Annie Jacobsen - Nuclear Armageddon in 2024 | SRS #120

Annie Jacobsen is a New York Times bestselling author, Pulitzer Prize finalist and Princeton graduate. Jacobsen’s works have received rave reviews by outlets like The Washington Post, USA Today, The Boston Globe and Vanity Fair. Her career spans numerous media formats, including writing and producing TV series like Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan and serving as a contributing editor for the Los Angeles Times Magazine. Her newest book, Nuclear War: A Scenario, has risen to critical acclaim and brought Jacobsen to the Shawn Ryan Show to discuss war, weapons, government secrecy, and national security.

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00:00 - Introduction
01:56 - Patreon question
05:39 - Tribalism
09:27 - Operation Paperclip
14:36 - Getting access
19:11 - Nuclear war with Russia
29:29 - Nine Nuclear Nations
34:00 - Satellite detection
47:12 - How many Nukes do we have?
57:18 - How a ballistic missile works
1:10:09 - War games
1:16:49 - A.I.
1:37:40 - Contingency plans
1:52:00 - What a nuclear attack looks like
2:07:18 - “The dead hand” Nuclear System
2:11:50 - Marine One
2:31:25 - Has nuclear Armageddon happened before?
3:01:00 - Provoking Nuclear War
3:09:29 - Area 51
3:41:14 - Directed Energy Weapons

[ShawnRyanShow]

Supporting us on Patreon and Ad Rev is what enables us to produce the quality content that we have come to love. We strive for perfection with each and every one of these stories. Please enjoy the show!

[AkronKid]

Shout out to all the non patreoms that have been here since the very beginning of the podcast. We love sir Shawn! You get us through our day with amazing guests and content!

[calebcool]

I can say one thing about nukes. I was stationed on MCBH Kaneohe during the Hawaii Nuclear Missile crisis. I woke up to an amber alert saying “ICBM Missile inbound, seek shelter immediately this is NOT A DRILL.”

I have never been more terrified in my entire life, I knew we had less than 40 minutes until being vaporized. We couldn’t get calls out because of the cell towers, alarms were going off. I experienced so many emotions. I finally managed to get one call out to my father and I got his voicemail. It makes me emotional thinking about what I said but I left my father a message saying.

“Hey dad, I know this won’t make any sense right now, there’s a missile coming for Hawaii. I just wanted to let you know that I love you so much, and please tell everyone how much I love them. Goodbye”

I sat on a bench waiting for my doom, evaluating my life and coming to terms with my own mortality and death. Then we found out it was an “accident”. Everyone was ANGRY. I was upset because I felt cheated. I was forced to evaluate my life and be okay with all the good and bad choices I made, never seeing my loved ones again and I had to find my inner peace. Still to this day I feel somewhat cheated, but am incredibly grateful that I’m alive.

The fear of Nukes is no joke, and I would never wish upon anyone to experience what I was forced too. Thank you for reading my story, I’ve only told my family this, but this interview made me feel like it was worth sharing with everyone.

[CastleRockDad]

So if this happens after 8 PM, with the current administration, we are totally screwed.

[MichaelLasleyIII]

I could listen to her for hours she has the most calming voice and her intelligence is paramount.

[DubChambers]

SRS is consistently dropping top-tier content.

[thehighlander]

Hey Shawn! Retired Air Force PJ here. Love your show and your choice of guests. Learn a-lot each episode.
Wanted to add some info: Annie correctly stated than no ICBM OR SLBM can be recalled, however, each of these vehicles CAN be stopped mid flight. If there is an inadvertent launch or a vehicle malfunction after launch it can be detonated and brought down during boost phase. I've watched it happen at Vandenberg where we test launch the Minuteman III ICBM. Plus the warhead is not affected. One can drop a nuke on a nuke without detonating the first. Anyway, just info.
Cheers brother.

[e_rokken]

“It’s illegal to have nuclear weapons in space.”

I would wager a hefty amount of money betting that we have nukes in space.

[tonyjames]

Sean… another wonderful show. Thank you for having the knowledgeable and thought provoking guests like this one. Does she say to read the book? Yes… that’s her job and passion. Did she get the information from other people? Yea, but they are the most credible sources anyone could speak with. Is there information or misinformation we do not know? Of course. This interview is meant to be thought provoking, not a military briefing. Sean, again, thank you. This conversation needs to be had.

[thebunnisher]

25:40 She complains about "Unpresidential" rhetoric of President Trump talking "Fire and Fury" vs. North Korea, yet does not follow with the FACT that Trump met for an absolutely unprecedented diplomatic meeting with North Korea by personally crossing the DMZ and it was Jim Acosta of CNN that was screaming "What about Otto Warmbier?" during the inking of the agreement between the two heads of state. Insanity.

[derekdelotto]

Lets GO! Best thing about being a truck driver us I can listen to an SRS episode from start to finish. Learning more here than any "news" channel

[reedestrada]

Shaun I’m an Air Force veteran. Annie is interesting but mostly over dramatic with lots of inaccuracies. Good example is her hyperbole describing the “Black Book” it’s actually red and every missile control room, bomber cockpit and submarine has a copy of the same book. You were right it contains the play book for nuclear war and it doesn’t work unless the players know the play…not just the team captain. I flew bombers and we had to memorize the contents of the “black book” and all the scenarios as we had the same short time frame to respond to an attack. Obviously it’s way more complicated than Annie explains. She describes the worst most improbable scenario …a blind unannounced attack on the U.S. Believe me the President has many options in his book besides a massive counter attack. Also the President is not the only person who has the launch codes. There are backups in case the President can’t act including backup airborne command and control aircraft. Also we no longer sling megaton weapons at each other. With increased accuracy came a reduction in bomb yields. Very complicated ….not at all like Annie claims.

[Artillery]

Her voice is soothing to my soul. 50 minutes in and I already bought her book.

[henrygonzalez]

Just as I was going to take a nap, I have a playlist of her interviews that I sleep to. Her voice is soothing but the topics lead to some funky dreams.🇺🇲💪🇺🇲
Nice to see that I'm not the only guy here that gets off on Nuclear Holocaust. Hey if you're going to go might as well go out with a bang.😜

[natdacatt]

What I love most about the SRS is that he's such an honest guy, that if he doesn't know about something he genuinely says "I don't know".

So many people not just in the podcast world, but in general, would generally bullshit and say something like "yeah, yeah" when they have no clue.

Here, we get the actual "I don't know" which is SO INFORMATIVE because there are so many of us as viewers that also don't know.

[innerlightfilms]

It could be argued that Trumps rhetoric surrounding Nukes is what brought him enough respect for North Korea and Russia to come to an understanding and friendship. It's sort of like if two men open carry a firearm, they treat one another with more respect when its clearly obvious they possess the ability to severely harm or kill one another. Your average person is NOT suicidal.

[eytqyzi]

I think after such a remarkable podcast with brilliant Annie Jacobson it would be a "crime" to keep on watching SRS without subscribing on the channel. Keep it up Shawn! Great work brother!👍👏👏👏

[CoryHannem]

I don’t care what you say about threatening is unpresidential… when trump showed the Isis leader a photo of his house and said f*CK around and find out was exactly how you handle that …

[Bmizzzle]

God Bless anyone who seeks the truth. bless Annie, Sean, and all of you who love the Red White and Blue. This show is only getting better and better. Rogan got the engines started for the podcast world. SRS is the jetfuel that will propel it to space.

[sjp]

Shawn made an excellent point, when he asked her about China & Russia seeing N. Korea’s missiles go over their country first. She tried to dodge that question bc then her whole storyline is dead. It was pretty cringy from there on & her constantly having to reiterate that she’s so “neutral”. 🙄. But at the end of the day, she’s an author & she’s here to promote her book. I think people need to keep that in mind while listening to her speak.