The Dead, The Blind, the Review

Hi,

Flight delays mean more time reading stuff. I polished off two excellent non-fiction books over the weekend.

The first was The Dead Hand by David E. Hoffman. It's the story of the nuclear arms race, mostly told from the Soviet point of view. A bit earlier this year, I reviewed a book called Red Atom that talked about the Soviet nuclear program. That book was a bit of a train wreck. The Dead Hand is awesome.

The book starts in the late 70's and moves forward to the present day covering major leaders, project directors and scientists. The biographies about the various personalities is generally short and to-the-point. The focus is on what those people did and the technologies they worked on. It's a very compelling book that provides a lot of insight into what was going on during the Cold War.

Case in point, the book's title refers to a project code-named Perimeter by the Soviets. The Soviets were worried that European-based nukes would strike Moscow before the leadership could reach a fire/no fire decision on nukes. In such an event, the Soviet leadership could turn control of the missiles over to a semi-autonomous system. If the system detected that a set of criteria had been met (no contact with command, detection of nuclear explosions, etc.), a missile would be launched that would cross over the Soviet Union. This missile carried a transmitter that would cause all remaining Soviet nukes to launch for targets in the US. Essentially it was a computerized strike from beyond the grave.

That system is still in operation today.

There's also a fair amount of information on the Soviet's chemical and biological weapons programs. The biological programs in particular have never been officially acknowledged to exist by the Soviets (or the Russians) and are probably still in operation today.

The book covers a great deal about the geopolitics involved. The series of Soviet old-guard that gave way to Gorbachev and then to Yeltsin, the efforts by Thatcher and Reagan to bring the Soviets to the bargaining table. The book does a pretty good job of presenting Regan's deep-seated fears of both Communism and nuclear weapons. It's an interesting look at what was going on behind the scenes.

The book also touches upon various espionage activities employed by both sides to gain information on the other. Once again, the Soviets appear to have played the spy game much better than the Americans, but it appears as though high-level paranoia among the party leaders made it difficult for them to take full advantage of the information that was coming in. Since the Soviets were breaking international treaties and developing biological weapons then obviously the Americans were doing the exact same thing. The fact that there was no information being returned on the programs means that it was just hidden very, very well.

Finally, the book discusses the state of these programs following the collapse of the Soviet Union. There's a chapter devoted to Project Sapphire, the clandestine effort by the US to swoop in to Kazakhstan and carry off a couple tons of highly enriched uranium. The lax storage and security of dangerous materiel and the desperate economic straights of the scientists who can produce them paints a scary picture.

Overall, I really enjoyed this book and if you've any interest in the subjects above, you should probably give it a look over.

Turning away from nuclear Armageddon, let's talk about caves. I like caves. When we were learning how to write up papers in elementary school, it was caves I picked as my subject. But at my size, I'm very much an "armchair spelunker". I've taken a couple of guided tours in tourist-friendly caves, but real caving I've skipped. Still, I like reading about it and that's why I snapped up Blind Descent: The Quest to Discover the Deepest Place on Earth by James M. Tabor.

The book pretty much does what it says on the tin. It discusses the efforts by two teams, an American and a Ukrainian, to find the deepest cave in the world. The American is Bill Stone, who's been exploring the super-caves of Mexico while the Ukrainian is Alexander Klimchouk who's working cave systems in Abkhazia (the breakaway republic that Georgia and Russia fought over recently). The book discusses the multi-year (multi-decade) efforts by the two men to plumb the earth.

The book pulls no punches about the danger and discomfort of cave work. Any number of mishaps can occur and if you're not lucky enough to get killed outright, you'll wind up very far from any help. Many passageways are little more than long, skinny tubes and getting a fully mobile person through them is a challenge, let along someone who's injured. The book discusses the additional dangers of cave diving and cave digging as well as the grinding mental stress of being trapped underground.

The book recounts the triumphs and tragedies that both men and their teams experienced and it stands as a testament to the blazing willpower of the men and women who explore these caves. The book includes a number of photographic plates that give some indication of the miserable conditions of spelunking -- including a couple that are positively claustrophobia-inducing.

If you're looking for gripping real-life adventure tales, Blind Descent is an excellent choice.

later
Tom

The Dead, The Blind, the Review

Hi,

Flight delays mean more time reading stuff. I polished off two excellent non-fiction books over the weekend.

The first was The Dead Hand by David E. Hoffman. It's the story of the nuclear arms race, mostly told from the Soviet point of view. A bit earlier this year, I reviewed a book called Red Atom that talked about the Soviet nuclear program. That book was a bit of a train wreck. The Dead Hand is awesome.

The book starts in the late 70's and moves forward to the present day covering major leaders, project directors and scientists. The biographies about the various personalities is generally short and to-the-point. The focus is on what those people did and the technologies they worked on. It's a very compelling book that provides a lot of insight into what was going on during the Cold War.

Case in point, the book's title refers to a project code-named Perimeter by the Soviets. The Soviets were worried that European-based nukes would strike Moscow before the leadership could reach a fire/no fire decision on nukes. In such an event, the Soviet leadership could turn control of the missiles over to a semi-autonomous system. If the system detected that a set of criteria had been met (no contact with command, detection of nuclear explosions, etc.), a missile would be launched that would cross over the Soviet Union. This missile carried a transmitter that would cause all remaining Soviet nukes to launch for targets in the US. Essentially it was a computerized strike from beyond the grave.

That system is still in operation today.

There's also a fair amount of information on the Soviet's chemical and biological weapons programs. The biological programs in particular have never been officially acknowledged to exist by the Soviets (or the Russians) and are probably still in operation today.

The book covers a great deal about the geopolitics involved. The series of Soviet old-guard that gave way to Gorbachev and then to Yeltsin, the efforts by Thatcher and Reagan to bring the Soviets to the bargaining table. The book does a pretty good job of presenting Regan's deep-seated fears of both Communism and nuclear weapons. It's an interesting look at what was going on behind the scenes.

The book also touches upon various espionage activities employed by both sides to gain information on the other. Once again, the Soviets appear to have played the spy game much better than the Americans, but it appears as though high-level paranoia among the party leaders made it difficult for them to take full advantage of the information that was coming in. Since the Soviets were breaking international treaties and developing biological weapons then obviously the Americans were doing the exact same thing. The fact that there was no information being returned on the programs means that it was just hidden very, very well.

Finally, the book discusses the state of these programs following the collapse of the Soviet Union. There's a chapter devoted to Project Sapphire, the clandestine effort by the US to swoop in to Kazakhstan and carry off a couple tons of highly enriched uranium. The lax storage and security of dangerous materiel and the desperate economic straights of the scientists who can produce them paints a scary picture.

Overall, I really enjoyed this book and if you've any interest in the subjects above, you should probably give it a look over.

Turning away from nuclear Armageddon, let's talk about caves. I like caves. When we were learning how to write up papers in elementary school, it was caves I picked as my subject. But at my size, I'm very much an "armchair spelunker". I've taken a couple of guided tours in tourist-friendly caves, but real caving I've skipped. Still, I like reading about it and that's why I snapped up Blind Descent: The Quest to Discover the Deepest Place on Earth by James M. Tabor.

The book pretty much does what it says on the tin. It discusses the efforts by two teams, an American and a Ukrainian, to find the deepest cave in the world. The American is Bill Stone, who's been exploring the super-caves of Mexico while the Ukrainian is Alexander Klimchouk who's working cave systems in Abkhazia (the breakaway republic that Georgia and Russia fought over recently). The book discusses the multi-year (multi-decade) efforts by the two men to plumb the earth.

The book pulls no punches about the danger and discomfort of cave work. Any number of mishaps can occur and if you're not lucky enough to get killed outright, you'll wind up very far from any help. Many passageways are little more than long, skinny tubes and getting a fully mobile person through them is a challenge, let along someone who's injured. The book discusses the additional dangers of cave diving and cave digging as well as the grinding mental stress of being trapped underground.

The book recounts the triumphs and tragedies that both men and their teams experienced and it stands as a testament to the blazing willpower of the men and women who explore these caves. The book includes a number of photographic plates that give some indication of the miserable conditions of spelunking -- including a couple that are positively claustrophobia-inducing.

If you're looking for gripping real-life adventure tales, Blind Descent is an excellent choice.

later
Tom