_United Nations._—No veto to protect those who violate stipulated
provisions of international agreement.
_Soviet Union._—All decisions require unanimous consent of permanent
members of Security Council.
The permanent members of the UNAEC have summarized the differences
between the Soviet plan and the world plan in the following fashion:
“The Soviet Union proposes that nations should continue to own explosive
atomic materials.
“The other five Powers feel that under such conditions there would be
no effective protection against the sudden use of these materials
as atomic weapons.
“The Soviet Union proposes that nations continue, as at present, to own,
operate, and manage facilities making or using dangerous quantities of
such materials.
“The other five Powers believe that, under such conditions, it would
be impossible to detect or prevent the diversion of such materials
for use in atomic weapons.
“The Soviet Union proposes a system of control depending on periodic
inspection of facilities the existence of which the national government
concerned reports to the international agency, supplemented by special
investigations on suspicion of treaty violations.
“The other five Powers believe that periodic inspection would not
prevent the diversion of dangerous materials and that the special
investigations envisaged would be wholly insufficient to prevent
clandestine activities.”
D
POSSIBLE QUESTIONS REGARDING H-BOMBS AND INTERNATIONAL CONTROL[1]
_The answers to many of the questions which follow are obvious. The
answer to other questions are less obvious. Each question has been
selected to suggest and to illustrate the kind of problem which may be
involved, whether easy or difficult of solution. It should be
emphasized that the original United States proposals and the existing
United Nations plan foresee and carefully take into account the
possibility of an H-bomb, as evidenced by the language they contain.
The same is true of the McMahon Act for domestic control of atomic
energy within the United States._
Footnote 1:
All material in this appendix, except those paragraphs headed
“Author’s Comments,” has been prepared by the staff of the Joint
Committee on Atomic Energy.
1. IS THE HYDROGEN BOMB A MORE OR LESS IMPORTANT WEAPON THAN THE ATOMIC
BOMB? MIGHT HYDROGEN BOMBS PROVE TO BE DECISIVE IN WAR, OR HAS THEIR
SIGNIFICANCE BEEN EXAGGERATED?
Dr. Harold Urey, a Nobel Prize winner in [chemistry], has suggested that
the H-bomb would be militarily decisive; Dr. Hans Bethe, [and other
noted physicists, have] indicated that the step from A-bombs to H-bombs
is as great as the original step from conventional to atomic explosives.
However, Dr. Robert F. Bacher, a former AEC Commissioner, states that—
while it [the H-bomb] is a terrible weapon, its military effectiveness
seems to have been grossly overrated in the minds of laymen.
Some of the questions which may bear upon this difference of opinion are
as follows:
(1) _Shock effect._—To what extent do H-bombs excel A-bombs in
permitting a highly destructive attack to be compressed in time?
(2) _Comparative numbers._—What quantity of A-bombs are required to do
the same job as a given number of H-bombs?
(3) _Neutron economy._—How much fissionable material for A-bombs is
sacrificed by using the neutrons available in reactors for making H-bomb
materials?
(4) _Deliverability._—Under various combat conditions, is the delivery
of H-bombs cheaper and surer than delivery of an “equivalent” number of
A-bombs?
(5) _Aiming accuracy._—How superior is a weapon which need strike only
within a number of miles in order to destroy its target over one which
must strike within 1 or 2 miles?
(6) _Psychology._—As compared with the A-bomb, to what extent might the
H-bomb impair an enemy’s will to resist and accelerate recognition of
defeat?
(7) _Tactical employment._—What is the relative value of A-bombs and
H-bombs in tactical situations—when used against troops in the field,
guerrilla fighters, forces preparing for amphibious invasion, a fleet, a
string of air strips or submarine bases, atomic facilities, underground
installations, etc.?
(8) _Definition of “military effectiveness.”_—Would the use of H-bombs
to destroy large urban centers containing no armaments plants have no
“military effectiveness,” or would such destruction aid the attacker and
therefore represent “militarily effective” use of the weapon? Is it
possible to distinguish, in an era of total war, between “military” and
“nonmilitary” targets?