Atomic Scientists Form Federation

Manawatu Times, Volume 70, Issue 266, 10 November 1945, Page 7

Atomic Scientists Form Federation

Study of Beneficial Possibilities Urged

(By Tel-ofiT&ph—Press Assn.—Copyright.) Received Friday 9.40 p.m. NEW YORK, Nov. 8.

Upwards of 90 per cent, of the 1300 scientific workers whose research and labour produced the atomic bomb have formed the Federation of Atomic Scientists for the following purposes: To study the implications to the United States and the world of the liberation of nuclear energy; to create a realisation of the dangers facing all civilisation if the tremendous, destructive potential of nuclear energy is misused; to help establish an atmosphere of world security in which the beneficial possibilities of nuclear energy may be developed; also to study the relation between national legislation and the establishment of an adequate international policy. In an informal talk with a group of Congressmen and pressmen, the scientists’ spokesman said they were unanimously convinced that knowledge of the bomb’s manufacture was a secret which could not he kept for long. They were unanimous in asserting that there were no fundamental scientific secrets not already known to all nations. Captain Harold Stassen, a member of the United States delegation to U.N.C.1.0. and Governor of Minnesota, addressing the Academy of Political Science, suggested the formation of a United Nations’ air force equipped with a limited number of atomic bombs. Thereafter manufacture should he banned in all nations as a crime against mankind. He proposed that the United Nations’ charter be amended by empowering the Security Council to establish an air force of five bomber and ten fighter squadrons manned by volunteers from the United Nations, with nor more than one-fifth of the personnel of any squadron to he of one nationality. He suggested that the present plants should manufacture 75 bombs. Each squadron would have five bombs and would be based at five suitable points in the world to serve as a stabilisation force for world order.