143. Editorial Note
On March 2, 1962, in preparation for his address to the nation on nuclear testing and disarmament, President Kennedy and senior administration officials briefed the bipartisan Congressional leadership. Glenn Seaborg summarized the briefing as follows:
[Page 356]“From 4 p.m. to 4:45 p.m. I attended a meeting the President called for the purpose of briefing the bipartisan leaders of Congress on his decision to resume atmospheric testing. Present were: the President, Senators Anderson, Mansfield, Russell, Pastore, Dirksen, Fulbright, Saltonstall and Hickenlooper; Congressmen Holifield, Price, McCormack, Van Zandt and Vinson; Secretary McNamara, John McCone, Harold Brown, Mac Bundy and I. The President described the general outline of the announcement that he intends to make on nationwide television tonight. Following this McCone gave a description, using charts, of the results of the Russian tests and their significance. Brown then made a brief statement regarding the four classes of tests in the U.S program: (1) effects, (2) advanced concepts, (3) verification, and (4) systems. I mentioned in particular the 2000 kilometer test to develop a capability for testing in outer space and also the role that Johnston Island and Christmas Island will play.
“The President said that Prime Minister Macmillan asked him to delay his announcement until today; the original plan had been to make the television announcement last night. The President said that the only dissenting message from a Head of State which should be taken seriously was from Japan. Countries like England, France, Switzerland, etc. have expressed approval. Senator Anderson said he feels the Soviet Union would accept our offer for a Treaty but in such a manner that prolonged negotiations would result; but the President assured him he meant it should be a signed Treaty before the deadline mentioned. The President said that we won’t announce the number of tests, but merely give a general description of the types and total fallout. It was the unanimous reaction of the members of Congress present, voiced individually by such people as Vinson, McCormack, Mansfield, Dirksen and Hickenlooper, that the President has made the proper decision in the proper way.” (Seaborg, Journal, volume 3, pages 243-244)
From his office in the White House at 7 p.m. the same day, President Kennedy delivered a major radio and television address on nuclear testing and disarmament. The President reviewed the U.S. attempts to achieve “an effective world-wide end to nuclear tests,” which would check the nuclear arms race, and the Soviet Union’s breaking of the moratorium in September 1961, which had prompted his decisions to renew underground tests and to begin preparations for atmospheric tests. Following the National Security Council’s completion of its review of the Soviet tests, the President continued, he had authorized the Atomic Energy Commission and the Department of Defense earlier that day to conduct a series of atmospheric tests “beginning when our preparations are completed, in the latter part of April and to be concluded as quickly as possible (within two or three months)—such series, involving only [Page 357] those tests which cannot be held underground, to take place in the atmosphere over the Pacific Ocean.”
In his address, President Kennedy provided an extensive review of the recent Soviet test series and the U.S. security needs that required additional U.S. tests, including some aboveground tests. He also emphasized the determination of the U.S. negotiators to reach a comprehensive disarmament agreement at the opening of the Eighteen-Nation Disarmament Committee in Geneva on March 14. “And of greatest importance to our discussion tonight, we shall, in association with the United Kingdom, present once again our proposals for a separate comprehensive treaty—with appropriate arrangements for detection and verification—to halt permanently the testing of all nuclear weapons, in every environment: in the air, in outer space, underground or under-water. New modifications will also be offered in the light of new experience.”
For full text of the President’s address, see Documents on Disarmament, 1962, volume I, pages 66-75.