Adenauer and the Gottingen Veto
T may be that the atom, like other schizo- Iphrenics, needs to be led gently back to the point at which the split first occurred. From Gottingen last week came a statement of the atomic danger which should bring some comfort to those who are appalled by the power of nuclear weapons to anzesthetise the mind before destroying the body. Without hysteria and with- out attempting to extend their protest to the whole field of nuclear warfare, eighteen leading German atomic scientists denounced their government's plans for a Bundeswehr armed with tactical atomic weapons; They also dropped a hint that they would refuse to co-operate with any native research scheme aimed at the production of a German bomb, although they admitted the de- terrent effect of the weapon in American hands.
In the eyes of a large section of West German opinion the eighteen scientists are so many Luthers hurling good sense at an outworn ethic; to Dr. Adenauer and his Defence Minister, Herr Strauss, they are ill-informed hedge priests who have shaken the faith of the people in their chosen leaders. The hurt tone of Dr. Adenauer's reaction even hints at the existence of a sump- tuary law which forbids an excessive display of moral initiative while this commodity is in short supply throughout the world. The immediate em- barrassment to the Bonn government has been great, and both the main political parties have been quick to see how just such an issue might wake the interest of an electorate which is not responding to conventional electioneering battle cries. Dr. Adenauer hastened to a meeting of his party followers to insist that the scientists were meddling with things they didn't understand and to paint his own apprehensions in the face of the atom in lurid colours. It was a pity, he said, that the scientists hadn't first come to him for advice; he could have directed their protest into the less harmful channel of a general appeal to the world Powers to harness the atom for peace.
The danger to the government of the con- troversy as it stands at the moment lies in the attraction for most Germans of heart-searching about the destructive power of nuclear weapons, a subject on which the German conscience is fairly clear. German intellectuals feel that their recent lesson in the evils of conformity may now make them readier to resist dictation from above than their counterparts in the .West who have less reason to be suspicious of authority. Whatever one may feel about this attitude as a whole, the sanity of the `GOttingen veto' should command attention in NATO countries where the con- troversy is apt to be hogged by the uncom- promising strategist and the starry-eyed politician.
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