Author (or Editor): Irwin Redlener |
Title: Alone in the Trenches: Americans at Risk: Why We Are Not Prepared for Megadisasters And What We Can Do Now |
Fiction? No |
Publisher: Knopf |
Date: |
ISBN: 0-307-26526-9 |
Series Name: |
Physical description: hardbound, 271 pgs, indexed |
Relevance to doaskdotell: citizenship, disaster preparedness, personal liberty |
Review: The author is director of the Remember, the History Channel has recently used the term “mega disasters” for its series on a number of horrific possibilities, like huge earthquakes, monster hurricanes (like Katrina), and tsunamis (a much greater danger, even on the East Coast, than a lot of people realize), as well as the obvious concern about terrorist attacks with WMD’s (Weapons of Mass Destruction) The book is in four parts, and it rehearses some of the well
known natural disaster (and terror) scenarios in some detail, with
simulations (such as a monstrous earthquake in Redlener makes some specific points.
For example, he discusses the possibility that terrorists would go
after soft targets, and particularly play the “women and children”
card (a bigger issue in Muslim and many other cultures) by attacking
schools, as with a written simulation of an incident in He also discusses the threat of nuclear detonations, a threat well articulated by Sam Nunn and others. Terrorists could use newer technology to assemble small nuclear weapons covertly. On the other hand, much of the recent media coverage about threats focuses on low tech threats used in unconventional ways, such as liquid explosives. In the last part of the book Redlener
discusses preparedness, and is critical of the quixotic and random
nature of American preparations. A number of countries, including Redlener discusses citizen
preparedness, and indicates that even in World War II it was not
taken as seriously by ordinary Americans as history typically
indicates. The Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962 presented probably the
most dire threat of nuclear annihilation,
but little was done to prepare Americans, and probably little could
be done. Today’s threats of WMD’s are
qualitatively different from the At the end, Redlener gives his recommendations to “ordinary people.” The first is “stay healthy and fit,” but the last is the edgiest: “work on family resiliency.” One problem, that he does not go into, is that many people are at odds with their biological families, although obviously his pointers would apply to same-sex couples as well. But there is a call for some degree of socialization from everyone.
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Related: “disaster” films |
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