- Hardcover: 288 pages
- Publisher: Bantam Dell Pub Group (Trd); 1st Anchor Books ed edition (Oct 1997)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0385485603
- ISBN-13: 978-0385485609
- Product Dimensions: 24.1 x 16.5 x 2.8 cm
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 3,089,656 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- See Complete Table of Contents
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Product Description
Product Description
When the Soviet Union collapsed, the cold war may have come to an end. But the deadly Soviet nuclear arsenal--thousands of warheads and hundreds of tons of plutonium--continues to sit virtually unguarded, presenting the world with a new and even more terrifying nuclear threat. And it's not just criminals, extremists, or terrorists who are now in a position to place us all at risk.
It is also Russia's high military command, who see their colleagues in other departments making millions off the privatization of industry; and it's the officers in charge of underguarded weapons stockpiles, unable to compete with the post-Communist new rich; and it's the very guards manning the night watch, whose bellies ache from hunger. . .
From the vaults of the National Security Council to the headquarters of the mysterious Twelfth Department in the Russian Ministry of Defense, veteran journalists Andrew and Leslie Cockburn take the reader on a tour of deadly potentialities: couriers crossing Central Europe with suitcases full of materials more lethal than any virus; a Siberian warehouse littered with the raw material of twenty-three thousand Hiroshimas; the fanatical terrorist who has already built one radioactive bomb. Then it is revealed how U.S. intelligence has realized with horror that among those involved in the business of nuclear smuggling is an organization born out of the old KGB, headed by a man described by one high-ranking official as "the most dangerous man in the world."
Based on firsthand reporting, classified documents, and the personal stories of the men and women on the front lines, One Point Safe makes it frighteningly clear that we're nowhere near as safe as we'd like to think.
It is also Russia's high military command, who see their colleagues in other departments making millions off the privatization of industry; and it's the officers in charge of underguarded weapons stockpiles, unable to compete with the post-Communist new rich; and it's the very guards manning the night watch, whose bellies ache from hunger. . .
From the vaults of the National Security Council to the headquarters of the mysterious Twelfth Department in the Russian Ministry of Defense, veteran journalists Andrew and Leslie Cockburn take the reader on a tour of deadly potentialities: couriers crossing Central Europe with suitcases full of materials more lethal than any virus; a Siberian warehouse littered with the raw material of twenty-three thousand Hiroshimas; the fanatical terrorist who has already built one radioactive bomb. Then it is revealed how U.S. intelligence has realized with horror that among those involved in the business of nuclear smuggling is an organization born out of the old KGB, headed by a man described by one high-ranking official as "the most dangerous man in the world."
Based on firsthand reporting, classified documents, and the personal stories of the men and women on the front lines, One Point Safe makes it frighteningly clear that we're nowhere near as safe as we'd like to think.
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11 reviews
18 of 19 people found the following review helpful
Re: nuclear terror policy, the Emperor Has No Clothes!
4 Nov 2001
Format:Hardcover
Andrew and Leslie Cockburn, the Robert and Suzanne Massie of inside Washington, finally find a subject adequate to their awesome network of connections - the ludicrous and almost totally complete and completely needless lack of a nuclear terror policy in the United States Government during the Administrations of Bill Clinton and of George Bush the Elder.
The Cockburns treat readers of One Point Safe to the unique and dizzying perspective of Energy Department nuclear intelligence specialist and White House policy hotshot Jessica Stern, and Stern turns out to be the Boswell of the incredibly scary era we live in, in which some fifty-odd nuclear bombs which can fit inside of a suitcase are... out there somewhere, lost in Soviet nuclear accounting and waiting for someome like Osama bin Laden to pick them up at a garage sale somewhere in Kazahkstan and use them on the United States.
This book had my complete attention when I picked it up ... long before the horrors of September 11th, the Cockburns managed to overcome any remaining doubt in my mind that America has been a sitting duck for nuclear terrorists for decades.
The authors of One Point Safe overcome even their own overblown journalistic prose, delivering an utterly terrifying true story about the complex network through which it still is presumably all too possible to buy weapons-grade nuclear material, possibly even still possible to buy assembled nuclear weapons, if only you have a few millions of dollars and the right contacts.
I won't spoil the surprise after upsetting surprise in this book, but if you are at all concerned about not becomning a martyr to the stunning stupidity and political corruption which has made nuclear terror against the United States an all-too-real possibility (even a probablility, now) then buy and read One Point Safe. Borrowing it from the library won't be good enough, you'll want to go back to this book again and again, if only to make reality checks of the false reassurances which still manage to ooze from Washington after the drastic remodeling of the Pentagon and the World Trade Center by airliners in 2001. Perhaps we need to re-read it just before each Election Day as well.
This book is an invaluable part of the thinking man's survival kit.
The Cockburns treat readers of One Point Safe to the unique and dizzying perspective of Energy Department nuclear intelligence specialist and White House policy hotshot Jessica Stern, and Stern turns out to be the Boswell of the incredibly scary era we live in, in which some fifty-odd nuclear bombs which can fit inside of a suitcase are... out there somewhere, lost in Soviet nuclear accounting and waiting for someome like Osama bin Laden to pick them up at a garage sale somewhere in Kazahkstan and use them on the United States.
This book had my complete attention when I picked it up ... long before the horrors of September 11th, the Cockburns managed to overcome any remaining doubt in my mind that America has been a sitting duck for nuclear terrorists for decades.
The authors of One Point Safe overcome even their own overblown journalistic prose, delivering an utterly terrifying true story about the complex network through which it still is presumably all too possible to buy weapons-grade nuclear material, possibly even still possible to buy assembled nuclear weapons, if only you have a few millions of dollars and the right contacts.
I won't spoil the surprise after upsetting surprise in this book, but if you are at all concerned about not becomning a martyr to the stunning stupidity and political corruption which has made nuclear terror against the United States an all-too-real possibility (even a probablility, now) then buy and read One Point Safe. Borrowing it from the library won't be good enough, you'll want to go back to this book again and again, if only to make reality checks of the false reassurances which still manage to ooze from Washington after the drastic remodeling of the Pentagon and the World Trade Center by airliners in 2001. Perhaps we need to re-read it just before each Election Day as well.
This book is an invaluable part of the thinking man's survival kit.
5 of 6 people found the following review helpful
An excellent read
5 Jun 2003
Format:Hardcover
I purchased this book some time ago, thinking the title referred to a story about an inherent safety deficiency in early US Nuclear Weapons Systems.
In fact, the book is the account of Project Sapphire, the undertaking of removing a large amount of the former Soviet Unions' poorly - guarded stock of fissile materials. The book, reading like excellent fiction, is chock full of facts and trivia; enough to satisfy even the most technically - oriented reader. I highly recommend it for anyone interested in nuclear or nonproliferation issues. In fact, it was the basis for the movie " the Peacemaker ".
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Outstanding Book That Should Scare the Daylight Out of You
22 Oct 1997
Format:Hardcover
In an era of world peace and the new world order, this book highlights the risks of the post cold war world and the threat of nuclear terrorism. The stories about the known capture of nuclear material outside the borders of the former USSR are enough to make you think about resurrecting your parents bomb shelter plans. When you contemplate the cases that are not known it makes you want to leave the planet.
I found myself engrossed in the book to the point of having to return to reality and to remember that the accounts in the book are not fictional. SCARY! A must read.
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