Listen free for 30 days

Listen with offer

  • The Twilight of the Bombs

  • Recent Challenges, New Dangers, and the Prospects for a World Without Nuclear Weapons
  • By: Richard Rhodes
  • Narrated by: Robertson Dean
  • Length: 13 hrs and 43 mins
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars (19 ratings)
Offer ends May 1st, 2024 11:59PM GMT. Terms and conditions apply.
£7.99/month after 3 months. Renews automatically.
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection - including bestsellers and new releases.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, celeb exclusives, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection - including bestsellers and new releases.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, celeb exclusives, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
The Twilight of the Bombs cover art

The Twilight of the Bombs

By: Richard Rhodes
Narrated by: Robertson Dean
Get this deal Try for £0.00

Pay £99p/month. After 3 months pay £7.99/month. Renews automatically. See terms for eligibility.

£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.

Buy Now for £12.99

Buy Now for £12.99

Pay using card ending in
By completing your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use and authorise Audible to charge your designated card or any other card on file. Please see our Privacy Notice, Cookies Notice and Interest-based Ads Notice.

Listeners also enjoyed...

Energy cover art
My Journey at the Nuclear Brink cover art
Confront and Conceal cover art
The Dead Hand cover art
The Bomb cover art
The Apocalypse Factory cover art
Gangsterismo cover art
The Evolution of Nuclear Strategy cover art
Exceptional cover art
Playing to the Edge cover art
The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich cover art
The War State cover art
Drift cover art
America's Secret War cover art
Intelligence Matters cover art
Known and Unknown cover art

Summary

The culminating volume in Richard Rhodes’s monumental and prizewinning history of nuclear weapons, offering the first comprehensive narrative of the challenges faced in a post-Cold War age.

The past 20 years have transformed our relationship with nuclear weapons drastically. With extraordinary depth of knowledge and understanding, Rhodes makes clear how the five original nuclear powers - Russia, Great Britain, France, China, and especially the United States - have struggled with new realities. He shows us how the stage was set for a second tragic war when Iraq secretly destroyed its nuclear infrastructure and reveals the real reasons George W. Bush chose to fight a second war in Iraq. We see how the efforts of US weapons labs laid the groundwork for nuclear consolidation in the former Soviet Union, how and why South Africa secretly built and then destroyed a small nuclear arsenal, and how Jimmy Carter’s private diplomacy prevented another Korean War.

We also see how the present day represents a nuclear turning point and what hope exists for our future. Rhodes assesses the emerging threat of nuclear terrorism and offers advice on how our complicated relationships with North Korea and South Asia should evolve. Finally, he imagines what a post-nuclear world might look like, suggesting what might make it possible.

Powerful and persuasive, The Twilight of the Bombs is an essential work of contemporary history.

©2010 Richard Rhodes (P)2010 Random House

Critic reviews

“Absorbing . . . Rhodes makes the technical issues lucid and accessible, and the tale also has intrigue and suspense, heroes (Jimmy Carter) and villains (the Bush administration). It’s a story of deceit, corrupt politics, and diplomatic half-measures, but also of improbable outbreaks of common sense and far-sightedness....Rhodes shows us the heartening spectacle of humanity slowly turning away from the abyss.” ( Publishers Weekly)
“Since the publication of The Making of the Atomic Bomb...Rhodes has owned the story of nuclear weapons.... [ The Twilight of the Bombs is] a skillful assessment of the transformation of nuclear weapons from the so-called guardians of our security during the Cold War to the burden and catastrophic threat they pose today....Informed and eloquent.” ( Kirkus)
“Impassioned....Rhodes’ formidable nuclear knowledge, readably presented, will convey his moral opposition to nuclear deterrence to a sizable audience.” ( Booklist)

What listeners say about The Twilight of the Bombs

Average customer ratings
Overall
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    11
  • 4 Stars
    7
  • 3 Stars
    1
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    0
Performance
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    12
  • 4 Stars
    2
  • 3 Stars
    1
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    0
Story
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    12
  • 4 Stars
    2
  • 3 Stars
    1
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    0

Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.