Published in Germany in 2012, this informative book—written, incidentally, by the son of acclaimed filmmaker Werner Herzog—looks at the seriocomic side of the history of nuclear experimentation after WWII. It’s a story, in large part, about unintended consequences. A revolutionary way of extracting uranium 235 from natural uranium in the 1940s made it possible, decades later, for pretty much any country—including some you would really, really not want to have this ability—to build a nuclear bomb. Military surveillance satellites, powered by small atomic power plants, were put into orbit in the 1960s; when one of them malfunctioned in the late ’70s, it came within one orbit of crashing into New York City (instead it landed, relatively harmlessly, in the Canadian northwest). Nuclear testing in Nevada in the early 1950s rendered an area of neighboring Utah highly radioactive, causing widespread cancer in the inhabitants of a small town, including, collaterally (and perhaps apocryphally), some temporary residents—the cast and crew of one of the worst movies ever made, The Conqueror (with John Wayne, who would later die of cancer, as Genghis Khan). Alternately funny and scary but overall mostly scary, the book reminds us just how frightening the Cold War really was. --David Pitt
Review
Praise for A Short History of Nuclear Folly
“The author and son of filmmaker Werner Herzog presents a sardonic, little-known history of misguided, accidental and irresponsible uses of nuclear technology.”
—Los Angeles Times
“Shocking and vitally important.”
—Publishers Weekly
“Unflinching . . . Herzog’s use of the word ‘folly’ is an understatement.”
—The Village Voice
“It is arguably not possible to imagine human stupidity on a grander scale than what Rudolph Herzog has stockpiled in his new book.”
—The Brooklyn Rail
“A well-written, if tragic, account of how little nuclear weapons testers knew or were willing to account for.”
—Vice
“Amusing . . . interesting and occasionally eye-popping.”
—Survival (The Journal of the International Institute for Strategic Studies)
“Herzog’s study is a shocking and vitally important reminder that we live in an unsteady nuclear age.”
—Publishers Weekly
“Looks at the seriocomic side of the history of nuclear experimentation after WWII . . . Alternately funny and scary but overall mostly scary, the book reminds us just how frightening the Cold War really was.”
—Booklist
“Darkly funny low points in our nuclear past as well . . . more of-the-moment prognostications of what we can expect from our nuclear neighbors.”
—Toronto Star
“For a book about such a heavy subject, A Short History of Nuclear Folly, keeps it quick and snappy and, dare I say, entertaining.”
—Philadelphia Review of Books
“An eclectic, innovative approach to the bureaucratization of creativity during the Cold War.”
—The Los Angeles Review of Books
“Meticulously researched and thrillingly told—reading this is as informative as it is spine-chillingly entertaining.”
—Die Zeit
“A haunting and well phrased warning.”
—Focus Online
“Rudolph Herzog’s collection of the most incredible stories reads as a tour through the most polluted places on the globe.”
—Frankfurter Rundschau
Praise for Rudolph Herzog’s Dead Funny: Telling Jokes in Hitler’s Germany
“A concise, compelling book.” —The Independent (UK)
“Herzog, the son of the film-maker Werner Herzog, shares his father’s curious and mordant wit.” —The Financial Times
“Dead Funny isn’t just a book of wildly off-limits humor. Rather, it’s a fascinating, heartbreaking look at power dynamics, propaganda, and the human hunger for catharsis.”
—The Atlantic, Best Books of 2012
About the Author
Rudolph Herzog is the author of Dead Funny: Humor in Hitler’s Germany. His documentary on humor in the Third Reich, Laughing with Hitler, scored top audience ratings on German Channel 1 and was also broadcast on the BBC. He is the son of the celebrated filmmaker Werner Herzog. A documentary by Rudolph Herzog based on A Short History of Nuclear Folly was released in 2014. He is currently filming How to Sell a War.
Jefferson Chase is one of the foremost translators of German history. He has translated Wolfgang Schivelbusch, Thomas Mann, and Götz Aly, among many other writers.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Did you know?
• Edward Teller, the “father of the H-Bomb,” relentlessly promoted a plan to use 300 nukes to build a second Panama Canal.
• Atomic technology ended up in many places where it didn’t belong: Reactors were used to power satellites, some of which crash-landed and triggered nuclear emergencies. A plutonium battery was also installed at the top of the Himalayas . . . and lost.
• There’s a derelict research reactor in the middle of Kinshasa, Congo, which was built by an eccentric Belgian missionary. The reactor is falling apart, and several uranium fuel rods have been stolen.
• John Wayne died of cancer, as did 46 members of the crew of The Conqueror, a notoriously bad B-movie shot in a contaminated canyon near the Nevada nuclear testing range.
• About 40 nuclear weapons were lost during the Cold War, some in populated areas in the U.S. Some almost triggered, others were never retrieved.
• Nazi scientist Gernot Zippe was captured by the Soviets and forced to build the uranium centrifuge, which was used by Iran, Pakistan and North Korea to build bombs.
