>>2
Theoretically, yes, but in the real world you're wrong. Say I wrote a language that said a simple arithmetic expression should take two instructions instead of one. It would obviously be slower.
This box plot shows how many times slower, the fastest benchmark programs for selected language implementations were, compared to the fastest programs.
>>5
I think the variables on the plot are quite clear. I already posted the math abstract on this long ago. In the End, anything you do in C++ will do more instructions than what you do in C in any compiler. SO if you need to do less instructions on your CPU, choose C or any *LISP*.