Twenty-four minutes.
That’s how long it would take—just 1,440 seconds—for a nuclear warhead to travel from North Korea to the largest nuclear power plant in California, where it could set off a chain reaction of events that bring human civilization back to the Stone Age. It’s a situation that may seem, to most, inconceivable. Yet, it’s one that author Annie Jacobsen plays out with disconcerting details in her new book, Nuclear War: A Scenario, which walks readers through what is known of the United States’ secret emergency protocols in the event of global Armageddon. “Since the end of World War II, the US government has been preparing for, and rehearsing plans for, a General Nuclear War,” she writes. “A nuclear World War III that is guaranteed to leave, at minimum, 2 billion dead.”
It starts, Jacobson explains, with a radar screen blip, touching off a chaotic countdown in which the president—and their uppermost military advisers—must decide if, when, where, and how to retaliate. The federal choreography from there is profound, demanding operational perfection from staff in countless agencies tasked with missile interception, international diplomacy, disaster response, and continuity of government—all in a haze of incomplete information. “Nuclear war,” as she argues, “robs man of reason.”
Pentagon employees note how its center looks like a bull’s-eye.Library of Congress, Theodor Horydczak.
In an interview with Vanity Fair, which has been edited for length and clarity, Jacobsen sounds the alarm about everything from Vladimir Putin’s nuclear saber-rattling to the “gaping holes” in America’s defense technology, and the chilling implications of a second Donald Trump presidency. “If you have a ‘mad king’ ruler in office,” she tells me, “it would behoove the entire world to make clear that that mad king behavior is unacceptable.”
Vanity Fair: From my vantage point, nuclear war has been a much hotter topic this year than in the recent past. Of course, in Hollywood, we had Oppenheimer, but there’s also been a lot of nuclear fear around Russia’s war in Ukraine. You probably started researching the book well before all this. What led you to want to dive into this topic specifically?
Annie Jacobsen: How many sources have said to me with chest-swelling pride that they dedicated their lives to preventing a nuclear World War III. And this out of the mouths of, like, the now deceased first director of science and technology at the CIA. You know, very high-level, upper-echelon, top-tier national security people proud that they prevented World War III. And I would always be confronted with this idea of deterrence, also known as prevention. In the former administration with President Trump, I heard his rhetoric—“fire and fury” comes to mind—and thought for the first time in my reporting career, My God, what if deterrence failed? And it stems a little from the “madman theory,” which is sort of entwined in nuclear nonproliferation issues. So, I then put that question to some of my sources. (And again, I’m talking about people who advise the president in the event of this god-awful situation.) And I was shocked that people were very forthcoming with me. I suddenly found myself on Zoom with people like former secretary of defense Bill Perry. So, there, my reporting began. And, of course, you are absolutely right on point because, my God, I never expected it to be headline news. You know, for Vladimir Putin to be, in the most terrible way, promoting the reading of my book because my book demonstrates in appalling detail just how horrific nuclear war would be.