FRENCH A-TEST

Press, Volume XCVIII, Issue 28981, 24 August 1959, Page 11

FRENCH A-TEST

Soviet Press Attacks

LONDON, August 22. Communist newspapers today attacked the French plan to explode an atomic bomb in the Sahara, but British newspapers were divided in their opinion. The Soviet Communist Party newspaper “Pravda” said the proposed explosion had raised a wave of protests in all countries. The newspaper, quoted by the official Soviet news agency Tass, said: “Nations understand that if the mushroom of an atomic explosion rises above Africa, it will not only threaten the health and life of millions of Africans, but will darken by its sinister shadow mankind's hopes for a speedy deliverance from the atomic danger.” Tass also quoted the newspaper “Sovietskaya Rossiya” as saying that the French "bourgeois press” was spreading rumours that it would be a clean bomb, and that its radioactive effect would be negligible. “However this may be,” the newspaper said, “this bomb, even before it has exploded, is already spreading malignant radioactive precipitate. It Is poisoning the atmosphere of confidence which is at present developing in relations between the East and West “The trouble is that as regards international relations, the French politicians are living in the past and would like to extend this past to the future relations among nations. By organising its atomic diversion in the Sahara, the French Government is taking upon itself a heavy responsibility before history.” British Views In London, the “Dsily Herald” urged France to renounce the atom bomb, while the “Daily Telegraph” said: “We have no right to criticise France for acting as we have done ourselves." The ‘*Daily Herald” said: “France can earn honour only by renouncing the bomb. The 'Herald* has no need to mince its words. All that we can say of France applies to Britain also.” The “Daily Telegraph" said the British-French "entente is still cordiale” in spite of a number of recent British leading articles and cartoons satirising the warmth of relations between Paris and Bonn and protesting against France's reported decision to test an atom bomb soon in the Sahara. “No censorious attitude on the British side can really stand the test of logic,” the "Daily Telegraph” said.

“Though we might all hope that the spread of the possession of nuclear arms might be checked by international agreement, failing that we have no right to criticise France for acting as we have done ourselves,” it said.