ARGUMENTS FOR TESTING SIR,—Though the guiding principle is that ex-
plosions should be as destructive as possible, the variety of means of delivering bombs and warheads is now so great that all kinds of refinements of design may be thought desirable. Different recipes might be best for different heights of explosion, for example . . . the improvement of bomb design in the Pacific tests should not be scorned. Something like a doubling of the explosive power of, warheads fitted to missiles like the American Minuteman is conceivable. Such a development would increase by 35 per cent. the capacity of the Minuteman force to destroy Russian military targets. This is too good a promise to be sneezed at. . .
Thus Mr. John Maddox in his article called 'The Arguments for Testing.' Unilateralists have been at- tacked for suspecting that they live in a world which is controlled by madmen. But surely the breezy language of Mr. Maddox does suggest that the society which has produced and condoned him has slipped into a condition of near-insanity?
I can understand and respect the man who de- cides, in anguish, that peace can best be maintained by keeping the nuclear weapons of the West. But how long can he preserve that saving and essential anguish?, Even Mr. Maddox may once have made that decision in full awareness of what it involves. But it is a hard, 'perhaps an impossible, psycho- logical task to support the Bomb while always keep- ing in mind its true nature and implications. Mr. Maddox's fatuous 'military targets' shows, perhaps,
THE SPECTATOR, MAY •1'1 ; 1.962 that he had become dimly aware of his own in- creasing frivolity.
And if Mr. Maddox maintains that a man's voca- bulary tells us nothing ,about his state of mind, I would simply ask hitn,vpether he wrote his article in a state of pity and horror.
PHILIP TOYNBEE
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