commendation to AFOAT-1 and their collaborators for their excellent performance of a most difficult mission. Our discussions, thoughmost enlightening, still leave us with a feeling that much remains to be understood about the design, purpose and operation of the four Soviet devices; a feeling. which was shared byall| Present. . sence i leadsustosuspect't b vareeehasbeenmadein’Soviet technology which is not clear to us.. This worry leads us to a suggestion which we strongly urge on the Com-- mission, namely, to. initiate a vigorous program of résearch in chemical explosives suitable for the implosion of atomic weapons. It has long been felt by some experts in the field of chemical explosives that great improvement in explosion yield per unit volume could be achieved by explosives research and development. The pressure of other programs however, has caused this field to be largely neglected. We feel that we should.no longer leave this largely unexplored. The gains to be achieved from success In this direction are enormous both in the reduction in size of large fission weapons and even more importantly in | the possibility of making smaller fission weapons of simple design and great economy of fissionaple material. It is well known that both the Russians and the British are very expert in the field of chemical explosives. It is conceivable to us that they may have made significant adyances in this field, The explosives in present use in the United States were developed for the more usual military purposes. Many of the requirements which are put on such explosives can perhaps be relaxed for nuclear weapons in order to achieve a greater energy release per unit volume, ‘With © this in mind and with regard to the great gains to be achieved for the weapons program from such a development, we_recommendthat the Commission proceed toward the exploration of these possibilities with all | speed, eo es " 2. Doctor Hafstad's presentation of the budgetary aspects of a fiveyear plan for power reactors, which is being developed by the Reactor | Division, raised a number of technical questions which seem relevant to ' the soundness of the plan. The Committee would appreciate a paper for its study before the next meeting which would appraise the significant technical features of the several reactor projects involved in the five- year plan, Such a study should compare and contrast the relative merits and economic promise of the projects, including chemical processing, and the probable time factors, Relevant budgetary estimates might well