Copyright Date:
2018
Edition Date:
2018
Release Date:
12/04/18
Pages:
420 pages
ISBN:
1-608-19673-9
ISBN 13:
978-1-608-19673-9
Dewey:
921
LCCN:
2017057657
Dimensions:
25 cm.
Language:
English
Reviews:
Publishers Weekly
(Fri Oct 06 00:00:00 CDT 2023)
Ellsberg (Secrets: A Memoir of Vietnam and the Pentagon Papers) mixes autobiography and history as he details the horrifying realities of America-s nuclear-weapons apparatus, with an aim to inspire future -courageous whistleblowers.- As a Harvard postgraduate fellow, Ellsberg-s work on decision theory attracted the RAND Corp.-s attention. In 1959 he joined a study of the communication of the -execute- message to launch nuclear strikes, coming to focus on how to ensure that no subordinate decided to attack without clear authorization. To Ellsberg-s amazement, the military-s vaunted -fail-safe- system didn-t work. He also learned that America-s pledge never to attack first is fiction; the U.S. would have struck if convinced that the U.S.S.R. was about to attack. He describes how a single, exquisitely detailed plan would have directed thousands of bombs onto Eastern Bloc targets, as well as China, even if China was not involved in a planned attack. America-s sole deterrence of the Soviet Union was to threaten Armageddon. Ellsberg recounts with precision both public and top secret arguments over American nuclear-war policy during the three decades after WWII. Despite modest improvements since, little has fundamentally changed. Ellsberg-s brilliant and unnerving account makes a convincing case for disarmament and shows that the mere existence of nuclear weapons is a serious threat to humanity. Agent: Andy Ross, Andy Ross Literary. (Dec.)
Bibliography Index/Note:
Includes bibliographical references (pages 353-387) and index.
Shortlisted for the 2018 Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Nonfiction From the legendary Pentagon Papers whistle-blower, an eyewitness exposé of America's Top Secret, seventy-year nuclear policy that continues to this day. Here, for the first time, former high-level defense analyst Daniel Ellsberg reveals his shocking firsthand account of America's nuclear program in the 1960s. From the remotest air bases in the Pacific Command, where he discovered that the authority to initiate use of nuclear weapons was widely delegated, to the secret plans for general nuclear war under Eisenhower, which, if executed, would cause the near-extinction of humanity, Ellsberg shows that the legacy of this most dangerous arms buildup in the history of civilization--and its proposed renewal under the Trump administration--threatens our very survival. No other insider with high-level access has written so candidly of the nuclear strategy of the late Eisenhower and early Kennedy years, and nothing has fundamentally changed since that era. Framed as a memoir--a chronicle of madness in which Ellsberg acknowledges participating--this gripping exposé reads like a thriller and offers feasible steps we can take to dismantle the existing "doomsday machine" and avoid nuclear catastrophe, returning Ellsberg to his role as whistle-blower. The Doomsday Machine is thus a real-life Dr. Strangelove story and an ultimately hopeful--and powerfully important--book about not just our country, but the future of the world.
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