"Right of Boom, forces us to consider what just one atomic explosion might mean for humanity’s future."

◼ Nuclear Terrorism in America - Tom Rogan/Washington Free Beacon

Benjamin Schwartz deserves much credit. Annihilating the claim that terrorism isn’t an existential threat to America, Schwartz’s new book, Right of Boom, forces us to consider what just one atomic explosion might mean for humanity’s future. Even better for a book about public policy, he writes with accessibility for serious readers, neither talking down to us nor assuming that we have technical expertise in his field.

Schwartz, a national security analyst at the Department of Defense, paints a picture of mayhem in the aftermath of such an explosion. “On an otherwise calm and uneventful morning, a small nuclear weapon explodes in downtown Washington, DC.… The casualty count rises to over a hundred thousand, and the destruction is measured in hundreds of billions of dollars.”

Discussing the history of the nuclear age, Schwartz seeks to educate the reader about the fact that the development of nuclear weapons is not cutting-edge science, nor is it nearly as complicated as commonly assumed. As he puts it, “Iran is a large and wealthy country; Iranian scientists are capable; and the atomic bomb is 1940s technology.” Nuclear proliferation is an inevitability we simply have to admit: “The greatest danger remains the great discovery—the knowledge that can’t be unlearned.”...KEEP READING