Ever since the late 1930s, scientists have been sharply divided on the question of atomic energy. It is hardly surprising, then, that the American public is so apprehensive about its use. Hack M. Holl, former chief historian a the U.S. Department of Energy, characterizes the furor over nuclear energy as "one of the great debates in American history." In this second edition of The American Atom, the editors have updated the collection of primary documents that tell the story of atomic energy in the United States from the discover of fission through the development of nuclear weapons, international proliferation, and attempts at control. Anyone interested in the evolution of the issues will want to examine the book's major sections on the Manhattan Project, the Oppenheimer Case, the hydrogen bomb, nuclear testing and the test ban, proliferation, arms control, and the strategy of deterrence.

This book explains the origin and historical development of North Korean nuclear weapon dated from the aftermath of World War II. The story of North Korea's nuclear program began when the United States dropped atomic bombs over Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945 which led to Japan's immediate defeat. Surprised by the speed of Japan's surrender, North Korea's founding leader Kim Il-sung vowed to secure nuclear capability to avoid suffering the fate of its eastern neighbor. Based on the author's extensive experience in the academia, government, and intelligence circles, the book traces how the nuclear program has evolved since and explores wide-ranging issues including the positive function of nuclear weapon in Pyongyang's local politics, the history of negotiations between Washington and Pyongyang, the prospects of denuclearization in the Korean Peninsula, the diplomatic and military options presented to US President Donald Trump in dealing with the nuclear threat, and the future scenarios of the North Korean regime and the possibilities of a reunified Korea.With the nuclear weapon crisis likely to persist in the foreseeable time, is it feasible for South Korea to achieve reunification in the Korean Peninsula? Will the six-party members like the US, China, Russia and Japan agree with reunification without denuclearization? Can the issues of nuclear weapon and unification be settled simultaneously in the future? The book seeks to address these questions and more.

An examination of nuclear arms control and defence containing papers that present opposing sides of the debate. Nuclear deterrence, Britain's defence budget, the state of Anglo-American relations, NATO strategies and Mr Gorbachev's security arrangements in Europe proposals are discussed.

Although the authors believe that the level of conventional and nuclear forces in Europe should and will be reduced, they do not consider that the military instrument will have lost all of its value in European political affairs. They still see a need to be prepared for tension and conflict.

At the battle of Agincourt, over six thousand noblemen--the flower of French knighthood--died in a day-long series of futile charges against a small band of English archers. They charged not simply because they failed to recognize the power of the longbow, but because their whole ethos revolved round an idealized figure of the knight that dated back to Homer: the man of great physical strength and valor, who excelled at hand-to-hand combat with men of equal worth. The bow was an affront to this ideal.
As Robert L. O'Connell points out in this vividly written history of weapons in Western culture, the battle of Agincourt typifies the complex and often paradoxical relationship between men and arms. In a sweeping narrative that ranges from prehistorc times to the Nuclear Age, O'Connell demonstrates how social and economic conditions determine the types of weapons and the tactics employed in warfare and how in turn innovations in weapons technology often undercut social values. He reveals, for instance, how the Church outlawed the use of crossbows--except against muslims--to preserve the status quo of the medieval world; how the invention of the gun required a redefinition of courage from aggressive ferocity to calmness under fire; and how the machine gun in World War I so overthrew traditional notions of combat that Lord Kitchener exclaimed, "This isn't war " Indeed, as O'Connell points out, the technology unleashed in the Great War radically changed our perception of ourselves: weapons had made human qualities almost irrelevant in combat. And with the invention of the atomic bomb, humanity itself became subservient to the weapons they had produced.
While its emphasis is historical, Of Arms and Men also draws on such disciplines as biology, psychology, anthropology, sociology, and literature to illuminate the course of arms. O'Connell integrates the evolution of politics, weapons, strategy, and tactics into a coherent narrative, one spiced with striking portraits of men in combat and brilliant insight into why men go to war.

More than forty years of commitment to nuclear weapons may have prepared Britain to take part in Armageddon, but not to defend itself against attack. What made British governments choose this path and how have they justified it? How have they responded to the moral questions it raises? Using material from recently-released official documents, Roger Ruston presents a moral history of British defence policy, from the 'lesson' of Appeasement to the nuclear modernizations of the eighties, and answers many of the questions that governments have avoided. The book will be of great interest to defence historians, moralists, politicians, and general readers who need a clear account of their country's defence predicament as a basis from which to devise workable and morally acceptable alternatives.

This historic document, generally known as 'The Smyth Report, ' was written in secret between the summer of 1944 and the spring of 1945 at the direction of Major General L.R. Groves, who was in charge of the atomic bomb project, as a 'report to the nation.'

Japan is the only country in the world to have been attacked with nuclear weapons. Her anti-nuclear Civil Society Organisations - with their experiences of coping with the fallout of the atom bomb blasts - are passionately committed to their cause. While international treaties are final objectives, there is another effective diplomatic approach towards nuclear disarmament: CSO diplomacy might open the window of deadlocked inter-state negotiations. The role of civil society in the field of security is relatively new, coming to prominence during the establishment of the Convention on the Prohibition of Anti-Personnel Mines, the so-called Ottawa Treaty. The Treaty signalled that the role, presence and decision of governments are essential. This is an investigation into how Japanese CSOs have influenced the Japanese official policy with regards to nuclear disarmament. It focuses on the private diplomacy of CSOs; on the mitigation of inter-state conflicts that lie behind nuclear issues; and on the involvement of governments in social movements of nuclear disarmament. Dr Kazuhiro Tobisawa suggests that developing a solid understand of the pertinent issues surrounding Japaneses CSOs could lead to the resolution of half-a-century of failed attempts at nuclear disarmament.

"A pioneering political-scientific history. . . . Lucidly composed, meticulously documented, and handsomely presented."--The Annals
"A fascinating and compelling story of the beginnings of the Chinese nuclear weapon program."--Arms Control Today

The development and use of the atomic bombs at Hiroshima and Nagasaki number among the formative national experiences for both Japanese and Americans, as well as for U.S.-Japan relations throughout the last half of the twentieth century. It is now clear, however, that memories and lessons learned from the bombings are still being reworked and contested, perhaps even more heatedly than they were in 1945. Tracking the development of that fifty-year trajectory, this volume explores the ways in which the bomb has shaped the self-image of both peoples: for Americans, the dominant story is that the bombs provided an appropriate and necessary conclusion to a just war; for Japanese, it is a symbol of their victimization. The distinguished contributors analyze the ways in which memories of the bombs, constantly reworked in the media, in the arts, and in the political arena, continue to define important, albeit often unacknowledged, undercurrents in the U.S.-Japan relationship.

Providing a rigorous and objective ethical analysis of nuclear deterrence, this book discusses such issues as the Soviet menace, possible holocaust, and strategic imperatives. At the same time, the authors unmask types of deterrence that they perceive essentially as moral evasions, maintaining that deterrence cannot be bluffing, pure counterforce, the lesser (or greater) evil, or a step towards disarmament. Concluding that deterrence is unjustifiable, this book examines the new questions of conscience that this raises for us all.

President Eisenhower's reliance on atomic weapons created as many problems as he hoped to solve with his defense policy. He hoped to provide a sustainable defense strategy that allowed the United States to maintain its security requirements without creating an excessive economic burden. This defense strategy, known as the New Look, benefitted the U.S. Air Force due to the focus on strategic bombing. However ballistic missiles offered the capability to launch nuclear warheads into the Soviet Union without the risk of their being intercepted. In order to do this, the U.S. required European missile bases to deploy its Intermediate Range Ballistic Missiles, while efforts continued to develop U.S. based Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles. Deploying atomic missiles to Europe required balancing regional European concerns with U.S. domestic security priorities. In the wake of the Soviet Sputnik launch in 1957, many in the U.S. feared Soviet missile capability. Getting ballistic missiles into Europe mitigated this domestic security issue but convincing North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) allies to agree to base missiles in their country raised issues concerning sovereignty, weapons control, and ran the risk of creating divisions in the NATO alliance.

Are nuclear arsenals safe from cyber-attack? Could terrorists launch a nuclear weapon through hacking? Are we standing at the edge of a major technological challenge to global nuclear order? These are among the many pressing security questions addressed in Andrew Futter's ground-breaking study of the cyber threat to nuclear weapons. Hacking the Bomb provides the first ever comprehensive assessment of this worrying and little-understood strategic development, and it explains how myriad new cyber challenges will impact the way that the world thinks about and manages the ultimate weapon. The book cuts through the hype surrounding the cyber phenomenon and provides a framework through which to understand and proactively address the implications of the emerging cyber-nuclear nexus. It does this by tracing the cyber challenge right across the nuclear weapons enterprise, explains the important differences between types of cyber threats, and unpacks how cyber capabilities will impact strategic thinking, nuclear balances, deterrence thinking, and crisis management. The book makes the case for restraint in the cyber realm when it comes to nuclear weapons given the considerable risks of commingling weapons of mass disruption with weapons of mass destruction, and argues against establishing a dangerous norm of "hacking the bomb." This timely book provides a starting point for an essential discussion about the challenges associated with the cyber-nuclear nexus, and will be of great interest to scholars and students of security studies as well as defense practitioners and policy makers.

Almost 145,000 Americans fled their homes in and around Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, in late March 1979, hoping to save themselves from an invisible enemy: radiation. The reactor at the nearby Three Mile Island nuclear power plant had gone into partial meltdown, and scientists feared an explosion that could spread radiation throughout the eastern United States. Thankfully, the explosion never took place-but the accident left deep scars in the American psyche, all but ending the nation's love affair with nuclear power. In Atoms and Ashes, Serhii Plokhy recounts the dramatic history of Three Mile Island and five more accidents that that have dogged the nuclear industry in its military and civil incarnations: the disastrous fallout caused by the testing of the hydrogen bomb in the Bikini Atoll in 1954; the Kyshtym nuclear disaster in the USSR, which polluted a good part of the Urals; the Windscale fire, the worst nuclear accident in the UK's history; back to the USSR with Chernobyl, the result of a flawed reactor design leading to the exodus of 350,000 people; and, most recently, Fukushima in Japan, triggered by an earthquake and a tsunami, a disaster on a par with Chernobyl and whose clean-up will not take place in our lifetime. Through the stories of these six terrifying incidents, Plokhy explores the risks of nuclear power, both for military and peaceful purposes, while offering a vivid account of how individuals and governments make decisions under extraordinary circumstances. Today, there are 440 nuclear reactors operating throughout the world, with nuclear power providing 10 percent of global electricity. Yet as the world seeks to reduce carbon emissions to combat climate change, the question arises: Just how safe is nuclear energy?

This book offers a novel approach to understanding the puzzle of nuclear proliferation by examining how leaders' beliefs and perceptions about the international system influence states' decisions to acquire nuclear weapons. Today, there is a persisting dilemma over the spread of nuclear weapons for both practitioners and scholars of international affairs. Uncertainty remains whether determined proliferators can be stopped, as shown by the cases of North Korea and Iran. These instances of proliferation raise questions about regional stability, the use of pre-emptive military action, and the potential for reactive-proliferation by neighbouring countries. Despite the serious implications surrounding the spread of these weapons, proliferation scholarship has thus far failed to solve what has been described as the "proliferation puzzle"- why do some countries choose nuclear weapons while others do not? The author argues that understanding basic psychological motivations, such as the role of power and perceptions of self and others, forms a strategic context which provides answers about a leader's willingness to proliferate. Proliferation willingness is a critical, yet frequently overlooked, part of the proliferation equation. Ultimately, it is the combination of willingness and proliferation opportunity (i.e. technical and scientific capabilities) that determines whether a country 'goes nuclear'. By examining several historical instances of proliferation decision-making-in South Africa, India, Libya and Australia-the book's findings highlight the fundamental role of leaders' beliefs in shaping proliferation outcomes. This book will be of much interest to students of nuclear proliferation, political psychology, security studies and IR in general.

This book is an authoritative account of the nuclear weapons inspections regime in Iraq from 1991 to 1998. Without a proper understanding of those years, the 2003 US invasion of Iraq after a futile WMD search remain unintelligible. In the 1990s, after adapting to a completely new kind of intrusive inspections with unprecedented access rights, the IAEA discovered and dismantled Iraq's clandestine nuclear weapons program and put in place an efficient monitoring system which could have contained Saddam Hussein's attempts to reconstitute his nuclear programs - had he ever tried to. However, the politicisation of the inspection process led to an end of the inspections in 1998. Based on various sources including inspection reports and other documents in the archive of the IAEA Iraq Action Team at the IAEA headquarters in Vienna, Dismantling the Iraqi Nuclear Programme presents completely new information about the weapons inspection regime in Iraq and offers valuable lessons for future non-proliferation and disarmament cases. The book also draws on discourse from Iraqi scientists, which provides a close look into not only the motivation of involved Iraqis, but also Iraqi concealment mechanisms. This book will be of much interest to students of nuclear proliferation, arms control, Middle Eastern politics, diplomacy, international security and IR.

The UK is one of nine states possessing nuclear weapons. Renewal of the Trident programme would extend Britain’s commitment to so-called nuclear ‘deterrence’ well into the second half of this century, despite treaty obligations and an ‘unequivocal undertaking’ to disarm. With more than 16,000 nuclear weapons stockpiled worldwide, the risk of one going off by accident or design is increasing every day. Wallis in The Truth about Trident explores the issues Trident presents and raises questions like: what would be the impact of their use? How safe are they in the meantime? Are they really necessary? Can we afford them? Are there better alternatives? This book aims to peel back layers of confusion and deceit to reach the truth about Trident.

Life and Times of the Atomic Bomb takes up the question of how the world found itself in the age of nuclear weapons - and how it has since tried to find a way out of it. Albert I. Berger charts the story of nuclear weapons from their origins through the Atomic Age and the Cold War up through the present day, arguing that an understanding of the history of nuclear weapons is crucial to modern efforts to manage them. This book examines topics including nuclear strategy debates, weapon system procurement decisions, and arms control conferences through the people and leaders who experienced them. Providing a chronological survey, Life and Times of the Atomic Bomb starts with the major scientific discoveries of the late 19th century that laid the groundwork for nuclear development. It then traces the history of nuclear weapons from their inception to the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945 and the reaction to them by key players on both sides. It continues its narrative into the second half of the twentieth century, and the role of nuclear weapons throughout the Cold War, engaging in the debate over whether nuclear weapons are an effective deterrent. Finally, the closing chapters consider the atomic bomb's place in the modern world and the transformation of warfare in an age of advanced technology. This clear and engaging survey will be invaluable reading for students of the Cold War and twentieth-century history.

Presidential nominations in the United States can sometimes seem like a media circus, over-hyped and overly speculative. Even informed citizens might be tempted to tune them out. Yet understanding the process, one distinct to American politics, is crucial for civic participation. If presidential elections are about who will lead the nation, presidential nominations are about who appears on the ballot. This concise and coherent Citizen's Guide examines who has power in presidential nominations and how this affects who we as citizens choose to nominate, and ultimately to sit in the Oval Office. Political scientist Wayne Steger defines the nominating system as a tension between an "insider game" and an "outsider game." He explains how candidates must appeal to a broad spectrum of elected and party officials, political activists, and aligned groups in order to form a winning coalition within their party, which changes over time. Either these party insiders unify early behind a candidate, effectively deciding the nominee before anyone casts a vote, or they are divided and the nomination is determined by citizens voting in the caucuses and primaries. Steger portrays how shifts in party unity and the participation of core party constituencies affect the options presented to voters. Amidst all this, the candidate still matters. Primaries with one strong candidate look much different than those with a field of weaker ones. By clearly addressing the key issues, past and present, of presidential nominations, Steger's guide will be informative, relevant, and accessible for students and general readers alike.

This collection of essays offers a fresh look at the 1970s, the crucial decade when the nuclear non-proliferation regime took shape. Exploring a broad array of newly declassified archival sources from different countries across the globe, and moving freely across methodological and national barriers, historians from Europe, North and South America, Asia and Africa discuss the making of the global nuclear order from truly international and transnational perspectives. The result is a fascinating and innovative volume which will remain an essential reference for historians of the nuclear age, of the cold war, and more generally of the evolution of the international system in the second half of the twentieth century. The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue of The International History Review.

The blockbuster #1 national bestseller Bret Baier, the Chief Political Anchor for Fox News Channel and the Anchor and Executive Editor of Special Report with Bret Baier, illuminates the extraordinary yet underappreciated presidency of Dwight Eisenhower by taking readers into Ike's last days in power. "Magnificently rendered. ... Destined to take its place as not only one of the masterworks on Eisenhower, but as one of the classics of presidential history. ... Impeccably researched, the book is nothing short of extraordinary. What a triumph!"--JAY WINIK, New York Times bestselling author of April 1865 and 1944 In Three Days in January, Bret Baier masterfully casts the period between Eisenhower's now-prophetic farewell address on the evening of January 17, 1961, and Kennedy's inauguration on the afternoon of January 20 as the closing act of one of modern America's greatest leaders--during which Eisenhower urgently sought to prepare both the country and the next president for the challenges ahead. Those three days in January 1961, Baier shows, were the culmination of a lifetime of service that took Ike from rural Kansas to West Point, to the battlefields of World War II, and finally to the Oval Office. When he left the White House, Dwight Eisenhower had done more than perhaps any other modern American to set the nation, in his words, "on our charted course toward permanent peace and human betterment." On January 17, Eisenhower spoke to the nation in one of the most remarkable farewell speeches in U.S. history. Ike looked to the future, warning Americans against the dangers of elevating partisanship above national interest, excessive government budgets (particularly deficit spending), the expansion of the military-industrial complex, and the creeping political power of special interests. Seeking to ready a new generation for power, Eisenhower intensely advised the forty-three-year-old Kennedy before the inauguration. Baier also reveals how Eisenhower's two terms changed America forever for the better, and demonstrates how today Ike offers us the model of principled leadership that polls say is so missing in politics. Three Days in January forever makes clear that Eisenhower, an often forgotten giant of U.S. history, still offers vital lessons for our own time and stands as a lasting example of political leadership at its most effective and honorable.

The radical changes in the Soviet bloc and the ending of the Cold War have made the sheer absurdity of the arms race transparent to virtually all observers. Yet none of the current theories of the arms race provides a coherent and systematic account of how, in the belated words of Time magazine, such a "pathology" developed in the first place. Moreover, none of these theories can readily address--much less explain--the rapid shifts in attitudes toward nuclear weapons that occurred at the start and at the end of the 1980s.

While not denying explanatory value to bureaucratic, technical, political, and economic factors, The Rise and Fall of Nuclearism focuses attention instead on the cultural dimensions of the arms race. It traces the long-term secular changes in Western societies that made the faith in "nuclearism" possible to begin with; and it draws on sociological concepts to explain how such a misplaced faith accrued to nuclear weapons and why this faith eventually came undone. The concept of "moral panic" is central to the argument. Ungar shows that moral panics were precipitated by authentic surges of fear responding to perceived Soviet challenges to American nuclear supremacy; these panics provided the political leverage for large-scale nuclear buildups and made possible the growth of the military-industrial complex in the United States. Elite efforts to orchestrate panics, however, typically failed or backfired.

The key to understanding the episodic nature of the arms race, Ungar argues, lies in the dynamic oscillation between nuclear worship, which viewed the "bomb" as the source of salvation, and nuclear dread, which conjured up images of vaporized cities and an end to civilization. In the concluding chapter he discusses what role nuclear fear--about proliferation, for instance--may continue to play in the post-Cold War world.

Political Fallout is the story of one of the first human-driven, truly global environmental crises—radioactive fallout from nuclear weapons testing during the Cold War—and the international response. Beginning in 1945, the United States, Britain, and the Soviet Union detonated hundreds of nuclear weapons in the atmosphere, scattering a massive amount of radioactivity across the globe. The scale of contamination was so vast, and radioactive decay so slow, that the cumulative effect on humans and the environment is still difficult to fully comprehend. The international debate over nuclear fallout turned global radioactive contamination into an environmental issue, eventually leading the nuclear superpowers to sign the landmark Partial Test Ban Treaty (PTBT) in 1963. Bringing together environmental history and Cold War history, Toshihiro Higuchi argues that the PTBT, originally proposed as an arms control measure, transformed into a dual-purpose initiative to check the nuclear arms race and radioactive pollution simultaneously. Higuchi draws on sources in English, Russian, and Japanese, considering both the epistemic differences that emerged in different scientific communities in the 1950s and the way that public consciousness around the risks of radioactive fallout influenced policy in turn. Political Fallout addresses the implications of science and policymaking in the Anthropocene—an era in which humans are confronting environmental changes of their own making.