I THOUGHT WE'D START TALKING ABOUT STIMSON SOMEWHAT. I UNDERSTAND FROM WHAT YOU TOLD ME THAT HE REALLY FELT THAT THE DECISION TO USE THE BOMB AND HOW TO HANDLE THE BOMB AFTER THE WAR WAS REALLY HIS, THAT HE HAD TURN OVER A LOT OF OTHER DAY-TO-DAY WORKINGS OF THE WAR DEPARTMENT TO MARSHALL, AND HE WAS DEVOTING HIS TIME TO THINKING ABOUT THE BOMB. COULD YOU--

Well, I think he thought that he needed advice on various aspects of this new phenomenon. But as far as the question of whether, when, how and why to use the bomb, he felt that was peculiarly a responsibility of his and Marshall's to be made to the President directly. As it turned out, this got to be a very major question on the part of the deliberations of the interim committee, but not so intended at the outset. Stimson recognized this was a unique force in the world. Not quite like the invention of the wheel, perhaps, but darned close to it, and it had all sorts of implications: how to deal with it domestically, what to do about it internationally, particularly with the Russians, how much information should be given out? Those were the things he wanted advice on. But as I say, the the Franck Report and other inputs from the scientists particularly, raised the question of use policy as well. And it happened that the committee itself came to the same conclusion he did, that it should be used directly as a military weapon at the first opportunity against the Japanese.

COULD YOU TELL US A LITTLE ABOUT YOUR INITIAL INVOLVEMENT WITH THE WAR DEPARTMENT, HOW YOU MET STIMSON AND WHAT HE WAS LIKE AS A PERSON?

Well, it was a... I really arrived there quite by chance. I was on my way out to Fort Hamilton, Ohio as a mint-fresh Second Lieutenant out of OCS medical administrative corps. And I came by the Pentagon on my way out to Fort Hamilton, met my boss from Cairo, where I'd been stationed for a year, and I asked him casually if he knew of any interesting things going on in the Pentagon, He said, "Yeah Harvey Bundy needs a man who is, is... Horseholder is going overseas, he wants his grandchildren to think well of him, and so Captain Hodge needs to be replaced." And I went to see Harvey Bundy, and we got along very well together. And sight unseen, in a sense, I just took the job when he offered it to me. I thought it might be more fun than juggling bedpans at Fort Hamilton. I didn't really know what it was all about for several weeks. I answered letters for the Secretary from little old ladies who were wondering why their boy had not made general yet. After all, he's already been through basic training. And I began to wonder whether this was really going to be any fun or not or of any use to the war effort. And then one day Mr. Bundy said, "Well here, Arneson, there's this cabinet in the corner I want you to read its contents very, very carefully." I thought of it many times afterward — the classification of the material should have been "Burn before reading," because here was the whole, the whole schmear. Manhattan District, our relations with the British, the Canadians, early efforts to determine feasibility efficient.... So I spent several weeks going through all this material, which was good preparation for being secretary of the Interim Committee when it was formed. And that's how I got there. ...Now Stimson...I have always been attracted to the, you know, Joe Alsop's characterization of him as "That granitic statue to the ancient virtues" He was a 19th century man I thought. He'd had a very remarkable career, he'd been US District Attorney in the southern district of New York; Governor General of the Philippines; he had been Secretary of War under Taft; he had been Secretary of State under either Hoover or Coolidge, Hoover I believe; and here he was, a staunch Republican Secretary of War in a Democratic administration. He was a unanimous choice of everybody for that job. Now he was in his late '70s, he was not well, he couldn't work a full day; half a day was the best he could do. But he compensated for that by turning over the War Department virtually to Marshall and his people, and spent very much of his time on this vexing problem of the atom.

LET ME ASK YOU, WHY DID HE FEEL IT NECESSARY TO DEVOTE SO MUCH TIME TO THIS? HOW DID HE PERCEIVE THE EMERGING ATOMIC BOMB?

Well, I think he thought it was a, a revolutionary discovery. As I mentioned, not quite the equivalent of the invention of the wheel, but it would have very great repercussions on all--

I WANT TO STOP YOU FOR A SECOND IF YOU DON'T MIND. COULD YOU START THAT THOUGHT OVER AND USE HIS NAME, SO WE'LL KNOW WHO YOU'RE REFERRING TO.

Yeah, right.

AND LOOK AT ME IF YOU WOULD—

Stimson was a very earnest man. He really plunged into things very, very thoughtfully. And he saw this development as quite unique with endless repercussions on civilization and life, next-door to the invention of the wheel you might say. And I think he had worries about it. He wasn't quite sure what to make of all this. Nobody did. And his particular concern was getting the war over with, he saw this as a unique weapon for that purpose, and I think never really wavered in his own conviction that it should be used. One had to go through all the rigmarole of getting opinions and whatnot. But actually his, his instructions to the Interim Committee did not include the question of use. While still pondering the matter, I believe he felt he was the one, together with Marshall, who should make recommendations to the President on this matter. As it happened the Interim Committee got involved and ended up with the same conclusion that he would have come to, very interesting process

COULD YOU TALK ABOUT THAT AT THE END OF MAY '45, WHEN THE INTERIM COMMITTEE DID ADDRESS THAT QUESTION, WHAT SOME OF THEIR CONCERNS WERE AND SOME OF THE OPTIONS THAT THEY DISCUSSED?

Well, there were several options. One was direct military use for maximum effect—

I'M GOING TO ASK YOU AGAIN IF YOU COULD START BY TELLING US THAT THE INTERIM COMMITTEE MET IN MAY 31st IN '45, AND STARTING THAT WAY.

This committee, the Interim Committee as it was called, and it was called the Interim Committee because Stimson realized a more permanent body would be required after the war to deal with this. And that was done of course in the McMahon Act of 1946. On the question of use, there were several options discussed by the committee: direct military use against targets for maximum effect to achieve what Churchill called two massive shocks that might bring an instant end to the war. There was a question of demonstration, which was favored by a number of people outside the Committee and one member of the committee, Ralph Bard from the Navy. That got shot down pretty fast. It was one of the Major points of the Franck Committee Report from some scientists in Chicago.

LET'S START WHERE YOU SAID THE INTERIM COMMITTEE DISCUSSED THE POSSIBILITY OF A DEMONSTRATION, AND PERHAPS YOU COULD MENTION SOME OF THE REASONS WHY, WHY THAT NOTION WAS REJECTED AND SOME OF THE PEOPLE WHO HAD THE IDEAS.

Yeah. The question of use policy arose very early in the deliberations of the committee. A number of the scientists had suggested, and in the early meeting of the committee with its scientific panel, I believe on May 31st, the question of use policy came up. The general consensus was clearly in terms of direct military use with maximum shock effect on targets that'd be... some had been saved for the express purpose of being used in this connection. Those who favored a demonstration came up with various ideas, which were all discarded. One suggestion was that the Japanese be invited and members of the United Nations be invited to a demonstration on some deserted island in the Pacific. The consensus on that was it would not really be as shocking as you'd want so to speak. Because while the test shot at Alamogordo was pretty darned impressive, the aftereffects in the desert were not very much... A little glassy pavement around the test site, but of course there weren't any buildings demolished and so on. So the idea was you had to have a populated area, a military target. Jimmy Byrnes, who was a member of the committee and the President's personal representative, was especially against this idea. He said, one, you... nobody would be awfully impressed by this if you tried to have a demonstration with B-17s dropping the bomb, or if you tried to hit some harmless target in Japan, like a cryptomeria forest. How do you know the bomber would get there? Especially if you announced it in advance. As it turned out, when the bombers did go, they were shrugged off by the populace. They just thought they were probably reconnaissance planes. And nobody seemed to think that a demonstration would really be convincing enough, that you'd be wasting your men and your tonnage on that. Now, the targets were rather carefully chosen, both Hiroshima and Nagasaki were major military centers. Stimson enters the picture... concern about this enters the picture with respect to Kyoto for example. Now, Kyoto was a very legitimate target. There were lots of military activities going on there. But it was also the national shrine of the Shinto. He knew it at first hand. He crossed it off the list of possible target immediately when Groves came in to get his approval. And bull-headed Groves didn't want to be thwarted in this, and he kept coming back to it again and again. And Stimson said, no, that city will not be bombed.

IN THE INTERIM COMMITTEE MEETINGS, WHAT WERE SOME OF THE DISCUSSIONS HAVING TO DO WITH THE SOVIET UNION. I KNOW OPPENHEIMER HAD TALKED ABOUT APPROACHING THE SOVIET UNION BEFORE THE BOMB WAS USED TO MAKE THEM AWARE OF WHAT WAS HAPPENING. AND I THINK MARSHALL...HAD SUGGESTED THAT SOVIETS MIGHT ACTUALLY BE INVITED TO WATCH THE TESTS. PERHAPS YOU COULD TALK ABOUT THOSE THINGS.

As I look back on that period of our history, I'm struck by ...how schizophrenic we were about the Soviet Union. There were those who wanted to believe the best, and there were those who were convinced of the worst. And there was a constant struggle between the two. Common sense would seem to indicate that if you're going to try to get a, an agreement on so portentous a matter, against such an unknown country, you'd do it on a private basis; you'd not run it past the UN, but go directly from us to them. It was the big question how we were going to handle this after the war. Uh, Stimson favored excuse me, he, he favored a direct private approach--

[MISC.]

This is where we might bring in that quotation if you like.

WHEN WE'RE DONE WITH THIS WHY DON'T WE DO THAT. WHY DON'T YOU START AGAIN AND SAY THAT STIMSON WAS CONCERNED.

In the international sphere the Secretary recognized the big problem was the Soviet Union. We'd had our wartime relations with the British and the Canadians, and those had gone along well, but the Soviet Union was a great enigma, and he felt that a direct approach, private approach should be made to them, not through the open forum of a UN with 49 nations clamoring. We would have to consult with the British in doing that. We thought the chances, if there were any would be better in that fashion. He felt that, and here again, you have a, a real gentlemanly approach to life, he felt the only way to get a man's trust would be to trust him and show your trust. I think Stimson was rather disabused of that after he'd been to Potsdam and saw the Russians in action. They did not strike him as a very friendly lot. And he had doubts later that we could, we could do anything with them at all, whether privately or singly. But it was worth a try. You just had to try. Public opinion and common sense would indicate that you'd have to do what you could.

ALL RIGHT. LET'S PICK IT UP WHERE YOU WERE GOING TO DESCRIBE THE DISCUSSIONS WITHIN THE INTERIM COMMITTEE BEFORE THE BOMB HAD BEEN DEMONSTRATED, WHAT SOME OF THE CONCERNS WERE ABOUT THE SOVIET UNION, AND WHO HAD THOSE, AND WHAT WERE THE POINTS OF VIEW OF VARIOUS MEMBERS OF THE COMMITTEE.

The Interim Committee didn't address itself to how we should handle this problem with the Soviet Union. There were several considerations. One was that we had a commitment from the Soviet Union they would enter the war once we finished off in Europe, and there was some ambiguity on that score, did we want them or didn't we want them. Would it be necessary or not necessary. You have to remember that the Joint Chiefs had not really been convinced that this new gadget was going to work. And they couldn't really drill it into their war plans. They were planning invasion in the first of November. Over the beaches with five thou— five million men. Thirty divisions were already on their way from Europe. They were going to face home troops of two and three-quarter million. Uh, every man 15 to 60 had been conscripted. There were ten thousand kamikaze planes to deal with. And children with explosives strapped on their backs to fall in front of tanks to blow them up. They were euphemistically called the Sherman carpet. Now, going into the home islands meant you were fighting the whole country, because their whole country would have been armed. Maybe the cannon would be brass-plated and the muskets would be muzzle-loading and their and bows and arrows wouldn't be very effective or the sharpened bamboo spears. But the slaughter would have been horrendous. Uh, MacArthur estimated we would have a million casualties. Uh,...seen an estimate of what the Japanese casualties would be, but probably many times that, including civilians. So the Joint Chiefs were proceeding on the assumption that that had to be planned for. And meanwhile, of course, the, the air force was making cinders out of the country. One bomber raid of a thousand-bomb bombers, loaded with incendiaries had flattened Tokyo in one night, killing 68,000 people. And between August and November 1, if that had gone on endlessly, the islands would be a mass of cinder. Uh...So we all looked upon the atom as a, let's see, what did Churchill call it, uh… something about divine intervention or — I don't remember the exact phrase. Deliverance, divine deliverance.

That that...the other factor involved here was what to do with the Emperor, and it seemed to us that, in the Committee that a shock effect would be better than this endless grinding down to a nub by conventional invasion. And then we had so we had those mixed feelings about the bomb itself, and we were massively ignorant about the Soviet Union really. There were those who thought they were nice people, we could get along with them. There were those who were quite the opposite. They thought there would be no chance of getting anywhere with the Russians. Stimson felt we ought to try. And the committee did, too. As a matter of fact, I think the scientific panel, especially Oppenheimer, thought that we ought to make a private approach to the Russians, right away; bring them in on the secret, the secret, and see what we could — come out of it. Uh, this got lost in the shuffle. I think Jimmy Byrnes, who was the President's representative in the committee found little favor in this; he was very hard-headed about the Russians. Proven right by subsequent events. --

EXCUSE ME — COULD YOU TELL ME AGAIN ABOUT BYRNES, WHAT HIS ATTITUDE WAS AND WHY?

Um...I've always thought of Jimmy Byrnes as a cocky, Bantam rooster. A little fellow and he had lots of opinions about everything. Including how to grow tomatoes; I remember talking to him about that one time. He was a very hard-headed guy. And I think he -- his private view about the Russians was he wasn't going to get anywhere with them, but he'd have to try, but not with any great enthusiasm. And he had more weight in the committee than anybody else because he did represent the President, and was a Secretary of State designee. I think he had more influence than just being one person.

WHAT WAS OPPENHEIMER'S ATTITUDE TOWARD THE RUSSIANS BEFORE THE BOMB WAS USED? WHAT WAS HE ADVOCATING?

Well, he hoped that we could make a, a direct approach.

LET ME ASK YOU TO START AGAIN, AND USE HIS NAME,

I think Dr. Oppenheimer thought we should make a direct approach to the Soviet Union. Uh, what he thought the chances were of getting anywhere I don't know, but it was worth a try. That's all you could say about anybody who advocated that, because nobody knew. I have the feeling that in this period we had very mixed feelings about the Russians and a great deal of ignorance. Here they were, our allies uncomfortable allies to be sure. But they did make a difference. Their efforts against the Nazis certainly helped us a great deal in the Normandy landings. But we didn't understand them and we didn't know what their real motivations were. During the war we tried to get some air bases on Soviet soil because it would be useful for us in fighting the Nazis. We never got 'em. They were not a very friendly lot at best, even when we were allied. So it was a shot in the dark really. And but we persisted, as you know, we got to the UN with a very remarkable plan for international control. I remember being thrilled by it. I thought that was the most remarkable document I'd ever read in my life. So did a lot of other people. But within several months it was clear the Russians were not going to buy it.

WE'LL GET TO THAT A LITTLE LATER. LET ME ASK YOU TO READ THIS NOW BEFORE WE GET TOO FAR AWAY FROM THAT....OK. COULD YOU READ THOSE PARTS THAT ARE UNDERLINED?

Just go right on into it without any--

YEAH, I THINK WE CAN INTRODUCE IT--

One of the memoranda that Stimson sent to the President had these words about relations with the Soviet Union and how to approach them. "Unless the Soviets are voluntarily invited into the partnership, upon a basis of cooperation and trust, we are going to maintain the Anglo-Saxon bloc over against the Soviet in the possession of these — this weapon. Such a condition will almost certainly stimulate feverous— feverish activity on the part of the Soviet toward the development of this bomb, and what will in effect a secret armament race of a rather desperate character. The establishment of relations of mutual confidence between her and us could afford to wait for the slow progress of time. But with the discovery of the bomb, it becomes immediately emergent. Those relations may be perhaps irretrievably embittered by the way in which we approach the solution of the bomb with Russia. For if we fail to approach them now and merely continue to negotiate with them, having this weapon rather ostentatiously on our hip, their suspicions and their distrust of our purposes and motives will increase. The chief lesson I've learned in a long life is that the only way you can make a man trustworthy is to trust him, and the surest way to make him untrustworthy is to distrust him and show your distrust." I think of that as a fine 19th century sentiment. I think Secretary Stimson was rather disabused of this when he saw at first hand at Potsdam how tough the Russians were. But he still had hope, and tried and believed that a direct approach would be the best to try, without guaranteeing any positive results.

BEFORE WE LEAVE THE SUBJECT OF STIMSON, COULD YOU — WHAT DO YOU KNOW ABOUT THE LAST CABINET MEETING THAT HE HAD BEFORE RETIREMENT? CAN YOU DESCRIBE WHAT HE DISCUSSED IN THAT MEETING?

Yes, yes. I wasn't there, but it's been recorded in various places. In his final cabinet meeting, Stimson raised the question of a direct approach to the Russians on this matter. Uh, it-- it met a very mixed reception. Uh, Dean Acheson supported Secretary Stimson; Henry Wallace supported Stimson's idea. But other members of the Cabinet sloughed it off as a pipe dream. And it was very inconclusive. The President as far as I know did not register any opinion one way or another. So it, it came to nothing although he did get his views expressed.

OK, I WANT TO JUST GO BACK FOR A SECOND. TRY TO THINK BACK -- I KNOW IT'S A LONG WAY TO GO, BUT AS IT BECAME APPARENT THAT THE BOMB WAS GOING TO BE READY FOR USE IN THE WAR, WAS THERE A SENSE, AS YOU ATTENDED THE INTERIM COMMITTEE MEETINGS WAS THERE A GREAT SENSE OF URGENCY? WHAT KINDS OF CONCERNS DID THOSE PEOPLE HAVE AS WE GOT IN TOWARDS JUNE OF 1945?

Well, the whole project was sort of 'The Perils of Pauline.' Uh, you know the Manhattan District was following several different paths toward getting uranium-235 and plutonium, trying every sort of device that would work or wouldn't work, and the question of when you'd have a completed bomb was very unclear. Estimates were made. They came out pretty close. Everyone was hoping that the sooner the better. Uh, and it was sooner the better actually, it was an amazing performance. I don't think there's any example in history where you get more quickly from research and development to, to final production. With all the uncertainties that were involved. Uh, there was concern of course as to timing also with regard to whether the Russians were going to come into the war. Now, books had been written. I know one in particular — I won't mention the author's name — but that the real purpose of bombing the Japanese with atom bombs was to keep the Russians out of the war, which is blatant nonsense. OK. We didn't really care very much one way or the other whether they got in--

EXCUSE ME, I'D LIKE TO USE THAT STATEMENT FROM YOU. AND I THINK IF YOU START AGAIN, SAYING SOMETHING LIKE I'VE READ THAT CERTAIN FEEL THAT THE MAIN REASON WE USED THE BOMB WAS TO KEEP THE RUSSIANS OUT AND TAKE IT FROM THERE.

The revisionists, as you would expect, have changed history in their own minds. I read so-some authors who felt that our main purpose in rushing the bomb into use was to keep the Russians out of the war. This is nonsense. We were getting there "as fast as we could with the mostest" — as a General used to say. Uh, and the timing was dependent on technical factors rather than political ones. Now, it happened that the Russians came in at the very last minute. But we were able to ignore in the peace process. Uh, early on, again, remember the Joint Chiefs weren't quite sure what this thing was and what difference it would make. There had been considerable hopes on getting the Russian mass armies into the fray. But as time passed and as the date approached and they realized what we had here, that faded from view pretty much. The Russians tried to capitalize on their very late entry. General MacArthur saw fit to ignore them when he took charge in Japan. And they never protested too much. We'd have had quite a mess on our hands if they'd been participating in the democratization of Japan.

JUST ONE THING, WHAT DO YOU SAY TO PEOPLE WHO SUGGEST THAT ONE OF THE MAIN REASONS THE UNITED STATES USED THE BOMB IN JAPAN WAS TO MAKE A GESTURE TOWARD THE RUSSIANS, A DEMONSTRATION OF POWER, AND TO MAYBE KEEP THE RUSSIANS IN LINE IN EUROPE, TO DEMONSTRATE THE POWER OF THE UNITED STATES? WHAT DO YOU SAY TO THAT ATTITUDE?

Well, you're entitled to that opinion, but I don't think much of it. Uh, I wrote a review of one of the books I read about on this theory of keeping the Russians out. And I said, and I firmly believe it that rather than take the view of the author, I'd rather take the word of Secretary of War, Stimson, and that we used it in order to give a shock, to end the war as quickly as possible on its merits. The Russians were extraneous in a very real sense at that point.

WHY WAS IT NECESSARY TO USE TWO BOMBS. FROM YOUR UNDERSTANDING OF HOW PEOPLE THOUGHT ABOUT IT AT THAT TIME, WOULDN'T ONE HAVE DONE THE TRICK?

Well I — this question was raised when I was in Hiroshima and Nagasaki last August, in connection with another program. Hiroshima was so completely devastated that nobody knew what had gone on there for a couple days. Finally the army, Japanese army got in and realized that the place was gone. So even the shock effect was delayed. Because no one knew what, what this was. It seemed to us that we might need to give the impression that it wouldn't only be two, it might be a lot more. Of course, we didn't have any more. We had only two bombs at that time. It would have taken another three weeks to get a third one ready. But we wanted a double shock to convince the Japanese that the jig was up. One of the interesting things I discovered in Japan was that in many ways the Japanese thought this was the way to— that they could save face in surrendering. Because nobody could stand against this new terror.

WERE THE TWO BOMBS ESSENTIALLY PART OF THE SAME DIRECTIVE?

Yes.

COULD YOU EXPLAIN THAT?

They were authorized separately, the first one—

I'M GOING TO ASK YOU TO START AGAIN AND SAY THE --

ABOUT THE USE OF THE TWO BOMBS AS PART OF THE SAME DECISION --

The decisions to drop, of course, had to be made by the President himself. He wanted to give one shot and see what happened. And of course actually not much happened for several days because there was such confusion in Japan, there were no communications with Hiroshima. The Cabinet was quarreling with itself and with the Emperor. And so it was decided to drop the second, I think it was on the 11th of August, and to leave the impression that more were to come if necessary. Now, it turned out not to be necessary. And that's fortunate, because we didn't have any more. It would be another three weeks before the third one would be ready. Uh, this was the shock effect that Churchill spoke about. He thought that maybe two would do it, and he turned out to be right. And the thing that I think is not often analyzed is what was going on in Japan at the time, in the government. Uh, over history, the Emperor had no power whatsoever, he never decided anything, he just simply recorded a consensus in his Cabinet. And when the consensus was reached, he'd issue a royal rescript. In this case he intervened personally. He said, fellas, we're finished, and we've got to suffer the unsufferable and bear the unbearable. The army was still holding out, but they were overruled, the royal rescript was written — they tried to sabotage that, but finally the Emperor's voice, which the Japanese people had never heard before, came over the air and announced surrender.

DO YOU THINK THAT WAS DIRECTLY ATTRIBUTABLE TO THE USE OF THE BOMBS?

Oh yes. I think very much so. As I mentioned earlier, it was almost a way of saving face for them.

COULD I ASK YOU JUST TO SAY THAT AGAIN IN A COMPLETE SENTENCE, THAT HAVING THE ATOMIC BOMB DROPPED ON JAPAN WAS FOR THEM A WAY OF SAVING FACE?

Yes. I think I discovered when I was in Japan last August talking to various people, one had the impression that they thought that the dropping of the bombs of such unique character and devastation was a way out for them, it was a way of saving face. Nobody could stand up against this. And that was true. Nobody could.

EXCUSE ME...OK, THE ( )?

Oh yes.

COULD YOU EXPLAIN VERY BRIEFLY, IF YOU COULD, HOW YOU HAPPENED TO RECEIVE THE FRANCK REPORT, WHAT, VERY GENERALLY THE FRANCK REPORT WAS SAYING, AND COMPTON'S DISSENT TO THAT.

Hm-mm. The scientists at Chicago, Met Lab, under Dr. Arthur Compton, ended up toward the end of our-- this period not having much else to do. And they began really worrying about the future. And came up with a strong recommendation that the bomb should be used in demonstration and not actual military use. The head of that group was Dr. Franck. And they were urgently concerned about getting this message to the Secretary of War, preferably to the President if possible --that was not feasible. So Franck came scurrying down to Washington one Saturday with Compton. The report recommended demonstration, saying that a direct military use would be immoral, it would weaken our position in the eyes of the world, etc. And they wanted to give this to the Secretary of War. Well, on Saturday the Secretary wasn't there. Neither was George Harrison, who what his deputy on the committee. And all they had to deal with was Captain Arneson, who happened to be working Saturday. And I promised to get it on to the proper authorities. Uh, Compton left a letter, covering letter on this. And he said he disagreed. Now, Compton was a very strong churchman, very devout Christian. And he said even on Christian principles he thought it was better that the world get to know what it was face to face with in the way of this new terrible weapon, if we were ever to get conviction we ought to have international control. Well, the report and his letter went on to Harrison the following Monday. And Harrison said, well, this is really something for the scientific panel to consider. Now, much has been made of the fact that the panel never got the actual copy of the report, but they didn't need it, because they knew exactly what the opinions were. And in fact, Compton and Oppenheimer were the other two members of the panel. Lawrence and Fermi met in Los Alamos. And they said, "Well, we've looked at this, and this doesn't hang together, so we see no alternative to direct military use.

COULD YOU AGAIN JUST SUMMARIZE WHAT ARTHUR COMPTON SAID IN HIS LETTER?

Yes, Arthur Compton disagreed with the report of the Franck Committee. He saw no alternative to direct military use. He felt only in that way would the world understand and come to grips with the terrible problems that were faced in, in its arrival in the world scene, what-- how to handle it — international control, domestically and internationally. That letter went forward with the report to, to George Harrison.

OK. THANK YOU.

That got it, the way you want it?

YEAH, YEAH THAT WAS GOOD. YOU WERE INVOLVED AFTER THE WAR ESPECIALLY IN THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE UNITED STATES AND THE UNITED KINGDOM...COULD YOU DESCRIBE BRIEFLY THE RANGE OF THAT RELATIONSHIP? DURING THE WAR THERE WAS COLLABORATION. SCIENTISTS HAD COME FROM GREAT BRITAIN TO LOS ALAMOS, THERE WAS A GREAT SPIRIT OF COLLABORATION. AND THEN THAT STARTED TO CHANGE. COULD YOU SUMMARIZE THAT RELATIONSHIP AS IT HAPPENED THROUGH THE WAR AND THEN--

Yeah. In the early days, 1939 is sort of the benchmark, we were working feverishly trying to figure out whether fission was possible or not. So were the British. We fumbled around for quite a while with a few thousand dollars assigned to the Navy to work on this problem and which came to naught. And about that the British analyzed the situation and came up with something called the MAUD Committee Report, which concluded unequivocally that fission was possible, and they gave the parameters of the material that was necessary and so on. Uh, this gave us a tremendous shot in the arm, it convinced us that we better get on with it, led to the formation of the Manhattan District, which meant going into production of several different methods simultaneously. And the British were invited to come over with their best scientists. I think we had something like two dozen British physicists, mostly at Los Alamos, although there were others around. The Canadians came into it. We had a bit of a problem with the French. There were four five Frenchmen who were very good, but they were responsible to and reporting to Joliot-Curie who's a self-admitted communist. So we were very touchy about them. They ended up mostly in Canada. But the collaboration with the British and the Canadians was, was open ended except they were subject to compartmentalization as much as we were. I mean, a guy who was working on one item didn't talk to another fellow who was working on a different item. But all of that fell apart when the war was over. Most of the physicists wanted to get back to England and get on to their own work. They learned a great deal from us of course in the process, and they were ahead of the game in the process. But they knew perfectly well in the war, they couldn't have mounted the counterpart to the Manhattan District, did not have the resources. Then during the war period there had been two documents signed by Churchill and Roosevelt: the Quebec Agreement in '43, the Hyde Park Aide-Memoire the same year, calling for continued cooperation across the board in the post-war period, subject only to a decision by the President as to how far we should go in peaceful uses. The ironic thing about those two documents is that they were— the British had a code name for this business called "Tube Alloys." And a navy fellow in the-- on the White House staff, looked at this nomenclature, and he said, well that must have to do with submarines, torpedo tubes. And so the stuff was misfiled. It wasn't until after the war we actually copies. In fact, at one stage we had to ask the British for a photocopy of the original. Well, those were executive agreements which were binding only on the signatories. They did not commit any subsequent administration. But we both tried to honor them, without success. Because the Atomic Energy Act of 1946, the McMahon Act, prohibited any inter— interchange of sensitive, so-called restricted data with any other country. And the only thing we could do in those circumstances, and still a source of bafflement to me, why the committee in considering legislation did not get informed about those two agreements, because they were crucial. There's some disagreement as to whether Senator McMahon knew about this or not. But I find no evidence that he did know about it. In fact, the records show that Dean Acheson went up on the Hill in 1948 and told the committee for the first time there had been these wartime agreements.

WAS THERE A FEELING AFTER THE WAR AMONG POLICY MAKERS THAT IF YOU HAD A CONTINUED COLLABORATION BETWEEN THIS COUNTRY AND THE UNITED KINGDOM IT WOULD INHIBIT INTERNATIONAL CONTROL AGREEMENT?

Yes, it's a good point. Uh, there were two difficulties with continued collaboration. One would be its negative effect on our relations with the Russians--

EXCUSE ME, I'M GOING TO ASK YOU TO START OVER AND SAY, THERE WERE TWO EFFECTS ON COLLABORATION BETWEEN THE UNITED STATES AND THE UNITED KINGDOM.

The matter of collaboration between the United States and the United Kingdom and Canada after the war ran into a couple of counter-currents. One was what effect would this have on our dealing with the Russians? We were being a little cozy with them. The other was we were trying to get international control through the UN. And that was directly in conflict with little private deals with any other country. Now... sometimes I suspect some of our people used that second reason for saying no to the Russians.

FOR SAYING NO TO THE BRITISH?

British, yeah, I'm sorry. Um, I think the British were more realistic than we were. Of course, they're, they're— they were more importunate than we, too, they needed our help getting on with their program. I think they thought the chances of international control were much slimmer than we did. For very practical reasons.

AND YOU PERSONALLY WERE INVOLVED WHEN...AND KING CAME TO MEET WITH THE ADMINISTRATION, YOU AND ROGER MAKINS ON THE BRITISH SIDE AND OTHERS. WHAT WAS IT THAT YOU WERE WORKING ON? WHAT WAS YOUR MANDATE YOU WERE TRYING TO DO, LATE 1945 AFTER THE WAR?

Yeah. I remember it well. I was asked to draw up a little historical chronology of just what our relations had been. The main purpose of the meeting with the British was to get their agreement on a proposal up at the UN for international control and to see what we might do about further collaboration between us, the two being rather in conflict. And the British agreed with us on the approach to the UN. And that was fine. But everything else was left pretty much in, in-- out in outer space. We could not come to any firm agreement as to what our post-war relationship should be. Um, one of the things that astounded the-- I think one of the reasons we probably didn't want to reveal too much about those two agreements, the Quebec Agreement and the Hyde Park Agreement, the British had a veto on our use of the atomic weapon in the war. Now some would say that was a derogation of Sovereignty, it wasn't really because when it came time, they were way ahead of us. We used the bombs in August, they gave their consent on the 4th of July, preceding. But when that got known up on the hill, there was a great hue and cry. It should never have been done. They were reminded there was a war on.

SO WHAT WAS THE RESULT OF THAT— THOSE MEETINGS WITH THE BRITISH LATE IN 1945? WHY DID THE COLLABORATION END BETWEEN THE UNITED STATES AND GREAT BRITAIN? WAS THERE A FEAR OF-- WERE THERE SECURITY CONCERNS ON THE PART OF THE UNITED STATES?

Yes, there, there, there were security concerns, which got blown all out of proportion I think. But the real stumbling block was the McMahon Act of 1946. We, we could not— we could not get around that without seeking an amendment to the act. And nobody had the temerity to even try to do that at that time. Um, so what we had to do was re— resort to a an executive sort of an agreement, which was not binding on either party. It was called a modus vivendi. Someone remarked that a modus vivendi is a -- an accommodation to irreconcilable positions, and the fellow who invented the term said that's about right. We came up with nine areas of cooperation we could work in with the British, like, you know, isotopes, uh civil defense radiation dangers and so on. Um, basic metallurgy of various materials such as plutonium, which got us into a real jam at one time. Now, a modus vivendi is brought about by Party A saying, "Here's what we've got down on paper, and I intend to follow what it says." And Party B says, "I feel the same way, and I'll agree to that." Nobody is really bound, except among friends, and we were friends and we were bound by it, but it did not have the force of law. And we lived with that for several years. Now, what, what grip did the British have on us? Their grip was raw materials. In those days the chief source by far was the Belgian Congo. The British happened to be represented on the Board of Directors of Union Miniere which owned these mines. So they, they could easily have insisted on getting half of the out— output. But they ended up giving most of it to us, because we had production and they didn't.

WHAT WAS THE BASIC PROBLEM IN CONTINUING THE QUEBEC AGREEMENT TYPE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN OUR TWO COUNTRIES?

Well, the basic problem in continuing wartime relations with the British and the Canadians was in the first place, a peacetime situation represents a different situation from a wartime situation. The other, rather odd aspect was that we seemed to fear that the British were interested in atomic energy only for power purposes. After all, their power supplies, their coal supplies were dwindling, atomic energy would seem to be a real godsend in terms of power production. Uh, this had been made plain by some of the British; Sir John Anderson, for example, said, "Yes, that's what we really want to do," And we felt that our own people would have a great deal of difficulty subsidizing the British atomic power business. Now, this turned out to be not quite as serious as we thought. But it was on everybody's mind, and it sort of sort of blocked rational thinking. Actually, they were interested in weapons, too. Of course, we would hope they wouldn't make any and we'd offered at one stage to give them some if necessary. But they went ahead with their own program, as you know, and they produce weapons. But there's...But you have a fellow like Senator Vandenberg, who said, "Well, look, we bailed these fellows out to the tune of billions of dollars, why do we have to do any more for them in this very special field?" There was a lot of Congressional opposition to dealing any further with the British. And there was some opposition in— on the part of the Executive as well. Uh, Groves was opposed. He was finished with his job, he didn't want to be bothered with all this other business—

EXCUSE ME ONE SECOND -- AND JUST START WITH THE IDEA OF GROVES, HOW GROVES FELT ABOUT THE BRITISH ( ).

Groves was very appreciative of the assistance that the British gave us during the war. He was very much opposed to give them any help after the war, particularly on the nuclear power side. I remember sitting in meetings with the British on his instructions to sit tight, don't give and inch. And we didn't give an inch.

WHAT WAS HIS CONCERN?

Well, he s— he s— he saw that we should not be subsidizing them in this, in this field. All we would be doing is facilitating things, because they were going to go ahead in any case. But on the other hand, he had great admiration for the British in two respects. One, they were the people, through their MAUD Committee Report, who convinced our people we could get on with this business of fission. We were languishing in self-doubt at that point. And he said the biggest boost that anybody gave the Manhattan Project was in the person of Sir Winston Churchill, more so than the President, more so than Bush or Cohen or anybody else. Uh, Churchill was very gung-ho about this, and he gave us lots of encouragement. As for individual contributions,...credit for...very much. There were a couple of little technical things he thought they were better at than we were. As a matter of fact, the cultural thing was there was one place in England, one place in the world, that could do the barriers for the gaseous diffusion process. And it was owned by the British, and we got our barriers from them.

LET'S TALK ABOUT THE BARUCH PLAN JUST A BIT. HOW DID YOU FEEL ABOUT THE...PLAN WHEN IT CAME BEFORE THE UNITED NATIONS? WAS THERE A FEELING OF OPTIMISM THAT THIS WAS REALLY GOING TO MEAN SOMETHING? OR DID IT SEEM BECAUSE OF THE WAY THE US/USSR RELATIONS HAD DEVELOPED, DID IT SEEM LIKE IT WAS DOOMED FROM THE START?

Well...question of international control. First of all, there was the Baruch-Lilienthal Report, which one of the most amazing documents ever written in modern history. We were offering to give up a valuable weapon for a strict, enforceable international control. Uh, I remember stories about Congressmen sitting up half the night reading it with great excitement, and I did so myself. And I went up to the UN from the War Department a few days before Baruch made his speech. I was up there for two years, daily more disenchanted with the prospects. Um, Baruch was not prepared to buy the Report hook line and sinker; he needed to put his own imprint on it. In fact his choice for the job was a poor one. Truman himself said that was the worst appointment he'd ever made. Now, Baruch was a very considerable gentleman, but he insisted on inserting into the plan the idea of no veto on violations. And there's a footnote...on that a little bit later. Uh, so it went to— before the Commission, and I think there was not optimism but hope that, by golly, this thing was so terrific. It was unprecedented in the world; that unprecedented solutions were required; and it would be recognized by the Russians and everyone else as being required. Those hopes as far as the Russians were concerned, were dashed before the end of the year, '46.

WHY WAS IT THE RUSSIANS — THEY DIDN'T HAVE AN ATOMIC WEAPON, WE DID. WHAT WAS THEIR ATTITUDE TOWARD THE BARUCH PLAN? WHY DIDN'T THEY WELCOME SOME KIND OF INTERNATIONAL CONTROL WHILE THEY WERE IN SUCH AN INFERIOR POSITION?

Two reasons I think. First of all, their position wasn't all that inferior. I mean, they were coming along pretty fast. We didn't know that, but they knew it. It's one of the reasons Stalin was so noncommittal—

I'M GOING TO ASK YOU TO START AGAIN. COULD YOU SAY, THE RUSSIANS WERE COMING ALONG PRETTY FAST IN ATOMIC BOMBS.

We've learned since the war that during that period the Soviet Union was pretty far advanced in production of the necessary materials for an atomic weapon, which they tested in 1949 as you know. Uh ...the uh...there was another point I wanted to make there.

LET'S START THAT AGAIN. THE QUESTION WAS, WHY WOULDN'T THE RUSSIANS ACCEPT THIS PLAN WHEN THEY SEEMED TO BE IN AN INFERIOR POSITION.

My thought was initially that because we thought that the Russians probably hadn't done very much in this field and they wouldn't be able to for quite a while, people like Groves thought it would take them 20 years to get a bomb, that they ought to be anxious to get into this kind of control system, because it would sort of equalize things. We could get rid of ours and there wouldn't be any bombs and so on. Well, we were mistaken about that because their, their work was well advanced. They were along with us step by step from '39 to '41, the only thing that got in the way was the Nazi invasion. They were kind of busy there for a while. Uh, the other thing is that we'd...seriously underestimated the Soviet Union in terms of secrecy and iron curtain. The real problem with any control system is, to be any good at all it's, it's really got to allow for on–site inspection, troops on the ground, inspectors on the ground, national... operation and management of...dangerous facilities, these, were utterly impossible for the Russians even to think about, less agree to. And we didn't, didn't really understand for a while. We thought they were just being difficult. But if you look at their proposals their, their paper proposals, no, no -- it's only now in the '80s that you hear Gorbachev talking about allowing inspection on Soviet soil.

WHAT WAS GROMYKO'S COUNTERPROPOSAL LIKE TO THE BARUCH PLAN?

A paper declaration to abolish nuclear weapons, no inspection, no international control. Like the Stockholm peace appeal, which they strongly backed. Ban the Bomb, with no guarantee it was being done. It was utterly ridiculous, actually. No grown man should have taken it seriously.

COULD I ASK YOU TO SAY THAT AGAIN AND SAY GROMYKO'S COUNTERPROPOSAL TO THE BARUCH PLAN WAS MERELY A...

Well, as this plan progressed through the interminable meetings of the UN, first of all Gromyko came in one day and said, "Your plan is unacceptable to us as a whole and in its separate parts." Period. His proposal in return was a vague sort of thing which called for, Ban the Bomb, without any enforcement procedures. Uh, and we, we could not get them to go any further than that. They were not able to overcome the idea that they would have to open up their territories, as we would if we were to have an effective control. The other thing they were able to do to muddy the waters was to make a big hue and cry about or position on the veto. The say that was Baruch's invention, and an unfortunate one because it was irrelevant. There's an interesting footnote to that, I used to keep in touch with Gromyko from time to time; I'd remember his birthday or send him a card. He used to call me up every once in a while for the next 15 years. And in 19—

EXCUSE ME, DO YOU MEAN TO SAY BARUCH? YOU SAID GROMYKO.

Baruch took Gromyko at his word. And he said, well, I'm getting out of this faulty market; and he quite, as you know at the end of 1946. I kept in touch with him over the years. I'd remember his birthday and send him a card or a telegram. And he'd call me up once in a while. This went on for 15 years. And one day I got a call from him. I was director of cultural affairs in the State Department; I had left the business of the atom long since behind. And he said "Arneson, what's the name of that fellow who opposed me on the veto." And I knew exactly whom he was talking about. I said, "His name is Lincoln Gordon." "Well," he says, "you know, he was right." And I damn near fell out of my chair. I mean, here's a man who was fighting tooth and nail for this thing. And after 15 years, in his '90s, he admits he was wrong. And I said, "well, yes, he was right." But I said it didn't really make any difference you know, because the Russians weren't going to buy anything anyway. But what it did give them was a stick to beat us over the head with. And they played it for all it was worth. But I've never ceased to be amazed that a man of 91 could admit error of that sort. He died very shortly thereafter.

I'M GOING TO ASK YOU JUST ONE FINAL THING. FROM YOUR PERSONAL INVOLVEMENT OVER THE YEARS, LOOKING BACK, WHAT — IS THERE SOMETHING YOU FEEL IS THE MOST MISUNDERSTOOD ASPECT OF THE WHOLE DEVELOPMENT AND USE AND SUBSEQUENT ATTEMPTS TO CONTROL ATOMIC WEAPONS. IS THERE SOMETHING THAT YOU'D LIKE TO SET STRAIGHT IF YOU HAD THE OPPORTUNITY.

It's left a few of us to play on. What I'd like to see — and I think here I would agree with Kennan, who, who made the proposal some while back. I see no earthly reason for the world to have 50,000 atom and nuclear bombs, I think we could cut down to ten percent. Kennan suggested 50 percent. Ten percent would be enough for both sides. Think of the huge waste of resources we're putting into this. And it escalates and escalates and escalates. You have a balance of terror — you can have a balance of terror with ten percent of the numbers. 5,000 would do the trick just as well as 50,000.

DOES IT SURPRISE YOU THAT NO NUCLEAR WEAPONS HAVE BEEN USED IN ANY YEAR SINCE 1945?

No, not at all. I think it's remarkable and inevitable that we should under present circumstances have been spared a world war for so many years. Because we and the Russians know it's mutual suicide. The Russians know that as well as we do. So why in heaven's name do we have to put up with 50,000 weapons on both sides?

MR. ARNESON, TO WHAT EXTENT DID AMERICA'S LIMITED CONVENTIONAL AND ATOMIC MILITARY CAPABILITIES FIGURE IN STATE DEPARTMENT PLANNING IN EARLY POST-WAR YEARS?

In the post-war years, as far as foreign policy was concerned, we were rather flailing about because we weren't quite sure what power we had. We had, indeed, mobilized with unseemly haste after the war. The Defense budget had been cut to $13 billion, which today sounds like peanuts, and it was. So we really didn't have a great deal to fight with. In fact, that put a premium on atomic weapons. Now, we didn't have very many of those, either. I remember when the Atomic Energy Commission took over and Bob Bacher went out, he was the scientific member of the Commission, went out to Los Alamos, he was dismayed and flabbergasted to find there was not a single weapon ready to be used. This was in '46. And we didn't have very many for the next couple years. So we were shadow-boxing in a way. The world thought we probably had dozens and dozens of them, and we didn't. For example in the Berlin crisis, '48, I had just come down from New York, I was just figuring out where my office was and what I was supposed to do and reading all of the stuff that had gone before. I had a call from General Marshall, who was then Secretary of State. The Secretary of State, you know, is unique. He can ask anybody's advice he wants to. Secretary Byrnes used to ask the elevator operator what he thought about things. And so Marshall called me, and he said, "Now, if we go to war with the Soviet Union on the Berlin crisis—"

CAN I JUST INTERRUPT YOU A SECOND, AND LET'S START AGAIN. CAN YOU DESCRIBE FOR ME YOUR MEMORIES OF THE BERLIN CRISIS IN 1948.

Yes. The Berlin crisis, of course, was the first real test we had of what our resolve might be. And of course the question of atomic weapons came into the discussion. I had just come down from New York, where I'd been for two years on UN business. General Marshall called me in, he was then Secretary. And he said "Mr. Arneson, if we go to war with the Soviet Union on the Berlin crisis, and suppose we use atomic weapons in the process, would you recommend bombing Leningrad?" And what flashed through my mind immediately was I remembered Kyoto in Japan, and how Marshall and Stimson vetoed the use of the weapon on that city. And I remembered Leningrad was a great cultural center of the Soviet Union, the...art collection and all of that. I also remembered that Leningrad is the chief communications net for the entire Soviet Union and their military forces. So you had to weigh pro and con on that. And I didn't know how many bombs we had. I never did know how many bombs we had. I didn't even know whether the Secretary knew how many bombs we had. And I said, "Well, depending how many got," I said, "I would recommend bombing Leningrad. If we're in the war, we're in the war and we've got to— no holds barred. The Russians won't be any pushovers in any case." He said, "Well, Mr. Arneson, I wish you'd go back to your office and come back again and see me tomorrow, and see if you have the same opinion." I thought I'd flunked the test somehow. And I went off, and I thought some more about it, and I talked to my fellows there, I had two or three guys working with me. And I came back with the same conclusion. And he thanked me, and that was all I heard about it. Obviously, the decision was not to use atomic weapons.

CAN I ASK YOU JUST TO GO THROUGH THAT A LITTLE BRIEFER? OK. IF YOU CAN TELL ME YOUR MEMORIES OF THE BERLIN CRISIS FROM THE BEGINNING AGAIN.

Yes. The Berlin crisis really represented a, a major test of our resolve. The question had been raised whether we would go to war with the Soviet Union, whether we'd use atomic weapons in the process. Marshall called me in at one stage and asked me what I thought about this, particularly whether we would bomb Leningrad, if we used atomic weapons. I hadn't really expected that question to be asked. I answered it to the best of my ability, I realized that Leningrad was a rather important strategic city, in terms of communications particularly. It's also a city of great cultural heritage. And it was kind of a...choice, but I recommended that we bomb Leningrad, if we had enough bombs to do so. And he queried me for two days on that, and I never knew what, what he had decided himself.

WAS IT YOUR UNDERSTANDING THAT PRESIDENT TRUMAN'S DECISION TO SEND THE ATOMIC-CAPABLE B-29 WAS AN EXPLICIT USE OF ATOMIC DETERRENCE?

During the Berlin crisis, we took several measures that were more psychological than real. Among other things, we dispatched B-29s to England with their consent, without atomic bombs. They may have had nuclear components so the crews could learn how to push the right buttons, but none of these were armed with, with fissionable material. But we hoped the Russians didn't know that, or anybody else. And it was psychological warfare.

WAS IT YOUR UNDERSTANDING AT STATE DEPARTMENT THIS WAS AN ACT OF ATOMIC DIPLOMACY ON TRUMAN'S

Yes. Sending B-29s to England was atomic diplomacy—

COULD YOU START AGAIN AND SAY BY SENDING THE B-29s...

Yeah. By sending the B-29s to England, we hoped to leave the impression that we were armed with— they were armed with nuclear weapons and we were prepared to use them. The fact of the matter is they were not armed, and there were no nuclear components in them,

DO YOU THINK IT WORKED IN ANY WAY?

Yes. The question of what really worked was the Berlin airlift.

I JUST WANT TO GO OVER THE FIRST QUESTION AGAIN. YOU SAID THERE WAS NO POLICY ON USING THE BOMB. AND I JUST WANT YOU TO EXPLAIN THERE WAS NO POLICY ON THAT, AND THE STATE DEPARTMENT TURNED TO CONTAINMENT. SO I'LL ASK YOU AGAIN. TO WHAT EXTENT DID AMERICA'S LIMITED CONVENTIONAL OR ATOMIC MILITARY CAPABILITIES FIGURE WITH STATE DEPARTMENT PLANNING IN 1947?

Well, I think it was a, a basic assumption that with these weapons we had a lot more clout than we might otherwise have. But we also realized there were other things to be done, especially as brought about by the Marshall Plan, to bring recovery in Europe. The Russians at that point were not making any serious thrusts that we had to counter, and we did that by not only the air-lift but psychological warfare, moving B-29s to England, letting the Russians draw their own conclusions. But you know the... it's said the military always fight the current war with last war's equipment. And it took the military some time to figure that we really had these weapons and what we were going to do with them. And I don't, think there was any clear picture emerging there for about a year or two as to just how this all would fit in to our military capabilities.

WHY DID THE STATE DEPARTMENT PURSUE THE LINE OF CONTAINMENT?

Well, we were becoming painfully aware that the Soviet Union was a, an aggressive component on the world scene, and we'd better do something about their ambitions. And the only thing that we could think of that could be handled was a policy of containment, which did not necessarily mean military confrontation, but many other things, like economic recovery and NATO and, and building up free world resources. Um... and it worked pretty well for a while, it really did. It seems to have been pretty much discarded in some ways now, but at the time it seemed like a very sensible position to take.

GOOD. AND THIS POLICY OF CONTAINMENT WAS BECAUSE THERE WAS NO OTHER MILITARY ROUTE TO TAKE?

Well, there were hotheads that were all in favor of bombing the hell out of the Soviet Union at the first opportunity. Churchill thought the communists should have been strangled at birth. But it was all talk. The thing was to get on with living and reconstruction. And try for international control, hope against hope that that could happen. Even when the hopes were dashed very early on, we persisted in— with the UN, for example, to, to bring other delegations in line with us, and we were remarkably successful on that. But it had nothing to do whatever with getting agreement from the Soviet Union. Until the Soviet test shot, which was in '49, I think we were very comfortable with our monopoly of atomic weapons.

CAN I JUST ASK YOU THE QUESTION...WHAT WAS AMERICAN NUCLEAR WEAPONS POLICY ON THE EVE OF THE SOVIET BOMBS, LOOKING BACK, BEFORE THE ACTUAL DETONATION, WHAT WAS YOUR MEMORY ( )?

The up to '49, before the Soviet explosion, I think we were busy producing more and more weapons. The military was getting more and more accustomed to grinding them into their war plans. The Atomic Energy Commission was caught between being the chief sub-contractor to the military in, in weapons, and trying to push nuclear power. You'll remember that David Lilienthal had come from T.V.A. to be chairman, he had great hopes for nuclear power, and he was greatly disappointed in this when the joint—when the general advisory commission, general advisory to the AEC, and this was headed by Oppenheimer, came out with a very pessimistic report.

CAN I JUST STOP YOU THERE, BECAUSE I THINK IT IS TOO GENERAL. LET ME ASK YOU SOMETHING MORE SPECIFIC THAN THAT BECAUSE THERE ARE OTHER POINTS ( ). OK. LET ME ASK YOU HOW YOU FELT WHEN YOU HEARD THE NEWS OF THE SOVIET BOMB BEING DETONATED.

Well, I think everyone was a little surprised, although there had been some very sensible estimates made by fellows like Cohen and Bush and fellows at, at Los Alamos, that it was about time for the Russians to set off their first detonation. And it put to shame Groves' estimate it would take them 20 or 30 years and they might never get the bomb. He said later that was because he didn't think the Russians had any uranium. It's a little hard to believe that in that vast expanse of territory there wouldn't be any uranium. Besides he said, admitted also, that he hadn't taken into account the fact that the Russians controlled the Joachimisthal mines in Czechoslovakia. So there was a, there was a kind of euphoria depending on who was talking. I think we knew though that the monopoly wouldn't last. Stimson recognized that back in 1945. It was just a question of time. But we were very ignorant of just how good the Russians were. We all liked to think they're just a bunch of bearded Bolsheviks, throwing conventional bombs around, Molotov cocktails, all thumbs, that couldn't do anything of any consequence. And they certainly told us that was not the case. As a subsequent analyses by some knowledgeable people indicate they were pretty much with us in development till the — till the Nazis invaded, and that stopped them cold for about two years. But they were pressing ahead with great vigor. And it's doubtful whether they need much help from us or our spies or anybody else.

CAN YOU REMEMBER HOW YOU HEARD ABOUT THE SOVIET BOMB DETONATIONS?

Yes. My deputy, Joe Chase, was our representative on the what we affectionately called JAKE, which was the Joint Atomic Energy Intelligence Committee, chaired by the CIA. And he brought the news back one afternoon. And the immediate question was should we announce this? There was a big disagreement about that for a while. There were some few, like Admiral Towers—

CAN I JUST STOP YOU A SECOND FOR THAT NOISE OUTSIDE LET'S JUST PICK UP AGAIN.

There were some who believed that this was just a plant blowing up. Admiral Towers, who was secretary of the NSC thought that. Defense Secretary Johnson thought that, I still— I think he still does but he, after all, was presiding over the emasculation of the defense establishment down to $13 billion, and he— this was sort of disquieting news for him. But everybody else knew this was the real thing. In fact, we called together a special panel I remember, Oppenheimer, Bob Bacher, the commissioner, and Dr. Bush examined the evidence, and it was unmistakable. It was, it was a test shot of an atomic weapon, it was not a plant blowing up. Well, that set in gear, as you know, a, a re-examination of our policies in something of a hurry, which eventuated an NSC-68, which is a rapid buildup of our strength, not only of atomic capabilities, but nu— conventional forces as well. Because we were vastly outnumbered in conventional forces.

WHAT WAS SECRETARY ACHESON'S REACTION TO THE AGENCY'S GENERAL ADVISORY COMMITTEE'S CONFUSION? AND WHY DID HE SUPPORT THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE HYDROGEN BOMB? THIS WAS A TURNAROUND FROM...-- JUST START BY SAYING SECRETARY DEAN ACHESON, AND WE'LL USE A WIDE SHOT.

Following the Soviet explosion, we had to examine what we were going to do about it. And the, the immediate question was whether we should go ahead with development of H-bombs. Dean Acheson...deplored the need for going ahead, but he saw no alternative. He after all, had been one of the principle architects along with Oppenheimer and Lilienthal on the original proposal to the UN for international control. He'd also lived through years of disappointment that it had never been accepted and wasn't likely to be. He proceed in a very careful manner. He listened to proponents and opponents. He heard from Lilienthal and, and Oppenheimer, who were against going ahead. And he listened to Paul Nitze and Butch Fisher and me, who, who recommended that we go ahead. Uh,...and but it was left, just— he wanted to think about this very carefully. He called in various people and had one-to-one talks with them. And I think the bottom line is, as I remember it one day we were talking about these various points of view. And he said, "You know, I, I spent an hour and a half the other day with, with Oppy" — they had gotten to know each other very well in the Acheson-Lilienthal report days, in fact, Oppy was really the author of most of that, and the teacher. And he said, "I listened to Oppy for an hour and a half, and I don't— didn't understand a thing he was saying." He said "How can you expect a paranoid adversary to disarm by example?" He, he voted for going ahead. Lilienthal opposed—

Any personal stories?

Well, the one other thing I wanted to say about Acheson's view has to do with George Kennan.

CAN YOU REMEMBER THE CONVERSATIONS WITH SECRETARY ACHESON CONCERNING HIS — HOW HE CAME ROUND TO THE IDEA OF SUPPORTING THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE HYDROGEN BOMB, AND ALSO SPECIFICALLY, DO YOU REMEMBER HIM BEING VERY CONCERNED ABOUT THE INCREASING RELIANCE BEING PLACED ON THESE WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION AS DAVE LILIENTHAL CALLED THEM, AND AS AN INSTRUMENT OF FOREIGN POLICY.

Yes, I remember Acheson as a...he was troubled by this problem.

BY SAYING SECRETARY ACHESON WAS TROUBLED, AND ...

Secretary Acheson was very troubled by the, the problem. But he was really quite a realist. He, he, he believed in the art of the possible. And he saw, obviously, we were not getting anywhere in international control with atomic energy, he thought that if the Russians got H-bombs before we did, it would be a tremendous blow to our foreign policy objectives. And we really didn't have any way of stuffing it back in Pandora's box, we just had to get on with it. Now, in that connection he ran afoul of George Kennan, who oddly enough thought that we might try again for some sort of international control. I kept thinking to myself, George, I wish you had spent two years up at the UN as I did, and you wouldn't talk that way. In fact, toward the end of the prolonged discussions, and everything was speeded up because of Senator Johnson's spilling the beans, you know, in public about this weapon there was a great pressure on the President to decide. In fact, Brien McMahon kept pushing and pushing and pushing. There was...some feeling that the President would be in grave difficulty if he didn't decide this matter pretty, pretty soon. But towards the end of this period, Kennan's views were quite clear—they were the same as the general advisory committee, that we should not go ahead with this. Acheson called him in one day and said, "George," and I remember this, Acheson repeated this before the Joint Committee when the ABM business was up. He said, "George, if you persist in your view on this matter, you should resign from the foreign service, you should assume a monk's habit, carry a tin cup, and stand on the street corner and say 'The end of the world is nigh'." Acheson found a much more congenial director of the policy planning staff in Paul Nitze than he did in George Kennan.

DO YOU REMEMBER ANY CONVERSATIONS WHICH TOOK BETWEEN SECRETARY ACHESON AND DAVID LILIENTHAL?

Yes. As I mentioned earlier in thinking about this problem, Acheson sought out the opinions of those in opposition as well as those in favor. And he talked not only to Oppenheimer but, but to Acheson— and to Lilienthal. David was in favor of not going ahead. As you know, the Commission itself was divided on this question. And Lilienthal hoped that somehow before a decision was made, even if we were to go ahead, we should have re-examined our objectives in peace and war in light of this development. Acheson thought that was a good idea, but he didn't think the time permitted that we should couple that with the decision to go ahead and then do what turned out to be NSC-68, which is well known to everybody by now as a real massive buildup of military psychological and economic strength. Uh... and as I say, he didn't understand what— really couldn't believe what Oppenheimer was arguing about.

WAS THERE ANY PRESSURE FROM THE MILITARY AT THIS POINT?

No. Actually the military and the State Department were pretty much arm in arm on this. We had the same view. The off-forc was the AEC itself. And if I may read the tea leaves, I think that Truman had made up his mind pretty fast. Whatever advice he got. He was that kind of fellow. On the other hand, he refused to be stampeded. Brien McMahon sent him a 5,000–word expostulation of how we ought to get on with things, and Truman said "Acheson, we've got this letter from Brien McMahon. We'll let him know what we decide after we've decided. He can just wait." Typical of the man.

DO YOU RECALL ANY CONVERSATION BETWEEN SECRETARY ACHESON AND EDWARD TELLER?

I tried to refresh my mind on that, and I find no evidence in any of the records that I can see that they ever met on this question. The other strange thing is that Admiral Strauss grew strongly in favor of getting on with this — never approached anybody in the State Department? Neither the Secretary or me or anybody else. He decided the thing he was going to do was run around left-hand and stir up Teller and Lawrence and the Joint Committee. And that he did very successfully. Quite unnecessarily I might say, because the decision was in process, and the outcome was pretty clear.

SO TO SUM IT UP, WHO WERE THE KEY FIGURES IN DEAN ACHESON'S DECISION?

Well, we... there were three people who worked on the basic paper which went to the special committee of the NSC. We had talks with the Secretary, Paul Nitze, Adrian Fisher, who was legal adviser, who had been general council at the AEC., he was an old friend of Acheson's from Princeton days. And myself. And I'm the one who summed up the arguments, and my paper was the basis for the decision,...And the conclusions were mine, because they were a consensus conclusion, which was what the Secretary wanted. It breezed through the special committee in about 15 minutes.

CAN YOU SUM UP THOSE— YOUR CONCLUSIONS?

Yes. We recommended that the President authorize work aimed toward a test, and that the question of production aid stockpiling should be left to the Defense and AEC to determine based on test results, and the third in meantime, the State Department and the Department of Defense to undertake a thorough-going review of our objectives in peace and war in the light" of Soviet advances- This is what eventuated in NSC-68. Oh, the final thing was that the President should announce the decision.

WHAT DO YOU REMEMBER ABOUT THE NSC. MEETING WHICH TOOK PLACE JANUARY 31ST? AND I WANT TO KNOW REALLY WHAT WERE THE FINAL CONSIDERATIONS WHICH WEIGHED HEAVILY ON PRESIDENT TRUMAN AT THE MEETING. AND LET'S WAIT FOR THAT NOISE. AND WHAT WAS THE TENSION? THIS IS, WE'RE AT THE NSC. MEETING AND YOU'RE GIVING ME YOUR RECOLLECTIONS OF THAT.

The special committee of the NSC had been set up by the President to deal solely with atomic energy question that had foreign policy military implications. Acheson was chairman of it, the State Department being the senior department of government. And we — Adrian Fisher and I went with him to the meeting from State, and the Secretary, Vince Johnson had Robert LeBaron with him, who was chairman of the military liaison committee. And as I remember, I think Lilienthal had Dr. Smyth, and that was all. The President did not preside, Acheson did. Now, the paper we had prepared in the State Department was a rather long one, and the analysis tried to argue both sides of the case, and everybody was familiar with that by now anyway, so we didn't go through word by word, we just went immediately to the conclusions. They were agreed to in a matter of minutes, slight changes in terminology. Acheson handled the meeting very skillfully, he tried to avoid any knock-down, drag-out fights. Everybody knew where everybody stood in the matter. Lilienthal entered a plea, an impassioned plea, for going the other direction. At that point Secretary Johnson said, "Well, fellows, I've got a meeting with the President at 12:15, which is about five minutes from now. Let's go over and get a decision." And so they went over, and the President had one question, He says, "Can the Russians do this?" And everybody agreed they could. And S... said, "We don't have much time, Mr. President The President said, "We'll go ahead." At that point, Lilienthal asked to be heard and presented his arguments. And the President cut him off. And in the end, Lilienthal finally voted with the other two. That was the end of that.

IF YOU COULD SUMMARIZE AGAIN, JUST THE BEGINNING OF THAT, YOU SAID THE STATE DEPARTMENT HAD MADE UP ITS MIND, AND IF YOU CAN JUST RUN THROUGH THAT AGAIN, SAYING WHAT THE STATE DEPARTMENT HAD DECIDED?

Yeah. In going to the meeting, we knew perfectly well that our position would be to go ahead on the bomb. The question had been raised in various quarters, by the way, what effect did the Fuchs disclosure have? Well, we were all aware of this, but it really made no difference to anybody. Whatever damage Fuchs did do in terms of helping the Russians — nobody quite knows, because nobody quite knew how far the Russians were getting on their own. What we do know is that the Fuchs matter really soured our relations, our attempts at closer cooperation with the British. We couldn't even raise the subject for a couple years. But sure, everybody knew about Fuchs defection. It was learned on the 27th of January; our meeting was on the 31st of the special committee. And everybody had that in mind, but it had no bearing on the decision, which had been made in increments for, for weeks.

DO YOU THINK IT AFFECTED PRESIDENT TRUMAN'S DECISION ON THIS?

No, I think he had made up his mind long before we did. I really do. I think he was the sort of fellow—

IF YOU COULD SAY PRESIDENT TRUMAN—

I think Truman had made up his mind even before we had, he was going— I would have thought he'd go ahead whether we recommended to him or not. He was that kind of man.

DO THE ROLE OF FUCHS DIDN'T HAVE ANY RELEVANCE

I don't think so. Remember, we were in the middle of the McCarthy period, so there was a lot of static all over the place. But decisions got made on their merits, not on McCarthy accusations.

(DISCUSSION)

On this question of whether to go ahead with the H-bomb, I think the President had pretty much made up his own mind in advance of any advice from anybody. He was just that kind of fellow. And of course, I think he was reassured when his best advisers in the matter agreed with him. If it— if there'd been no special committee I suspect he would have decided to go ahead in any case.

YOU THINK THE ATOM BOMB WAS NO LONGER THE RELUCTANT WEAPON.

That's right. Yeah.

LOOKING BACK ON THE H-BOMB DECISION, DO YOU BELIEVE THAT THIS WAS THE SORT OF LAST CHANCE TO AVERT AN ARMS RACE?

Well, having lived through, as I say, two years at the UN listening to Gromyko's eternal "Nyets", I don't think there was any chance to begin with of getting international control. And only now when we're having second thoughts about this horrendous mega tonnage that we have, which, most of which is absolutely superficial, might we consider getting some sort of agreement to reduction.

( ) ABOUT NSC-68 NOW (?).

Yep. A direct outgrowth of the decision on the H-bomb was of course the recommendation that we make a thorough re-examination of our objectives in peace and war, which resulted in NSC-68, which is now known universally almost, and a profound study of all our resources, what we needed to build up and what to emphasize, not only in military strength, but economic strength; we needed more conventional forces as against nuclear forces. And we needed a psychological warfare program which led off— w— wandered off later into so-called Project Candor, also called project Wheaties because it was discussed at breakfast meetings over Wheaties. The White House fellow, Jackson and Admiral Strauss. Candor didn't get very far, but there was a massive project there which was a direct result of the Soviet explosion. I had very little to do with that; Paul Nitze was the main laboring...and he didn't have a lot to say about that.

DID IT IN FACT MARK A CHANGE IN THE STATE DEPARTMENT'S THINKING, A VERY BIG CHANGE?

Mmmm, yes. As far as the State Department was concerned, it solidified a lot of ideas which we'd all had. The biggest impact was in the, in the Pentagon. The Secretary of Defense had to realize that $13 billion a year wasn't enough for a military budget. It would— it would be much greater than that. Now, there was a certain anomaly in this thing, there was also a call for heavy emphasis on civil defense, which is pretty much nonsense — there ain't no civil defense.

IT'S A VERY DIFFERENT WAY OF DEALING WITH THE SOVIET THREAT, THOUGH?

Yeah. Another sort of graduate school variation on containment.

I REALIZE YOU'RE OVERLAPPING HERE... OK. WHAT KIND OF IMPACT DID THE TRUMAN PRESS CONFERENCE HAVE...IMPLICATION ( )?

Truman's press conference in which he mentioned consideration was being given to all— any and all weapons in Korea had Attlee flying over here by the nearest plane he could grab. And he wanted to know what in the world that meant. And we had several conferences with Attlee, and the last day of his stay here, Acheson and I went over to the meeting at the White House and they were drawing up the communiqué. And of course, there were many other things considered. It went on for page after page, and finally we had to put in something about this thing. And Truman being of a very generous mind that day, was about to tell the British, "Of course, you can have a veto on our use of weapons." We'd clarified what he meant you know, in the press, that he didn't really mean what he'd said consideration, yes, but that didn't mean deciding. And when the President said that, "We, we will let you continue having veto," Acheson became kind of exercised, and he said, I recall, "Let's have a recess here." And we went into the side room, and Lovett was there, Averell Harriman, I was there. And Lovett turned to me and he said, "Arneson, tell us what we're going to write in this communiqué about this." And so I scribbled something out in-- down on one knee beside the couch with Harriman on my right, and I remember the words were that the President expressed hope that atomic weapons would never be used. He pledged to inform the Prime Minister if there were any change, any change in the situation. And I showed it to Harriman. He said, "That's fine, but change the 'any' to 'a.'" That's a nicety of diplomacy that had missed me. We weren't going to just tell them anytime, but you know, a real change. And that satisfied Attlee, and of course, that was exactly what we planned to do. They no longer rely on a, a veto which they had in the Hyde Park Aide-Memoire back in '43. But that undertaking applied only to the present administration at the time, did not apply in 1950 or whenever it was. So that was the end of that. And then the problem arose in our own country, were we going to use atomic weapons in Korea or not? Dr. Matthews, H. Freeman Matthews, who was the Deputy Undersecretary, number three in the department, called me in one day, he says, "I'm getting rather exercised by all these rumors I hear about use or non-use of atomic weapons in Korea." He said, "I want you to go over and get General Bradley out of the Joint Chief's meeting, and ask him. Tell him I've got to know." So I go over to the Pentagon, I get by all these phalanxes of guards and finally get into the anteroom to the meeting room. And Bradley saunters out as though he were planting corn out in Kansas somewhere, a very homely sort of guy. And I said, "I, I hate to presume on you, General, but — and we think we know the answer you're going to give us, but we need to know it urgently. Are we or are we not going to use atomic weapons in Korea?" And he said, "Hell no." I went back and made Dr. Matthews feel a lot better. And there was never any change in that situation. MacArthur had in mind we might put a barrier of radioactive waste across the 38th Parallel; that didn't get anywhere either. The actual point of all this is that, as General Nichols pointed out later there were no suitable targets. And if we used them ineffectively, it would have the psychological effect of reducing our stockpile by 50 percent probably. And there was no point in using them if they didn't have proper targets. I don't think there were any moral compunctions.

You want this one shorter or longer than the other one?

JUST AT YOUR OWN PACE, THE SAME WORDING.

As the war in Korea went on and on, everybody was getting impatient with it. And it didn't...look like a winning situation to us at all, of course there was a lot of speculation whether we'd use atomic weapons or not. And one day, Undersecretary — Deputy Undersecretary, Doc Matthews called me in, and said, "I've really got to know the answer to this, because the rumors are flying all over the town, and Washington's a well known place for flying rumors. Go over and see General Bradley who's chairman of the Joint— they're meeting," he says, "right now in session, but he'll come out to see you, I'll see to that." So I drive over, and I walk down the long corridor with all the guards, and I finally get into the inner sanctum. And Bradley came strolling out as though it was just a nice warm summer day to be enjoyed, very nice man, homely man in a complimentary sense. And I said "Sorry to trouble you, but Dr. Matthews is kind of exercised about this. We think we know the answer, but we must have the answer. Are we going to use atomic weapons in Korea?" And Bradley said, "Hell no." And that was what we wanted to hear.

...THE STORY OF ACHESON AND OPPENHEIMER -- AND THIS IS HIM SAYING THAT HE DIDN'T KNOW WHAT ON EARTH HE WAS TALKING ABOUT.

Yep.

Acheson spent a lot of time on this question of the H-bomb decision. He, he, he normally would depend on staff work, he usually did. But this time he went around and got individual opinions from Lilienthal, Oppenheimer, us, and himself, and his God. And I remember one day, he— he and I were talking about this. And he says, "You know I spent a lot of time with Oppy the other day, and as you know, I'm very fond of Oppy, because he, he was our teacher on the Acheson-Lilienthal report. But he said, "I listened to him as carefully as I— and as sympathetically as I knew how, and I couldn't really follow his argument worth a darn." He said, "You know, to me the bottom line is, how can you get a paranoid adversary to disarm by example?"