Bought off the cuff at the IWM Duxford museum shop, this turned out to be the most terrifying book I’ve ever read – by far.
It walks minute-by-minute through the hypothetical actions and impacts following a surprise nuclear launch by North Korea, initially attacking the US with a single intercontinental ballistic missile. This rapidly escalates into total nuclear war; an almost certain result based on the overwhelming majority of war game simulations run across the decades.
The descriptions of actions and decisions taken are thoroughly researched and sourced from numerous people involved in actual planning; that’s the truly scary element, everything that takes place has some form of precedent, be that a declassified plan, a strategy, or a previous near miss.
Then there are the vivid depictions of the weapons themselves and the utter destruction they caused. The scale of the explosions, the subsequent fall out, the ensuing nuclear winter; every single stage is horrific.
The timescale for near destruction of humanity is measured in mere minutes; another hideous insight the book conveys is the ridiculous lack of time to think and react in these civilisation changing moments. Leaders (who are realistically woefully unprepared for the situation) have just a handful of minutes to process limited and imperfect information before making decisions that will result in billions of deaths.
And looking at the utterly inappropriate people that currently sit in these geopolitical leadership positions really strips any last element of hope.
Highly recommended but prepare to come away consumed by dread.
