Annie Jacobsen

I believe in that truth, you know.

But I do also think what's interesting is, like, someone I interviewed here in the book was Leon Panetta.

So not only was he a former SecDef, but he was former CIA chief and he was former White House chief of staff under Clinton.

And in our interview, I learned a lot from him about those three kind of elements of the national security, advising the president, being SecDef, being in charge of all of this, and being CIA chief from the intelligence point of view.

But

What was even more interesting about interviewing Panetta was that he said to me at the end of our interview, it's good that you're doing this.

The American people need to know.

That's a direct quote from him.

So here's a guy who has spent his entire life entrenched in that system that you're talking about.

And then outside of it, once he retires, puts on his, shall we say, grandfather's hat.

the human hat and is suddenly like this is really going in the wrong direction.

I would hope that that would lead to more people thinking wisely about what it is they're doing when they're in office as far as nuclear war is concerned.

But what's – I agree with you.

The first part of Eisenhower's speech is spot on and that is absolutely true.

And yet at the same time – this is why I think people stop talking about things like nuclear war or they move on to another more interesting subject that might be more entertaining.

Because who really wants to hear about this problem that seems to be cyclical and there is – because you have to have a strong defense.

You have to have a national security, otherwise you get walked all over.

I think people kind of agree that.

Yes.

You can't really have a peace force.