After 40 Years, Treaty To Ban All Nuclear Weapons Tests May Be At Hand

The development and testing of nuclear weapons has proven to be the most significant research and development project in the history of the U.S. Launched 54 years ago by the greatest assemblage of scientific and engineering talent ever gathered for one purpose, it was successful in attaining its two initial goals. One was to keep the Allies ahead of any effort by the scientifically sophisticated Germans to develop such weapons. This was achieved by default: The Germans did not try. The other goal, achieved by astounding organization and technical brilliance, was to produce a weapon that would help hasten the end of the bloodiest war ever. By boosting the destructive power of military ordnance a thousandfold in one bound, and by another thousandfold a few years later, the nuclear weapons development programs of the U.S. and other nations have had profound impacts on the relations among nations, the basic concepts of what constitutes national security, ...