Here, for the first time, in a brilliant, panoramic portrait by the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Making of the Atomic Bomb, is the definitive, often shocking story of the politics and the science behind the development of the hydrogen bomb and the birth of the Cold War. Based on secret files in the United States and the former Soviet Union, this monumental work of history discloses how and why the United States decided to create the bomb that would dominate world politics for more than forty years.

The Washington Post Book World

A dark tale told with gripping intensity....Chilling and brilliant. [The] authoritative and riveting sequel to [the] Pulitzer Prize-winning saga The Making of the Atomic Bomb.

San Jose Mercury News

Rhodes is a meticulous scholar, yet his tale is as riveting as any suspense thriller, replete with fascinating and bizarre characters, exotic locales, and a cliff-hanging plot. And all of it is true.

The New York Times Book Review

A book of formidable range...draws on a vast array of sources, melding previous scholarship with an abundance of fresh material....Rhodes writes with a sharp eye for anecdote, character and political context....The result is a brilliantly rich and vivid account of the Cold War.

Nature

This most rewarding book is unique in the grim grandeur of its scope, the richness and originality of its content, and its deep and humane understanding.

Angeles Times

[Dark Sun] demonstrates the same ambition; literary skill; unrelenting research; talent for portraiture; understanding of the links between science, war and politics; willingness to stand up to large historical questions; and sound judgment that distinguished Richard Rhodes's 1988 book, The Making of the Atomic Bomb. But this is the more important volume, not only because of its influence on the way we think about a half-century of world history, but because the hydrogen bomb continues to cast a shadow on the world today.

Preface to the Sloan Technology Series

Prologue: Deliveries

Part One

A Choice Between Worlds

1. 'A Smell of Nuclear Powder'

2. Diffusion

3. 'Material of Immense Value'

4. A Russian Connection

5. 'Super Lend-Lease'

6. Rendezvous

7. 'Mass Production'

8. Explosions

9. 'Provide the Bomb'

10. A Pretty Good Description

Part Two

New Weapons Added to the Arsenals

11. Transitions

12. Peculiar Sovereignties

13. Changing History

14. F-1

15. Modus Vivendi

16. Sailing Near the Wind

17. Getting Down to Business

18. 'This Buck Rogers Universe'

19. First Lightning

20. 'Gung-ho for the Super'

Part Three

Scorpions in a Bottle

21. Fresh Horrors

22. Lessons of Limited War

23. Hydrodynamic Lenses and Radiation Mirrors

24. Mike

25. Powers of Retaliation

26. In the Matter of J. Robert Oppenheimer

27. Scorpions in a Bottle

Epilogue: 'The Gradual Removal of Prejudices'

Acknowledgments

Notes

Glossary of Names

Bibliography

Index