| This thesis focusses on the nuclear testing policies of the Eisenhower administration in the period 1953--60. Specifically, it analyses the decisions made by the president, the secretary of state, and key bureaucracies: the Atomic Energy Commission, the Department of Defence, the State Department, and the Central Intelligence Agency. This study also examines the international implications of these policies, including the impact of American nuclear explosions on countries like Japan. In addition, it analyses the influence of other nuclear powers, notably Great Britain and the Soviet Union, on the U.S. decision-making process.;The dissertation challenges the view held by some historians that the United States seriously pursued a comprehensive test ban treaty in the 1950s. It concludes that the U.S. policy underwent very little change during this period, despite mounting international pressure in favour of a halt to testing. American inflexibility resulted from a divided administration. Increasingly aware of the international political advantages to be gained from a treaty, the State Department, led by John Foster Dulles, and the President's Special Assistant for Disarmament, Harold Stassen, advocated a change in the U.S. policy. From 1955 to 1957, Stassen proposed a moratorium during the UN Disarmament Subcommittee negotiations in London. Similarly, during the Test Ban Talks, which took place in Geneva from 1958 to 1960, State representatives urged the administration to support British and Soviet proposals calling for a treaty banning all nuclear explosions. In contrast, the military bureaucracies consistently blocked any accord which would limit the American nuclear weapons program. Throughout the negotiations in London and Geneva, the Pentagon and the Atomic Energy Commission fought a successful rearguard action against a test ban agreement.;As president, Eisenhower had the authority to shift the American policy in favour of an accord but he proved unwilling to do so. Reinforced by the American public and Congress, Eisenhower invariably supported the arguments presented by the defence bureaucracies. Distrustful of the Russians and worried that an agreement with the U.S.S.R. might lead to "our Munich," the president, like many of his military advisors, preferred the risks involved in proliferation and a nuclear arms race to those involved in a comprehensive test ban treaty. |
