For eight years, humanity has lived underground.
Above them, the nuclear war continues.
Or so they have been told.
The surface belongs to machines now—robot “leadies” built to fight a war too radioactive for human beings. Every day they return below ground with reports of ruined cities, new attacks and an enemy that refuses to surrender.
Then someone decides to go up and see the war for himself.
What he discovers changes everything.
Tonight on Chesterton Radio, X Minus One presents “The Defenders,” adapted from the story by Philip K. Dick—one of the most provocative science-fiction writers of the twentieth century.
Broadcast by NBC on May 22, 1956, The Defenders comes from the darkest years of the Cold War, when nuclear bombers stood ready, civil-defense planners contemplated life underground, and Americans were learning to live with the possibility that civilization might disappear in an afternoon.
But Dick asks a stranger and more unsettling question:
What if the machines entrusted with fighting our war understood something that we did not?
It is science fiction, Cold War thriller and moral fable in one remarkably compact radio drama—and nearly seventy years later, its questions about war, automation, artificial intelligence and human judgment sound less dated than ever.
And there is another reason we’re listening tonight.
Chesterton Radio is broadcasting from Omaha, Nebraska, just a few miles from Offutt Air Force Base—the place that became the nerve center of America’s Strategic Air Command and one of the most important command posts of the nuclear age.
Later, we’ll go deeper into that remarkable Nebraska story.
For now, turn down the lights.
The people are underground.
The machines are on the surface.
And something is very wrong with the war.
Welcome to The Defenders.
Keep the Little Station on the Air
Chesterton Radio is an independent listener-supported project devoted to great stories, forgotten radio, thoughtful conversation, history, literature, faith and wonder.
If you enjoy what we’re doing, please consider becoming a paid subscriber or supporting the station through Patreon or Buy Me a Coffee.
Every contribution helps keep the Little Station broadcasting.
Stories • Ideas • Wonder
And as always—
The Open Door is always on.
Get full access to CHESTERTON RADIO at www.chestertonradio.com/subscribe
