression would be irrational. This guardedly optimistic conclusion could be premised on the assumption that Iran’s decisions would be (1) rational or survival-maximizing, and (2) unaffected by accident or decisional-miscalculation.
What if such a relatively promising assumption would not seem warranted? [14] In such perplexing cases, irrationality would not be identical to madness. Unlike a “crazy” or “mad” adversary, one which would have no discernible order of transitive preferences, an irrational Iranian leadership could still maintain a distinct, consistent and sequentially-ordered hierarchy of national objectives.
There would be other relevant particulars. It is reasonable to expect that even an irrational Iranian leadership would hold in unwaveringly “high esteem” its own military officials and institutions. Reasonably, this leadership would remain aptly fearful of Israeli deterrent threats to vulnerable individuals and agencies.
Civilian targets per se would be excluded from any relevant Israeli attack. Such calculated exclusions would not only be in Israel’s overall strategic interests. It would also be necessary to ensure Israeli compliance with the authoritative law of war, that is, with a mandated adherence to binding military rules. [15] Even during the current Gaza War, certain appearances to the contrary, law-based conduct has remained deeply embedded in Israel’s operational planning. [16] Though Israeli bombs have killed or wounded thousands of Palestinian combatants, the legal cause of these harms has been Palestinian” perfidy” or human shields. Unlike Palestinian terrorist actions against Israeli civilians, which are always criminal, Israeli attacks lack mens rea or criminal intent. [17] This widely-overlooked absence is never mere happenstance, It is commanded to every soldier of Israel as Tohar HaNeshek or the “purity of arms.” [18]
Rationality and Irrationality
Iran needn’t be an irrational adversary to represent a lethal danger to Israel. A nuclear or near-nuclear Iran could still be perilous to Israel if its leadership were able to meet all the usual criteria of decisional rationality. Even an Iranian military that had “only” radiation dispersal devices in its arsenal (not a genuine “chain-reaction” nuclear explosive) could create overwhelming crisis situations with Israel. In such unpredictable circumstances (i.e., in extremis atomicum), Israel’s prior decisions concerning “deliberate nuclear ambiguity” [19] and a “Samson Option” [20] could prove determinative.
If Iran were presumed rational in the usual sense of valuing national survival more highly than any other preference or combination of preferences, Jerusalem could consider certain more-or-less plausible benefits of pretended irrationality. Years ago, Israeli General and Defense Minister Moshe Dayan warned prophetically: “Israel must be seen as a mad dog; too dangerous to bother.” In this crude but potentially enlightening metaphor, Dayan acknowledged that it can sometimes be rational for beleaguered states to pretend irrationality.
What if the Iranian adversary were presumed irrational in the sense of not caring most about national survival? In this aberrant but still-conceivable case – one in which Iran resembled the suicide-bomber in macrocosm – there would be no foreseeable deterrence benefit for Israel in pretending irrationality. Moreover, the more probable threat of a massive nuclear counterstrike by Israel would be no more persuasive to Tehran than if Iran’s declared enemy were entirely rational.
And what about “madness?” “Do you know what it means to find yourself face to face with a madman?” inquires Luigi Pirandello’s Henry IV. While this pithy theatrical query could have some residual relevance to Israel’s existential security concerns with Iran, the particular strategic challenges arising from that nuclearizing adversary will more likely come from decision-makers who are rational, not mad. With this clarifying idea in mind, Israel will soon need to fashion a more carefully focused and formal strategic doctrine, one from which aptly nuanced policies and operations could be expertly drawn and reliably shaped.
There is more. This doctrine would identify and correlate all available strategic options (deterrence; preemption; active defense; strategic targeting; nuclear war fighting) with critical national survival goals. It would also take very close account of variously possible interactions between these discrete but sometimes intersecting strategic options. At times, these interactions could be authentically synergistic. Here, by definition, the “whole” effect would be greater than the sum of all relevant “parts.” [21]
Calculating these many-sided interactions will present Israel with a computational task of the highest order. [22] In cases of synergy, it could develop that the anticipated entirety of Iranian-inflicted harms would be greater than the presumed sum of discrete parts. For Israeli decision-makers, recognizing this task as a preeminently scientific or intellectual problem represents a necessary first step to meeting Israel’s survival goals.
In its broadest possible decisional terms, Israel has no real choice. Nuclear strategy is a “game” that sane and rational decision-makers must sometimes “play.” But in order to compete effectively and lawfully, any would-be adversary must first assess (1) the expected rationality of each opponent; and (2) the probable costs and benefits of pretending irrationality.
At best, these issues are daunting, and will not easily yield to interpenetrating and imprecise forms of assessment. They represent challenging but vital judgments that will require accompanying refinements in both intelligence and counter-intelligence. Also needed will be carefully calculated, selectively partial and meticulously fashioned movements away from Israel’s outdated national policy of “deliberate nuclear ambiguity.” [23]
Taking the Bomb out of the “Basement”
For Israel, it is no longer be sensible to keep its “bomb” in the “basement.” [24] Moving quickly toward selected levels of nuclear disclosure would usefully complement any renewed efforts at diplomacy and strategic bargaining. It would be a delicate balance. In the final analysis, the trick would be for Israel to maintain an upper-hand in competitive risk-taking with Iran (i.e., “escalation dominance”), but without incurring unacceptably high risks of catastrophic war. For Israel, such risks could arise even before Iran becomes a nuclear power.
To survive into the future, Israel’s leaders must come to terms with the knowledge that no ad hoc process of interminable Israeli preemptions would keep Iran from achieving operational nuclear status. Today, for Israel, the only sensible option is to prepare for viable long-term nuclear deterrence vis-à-vis Tehran and to base such necessary preparations on capable intellectual processes. [25] To Israel’s considerable benefit, the anti-science Trump Era of contrived US remedies (e.g., the “Abraham Accords”) is over. For the moment, at least, Israel has a not-to-be-forfeited opportunity to undertake still-meaningful strategic initiatives concerning Iran. Any further efforts at preemption, whether incremental (resembling Stuxnet and Natanz hacking) or “all-at-once,” (resembling Operation Opera and Operation Orchard) [26] would be transient and of limited existential utility.
Exploiting Regional Sunni-Shiite Geopolitics
There is more. Originally, the Abraham Accords and related agreements with Sunni Arab states represented “good news” for Israel. [27] In essence, however, these agreements made Israeli security more dependent on newly-designated Sunni “allies” and further antagonized the nuclearizing Shiite regime in Tehran. Net-net, unless one believes that Israel has reason to worry about attack from Bahrain, Morocco or UAE, “Abraham” was silly at best. From a jurisprudential standpoint, the Accords were never more than a shallow public relations effort. Even Trump’s expressly conspicuous US embassy move from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem created no security benefits for Israel.
What about the steadily accelerating resurgence of Palestinian terrorism in Judea and Samaria? In short order, any such resurgence could create its own escalatory momentum, generating not only additional instances of ritualistic terror-violence (terror oriented toward “power over death” or “martyrdom”), but also revitalized drives toward Palestinian statehood. [28] In view of jihadist terror groups’ openly exterminatory orientation to Israel, [29] a law-violating bent that has never wavered, Palestine could quickly become “the last straw,” the one that finally breaks the camel’s back.
There is more. Pakistan, an already nuclear Islamic state existing in a protracted nuclear standoff with India, has expressly tilted toward “usable” theater nuclear weapons (TNW). Since Pakistan announced its test of the 60-kilometer Nasr ballistic missile back in 2011, that country’s emphasis on TNW or tactical nuclear weapons appears intended to most effectively deter a conventional war with India.
By threatening, at least implicitly, to use relatively low-yield battlefield nuclear weapons in retaliation for major Indian conventional attacks, Pakistan seemingly hopes to appear more credible and less provocative to Delhi. Over time, though unintended, this strategy to protect itself from any Indian nuclear strikes (whether expressed as aggressions or reprisals) could elicit various Israeli imitations or replications. For the time being, though it is credible that Israel has rejected any openly “warfighting” [30] or “counterforce” nuclear strategy, it is also likely that such rejection is not yet fully understood by Iran.
“In war,” says Clausewitz, “everything is simple, but the simplest thing is still difficult.” Until today, Israel’s national nuclear doctrine and strategy have formally remained ambiguous. Still, traditional ambiguity was effectively breached at the highest possible level by two of Israel’s former prime ministers, Shimon Peres, on December 22, 1995 and again by Ehud Olmert on December 11, 2006. Peres, speaking to a group of Israeli newspaper and magazine editors, affirmed publicly: “…give me peace, and we’ll give up the atom. That’s the whole story.” When Olmert later offered similarly general but also revelatory remarks, they were widely interpreted as “slips of the tongue.”
Today, the traditional idea of a “bomb in the basement” should be challenged in Jerusalem. Among other things, the central importance of codified military doctrine lies not only in the ways it can animate, unify and optimize national forces, but also in the more-or-less efficient manner it can transmit desired “messages” to enemy states, sub-state enemy proxies (e.g., Hamas or Hezbollah), or state-sub-state enemy “hybrids” (e.g., Iran-Hamas). Understood in terms of Israel’s presumptive nuclear strategy, any continuous across-the-board ambiguity could prove net-injurious to the tiny country’s national security. While possibly counter-intuitive, this is likely because any truly effective deterrence posture could sometimes call for a military doctrine that is at least partially recognizable by adversary states and sub-state insurgent/terrorist group foes.
Moving Beyond Excessive Nuclear Secrecy and “Friction”
There is always more. In any routine military planning, having available options for strategic surprise could prove helpful (if not fully prerequisite) to successful combat operations. But successful deterrence is another matter entirely. In order to persuade would-be adversaries such as Iran not to strike first – in these circumstances a manifestly complex effort of dissuasion – projecting too much secrecy could prove counter-productive.
To be deterred by Israel, a near-nuclear or newly-nuclear Iran would need to believe (1) that at least a critical number of Israel’s retaliatory forces would successfully survive any enemy first-strike, and (2) that these forces could not subsequently be stopped from hitting their pre-designated targets in Iran or elsewhere. Regarding the “presumed survivability” component of any such adversarial belief, continuously reliable sea-basing (submarines) by Israel could provide a critical case in point. [31]
If carefully articulated, expanding nuclear doctrine openness or “selective nuclear disclosure” would represent a rational option for Israel, but only to the extent that Iran were first made aware of Israel’s usable nuclear capabilities. The presumed operational benefits of any such expanding doctrinal openness would accrue from variously deliberate flows of information concerning matters of dispersion, multiplication and hardening of its strategic nuclear weapon systems and certain technical features of these systems. Most important, doctrinally controlled and orderly flows of information could serve to remove any lingering enemy state doubts about Israel’s strategic nuclear force capabilities and also its realistic intentions.
A key problem in purposefully refining Israeli strategic nuclear policy on issues of deliberate ambiguity has to do with what Prussian military thinker Carl von Clausewitz famously called “friction.” No military doctrine can ever fully anticipate the actual pace of combat activity, or, as a corollary, the precise reactions of individual human commanders under fire. It follows that Israel’s nuclear doctrine should be fashioned to combine adequate tactical flexibility with selective doctrinal openness. To understand exactly how such seemingly contradictory objectives could be reconciled in Jerusalem now presents a primary intellectual challenge to Israel’s prime minister and national command authority.
Preventing Inadvertent and Accidental Nuclear War
In the end, Israeli planners must think more systematically about plausible paths to a nuclear war that include risks of an inadvertent or accidental nuclear war. It is entirely possible (even probable) that the risks of any deliberate nuclear war involving Israel would be very small, but that the Jewish State could still be more-or-less vulnerable to such a war occasioned by a mechanical/electrical/computer malfunction/hacking intrusion on one side or another and/or by decisional errors in reasoning (miscalculations).
To properly assess the different but intersecting risks between a deliberate nuclear war and an inadvertent or accidental nuclear war should be regarded in Israel as an absolutely overriding obligation. These risks could exist independently of one another and could be impacted in various ways by post Gaza War alignments. Of special note here are potentially rising anti-Israel roles of Russia, China and North Korea.
There is one more core conceptual distinction that warrants mention at this concluding point of assessment. This distinction references the difference between inadvertent and accidental nuclear war. By definition, any accidental nuclear war would be inadvertent. Conversely, however, an inadvertent nuclear war would not necessarily be accidental.
False warnings, which could be generated by various types of technical malfunction or sparked by third-party hacking/digital mercenary interference, would not be included under the causes of an unintentional or inadvertent nuclear war. Instead, they would represent variously cautionary narratives of an accidental nuclear war.
Potentially most critical among the causes of an inadvertent nuclear war would be errors in calculation by one or both or several sides. The most blatant example would involve misjudgments of enemy intent or enemy capacity that emerge and propagate as a particular crisis escalates. Such consequential misjudgments could stem from an understandably amplified desire by one or several adversarial parties to achieve “escalation dominance.”
Always, in any such projected crisis condition, all rational sides would expectedly strive for escalation dominance without too severely risking total or near-total enemy-inflicted harms. Wherever one or several adversaries would not actually “be rational,” all usual deterrence “bets” would be “off.” Where one or several sides would not be identified as rational by Israel, military planners would then need to input unorthodox sorts of security options, including ones that could derive in whole or in part from now-prevailing war alignments.
Other causes of an inadvertent nuclear war involving Israel could include flawed interpretations of computer-generated nuclear attack warnings; an unequal willingness among adversaries to risk catastrophic war; overconfidence in deterrence and/or defense capabilities on one or several sides (including Israel); adversarial regime changes; outright revolution or coup d’état among adversaries and/or poorly-conceived pre-delegations of nuclear launch authority among foes.
Serious problems of overconfidence could be aggravated by successful tests of a state’s missile defense operations, whether by Israel or by Iran. These problems could also be encouraged by any too-optimistic assessments of alliance guarantees. An example might be an intra-crisis judgment in Jerusalem that Washington stands firmly behind its every move during an ongoing crisis, up to and including certain forms of reprisal that are more reasonably imagined than actual.
Because a prospective nuclear threat from Iran might not be from a “bolt-from-the-blue” attack, but originate instead from a series of interrelated escalations, Israeli nuclear deterrence ought always to be viewed as part of a far wider spectrum of strategic dissuasion. In this connection, Israel’s military planners will have to inquire to what extent nuclear deterrence could be meaningfully persuasive in cases of conventional military or even large-scale (state-supported) terrorist threats. Though the plausibility/credibility of any Israeli threats of nuclear retaliation or counter-retaliation would be greatest where the aggression itself was identifiably nuclear, there could still remain circumstances wherein a massive non-nuclear aggression would warrant a limited Israeli nuclear response. In these improbable but still conceivable circumstances, Israel would need to clarify all such inherently dialectical reasoning “in advance.”
As any such situations would be unprecedented or sui generis, nothing prospectively remedial could be calculated by Israel with any genuine measures of decisional confidence.
Clarifying Summations
In a near worst-case scenario, [32] Israel would soon have to accept a nuclear Iran as fait accompli and plan to suitably blunt any corresponding or correlative security risks via refined deterrence policies. To accomplish this indispensable and law-based objective, Jerusalem/Tel Aviv will first need to back away from its traditional preemption tactics and implement credible deterrence policies vis-à-vis Tehran at all levels of prospective conflict. These levels would range from major terrorist assault to country nuclear attack. Focusing exclusively on more explicitly immediate nuclear threats would ignore a core axiom of contemporary strategic planning: A “bolt-from-the-blue” nuclear attack is not the only way in which Israel could become vulnerable to a catastrophic nuclear war.
Left unreciprocated or unmanaged, even “only” a conventional military attack on Israel (including a major terror attack) could escalate in increments to full-scale atomic conflict. At best, the Trump-era “Abraham Accords” should be considered as altogether minor improvements. At worst, they contributed both to overt Iranian hostility and growing Palestinian fears of insignificance. In the final analysis, Iran will never be deterred from its conspicuously advancing schedule for nuclearization by any contrived coalition of selected Sunni Arab states and Israel.
A last thought dawns. Law-supporting Israeli defense policy requires vigorous antecedent theorizing. Ipso facto, “subjugating” Iran’s potentially nuclear assets “without fighting” (a strategic principle that goes back top Sun-Tzu’s Art of War) represents Israel’s optimal strategic objective, but acquiring any such supremacy must first be recognized as an intellectual task. [33]
For Israel, a rudimentary lesson of its current wars against Iranian surrogates should be that the first battle of any future direct conflict with Iran must be won before any tangible clash of armies. Reduced to its conceptual essence,[34] war represents a primal struggle of mind over mind. Unless Israel can understand that this bitter struggle means much more than maintaining a “qualitative edge,” even an asymmetrical nuclear advantage could ultimately fall short of national survival obligations.
From the complementary standpoint of international justice, leaders of the Jewish State ought never to forget that mind-based nuclear deterrence can be gainfully or indispensably law-enforcing. No other valid conclusion could be drawn about a world legal system that continues to operate as a self-help or “vigilante” system. [35] Inter alia, while functioning within this continuously fractured “state of nature,” Israel’s security posture on Iran will need to conceptualize certain Iranian surrogate forces (especially Hezbollah) as potentially interlocking armies rather than as sub-existential terror-organizations. [36]
Notes
[1] This obligation is rooted in the universal obligation of states to “stay alive” and the complementary obligation to oppose nuclear proliferation by recalcitrant states. Regarding the obligations of national self-protection and survival, we may look to Cicero’s classical declaration in The Laws: “The safety of the people shall always be the highest law.” On corollary matters of citizen obligation, we may consider the classic statement of seventeenth-century Englishman Thomas Hobbes at Chapter XXI of his Leviathan: “The obligation of subjects to the sovereign is understood to last so long, and no longer, then the power lasts by which he is able to protect them.” Parenthetically, one of Israel’s Dolphin-class submarines (acquired from Germany) is the INS (Israeli Navy Submarine) Leviathan.
[2] On the criminality of Hamas under authoritative international law, see, by this author, Louis René Beres: https://www.jurist.org/commentary/2023/10/hamas-terror-attacks-and-international-law/
[3] For assessments of the probable consequences of nuclear war fighting by this author, see: Louis René Beres, Surviving Amid Chaos: Israel’s Nuclear Strategy (Rowman & Littlefield, 2016; 2nd. ed., 2018); Louis René Beres, Apocalypse: Nuclear Catastrophe in World Politics (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1980); Louis René Beres, Mimicking Sisyphus: America’s Countervailing Nuclear Strategy (Lexington MA: Lexington Books, 1983); Louis René Beres, Reason and Realpolitik: US Foreign Policy and World Order (Lexington MA; Lexington Books, 1984); and Louis René Beres, ed., Security or Armageddon: Israel’s Nuclear Strategy (Lexington MA: Lexington Books, 1986).
[4] “Classical” examples of such a defensive first-strike are Israel’s Operation Opera (against Iraq) and Operation Orchard (against Syria).
[5] See, on this issue: Louis René Beres and (Major-General/IDF/Res.) Isaac Ben-Israel, “Think Anticipatory Self-Defense,” The Jerusalem Post, October 22, 2007; Professor Beres and MG Ben-Israel, “The Limits of Deterrence,” Washington Times, November 21, 2007; Professor Beres and MG Ben-Israel, “Deterring Iran,” Washington Times, June 10, 2007; Professor Beres and MG Ben-Israel, “Deterring Iranian Nuclear Attack,” Washington Times, January 27, 2009; and Professor Beres and MG Ben-Israel, “Defending Israel from Iranian Nuclear Attack,” The Jewish Press, March 13, 2013. See also: Louis René Beres and (General/USAF/ret.) John T. Chain, “Could Israel Safely Deter a Nuclear Iran?” The Atlantic, August 9, 2012; Professor Beres and General Chain, “Living with Iran,” BESA Center for Strategic Studies, Israel, May 2014.
[6] The most precise origins of anticipatory self-defense in customary international law lie in The Caroline, an incident that concerned the unsuccessful rebellion of 1837 in Upper Canada against British rule. Following this case, the serious threat of armed attack has generally justified certain appropriately defensive actions. In an exchange of diplomatic notes between the governments of the United States and Great Britain, then U.S. Secretary of State Daniel Webster outlined a framework for self-defense that did not require any prior military attack. Here, the jurisprudential framework permitted a military response to a threat so long as the danger posed was “instant, overwhelming, leaving no choice of means, and no moment for deliberation.” See: Beth M. Polebaum, “National Self-defense in International Law: An Emerging Standard for a Nuclear Age,” 59 N.Y.U.L. Rev. 187, 190-91 (1984) (noting that the Caroline case had transformed the right of self-defense from an excuse for armed intervention into a legal doctrine). Still earlier, see: Hugo Grotius, Of the Causes of War, and First of Self-Defense, and Defense of Our Property, reprinted in 2 Classics of International Law, 168-75 (Carnegie Endowment Trust, 1925) (1625); and Emmerich de Vattel, The Right of Self-Protection and the Effects of the Sovereignty and Independence of Nations, reprinted in 3 Classics of International Law, 130 (Carnegie Endowment Trust, 1916) (1758). Also, Samuel Pufendorf, The Two Books on the Duty of Man and Citizen According to Natural Law, 32 (Frank Gardner Moore., tr., 1927 (1682).
[7] From the standpoint of international law, it is always necessary to distinguish preemptive attacks from “preventive ones.” Preemption is a military strategy of striking an enemy first, in the expectation that the only alternative is to be struck first oneself. A preemptive attack is launched by a state that believes enemy forces are about to attack. A preventive attack, however, is launched not out of genuine concern about “imminent” hostilities, but for fear of a longer-term deterioration in a pertinent military balance. In a preemptive attack, the length of time by which the enemy’s action is anticipated is very short, while in a preventive strike the interval is considerably longer.
[8] This was a core conclusion of this author’s “Project Daniel” Final Report in 2004 (first prepared as a confidential report to then PM Ariel Sharon).
[9] The terror Brigades are led by PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, and are less directed by Iran per se.
[10] Says Karl Jaspers in Reason and Existence (1935): “The rational is not thinkable without its other, the non-rational, and it never appears in reality without it. The only question is, in what form the other appears, how it remains in spite of all, and how it is grasped.”
[11] See, for example, Louis René Beres, “Religious Extremism and International Legal Norms: Perfidy, Preemption and Irrationality,” Case Western Reserve Journal of International Law, Vol. 39, No. 3., 2007-2008.
[12] Expressions of decisional irrationality could take different and sometimes overlapping forms. These include a disorderly or inconsistent value system; computational errors in calculation; an incapacity to communicate efficiently; random or haphazard influences in the making or transmittal of particular decisions; and the internal dissonance generated by any structure of collective decision-making (i.e., assemblies of pertinent individuals who lack identical value systems and/or whose organizational arrangements impact their willing capacity to act as a single or unitary national decision maker).
[13] This legal assumption of solidarity between states in their presumptively common struggle against aggression and terrorism is also already mentioned in Justinian, Corpus Juris Civilis (533 C.E.); Hugo Grotius, 2 De Jure Belli Ac Pacis Libri Tres, Ch. 20 (Francis W. Kesey, tr., Clarendon Press, 1925) (1690).
[14] On pertinent background issues of rational vs. irrational adversaries, consider Oswald Spengler: “`I believe,'” says the author of The Decline of the West, “is the great word against metaphysical fear, and at the same time it is an avowal of love.'”
[15] Crimes of War concern (1) laws on weapons; (2) laws on warfare; and (3) humanitarian rules. Codified primarily at The Hague and Geneva Conventions, and known thereby as the Law of Hague and the Law of Geneva, these rules seek, inter alia, to bring discrimination, proportionality and military necessity into belligerent calculations. On the main corpus of jus in bello, see: Convention No. IV, Respecting the Laws and Customs of War on Land, With Annex of Regulations, Oct. 18, 1907, 36 Stat. 2277, T.S. No. 539, 1 Bevans 631 (known commonly as the “Hague Regulations”); Convention for the Amelioration of the Condition of the Wounded and Sick in Armed Forces in the Field, Aug. 12, 1949, 6 U.S.T. 3114, T.I.A.S. No. 3362, 75 U.N.T.S. 85; Convention Relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War, Aug. 12, 1949, 6 U.S.T. 3316, T.I.A.S. No. 3364, 75 U.N.T.S. 135; Convention Relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War, Aug. 12, 1949, 6 U.S.T. 3516, T.I.A.S. No. 3365, 75 U.N.T.S. 287.
[16] Among other things, this means conduct covered by peremptory Nuremberg Principles. See AGREEMENT FOR THE PROSECUTION AND PUNISHMENT OF THE MAJOR WAR CRIMINALS OF THE EUROPEAN AXIS POWERS AND CHARTER OF THE INTERNATIONAL MILITARY TRIBUNAL. Done at London, August 8, 1945. Entered into force, August 8, 1945. For the United States, Sept. 10, 1945. 59 Stat. 1544, 82 U.N.T.S. 279. The principles of international law recognized by the Charter of the Nuremberg Tribunal and the judgment of the Tribunal were affirmed by the U.N. General Assembly as AFFIRMATION OF THE PRINCIPLES OF INTERNATIONAL LAW RECOGNIZED BY THE CHARTER OF THE NUREMBERG TRIBUNAL. Adopted by the U.N. General Assembly, Dec. 11, 1946. U.N.G.A. Res. 95 (I), U.N. Doc. A/236 (1946), at 1144. This AFFIRMATION OF THE PRINCIPLES OF INTERNATIONAL LAW RECOGNIZED BY THE CHARTER OF THE NUREMBERG TRIBUNAL (1946) was followed by General Assembly Resolution 177 (II), adopted November 21, 1947, directing the U.N. International Law Commission to “(a) Formulate the principles of international law recognized in the Charter of the Nuremberg Tribunal and in the judgment of the Tribunal, and (b) Prepare a draft code of offenses against the peace and security of mankind….” (See U.N. Doc. A/519, p. 112). The principles formulated are known as the PRINCIPLES OF INTERNATIONAL LAW RECOGNIZED IN THE CHARTER AND JUDGMENT OF THE NUREMBERG TRIBUNAL. Report of the International Law Commission, 2nd session, 1950, U.N. G.A.O.R. 5th session, Supp. No. 12, A/1316, p. 11
[17] See by this writer, Professor Louis René Beres at BESA (Israel): https://besacenter.org/the-gaza-war-and-international-law-an-informed-assessment/
[18] The absence of mens rea on the part of Israel also signifies Israeli compliance with rules of “military necessity.” The principle of “military necessity” has been defined authoritatively as follows: “Only that degree and kind of force, not otherwise prohibited by the law of armed conflict, required for the partial or complete submission of the enemy with a minimum expenditure of time, life, and physical resources may be applied.” See: United States, Department of the Navy, jointly with Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps; and Department of Transportation, U.S. Coast Guard, The Commander’s Handbook on the Law of Naval Operations, NWP 1-14M, Norfolk, Virginia, October 1995, p. 5-1. Reprinted in Adam Roberts and Richard Guelff, Documents on the Laws of War, Third Edition, Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2000, p. 10. The term “military necessity” is discoverable, inter alia, in the 1946 Judgment of the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg, Extracts on Crimes Against International Law, referring to Art. 6(b) of the London Charter, August 8, 1945: “War crimes: namely, violations of the laws or customs of war. Such violations shall include, but not be limited to, murder, ill-treatment, or deportation to slave labor, or for any other purpose of civilian populations, of or in occupied territory, murder of hostages, plunder of public or private property, wanton destruction of cities, towns, or villages, or devastation not justified by military necessity.” See: Roberts and Guelff, supra., p. 177. Text reprinted from Trial of the Major War Criminals Before the International Military Tribunal, Nuremberg, Vol. XXII, IMT, Secretariat, Nuremberg, 1948, pp. 413-14, and 497.
[19] See by this writer, Louis René Beres, at JURIST: https://www.jurist.org/commentary/2023/10/israels-strategic-doctrine-nuclear-ambiguity-and-iran-backed-terror/
[20] See by this writer, at Modern War Institute (West Point): Professor Louis René Beres, https://mwi.westpoint.edu/israel-samson-option-interconnected-world/
[21]See, by this writer, at Harvard National Security Journal, Harvard Law School: Louis René Beres, https://harvardnsj.org/2014/06/staying-strong-enhancing-israels-essential-strategic-options-2/
[22] For this writer’s most comprehensive assessment of these complex issues, see: Louis René Beres, Surviving Amid Chaos: Israel’s Nuclear Strategy (New York and London: Rowman & Littlefield, 2016), 167 pp (2nd ed., 2018). https://www.amazon.com/Surviving-Amid-Chaos-Strategy-Destruction/dp/1442253258 See also: https://www.israeldefense.co.il/en/content/surviving-amid-chaos-israels-nuclear-strategy
[23] The actual security benefits to Israel of any explicit reductions in nuclear secrecy would remain dependent, more or less, upon Clausewitzian “friction.” This refers to the inherently unpredictable effects of errors in knowledge and information concerning intra-Israel (IDF/MOD) strategic uncertainties; on Israeli and Iranian under-estimations or over-estimations of relative power position; and on the unalterably vast and largely irremediable differences between theories of deterrence, and enemy intent “as it actually is.” See: Carl von Clausewitz, “Uber das Leben und den Charakter von Scharnhorst,” Historisch-politische Zeitschrift, 1 (1832); cited in Barry D. Watts, Clausewitzian Friction and Future War, McNair Paper No. 52, October, 1996, Institute for National Strategic Studies, National Defense University Washington, D.C. p. 9.
[24] On identifying alternative nuclear disclosure options, see: Louis René Beres, “Israel’s Strategic Doctrine: Updating Intelligence Community Responsibilities,” International Journal of Intelligence and Counterintelligence, Vol. 28, No. 1, 2015, pp. 1-16.
[25] For earliest published writings by Professor Beres on the Iranian nuclear threat, see: Louis René Beres, “Israel, Force, and International Law: Assessing Anticipatory Self-Defense,” The Jerusalem Journal of International Relations, Vol. 13, No. 2., June 1991, pp. 1-14; Louis René Beres, “After the Gulf War: Israel, `Palestine,’ and the Risk of Nuclear War in the Middle East,” Strategic Review, Vol. XIX, No. 4., Fall 1991, pp, 48-55; Louis René Beres, “Israel, Iran and Prospects for Nuclear War in the Middle East,” Strategic Review, Vol. XXI, No.2., Spring 1993, pp. 52-60; Louis René Beres, “Israel, Iran and Nuclear War: A Tactical and Legal Assessment,” Jerusalem Letter, Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Jerusalem, Israel, November 1993, pp. 1-7; Louis René Beres, “North Korea Today, Iran Tomorrow,” Midstream, June/July 1994, pp. 5-7, co-authored with COL. (IDF/res.) Yoash Tsiddon-Chatto (former Chief of Planning, Israel Air Force); Louis René Beres, “The Security and Future of Israel: An Exchange,” Midstream, Vol. XXXXI, No. 5., June/July 1995, pp. 15-23, a debate between Professor Beres and Maj. General (IDF/res.) Shlomo Gazit, a former Chief of IDF Intelligence Branch (Aman) and later, military advisor to Prime Minister Shimon Peres; Louis René Beres, “Israel, Iran and Nuclear War: A Jurisprudential Assessment,” UCLA Journal of International Law and Foreign Affairs, Spring 1996, Vol. 1., No. 1, pp. 65-97; Louis René Beres, “Israel, Iran and Preemption: Choosing the Least Unattractive Option Under International Law,” Dickinson Journal of International Law, Vol. 14, No. 2., Winter 1996, pp. 187-206; Louis René Beres, “The Iranian Threat to Israel: Capabilities and Intentions,” International Journal of Intelligence and Counterintelligence, Vol. 9., No. 1., Spring 1996, pp. 51-62; Louis René Beres, “The Iranian Threat to Israel,” Midstream, Vol. 44, No. 6., September/October 1998, pp. 8-11; Louis René Beres, “Security Threats and Effective Remedies: Israel’s Strategic, Tactical and Legal Options: A Comprehensive Master Plan for the Jewish State in the Third Millennium,” The Ariel Center for Policy Research (Israel), ACPR Policy Paper No. 102, April 2000, 110 pp; Louis René Beres, “Iran’s Growing Threat to Israel,” Midstream, Vol. XXXXVI, No. 7, November 2000, pp. 2-4; and Louis René Beres, “Israel and the Bomb,” a Dialogue with Professor Zeev Maoz, International Security (Harvard University), Vol. 29, No.1., Summer 2004, pp. 1-4.
[26] See https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/operation-opera-raid-on-iraqi-nuclear-reactor; and see also: Menachem Begin Heritage Center, Israel’s Strike Against the Iraqi Nuclear Reactor 7 June 1981, a collection of original articles and lectures by Yitzhak Shamir, Rafael Eitan, David Ivri, Yaakov Amidror, Yuval Ne’eman, Yoash Tsiddon-Chatto, and Louis René Beres. Also: Louis René Beres and COL. (IDF/ret.) Yoash Tsiddon-Chatto, “Reconsidering Israel’s Destruction of Iraq’s Osiraq Nuclear Reactor,” 9 Temple International and Comparative Law Journal, 437 (1995).
[27] See https://www.state.gov/the-abraham-accords/ These agreements refer only to relations between Israel and Bahrain and Israel and UAE. Also to be considered as complementary here is the Israel-Sudan Normalization Agreement (October 23, 2020) and Israel-Morocco Normalization Agreement (December 10, 2020).
[28] Any insistence that a Palestinian state remain “demilitarized” is not “merely” unrealistic. It is also potentially inconsistent with pertinent international law. On this point, see: Louis René Beres and (Ambassador) Zalman Shoval, “Why a Demilitarized Palestinian State Would Not Remain Demilitarized: A View Under International Law,” Temple International and Comparative Law Journal, Winter, 1998, pp. 347-363. See also, by Professor Beres and AMB. Shoval, at West Point (US Department of Defense): https://mwi.usma.edu/creating-seamless-strategic-deterrent-israel-case-study/ Zalman Shoval was two-times Ambassador of Israel to the United States.
[29] In law, nuclear war and genocide need not be considered as mutually exclusive. War might well be the means whereby genocide is undertaken. According to Articles II and III of the Genocide Convention, which entered into force on January 12, 1951, genocide includes any of several listed acts “committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group as such….” See Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide Done at New York, Dec. 9, 1948. Entered into force, Jan. 12, 1951. 78 U.N.T.S. 277.
[30] Variously conspicuous preparations for nuclear war fighting could be conceived not as a distinct alternative to nuclear deterrence, but as an essential or integral component of law-based nuclear deterrence. Earlier, strategist Colin Gray, reasoning about U.S.-Soviet nuclear relations, argued a vital connection exists between “likely net prowess in war and the quality of pre-war deterrent effect.” (See: Colin Gray, National Style in Strategy: The American Example,” INTERNATIONAL SECURITY, 6, No. 2, fall 1981, p. 35.) Elsewhere, in a published debate with this writer, Gray said essentially the same thing: “Fortunately, there is every reason to believe that probable high proficiency in war-waging yields optimum deterrent effect.” (See Gray, “Presidential Directive 59: Flawed but Useful,” PARAMETERS, 11, No. 1, March 1981, p. 34. Gray was responding directly to Professor Louis René Beres, “Presidential Directive 59: A Critical Assessment,” PARAMETERS, March 1981, pp. 19 – 28.).
[31] See, on such basing imperatives: Louis René Beres and Admiral (USN/ret.) Leon “Bud” Edney, “Israel’s Nuclear Strategy: A Larger Role for Submarine Basing,” The Jerusalem Post, August 17, 2014; and Professor Beres and Admiral Edney, “A Sea-Based Nuclear Deterrent for Israel,” Washington Times, September 5, 2014. Admiral Edney served as SACLANT, NATO Supreme Allied Commander, Atlantic.
[32] The worst case, prima facie, would be an actual nuclear war with Iran.
[33] In the 17th century, French philosopher Blaise Pascal remarked prophetically (Pensées): “All our dignity consists in thought…. It is upon this that we must depend…Let us labor then to think well: this is the foundation of morality.” Similar reasoning characterizes the writings of Baruch Spinoza, Pascal’s 17th-century contemporary. In Book II of his Ethics Spinoza considers the human mind, or the intellectual attributes, and – drawing further from Descartes – strives to define an essential theory of learning and knowledge.
[34] See, accordingly, F.E. Adcock, The Greek and Macedonian Art of War (1962).
[35] Recall in this connection the view of 17th century English political philosopher Thomas Hobbes; that in the international “state of nature” (a condition of anarchy) there can be neither justice nor law (Leviathan).
[36] See Brig. Gen (res.) Eran Ortal, https://besacenter.org/hezbollah-must-be-fought-like-a-state-army-not-like-a-terrorist-organization/ (BESA/Israel/September 26, 2024).
Louis René Beres is Emeritus Professor of Political Science and International Law at Purdue. He is the author of many books and articles dealing with nuclear strategy and nuclear war, including Surviving Amid Chaos: Israel’s Nuclear Strategy (Rowman & Littlefield, 2016) https://paw.princeton.edu/new-books/surviving-amid-chaos-israel%E2%80%99s-nuclear-strategy; Apocalypse: Nuclear Catastrophe in World Politics (The University of Chicago Press, 1980); Mimicking Sisyphus: America’s Countervailing Nuclear Strategy (D.C. Heath/Lexington, 1983); Security or Armageddon: Israel’s Nuclear Strategy (D.C. Heath/Lexington, 1986); and Terrorism and Global Security: The Nuclear Threat (Westview, 1987). In the United States, he often publishes in the Department of Defense Journals Parameters: The Journal of the U.S. Army War College, Special Warfare; The War Room; and Modern War Institute (West Point). In Israel, he was Chair of Project Daniel (PM Sharon, 2003). http://www.acpr.org.il/ENGLISH-NATIV/03-ISSUE/daniel-3.htm. Professor Beres has contributed to the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists; Yale Global; Oxford University Press Yearbook of International Law; Harvard National Security Journal (Harvard Law School); International Security (Harvard); World Politics (Princeton); Horasis (Zurich); JURIST; Military Strategy Magazine; The Strategy Bridge; Modern Diplomacy; Air-Space Operations Review (USAF); The American Political Science Review; The Daily Princetonian; The Atlantic; The New York Times; BESA Perspectives; INSS (Tel-Aviv); and International Journal of Intelligence and Counterintelligence. He was born in Zürich on August 31, 1945.
