Arms Control and Strategic Stability in the Middle East and Europe

Contents
Preface
Part I: Following the JCPOA
Iran’s Road to Deliverable Nuclear Weapons / Ephraim Asculai
JCPOA Provisions for Access to SIran’s Road to Deliverable Nuclear Weaponsuspect Sites: The IAEA, Iran, and P5+1 Risks / Owen Alterman
From Oil to Nuclear Energy? The Development of Civilian Nuclear Programs in the Middle East / Yoel Guzansky and Gallia Lindenstrauss
Part II: NATO and Missile Defense
NATO's Nuclear Deterrence in the Post-Ukraine Era / Azriel Bermant
Unwilling to Succeed: The Czech Position on US Missile Defense – Between Strategy and Public Political Debate / Irena Kalhousová
Part III: Israel’s Strategic Dilemmas
Israeli Deterrence in the 21st Century / Avner Golov
Israel and Strategic Stability in the Middle East / Shlomo Brom
From Nuclear Disarmament to “Strategic Stability”: Implications for Israel of an Emerging Global Debate / Emily B. Landau
Contributors

Preface

This collection of articles on nuclear proliferation, deterrence, arms control,and national security is the outgrowth of a multi-year project at the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS) under the auspices of the INSS Arms Control and Regional Security Program. It is the third and final volume in a series of edited volumes that with the support of a generous grant from the Hewlett Foundation further our goal to encourage researchers to develop expertise in the realm of arms control. The changing global landscape, with new strategic challenges emerging at both the international and regional levels, makes it imperative for analysts and strategists to sharpen thinking on a host of new dilemmas relating to the control of nuclear weapons. These dilemmas include the need to rein in determined and dangerous proliferators, as well as to bolster national security and maintain manageable deterrent relationships where nuclear weapons continue to exist.

The first theme addressed by the articles compiled here is the ongoing challenge of Iran’s nuclear program and activity, which continues despite the deal concluded in the summer of 2015. The terms of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) raise some difficult issues for arms control practice and analysis. The deal has created some new standards, which pose questions about its relationship to the NPT. Moreover, it sets precedents both for inspecting Iran in the future and for other non-nuclear weapons state members of the treaty. Against this background, Ephraim Asculai examines the thorny issue of Iran’s missile program – one critical component of a working nuclear weapons capability that was left outside the negotiations with Iran, and is not covered by the deal – and Owen Alterman tackles the issue of inspections at suspect sites in Iran in the coming years. Yoel Guzansky and Gallia Lindenstrauss assess civilian nuclear programs in the Middle East emerging in this new atmosphere.

The articles by Azriel Bermant and Irena Kalhousová move the discussion to the international arena, with the former focusing on the challenges that NATO faces in conducting an effective nuclear deterrence strategy that balances the need to respond to new Russian challenges against the desire to avoid unintended escalation. The article that follows zeroes in on the strategic and political dilemmas that arise for one state – the Czech Republic – when considering US missile defense plans.

In the final group of articles, Avner Golov examines dilemmas that Israel faces in the realm of deterrence in the new millennium, and Shlomo Brom and Emily Landau both assess the notion of strategic stability in a Middle East context. Brom focuses on state interests and relations in the region, while Landau assesses the implications for Israel of the global debate on nuclear matters that has shifted over the past decade from nuclear disarmament discourse to policies that increasingly reflect a perceived need to maintain nuclear deterrence and strategic stability. Previous versions of these latter two articles were first posted on a closed website managed by the Program on Strategic Stability Evaluation (POSSE) in July 2014, and we are pleased to acknowledge the generous support of POSSE, sponsored by the Carnegie Corporation of New York.

As in the other volumes in this series, the authors represented in this collection are a diverse group that both individually and together make new and important contributions to arms control research in Israel. Departing from the previous volumes in the series, however, this collection includes three articles by seasoned arms control experts alongside essays by younger researchers, to reflect the nature of the work on arms control at INSS, which proceeds individually and as part of the collective contribution to the field.