New Book Analysis and Notes

I finished reading Paul Boyer's By the Bomb's Early Light. Notes and references here. The book describes a world of people scrambling to catch up with the changes they wrought. Quite relevant today. I don't necessarily recommend reading it straight through- a lot of material from the scientists and other fringe peace groups can be skipped. The best chapters are the first on public reaction and the last on government disinformation. Funny to see that Gen. Groves personally chose Dagwood as the official cartoon character of propaganda.

New book

I couldn't find the Willis book at the library, so I backed up. Am currently reading By the Bomb's Early Light, by Paul Boyer. I remember this book from college, not because I read it but because it seemed like everyone I knew had it on their coffee table. The hip 80's cover stood out.

I picked it up from a reference by Stewart Udall's Myths of August. As I recall, many of Udall's citations for whacked out projects (atomic airplane, nuclear dynamite, rearranging the Mediterranean Sea) came from this book.

My first-first thought after a couple chapters is that the bomb had a 9/11 type effect on America, people were terrified that the end of the world was nigh. Remarkable considering we had a monopoly on the technology and had just used it to liquidate an enemy.

My second-first thought is that the cold war could be interpreted as America's response to the USSR's rejection of American hegemony, a hegemony the U.S. sought in desperation out of fear of the bomb. With the end of the cold war people took it for granted that the threat had passed. Then 9/11, and we party like it's 1945.