If you're not familiar with these books, here's the basic synopsis of each: Rosenberg takes a look at three primary groups of people who all have a stake in running the Middle East and world domination--the Islamic Radicals, Islamic Reformers, and Christian Revivalists, while Wyden's book details what its title and subtitle suggest--the ambition and anguish over the start of the atomic age.
Now, you may ask, why do these two books work so well together? The answer is simple and chilling: Though they were written 25 years apart, Wyden throws a magnifying glass on the human complexities and failures to regulate (or otherwise refuse to start) the atomic age, and Rosenberg dives beneath the surface of world politics to illuminate one of the darkest and most dangerous times ahead for the world since the end of WWII.
Consider these facts from each book:
(Day One)--The hundreds of scientists fanned out across the country and eventually (mostly) gathered in Los Alamos did not know exactly what they were unleashing. Their test plutonium bomb detonated in Alamogordo, NM, just days before the Hiroshima bomb drop, shocked them all. One scientist was temporarily blinded from 20 miles away (watching through a truck windshield). The bomb's fireball, "infinitely brighter than the sun, its temperature 10,000 times greater, began an eight-mile ascent, warming the faces of the men . . . turning night into day for more than a hundred miles." Scientists and a few army personnel had previously issued warnings, asked for a peaceful demonstration, or no use at all, of the bomb that would forever change the world. But in what Wyden calls the "rush to decision," these protests were swept aside in favor of using the bomb on Japan.
(Inside the Revolution): America was "asleep" according to past CIA operatives and leaders, when Iran became the first Islamic state ever in 1979. We thought it didn't matter. But over the years, Iran's leaders have radicalized Islam, and they mince no words when it comes to what they want: world domination, and a world without Israel and the United States, which they label "the Little Satan" and "the Great Satan" respectively. Ahmadinejad has said, "Israel must be wiped off the map." Osama bin Laden, who has so far eluded capture, has made it plain he considers the acquisition of weapons of mass destruction--and specifically, nuclear weapons--"a religious duty." The audience for radical Islam's agenda has been told to "imagine a world without the United States."
We've been here before. The Cold War and the Cuban Missile Crisis brought us to the brink of destruction. But the key difference seems to be that a sense of annihilation, a real fear of death on a mass scale, stopped the nightmare from unfolding. Those who would radicalize Islam for their own ends believe dying for Allah is a great honor--the highest honor--and life doesn't mean anything to the radicalized mind. It's simply a means to an end. Therein, of course, lies the danger.
As I watch today's headlines, Ahmadinejad, the radical, and Mir Hossein Mousavi, the reformist, are both claiming victory, a situation bound to destabilize Iran even further.
Just seconds after the Alamogordo detonation, Kenneth Bainbridge, the chief physicist at the test site, "sounded the first public note of regret," according to Wyden. He had on his mind the recent destruction of Britain by the Germans, and said, "Oppie, now we're all sons of bitches." Had we handled the start of the nuclear age differently, Bainbridge would have never had to utter those telling words. And Iran's elections wouldn't grip the world they way they do right now.
