I.
This one goes out to Leó Szilárd, conceiver of the chain reaction. This one’s for Otto Hahn and Fritz Strassmann, bombardiers of uranium with neutrons, discoverers of atomic fission. We’ve got love for Julius Oppenheimer, director of the Manhattan Project.

II.
“If the radiance of a thousand suns were to burst at once into the sky, that would be like the splendor of the mighty one.” The Bagavad Gita

III.
Truman’s first maneuver, this one goes out to Alamogordo, the ushering in of the nuclear age. Using beautiful euphemisms, we could target built up areas. August 6, 1945, Hiroshima. August 9, 1945, Nagasaki.

IV.
But nuclear weapons have prevented the large-scale wars that defined the first half of the twentieth century from happening in the second half. The reason the USA never started a war with the USSR was because of the atomic bomb, because of the hydrogen bomb, because of mutually assured destruction. And if we’re all going to die in a flash of beautiful, blinding light I can die happy knowing that the peaceniks are getting their eyeballs ripped out too, without anytime to be smug about their having predicted the destruction of the world.

V.
London, Paris, Moscow, New York all reduced to giant post-apocalyptic playgrounds. A whole lot of useless history turned into useful rubble. Let’s give hardcore social Darwinism a chance. We want to see the survivalists stock piling anti-radiation pills and canned goods in out-of-town nuclear bunkers proved right. We want to see them come out of their holes and rebuild society, and what a society that would be.