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The radioactive plume from the bomb dropped on Nagasaki, dropped by a US B-29 superfortress Bockscar.

Slave to the Bomb

We don’t need to imagine a world ravaged by nuclear war – we’re already living in it.
by Erik Baker via The Saturday Evening Post on March 28, 2024
Mushroom cloud of nuclear bomb.

Forgetting the Apocalypse

Why our nuclear fears faded – and why that’s dangerous.
by Daniel Immerwahr via The Guardian on May 12, 2022
Illustration of John von Neumann surrounded by mathematical formulas, by Valentin Pavageau

John von Neumann Thought He Had the Answers

The father of game theory helped develop the atom bomb—and thought he could calculate when to use it.
by Samanth Subramanian via The New Republic on March 8, 2022
Dr. Strange Love, from the Stanley Kubrick film of the same name

Watching the End of the World

The Doomsday Clock is set to two minutes to midnight. So why don't we make movies about nuclear war anymore?
by Stephen Phelan via Boston Review on June 11, 2019
partner

The Year The World Almost Blew Up – And Nobody Noticed

On November 9, 1983, the Soviet Union nearly ordered a full pre-emptive nuclear strike against the US and Western Europe.
by Taylor Downing via HNN on May 27, 2018

The People Who Would Survive Nuclear War

How an appendix to an obscure government report helped launch a blockbuster and push back the possibility of atomic war.
by Alexis C. Madrigal via The Atlantic on January 25, 2018

Is It Time for a 21st-Century Version of ‘The Day After’?

It’s beginning to feel like the 1980s all over again.
by Marsha Gordon via The Conversation on January 25, 2018
Daniel Ellsberg

Daniel Ellsberg Is Still Thinking About the Papers He Didn’t Get to Leak

The man who leaked the Pentagon Papers is back with a new book, The Doomsday Machine.
by Andrew Rice via Intelligencer on November 28, 2017

What if the President Ordering a Nuclear Attack isn’t Sane?

There are fewer checks in the system than you might think.
by Michael S. Rosenwald via Retropolis on August 9, 2017

What Good Is Fear?

As we face down the threat of climate change, it’s worth considering how fear of nuclear war has spurred humanity into action.
by Rebecca Onion via Slate on July 20, 2017

The U.S. Contemplated a Nuclear Confrontation in North Korea in 1953.

The Trump Administration can - and should - learn from that moment.
by David E. Kaiser via TIME on April 14, 2017

The World Almost Ended One Week in 1983

In 1983, the U.S. simulated a nuclear war with Russia—and narrowly avoided starting a real one. We might not be so lucky next time.
by Nate Jones, J. Peter Scoblic via Slate on April 13, 2017

Neutron Sunday

In 1956, Ed Sullivan showed America what nuclear war looks like. We were never the same again.
by Donald Fagen via Slate on October 14, 2016
A dairy farm near Charlottesville (Library of Congress).

'Charlottesville': A Government-Commissioned Story About Nuclear War

A fictional 1979 account of how the small Virginia city would weather an all-out nuclear exchange between the U.S. and U.S.S.R.
by Nan Randall via The Atlantic on January 1, 1979

The Naval Scientist Who Wanted To Know How Football Players Would Survive Nuclear War

It wouldn’t take much, the fan explained, just some radioactive material inside the players, who would then undergo a physical examination.
by Chris Roberts via Defector on January 24, 2025
Depictions of possible causes of apocalypse through war, disaster, and climate change.

Apocalypse, Constantly

Humans love to imagine their own demise.
by Adam Kirsch via The Atlantic on December 31, 2024
Photographs of historian Zachary Schrag and his father Philip Schrag in front of a Nuclear War plan background

Two Generations of Nuclear Hopes and Nuclear Fears

A conversation with historian Zachary Schrag and his father Philip Schrag about their multi-generational encounters with nuclear threats.
by Alex Wellerstein via Doomsday Machines on October 4, 2024
Civil Defense warning.

The Occasion Instant, 1961

What can be learned from how people responded to false alarms about nuclear war in the late 1950s?
by Alex Wellerstein via Doomsday Machines on September 11, 2024
A hallway in the Greenbriar bunker, lined with steel and cement walls

The Town That Kept Its Nuclear Bunker a Secret for Three Decades

The people of White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia, helped keep the Greenbrier resort's bunker—designed to hold the entirety of Congress—hidden for 30 years.
by Emily Matchar via Smithsonian on April 9, 2024
J. Robert Oppenheimer lecturing in front of chalkboard.

Oppenheimer’s Second Coming

Japanese were interested when Oppenheimer visited Japan as an honored guest in 1960. Will they be also interested in the Nolan film released today in Japan?
by Gregory Kulacki via Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists on March 28, 2024
Frank Oppenheimer holding prism up to face

The Atomic Bomb, Exile and a Test of Brotherly Bonds: Robert & Frank Oppenheimer

A rift in thinking about who should control powerful new technologies sent the brothers on diverging paths.
by KC Cole via Knowable Magazine on March 5, 2024
Israeli artillerymen plug their ears while laying down a barrage on Syrian positions.

The Arab-Israeli War 50 Years Ago Brought Us Close to Nuclear Armageddon

As world leaders scramble to prevent the Israel-Hamas war from escalating, it is often forgotten just how close the Yom Kippur War came to all-out nuclear war.
by Gordon F. Sander via Washington Post on October 10, 2023
Oppenheimer movie poster.

Fact, Fiction, and the Father of the Bomb

On Christopher Nolan’s “Oppenheimer.”
by Alex Wellerstein via Los Angeles Review of Books on August 30, 2023
original

Reviewing the Oppenheimer Reviews

Christopher Nolan's blockbuster has generated a torrent of historical commentary about the birth of nuclear weapons. Is there something missing from the conversation?
by Kathryn Ostrofsky on August 25, 2023
Daniel Ellsberg speaking to the press.

Daniel Ellsberg’s Life Beyond the Pentagon Papers

After revealing the government’s lies about Vietnam, Ellsberg spent six decades as an anti-nuclear activist, getting arrested in civil-disobedience protests.
by Ben Bradlee Jr. via The New Yorker on June 16, 2023
Richard Nixon discusses Vietnam with National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger and Deputy National Security Advisor Al Haig at Camp David, 1972.
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The "Madman Theory" Was Quintessential Nixon

The rash ruse was central to Nixon’s strategy to fight the Cold War, and can also tell us a good deal about the famously elusive ex-president himself.
by Zachary Jonathan Jacobson via HNN on March 26, 2023
Castro and Kruschev.
partner

Putin’s Nuclear Threats Evoke Cold War Tensions of the Cuban Missile Crisis

Russia’s recent nuclear threats have revived Cold War animosity with roots in the Cuban missile crisis.
via Retro Report on February 23, 2023
President Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping shake hands at the Group of 20 summit.
partner

Diplomacy Defused Cold War Crises. It Can Help Again Today.

The type of quiet, personal, informed diplomacy advocated by George Kennan can reduce tensions with China and Russia.
by Frank Costigliola via Made By History on February 10, 2023
The door and interior tunnel of the Nantucket fallout shelter.

Inside JFK's Secret Doomsday Bunker

The president's Nantucket nuclear fallout shelter could become a National Historic Landmark—but efforts to preserve its history have stalled.
by Jenn Morson via Smithsonian on February 6, 2023
People in Ukrainian subway station converted into bomb shelter with makeshift beds and kitchen.

The History of the Family Bomb Shelter

Throughout history, the family bomb shelter has reflected the shifting optimism, anxieties, and cynicism of the nuclear age.
by Thomas Bishop via Zócalo Public Square on April 18, 2022
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