Some Little-Publicized Difficulties with a Nuclear Freeze; RDA-TR-122116-001
Marina del Rey, CA: R & D Associates, 1983. Presumed First Edition, First printing. Comb binding. [2], i, 30 pages. Printed on one side only. Footnotes. Staple at top of front cover. Cover has some wear and soiling. RARE surviving copy. This report was referenced in the seminal article (International Security, Fall 1987 (Vol. 12, No. 2) ), A Low Threshold Test Ban by Frank N. von Hippel, Harold A. Feiveson, and Christopher E. Paine. Jack W. Rosengren was responsible for the physics design of the first Polaris warhead and an early Minuteman warhead. Later, he became associate director for nuclear weapons design at the Lawrence Livermore Laboratories in California, and then deputy director for science and technology at the Defense Nuclear Agency. In this report he addresses three particular bans proposed for a Freeze, the perishability of nuclear weapons, some past examples of stockpile problems and offers conclusions related to the production of nuclear weapon materials, the production of nuclear weapons, the testing of nuclear weapons, and an overall conclusion. Behind a surge of support for the Freeze idea in the 1980s lay growing public concerns about the outbreak of nuclear war. In the late 1970s, Soviet-American détente unraveled and the Cold War began to revive, with new conflicts emerging in Africa, Central America, and Afghanistan. That caused nuclear arms control agreements between the two superpowers, such as SALT II, to be jettisoned and each embarked on dangerous nuclear expansion programs. The Soviet government began to replace its older nuclear weapons with more accurate, intermediate-range SS-20 missiles, directly threatening Western Europe. For its part, the US government announced plans for a NATO nuclear buildup with an enhanced radiation weapon (the neutron bomb) and, after that venture collapsed thanks to public protest, with a new generation of intermediate-range nuclear weapons: cruise and Pershing II missiles. Along with their investment in nuclear arms, national leaders employed a particularly hardline rhetoric. Ronald Reagan, who had opposed every nuclear arms control agreement negotiated by his Democratic and Republican predecessors, had denounced the SALT II treaty as “an act of appeasement.” While scornful of previous attempts at arms limitations, and championing a massive US nuclear weapons buildup, he nevertheless proposed and commenced negotiations for the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, (START I), which his successor, George H. W. Bush, signed in 1991. A key argument against the nuclear freeze movement was that it was an action that would leave the Soviet Union in a state of superiority. Polls show that while a majority of the public supported the freeze, they "did not support freezing a Soviet advantage in place". Time said the movement was "understandable, but in the view of many nuclear experts, the solution is impractical and unwise". McGeorge Bundy (a critic of the Reagan administration) said "the issues were far too complicated to be resolved by a bilateral freeze, which was a dubious notion in any case" Condition: Good.
Keywords: Nuclear Freeze, Fissile Material Production, Nuclear Weapons, Weapons Testing, Weapons Production, Polaris Warhead, Poseidon Warhead, Minuteman Warhead, W45, Tactical Nuclear, W52, High Explosive, Risk Assessment
[Book #84033]
Price: $150.00