<--PREV Doc #1287  |  Memorial Commission Home Page  |  Second Term Table of Contents  |  Presidential Papers Home Page  |  Doc#  |  NEXT--> Doc #1289 Document #1288; August 13, 1959 To Neil Hosler McElroy Series: EM, AWF, DDE Diaries Series ; Category: Secret The Papers of Dwight David Eisenhower, Volume XX - The Presidency: Keeping the Peace Part VII: Berlin and the Chance for a Summit; March 1959 to August 1959 Chapter 18: "These extremist approaches"   Dear Neil: With respect to your memorandum of August fifth, I agree with the position you have taken.1 I agree also with your conclusion that it will be some time before we can, either in concert with other nations or unilaterally, determine the character of tests, if any, we may undertake in the future.2 As you know, I feel that world opinion is very definitely swinging against tests that involve any additional contamination of the atmosphere.3 I am not certain what the effect would be of an underwater test, but this is one of the things I shall learn from Dr. Kistiakowsky.4 As ever 1 Secretary of Defense McElroy’s memorandum concerning the resumption of nuclear testing after the expiration of the suspension period (October 31, 1958, through October 31, 1959) is in AWF/A. For background on the moratorium and the Geneva Conference on Discontinuance of Nuclear Tests see nos. 718 and 737. McElroy had directed the Department of Defense, which had cut back preparations for future tests, to make modest plans to resume nuclear testing. He felt that very high altitude tests, in particular, were needed "to obtain information on interruptions or blackouts of communications and other effects of nuclear explosions in a hitherto relatively unexplored environment." These tests would also help gauge the effectiveness of the available detection systems. In the meantime, McElroy had asked for the views of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The JCS had maintained that it was contrary to the interests of the United States to impose restrictions on the development of its armaments in the absence of enforceable agreements that would impose equivalent restrictions on the Soviet Union (Twining to McElroy, Aug. 13, 1959, AWF/A, McElroy Corr.; see also McElroy to Eisenhower, Aug. 14, 1959, ibid.). 2 McElroy had concluded that it would be unwise to embark on the expensive preparations required for testing until the outcome of the Geneva negotiations and its implications for future U.S. policy became known. 3 On the growing world-wide fear of radiation hazards from atomic war and the hazards of nuclear weapons testing see no. 1267, and Congressional Quarterly Almanac, vol. XV, 1959, pp. 746 - 48. See also Divine, Blowing on the Wind, pp. 262 - 80; Eisenhower, Waging Peace, p. 474; Hewlett and Holl, Atoms for War and Peace, pp. 295 - 99; and George Bogdan Kistiakowsky, A Scientist at the White House: The Private Diary of President Eisenhower’s Special Assistant for Science and Technology (Cambridge, 1976), pp. 249, 263 - 64, 291, 295, 325 - 27. 4 McElroy had said he was issuing instructions to continue preparations for one or more underground tests in 1960. He added that preparations for more extensive tests, including underwater and high altitude tests, would be limited to maintaining test plans in a current status and to the procurement of very long lead time items only. On this same day the Joint Chiefs of Staff would question the ability of existing control systems to detect and identify underwater nuclear explosions. The Joint Chiefs had forwarded the memorandum to the Under Secretary of State with a request that the President’s recently appointed Special Assistant for Science and Technology, George Bogdan Kistiakowsky, assess the technical aspects (Twining to McElroy, Aug. 13, 1959, and McElroy to Eisenhower, Aug. 20, 1959, AWF/A, McElroy Corr.). Kistiakowsky (Ph.D. University of Berlin 1914) had immigrated from Kiev, the Ukraine, in 1926. He had been teaching chemistry at Harvard since 1930 and had been instrumental in the development of the atomic bomb. He had also served on Eisenhower’s Science Advisory Committee since its inception in 1957. On August 26 the State Department would announce that the President had ordered a two-month extension of the moratorium on testing, to begin on October 31 (U.S. Department of State Bulletin 41, no. 1055 [September 14, 1959], 399; Congressional Quarterly Almanac, vol. XV, 1959, p. 73; Kistiakowsky, Diary, pp. 140 - 43, 214; and New York Times, Aug. 27, 1959). For developments see nos. 1326 and 1327. Bibliographic reference to this document: Eisenhower, Dwight D. Secret To Neil Hosler McElroy, 13 August 1959. In The Papers of Dwight David Eisenhower, ed. L. Galambos and D. van Ee, doc. 1288. World Wide Web facsimile by The Dwight D. Eisenhower Memorial Commission of the print edition; Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996, http://www.eisenhowermemorial.org/presidential-papers/second-term/documents/1288.cfm <--PREV Doc #1287  |  Memorial Commission Home Page  |  Second Term Table of Contents  |  Presidential Papers Home Page  |  Doc#  |  NEXT--> Doc #1289

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