Atoms for Peace

"Atoms for Peace" squares nicely with the theme suggested by the "Communications for Peace", doesn't it? Only this stamp doesn't dance around the subject like the other one. "Atoms" for Peace. Not "Spaceflight to the Moon" for Peace or "Orange Tang" for Peace or "Cordless Telephones" for Peace. No, this is "Atoms" for Peace.

And this stamp predates our "Communications for Peace" example by a decade or so, coming out in 1955, when the memory of what happens when we, or others, split one of those atoms was still fresh.

But, as usual, there's more to the story.

"Atoms for Peace" was a bona fide United States program, a real thing. The Atoms for Peace plan was kicked off by President Eisenhower in his address to the United Nations (remember them?) General Assembly on December 8, 1953. In this address, Eisenhower recognized the danger and destructive power in an atomic age, and pledged the United States would lead the way in ensuring the durability of civilization in an unsure age. At the end of the "Atoms for Peace" address, several objectives were outlined, including a call to begin the reduction of atomic weapon stockpiles and plan for multinational participation in research into peaceful uses for fissionable material. The creation of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA, and yes, that IAEA) was a result of the Atoms for Peace plan.

This speech is also where that truncated quote around the border of the stamp comes from; here's the whole thing, from the end of the address:

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.

But this call for arms reductions and peaceful research was really the second of two "speeches within the speech". The first "speech within" held different message.

To understand the significance of the first part of the speech, we need a little back story.

In August of 1953, the Soviet Union announced it had developed a thermonuclear (hydrogen) bomb, a development that greatly increased the destructive power of the USSR.

It is no coincidence that Eisenhower's Atoms for Peace address came a few short months after this announcement. In retrospect, it is now clear that this address was a significant early strike in the Cold War, a war that we now know would be waged over decades.

Early in the address, Eisenhower draws out the sides:

But the dread secret and the fearful engines of atomic might are not ours alone. In the first place, the secret is possessed by our friends and Allies, Great Britain and Canada, whose scientific genius made a tremendous contribution to our original discoveries and the designs of atomic bombs.

The secret is also known by the Soviet Union.

The Soviet Union has informed us that, over recent years, it has devoted extensive resources to atomic weapons. During this period, the Soviet Union has exploded a series of atomic devices, including at least one involving thermonuclear reactions.

He also lays the foundation for a notion that would later become known as the deterrence theory of Mutually Assured Destruction:

Should such an atomic attack be launched against the United States, our reaction would be swift and resolute. But for me to say that the defense capabilities of the United States are such that they could inflict terrible losses upon an aggressor - for me to say that the retaliation capabilities of the United States are so great that such an aggressor's land would be laid waste - all this, while fact, is not the true expression of the purpose and the hope of the United States.

So make no mistake here. The penalty for an atomic attack on the United States is fierce and final in nature. The response will be swift, but it will also be a regrettable event. The purpose and hope he refers to, of course, is for the nuclear nations to turn back from the brink, and work together to discover how to harness the power of the atom for non-belligerent purposes.

Which is what that second "speech with in the speech" is all about.

But even as he made his proposals for peace at the end of the address, Eisenhower called out the Soviets one more time:

The United States would be more than willing - it would be proud - to take up with others "principally involved" the development of plans whereby such peaceful use of atomic energy would be expedited.

Of those "principally involved" the Soviet Union must of course, be one.

We know how the Cold War played out, how long it lasted. This was an unknown quantity on December 8, 1953. But there are two sentences (placed separately) from the address of that day that lean towards irony/prophecy:

But let no one think that the expenditure of vast sums for weapons and systems of defense can guarantee absolute safety for the cities and the citizens of any nation.

On the record has long stood the request of the United States, Great Britain and France, to negotiate with the Soviet Union the problems of a divided Germany.

The irony is that it actually was the expenditure of vast sums for weapons and systems of defense that finally ended the Cold War as the arms race of the 70s and 80s finally bankrupted the Soviets. The prophecy is that the Cold War ended in November of 1989 as a wall that divided Germany came down.

The war that was begun with Atoms for Peace, ended with Peace through Strength (someone really should use that).