Why Russia Wants New U.S. A-Tests:

...The economic cost and technical difficulty of underground tests may not be his only reasons...

...Oddly enough, it is the same problem that Khrushchev himself has been facing during the past three years over Berlin...

...Until now, Khrushchev has made his judgment of priorities clear by continually postponing the implementation of specific threats which he made initially under a specific time limit...

...The Russian Premier has reversed the previous Soviet position and now insists that a test ban must be conditional on other disarmament measures...

...But Khrushchev's June 15 speech to the Russian people was unequivocal: "Control over the observance of a nuclear test ban treaty must be exercised with the participation of representatives of the three existing groups of states—and at that, the representatives of these three groups of states may adopt only agreed decisions...

...The motives behind this fundamental change of Soviet policy remain obscure...

...One of President Kennedy's graver errors during the Cuban adventure was his attempt to justify possible American intervention by the precedent Russia set in Hungary...

...Russia's evident desire to resume testing should weigh heavily with President Kennedy, it seems to me, in the agonizing decision he now faces on America's test policy...

...and it has always been agreed that a threepower treaty must lapse unless it is signed by all future nuclear powers...

...Khrushchev has always understood better than his Western rivals that the main value of atomic weapons lies in their political impact during peacetime rather than their military effect in war...

...to gain and hold the confidence of the uncommitted countries or to convince the Communist bloc that its patience is not unlimited...

...It is conceivable that Russia has clandestinely exploded several bombs underground, but American intelligence must be worse than its severest critics maintain if no hint of such tests has reached the Central Intelligence Agency...

...into resuming tests first so as to divert the odium from themselves...

...But though the feasibility of underground tests is now admitted, it is doubtful whether even America would find that the stupendous cost involved could be justified by the result: For one thing, testing conditions would differ greatly from the conditions of operational use...

...Khrushchev might deliberately weaken Kennedy's position against the American test lobby so as to escape the penalties he would incur from world opinion if Russia were the first to resume testing...

...One can concede a case for smaller warheads to increase America's effective missile strength, although the passion for tiny battlefield atomic weapons seems self-defeating, particularly since the Russians are likely to respond to the use of a 10-ton atomic weapon against their forces with a 20-kiloton weapon against ours if that is the smallest they happen to have available...

...This would rob the West of an immensely strong position in the battle for the uncommitted world, just at the moment when the West needs all the support it can muster for the critical debates in the next United Nations session...

...Khrushchev has given formal notice that he will start testing a series of new Soviet weapons the moment America breaks the existing moratorium...

...holds underground tests, despite the propaganda advantage of doing so...

...He is already under strong public pressure to resume tests...

...At one stage, Tsarapkin went so far as to say that even another test by France would open the door to Soviet tests...

...As for the neutron bomb, even if it proved to be feasible in five or ten years time it is difficult to see what it could add to prospective American strength either for deterrence or defense, although it might seem the best investment for countries which have not yet entered the nuclear arms race...

...Faced with a similar dilemma in the test ban talks, President Kennedy would be wise to show the same kind of patience and not resume testing immediately...

...Such is the underlying rationale of the Soviet "troika" proposal...

...As if this were not enough, the Kremlin has also insisted that inspection not actually commence until four years after the test ban treaty has been ratified...

...Large numbers of personnel would be involved in underground tests and it would be difficult to disguise the colossal excavations required...

...For weeks the Soviet delegate, Semyon K. Tsarapkin, refused to comment, and when he finally broke his silence it was to reject the Western concessions out of hand and to raise entirely new obstacles of his own—notably, the demand for a "troika" in the council responsible for administering the agreement, which would give the Soviet Union a running veto on the activities of the inspection teams...

...Khrushchev's recent speeches make it clear that he no longer sees much advantage in a test ban agreement as such: "It would not be some kind of a dam to bar the way to an arms race...

...American resumption before the Berlin crisis reaches its peak could play straight into Khrushchev's hands...

...It is equally possible that the Soviet leader wants to test his new weapons above ground not so much to give his generals and scientists knowledge of how they work, as to derive political benefit from revealing their nature to the outside world...

...The most important and difficult problem for Western diplomacy in the next few years will be to demonstrate its firmness against Soviet intransigence in ways which attract rather than repel the sympathy of the uncommitted peoples...

...could disarm criticism by testing underground, which would eliminate fall-out, and that Russia may in fact have been carrying on underground tests throughout the Geneva negotiations, since there is no sure way of detecting them...

...Whether this argument is held to be decisive will depend largely on whether in the total world political context it is more important for the U.S...

...True, there were ambiguities in Tsarapkin's statements about the work of these teams, and some Western observers have tried to find grounds for hope...

...Jerome B. Wiesner, one of President Kennedy's chief scientific advisers, argued along these lines in a recent issue of Daedalus...

...The real case for an American resumption of tests, in my view, depends less on the presumed military advantages than on the need to convince Khrushchev that he cannot rely on getting what he wants for nothing, and that when Kennedy threatens a specific response to Soviet intransigence on a specific issue, he means what he says...

...In his June 15 speech, in fact, he went out of his way to explain to his television audience in the Communist Bloc that "General de Gaulle says that he wants to have his own nuclear arms so as to enable France to conduct an independent policy...

...The deadlock is now complete and the world knows that the responsibility for it lies wholly with the Soviet Union...

...From this point of view, the socalled "double standard" of judgment so often applied by the uncommitted countries, despite its obvious injustice, is an asset to the West...

...There is also a good deal of evidence to suggest that a major factor behind the change is Soviet reluctance to seek China's adherence to a test ban treaty at this time...

...If Nikita Khrushchev had deliberately aimed to undermine the position of those who believe that Russia recognizes a common interest with America in ending the arms race and stopping the spread of atomic weapons, he could scarcely have succeeded more completely...

...In any case, there is increasing reason to believe that either Russia or China or both want to carry out atomic weapons tests in the near future, and that they hope to provoke the U.S...

...It may be that when the Russian leaders came to examine the extent of inspection required to police a test ban they decided that the gains in disarmament were not worth the losses in secrecy...

...As Joseph Alsop has suggested, the Soviet Premier may well wish to demonstrate his new atomic weapons in public in order to strengthen his -diplomatic hand during the crisis he threatens over Berlin...

...The point to be established is that a disarmament agreement must depend on effective control and that without effective control Khrushchev will not get the West to disarm...

...In this respect, it is surely significant that Khrushchev has not said his tests will be underground, even if the U.S...

...initiative of this nature would make more impact on uninformed opinion than all the Soviet obstructiveness in the Geneva negotiations...

...Anything which in Afro-Asian eyes tends to put America and Russia morally and politically on the same level helps to create the image of a world divided permanently into three separate groups...

...The United States and Britain as yet have not the slightest idea how to obtain the adherence of President de Gaulle to an agreement...

...The American test lobby argues that the U.S...

...Moreover, although informed world opinion might appreciate the motives for a resumption of American tests, any U.S...

...If this is true, President Kennedy would be wise to wait at least until the end of the year before permitting the resumption of U.S...

...But if this is so, it is still surprising that Khrushchev did not seek greater propaganda advantage from the recent French atomic tests...

...So far Khrushchev's campaign to introduce the "troika" system into the United Nations Secretariat has won little sympathy from the uncommitted countries whose support is indispensable for its success...

...When the Geneva talks resumed in March the American delegation offered substantial concessions on all six of the points which were still at issue...

...tests...

...This would extend the present uncontrolled moratorium on tests to a total of at least seven years...