Fall-out From Russian Tests May Delay U.S.

Press, Volume CI, Issue 29797, 13 April 1962, Page 11

Fall-out From Russian Tests May Delay U.S.

(N.Z. Press Association—Copyright) WASHINGTON, April 12. Fall-out from Soviet nuclear explosions last year might delay the United States planned atmospheric tests this month. Dr. Ralph Lapp, a leading nuclear scientist, speculated that a delay was possible because fall-out from the Soviet tests was now beginning to show up. He told the Associated Press that the United States might decide on such a delay to make clear that fall-out was coming from the Soviet tests.

Questioned about this speculation, a spokesman for the Atomic Energy Commission said all he could do tvas to refer to President Kennedy’s statement on March 2 announcing the planned resumption of atmospheric testing. The President said at that time that testing would begin in the latter part of April unless the Soviet Union agreed to accept an effective nuclear test ban treatyOfficials of the Public Health Service reported earlier today that the expected Russian fall-out was showing up although apparently very slowly. Unconfirmed newspaper reports in Washington si gested that the United States atmospheric series in the Pacific would open between April 23 and April 26 so that the first shot would have been ■fired before the British Prime Minister (Mr Macmillan) arrived in New York on April 27 to make a speech and to confer with President Kennedy in Washington the following day One press dispatch said the opening of the series before April 27 would relieve Mr Macmillan from further pressures from British pacifists who were demanding the halting of the planned tests. Russia was due to give its reply to the British and American appeal to R-issla to accept international inspection as part of a nuclear tes‘ ban treaty at today’s meeting of the 17-nation disarmament conference at Geneva “Izvestia.” the official Soviet Government newspaper. indicated last night that the reply would be “no.” The plea, made by Mr Macmillan and President Ken-

nedy, was made tor obvious propaganda purposes, said the newspaper, the British United Press reported. The United States has warned Russia that it is not prepared to risk its own security on a paper pledge by Russia that it would never test nuclear weapons again. The eight neutral countries are expected to submit a joint plan for a tesi ban treaty soon. Earlier this week the. asked their governments for approval to submit the plan to the conference The Russian newspaper, “Pravda,” today described as nuclear blackmail the latest appeal to Russia. “It sounds like an ultimatum—you agree to the Western conditions on inspection or else at the end of April there will be nuclear tests over the Pacific,” the newspaper said. The newspaper said that it was still not too late to agree on a nuclear test ban treaty and there was “no peed for any clumsy system of control”

In Washington, women of the “Strike for Peace” group, ignoring cold shoulder treatment by the White House, today intensified their campaign against renewed United States atmospheric nuclear testing. As the date for the resumption of testing drew near, leaders of the women’s group began an around-the-clock' vigil outside the White House.

Reinforcements from east coast states and inland are expected to arrive tomorrow to swell the group of silent pickets outside the Presidential mansion.

Plans for the stepped-up campaign were laid last night after President Kennedy had denied a request

for an interview from representatives of the Strike for Peace group. Mrs Cyrus Eaton, wife of the Cleveland industrialist, Mr Cyrus Eaton, who is a friend of Mr Khrushchev, arrived in Washington last night to join the group When told that the President had refused to meet the women, Mrs Eaton told

reporters: “We will stay there until he agrees to see us." Mrs Margaret Russell, a spokesman for the demonstrators. said she did not know how long the vigil would be continued, but the women would patrol before the White House in shifts of two hours, walking slowly and not talking.