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11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A MUST HAVE for your library, December 17, 2002
This review is from: Us Nuclear Weapons the Secret History (Hardcover)
I coulda sworn I wrote a review for this book. Ah, well... This book was written by Chuck Hansen in 1988. It represents the sum total of all of the releasable information on the United States Nuclear Weapons Program at that period. The volume is chock full of photographs, facts, figures, dates, places, and names. There is *NO* fluff. For many years, it has been *the* reference book on US Nuclear Weapons Systems. It explains very well the theories behind how the sytems operate, broken down into sections such as, nuclear weapons physics, arming, fuzing and firing, weapons systems types, etc. This book graces the shelves of every subject matter expert. Look at the more knowledgable articles on the subject; they all reference this book in the appendix. Unfortunately, there were only a few printings. For this reason, it has become scarce, and expensive when it does appear ( I paid ($$$) for my exc/exc HB copy). I possess just about every tome on the subject. There is no other book that covers the same ground with the same detail as this one. It simply is the encyclopedia of Nuclear Weapons Non-Sensitive / Unclassified Information.
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The foundation to US Nuclear Weapon history/design, March 25, 2006
This review is from: Us Nuclear Weapons the Secret History (Hardcover)
Mr. Hansen's book, "US Nuclear Weapons: The Secret History" has become an essential reference for this important area of national security. The diagrams, pictures and references to DOE/DoD publications is invaluable. Throughout the text, there are minor areas that cover the gray area of being unclassified to sensitive - This kind of intrigue makes it worth the read. One of the best features of the book is the tabulated lists of specific weapons design to individual weapon systems. From this I can easily know that a Mark III was the "Fat Man" and the Mk 12 fits on the top of a Minuteman ICBM. This alone makes the book valuable. One confusing aspect is the history of nuclear tests. There are very few clear tables showing test NAME, PLACE, YIELD; the info has to be gleaned from the [small-print] text. The photo spread has awesome color photos of random test shots. One photo shows the crater made by an underground shot - like USAF missileers say, "Its not the blast that kills you; its the fall to the bottom of the crater..." The ONLY drawback to this book is its OUTRAGEOUS price. I happened to obtain a good copy for $30. I can't say if you should spend hundreds of dollars to purchase - but if you to obtain it, you will definitely appreciate it.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
lots of errors, May 13, 2009
This review is from: Us Nuclear Weapons the Secret History (Hardcover)
While Mr Hansen did a good job in most aspects of the book, he made a number of glaring mistakes that should have caught. For example, the information on the B28FI bomb and the B28RI bombs was reversed, and a lot of information on the MK 7 fuzing and firing systems was totally wrong. I know because i worked on both of these weapons for a number of years. When you see errors like that, it casts doubt on the rest of the book.
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