American Nukes

Command and Control, by Eric Schlosser

Command and Control is two books in one. The main story tells of an accident at a Titan II ICBM silo in Damascus, Arkansas. Around that Schlosser offers perhaps the clearest, most readable introduction to the history of nuclear weapons and the questions about their safety and control. If you read one book on nuclear weapons, read Command and Control.

The Wizards of Armageddon, by Fred Kaplan

Wizards takes you behind the scenes to uncover the planning process to control and use nuclear weapons. Jaw-dropping in places (the section on the SIOP nuclear attack plan is one such place), Kaplan’s book shows why so many nuclear bombs were built and why nuclear war should not be left to the generals. Also see his book The Bomb: Presidents, Generals, and the Secret History of Nuclear War, a companion book in a way and also highly recommended.

The Making of the Atomic Bomb, by Richard Rhodes

If there is a standard text in the history of nuclear weapons, this is it. Richard Rhodes won a well-deserved Pulitzer Prize The Making of the Atomic Bomb which covers the early discoveries that led to fission, the Manhattan Project, and more. I read this cover to cover in 1987 when it first came out as a twenty-two-year-old and it still holds up today. A best-selling book, Rhodes also wrote several other books on nuclear weapons including the follow-on Dark Sun: The Making of the Hydrogen Bomb, and Arsenals of Folly: The Making of the Nuclear Arms Race.

First-hand accounts of the Hiroshima bombing

John Hersey’s classic Hiroshima was first published in The New Yorker in August 1946–just a few weeks after the bombing. The book version was out before the end of the year. It follows a handful of survivors of the atomic attack and was a major publishing event then and is still in print today.

The first of a promised two-volume set, Hiroshima: The Last Witness by M.G. Sheftall, is a far more detailed recounting by those who experienced the attack. Incredibly gruesome at times, it is a compelling book that makes the human cost of a nuclear strike tangible. The second book, on Nagasaki, is scheduled to be out in late 2025.

How to Photograph an Atomic Bomb, by Peter Kuran

Did you know that the Air Force had its own film studio, located in the famed Laurel Canyon in the Hollywood Hills? Lookout Mountain made films of surprising quality and did especially interesting work photographing nuclear tests. A labor of love (if that is the right phrase) from animator Peter Kuran, How to Photograph an Atomic Bomb is a delightful peek behind the scenes for anyone interested in the challenges in photographing nuclear explosions. At Atom Central, Kuran’s site, the book appears to be out of print but check with them to see if there are additional copies or another press run on the way.

Manhattan Project Books

Oppenheimer gets all the credit but he and his team were only part of the atomic bomb development effort and maybe not even the most challenging part. Leslie Groves was the head of the Manhattan Project (not Oppenheimer, as many believe) and he wrote a book about his experiences, Now It Can Be Told: The Story of the Manhattan Project. Overseeing the project and guiding it to success was a complex task and its worth learning about in Grove’s own words.

Completely overshadowed by Oppenheimer’s fame, Kenneth Nichols may have had the most difficult job of all–to run the operations that produced the nuclear material for the bomb. It was the difficulty is producing the right kind of uranium and plutonium in sufficient quantities that set the pace for the bomb effort (and the great obstacle that prevented Nazi Germany from building their own bomb). The Road to Trinity: A Personal Account of How America’s Nuclear Policies Were Made, tells the story from Nichols’ own perspective. Unfortunately, and ironically, this book appears to out of print.

Nuclear Weapons, by Mark Wolverton

Wolverton’s book is the best short introduction to nuclear weapons and the issues they present. It’s a big-pocket-sized book, published as part of the MIT Press Essential Knowledge Series, but it covers a lot of ground. Fun fact: for American Nukes I initially intended to write straightforward, short essays to accompany each weapon instead of the more personal essays I ended up writing. What changed? I read this book, again and again encountering pages that looked like the texts I had hoped to write, only Wolverton did it better. Wolverton is also the author of Burning the Sky: Operation Argus and the Untold Story of the Cold War Nuclear Tests in Outer Space, which recounts the Cold War atomic tests in space that seem more than a little out of control–and it is a story with fresh relevance today as we move into space-based military conflicts.

Hitler: Downfall, 1939–1945, by Volker Ullrich

What is a biography of Adolf Hitler doing on this list? Something powerful. This is the second volume of Ullrich’s history of Hitler and the decision-making of the Nazi leadership in World War II and although it makes little mention of nuclear weapons (jump to page 495) a reader, asking themselves the question “Would they have?,” can only conclude that the Nazis, and any other entity possessing nuclear weapons, would always always always use them when facing major military setbacks. And maybe in other circumstances as well. A sobering and enlightening book.

Weapons Specifications Texts

Swords of Armageddon, by Chuck Hansen. Swords is a set of electronic files compiled by Hansen, mostly through Freedom of Information Act requests. It’s the mother lode of data on the US nuclear arsenal and all of the other books on this page draw from it from one degree to another. It is about three thousand pages in length (not a typo) but is, of course, searchable. Note: Hansen passed away in 2003 and I’ve read reports that the people selling his work might not be responsive. Please contact them before you send money.

U.S. Nuclear Weapons: The Secret History, by Chuck Hansen. Before Swords Hansen published his Secret History in hardback form. Though out of print it can be purchased used (which is how I got my copy). It is only 232 pages in length. Note that the book, after covering the early nuclear bombs, is organized by warhead, not by weapon. Often a particular warhead will be used in a variety of weapons systems, so this organizational strategy makes a lot of sense from a certain perspective, just not the perspective I need for American Nukes.

Atom Bombs: The Top Secret Inside Story of Little Boy and Fat Man, by John Coster-Mullen. Coster-Mullen was a truck driver, a photographer, and a dedicated amateur nuclear archeologist. He discovered many interesting things, including his important discovery that the published descriptions of Little Boy to that point were all wrong in a fundamental way. This thick, spiral-bound, self-published book also includes many photographs made by Coster-Mullen of the weapons themselves, inside and out.

A Technical History of America’s Nuclear Weapons (two volumes), by Dr. Peter A. Goetz. This book is a valuable resource on the details of the weapons in the nuclear arsenal and a nightmare to use. There’s lots of good stuff here–the combined length of both volumes is 1296 pages. Unfortunately, it is maddeningly hard to find anything. There is no index of any sort and there are no section headings which makes looking for information on a given weapon a tedious game of hunt and seek. I have the paper version–I highly recommend you not make my mistake and purchase the electronic (searchable) version instead.

Nuclear Weapons of the United States: An Illustrated History, by James N. Gibson. Covering much the same ground as the other technical weapons books on this list, Gibson’s work is organized, has an index, and uses a font in a size that is easily readable. That is reason enough to obtain it. Amply illustrated, this book is especially strong on missile systems. Note that there is a similar book by Gibson, published seven years earlier: The History of the US Nuclear Arsenal. The Illustrated History, despite the difference in the title (and change of publisher), is an updated version of that earlier book.

US Guided Missiles: The Definitive Reference Guide, by Bill Yenne

As I write this I am up to about 1960 in researching and posting on US nuclear weapons. Yenne’s book looks very promising (which is why I am including it here) but, as most of its contents are post-1960, I haven’t used it enough to say anything useful about it. Stay tuned!