Long before former president and convicted felon Donald Trump threatened to use nuclear weapons on Twitter, American presidents were using and misusing the threat of nuclear force. Far from being a cold, rational system, the mechanisms by which the commander in chief could actually use the world’s most powerful nuclear arsenal have often been haphazard, cobbled together, and susceptible to mistakes. This book illustrates this fact from Truman to the Cuban Missile Crisis to North Korea, the history of how presidents think about and use “the bomb” has involved more than a few close calls and could probably do with some serious reconsideration.