Sixty-five years after our first detonation of the superbomb, are we in a better place? “We have big sticks too.” A post-Mike world During the United States’ half-century of testing, the U.S.S.R., the United Kingdom, China and France all detonated their own share of hydrogen bombs-ostensibly as tests, but also as reminders to the rest of the world: Other nations-especially the Soviet Union-began producing thermonuclear weapons of their own. Not that the rest of the world was content to sit and watch while the United States stockpiled weapons of mass destruction. President Theodore Roosevelt famously spoke about speaking softly and carrying a big stick-President Truman was authorizing the production of sticks powerful enough to alter geography. In fact, not even two years after Mike blew Elugelab off the map, the detonation of Castle Bravo blew another, deeper crater into the Bikini Atoll. Beginning in 1942, the United States spent half a century building and testing over 1,100 nuclear devices of all shapes and sizes. Mike was that superbomb-but it wasn’t the only superbomb. Like all other work in the field of atomic weapons, it is being and will be carried forward on a basis consistent with the overall objectives of our program for peace and security.”
Accordingly, I have directed the Atomic Energy Commission to continue its work on all forms of atomic weapons, including the so-called hydrogen or superbomb. Truman explained, “It is part of my responsibility as Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces to see to it that our country is able to defend itself against any possible aggressor. Today you can use Bing or Google Maps to take a look at the gaping hole where Elugelab used to be. Within moments, Elugelab was transformed into a smoking crater over a mile wide and deep enough to contain a 15-story building. It was an attempt to enhance the explosive yield of nuclear weapons using the power of fusion. Mike was a thermonuclear bomb-the first in human history. This is because at 7:15 a.m., Elugelab was enveloped in a blinding flash of light and subjected to a 10.4 megaton explosion-a blast over 600 times more powerful than the atomic bomb that decimated Hiroshima during World War II.Īt the epicenter of that explosion was Mike. 1, 1952, at 7:14 a.m., Elugelab was an island in the Enewetak Atoll. NovemSixty-five years ago today, the world powers were in a frenzy of nuclear research and development in the hopes of ensuring “peace and security.” Did it work?
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