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Atlantic Unbound | Archive
William Langewiesche ..... Recent articles by William Langewiesche: How to Get a Nuclear BombIt wouldn’t be easy. But it wouldn’t be impossible. A reporter travels the world to find the weaknesses a terrorist could exploit. The Point of No ReturnFirst Pakistan's A.Q. Khan showed that any country could have made a nuclear bomb. Then he showed—not once but three times—why the nuclear trade will never be shut down. The Wrath of KhanHow A. Q. Khan made Pakistan a nuclear power—and showed that the spread of atomic weapons can't be stopped. Ziad for the DefenseWhen Saddam Hussein goes on trial, he will not lack for legal defenders. Heading his team at the moment is a man named Ziad al-Khasawneh. Hotel BaghdadFear and lodging in Iraq. The AccuserOne woman has spent decades documenting crimes against humanity in Iraq. Now Saddam and his circle are facing justice. Letter From BaghdadLife in the wilds of a city without trust. Welcome to the Green ZoneOur fortified bubble in Baghdad is a microcosm of America—and of what has gone wrong in Iraq. A Sea StoryOne of the worst maritime disasters in European history took place a decade ago. It remains very much in the public eye. On a stormy night on the Baltic Sea, more than 850 people lost their lives when a luxurious ferry sank below the waves. From a mass of material, including official and unofficial reports and survivor testimony, our correspondent has distilled an account of the Estonia's last moments—part of his continuing coverage for the magazine of anarchy on the high seas. A Two-Planet Species?The right way to think about our space program. Columbia's Last FlightThe inside story of the investigation—and the catastrophe it laid bare. Excerpts From "American Ground: Unbuilding the World Trade Center"PART THREE: THE DANCE OF THE DINOSAURS Excerpts from "American Ground: Unbuilding the World Trade CentePART TWO: THE RUSH TO RECOVER. Excerpts From "American Ground: Unbuilding the World Trade CentePART ONE: THE INNER WORLD. Storm IslandIf you like extreme weather, the French island of Ouessant is a good place to find it. The Crash of EgyptAir 990Two years afterward the U.S. and Egyptian governments are still quarreling over the cause—a clash that grows out of cultural division, not factual uncertainty. A look at the flight data from a pilot's perspective, with the help of simulations of the accident, points to what the Egyptians must already know: the crash was caused not by any mechanical failure but by a pilot's intentional act. Peace is HellEvery six months the Pentagon sends nearly 4,000 soldiers to Bosnia and brings nearly 4,000 soldiers home. To see how it's done is to understand why keeping peace has become harder than waging war—and why the Pax Americana has stretched the mighty American military to the limit. The Profits of DoomOne of the most polluted cities in America learns to capitalize on its contamination. Eden: A Gated CommunityThe plot contains elements of Lost Horizon and Heart of Darkness, Fitzcarraldo and The Tempest. After making a fortune as founder of North Face and Esprit, Douglas Tompkins embraced the principles of deep ecology. Then, forsaking civilization, he bought a Yosemite-sized piece of wilderness in Chile, where only he and a like-minded few would live. They intended to show the world how an eco-community could flourish even as the ancient forest was kept pristine. Tompkins ran into one big problem: other people. The Lessons of ValuJet 592As a reconstruction of this terrible crash suggests, in complex systems some accidents may be "normal"—and trying to prevent them all could even make operations more dangerous. Slam and JamFor all the reports of equipment failures and "close calls" and controller burnout, the nation's air-traffic-control system is in fact far less precarious, in terms of safety, than people imagine it to be. The real threat to the system's integrity has as yet received little attention. |
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