Resisting the Bomb continues the story, begun in the award-winning One World or None, of humanity's efforts to avert nuclear destruction. Beginning with the catastrophic atmospheric nuclear weapons tests of 1954, it describes the gradual development of a grassroots, worldwide movement for nuclear disarmament. By the late 1950's and early 1960's, this campaign had taken on mass dimensions in many nations, with antinuclear protests simultaneously drawing hundreds of thousands of people in dozens of countries.
The movement engaged the efforts of some of the world's most prominent and revered intellectuals, such as Albert Schweitzer and Bertrand Russell, and had a substantial impact on major political, labor, and religious groups, as well as on public opinion. Even within the relatively closed confines of Communist countries, antinuclear activities emerged and exerted pressure on public officials. As a result, the public policy of numerous countries began to shift away from a reliance upon nuclear war and toward curbing the nuclear arms race -- a process that culminated in the partial test ban treaty, the nuclear nonproliferation treaty, and other arms control measures of the 1960's.
This is the first comprehensive account of worldwide nuclear disarmament activism and its consequences during these years. The book is based on extensive research, in fifteen countries, on more than a hundred peace groups and government agencies. Many of the documents -- such as those drawn from the files of the U.S. State Department, the Atomic Energy Authority of Great Britain, and the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union -- were until recently classified as top secret. Now,together with personal interviews and material drawn from peace movement periodicals, they contribute to a vivid panorama of the global antinuclear campaign and provide startling revelations about the efforts of government officials to repress, contain, and, finally, accommodate to popular protest.
