Fifty years ago
IN Mr. Churchill's statement about the atomic bomb issued by Mr. Attlee on Sunday exultation at having anticipated the enemy gave way to awe. Mr. Churchill spoke of this "revelation of the secrets of Nature" as one "long mer- cifully withheld from man." So terrific a power of destruction is now known to be in the hands of the Allies that in ret- rospect we can see that the race between the scientists threatened to be the decisive factor in the war against Germany. If Germany had won that race — and through her own folly at least two of the ablest specialists trans- ferred their services to us — she could have reduced the civilisation of Britain, Russia and America to ashes. But thanks to the genius of our men of sci- ence, and the foresight of statesmen in Britain and America who planned a colossal combined research organisa- tion, the secret, discovered and applied, is now in Allied hands, and the appalling effectiveness of their new weapon has been demonstrated by the destruction of Hiroshima with a single bomb. It is now evident that there are no limits to the devastation that we can inflict on Japan in a short time, and that she is confronted with the choice of sur- render or speedy annihilation ... Uppermost in everyone's mind is the sobering reflection that this triumph of organised scientific research is in the first place a triumph in the interests of destruction ... The problem, transcend- ing all others in the material sphere, is how to control the use of a knowledge which is capable of effecting a compara- tively swift and beneficial transforma- tion in man's utilisation of the world's resources, and capable equally of the utter destruction of civilisation. The Spectator 10 August 1945
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