Peace or Atomic War

The following tape recorded program is distributed through the facilities of the National Association of educational broadcasters. If our generation bans nuclear arms it will be taking the first step towards the distant aim of ending all wars. If that step is not taken we must continue on the road leading to nuclear war and to misery. Those are the words of Dr Albert Schweitzer who on April 28 29 30 years 1958 through the medium of the Norwegian Broadcasting System presented his thoughts on the most challenging problem of our time peace or atomic war. What follows is a reading of the text provided by the Norwegian Information Service. Readers are Professor Harold Shiflet principal and students and staff of radio station WSU why the State University of Iowa here in the words of Dr Albert Schweitzer is peace or atomic war. Part 1 the renunciation of nuclear tests. In April last year I raised my voice together with others to draw

attention to the great danger of radioactive poisoning of the air and the earth following tests with atom bombs uranium bombs and hydrogen bombs. With others I appealed to the nuclear powers to come to an agreement to stop the tests as soon as possible. At the same time declaring their genuine desire to Reynosa the use of atomic weapons at the time there was a reasonable hope that this step would be taken. It was not to be. The negotiations led by Mr Harold Stassen in London last summer between the three nuclear powers achieved nothing. The conference arranged by the United Nations in the autumn of last year suffered the same fate as the Soviet Union withdrew from the discussions. The Soviet Union has recently proposed a disarmament plan on the basis of which discussions are apparently being planned. As a first step the plan presupposes that nuclear tests should cease immediately. What chances have this condition of being fulfilled.

One might have thought that to agree on this point would be easy for all those involved. None of them would have to sacrifice any of the atomic weapons in their possession and the handicap of not being able to try out new ones would be the same for all. Even so the proposal is difficult for the United States and Britain to accept. They spoke against it when the matter was discussed in the spring of 1987 and since then ceaseless propaganda has been directed against the view that the radiation following nuclear tests is so dangerous that it is necessary to stop them. The American and European press is constantly receiving abundant propaganda material supplied by governmental atomic commissions and scientists who feel called upon to support this view. From a statement issued by the subcommittee of the American Atomic Energy Commission I quote the following phrases within the framework of scientific and military requirements. It is advisable that nuclear tests are limited to a minimum the necessary

step should be taken to correct the present confusion of the general public. The present and potential effects on heredity from the gradual increase in radioactivity of the air are kept within tolerable limits. The possibility of a harmful effect which people believe to be outside control has a strong emotional effect. The continuation of nuclear tests is necessary and justified in the interest of national security. What is meant by confusion of the public is the fact that people are becoming increasingly aware of the dangers resulting from nuclear tests. The meaning of the obscure statement that the effect on heredity of the increase in the radioactivity of the areas kept within tolerable limits. Is this that the number of deformed children that will be born as a result of the harm done to the sexual cells supposedly will not be large enough to justify the stopping of the tests. Now the view of the scientists that feel called upon to reduce the danger of radioactivity to what they believe to be its

right proportions is expressed by a Central European scientist who concluded a speech on the subject with the following bowed prophetic words. If the tests are carried on with the same frequency as in the last years the radioactive poisoning will be four times stronger in one thousand eighty three than at present and about six times stronger around the year 2010. And even that strength would be small compared with natural radiation. It can be stated categorically that the risk for mankind involved in nuclear tests is small. That is not to say that there is no risk in this context. I should like to quote the words of the American physicist and member of the Atomic Energy Commission professor Dr. Libby. The risk of radioactive poisoning must be balanced against the risk to which the entire free world would be exposed if nuclear tests were abandoned before a safe international disarmament agreement has been brought about. The tests are

necessary if the United States of America is not to be left behind in the development of nuclear weapons. During the continued reassurance campaign a very prominent American nuclear physicist went to the length of declaring that the luminous watch dials in the world represent a greater danger than the radioactive fallout of all nuclear tests. Up till now. The reassurance propaganda expects much from the glad tidings that science has succeeded in making the prototype of a hydrogen bomb producing far less dangerous radioactive materials than the usual ones. The new bomb is called the clean hydrogen bomb. The old type must from now on be content to be called the dirty bomb. The clean hydrogen bomb differs from the other in having a jacket made of a material which does not like Uranium 238 release immense quantities of radioactive elements of the enormous explosion temperature.

That is why it is less harmful as regards radioactivity than the usual ones. It is however also less powerful. The new highly praised hydrogen bomb is. Let it be said in passing only a relatively clean trigger is an uranium bomb made of the favorable uranium 235 an atomic bomb is part of all as the one dropped over Hiroshima. This bomb when detonated also produces radioactivity as do the neutrons released in great numbers at the explosion in an American newspaper in the beginning of this year. Edward Teller the father of the dirty hydrogen bomb sings a hymn of praise to the idyllic nuclear war to be waged with completely clean I driven bombs he insists on the continuation of the tests to perfect this ideal bomb. Here are two stanzas from Edward teller's him to the idyllic nuclear warfare further tests will put us into position to fight our opponent's war

machine while sparing the innocent bystanders clean weapons of this kind will reduce unnecessary casualties in a future war. Of course neither the United States nor the Soviet Union is thinking of producing this less effective bomb for use in a possible war. The American War Department has quite recently declared that the irradiation of whole areas has become a new offensive weapon. The clean hydrogen bomb is intended for the show window only not for use. The ban is to help people to believe that from now on nuclear tests will be followed by less and less radiation and that no real argument speaks against the continuation of the tests. Those who think that the danger created by nuclear tests is small mainly take the air radiation into consideration and persuade themselves to believe that the danger limit has not yet been reached. The results of their arithmetic are however not so reliable as they would like to believe.

Through the years the toleration limit for radiation has had to be reduced several times in one thousand thirty for it was one hundred radiation units per year at present. The limit is officially put at five. In many countries it is even lower. Dr. Laura's n Taylor of the United States who is regarded as an authority on protection against radiation holds like others that it is an open question whether there is anything called a harmless amount of radiation. He thinks that we can only speak of an amount of radiation which we regard as tolerable. We are constantly being told about a permissible amount of radiation. Who permitted it who has any right to permit it. When speaking about the risk of radiation we must take into consideration not only the radiation coming from the outside but also of that coming from radioactive elements in our body. What is the source of this radioactivity.

The radioactive elements brought up in the air by nuclear tests do not stay there permanently in the form of radioactive rain and radioactive snow or they fall down on the earth they enter the plants through leaves and roots and stay there. We absorb them through the plants by drinking milk from the cows or by eating the meat of animals which have fed on it radioactive rain infects our drinking water. The most powerful radioactive poisoning occurs in the areas between the northern latitudes 10 degrees and 60 degrees. Because of the numerous nuclear tests conducted mainly on those latitudes by the Soviet Union and the United States the radioactive elements absorbed over years by our body are not evenly distributed in the cellular tissue but are deposited in accumulated at certain points. From these points the internal radiation takes place causing injuries to particularly vulnerable organs. I want this kind of radiation lacks in strength is made up for by its longevity. Working as it does day and night for

years. It is a well-known fact that one of the most widespread and dangerous elements absorbed by us is Strontium 90. It is stored in the bones and emits from there its rays into the cells of red bone marrow where the red and white blood corpuscles are made. Blood diseases fatal in most cases are the result the cells of the reproductive organs are particularly sensitive even relatively weak radiation may lead to fatal consequences. The most sinister aspect of internal as well as external radiation is that years may pass before the evil consequences appear. Indeed they may make themselves felt not in the first or second generations but in the following ones. Generation after generation for centuries to come will witness the birth of numbers of children with mental and physical defects. It is not for the physicists choosing to take into account only the radiation from the air. To say the decisive

word on the dangers of nuclear tests that right belongs to the biologists and physicians who have studied internal as well as external radiation and to those physicists who pay attention to the facts and stablished by the biologists and physicians. The declaration signed by nine thousand two hundred thirty five scientists of all nations and to the secretary general of the United Nations by the well-known American scientist Dr. Linus Pauling on January 13th 1958 gave the reassurance propaganda its death blow. The scientists declare that the radioactivity gradually created by a nuclear test represents a great danger for all parts of the world particularly serious because of its consequences its consequences will be an increasing number of deformed children in the future. For this reason they insist on an international agreement putting an end to nuclear tests in the future. The propaganda for the continuation of nuclear tests can no longer maintain

that the scientists do not agree on the question of the danger of radiation. That one must for that reason await the decision of international bodies and abstain from alarming the public by saying that radiation represents an actual danger growing more serious every day. This propaganda will continue to set the tone in certain newspapers. But beside it the truth about the danger of nuclear tests marches imperturbably along influencing an ever increasing section of public opinion. In the long run even the most well organized propaganda can do nothing against truth. One in comprehensible aspect of the propaganda for the continuation of nuclear tests is its complete disregard of their harmful effects on future generations which according to biologists and physicians will be the result of the radiation to which we are being exposed. The declaration signed by the nine thousand two hundred thirty five scientists did

well in stressing that danger. We must not assume the responsibility for the future birth of thousands of children with the most serious mental and physical defects simply because we did not pay enough attention to that danger. Only those who have never been present at the birth of a deformed baby never witnessed the whimpering and the shock of its mother. They have to maintain that the risk in going on with nuclear tests is one which must be taken under the given circumstances. The well-known French biologist and geneticist General Stan calls the continuation of nuclear tests the future crime. It is the particular duty of women to prevent this sin against the future. It is for them to raise their voice against it in such a way that they will be heard. It is a strange fact that till now nobody has taken into consideration that the question of whether nuclear tests should be stopped or continued is not one which concerns the nuclear powers

exclusively a question for them to decide a pleasure who is giving these countries the right to experiment in times of peace with weapons involving the most serious risks for the whole world. What has international law and thrown by the United Nations and so highly praised in our time to say on this matter does it no longer look out on the world from its temple then take it out that it may face the facts and do its duty accordingly. International law what it once discovered the interesting case of Japan that country suffers heavily from the effects of nuclear tests. The radioactive clouds created by the Soviet tests in North East Siberia and by the American ones that bikini an island in the Pacific Ocean are carried by the wind over the country. The resulting radioactive poisoning is the worst possible very powerful radioactive rainfalls are quite common. The radioactive poisoning of the soil in the vegetation is so powerful that the inhabitants of various districts ought to

abstain from using their harvest for food. They are then faced with situations in which they are forced to eat rice infected with Brownian an element particularly dangerous for children. The oceans around it do plan is also at times dangerously radioactive and thereby the very food supply of the country in which fish is always played an important part is being threatened because of the large amount of radioactive fish unsuitable for consumption. As every new nuclear test makes a bad situation worse. The Japanese ministers when hearing of plans for new tests to the north or south of Japan have presented their country's urgent appeal in Washington or Moscow beseechingly American or Soviet authorities to give up their plans. The answer was always the same. They regret that there can be no question of so doing. While as yet the powers are reached no agreement to that effect as late as on February 20th

1958. This happened again in the capital of one of the nuclear powers. We always learn about the appeal and the refusal through short telegrams in the newspaper. Just like any other news item the press did not disturb us with editorials drawing our attention to making us share in that which lies behind the news. The misery of the Japanese people. In that way we in the press have been made guilty of lack of compassion more guilty is however. International law which has kept silent and indifferent on this question Year after year. It is high time that it is being realized that the question of the continuing or ceasing of nuclear tests is a matter for international law to take up. Mankind is imperiled by the tests mankind insists that they stop and has every right to do so if there is left in the civilization of our times anything of living

international law or if it should be reestablished then the nations responsible for nuclear tests must renounce them immediately without making this dependent on a disarmament agreement. This matter has nothing to do with disarmament. The nations in question will continue to have those weapons which they now have. There is no time to lose. New tests increasing the danger must not be allowed to take place. It is important to realize that even without new tests the danger will increase during the coming years. A large part of the radioactive elements flung up in the atmosphere and stratosphere at the nuclear experiments is still there. It will have come down only after several years probably about 15. The immediate renunciation of further tests will create a favorable atmosphere for talks on banning the use of nuclear weapons. When this urgently necessary step has been taken such negotiations can take place in peace.

You are listening to a reading of Dr Albert Schweitzer statement piece or atomic war. You have just heard part one. The renunciation of nuclear tests part 2 is titled The risk of nuclear war. A nuclear war between the Soviet Union and the United States is today a threatening possibility only an agreement between the two powers to renounce the use of nuclear weapons can prevent it. How have we got into this predicament. In one thousand forty five United States succeeded in making an atom bomb based on fission of uranium 235. The bomb was dropped on Hiroshima on August 6 and on Nagasaki on August 9 that year the bomb gave the United States an exceptional military lead over all other nations. As of July 1949 the Soviet Union also had the atom bomb as powerful as those protected by the Americans between 1946 and 1949.

Peace was preserved only because each of the two powers feared the bounds of the other. On October 3rd 1952 Britain exploded her first atom bomb on the island of Malta Bello on the northwest coast of Australia. The United States then to reconquer its lead decided to let Edward Teller make the hydrogen bomb expected to be many times more powerful than the uranium atom bombs. The first test of the new bomb was carried out in May 1951 and I know we talk at all in the Pacific. On March 1 1954 they perfected a hydrogen bomb was exploded in a bikini. A volcanic island in the Marshall group in the Pacific. It's a fact proved far stronger than estimated the Soviet Union had however started the production of hydrogen bombs at the same time as the United States. The Russians exploded their first hydrogen bomb on August 12th 1953. A further step forward was also made simultaneously by the two powers.

It turned out that the atom bomb constructed by the United States during World War Two could be used and the Rockets developed by Germany during the same period. From then on it was no longer necessary to rely exclusively on big planes for bringing the bombs to their destination from their launching sites guided missiles can be accurately aimed at distant targets. The rocket warhead consists of either a usual explosive or a uranium or hydrogen bomb. At present the Soviet Union is supposed to have rockets with a range of up to 1000 kilometers. Rockets having a range of eighteen hundred kilometers are shortly expected. If they do not already exist the Americans are reported to have rockets with a range of up to 2400 kilometers whether so-called Intercontinental rockets having a range of more than 8000 kilometers and being able to cross the Atlantic have yet been constructed or not.

It is not possible to tell. We can safely assume that the problem can be solved and that both the east and west are busily working at it in this field the Soviet Union has apparently the lead over the United States. Even if that present Intercontinental rockets are not a reality America is forced to take into account that its cities coastal ones as well as cities in the interior can be hit by rockets fired from submarines rockets travel at immense speed the Intercontinental rockets would probably use less than half an hour over the Atlantic carrying an effective load of from 1 to 5 tons. What would a nuclear war be like today. Let us first consider the so-called local war. A lot of people secretly hope that hostilities will start with a nuclear war which it is possible to localize to a certain extent and in which use will not be made a perfected atom bombs and powerful hydrogen

bombs only of rockets of short and intermediate range. They hope that the resulting destruction will be kept within certain limits and that peace can be concluded before the war becomes total. In a war waged with rockets of a range up to 20 400 kilometers. Local limitation does not mean very much if the warhead is of the size and power of Hiroshima bomb and not to speak of a hydrogen bomb. There is no reason to underwrite the resulting destruction. It is hard to believe that the opponents will not from the very start make use perfected the atom bombs or hydrogen bombs of the most modern type in bombing big cities. The amount of energy released by a hydrogen bomb is a thousand times larger than that of an atom bomb. It is highly probable that in a future nuclear war rockets as well as bombers will be used for warfare with heavy bombing will not be replaced by rocket warfare. It will be made more total. The fireball created by a hydrogen bomb has a diameter of up to several

kilometers. The heat engendered is estimated at 100 million degrees Celsius. This gives us an idea of how many people will be killed in a city by the blast itself by the falling and flying objects by fire and heat and by the first IF very short radiation the lethal radioactive poisoning following the explosion will cover an area of about forty five thousand square kilometers. In a statement to a congressional committee an American general is reported to have said that 70 million people would be killed or injured if at 10 minute intervals. One hundred and ten hydrogen bombs were dropped on the United States. Thousands of square kilometers would be made uninhabitable for a generation. This is the same as saying that 15 to 20 hydrogen bombs of the latest type would virtually finished countries like Britain West Germany or France as regards protective measures in a nuclear war.

It is sufficient to quote the words that President Eisenhower is reported to have said after having witnessed a bombing maneuver or protective covering was tested here only prayer can help. To protect oneself during a nuclear bomb attack there is as a matter of fact hardly anything to do but to throw oneself behind a thick wall of stone or concrete face downwards and to cover if possible the back of head and body with a piece of material if not in the area of total destruction. One may then have a chance of escaping death by radiation. It is also important that survivors are given a non-radioactive food and water if possible and are brought out of the contaminated area immediately. There can be no question of building f active shelters for the whole population. From where should the necessary space and means be taken. And how would people get time in case of nuclear bombing to seek shelter in a nuclear war there will be no victory

only defeat nuclear bombs and warheads would inflict the same amount of suffering on each side. The resulting destruction will be on the whole permanent and no armistice or peace can end it. When speaking of nuclear arms no nation can say to its opponent now arms must decide only let us now commit suicide together by mutual annihilation. A member of the British Parliament has rightly said that he who makes use of nuclear arms will have the fate of a baby using it stating he will die from it. A nuclear war in defense of threatened liberty will not achieve its purpose. Those for whom it is being waged will have ceased to exist in the course of it or will die miserably afterwards instead of Liberty they will have annihilation. Under the radioactive dust clouds following a war between the east and west the continued existence of mankind would be at stake. The two powers need not even use their whole stock of

atom and hydrogen bombs estimated at 50000 to create that situation a nuclear war is in other words a completely meaningless and inconceivably terrible thing which must not in any circumstances be allowed to take place. The risk that the cold war will become a nuclear war is unfortunately greater now than ever before. Because of the possibilities created by guided missiles. The principal of the United States was formally to be the only country besides the Soviet Union to have nuclear weapons having no interest in supplying other states with them. These states would in any case not have known what to do with them. The construction of guided missiles of short and intermediate range changed the situation. For with them the allies of America and I can achieve purposes which they consider to be in the interest of themselves and of America. That is why the United States abandoned the

principles of keeping nuclear weapons to herself. It was a fatal decision. America's point of view is understandable. She will enable the NATO's States to defend themselves against the Soviet Union. But this step is interpreted by the Soviet Union as a new threat to its security. A possibility which did not exist before the possibility of a nuclear war on European soil between the United States and the Soviet Union has now been created. With guided missiles of a range up to 20 400 kilometers. Russian cities like Moscow and car cough can be bombed from western Germany cities far into the interior of the Soviet Union may be attacked with rockets of intermediate range fired from Turkey and Persia countries which might accept these weapons for defense purposes. In that way the Soviet Union may come to think of herself in a situation where she must divert and in circling movement directed against her.

The strategic importance of the Middle East causes both the Soviet Union and the United States to make efforts to win the peoples of this area over to their sides partly through economic support partly through supplying them with weapons conventional weapons to begin with openly or in secret the two great powers are behind all conflicts in the Middle East. Incidents in these countries can thus be fatal for world peace. The Middle East has taken over the part played by the Balkans before World War 1.