William R. Forstchen
ONE SECOND AFTER
For I have become death, the destroyer of worlds.
Acknowledgments
All books are, in a way, the works of others… those who inspired me as a kid, taught me to be a teacher, a writer, a father. Those of you who grew up with science fiction during the Cold War will remember
Special thanks must go to my friend, Newt Gingrich, for kindly providing the foreword to this book, the encouragement, advice, and crucial contacts he helped me with along the way. Captain Bill Sanders, who serves with our Navy, is one of the world’s leading experts on this topic; it was Newt who introduced me to him, and as I worked on this project his advice was invaluable, along with his friendship. I must emphasize that Captain Sanders is a true professional; at times I asked questions to which he replied, “I can’t answer that,” and there the discussion ended. Everything he did help me with is public record and not classified. Congressman Roscoe Bartlett, a true public servant, who headed up a Congressional committee evaluating the threat of electromagnetic pulse was a great inspiration as well.
An old friend, who might seem out of place in this acknowledgment is the author Jean Shepherd. So few recall his name today, though nearly all are familiar with his famous movie about a family Christmas during the Depression. His writing and radio show inspired me when I was growing up near New York City, and by incredible good luck, he was a neighbor of mine up in Maine. As a fledgling writer, I spent some incredible moments with Jean and always remembered how he said “write what you know, kid.” After so many books set in the past, or future, for the first time I turned to writing one set now, and it was Jean’s advice that led me to this story set in my hometown. Black Mountain, Asheville, and Montreat College, where I teach history, are all very real. Of course, being a work of fiction the characters are fictional, but friends and neighbors might sense something of themselves in this story, and to all of them I owe my deepest gratitude for their years of friendship. Particular thanks should go to Jack Staggs, chief of police, for his insights, to my family doctor and our local pharmacist, conversations regarding this story left all of us chilled. And as always Bill Butterworth (W. E. B. Griffin Jr.) one of the best darn editors and friends one could ever ask for.
As always my thanks to Montreat College, to the thousands of students I have taught there across the years, whom I love deeply, and who were indeed an inspiration as are some of my fellow faculty, the president of our college and the board of trustees, especially Andy Andrews, veteran of Omaha Beach and close friend for so many years. Thanks as well to the staff at a nearby nursing home, who guided my father and me through the last year of his life… truly everyone who works there is a guardian angel.
A writer cannot function without good editors, publishers, and agents. Tom Doherty will always stand in my view as one of the best, and Bob Gleason, though we had a few “moments” at times, moved this book forward and I am grateful. As for the agents who believed in this, Eleanor Wood, Josh Morris, and Kevin Cleary… all I can say is thanks. And there is someone else special, Dianne St. Clair, who has always believed in me, and whose loving encouragement always came at the right moment. And to Brian Thomsen, thanks for everything.
In closing, I hope that this book never comes true. The threat is real, frightfully real, made even more frightening when you take the time to study it, question the experts, and have a sense of history. The moment of a fall from greatness often comes just when a people and a nation feel most secure. The cry “the barbarians are at the gates” too often comes as a terrifying bolt out of the blue, which is often the last cry ever heard. There are those in this world today who do wish this upon us and will strive to achieve it. As was said by Thomas Jefferson, “the price of freedom is eternal vigilance.”
I pray that years from now, as time winds down for me, critics will say this was nothing more than a work of folly… and I will be content… for the vigil was kept and thus my daughter and those I love will never know this world I write of.
FOREWORD
by Speaker Newt Gingrich
Though this book is a work of fiction, it is also a work of fact, perhaps a “future history,” that should be thought provoking and, yes, even terrifying for all of us. I know this from personal study, across decades, of the very real threat to American security that is posed by this particular weapon that Bill Forstchen writes about in One Second After.
There has been much attention given, since 9/11, to a wide variety of threats to our nation… additional attacks by the hijacking of commercial airliners, biological and chemical attacks, even the potential of a so-called “dirty bomb,” or even an actual nuclear detonation in the center of one of our major cities.
But few have talked about, let alone heard about, the terrible, in fact overwhelming, threat of EMP, which is short hand for “electromagnetic pulse weapon.”
My friend, Captain William Sanders, USN, one of our nation’s leading experts on this particular weapon, will provide the afterword for this book, explaining in greater detail, using unclassified documents, as to how such a weapon works. In short form here, when an atomic bomb is detonated above the earth’s atmosphere, it can generate a “pulse wave,” which travels at the speed of light, and will short-circuit every electronic device that the “wave” touches on the earth’s surface. It is like a super lightning bolt striking next to your house and taking out your computer, except infinitely worse, for it will strike our entire nation, most likely without warning, and could destroy our entire complex electrical grid and everything attached into that grid. It is a real threat, a very real threat and one that has deeply worried myself and many others for years.
My friend, Bill Forstchen, has coauthored six historical novels with me across the years. I have gotten to know him closely. He holds a Ph.D. in history from Purdue, he has specialized in the history of military technology, and this is no wild flight of fantasy on his part. In fact, the start of this book was a conversation that Bill and I shared several years back, concluding with his announcing that he felt he should write a novel about the threat, to raise public awareness.
As I said before, I see this book as a terrifying “future history” that might come true. Such books have a significant tradition in their own right. H. G. Wells wrote frightfully accurate prophecies of what history now calls World Wars I and II. Two of the great classics of the Cold War,
I’d like to think that Bill’s novel may do the same. Few in our government and in the public sector have openly confronted the threat offered by the use of but one nuclear weapon, in the hands of a determined enemy, who calibrates it to trigger a massive EMP burst. Such an event would destroy our complex, delicate high tech society in
