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Government secrecy-intelligence is one theme of Red Cloud at Dawn, illustrated throughthe dangerous games the United States and the U.S.S.R. played over theadvent of the atom bomb. The conclusion by Princetonhistory professor Michael D. Gordin is that American intelligence was bad andthe Russians did a better job of finding what they needed, through spies andcareful analysis of open sources. Feeling the tug of democracy, the UnitedStates published many details of its atomic project, not enough to build a bombyet sufficient to provide a highly organized state with a general blueprint.Gordin has a good understanding of the duplicitous world of espionage (“Knowingthat you are not supposed to know something is often as valuable as knowingwhat it is”). The author also addresses the complexity of constructing an atombomb, a task whose high hurdles have slowed (but not stopped) the proliferationof nuclear weapons.
