se wrote at a time when the nuclear threat was being talked about as if it were greater than ever before, and this may have been a consequence of the Reagan era, when the Soviet Union was described as the Evil Empire and when nuclear proliferation was also taking place so that more countries had the capability to make a nuclear device. This was also the era when terrorism was rising around the world, with the added threat that a terrorist group might be able to acquire a nuclear device and use it for its own purposes. Americans were especially fearful of potential nuclear power additions such as Libya and Iran.
However, Americans turned sour on nuclear power long before that development. One important element rightly cited by Newhouse as having great import and influence throughout the nuclear age was the group of professionals who guided nuclear policy and who developed all strategy on the basis of the perceived nuclear threat. Newhouse sees them as encouraging an ideological and polarized debate instead of seeking to reduce tensions with a more re
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