My Journey at the Nuclear Brink
by William J. Perry, reviewed by Jerry Brown as A Stark Nuclear Warning
in New York Review of Books. post 
Perry is forthright when he says: “Today, the danger of some sort of a nuclear catastrophe is greater than it was during the Cold War and most people are blissfully unaware of this danger.”
Perry does not use his memoir to score points or settle grudges. He does not sensationalize. But, as a defense insider and keeper of nuclear secrets, he is clearly calling American leaders to account for what he believes are very bad decisions.
Perry writes that he started young, at the age of twenty-six in 1954, as a senior scientist at Sylvania’s Electronic Defense Laboratories in what is now called Silicon Valley. Today we think of this part of the world as the home of Apple, Google, and Facebook, but back then the principal work was defense, the business of mass destruction.
Perry candidly recognizes that the nuclear threat also meant very good business for defense laboratories such as his own employer, Sylvania. His work there focused on understanding the Soviet missile and space systems and he found the challenges of this high-tech spying exhilarating and highly profitable.
Note: The review goes on to recount Perry's role in the defense department, cuban missile crisis, nato expansion, and loose nukes. All to give his concerns credibility.
Although he didn’t believe that nuclear deterrence required that we match our adversary weapon for weapon, he acceded to the political pressure to keep up with the other guy. Then as now, Perry writes, he believed that America would possess all the deterrence it needs with just one leg of the so-called triad: the Trident submarine.
Many experts agree, but presidents follow the political and highly dangerous path of sizing our nuclear force to achieve “parity” with Russia. Such a competitive and mindless process always leads to escalation without end.
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See Valley's Secrets for Steve Blank's account of defense dollars in silicon valley.