Amerikai Magyar Értesítő, 1982 (18. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)
1982-11-01 / 11. szám
For peace, says a nuclear physicist 1982. november Amerikai Magyar értesítő 19.oldal THE EVENING SUN We need a shield, not a freeze By Edward Teiler BALANCE OF TERROR is not a nice idea. Rs originator, former Secretary of Defense Robert Strange McNamara, is not a comforting man. Yet this policy has been the keystone of our defense policy for two decades. I suspect that this is one of the strong but not obvious reasons behind the nuclear-freeze movement. President Reagan made the courageous and overdue statement that the Soviet Union has more powerful nuclear arms than the United States. In other words, the balance is less certain than the terror. Is it surprising that the cry “Stop! Freeze!” has gone up? Yet what is obvious is not necessarily right. Peace is endangered as it has not been since the sad and terrible days of Munich and Chamberlain. Will the nuclear freeze buy peace in our time? In what way does the freeze movement differ from our past and continuing effort for arms limitation? Do the advocates of the freeze know that in the last 16 years the explosive power of nuclear bombs in the U.S. arsenal has decreased to half its earlier value? Do they know that today the Soviet arsenal is more than three times ours in destructive power? When was the world more secure — in 1962 or 1982? Why continue down a path that is tried and untrue? Does a new name for an old idea improve the idea? The real question is this: If the balance of terror no longer works, if Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD) is bankrupt, if detente is self-delusion, what will help? The answer is simple but by no means easy. The answer is true defense in the most literal sense of the word. We need weapons — not against people, not against industries, not even against missiles waiting in their silos to be fired, but against explosives that have been fired and that, within minutes, would reach their targets and kill. The sword has been invented; now we must work on the shield. What is being suggested contradicts a simple, generally accepted idea: that there is no defense against devastating nuclear bombs. They approach faster than a bullet. Can one shoot down a bullet? Yes. The answer is that there are no absolute weapons. But what is needed is the best defense, and that defense is nuclear in nature. To convince people that defense against incoming nuclear weapons can be effective is difficult. It may even be impossible under present conditions. The difficulty lies in the great patience required to understand new scientific and technical facts. The impossiblity arises from the classification of the relevant information. The laws of our country demand that I not disclose classified information. If the rules were broken, orderly cooperation would cease. But I can and do argue that it is imperative to change the rules. We have good evidence, though we have no proof, that the Soviet military and the Soviet leaders have the information that we are withholding from our own people. We call our secrecy “security.” What kind of security is produced by keeping American voters in ignorance of vital information that the Soviets probably possess? What kind of security results from not explaining to our own scientists the work being done on devices for real defense — not mass murder? The first step toward peace is understanding. In the present case, understanding requires some difficult decisions to open up information that hither to has been kept secret. The greatest of physicists, who overcame the deep mysteries of atomic structure, was Niels Bohr. He said, “The best weapon of a dictatorship is secrecy, but for a democracy, the best weapon is that of openness.” I can only give the general nature of the possibilities for defensive weapons and the circumstance that sets them apart from nuclear weapons of mass destruction. The possibility of very effective defensive weapons comes from the prospect of using nuclear explosives of limited energy to disable incoming missiles. This could be accomplished in a manner that would leave the ground level free of the effects of blast, heat and fallout. The “salvation” offered by the freeze advocates will prevent the development and deployment of such protective defense systems. r What signposts could we follow toward peace? • Vote NO on the freeze initiative, if there is one in your state. • Demand a classification policy that eliminates excessive secrecy. • Support the development of defensive weapons. • Reduce destructive weapons, including weapons of retaliation, as defensive weapons are deployed. Defense will become cheaper than offense and be more effective. • Share all weapons, efforts, plans,, research and responsibilities with our proven allies whose interest in peace equals our own. • Replace treaties that forbid action with treaties that encourage cooperation. Cooperation engenders good will, and good will strengthens peace. • Expect that troubles will continue to arise. Tomorrow’s problems may be bigger, but they have a possibility of being the troubles of billions of lives, not of millions of deaths. The road to peace is not easy. People who lack foresight or who are full of fears cannot make their way along it. But this is the road that continues the great revolution of Western civilization — a road filled with an incredible variety of individuals, nations and cultures traveling together, a road that leads to survival by using the limitless power of human invention, cooperation and good will. Can the people of the Western democracies continue on such a road? Edward Teller, the nuclear physicist, is senior research fellow at the Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace.
