The Nuclear Express A Political History of the Bomb and Its Proliferation

by Reed, Thomas; Stillman, Danny

• ISBN13: 9780760335024
• ISBN10: 0760335028
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2009-01-02
• Publisher: Zenith Press

Summary

This is a political history of nuclear weapons from the discovery of fission in 1938 to the nuclear train wreck that seems to loom in our future. It is an account of where those weapons came from, how the technology surprisingly and covertly spread, who is likely to acquire those weapons next and most importantly why. The authorsrs" examination of post-Cold War national and geopolitical issues regarding nuclear proliferation and the effects of Chinese sponsorship of the Pakistani program is eye opening. The reckless "nuclear weapons programs for sale" exporting of technology by Pakistan is truly chilling as is the on again off again North Korean nuclear weapons program.

Author Biography

Thomas C. Reed is a former nuclear weapons designer (Livermore), political manager (Reagans’s gubernatorial contests), defense official (Secretary of the Air Force), White House staffer (Special Assistant to the President for National Security Policy), and businessman.  Frequent visitor to Russia and Ukraine.  Author of At the Abyss:  An Insider’s History of the Cold War.  (2004, Presidio/Random House)  Reed resides in northern California.
 
Danny B. Stillman is a Los Alamos physicist with decades of experience in nuclear design, diagnostics and testing.  For thirteen years Stillman directed the Los Alamos Technical Intelligence Division; at the end of that tour he was awarded the Intelligence Community Seal Medallion. Stillman lives near Albuquerque in White Rock, New Mexico.

Table of Contents

Prologue	p. 2
Big News: Fission Releases Neutrons!	p. 8
Los Alamos: A First, But Not the Last	p. 12
The Raids on Japan	p. 20
The U.S.S.R. and the United Kingdom: Unintended Partners	p. 26
First Attempts at Controls	p. 54
France and Israel: The Apprentices	p. 68
China Breaks the European Cartel	p. 84
Nuclear Maturity Comes to the Little Three	p. 114
Struggling with the Barn Door	p. 132
Changes of State in the Mideast and South Asia	p. 148
South Africa	p. 170
The Soviet Union	p. 186
The Once-Nuclear Soviet Republics	p. 204
China's Decade of Nuclear Transparency	p. 220
The Fakirs: India, Pakistan, and North Korea	p. 236
Fingerprints	p. 268
Star and Crescent Rising	p. 278
Georges-Antoine Kurtz is Alive and Well	p. 302
Why?	p. 312
Epilogue	p. 320
Glossary	p. 332
Appendices
The Physics of Nuclear Weapon Design	p. 340
Bombing Missions over Japan by the 393rd (Nuclear) Bombardment Squadron, July 20-August 14, 1945	p. 346
U.S. Aircraft Accidents with Nuclear Weapons Aboard	p. 348
Principal Soviet Nuclear Production Facilities	p. 352
Notes on D. B. Stillman's Ten Visits to the Chinese Nuclear Weapon Complex, 1990-2001	p. 354
Chronology	p. 364
Acknowledgments	p. 382
Index	p. 385
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