History
Learn about nuclear weapons’ pivotal role in global policy during World War II, the Cold War, and the post-Cold War era. Click through to learn more about the development of nuclear norms, nuclear ethics, and activism.
Pre Cold War
In the spring of 1945, President Harry S. Truman set up the Interim Committee on Atomic Energy to discuss policy options regarding the use of nuclear weapons in combat and the possible political implications such a use might have. The Interim Committee, chaired by Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson, was comprised of top US government officials and scientists involved in the Manhattan Project. The Interim Committee issued a report advising that a nuclear weapon should be used without warning as soon as possible against a military target in Japan.
The first nuclear weapon detonation, codenamed Trinity, took place on July 16, 1945, in the desert of New Mexico, USA. The bomb, nicknamed “the gadget,” was a plutonium implosion device with a yield of about 20 kilotons of TNT. The explosion created a fireball that rose to 12 kilometers and a mushroom cloud that reached 18 kilometers. The blast was felt hundreds of kilometers away, and the shockwave shattered windows in nearby towns. In the hours following the detonation, radioactive ash rained down on downwind communities, who had not been notified of the nuclear detonation. Children played in this radioactive fallout like snow.
Despite lack of evident military necessity, U.S. President Harry Truman approved the order for the Atomic Bomb to be used on Japan
On August 6th, 1945, the United States detonated the 15 kiloton gun type atomic weapon “Little Boy” over the city of Hiroshima. A few days later on August 9th, 1945, the 25 kiloton atomic bomb, “Fat Man”, was detonated over the city of Nagasaki. Over 100,000 died instantly in the explosions, and at least as many died in the years following from effects of the radiation.
On the same day as the bombing of Nagasaki, the USSR entered the war against Japan in Manchuria. Emperor Hirohito announced the surrender of Japan a few days later.
Learn more about this decision here.
On October 24, 1945, the United Nations Charter entered into force, and the new international organization was founded.
WE THE PEOPLES OF THE UNITED NATIONS DETERMINED
to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war, which twice in our lifetime has brought untold sorrow to mankind, and
to reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person, in the equal rights of men and women and of nations large and small, and
to establish conditions under which justice and respect for the obligations arising from treaties and other sources of international law can be maintained, and
to promote social progress and better standards of life in larger freedom,
AND FOR THESE ENDS
to practice tolerance and live together in peace with one another as good neighbours, and
to unite our strength to maintain international peace and security, and
to ensure, by the acceptance of principles and the institution of methods, that armed force shall not be used, save in the common interest, and
to employ international machinery for the promotion of the economic and social advancement of all peoples,
Cold War
“It would, nevertheless, ladies and gentlemen, be wrong and imprudent to entrust the secret knowledge or experience of the atomic bomb, which the United States, Great Britain, and Canada now share, to the world organization while it is still in its infancy. It would be criminal madness to cast it adrift in this still agitated and un-united world.
No one in any country has slept less well in their beds because this knowledge and the method and the raw materials to apply it are at present largely retained in American hands.
I do not believe that we should have all slept so soundly had the positions been reversed and some Communist or neo-Fascist state monopolized, for the time being, these dread agents. The fear of them alone might easily have been used to enforce totalitarian systems upon the free democratic world, with consequences appalling to human imagination.
God has willed that this shall not be, and we have at least a breathing space to set our house in order, before this peril has to be encountered, and even then, if no effort is spared, we shall still possess so formidable a superiority as to impose effective deterrents upon its employment or threat of employment by others.
Ultimately, when the essential brotherhood of man is truly embodied and expressed in the world organization, with all the necessary practical safeguards to make it effective, these powers would naturally be confided to that organization.”
At the first meeting of the United Nations Atomic Energy Commission, U.S. delegate Bernard Baruch presents a proposal to internationalize control of atomic energy. “We are here to make a choice between the quick and the dead. That is our business. Behind the black portent of the new atomic age lies a hope, which seized upon in faith, can work our salvation. If we fail, then we have damned every man to be the slave of Fear. Let us not deceive ourselves. We must elect World Peace or World Destruction.”
The plan contains steps to eliminate U.S. nuclear weapons (as the only nation currently in possession) alongside the implementation of international controls. The Soviet Union insisted that complete disarmament must precede the control of an international authority and refused to give up their veto power in the matter as the plan called for. The proposal failed and both countries continued their nuclear weapons programs.
Following the first use of Nuclear Weapons, several countries started an all out effort to build nuclear bombs. The Soviet Union, who had been engaging in nuclear research during World War 2 but not prioritizing it, especially began working in earnest. They detonated their first nuclear weapons test in 1949. The UK developed the bomb in 1952, France in 1960, and China in 1964.
The Cold War is a term used to describe a period of rivalry and suspicion between the United States and the Soviet Union after the Second World War.
Each bloc had its ideological mission, networks of alliances and third-world clients, and deadly nuclear weapons arsenal. Europe was divided, with massive military forces of the United States and its NATO allies on one side and massive forces of the Soviet Union and its Warsaw Pact allies on the other. Germany was split, with three-quarters of the country (and three-quarters of the city of Berlin) occupied by the United States, Britain, and France. The remainder, surrounding West Berlin, was occupied by the Soviet Union.
When Joseph Stalin died in 1953, cold war tensions eased for a time until the Cuban Missile Crisis. As the first step toward a Nuclear Test- Ban Treaty, the U.S. and the Soviet Union agreed on a testing moratorium. This continued until The Soviet Union began testing weapons again in 1961 and the U.S. followed suit.
President Eisenhower’s farewell address in 1961 warned against the establishment of the military industrial complex
In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.
In October of 1962, A tense standoff begins when U.S. reconnaissance discover Soviet missiles in Cuba. The U.S. blockades Cuba for thirteen days while President John F. Kennedy and Premier Nikita Khrushchev work out a behind-the-scenes deal in which the Soviet Union publicly removes its missiles from Cuba and the U.S. privately removes missiles from Turkey. The crisis brought the two nations to the brink of nuclear war. Subsequent meetings among key decision makers in the Cuban Missile Crisis have shown how many misperceptions there were during the tense period of the crisis, and how fortunate the world was to have escaped a dreadful nuclear holocaust between the two “superpower” states.
The crisis resulted in the creation of a Hotline Agreement between the US and Soviet Union that would allow for instantaneous communications between the leaders of the two countries. The Cuban Missile Crisis stands today as a constant reminder of the immense danger that is ever present in the Nuclear Age. At this time the United States had around 27,000 warheads and Russia had around 3,000.
Throughout the era, civilian organizations worked hard to promote peace and disarmament. In 1957, the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament formed in the UK and adopted what became the most widely known symbol for peace. The same year, the National Committee for a Sane Nuclear Policy(SANE) formed in the United States. In 1982, the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation was formed by David Krieger and Frank K. Kelly. The largest protest in American history occurred in New York that year with an estimated 1 million people marching for an end to nuclear weapons. In 1987, the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War won the Nobel Peace Prize for their work promoting nuclear disarmament and peace.
The Treaty Banning Nuclear Weapon Tests in the Atmosphere, in Outer Space and Under Water, or the Partial Test Ban Treaty, was signed in Moscow in 1963. The treaty states in its preamble that the principal aim of the United States and the Soviet Union is: “the speediest possible achievement of an agreement on general and complete disarmament under strict international control in accordance with the objectives of the United Nations which would put an end to the armaments race and eliminate the incentive to the production and testing of all kinds of weapons, including nuclear weapons.”
Countries and people around the world began denouncing nuclear weapons in the form of Nuclear Weapons Free Zone Treaties. This began with the Treaty of Tletelolco declaring Latin America and the Caribbean nuclear weapons free zone and committed to disarmament in 1967. The Treaty of Rarotonga in 1985 declared the South Pacific a nuclear free zone.
Other treaties and agreements during the cold war governed limitations on nuclear weapons in the Antarctic(1959), Outer Space (1967), the Sea Bed and Ocean floor (1971), and the Moon (1979).
Following the end of the cold war, other NWFZ treaties established Southeast Asia (Treaty of Bangkok 1995), Africa (Treaty of Pelindaba 1996), and Central Asia (CANWFZ Treaty 2006) Nuclear weapons free zones making large swathes of the Earth free from nuclear weapons.
The Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons entered in force as a landmark nonproliferation treaty in 1970 when it was agreed and deposited by the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Soviet Union. The NPT seeks to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons and weapons technology while promoting cooperation over the peaceful use of nuclear technology. With its central goal being to further nuclear disarmament, 191 parties, including the five nuclear-weapon States (as recognized by the NPT), are currently parties to the treaty. The international community adopted this treaty as the first significant effort to recognize and reduce the threat that nuclear weapons pose to the world’s security.
Post Cold War
As the Cold War ended, a period of arms control agreements began. The Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty(START) signed in 1991 to reduce nuclear weapons arsenals of Russia and the U.S. by 50 percent by the 2000s. France and China acceded to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. North and South Korea signed a Joint Declaration for a Non-Nuclear Korean Peninsula. The START II Treaty was signed in 1993 by the U.S. and Russia agreeing to limit the number of strategic warheads on each side by 2003. New Start, currently the last remaining major arms control treaty and the only thing limiting the number of warheads in Russia and the U.S., is set to expire in 2026.
However, as tensions ease between the two nuclear superpowers, other nations seek to develop nuclear weapons programs. This includes Iran, Israel, Pakistan, and North Korea who eventually withdraws from the NPT and the International Atomic Energy Agency.
The CTBT opened for signature in 1996 and has been ratified by 178 nations. However, it has not entered into force as it requires ratification of 44 specific nations including China, India, Pakistan, North Korea, Israel, Iran, Egypt, Russia and the United States who have not yet ratified. It seeks to prohibit any explosion of a nuclear weapon as well as constrain the development qualitative improvement of nuclear weapons.
China, who continued nuclear tests until 1996, was among the first countries to sign the treaty but has not ratified. Russia ratified the treaty in 2000, but has since de-ratified due to the imbalance of the United States never joining the Treaty.
The U.S., Russia, and China, continue to perform subcritical nuclear tests that do not result in a full nuclear chain reaction and explosion to this day.
In 1998, Pakistan became a nuclear power, resulting in dangerously heightened tensions with India, its nuclear armed neighbor. The two countries conduct an escalating cycle of nuclear tests in response to each other. A series of agreements are signed to reduce tensions between the two nations.
The Nonproliferation Treaty, whose goal was to stop the spread of nuclear weapons, and commit to working towards a universal instrument of verifiable disarmament as soon as possible stalls as states parties are unable to agree on a path forward, and several nuclear armed states are not party to the treaty. The 3rd review conference in 2000 concludes without progress.
On April 24, 2014, the Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI) filed lawsuits against all nine Nuclear Weapon States in the International Court of Justice and, separately, against the United States in U.S. Federal District Court for violations of international law with respect to their disarmament obligations. The Nuclear Age Peace Foundation served as a consultant to the RMI on these lawsuits, working closely with the Marshallese government and assembling the US legal team.
In 1996, the ICJ affirmed that there is an unconditional obligation to achieve the complete elimination of nuclear weapons under strict and effective international control. At the time of these lawsuits, the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) had been in force for over 44 years. Yet the Nuclear Armed States continue to rely heavily on nuclear weapons and engage in modernization programs while the NPT stalls.
The lawsuits are eventually dismissed. Learn more here.
At the NPT meeting in 2012, Switzerland delivered a humanitarian joint statement calling for the elimination of nuclear weapons. Four- fifths of all UN members sign onto the statement.
A series of 3 conferences on the humanitarian conferences of nuclear weapons were held in 2013 and 2015. The second conference, held in Mexico, concluded that it was time to negotiate a complete ban on nuclear weapons. The UNGA then voted to establish a working group to develop legal provisions for achieving and maintaining a nuclear weapons free world in late 205. In August of 2016, the working group recommended negotiations banning nuclear weapons to convene.
Negotiated in 2017 despite opposition of nuclear-armed nations, the UN adopted the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons by a vote of two-thirds of the world’s nations. When 50 states became parties to the treaty, the TPNW entered into force in 2021, making everything to do with nuclear weapons illegal under international law. Since its entry into force, 3 Meetings of States Parties have been held. There are currently 95 signatories and 74 states parties to the treaty, a global majority of countries. No nuclear armed states have joined the Treaty yet.
Civil society, including the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, is highly engaged with advancing the treaty.