ATOM BOMB STOCKS

Press, Volume XCIII, Issue 27914, 10 March 1956, Page 9

ATOM BOMB STOCKS

Estimate By U.S. Scientists (N.Z. Pres* Association—Copyright) WASHINGTON, March 8. A leading atomic scientist said today it was probably a “good guess” that the United States had about 35,000 atom bombs and the Soviet Union about 10,000. The statement was made by Mr Harold C. Urey, who helped develop the atom bomb. Dr. Urey and two other scientists sharply attacked the Government’s secrecy surrounding scientific developments in testimony before a House of Representatives Government Operations Sub-committee, which is studying government information policies. Mr David Teeple, a security officer on the first atom bomb project and now a Government atomic consultant, disagreed that Government secrecy had been a “serious impediment” to scientific progress. He said that “proper security safeguards” were needed to hamper the military efforts'of potential enemies. Dr. Urey said the United States could not keep the Soviet Union from learning United States scientific developments even if Soviet spies were frustrated. Scientists in other countries could learn “all the facts that we can learn” through their own experiments, he said. Dr. Urey, who is now conducting research at the University of Chicago, said that the present government secrecy prevented many scientists from getting information needed to advance their research. He proposed that no fundamental knowledge be kept secret, only details of weapons. He also recommended that the Government translate and publish Soviet scientific journals, which he said, would make it less likely that the United States would be “badly surprised by the U.S.S.R.” Mr Donald Hughes, senior physicist at the Brookhaven National (Atomic) Laboratory, said that current secrecy procedures were “really a step to insecurity.”

He said that the Geneva Atoms-for-Peace Conference, which he attended last year, showed that the Soviet had made tremendous advances in scientific knowledge but that the United States still had a definite lead. Mr William Houston, president of the Rice Institute, said that restricting the use of basic scientific information only prevented the Americans from using it immediately.