The peril of nuclear proliferation is urgent and intractable, argues journalist Venter (Iran's Nuclear Option
, etc.) in this sprawling exposé, which examines the supply and demand side of the international nuclear black market. Iran, Venter contends, is the most determined and—given its anti-Israel animus—dangerous seeker of nuclear weapons, but al-Qaeda is in the market, as are possibly Saudi Arabia, Syria, Algeria and Egypt. Underpinning their ambitions is a dense web of suppliers, centered on the Pakistani proliferation entrepreneur A.Q. Khan. His network is a dark caricature of globalization, bringing together stolen fissile material from the former Soviet republics, European nuclear technology, Pakistani uranium-enrichment expertise, nuclear-capable North Korean missile designs and know-how from Russia, China, South Africa and elsewhere. With so much support and lax oversight by the International Atomic Energy Agency, Venter warns, covert nuclear-weapons programs like Iran's are far more advanced than is generally understood. Meticulously tracing who sold what to whom, Venter offers a comprehensive, if sometimes disorganized and repetitive, account of the industry, complete with sketchy sidebars on nuclear science and engineering and unhelpful (one hopes) diagrams of atom bombs, centrifuges and missiles. The welter of details about proliferation's intricate maze can be eye-glazing, but they make Venter's book a useful introduction to this unavoidably complex—and dire—issue. (Mar. 1)