David Holloway (1) (1943–)

The sort of stodgy and boring prose you'd expect from an academic; nonetheless the subject matter is fairly interesting.

This is an account from 1982 of what the Cold War arms race looked like. Interesting to me was that, even given when it was written and without the hindsight we have now, it strongly implied that the US, substantially more so than the USSR, was the villain when it came to nuclear weapons. The US comes across as more interested in using nuclear weapons than just maintaining them as a deterrent, as more interested in making threats implicitly backed by nuclear weapons, as more stupid about constantly changing its nuclear support technology (MIRVs, GPS positioning, ABM systems) so as to undercut MAD.… (mais)

Absolutely wonderful book on a remarkably fascinating topic. Holloway makes excellent use of the information made available after the fall of the USSR. The joy of Holloway's telling of the Soviet bomb project is that it is completely scientist centric, describing what it was like to makes discoveries in the highly politicized environment of Stalin's Russia. While Holloway is very honest about the role that spying played in expiditing the
bomb for the Soviets, he is equally honest about how little the Soviet scientists themselves were aware of the information that the generals, and a few select scientists had. The role of those who were informed was not to dictate what should be done, but rather to steer spontaneously generated discussion towards the proven (i.e., American) path. Critical reading for anyone interested in the history of the atom bomb.… (mais)