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BEST COPY AVAILABLE
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September 5, 1957
FACTS ASSOCIATED WITH THE CONTINUANCE OF THE NUCLEAR WEAPONS TESTING PROGRAM
It ia difficult to give unclassified explanations of the need for the continuance of
the nuclear weapons test program. Perhaps the best pudlic statement which has been
made on this subject is the detailed White House Press Release of October 24, 1956.
This Prees Release contains a statement by the President which includes ten points
which he felt bore on this probleme In addition, the Press Release contains four
memoranda, one lists the tests which have been conducted by the United States, another is a statement on fallout, the third is a statement on the long-range detection
Briefly, the President's ten points are
le Concrete progress is to be seen in the Atoms for Peace Program, the setting
up of a Cabinet rank officer for disarmament, the discussions of the open skies offer,
the acceptance of the Russian proposals for ground inspection, and the setting up of
the International Atomic Energy Agency-
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of the detonation of Soviet nuclear weapons, and the fourth is a list, together with
explanations, of ninety stepe that have been taken by this Government and others in
an effort to reach an agreement with the Soviet Union on nuclear weapons production
and testing and the Atoms for Peace Progran-
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y
2- This Government's policy is “safe guards first and then disarmament" (there
have been fourteen Soviet rejections of this idea in the last two years).
3- This Government feels that under the circumstances it must continue to de~
velop and test nuclear weapons. The strength in this field is important due to the
unavoidably large numerical superiority of Communist manpover.
4°
The
present rate of thermonuclear teste by this country and others does not
imperil health. This conclusion is based on the findings of 150 scientists, of the
first rank, of the independent National Academy of Sciences, who reported in June
1956 that fallout is a "small fraction of the exposure that individuals receive from
natural sources and from medical x-rays during their lives".
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The weapone teste have two benefite:
a)
They mke it possible to harness and discipline weapons, effectively re-
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due the fallout, and make it possible to concentrate their destructive power on
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military objectives.
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b) Knowledge vital to Civil Defense and to the development of defensive
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weapons is gained.
6-
Fallout is uevoidable from weapons of all sises.
(Recently the President
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has annocumed that new developmente may make it possible to produce veapons with
little or no fallout.)
7.
: Sovict Union has insisted since 1946 on voluntary disarmament with mo
eafe guards:
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S- Teste in Rassia of very large weapons can protably be detected, but sot of
weapons of 41] sisea.
Je feo yeare are nested to prepare anicontuct « test. Consequently, this work
cemnot be stopped and sterted again quickly.
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