Bad Idea #53 "History shows nuclear war will never happen.” with David Holloway

Saving the World From Bad Ideas · May 21, 2026 · 1h · transcript

In this episode of Saving the World from Bad Ideas, Mark Lynas speaks with Stanford historian David Holloway about one of the most dangerous assumptions of the nuclear age: history shows nuclear war will never happen. Drawing on Holloway’s new book Nuclear Weapons and International History, they trace the development of the bomb from the Manhattan Project to the thermonuclear age, the Cuban Missile Crisis, launch-on-warning doctrines, arms control, and the unraveling of the post-Cold War nuclear order. The conversation makes clear that the fact nuclear war has not happened yet is no guarantee…