Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists articles from January 1995

Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists archives from January 1995

Visionaries. (scientists that examined the place of nuclear weapons in arsenals) (Editorial)
January 1, 1995... More than a century ago, Jules Verne wrote of journeys to the center of the earth, cruising 20,000 leagues beneath the sea, and being shot to the moon from a 900-foot cannon. A little later, H.G. Wells imagined time travel, martial Martians, and...

Open the files, please: Japanese government rhetoric about its 'nuclear allergy' is not entirely persuasive; it's time to clear the air.
January 1, 1995... When Greenpeace revealed in September 1994 that the U.S. Energy Department had been secretly supplying Japan with technical know-how on producing weapon-grade plutonium, it was just one in a series of nuclear revelations that shocked the Japanese...

The transfermium wars. (procedure for naming new chemical elements)
January 1, 1995... Glenn Seaborg has enjoyed recognition as a Nobel laureate for a long time--he and a colleague, Edwin McMillan, won the prize in chemistry in 1951 for the discovery of element 94, plutonium. And for a while last year it appeared that he would...

Jerome B. Wiesner, 1915-1994. (scientist) (Obituary)
January 1, 1995... If U.S. power is sometimes coupled with intelligent humanism, grace, and compassion, it is because of persons like Jerome B. Wiesner, who died October 21, 1994, at 79 years of age. Like Andrei Sakharov, another scientist-humanist whom he admired,...

Censorship by death. (murders of Russian investigative journalists)
January 1, 1995... One major achievement of glasnost and perestroika, the breakdown of the Soviet Empire, and Yeltsin's hectic reign has been the lifting of censorship in Russia. But a new type of censorship is emerging, enforced by bombs and guns, fists and brass...

Getting down to business. (implementation of the Nunn-Lugar bill to demilitarize Russia)
January 1, 1995... Three years ago, Congress passed the Nunn-Lugar bill to provide U.S. aid in denuclearizing and demilitarizing the former Soviet Union. After a slow start, the program is now beginning--literally--to deliver the goods. Because implementation has...

Incineration confrontation. (destruction of chemical weapons controversy) (Column)
January 1, 1995... For over a decade, the U.S. Army has been assembling, testing, and refining a program to destroy the U.S. chemical weapons stockpile, which consists of some 30,000 tons of nerve and blister agents located at eight storage sites in the continental...

Right turn ahead: on national security issues, expect major fights on marginal issues and marginal fights on the major ones.
January 1, 1995... As the Republicans take the reins of Congress on January 4, a revolution in national security and foreign policy is widely anticipated. The military budget is expected to skyrocket. It will be thumbs up for Star Wars, thumbs down for the ABM...

Clinton's choice. (national security changes)
January 1, 1995... Last November's election results should give pause to those of us who are concerned about America's standing in the world. If the Democrats had retained control of the Senate, we probably would be about to see a long-overdue housecleaning of...

Jury-rigged, but working. (includes related article on International Atomic Energy Agency goals) (Special Section: Nonproliferation) (Cover Story)
January 1, 1995... Not long after the first nuclear weapons were detonated in 1945, many expressed the fear that dozens of countries would eventually get "the bomb." Proliferation fears reached their height in the early 1960s when President John F. Kennedy said...

The price of nonproliferation. (nuclear weapons development in North Korea) (Special Section: Nonproliferation) (Cover Story)
January 1, 1995... After a summer of crisis and uncertainty, North Korea and the United States concluded a "Framework Agreement" last October designed to ease tensions on the Korean peninsula. Although North Korea has never admitted to having a nuclear weapons...

Why we have to keep the bomb. (nuclear weapons) (Special Section: Nonproliferation) (Cover Story)
January 1, 1995... The United States holds contradictory policies which are on a collision course. On the one hand, it repeatedly commits to the goal of total nuclear disarmament. On the other, it depends on nuclear deterrence for security. In the past, U.S....

Western biases. (nuclear arms race in South Asia) (Special Section: Nonproliferation) (Cover Story)
January 1, 1995... It is fashionable in Western propaganda to distinguish between the five "responsible" nuclear powers and the "irresponsible" others. At worst, this is racist nonsense. At best, it displays massive ignorance. Of the three undeclared nuclear...

Most favored nation: the United States carries a big stick on proliferation, but talks softly regarding Israel. (Special Section: Nonproliferation) (Cover Story)
January 1, 1995... Every American president since Harry S. Truman has been against the proliferation of nuclear weapons. Publicly, at least. Behind closed doors, the opposition has been less clear cut, more nuanced. The United States doesn't want North Korea to...

Atomic vets battle time. (veterans exposed to atomic radiation in experiments) (includes related articles)
January 1, 1995... In April 1953, Herb Stradley was 20 years old and a private first class in Combat Battalion A of the U.S. Army. In those days, he felt "indestructible." His main concern that spring was trying to duck the brutal sun at Camp Desert Rock, a tent...

Ending Europe's Wars.
January 1, 1995... Jonathan Dean has labored long in the cause of a stable and secure Europe. He lied about his age to serve in the Canadian Army during World War II. As a U.S. foreign service officer in the 1950s he helped establish the ground rules for...

Factories of Death: Japanese Biological Warfare 1932-45 and the American Cover Up.
January 1, 1995... Stories about Japan's biological warfare experiments before and during World War II began surfacing as soon as the war was over. The sources of these reports were sometimes suspect, and the reports left major questions surrounding the research...

U.S. strategic nuclear forces, end of 1994.
January 1, 1995... On September 22, Defense Secretary William J. Perry announced the results of the Nuclear Posture Review (NPR), initiated by his predecessor, Les Aspin, on October 29, 1993. The review establishes the missions and levels for U.S. strategic nuclear...

Inarticulating nuclear policy. (Congressional testimony of Deputy Secretary of Defense John M. Deutch)
January 1, 1995... Granted nuclear weapons no longer have the hyper profile they once had, but when Deputy Secretary of Defense John M. Deutch appeared before the House Foreign Affairs Committee on October 5 to explain the Nuclear Posture Review, his mind must have...