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Peter Hennessy is widely acknowledged to be one of the most entertaining British historians now writing. But the subject of his new book is far from conventionally engaging. Based on primary archival research and interviews with participants, for which Hennessy is also renowned, it examines in detail the top-secret retaliation procedures that were put in place should the UK be attacked in a nuclear war, and what the planners thought the consequences of such a war might be.