311. The Defense Monitor: Nuclear Recollections
- Author:
- Bruce Blair
- Publication Date:
- 04-2003
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Center for Defense Information
- Abstract:
- Rear Adm. Eugene (Gene) Carroll, our beloved colleague who passed away this February, often shared with me his recollections of the role he once played in planning for nuclear war. As quoted in his obituary in the Washington Post, Gene once wrote: “During the horrible confrontation with the Soviet Union we called the Cold War, I frequently stood nuclear alert watch on aircraft carriers. For a period of time my assigned target was an industrial complex and transportation hub in a major city in Eastern Europe … My bomb alone would have resulted in the death of an estimated 600,000 human beings. Multiply that by 40 or 50 times and you can understand what two carriers alone would have done.”
- Topic:
- Security, Defense Policy, and Cold War
- Political Geography:
- United States, Europe, and Soviet Union