Eisenhower's Atoms for Peace

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Texas A&M University Press, 2002 - 162 síđur
In his "Atoms for Peace" speech of 1953, President Dwight David Eisenhower captured the tensions--and the ironies--of the atomic age. While nuclear devastation threatened all nations, Eisenhower believed only nuclear preparedness offered protection; while nuclear weapons loomed as the ultimate war cloud, nuclear power offered progress and hope.

In this thought-provoking consideration of Eisenhower's speech and others leading up to it, Ira Chernus views the "Atoms for Peace" speech, presented to the General Assembly of the United Nations, not merely as a legitimation of American foreign policy but as itself an act of policy. Indeed, he frames the policy in a new interpretation of Eisenhower's broad discursive goal, which he calls "apocalypse management," a plan to allow the United States to manage threats and crises around the world.

Chernus sheds new light on the internal consistency of Eisenhower's thought, which many observers have found inconsistent, as well as on the ways in which the president's rhetoric backed him into a policy corner he had not intended to occupy. Chernus also reviews the domestic impact of the speech through a detailed examination of media interpretations in the United States.

This tightly reasoned, clearly written study offers a new understanding of the evolution of cold war nuclear policy, the power of presidential rhetoric, and the political understanding of America's "man of peace," Dwight David Eisenhower. The full text of Eisenhower's speech is presented in the text. Those interested in American foreign policy will find it compelling reading; scholars and students will find it challenging and rewarding analysis.
 

Efni

The Oppenheimer Panel
15
The Origins of Operation Candor
25
Candor and the New Look
53
From Candor to Atoms for Peace
79
The Final Text and Its Interpreters
96
Conclusion
119
Notes
133
Bibliography
155
Index
159
Höfundarréttur

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Common terms and phrases

Vinsćlir kaflar

Síđa xvii - The governments principally involved, to the extent permitted by elementary prudence, to begin now and continue to make joint contributions from their stockpiles of normal uranium and fissionable materials to an International Atomic Energy Agency.
Síđa xv - ... must not lack patience. I know that in a world divided such as ours today salvation cannot be attained by one dramatic act. I know that many steps will have to be taken over many months before the world can look at itself one day and truly realize that a new climate of mutually peaceful confidence is abroad in the world. But I know, above all else, that we must start to take these steps — now.
Síđa xi - And in the confident expectation of those accomplishments, I would use the office which, for the time being, I hold, to assure you that the Government of the United States will remain steadfast in its support of this body. This we shall do in the conviction that you will provide a great share of the wisdom, the courage, and the faith which can bring to this world lasting peace for all nations, and happiness and wellbeing for all men. Clearly, it would not be fitting for me to take this occasion to...
Síđa xvii - States knows that if the fearful trend of atomic military buildup can be reversed, this greatest of destructive forces can be developed into a great boon, for the benefit of all mankind. The United States knows that peaceful power from atomic energy is no dream of the future. That capability, already proved, is here — now — today. Who can doubt, if the entire body of the world's scientists and engineers had adequate amounts of fissionable material with which to test and develop their ideas, that...
Síđa xix - To the making of these fateful decisions, the United States pledges before you — and therefore before the world — its determination to help solve the fearful atomic dilemma — to devote its entire heart and mind to find the way by which the miraculous inventiveness of man shall not be dedicated to his death, but consecrated to his life.
Síđa xvii - The United States would seek more than the mere reduction or elimination of atomic materials for military purposes. It is not enough to take this weapon out of the hands of the soldiers. It...
Síđa xvi - that the Disarmament Commission study the desirability of establishing a sub-committee consisting of representatives of the Powers principally involved, which should seek in private an acceptable solution ... and report on such a solution to the General Assembly and to the Security Council not later than 1 September 1954.' The United States, heeding the suggestion of the General Assembly of the United Nations, is instantly prepared to meet privately with such other countries as may be 'principally...
Síđa xii - I feel impelled to speak today in a language that in a sense is new, one which I, who have spent so much of my life in the military profession, would have preferred never to use. That new language is the language of atomic warfare.
Síđa xvi - The United States, heeding the suggestion of the General Assembly of the United Nations, is instantly prepared to meet privately with such other countries as may be 'principally involved,' to seek 'an acceptable solution' to the atomic armaments race which overshadows not only the peace, but the very life, of the world.

Um höfundinn (2002)

IRA CHERNUS is a professor of religious studies at the University of Colorado at Boulder. Trained in philosophy and religious studies, with a Ph.D. from Temple University, he has focused on the rhetoric and symbolic import of nuclear weapons and U.S. foreign policy. He is co-director of the Peace and Conflict Studies Program at the University of Colorado and a frequent columnist for the History News Service.

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