Foreign News and Analysis Since April 2005 -- formerly China Confidential -- for America and Israel and their friends abroadForeign Confidential ™
Friday, September 16, 2011
French Muslims Defy Outdoor Prayer Ban
ISI May Have Helped Taliban Attack US Embassy
Pyongyang Poison Plot Foiled
From Jerusalem with Love: B-Boys for Torah
Understanding Israel's Nuclear Doctrine
Thursday, September 15, 2011
Iran the Film, a Suppressed Masterpiece
Saturday, 17 September 2011
Red Lines and the Ultimate Security Guarantor
Israel's nuclear doctrine is shaped by its lack of strategic depth: a subsonic fighter jet could cross the 72 kilometres (39 nmi) from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea in just four minutes. It additionally relies on a reservist-based military which magnifies civilian and military losses in its small population. Israel tries to compensate for these weaknesses by emphasising intelligence, maneuverability and firepower.
As a result, Israel's strategy is based on the premise that it cannot afford to lose a single war, and thus must prevent them by maintaining deterrence, including the option of preemption. If these steps are insufficient, it seeks to prevent escalation and determine a quick and decisive war outside of its borders.
Strategically, Israel's long-range missiles, nuclear capable aircraft, and possibly its submarines present an effective second strike deterrence against unconventional and conventional attack, and if Israel's defences fail and its population centres be threatened, the Samson Option, an all out attack against an adversary, would be employed. Its nuclear arsenal can also be used tactically.
Although nuclear weapons are viewed as the ultimate guarantor of Israeli security, the country has avoided building its military around them, instead pursuing absolute conventional superiority so as to forestall a last resort nuclear engagement.
According to historian Avner Cohen, Israel first articulated an official policy on the use of nuclear weapons in 1966, which revolved around four "red lines" that could lead to a nuclear response:
Source: Wikipedia
INTRODUCTION TO THE VIDEO SHOWN BELOW: There was a time, before the Carter administration-assisted Islamic Revolution, when Iran was an American ally led by a modernizing monarch, Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi.
The legendary Claude Lelouch made this little-known, 1971 film as a gift to the Shah's wife, Empress Farah. The film, simply titled Iran, won six international awards shortly after its release.
Iran consists of spectacular geographical and archaeological footage interspersed with slice-of-life shots, exhibiting some of the best juxtapositional editing ever accomplished in the history of motion pictures.
Iran is a politically suppressed masterpiece--an example of hidden cinema--from the director of A Man and a Woman, Happy New Year, and And Now My Love. Lelouch shot a staggering six miles of footage to make Iran--a visual poem that transcends time and space. The musical score by Francis Lai is priceless.
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