Rickover: Father of the Nuclear Navy

About the Author

Thomas B. Allen is an author and editor. For more than fifteen years he served with the National Geographic Society as associate chief of the book service. He edited the million-plus bestseller We Americans and has published numerous works of fiction and non-fiction, including War Games. Allen and Polmar have collaborated in writing seven books and numerous articles. Both live in the Washington area.

Norman Polmar is a leading expert on naval and aviation matters. An internationally known analyst, consultant, and award-winning author, Polmar has written more than 40 books, including, with K. J. Moore, Cold War Submarines: The Design and Construction of U.S. and Soviet Submarines (Brassey’s, ISBN 1-57488-594-4) and Historic Naval Aircraft: From the Pages of Naval History Magazine (Brassey’s, ISBN 1-57488-572-3). He is a columnist for the U.S. Naval Institute's Proceedings and Naval History magazines. Polmar lives in the Washington, DC, area.

Product Description

Hyman G. Rickover was not long removed from his Jewish roots in Poland when he graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1922. After a respectable career spent mostly in unglamorous submarine and engineering billets, he took command of the U.S. Navy’s nuclear propulsion program and revived his career, being retired—involuntarily—some thirty years later in early 1982. He was not only the architect of the nuclear Navy but also its builder. In the process, he erected a network of power and influence that rivaled those who were elected to high office, and that protected him from them when his controversial methods became objectionable or, as critics would suggest, undermined the nation’s vital interests. Authors Thomas B. Allen and Norman Polmar, whose full-length biography of Rickover (in manuscript in 1981) was consulted by the Reagan Administration during the decision to remove him from active duty, are eminently qualified to write an essential treatment on the controversial genius of Admiral Rickover.

From the Publisher

Military Profiles are essential treatments of the lives of significant historical figures. Each book includes the details that one finds in a full-length biography and addresses a theme that explains which aspects of a subject's character, background, or behaviour makes him or her worthy of our attention today.