Command and Control on PBS' American Experience

Eric Schlosser’s 2013 best-selling book Command and Control: Nuclear Weapons, the Damascus Accident, and the Illusion of Safety was turned into an episode of PBS' American Experience program. Airing tomorrow night (January 10), the episode was filmed in a retired Titan II missile silo and incorporates original news footage from the incident.

I read Command and Control a few years ago and it’s been one of my favorite books ever since, for the cautionary tale it presents. Without giving anything away, it does seem fairly miraculous that we didn’t accidentally end humanity during the development of these weapons.

In anticipation of the PBS program, Eric Schlosser wrote a followup, of sorts, published in The New Yorker: “World War Three, by Mistake.” Lastly, here’s the trailer for the PBS adaptation: