* The Debate over the Hydrogen Bomb 140364 A recently declassified report sheds light on the original U.S. decision to develop the “Super.” The unanimous opposition of the Oppenheimer committee, overruled then,appears now to have been Bascal correct, crenata ath an Cbrnnanent, tee Conn, plan, , AOthe The aot ip gnhaa at be wen betel Hb Le resus thare Lone Herbert F. York ie “ be ee “ae tm ak tan carried out a coup in the shadow of the Red Army and replaced the government of that country with one subservient to Moscow. Also in 1948 the Russians unsuccessfully attempted to king and soon afterward established the People’s Republic of China. Taken together, these and similar but less dra- matic events were generally perceived in the West as resulting in the creation of a monolithic and aggressive alliance stretching the full iength of the Eurasian continent, encompassing almost half of the world’s people and threatening much of the rest. Then in the fall of 1949 the Russians exploded their first atomic bomband ended the brief American nuclear monopoly, At the end of World War I most atomic scientists in the U.S. had esti- ble wo thewhalers”mont aacach an an cnormousty powerful countries. Coming as it did at aime and destructive weapon. In essence they when all Americans saw the contended that the world oughtto avoid cold war as rapidly going from bad to the development and stockpiling of the smaller armies a worse, the Russian test was seen as 2 superbombif it was at all possible, and those responsible for U.S. nuclear policy. Most of the proposed responses concluded that the dynamism andrelative status of U.S. nuclear t ogy were such that the U.S. could safel prun the risk that the U.S.S.R. might not prac- 5 involved substantial but evolutionary changes in the current U.S. nuclear programs: expand the search for additional supplies of fissionable material, step up the production of atomic weapons, adapt such weapons to a broader range of delivery vehicles and end uses, and the like. One proposal was radically different. It called for the fastest possible developmentof the hydrogen bomb, which was widely referred to at the time as the superbomb (or simply the Super). This weapon, based on the entirely new and as yet untested principle of thermonu- mated that the U.S.S.R. would need four - clear fusion, was estimated to have the or five years to make a bomb based on potential of being 1,000 or- more times first Russian one turned out to be four as.powerful as the fission bombs that had marked the end of World War II. Work on the theory of the superbomb hadal- eryone, including most U.S, Government it had never had a very high priority, ’ the nuclear-fission principle; the time interval from the first American test to the years and six weeks. Even so, nearly evofficials and most members of Congress, reacted to the event as if it were a great surprise. Many of them hadeither forgotten or had never known the experts’ original estimates, and in any case the accomplishment simply did net fit the almost universal view of the U.S.S.R. as a technologically backward nation. Besides being a great surprise the Russian test explosion was a singularly unpleasant one. The U.S. nuclear monopoly had been seen by many as compensating for the difference between the hordes of conscripts supposedly available to the Communist bloc and the pain 0 Co eteceted! ma Se challenge that demanded a reply. The force the Western allies out of Berlin by immediate challenge being nuclear, a blockading all land transport routes to - particularly intensive search for an aptke city. In early 1949 the Communist propriate respouse was conducted by People’s Liberation Army captured Pe- pee Sa bree en n 1948 gerofaiGommun’s Te 4 Aer anes ES ready been going on for seven years, but andso far it had yielded no practical result. A number of scientists and politi- cians endorsed the proposal, but for years Edward Teller had beenits leading advocate. The superbomb proposal led to a brief, intense and highly secret debate. [te opponents of the proposal argued that a U.S. decision to forgo it was a necessary. precondition for persusding others to do likewise. Furthermore, they tice similar restraint and would instead . initiate a secret program of its own. The advocates of the superbomb maintained that the successful achievement of such a bomb by the Russians was only a matter of time, and so at best our forgoing it would amountto a delib- erate decision to become a second-class power, and at worstit would be equiva- lent to surrender, They added that unveloping any other weapon. The secret debate about what the American response ought to be took place within the Government itself. Manyorganizations were involved, including the National Security Council, the Departmentof Defense, the Depart- ment of State and the Congressional Joint Committee on Atomic Energy, but the initial focus of the debate lay within the Atomic Energy Commission. Theearly official reaction of the AEC’s -Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory to the ~ Russian test was a proposal to step up the pace of the nuclear-weapons program in all areas. Among other measures, Norris E. Bradbury, the director, opment was necessary for maintaining recommended that thelaboratory go on a six-day work week and that they expandthe staff, particularly in theoretical be morally wrong to initiate the develop- This acceleration was to include not only programs for improving fission that neither the possession of the new bombnortheinitiation of its devel- the national security of the U.S., and that under such circumstances it would - dertaking the development of the superbomb was morally no different from de- StaffordWarren e|24/rs physics.