The Spread of Nuclear Weapons: Leonard Beaton and John Maddox. Published for the Institute of Strategic Studies by Chatto and Windus, 18s. 210 pp.
When a difficult task has been performed once, it is often supposed that it is easier to perform it another time. Thus nowadays no-one is likely to be particularly impressed by the news that Everest is climbed, though the task is presumably only slightly easier than it was in 1953.
People tend to be equally blasé about another extremely difficult performance, the acquisition of nuclear weapons, and assume that the development by other countries of nuclear capabilities is inevitable and a mere matter of time. (CND and the political left in this country has been at fault here.) The very phrase used, “the spread of nuclear weapons” is a misleading one, for generally speaking nuclear weapons do not spread, but rather go through the painful process of being produced independently in different countries. The bomb made by the Nth country may require just as much (or at any rate almost as much) effort put into its development as the first bomb made by the USA. In fact, it is encouraging to note that no nuclear weapons development programme has ever produced the “goods” as quickly as the first one, the Manhattan project which lasted from 1941 to 1945.