Traces the story of the physicists and their families who lived in the then-secret city of Los Alamos during the invention of the atomic bomb, years during which they lied to outsiders about their daily existences and endured harsh living conditions with minimal privacy. By the author of Tuxedo Park. Reprint. 50,000 first printing.

Documents how a small band of activists infiltrated one of the most secure nuclear weapons sites in the U.S., tracing the history of America's nuclear stewardship while exploring questions about the country's disproportionate nuclear capabilities.

The Pulizer Prize-winning author of The Making of the Atomic Bomb narrates the story of the postwar superpower arms race that culminated in the Reagan-Gorbachev era when the U.S. and Soviet Union came all too close to nuclear war, chronicling the nuclear policies on both sides following World War II and their implications for global peace and security. Reprint. 20,000 first printing.

Drawing on declassified material such as MI6's Farm Hall transcripts, coded Soviet messages cracked by American cryptographers in the Venona project, and interpretations by Russian scholars of documents from the Soviet archives, Atomic presents a brilliant new account of the race to build humankind's most destructive weapon.

The disturbing story of the Soviet biological warfare program is told by the man who ran it, with details of the biowarfare programs in Cuba and India and information on the anthrax outbreak in Sverdlovsk. Reprint.

Daniel Gerstein draws on twenty-nine years of experience in the security and defense sectors to address the threat of bioterrorism in the twenty-first century. He warns that while the proliferation of knowledge and capabilities in the field of biotechnology offers ever-increasing opportunities for scientific breakthroughs, the potential for the misuse of that knowledge also increases. Gerstein takes a classic game theory approach in his analysis of the potential for a bioterror attack in the future. His examination provides an objective capability for assessing threats, understanding emerging trends, and developing mitigation strategies. However, in the end the book is less about predicting future behavior than about understanding the framework in which dangerous capabilities are allowed to proliferate. The study also makes a valuable contribution to the debate over perceived threats and vulnerabilities in this new global environment.

Gerstein, a strategist and policy expert who has served in the security and defense fields, examines the threat of bioterrorism in the 21st century. He argues that the increase in globalization, terrorism, and biotechnology collectively present the potential for the threat of bioterrorism in the US, and aims to gain an understanding of the facts surrounding this potential, the likelihood of an attack, and the actual danger the country faces. He address the framework within which the connection between globalization, terrorism, and biotechnology allows for more dangerous capabilities to proliferate; the motivations that drive each of the actors; and the potential outcomes relating to the use of biological weapons, as well as biodefense. The book originated in his dissertation. Annotation ©2010 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

A former nuclear weapons designer and head of nuclear weapons research at Los Alamos, Stephen M. Younger delivers an insightful and urgent inquisition on the role of nuclear weapons in the twenty-first century. Does the United States need a massive atomic arsenal in an era of precision bombs and missile defense? Under what circumstances might we use nuclear weapons? And how does the proliferation of nuclear weapons by North Korea and Iran affect America's nuclear policy? With his deep understanding of the technology and politics of nuclear arms, Younger challenges us to join a new debate on the future of the ultimate weapon.

Perhaps no scientific breakthrough has shaped the course of human history as much as the harnessing of the atom. Yet the twentieth century might have turned out entirely differently had this powerful technology stayed under the control of Great Britain, whose scientists spearheaded the Allies’ nuclear arms program at the outset of World War II. As award-winning science historian Graham Farmelo reveals in Churchill’s Bomb, Britain’s supposedly visionary leader remained unconvinced of the potentially earth-shattering implications of his physicists’ research. Churchill ultimately shared Britain’s nuclear secrets with?and ceded its initiative to?America, whose successful development and deployment of an atomic bomb placed the United States in a position of supreme power at the dawn of the Nuclear Age. A groundbreaking investigation of the twentieth century’s most important scientific discovery, Churchill’s Bomb reveals the secret history of the weapon that transformed modern geopolitics.

The author of Fast Food Nation presents a minute-by-minute account of an H-bomb accident that nearly caused a nuclear disaster, examining other near misses and what the author perceives as America's growing susceptibility to a catastrophic event. Reprint. A best-selling NYT Notable Book of 2013. 200,000 first printing.