All language subtitles for Neutron.Bomb.2022.1080p.WEBRip.x264.AAC-[YTS.MX]

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- I'm not universally beloved,

to put it mildly.

At one juncture in my life,
I was perhaps,

and maybe this is correct,

the most reviled creature
on the face of the earth

because of the neutron bomb,

which was unquestionably,
at that time of its arrival,

the most detested
weapon on earth.

[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC]

- [NEWSCASTER] We
are in mortal peril.

- [NEWSCASTER] The neutron bomb

would operate as
a kind of death ray.

It will destroy all life
in the targeted area.

- [SAM COHEN] I
began to see radiation,

nuclear radiation,
as an effective means

of waging ground warfare
in a relatively moral way.

- [NEWSCASTER] First, there is
an emission of thermal energy.

- [NEWSCASTER] Enter
the neutron bomb.

- [NEWSCASTER] A
neutron warhead

is a defensive
weapon designed to-

- [NEWSCASTER] ...this
particular bomb seems to

have discovered
that radiation kills people.

The neutron bomb is no
exception, it will kill people.

- This technology
kept ramping up

and becoming
even more lethal,

and now we have
the neutron bomb.

I mean, it was the whole
idea with the neutron bomb,

was it so that they could go
into an area and drop this bomb

and it wouldn't
destroy buildings,

it would just
kill people, right?

- Yes.

[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC]

- Since the beginning of time,

man has been devising
weapons of destruction.

The slingshot, employed
by David against Goliath

and used by the armies
of Alexander the Great.

The catapult and the ballista,

formidable weapons
of their time.

The great spears of
the Greek warriors,

and the broad swords
of the armored knights.

The invention of
gunpowder by the Chinese

revolutionized warfare

and ushered in a new
era of explosive munitions

through the creation of
crude bombs, field artillery,

and even hand grenades.

World War I saw the
development of automatic weapons

like the machine gun,

the giant artillery cannons,

the tank, and the airplane.

Toward the end of World War II,

man created the
first atomic bomb

and plunged the world
into the atomic age.

[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC]

- [NARRATOR] Nuclear weapons,

created in all shapes and sizes,

large ones and small ones.

For nearly 75 years,

the United States designed
and tested these weapons

to improve their size,
weight, and purpose,

for a war which
may never be waged.

One weapon stood
out amongst all others

in purpose and function,

enhancing an invisible
yet deadly characteristic

of nuclear fusion.

This was the neutron bomb.

[DRAMATIC MUSIC]

[MACHINE WHIRRING]

[ROCKET LAUNCH]

[DRAMATIC MUSIC]

- Enter the neutron bomb.

- [NARRATOR] At the center of
this weapon is the neutron.

Nestled within the
structure of an atom

exists a tranquil
sub-atomic particle

that possesses no electric
charge, called the neutron.

- Neutrons were discovered
in England in 1932.

They were immediately perceived
to be immensely valuable

for sub-nuclear research,

because unlike the
particles that had been used

to bombard atoms,

to look at them,
if you will, up to that time,

neutrons could
slip into the nucleus,

positively charged nucleus,
of an atom,

without being repelled
by that positive charge.

They would just kind
of fall into the nucleus

and then all sorts of
interesting things would happen.

- [NARRATOR] These free neutrons

can invade the
foundation of matter

and create useful isotopes
for medicine and industry.

Free neutrons, however,

can be extremely
hazardous to all living things.

Free neutrons are produced

within the heart of
a nuclear reactor,

or from a chain reaction
created in the detonation

of an atomic bomb.

From the beginning of
nuclear testing in 1945,

neutrons have maintained
a special interest

in all atomic tests.

- When the scientists
at Los Alamos

worked on the targeting
of the first bombs

on the Japanese cities
during the Second World War,

they were concerned
that these weapons

not be perceived to be
some new kind of poison gas.

They were concerned that
the primary destructive force

that was harnessed
would be blast and fire,

but not radiation.

They were however, aware
that one of the first kinds

of radiation coming
off a nuclear fireball

would be prompt neutrons,
a huge flux of neutrons,

and that those neutrons
would kill anyone

within a certain range.

What they calculated, however,

was that anyone who would
be killed by the neutron flux

would probably be killed

by the blast of the
explosion as well.

- [SCIENTIST] First, there is an
emission of thermal energy,

gamma rays, and neutrons.

Depending upon the
altitude of the burst,

the neutrons reach the target

in large or small quantities.

The gamma rays extend
far from the target center.

In general,
radiation causes ionization

in the component atoms of cells,

altering their chemical nature

and impairing or destroying
their normal function.

With whole body radiation,

ionization causes
loss of function

of the more sensitive
tissues and organs.

The degree of loss
depends upon the dosage.

If the exposure is both
general and severe,

death results.

[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC]

[CROWD APPLAUDING]

- [NARRATOR] In May of 1945,

the war in Europe
came to an end.

Nazi Germany was defeated.

Churchill, Roosevelt,
and Stalin

met cordially at
Yalta and Potsdam

to discuss the fate of Germany.

The allies agreed that the
countries they had occupied

should be liberated

and that freely elected

governments should
be encouraged.

But for the countries
occupied by Russia,

Stalin had other plans.

The Russians kept
their army intact,

overwhelmingly maintaining

the largest military
force in Europe.

Then Russia decided to cut off

the allied sectors of
Berlin from the west.

Trains and road
transports were stopped.

Electric power was cut.

West Berlin was isolated
from the free world.

The response was
the Berlin Airlift.

For the next 11 months,

American, British,
and French planes

landed one after another,

delivering supplies of food,
coal, and petroleum

into the besieged city.

The Russian blockade of Berlin

had brought Europe
to the brink of war.

It was at last clear that only
a strong defensive alliance

could deter them
from further aggression.

On April 4th, 1949,

the North Atlantic Treaty was
signed by 12 western nations.

This alliance became known

as the North Atlantic
Treaty Organization.

[MILITARY MUSIC]

- In 1949, there were a series
of very momentous events

happening on the
geopolitical stage.

One of them, of course,
in April, 1949,

was the formation of the North
Atlantic Treaty Organization.

This was a group of 12 nations,

including the United States

and several other
European nations,

which, together,
created a security alliance

where the whole would be greater
than the sum of the parts.

- The fact that the Soviet Union

had taken over Eastern Europe

in the aftermath of
the Second World War

as part of the
spoils of victory,

the fact that
therefore there was,

as Winston Churchill
famously said in 1946,

an iron curtain
drawn across Europe

with the Soviet Communist
world on one side

and the western, we hoped,
democratic world

on the other side.

- The loss of China,
if you will, to the Communists,

and then finally,

I suppose we could say
the sense of crisis culminated

in August of 1949,

when the Soviets detonated
their first atomic bomb,

which was then announced
to the American people

about a month later,
in September, 1949.

[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC]

- [ANNOUNCER] Eight,
seven, six, five, four

three, two, one, zero.

[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC]

- [NARRATOR] Early
nuclear operations

focused on training American
and NATO ground troops

in the use of atomic
weapons on the battlefield.

[PENSIVE MUSIC]

- [W. PATRICK MCCRAY]
Nuclear weapons can,

to put it crudely,
be divided into two categories.

One of them would be
tactical nuclear weapons,

which would be for
use on a battlefield.

These would be
small-yield weapons

that would be
designed to be used in

particular theaters
of operation.

- "Theater" and "tactical"
nuclear weapons

are to some degree,
interchangeable terms,

but "theater"
basically refers to

a particular area of conflict,

thus the Korean War theater,

the European theater.

- And at the other
end of the spectrum

are the strategic
nuclear weapons,

the weapons that are large
enough to destroy entire cities.

- [NARRATOR] In the
summer of 1951,

more than 100
scientists and academics

participated in Project Vista,

a secret study

hosted by the California
Institute of Technology.

Vista's purpose was to determine
how existing technologies

supported by nuclear weapons

could offset NATO's
weaker conventional forces

and repel a massive
Soviet invasion.

[DRAMATIC MUSIC]

- Vista was a special project,

it was initiated
both by the Air Force

and then also by the US Army.

And the whole idea of
Vista was to study the ways

in which Western Europe
might be defended against

a massive Soviet attack.

And of course, one of the
technologies that was looked at,

and probably the most
controversial aspect

of the Vista report,

was that the United
States should develop

lots of small-scale, low-yield,
tactical nuclear weapons

and deploy these for
use on the battlefield,

in that the United
States would counter

Soviet superiority,
and manpower, and tanks,

with American superiority when
it came to nuclear armaments.

- As Robert Oppenheimer
told the army in his lecture

in the early 1950s,
they were always too big.

How do you make them little?

And if you make them little,

does that put
everything at risk of

crossing what was
an increasing barrier

between conventional weapons,
as we now call them,

and nuclear weapons?

- [NEWSCASTER] Mr. President,
Bob Frank, CBS News.

Yesterday at his
news conference,

Secretary of State Dulles,

indicated that in the event
of general war in the Far East,

we would probably make use

of some tactical,
small atomic weapons.

Would you care
to comment on this

and possibly explain it further?

- Well, in any combat

where these things can be used
on strictly military targets

and for strictly
military purposes,

I see no reason that
they shouldn't be used

just exactly as you'd use
a bullet or anything else.

- Can't we design some that
could be used by the army?

Remember,
Eisenhower was an army man,

he wasn't an Air Force pilot,

he was concerned that
the army had the benefit

of these very powerful,
and efficient, and lightweight,

relatively speaking, explosives.

Therefore, he commissioned
all sorts of efforts

to find ways to make

battlefield-scale
nuclear weapons.

[DRAMATIC MUSIC]

- The battleground of the future

may well be a
nuclear battleground,

and the nuclear weapon is
perhaps the greatest challenge

to the foot soldier
in military history.

The United States Army believes

it is a challenge
that can be met

and that today's soldier
has a chance of surviving

this new weapon,
just as the soldier of the past

was able to survive
the weapons of his day.

[DRAMATIC MUSIC]
[GUNFIRE ECHOING]

- [ARMY INSTRUCTOR] Keeping
in mind that your first

priority, as always,

is to perform your
assigned task,

now let's see what protective
measures you can take

against an atomic attack.

For atomic defense, you
need a deeper hole than usual.

Have a minimum of three
feet between ground level

and the top of your body
in crouching position.

The sides may crumble,

but this foxhole will give
you very good protection

against flying missiles,
heat, and radiation.

Have faith in your leaders,

they will ensure that you
do not get more radiation

than is absolutely necessary.

[EXPLOSIONS ECHOING]

Your weapons and equipment

may also be contaminated
by radioactive fallout.

[EXPLOSIONS ECHOING]

If your immediate
assignment requires their use,

go ahead and use them.

The risk of not
carrying out your job

will be more critical than the
amount of radiation you get.

You can decontaminate
your equipment in the field

by sweeping or scraping it down.

- Today, the army
is training its soldiers

against possible
nuclear warfare,

and teaching them the most
effective methods of defense

against atomic attack.

There is no minimizing the
potency of the nuclear weapon,

but today's soldier,

well-informed as to the
nature of that weapon,

and well-trained
in test explosions

over the last few years,

has a better chance of survival
on the atomic battlefield.

[PENSIVE MUSIC]

- [NARRATOR] In
November of 1952,

an event took place which
was to have a profound effect

on the scientific and
political climate of the world.

This event was the
detonation of Ivy Mike,

the first full-scale test of
a thermonuclear device.

The blast produced
a flood of neutrons.

In an instant,
experiments were exposed

to more than 10
times the neutrons

that similar experiments
could be exposed to

by a nuclear reactor in a year.

This got the interest of some

in at least two separate fields,

that of bomb design

and the associated diagnoses
of bomb performance,

and those in interested
in collateral effects,

the incidental
reaction to material

and people in particular.

The experimental
hydrogen bomb test verified

that an extremely high
flux or surge of neutrons

had occurred within
the Ivy Mike detonation.

- What comes off?

Well, a lot of different
kinds of radiation,

but one of the most
prominent kinds,

an enormous flux of neutrons,

and these neutrons in turn,

as the scientist Philip
Morrison commented about

our first big test,

those neutrons produced every
element on the periodic table,

and a bunch of manmade elements

all the way up
through from 92 to 116,

on the now bigger periodic
table of manmade elements.

- [NARRATOR] Intrigued,
the Atomic Energy Commission

established a study program

to investigate this
particular characteristic

of nuclear weapons.

[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC]

Several subsequent events

would help to shape the
development of the neutron bomb.

[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC]

[DRAMATIC MUSIC]

Castle Bravo,

the largest nuclear test
conducted by the United States,

exploded,

delivering a promptly lethal
dose of radioactive fallout

to more than 6,000 square
miles of the Pacific Ocean,

injuring the Marshall Islanders
and some Japanese fishermen

caught inside the danger zone.

[DRAMATIC MUSIC]

[SOMBER MUSIC]

In response to the
public alarm over fallout,

Lewis Strauss,
Chairman of the AEC,

requested both
weapon laboratories

to investigate the possibility

of reducing radioactive fallout

through designing clean
multi-megaton weapons,

relying almost
entirely on fusion.

[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC]

- I have been visited by people

that certainly, by reputation
and common knowledge,

are among the most eminent
scientists in this field,

among them,
Dr. Lawrence and Dr. Teller.

What they're working on is this:

the production of clean bombs.

They tell me that already,

they are producing bombs
that have 96% less fallout

than was the case
in our original ones,

or what they call dirty bombs.

But they go beyond this.

They say, "Give us four
or five years to test

each step of our development,

and we will produce an
absolutely clean bomb

so that the weapon
becomes completely military

in its application.

If you use it on
the battlefield,

you will have an effect
only so far as its blast

and heat waves reach,

and there will be
no fallout to injure

any civilian or anyone,

any innocent bystanders
that are off for X miles

or the necessary
distance to get out

of the area of heat and blast."

Moreover, they go to say this:

"If you are going
to get the full value

out of the atomic science
in peaceful development,

that is, let us assume that
there are no more bombs

made or used,

and you want to make certain

that you are getting the
best out of this new science

for the peaceful
uses of mankind,

these tests must go on."

- [NARRATOR] The weapon
laboratories vigorously pursued

clean nuclear weapon technology,

which would minimize fission

in favor of radioactively
cleaner fusion.

This would be an important step

toward development
of the neutron bomb.

However, success in
developing clean nuclear weapons

wasn't easy.

At first, only extremely
large nuclear bombs

could be made clean.

The government tested
such devices in the Pacific

as part of Operation
Redwing in 1956.

Conducted at Bikini Atoll,

these megaton tests
were over 200 times

the yield of the bomb
which leveled Hiroshima,

and of which the majority
of the explosive force

was considered
clean from fusion.

These weapons could
only be considered clean

when compared to
their dirty counterparts,

yet still included tens of

kilotons of
fissionable material.

[DRAMATIC MUSIC]

The military needed
small low-yield weapons

for the future
battlefields of Europe,

small tactical weapons in
the fractional kiloton range,

only a thousandth the size
of the Nagasaki atomic bomb.

But these were still
radiologically dirty devices

and their fallout threatened
collateral damage

for allied troops
on the battlefield.

[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC]

Meanwhile, testing continued
with tactical fission bombs

for the battlefield.

The government tested
competing designs

for the Davy Crockett
battlefield nuke.

During these tests,

pigs placed in
tactical environments

were used as biological targets

with immediate
lethality from radiation

as the principal objective.

[BOMB EXPLOSION ECHOING]
[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC]

[EXPLOSION ECHOING]

- Can you move
it up a little bit?

Thank you.

I'd like the first slide, please.

Our primary objective
was to determine

the immediate lethal response
to the Humboldt device.

Next.

Here are the animals 12
minutes after detonation.

You can see that
they hardly move at all.

This one was very close to the
front of the APC at 25 yards,

and he is manifesting Central
Nervous System Syndrome

due to the acute central
nervous system radiation injury.

Next.

All of these animals have
received an average dose

of 40,000 rads.

Next.

They were all alive for at
least two and a half hours.

You can obviously see how
stunned these animals are.

Next.

This is pure prompt neutron
gamma radiation injury.

We've been getting requests
from commanders repeatedly,

concerning how
much radiation it takes

to kill a human immediately,

or how much
radiation it would take

to stop an infantry
man in his tracks,

or to prevent him
from driving a truck,

or prevent him
from pulling a trigger.

Obviously, no one can
give an exact answer on this

with respect to human beings.

The group decided a
person had to be 10% efficient

just to pull a trigger.

To assault a position
with any hope of survival,

he should be 90% efficient.

If a commander is
interested in incapacitating

50% of a group of troops

so that 50% of them
cannot pull a trigger,

3,000 rads would be necessary.

If the commander
were interested,

say, in a period of one hour,

he would have to deliver
10,000 rads to incapacitate

50% of these troops so that
they couldn't pull a trigger.

Now at eight hours,
the dose is reduced again

because radiation
sickness has taken over,

and by 24 hours, 1,000 rads
would've sufficed initially.

Now, with respect
to killing immediately,

no one knows how much
radiation it would take

to kill 50% of the
unit within 5 minutes.

The dose would
certainly be most fantastic.

At 30 minutes,
it is estimated that the dose

would still be greater
than a 100,000 rads.

Are there any questions?

Anthony?

- You see, here's the problem.

Immediate lethality only
occurred where the test subjects

would've been killed by
the force of the blast anyway.

If you're gonna
weaponize radiation,

you want it to incapacitate
the enemy immediately,

not two days or a week later.

- [NARRATOR] Enter Sam Cohen,

the architect of
the neutron bomb

who began his
career at Los Alamos,

providing the
neutron calculations

for the Fat Man atomic bomb.

- Real early on,

I began to see radiation,

nuclear radiation,

as an effective means
of waging ground warfare

in a relatively moral way.

- [NARRATOR] The army called
for the use of atomic weapons

to break the stalemate
in the Korean War,

advocating field tests

to establish a doctrine
for battlefield use.

[GUNFIRE ECHOING]

[EXPLOSION ECHOING]

- And I was dispatched
as an observer,

to see what was happening there,

and then in the back of my mind,

wonder about the applications
of tactical nuclear weapons.

[HEAVY ARTILLERY FIRE]

But now here I was,
in the middle of a war going on,

and I saw the hideous
carnage of the innocents,

and destruction
of their habitats,

and their industries, you know,

and all the structures
that made their lives viable.

And this was all done
by non-nuclear weapons,

and we did just as good a job
with our conventional weapons

as the bomb that
leveled Hiroshima did,

so-called Little Boy bomb.

What Seoul looked like

when I entered
Seoul for the first time,

it looked almost exactly
like Hiroshima after the bomb.

[SOMBER MUSIC]

And in wandering
around the countryside

and seeing the awful
state of the peasantry

and seeing how they
were affected by the war

and by our weaponry,

and that's what it's
always been about,

and it's immoral,

it's just plain immoral.

Now, excuse me,

it's not irrational

because that's what war
has always been about.

Use the biggest bombs you can,

blast the living daylights
outta all these goddamn cities,

which is precisely what
we did at World War II.

And we did a beautiful job

against Germany and Japan

with fire bombs and large
high-explosive bombs,

and we killed countless,

hundreds of thousands,
if not millions,

of innocent urban dwellers,

and that ain't right.

That's immoral, but that's
the way it was fought.

[SOMBER MUSIC]

[MUSIC CONTINUES]

That's just the
way that war was,

and I was all for it,

and I'm not about to damn myself

and condemn myself

for the attitude that I had,
it was typically American.

You blast the bad
guys into oblivion,

and bad guys being men,
women, and children.

I had not a feeling of
wretchedness, of guilt.

Not in the slightest.

This began to put a little sense

of what I would call
normal decency, into me.

Namely, if you wanna go to war,
and sometimes you have to,

try and keep it as
clean as you can.

[DRAMATIC MUSIC]

So we drove into Seoul

and we had to drive across
a bridge on the Han River.

And this bridge looked like
it had a case of smallpox,

it was just cratered

as a result of countless
high-explosive bombs

that had pocked it up.

But it was never destroyed,
it was built so firmly.

And so, the first
question I asked myself,

suppose we dropped a
nuclear weapon on that bridge.

It would go into the river.

Now, that bridge was
a very important part

of our military exercises,

and so it was a
real military asset,

so I began getting ideas.

But now,
from a moral standpoint,

see, I would not have regarded
the destruction of that bridge

as immoral,
because it could have been done

with a very low-yield,

accurately delivered
nuclear weapon.

[EXPLOSION ECHOING]

[DRAMATIC MUSIC]

And it would not have
destroyed the town of Seoul

or anything else like that,

it simply would've
destroyed the bridge.

- But while the phones are
ringing off the hook tonight,

this is a very
interesting topic.

Do you think that
using a neutron bomb,

is that a moral issue?

Because Sam Cohen,

he talks about how he felt
that it was a moral weapon

to use this on somebody else.

- [CALLER] I think drones
are the way to go myself.

- [PETER KURAN]
Maybe I could fill in.

- All right, well,
thank you so much, Sam.

We have another caller.

Well, thank you.
Thank you for calling.

Do you think that it's a moral
issue, the neutron bomb?

I'm stuck on this moral issue.
We have a caller on the line.

This is a Jim from
Orange County.

- [JIM] Hi.

- Are you familiar with the
effects of a neutron bomb?

And it's not just-
We're not just

talking about an
immediate death.

This is horrific.

[TELEPHONE BEEPING]

All right, Jim, well thank
you very much for your call.

Wow, pretty interesting, huh?

They love or hate this guy.

- I went to work for a very
famous Air Force General

who masterminded
our ICBM development,

and that's Benny Schriever,
General Bernard Schriever.

And here's a guy
who would devise

a thermonuclear,
a ballistic missile,

that would've killed God
only knows how many millions.

[PATRIOTIC MUSIC]

But at the same time,
regarding the battlefield,

he began hammering at me.

See, I was his nuclear advisor,

he was running a planning shop

for the Air Force
and the Pentagon.

He began hammering
on me: "Sam,"

he says, "Why don't you
give me a weapon

that will produce all
these horrendous effects

on innocents?"

He says, "It's the
logical thing to do."

Now, what I had to do is I
had to look for a warhead

that had the necessary
characteristics,

and so I used to pay
very frequent visits

up to the Livermore
Nuclear Laboratory

in Northern California.

And I'd always visit with
the director of the lab,

we were very good friends,

and I'd ask him if
there was anything new

in your developments.

Well, this particular visit,
he said yes.

He said, "But I'm not quite
sure if you'd be interested."

I said, "Why are you
hesitant about my interest?"

He says, "This is a
nonmilitary warhead.

This is for peaceful
applications

for the so-called
Project Plowshare."

You know,
"Turn swords into plowshares."

[PROJECTOR WHIRRING]

- [NEWSCASTER] The
United States is conducting,

for the benefit of all nations,

a program it calls Plowshare.

- The great and violent
power of nuclear explosions

can be used for
peaceful purposes.

We call this Project Plowshare.

Geographical engineering,

move great amounts of earth,
build canals, harbors,

use nuclear explosives

like high explosives
have been used,

for the purpose of mining.

Use nuclear explosives
in the bowels of the earth,

using the earth
itself as the crucible.

We built up a physics laboratory

right down there
in the salt mine,

to find out more
about the neutrons

which make nuclear explosives
and nuclear reactors tick.

We try to do the best

to develop further,
this great tool, nuclear energy,

for peaceful purposes.

But at the very outset

we were convinced of one thing,

the most interesting
thing that we might find out,

maybe something which
no one expects, a surprise.

[DRAMATIC MUSIC]

- And I really wasn't
all that much interested

in the peaceful application
of nuclear devices,

and he called the project
heads of two projects

who were working on these clean,
peaceful nuclear weapons,

to come in and brief
me on these weapons.

And when they
were through briefing-

see, they were thermonuclear,
fusion, not fission.

When they were through
briefing me, I asked them,

I said, "How many
neutrons come out?"

And they said, "Well, we have
to make a quick calculation."

And the answer was

essentially,
all of the neutrons came out,

they weren't
absorbed in the device.

Well, with that I said,
"Thanks a lot,"

and I excused myself
and I raced for the airport,

went back to Santa Monica

and to the Rand Corporation
where I was working.

I went up to my office
and I took out a slide rule

my Dad had given
me on my 15th birthday

when I had displayed
an interest in science,

and I made the
necessary calculations.

I knew how to make neutron
calculations real good.

And lo and behold, what
came out of these calculations,

was a weapon, that if
burst at a proper altitude,

would kill the bad
guys underneath

but spare the properties,

the cities and towns
of the good guys.

And vóila! Here is how the
neutron bomb came about.

- What would someone
expect to feel or experience

from the effects of
the neutron bomb?

- It all depends how close
you are to the burst point.

[PENSIVE MUSIC]

[MUSIC CONTINUES]

[DRAMATIC MUSIC]

If you're roughly
1,000 yards away,

you, within a matter of minutes,

are going to be rendered
totally incapacitated,

and physiologically, you will be

one of the most miserable
creatures imaginable.

You will be vomiting
your guts out,

your head will be bursting

as your central nervous system

has been knocked out of order.

And within a matter of

less... considerably
less than an hour,

you'll be dead.

But within a matter of minutes,

you'll be unable to
conduct combat operations.

So you're gone.

If you go a few
more 100 yards out,

then you can pick
up a nonlethal dose

that will still have
effects on you.

And you'll survive it,

you'll live through it,

but you will not feel very well

and you'll feel disoriented.

You won't be violently ill

like the poor guy
at 1,000 yards,

but nevertheless,
you will not be physically

or mentally capable of
conducting combat operations.

So if you're talking
about a tank crew

that picks up this dose,

they won't be able to
work their tank for a while.

Now, if they were out
of the combat theater,

I'd say, well, fine and dandy,
they'll pull through,

they won't be very
happy for a while.

The dose is far less than
the dose that produces

these God-awful,
hideous effects,

but it will still have the
desired military result

of putting an enemy
soldier out of action...

because the neutron bomb

is the most discriminate
weapon ever devised.

There's a very sharp cutoff

between the radius out to
which the enemy will be killed

and where the friendly
troops are positioned.

After the war is over,

instead of having a
continent of devastation,

physical devastation,

it'll be a physically
intact continent.

[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC]

From a radioactivity standpoint,

the radioactive effects will be,

to a first approximation,
zero, zilch,

and the area that's
under the burst

will be inhabitable immediately.

And if the burst
is used in a city

and the populace has
taken common-sense steps

to protect themselves
by taking shelter

against the radiation,
the neutron radiation...

[EXPLOSION ECHOING]

then they won't be touched.

- [NARRATOR] Further
developments of the neutron bomb

would have to wait

as Eisenhower imposed a
moratorium on nuclear testing

through the end of
his presidential term.

Undeterred by the moratorium,

Sam continued his research
with fellow strategists

at the Rand Corporation,

whose responsibility
was to formulate

and shape military policy.

At Rand, Sam continued to
pursue his vision of a bomb

that would one day
weaponize neutron radiation.

- I went into analysis,
strictly Freudian,

and this went on
for about six years,

and it was six of
the most agonizing

yet fascinating
years of my life,

because thanks to
listening to myself,

because I had no choice,

see, now I have the analyst

and the son a bitch,
he would just sit there

and he wouldn't say a word.

I was, to a certain extent,

and this would vary from
individual to individual,

a neurotic.

I wasn't a psychotic,

at this stage of the game,
I might say.

I was employed in security work,

in doing nuclear weapons work,

and I had top secret clearances
and so on and so forth,

so if I had been psychotic,

I never would've gotten the job,
or let alone clearances.

I was working with a think tank

called the Rand Corporation,

which has become
world famous,

in Santa Monica, California,

and I was in with a group
of extremely bright guys,

to put it mildly.

They were not only bright

but to a very,
very high percentage level,

they were neurotic as all hell,
just like I was, okay?

And now, having
this analytic background

and allowing me to
understand people,

I began to see these guys

who were being driven
by their neuroses.

Now, the Rand Corporation

had a huge effect on
our nuclear policies.

They had it all figured
out on computers,

and the computers were
based on mathematical models,

and the mathematical models

were based on their
neurotic way of thinking.

But they're with us.

Now, the question,

if push came to shove and
we wound up in a nuclear war,

would it go according to
these policies and strategies?

No.

Absolutely no way.

How would it go?
Heaven only knows.

I don't.

Despite all the profound
calculations by such geniuses,

as the late great Herman Kahn,

you know, the master of
thermonuclear war and so on.

I would say Herman,

who had a huge effect
on Washington thinking,

believed we could fight
and win a thermonuclear war.

[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC]

[MUSIC CONTINUES]

[MUSIC CONTINUES]

What a pile of crap.

He pretended to
really believe it.

Now, the truth of the matter is

he didn't believe it one bit,

but he was a
natural-born showman

and he desperately
needed attention.

- [ADVERTISER] Man looks
not only to their great energy

but also to their
relative size and cost.

He sees that a 10 kiloton
nuclear explosive, for example,

could be as small as 15 inches

in diameter,
and three feet long.

The price would
be about $350,000.

Furthermore, if he increases
the nuclear yield 200 times,

up to two megatons,

the package is only about
two feet greater in diameter

and seven feet longer,
and the price barely doubles.

[DRAMATIC MUSIC]

- I visited the Pentagon

and I was introduced
to Tom Moorer,

who was a fledgling rear admiral

in charge of long range
planning for the Navy,

by a colleague of his.

So I come into Moorer's office

and I take out
my briefing charts

and I go through
my song and dance,

and when I'm all through,

he has practically
gone through the ceiling.

He really got
excited and he said,

"Do you mind if I ask
you to give your briefing

around certain quarters of
the Navy in the Pentagon?"

I said, "Of course I don't mind.

You arrange for
it and I'll show up."

And before you knew it,

you had an exponentiating
chain reaction.

I had briefed every
significant quarter

of the Navy in the Pentagon,

all the way on up to the
Chief of Naval Operations,

and they wanted that bomb.

Thanks to the Navy pressures,

it worked its way
out of the Navy

and into the office of
the Secretary of Defense.

And there was this briefing
in his conference room,

the Secretary's conference room,

and I was on stage
with my charts,

and in the audience were a
bunch of very senior characters,

you know, in the Pentagon,
including an admiral

by the name of Arthur Radford,

who was then the Chairman
of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

And when I was all through,
Admiral Radford muttered,

"If we only had these
weapons at Dien Bien Phu,"

this was during the
French war in Indochina.

And it would've been
ideal for us in Vietnam.

Had we used these
weapons in Vietnam,

we could have won
that war in short order

and saved God only knows how
many thousands upon thousands

of American soldier boys' lives.

- [NARRATOR] Throughout 1959,

Sam continued to pitch
his fusion weapon concept

to various agencies
of the government,

including the Department of
Defense, the State Department,

the CIA, the Atomic
Energy Commission,

and the National Security
Council Planning Board.

It was during this time period

that this advanced
weapon concept

became popularly known by
the press as the "neutron bomb."

Generating the kind of hysteria
that could only be created

by the premiere of
a Hollywood movie,

news of the neutron
bomb spread quickly.

As the revelation of this
newly proposed weapon

raced across newspapers,
television, and radio.

It took root in the
political landscape

and resounded through Congress.

Connecticut's Democratic
Senator, Thomas J. Dodd,

became the neutron bomb's
most enthusiastic proponent,

telling Congress...

- [VOICEOVER]
"We are in mortal peril.

More than a year has
passed since I first spoke

on the folly of the
test ban moratorium.

I mentioned the neutron bomb

would operate as
a kind of death ray.

It would do next to
no physical damage

and result in no contamination,

but it would immediately destroy

all life in the target area.

Today, I doubt there is a single
nuclear physicist of repute

who would challenge
the neutron bomb

from the standpoint
of feasibility.

It can be built, but nothing
can be done to build it

until we are free to
resume nuclear testing."

- [NARRATOR] Responding
to Senator Dodd,

Linus Pauling proclaims...

- We have had
one principal reason

for hope during
the last three years,

the negotiations for a
bomb test agreement

being carried out in Geneva.

And now there is a great
effort being made by the forces

of militarism in
the United States,

to break off the
negotiations in Geneva

and to start up
bomb tests again.

The greatest foe of
the peace movement

and the committee for
a sane nuclear policy

is Senator Thomas J. Dodd.

He, in his speech on
the 12th of May, 1960,

urged that we stop trying

to make an
international agreement

to stop the testing of
all nuclear weapons,

that the United States
immediately resume

the testing of nuclear weapons,

and now he is bally-hooing
what he calls a neutron bomb.

This is a great fraud.

Senator Dodd said, "If the
Soviets were to get it first,

it might well cost
us our freedom.

If the day should ever come

when the Kremlin forces a
showdown crisis over Berlin

and then demonstrates its
possession of the neutron bomb,

we would find
ourselves confronted

with the price of
capitulation in Europe

or all-out nuclear war."

This is pure poppycock.

The neutron bomb is a fraud,
a hoax, and nothing more.

- [NARRATOR] Former Atomic
Energy Commissioner,

Thomas Murray,
sent an ominous letter

to presidential candidates
Kennedy and Nixon,

warning that the
Russians were developing

new types of atomic weapons

which could lead
to nuclear blackmail

unless the United States
was allowed to resume testing.

Murray identified
two different weapons

on the drawing board,

whose code names were synonymous
with the neutron bomb.

Contemplated as a
battlefield weapon,

Eisenhower eventually
had reservations

about the concept
of the neutron bomb.

- He didn't like it.

For his own, I consider to be,
grossly immoral reasons,

didn't believe in
battlefield nuclear weapons

regardless of how
discriminate they might be.

Even though he
had these thousands

of nuclear weapons
under his command,

battlefield weapons, tactical
weapons, under his command,

I don't think he ever
would've made that call.

[DRAMATIC MUSIC]

We'll never know.

- Our military
organization today

bears little relation
to that known

of any of my
predecessors in peace time,

or indeed by the fighting
men of World War II or Korea.

Until the latest of
our world conflicts,

the United States had
no armaments industry.

American makers
of plowshares could,

with time and as required,
make swords as well.

[EXPLOSION ECHOING]

But we can no longer risk
emergency improvisation

of national defense.

We have been compelled to create

a permanent armaments
industry of vast proportions.

In the councils of government,

we must guard against the

acquisition of
unwarranted influence,

whether sought or unsought,

by the military-industrial
complex.

Only an alert and
knowledgeable citizenry

can compel the proper meshing

of the huge industrial and
military machinery of defense

with our peaceful
methods and goals.

- [NARRATOR] Soon after
Eisenhower left office,

the newly elected
president and NATO allies

were faced with renewed
threats over West Berlin

by the Soviet Union.

[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC]

On August 30th, 1961,

the Russians broke the
nuclear testing moratorium,

culminating with the detonation

of a 57-megaton hydrogen bomb,

allowing the United
States to proceed

with a new series of tests.

Many of those tests,
conducted in the fall of 1961,

were designs considered
for low-yield tactical use,

including continued
development of the neutron bomb.

Despite its growing reputation

as the government's
worst-kept rumor,

the neutron bomb
was back in the news.

- [REPORTER] Mr. President,

there's been lots
of talk recently

about the development
of a neutron bomb.

Could you give us your
estimate of the feasibility

of developing a weapon which
would destroy human beings

without destroying
real estate values?

- [PRESIDENT KENNEDY] No.

- [NARRATOR] Publicly,
Kennedy refused to discuss

the neutron bomb.

Privately however,
he debated the use of the weapon

he referred to as
the "fusion bomb."

- [NEWSCASTER] These troops,
forming a special task force,

were the first in
our army's history

to engage in a tactical exercise

supported by live
nuclear fire power.

[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC]

[MUSIC INTENSIFIES]

[MUSIC CONTINUES]

[EXPLOSION ECHOING]

[MUSIC CONTINUES]

[PENSIVE MUSIC]

This field exercise was
not a war gaming maneuver,

but rather a pre-designed
demonstration

of the tactical employment
of low-yield nuclear weapons

in conjunction with
conventional weapons.

- [SOLDIER] By this time,
I think the rest of the group

had all reached the same
conclusion I had reached,

that some limited
wars can best be fought

with a combination of
conventional weapons

plus nuclear weapons, for
appropriate tactical targets.

It could mean the difference
between winning now

or fighting for months.

[PENSIVE MUSIC]

- [NEWSCASTER] In 1964,

important steps
in this direction

were taken in experiments,

with nuclear explosives
specially designed

to produce high-intensity
neutron radiation,

the specific characteristic
that promotes isotope formation.

In one hundred-millionth
of a second,

more neutrons were
released by each explosion

than could be
released over decades

in the most efficient
nuclear reactor.

The blast pumped these neutrons
into targets of uranium,

producing isotopes of very
heavy elements beyond uranium.

Eventually, Plowshare
scientists hope to use

these heavier elements as
targets in nuclear explosions.

- [NARRATOR] Over
the next decade,

26 nuclear tests would be

conducted under
Project Plowshare,

for the development of
peaceful nuclear weapons.

The neutron bomb
continued to be aided

by advancements
in this technology.

The future looked bright for
peaceful nuclear explosions,

but unrealized expectations

and public and
political opposition

doomed the program to closure.

Plowshare quietly ended in 1977.

Without Plowshare,

the path the neutron bomb
would take would be bumpy.

The neutron bomb
found early success

as the warhead for
the Sprint missile.

The SPRINT was an
anti-ballistic missile, or ABM,

designed to explode and
deliver a blast of neutrons,

rendering incoming
ICBMs inoperable.

The Sprint was capable
of hypersonic speeds,

reaching temperatures twice
the melting point of steel,

[WHICH] would cause
the missile to glow

as it shot through
the atmosphere.

However, high costs,

questionable results,

and the lack of
congressional support

retired the Sprint in 1975.

In the ever-changing
world of defense,

Sam's advocacy
for his neutron bomb

was falling increasingly
on deaf ears.

[EXPLOSION ECHOING]

The Air Force favored
its strategic programs,

like the ICBM and
Long Range Bomber.

The Navy favored the Polaris

as its nuclear weapon of choice.

The army was preoccupied
with the Vietnam War

and stewardship of the
Sentinel ABM program.

[HELICOPTER ENGINES RUMBLING]

Lyndon Johnson
had little interest

in Cold War confrontation,

as he reduced government
support for many programs

to pay for the Vietnam War.

After Vietnam,
the government and the military

returned to a strategy
of flexible response,

reviving interest in
tactical nuclear weapons.

[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC]

- All right, you'll be working
on this assignment in groups.

Barker,
your group will develop plans

using only conventional weapons.

Fox, you have no restrictions,

you may use any
weapons in the arsenal,

including nuclear ones,

against any targets
you deem suitable.

Maloy, your group
also has permission

to use nuclear weapons,

but you're restricted
to using them

against tactical targets.

Our next get-together
will be on Thursday

to receive your reports.

That's all, gentlemen.

- [NARRATOR] In 1973,
the Army Chief of Staff

produced a memorandum

requesting a study to
reexamine nuclear artillery.

The study requested
radiation dose requirements

for incapacitating
military personnel

and minimizing
collateral damage.

- [NEWSCASTER] The
goal is to establish

a valid and consistent model

from which military planners
can predict the probability

of mission accomplishment

in a wide range of
operational situations.

A project involving 10
primates was initiated

to determine gross
performance efficiency

after irradiation.

The reactor is programmed
and the subject positioned

to receive a mid-head dose

of approximately 10,000
rads of mixed gamma

and neutron radiation

in a period of about
50 microseconds.

These parameters approximate
the dose and delivery rate

that might be anticipated

following the detonation
of a nuclear weapon.

[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC]

[DRAMATIC MUSIC]

[MUSIC CONTINUES]

[MUSIC CONTINUES]

[MUSIC CONTINUES]

[MUSIC CONTINUES]

[MONKEY SCREAMING SHRILLY]

[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC]

[DRAMATIC MUSIC]

[MONKEY SCREAMING GUTTURALLY]

- Hello there,
are you conscious?

- Can you hear us?

Can you see this light?

- We'd like to ask you
some questions. Is that okay?

- What was the last thing you
remember before the blast?

Were you unconscious
at any time?

If so, do you know for how long?

In the period immediately
following the blast,

do you remember any inability
to perform major functions?

If so, how long did
that impairment last?

- Are you sick or nauseated?

Did you vomit after the attack?

[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC]

[MUSIC FADES]

[DRAMATIC MUSIC]

- Good evening.

The neutron bomb
is back in the news.

- [NARRATOR] Senator
Stuart Symington,

head of the Committee
on Atomic Energy,

was a staunch opponent
of the neutron bomb.

This opposition evaporated

when Symington retired
from the Senate in 1976,

thereby opening the door to
approval of the neutron bomb.

Quietly, the neutron
bomb was reintroduced

into the energy
department's budget request.

[RAPID TICKING]

The neutron bomb had reappeared

after secretly being inserted

into a House Appropriations Bill

during the Carter
Administration.

- Do I have any questions?

[CROWD LAUGHING]

- How do you
reconcile your decision

to go ahead with
the neutron bomb

with your inaugural pledge

to eliminate all
nuclear weapons?

Also, why didn't you know
the money was in the bill?

And three, doesn't this
escalate the arms race?

And I have a follow-up.

[CROWD LAUGHING]

- Well, it's a very
serious question.

In the first place, I did
not know it was in the bill.

The enhanced radiation
or neutron bomb

has been discussed

and also has been under
development for 15 to 20 years.

It's not a new concept at all,
not a new weapon.

It does not affect our assault

or strategic weapons
negotiations at all,

it's strictly designed
as a tactical weapon.

Before I make a final decision

on the neutron
bomb's deployment,

I would do a complete
impact statement analysis on it,

I'll submit this information
to the Congress.

But I have not yet decided

whether to approve
the neutron bomb,

I do think it ought to be
one of our options, however.

- [NARRATOR] Almost immediately,

funding from the neutron
bomb faced opposition

by then Oregon Senator,
Mark Hatfield,

who blocked finances
for the weapon.

- I think that argument
is the very reason

why we should be very reticent
to embark upon this system,

because there's more
of an invitation to use it

and to introduce it into
conventional warfare.

- Some of the opponents
of this particular bomb

seem to have discovered
that radiation kills people.

They also seem
to have discovered

that bombs kill people.

All weapons kill people.

Nuclear weapons are dangerous,
there is no doubt about it.

The neutron bomb is no
exception, it will kill people,

that's the express
purpose of it.

- [NARRATOR] Initially,
Carter opposed the neutron bomb,

which was on its way
to being fitted for use

as an artillery shell

and as the warhead
for the Lance Missile.

Although the Lance had
been on the drawing board

since the mid 1950s,

and eventually introduced
into the US arsenal,

it wasn't until 1977

when the Lance was ready to
move into the production phase

for its neutron warhead.

- The six-kiloton device

was to be used
in a tactical missile

called the Lance,
a battlefield missile.

[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC]

[MUSIC CONTINUES]

[MUSIC CONTINUES]

[MISSILE WHOOSHING]

[DRAMATIC MUSIC]

Now, the army never
wanted those damn things,

they never did from
the very beginning,

but it was forced upon
them by the president,

toward keeping a promise, okay?

Well, in design specifications

for how the weapon
would be used,

it was to be exploded as
close to the surface as possible

to avoid contact,

which might've produced

your large-scale
radioactive fallout,

like a few hundred
feet above the surface,

the reason being

the army never
trusted radiation.

What it wanted was
physical demolishment

of enemy tanks.

[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC]

The military did not
want people to know

that it did not have a
significant blast component.

That it had a reduced blast
component, fine and dandy.

- [NARRATOR] The neutron bomb

would move from
one conflict to another,

from the battlefields
of Congress

to the front lines of Europe.

- That was where the
battle would be fought,

but it was densely
populated with human beings.

Germany in particular,

which was where the
line was really drawn,

between east and west Germany,
was densely populated.

How could you use
nuclear weapons

without killing more
friendly civilians

than enemy combatants?

The idea of a neutron bomb was

if you could suppress
the blast and fire effects

of a nuclear weapon

and enhance the neutron
effects of a nuclear weapon,

you might be able
to have a weapon

that would kill those
guys inside those tanks,

but with minimal damage
to the German countryside.

Germany is a densely
populated country.

The German leadership,
really very early on

understood, as I think
Helmut Schmidt said later on,

"One nuclear
explosion in my country

and then the war would be
over as far as we're concerned.

We'd stop,
we wouldn't fight anymore,

because there's no point in

destroying our
country to save it."

- [NARRATOR] NATO members
could not agree on deployment

of the neutron bomb,

saying it is militarily useful
but politically dangerous.

- And I can assure
you that the SACEUR

would not ask for the
use of those weapons

unless he projected

that the defense was no
longer gonna be viable,

and therefore,
we face two choices,

one to be overrun
and to give up,

which is not very viable to me,

or two, to resort to the use
of theater nuclear weapons,

which is also not
very viable to me.

- [NEWSCASTER] The
neutron bomb kills people

the same way monkeys are killed

in this armed
forces laboratory,

by huge doses of radiation.

- [NARRATOR] While pressure
erupted from all sides

and countries on the issue,

President Carter postponed
production of the neutron bomb.

- And I'm looking forward
to going to get some rest.

- [REPORTER] The Senate's
saying it turned down

the neutron bomb
by one vote today.

- Oh, did they?
That's a matter I

haven't gotten
into very deeply.

We'll look into
it in the future.

- Do you think the neutron
bomb is really essential?

- I don't know.

I'll see you later.

- [RONALD REGAN] The neutron
warhead is a defensive weapon

designed to offset superiority

that the Soviet Union
has on the Western front,

against the NATO nations.

You also have to remember

that those who are
crying the loudest,

the Soviet Union,

and many of those who,

under the name of
pacifism in Western Europe,

who are opposing
things like this,

are really carrying
the propaganda ball

for the Soviet Union.

- President Reagan,

many people don't realize this,

came to office with
a personal dream

that he had been
pursuing ever since 1945,

to get rid of all the nuclear
weapons in the world.

That was the famous
summit at Reykjavík in 1986.

But he was shrewd
enough to realize

that he would have to start by

building up the US
military to such a high level

that no one, domestically
or on the Soviet side,

could claim he was
weak on defense.

So the first thing he did was
double the US defense budget,

and in doing so,

they had to go to the farthest
reaches of their dream book

that they could use to
spend all that money on.

And I think the reason

the neutron bomb
reemerges a little bit

during the early years of
the Reagan Administration,

we got all this money, the
president wants us to spend it,

okay, let's throw
that back into the mix,

maybe we should work
on that a little more.

- Yeah, that was one
of his principal themes

and he promised, you know,
if elected president,

"I will develop and
stockpile that weapon."

And he kept his
promise, incidentally,

but he went back on it
from the following standpoint.

He was stockpiling in the
United States, not in Europe,

It was the only place

where they could
have been of any good.

And the reason being

is that the Europeans, who
were really detested my bomb,

wouldn't have
anything to do with it.

[DISTORTED CROWD NOISE]

I put up a big holler,

and you know how
much good that did me?

On the positive side, zero.

On the negative side,
a lot of harm.

As a matter of fact,

the fellow who really
ran the Air Force,

the famous infamous
General Curtis LeMay,

he tried to crush me

and bring my
briefings to a halt.

- But LeMay, as well as
the other Air Force generals

who were part of
strategic Air Command,

had a distinct preference,

not so much for small-scale
tactical nuclear weapons,

but for the large,
strategic nuclear weapons

that they wanted to use
to lay waste to Soviet cities

and Soviet industrial
infrastructure.

- General LeMay
wanted all the bombs,

and he wanted big bombs,

the bigger the better,

because his idea
of how to prevent

an attack on the United
States by the Soviet Union

was to attack the Soviet Union

before they could attack us,

either in the final
minutes of a conflict

before it went nuclear,

or God knows,
as a preemptive war,

which was seriously discussed.

- Now, really and truly,
from the very beginning,

the army never wanted
battlefield nuclear weapons.

Never.

The reason being,

they had done some studies

which they decided
to take seriously

for political reasons,

that showed it was
impossible to fight

a battlefield nuclear
war in Europe

without wiping
out half of Europe

and contaminating
the other half.

[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC]

- The idea of a weapon
that would just kill people

and leave the neighborhood
intact, so to speak,

had a really bad smell to it,
for most people.

It sounded like

what had gone on in Nazi
Germany in the Second World War,

if you will.

Let's just kill everybody around

and then we'll take
over their buildings,

and their houses, and
their factories, and so forth.

So from that point of view,
if you will,

I'm sure the Pentagon
thought of that

as a public relations problem.

- [NARRATOR] A month after
the surrender of Iraqi forces

in Operation Desert Storm,

President George H.W.
Bush moved unilaterally

to denuclearize the US Army,
including the neutron bomb.

- I am announcing today,
a series of sweeping initiatives

affecting every aspect of
our nuclear forces on land,

on ships, and on aircraft.

I'll begin with the category

in which we will make the
most fundamental change

in nuclear forces
in over 40 years.

Non-strategic or
theater weapons.

I'm therefore directing
that the United States

eliminate its entire
worldwide inventory

of ground-launched, short-range,

that is, theater,
nuclear weapons.

We will bring home and destroy

all of our nuclear
artillery shells

and short-range
ballistic missile warheads.

- We have zero,

thanks to two guys.

General Colin Powell

who advised President
George Herbert Walker Bush,

this is right after
the Persian Gulf War,

to get rid of all of the
battlefield nuclear weapons.

He didn't need them,
he didn't want them,

and so Bush put forth an edict,

destroy all of these weapons.

And so, here were all
these thousands of weapons

which were destroyed,
including my neutron bomb.

[PENSIVE MUSIC]

For the time being,
it's gone for all time.

[SOMBER MUSIC]

[KEYBOARD KEYS CLICKING]

What I've always told myself,

it's not a question of if,
but when.

The bombs that
I've been discussing

are the bombs we've
actually developed,

and so I've talked
about their nature,

and their effects,
and so on and so forth,

but let's talk about
another bomb,

and I have a nickname for this.

I was the first guy
to become aware

of this bomb and
its implications,

and this bomb I call
the Nothing Bomb.

It doesn't knock down buildings,

it doesn't contaminate
the surface

over a huge area or
anything else like that,

but there's one
thing that it does do,

so it's not a totally
nothing bomb.

It kills people with neutrons

from a device,

roughly speaking,
the size of a baseball,

and a yield, not kilotons,

but at the ton level.

And that makes it the
ultimate radiation weapon,

the ultimate neutron bomb.

And it was based, technically,

on a very exotic substance

to get the super
effective explosives,

you know,
for a peaceful application.

And it involves an
explosive that didn't go bang,

instead what it did
is it got extremely hot

and it glowed white hot,

and inside that
glowing material,

the pressures were
enormous beyond imagination.

They were comparable to
the temperatures and pressures

that existed in the
inside of the sun.

Now, you know what the sun does,

it produces
thermonuclear reactions

where the ingredients
are the two heavy forms

of hydrogen,
deuterium, and tritium,

which are the same ingredients
of a regular neutron bomb.

This one is pure fusion.

And would you like
to know something?

Despite all of these treaties
and agreements we've reached

regarding nuclear arms control,

for a country to produce
these kinds of explosives

is strictly permissible.

Not one treaty
that's ever come out,

not one agreement
that's ever come out,

has forbidden the
development of such devices.

[SINGER VOCALIZING]
[ENERGETIC MUSIC]

So I don't claim any
God-given uniqueness

as being the only one on Earth

that really understands
what this business is all about.

I don't. I never have
and I never will.

It's not about logic and
it's not about rationality,

and I'll add one,
it's not even about sanity.

[DRAMATIC MUSIC]

[DISTORTED VOICE]

My thinking along
nuclear weapon lines

and what kinds of weapons
ought to be developed

and stockpiled and so on,

has been my moral view of
the subject of nuclear weapons,

and their use,
and how they oughta' be used.

I'm being more than a little
bit overly pompous here,

in acclaiming my morality,

because I ain't that moral.

You know, I've still got a
lot of meanies inside of me,

but good, despite all the
years of psychoanalysis

that I went through.

But I'm, relatively speaking,

whether you wanna
make about morality,

a moral- a far more moral person

than I was before the analysis.

And not only more moral,
but more rational.

[TELEPHONE RINGING]

- And we have Ray on the
line and she had a question.

Ray, what's your question?

- [RAY] My question is,

why do I need to wait
for 18 hours to die?

Why can't I just like,
up and die?

Would it be better
if one had a gun

or if one had a supply of pills,

and then one would
just down it and pass out

or shoot one's brains out

instead of suffering
the 18 hours?

- I would say, you know, for me,

I'm just gonna get
a bottle of Jack.