In this work of history, science and politics, Richard Rhodes, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Making of the Atomic Bomb, tells for the first time the secret story of how and why the hydrogen bomb was made; traces the path by which "the Bomb," the supreme artifact of twentieth-century science and technology, became the defining issue of the Cold War; and reveals how close the world came to nuclear destruction before the United States and the former Soviet Union learned the lesson of nuclear stalemate.

Includes bibliographical references (p. [691]-703) and index.

Prologue: Deliveries. -- pt. 1. A choice between worlds. 'A smell of nuclear powder' ; Diffusion ; 'Material of immense value' ; A Russian connection ; 'Super lend-lease' ; Rendezvous ; 'Mass production' ; Explosions ; 'Provide the bomb' ; A pretty good description. -- pt. 2. New weapons added to the arsenals. Transitions ; Peculiar sovereignties ; Changing history ; F-1 ; Modus Vivendi ; Sailing near the wind ; Getting down to business ; 'This Buck Rogers universe' ; First lightning ; 'Gung-ho for the super' -- pt. 3. Scorpions in a bottle. Fresh horrors ; Lessons of limited war ; Hydrodynamic lenses and radiation mirrors ; Mike ; Powers of retaliation ; In the matter of J. Robert Oppenheimer ; Scorpions in a bottle. -- Epilogue: 'The gradual removal of prejudices'