Very fine sand coated with radioactive poisons could be spread thinly over the area.

6. THE DANGER OF RADIOACTIVE POISONING

Radioactivity is a dangerous aftermath of an A-bomb explosion. The explosion itself can produce radioactivity in common materials close to the point of explosion, and an underwater blast would drench relatively large areas with dangerous spray and vapor. The atmosphere would be contaminated with debris of the A-bomb.

This sort of radioactivity would be dangerous enough, but there is a possibility that an invisible radioactive "dust sand" could spread over cities of the earth and kill their populations with radioactivity without the noisy warning of an A-bomb.

There has been less discussion about this specter of radioactive poisons than about the A-bomb itself. The famous Smyth Report of 1945 contained a brief reviewing paragraph on the danger. In 1948 an Austrian by the name of Dr. Hans Thirring discussed the danger. Official documents in 1950 alerted the American people with considerable brevity. The Atomic Energy Commission has reported that studies on the feasibility of radiological substances as a method of warfare are being continued. The official designation of this type of weapon is RW, standing for radiological weapon. Ex-Secretary of Defense, Louis Johnson, reported the possibility of RW as an outgrowth of atomic energy applications for national defense. He warned in an official report that every atomic pile of suitable size, irrespective of its design or purpose, is a potential source of a significant quantity of RW agents.

He told the American people that RW weapons could be made available in another country whether or not they produced an atomic bomb.

Obviously, RW is at present a "mystery weapon" to the dangers of which American officials are alert.

WHAT IS RW?

What would be done to prepare to use RW would be to collect the debris of smashed uranium atoms from atomic furnaces in which fissionable material is being burned. About a dozen of these products would be useful in warfare. These emit beta rays (electrons) or gamma rays of substantial energy, and half of their substance would be disintegrated in periods from about a week to a year.

Very fine sand would be coated with these radioactive poisons and spread very thinly over the area where it is desired to wipe out life.

The person in a poisoned area has no way of knowing that he is in danger either by the evidence of his senses or by any unsophisticated tests. He may receive a lethal dose of radiation before he knows that he is endangered, and yet a few days later he may die. Radioactivity detectors would tell of the danger. If a person is aware of the danger he may survive if he flees the area at once with a dampened handkerchief over his nose and mouth. Walls of a sturdy building or even heavy clothing would lower exposure risk, but half an hour of breathing of dust stirred up by passing winds would give a fatal internal dose.

Radioactive "death sand" because of its novel and unique properties may be useful in special situations, but its proper use in war would be very difficult.

The "death sand" is prepared by drying fission product salt solutions on sand or metal powder. It is described as the lightest and most transportable of all the weapons of mass destruction. A highly deadly layer on the surface of the ground would weigh almost nothing and would be quite invisible.

Enough radioactive fission products are produced each month at the Hanford, Wash., plant to contaminate 144 square miles, or more than six times the area of Manhattan.

It is not considered now too practical to separate the products of the atomic pile needed in radiological warfare.

RADIOACTIVITY FROM THE SUPERBOMB

With the development of the hydrogen superbomb, a greater radioactivity danger to the world would be imminent.

Radioactivity from superbombs could completely destroy life on a whole continental area. That is one of the threats of the hydrogen bomb to our civilization. The complete destruction of a large city by one H-bomb is appalling enough. But experts see even grimmer possibilities in the radioactivity that can be produced by the superbombs.

Radioactive materials in great amount could be flung into the atmosphere if the conditions of the explosion of the hydrogen bomb were carefully selected. Actually the effects of neutrons and hard gamma radiation (X-rays) from a hydrogen bomb would not extend much father from the blast center than they would in the case of an atomic or fission bomb.

Explode a series of H-bombs in the Pacific and radioactive winds could carry devastation across continental United States.

The debris of a hydrogen bomb would not be much more radioactive than remains of the uranium or plutonium bomb set off within it to trigger it. But a great blast of neutrons and other radiation would be produced, extremely intense within the explosion area. This radiation could be used to create radioactive poison contaminants of the atmosphere in large quantity. For many miles away from the blast and damage area fine particles of what amounts to "artificial radium" would fill the air and be transported on every wind, sickening man, beast and plants alike and wiping them out.

Explode a series of H-bombs in the Pacific and radioactive winds would carry devastation across continental United States. Lay down bombs along the line of the iron curtain and death would sweep over the U.S.S.R.

THE USE OF RADIOACTIVE ISOTOPES

The marvelous development of artificial radioactive isotopes, so useful in medical, biological and industrial research, tells how hydrogen and atomic bombs can be used for such poisonous, radioactive warfare.

Around the bomb materials, or mixed in with them, would be placed large quantities of elements that would be transformed by neutrons into intensely radioactive substances. Everyone knows what some of these might be. Use cobalt metal and the air will be filled with the radium substitute now being used extensively in hospitals for irradiating cancers. This radiocobalt lasts a relatively long time, since only half of it is radiated away in five years. The debris of a cobalt-reinforced hydrogen bomb would persist for years, and its deadly dust would be carried around the earth by the atmospheric circulation, just as the dust of the explosion of Krakatau volcano in 1883 reddened sunsets of the world for years afterwards.

There are much shorter-lived radiosotopes, such as radioiodine, made in the atomic reactors by neutron bombardment. Iodine's radiations wear out much faster, since its half-life is only 13 days, but it is very intense at first. To an enemy population it would be a dangerous dose. It would bombard everything in the same way that, medically, it is now used to destroy and reduce the activity of the thyroid gland when it is overactive or cancerous.

Other artificially radioactive substances could be created in the hydrogen bomb blast. Some of them undoubtedly would be most effective for warfare.

Against such radioactive poisons there seems to be little chance of real protection.

Would our nation use such radioactive warfare? Would a potential enemy launch this new and insidious attack, just as the Germans started gas warfare in the First World War?

Against such radioactive poisons there seems to be little chance of real protection. It might wipe out life on the earth. Crops, animals, and all other living things would be affected. A fortunate few might be able to survive the attack by wearing protective clothing and masks to filter out the radioactive dust.

These are realities of the atomic dilemma that faces the world. In other nations, people and officials are asking the same questions with the same indecision and gnawing fear, so far as they are allowed to know the facts.