Author : Thomas B. Cochran
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 313 pages
File Size : 29,43 MB
Release : 2019-04-15
Category : History
ISBN : 0429720580
The Natural Resources Defense Council once again provides the definitive account of the current status of Russian nuclear weapons. Taking advantage of previously unavailable information the authors describe the origins, growth, and decline of the massive Soviet nuclear weapons production complex-the places involved in the recent headline-making epi
Author : David Holloway
Publisher : Yale University Press
Page : 507 pages
File Size : 12,10 MB
Release : 2008-10-01
Category : History
ISBN : 0300164459
The classic and “utterly engrossing” study of Stalin’s pursuit of a nuclear bomb during the Cold War by the renowned political scientist and historian (Foreign Affairs). For forty years the U.S.-Russian nuclear arms race dominated world politics, yet the Soviet nuclear establishment was shrouded in secrecy. Then, shortly after the collapse of the Soviet Union, David Holloway pulled back the Iron Curtain with his “marvelous, groundbreaking study” Stalin and the Bomb (The New Yorker). How did the Soviet Union build its atomic and hydrogen bombs? What role did espionage play? How did the American atomic monopoly affect Stalin's foreign policy? What was the relationship between Soviet nuclear scientists and the country's political leaders? David Holloway answers these questions by tracing the dramatic story of Soviet nuclear policy from developments in physics in the 1920s to the testing of the hydrogen bomb and the emergence of nuclear deterrence in the mid-1950s. This magisterial history throws light on Soviet policy at the height of the Cold War, illuminates a central element of the Stalinist system, and puts into perspective the tragic legacy of this program―environmental damage, a vast network of institutes and factories, and a huge stockpile of unwanted weapons.
Author : Michael D. Gordin
Publisher : Macmillan + ORM
Page : 417 pages
File Size : 14,84 MB
Release : 2009-09-29
Category : History
ISBN : 142994241X
A NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW EDITORS' CHOICE Following the trail of espionage and technological innovation, and making use of newly opened archives, Michael D. Gordin provides a new understanding of the origins of the nuclear arms race and fresh insight into the problem of proliferation. On August 29, 1949, the first Soviet test bomb, dubbed "First Lightning," exploded in the deserts of Kazakhstan. This surprising international event marked the beginning of an arms race that would ultimately lead to nuclear proliferation beyond the two superpowers of the Soviet Union and the United States. With the use of newly opened archives, Michael D. Gordin follows a trail of espionage, secrecy, deception, political brinksmanship, and technical innovation to provide a fresh understanding of the nuclear arms race.
Author : Richard Rhodes
Publisher : Simon and Schuster
Page : 770 pages
File Size : 35,47 MB
Release : 2012-09-18
Category : History
ISBN : 143912647X
Here, for the first time, in a brilliant, panoramic portrait by the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Making of the Atomic Bomb, is the definitive, often shocking story of the politics and the science behind the development of the hydrogen bomb and the birth of the Cold War. Based on secret files in the United States and the former Soviet Union, this monumental work of history discloses how and why the United States decided to create the bomb that would dominate world politics for more than forty years.
Author : Alex Wellerstein
Publisher : University of Chicago Press
Page : 558 pages
File Size : 47,9 MB
Release : 2021-04-09
Category : History
ISBN : 022602038X
"Nuclear weapons, since their conception, have been the subject of secrecy. In the months after the dropping of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the American scientific establishment, the American government, and the American public all wrestled with what was called the "problem of secrecy," wondering not only whether secrecy was appropriate and effective as a means of controlling this new technology but also whether it was compatible with the country's core values. Out of a messy context of propaganda, confusion, spy scares, and the grave counsel of competing groups of scientists, what historian Alex Wellerstein calls a "new regime of secrecy" was put into place. It was unlike any other previous or since. Nuclear secrets were given their own unique legal designation in American law ("restricted data"), one that operates differently than all other forms of national security classification and exists to this day. Drawing on massive amounts of declassified files, including records released by the government for the first time at the author's request, Restricted Data is a narrative account of nuclear secrecy and the tensions and uncertainty that built as the Cold War continued. In the US, both science and democracy are pitted against nuclear secrecy, and this makes its history uniquely compelling and timely"--
Author : Richard Rhodes
Publisher : Simon and Schuster
Page : 890 pages
File Size : 36,29 MB
Release : 2012-09-18
Category : History
ISBN : 1439126224
**Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Award, and the National Book Critics Circle Award** The definitive history of nuclear weapons—from the turn-of-the-century discovery of nuclear energy to J. Robert Oppenheimer and the Manhattan Project—this epic work details the science, the people, and the sociopolitical realities that led to the development of the atomic bomb. This sweeping account begins in the 19th century, with the discovery of nuclear fission, and continues to World War Two and the Americans’ race to beat Hitler’s Nazis. That competition launched the Manhattan Project and the nearly overnight construction of a vast military-industrial complex that culminated in the fateful dropping of the first bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Reading like a character-driven suspense novel, the book introduces the players in this saga of physics, politics, and human psychology—from FDR and Einstein to the visionary scientists who pioneered quantum theory and the application of thermonuclear fission, including Planck, Szilard, Bohr, Oppenheimer, Fermi, Teller, Meitner, von Neumann, and Lawrence. From nuclear power’s earliest foreshadowing in the work of H.G. Wells to the bright glare of Trinity at Alamogordo and the arms race of the Cold War, this dread invention forever changed the course of human history, and The Making of The Atomic Bomb provides a panoramic backdrop for that story. Richard Rhodes’s ability to craft compelling biographical portraits is matched only by his rigorous scholarship. Told in rich human, political, and scientific detail that any reader can follow, The Making of the Atomic Bomb is a thought-provoking and masterful work.
Author : John Harte
Publisher : Pen and Sword Military
Page : 282 pages
File Size : 26,28 MB
Release : 2023-09-30
Category : History
ISBN : 1399049143
When Nazi Germany began a secret weapons program called The Uranium Club in April 1939, Stalin was alerted by his American and British spies of the possibility that German scientists were working to develop an atomic bomb. The British Government and the United States, and Stalin, realized that if Hitler used The Atom Bomb, it could mean the end of the West or the end of the world. John Hartes new book about The Manhattan Project describes how Soviet Russias leading spymasters in Moscow Center obtained information from British and American physicists to make a Soviet atomic bomb at each and every stage when the American bomb was developed at Los Alamos in New Mexico.
Author : Vince Houghton
Publisher : Cornell University Press
Page : 248 pages
File Size : 18,21 MB
Release : 2019-09-15
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 1501739603
Why did the US intelligence services fail so spectacularly to know about the Soviet Union's nuclear capabilities following World War II? As Vince Houghton, historian and curator of the International Spy Museum in Washington, DC, shows us, that disastrous failure came just a few years after the Manhattan Project's intelligence team had penetrated the Third Reich and knew every detail of the Nazi 's plan for an atomic bomb. What changed and what went wrong? Houghton's delightful retelling of this fascinating case of American spy ineffectiveness in the then new field of scientific intelligence provides us with a new look at the early years of the Cold War. During that time, scientific intelligence quickly grew to become a significant portion of the CIA budget as it struggled to contend with the incredible advance in weapons and other scientific discoveries immediately after World War II. As Houghton shows, the abilities of the Soviet Union's scientists, its research facilities and laboratories, and its educational system became a key consideration for the CIA in assessing the threat level of its most potent foe. Sadly, for the CIA scientific intelligence was extremely difficult to do well. For when the Soviet Union detonated its first atomic bomb in 1949, no one in the American intelligence services saw it coming.
Author : Steve Sheinkin
Publisher : Roaring Brook Press
Page : 258 pages
File Size : 49,19 MB
Release : 2023-01-24
Category : Juvenile Nonfiction
ISBN : 1250291038
A riveting graphic novel adaptation of the award-winning nonfiction book, Bomb—the fascinating and frightening true story of the creation behind the most destructive force that birthed the arms race and the Cold War. In December of 1938, a chemist in a German laboratory made a shocking discovery: When placed next to radioactive material, a Uranium atom split in two. That simple discovery launched a scientific race that spanned three continents. In Great Britain and the United States, Soviet spies worked their way into the scientific community; in Norway, a commando force slipped behind enemy lines to attack German heavy-water manufacturing; and deep in the desert, one brilliant group of scientists, led by "father of the atomic bomb" J. Robert Oppenheimer, was hidden away at a remote site at Los Alamos. This is the story of the plotting, the risk-taking, the deceit, and genius that created the world's most formidable weapon. This is the story of the atomic bomb. New York Times bestselling author Steve Sheinkin's award-winning nonfiction book is now available reimagined in the graphic novel format. Full color illustrations from Nick Bertozzi are detailed and enriched with the nonfiction expertise Nick brings to the story as a beloved artist, comic book writer, and commercial illustrator who has written a couple of his own historical graphic novels, including Shackleton and Lewis & Clark. Accessible, gripping, and educational, this new edition of Bomb is perfect for young readers and adults alike. Praise for Bomb (2012): “This superb and exciting work of nonfiction would be a fine tonic for any jaded adolescent who thinks history is 'boring.' It's also an excellent primer for adult readers who may have forgotten, or never learned, the remarkable story of how nuclear weaponry was first imagined, invented and deployed—and of how an international arms race began well before there was such a thing as an atomic bomb.” —The Wall Street Journal “This is edge-of-the seat material that will resonate with YAs who clamor for true spy stories, and it will undoubtedly engross a cross-market audience of adults who dozed through the World War II unit in high school.” —The Bulletin (starred review) Also by Steve Sheinkin: Fallout: Spies, Superbombs, and the Ultimate Cold War Showdown The Port Chicago 50: Disaster, Mutiny, and the Fight for Civil Rights Undefeated: Jim Thorpe and the Carlisle Indian School Football Team Most Dangerous: Daniel Ellsberg and the Secret History of the Vietnam War Born to Fly: The First Women's Air Race Across America The Notorious Benedict Arnold: A True Story of Adventure, Heroism & Treachery Which Way to the Wild West?: Everything Your Schoolbooks Didn't Tell You About Westward Expansion King George: What Was His Problem?: Everything Your Schoolbooks Didn't Tell You About the American Revolution Two Miserable Presidents: Everything Your Schoolbooks Didn't Tell You About the Civil War
Author : Lee G Pondrom
Publisher : World Scientific
Page : 785 pages
File Size : 30,69 MB
Release : 2018-07-25
Category : Science
ISBN : 9813235578
'Political intrigue, the arms race, early developments of nuclear science, espionage and more are all present in this gripping book … The book is crisply written and well worth the read. The text includes a number of translated segments of official documents plus extracts from memoirs of some of the people involved. So, although Pondrom sprinkles his opinions throughout, there is sufficient material to permit readers to make their own judgements. 'CERN The book describes the lives of the people who gave Stalin his weapon — scientists, engineers, managers, and prisoners during the early post war years from 1945-1953. Many anecdotes and vicissitudes of life at that time in the Soviet Union accompany considerable technical information regarding the solutions to formidable problems of nuclear weapons development. The contents should interest the reader who wants to learn more about this part of the history and politics in 20th century physics. The prevention of nuclear proliferation is a topic of current interest, and the procedure followed by the Soviet Union as described in this book will help to understand the complexities involved.
