On August 6, 1945, 77 years ago today, the United States dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan. A second detonation in Nagasaki followed three days later; to date, the two attacks represent the only time nuclear weapons have been used in war.
As the U.S.-Soviet nuclear arms race gained steam in the years that followed, recognition of these weapons’ capacity for destruction prompted efforts to minimize the risk of nuclear war. The voices calling for arms control and disarmament in the pages of Foreign Affairs included the physicists who were the key architects of the U.S. and Soviet nuclear programs: J. Robert Oppenheimer and Andrei Sakharov.
Writing in 1953, as “the atomic clock [ticked] faster and faster,” Oppenheimer urged more transparency about the status of nuclear stockpiles, stronger defenses against an attack, and better plans for international regulation. Three decades later, in 1983, Sakharov acknowledged the difficulty of disarmament “in a world poisoned with fear and mistrust,” but warned that even a limited nuclear strike risked spiraling into “a calamity of indescribable proportions.” Despite several close calls, the United States and the Soviet Union made it through the Cold War without testing that prediction. Today, with tensions between Washington and Moscow at their highest pitch in decades, Sakharov’s closing plea—that the world “realize the absolute inadmissibility of nuclear war”—serves as an apt warning once again.
— Daniel Kurtz-Phelan, Editor
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