This book presents an insider's history of U. S. nuclear strategy from the late 1940s to the early 1980s. The author describes how technology and nuclear war theory combined to provide diplomacy leading to a peace that often balanced precariously on the brink of nuclear disaster. The book tells the story of the small group of civilians who secretly developed nuclear strategy from the end of World War II through U.S. President Ronald Reagan's "Star Wars". It reveals a compelling view of the Cold War.