Shopping For The Bomb in the Basement: How Israel Went Nuclear and What That Means for the World Discounts - Bargain The Bomb in the Basement: How Israel Went Nuclear and What That Means for the World

Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 956
Format: Bargain Price
Label: Simon & Schuster
Manufacturer: Simon & Schuster
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 416
Publication Date: January 09, 2007
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Studio: Simon & Schuster

Alternate Versions: Click to Display

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Books > Specialty Stores > Custom Stores > Bargain Books > History > General
Books > Subjects > History > Middle East > Israel
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Editorial Review:

Product Description:
As Iran continues to develop its nuclear program and explicitly denounces Israel, Michael Karpin's The Bomb in the Basement provides important context for the ongoing tensions in the Middle East.

After Israel won its war of independence in 1948, founding prime minister David Ben-Gurion realized that his country faced the possibility of having to fight Arab nations again in the future. He embraced the idea of developing a nuclear capability and put a young lieutenant, Shimon Peres, in charge of the project. This was the beginning of Israel's quest for nuclear capability, a project that could not have happened without the cooperation of the French. In The Bomb in the Basement, journalist Michael Karpin gives us the most complete account of how Israel became the Middle East's only nuclear power and how its status as an officially unacknowledged nuclear nation affects the politics of that volatile region.

Karpin's research includes exclusive interviews that provide new insights into the key figures behind the program (notably a harsh rivalry between Peres and Isser Harel, the first head of Mossad). He explains how different U.S. administrations have dealt with Israel's nuclear status, from Eisenhower's disapproval to Johnson's open support. And he shows how the key to Israel's nuclear capability has been its policy of "nuclear ambiguity."

A compelling account of a complicated history, The Bomb in the Basement raises provocative questions about how Israel's nuclear arsenal may affect not only its own future, but the future of the entire Middle East.

Customer Reviews

Average Rating: out of 5 stars

Rating:

- lots of juicy tidbits here
This is a terrific book. It's a bit gossipy, which makes it extra entertaining. Example: Golda Meir's breakdown during the Y-K war; the general contempt for Shimon Peres; how both Truman and Kennedy acknowledged that they owed their election to the Lobby; how Rabin got his Phantoms out of LBJ; Teller's assistance with the project. There is a great deal of information about the French connection, pre-de-Gaulle. And it is of course not just about the development of the device, but about the creation ... Read More

Rating:

- An extremely interesting story which is very well told
The first that the author clarifies is that the book has been heavily cencored by the Israeli military, thus do not expect to find in it startling revelations about Israel's nuclear program. What you will find though is a very good account of the whole effort and its protagonists, from 1948 to the present (albeit the story somehow stops in the `80s). The reader will find also many similarities between the Israelis' efforts to conceal their project and the Iranians' efforts today and will come to the ... Read More

Rating:

- Too Long - Should Only Have Been a Magazine Article!
France decided to get the bomb as a means of retaining its status as a world power and to free itself from American patronage. Since the 1940s the U.S., Canada, and Britain had excluded France from nuclear secrets, mainly due to fear that communists in French nuclear research programs would pass information to the Soviets.

France also went on to play the key role in moving Israel to nuclear weapons capability. France's support began with a commonality of interests - both were being confronted ... Read More

Rating:

- A Great History of Israel's Nuclear Program
"The Bomb in the Basement" is a superbly written history of Israel's nuclear program. It documents it from the earliest stages during the pre-state period all the way till the Yom Kippur War. There is also a small chapter on how Israel might deal with an Iranian bomb. Before reading this book, I was not aware at how involved Ben-Gurion was in Israel's quest for nuclear weapons. This book also details how US policy helped Israel get the bomb, and contains many fascinating insights into US-Israeli relations ... Read More

Rating:

- Great Review of Modern Israel History and Even Handed
I was fascinated by this book. It provides a great review for the history of Israel, from the perspective of developing nuclear capability, and pretty good political analysis. I learned a lot of things I had previously been unaware of including why Lyndon Johnson was so attached to Israel, and how Anwar Sadat planned the last war Egypt fought against Israel. The insights I gained into Egypt were by themselves worth the book. I finished the book with lots of admiration for Sadat. The book also discussed Egypt's ... Read More

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