Overview

The president loses control of fifty nukes for nearly an hour. Russian nuclear bombers almost bump wingtips with American fighter jets over the Pacific coast. North Korea detonates nuclear weapons underground. Iran's nuclear shroud is penetrated by a computer worm. Al-Qaeda goes on the hunt for Pakistan's bomb, and Israelis debate the merit of a preemptive nuclear strike. Treaties are signed, but thousands of nuclear weapons are still on hair-trigger alert.This is how the end begins. In this startling new book, bestselling author Ron Rosenbaum gives us a wake-up call about this new age of peril and delivers a provocative analysis of how close--and how often--the world has come to nuclear annihilation and why we are once again on the brink. Rosenbaum tracks down key characters in our new nuclear drama and probes deeply into their war game strategies, fears, and moral agonies. He travels to Omaha's underground nuclear command center, goes deep into the missile silo complexes beneath the Great Plains, and holds in his hands a set of nuclear launch keys. Along the way, Rosenbaum confronts the missile men as well as the general at the very top of our nation's nuclear command system with tough questions about the terrifying assumptions underlying it. He reveals disturbing flaws in our nuclear launch control system, suggests remedies for them, shows how the old Cold War system of bipolar deterrence has become dangerously unstable, and examines the new movement for nuclear abolition. Having explored the depths of Hitler's evil and the intense emotion of Shakespeare's tragedies, Rosenbaum now has produced a powerful, urgently needed work that challenges us: Can we undream our nightmare?

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9781416594215

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&ldquo;Ron Rosenbaum has written a Dr. Strangelove for our time. He&rsquo;s done the seemingly impossible: captured the way our current situation is even more terrifying, more deeply surreal. If you ever thought human beings were rational, think again.&rdquo;<p>&#8212;Errol Morris, director of The Fog of War

Is there a scenario in which nuclear retaliation would be moral? Rosenbaum's answer is a definitive no. Any reader of this upsetting book will be convinced that he's right. <p> --Nathaniel Rich, The Daily Beast

Is there a scenario in which nuclear retaliation would be moral? Rosenbaum's answer is a definitive no. Any reader of this upsetting book will be convinced that he's right. --Nathaniel Rich, The Daily Beast The virtues of How the End Begins are numerous and impressive . . . this is a deep meditation on the role, meaning, and possible consequences of nuclear weapons in our time. --Michael Anton, The Weekly Standard This book is a wide-angle and quite dire meditation on our nuclear present; Mr. Rosenbaum is convincingly fearful about where humanity stands . . . An unsuspecting reader who picks up this book expecting a buttoned-down, blue-blazered examination of our nuclear present, a Tom Clancy kind of nonfiction volume, is in for an intellectual drag race. Mr. Rosenbaum is pushy and emphatic on the page . . . Rosenbaum's book is bracing and never dull. --Dwight Garner, The New York Times With the bomb proliferating, Rosenbaum is an alarming herald of current and possibly future events. -- Booklist In clear, crisp language, Rosenbaum not only vividly details his personal odyssey 'to map out the terra incognita . . . of the new nuclear landscape, ' but also challenges the rest of us to confront the gathering storm. --Publishers Weekly When President Obama called for a world without nuclear weapons, some were skeptical. Read this book to understand the fearful alternatives. --Hendrik Hertzberg, senior editor at The New Yorker Ron Rosenbaum takes on the subject of how Armageddon might come: not because of divine intervention but because of the endemic incompetence of the human species. Rosenbaum tells this story with his characteristic mix of shoe-leather reporting, deep analysis, and elegant writing. --Peter Bergen, author of The Longest War and The Osama bin Laden I Know While the world twiddles its thumbs in the face of the possibility of nuclear devastation, Ron Rosenbaum's well argued and courageous book convincingly says: Wake up! The 'end' in his title is a diabolical double entendre: the end of the world, or the end of the staggering danger of world holocaust? Rosenbaum says to humanity: choose. --Todd Gitlin, author of The Chosen Peoples and The Sixties A tenaciously reported, passionately argued warning. -- Kirkus Reviews Ron Rosenbaum might qualify for the title of America's greatest living journalist. He is certainly a hero to an entire generation of writers. No matter the subject, Rosenbaum asks the hardest questions, draws out the most fascinating and unexpected answers, and never, ever gives up. And he has not yet written, in his long and storied career, an uninteresting sentence. When Rosenbaum gets fixed on a subject as urgent as the specter of nuclear catastrophe, he produces work that is unparalleled in the English language. --Jeffrey Goldberg, National Correspondent for The Atlantic and author of Prisoners If you think 'the atomic age' is over, read this book and shudder. Ron Rosenbaum plunges into the rabbit hole of nuclear-deterrence thinking--from the missilemen in the silos to the commanders on the lookout posts to the strategic priests turned no-nukes advocates--with infectious zest. He knows the intellectual thrill of tracing the war-gamers' logic all the way out--and the moral horror that comes from daring to look into the abyss. --Fred Kaplan, Slate War Stories columnist and author of The Wizards of Armageddon Ron Rosenbaum has written a Dr. Strangelove for our time. He's done the seemingly impossible: captured the way our current situation is even more terrifying, more deeply surreal. If you ever thought human beings were rational, think again. --Errol Morris, director of The Fog of War Ron Rosenbaum has written a Dr. Strangelove for our time. He's done the seemingly impossible: captured the way our current situation is even more terrifying, more deeply surreal. If you ever thought human beings were rational, think again. -Errol Morris, director of The Fog of War

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