By John Mearsheimer
(source: AntiWar.com)
Transcript of John J. Mearsheimer’s remarks at the IRmep conference at the International Spy Museum "Israel’s Nuclear Arsenal: Espionage, Opacity and Future" Washington, DC, 7/7/2010
What I want to do is ask four questions, and then answer them.
The first is, "why did Israel develop nuclear weapons to begin within the 1950s and 1960s?" Second, "does it make sense today for Israel to have a nuclear deterrent?" Third, "does opacity make good strategic sense for Israel?" "Does it matter for the United States?" And four, "is it in America’s interest for Israel to have nuclear weapons?"
Those are the four questions I want to answer.
You want to remember, when I answer those first two questions about why Israel developed nuclear weapons I’m going to approach it from Israel’s point of view. This will become clear as I go along, but Israel and the United States are separate countries. And sometimes what’s good for Israel is not good for the United States.
On the question of Israel and nuclear weapons, let me start with a general point. The reason that states want nuclear weapons in almost all cases is because they are the ultimate deterrent. They make it almost impossible for an adversary or an opponent to attack your homeland and threaten the survival of your state for the obvious reason that if you have nuclear weapons and your survival is at risk, that’s one clear circumstance under which you’re likely to use those nuclear weapons. Many people now argue, here in Washington especially, that nuclear weapons have offensive capability, and if Iran were to get nuclear weapons it could use those weapons to dominate the Gulf and establish hegemony in the region.
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