SCIENCE • TECHNOLOGY ECONOMICS • POLITICS July-August 1983 New Advances Promise Third-Generation Fusion Devices The world will have widespread fusion power by the year 2000. The only question is whether it will be delivered by an ICBM or a tokamak. It's up to you! With your help, the Fusion Energy Foundation can • put Fusion magazine into the hands of 200,000 progrowth Americans • educate America on the benefits—economic, military, and scientific—of developing directed energy beam technologies • send speakers nationwide to debate nuclear freeze advocates on campuses and at commun­ ity meetings • promote science and technology—specifically the development of nuclear fusion and fission and space explor­ ation—as the most important tools for continuing human progress. Join the Fusion Energy Foundation and give gift subscriptions to Fusion magazine. Yes, I want to support the Fusion Energy Foundation. Enclosed is: • Sustaining membership $250 • Individual membership $75 • Corporate membership $1,000 (All memberships include 10 issues of Fusion) • 1-year subscription to Fusion $20 (6 issues) • 2-year subscription to Fusion $38 (12 issues) Make checks payable to Fusion Energy Foundation, Box 1438, Radio City Station, New York, N.Y. 10101 EDITORIAL STAFF Editor-in-Chief Dr. Steven Bardwell Managing Editor Marjorie Mazel Hecht FUSION Assistant Managing Editor Lydia Dirtier Schulrnan Vol. 5, No. 9 Fusion Technology Editor Charles B. Stevens Washington Editor Marsha Freeman Energy Editor William Engdahl Features Books Editor David Cherry Art Director Alan Yue 16 Thomas Alva Edison: The Scientist Who Created Advertising Manager The Electric Light and Power Industry Joseph Cohen Circulation and Subscription Manager Michael Tobin Denise Ham The suppressed history of Thomas Alva Edison, who waged a successful (212) 247-8820 10-year battle to build efficient, centralized electric power stations to FUSION (ISSN 0148-0537) is published 4 times light the world and power its industries. a year by the Fusion Energy Foundation, 304 West 58th Street, Fifth Floor. New York, N.Y. 10019, Tel. (212) 247-8439. Dedicated to providing accurate and comprehensive information on advanced en­ ergy technologies and policies, FUSION is com­ mitted to restoring American scientific and tech­ 34 The X-Ray Laser by 1986! nological leadership. FUSION coverage of the frontiers of science focuses on the self-developing Dr. Steven Bardwell qualities of the physical universe in such areas as An adequate defense against nuclear weapons is possible only when the plasma physics—the basis for fusion power—as well as biology and microphysics, and includes boost phase intercept problem is solved. The X-ray laser gives us this ground-breaking studies of the historical devel­ capability—and estimates are that its first deployment is possible within opment of science and technology. The views of the FEF are stated in the editorials. two or three years. Opinions expressed in articles are not necessarily those of the FEF directors or advisory board. Subscriptions by mail are $20 for 6 issues or $38 for 12 issues in the USA; $25 for 6 issues in Canada. Airmail subscriptions to other countries are $40 for 6 issues. 38 New Los Alamos Breakthroughs Point to Address all correspondence to FUSION, Fusion Compact, High Density Magnetic Fusion Devices Energy Foundation, P.O. Box 1438, Radio City Station, New York, N.Y. 10101. Charles B. Stevens Second class postage paid at New York, N.Y. Experiments at Los Alamos National Laboratory indicate that magnetic Postmaster: Send address changes to FUSION, P.O. Eox 1438, Radio City Station, New York, N.Y. fusion devices can become self-sustaining at high densities, thus making 10101. possible an ideal fusion reactor that burns advanced fusion fuels efficiently at an extremely low capital cost. Note to Libraries and Subscribers We apologize for irregularity in our print­ ing schedule this year, but we assure read­ ers that the only pronuclear science maga­ zine in the country intends to continue pub­ lishing! Because of financial difficulties, the News FEF published only 4 issues of FUSION in 1983, and this issue is being mailed late to FUSION REPORT subscribers. The FEF will publish 4 issues 9 The Secret of Laser Fusion: The Japanese Have It! in 1984, beginning with Vol. 6, No. 1, May- June 1984. Dr. Steven Bardwell Subscribers who purchased a 10-issue THE YOUNG SCIENTIST subscription and those who purchased a 6- 52 Looking Deep into Space with NASA's Space Telescope issue subscription will receive the number of issues they paid for. Marsha Freeman Contributions to the FEF are welcome (and 54 Tales of Science: Marie and Pierre Curie tax deductible). And the Discovery of Radioactivity Copyright S 1983 Fusion Energy Foundation Jon Cilbertson Printed in the USA All Rights Reserved ISSN 0148-0537 USPS 437-370 On the cover: The ZT-40 reversed field pinch magnetic fusion device at Los Alamos Na­ Departments tional Laboratory has provided a series of spectacular and unexpected results in the 2 EDITORIAL 56 BIOTECHNOLOGY past year, opening new engineering and 6 LETTERS 58 BOOKS theoretical possibilities for the achievement of nuclear fusion. Photograph courtesy of 6 VIEWPOINT Los Alamos National Laboratory; cover de­ sign by Virginia Baier. Editorial WE CALL IT 'METASTABLE TENSION' AND FIND n WOKftS QUITE WELL! Dr. Strangelove This guest editorial was written by Paul Gallagher, exec­ utive director of the Fusion Energy Foundation. Those who have considered the real "Dr. Strangelove" to be Henry Kissinger have not looked deeply enough into the •history of the antinuclear policy doctrine known as MAD— mutually assured destruction—and its corollaries. Kissin­ ger's conscious acts against the strategic security interests of the United States, including his deliberate disinforma­ tion to U.S. presidents concerning potential weapons tech­ nologies and Soviet policies, have continued for 25 years. But since his 1957 book, Nuclear Weapons and National Security, behind Kissinger's nuclear weapons policies has been a far more evil man—Lord Bertrand Russell, and his associates. The documentation is absolutely clear (only a highlight of it is presented here) that the Dr. Strangelove of Stanley Kubrick's "How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb," was Dr. Leo Szilard, Russell's close collaborator among the pan-European emigre scientist circles. 2 FUSION July-August 1983 Founded the Nuclear Freeze In 1957, Russell and his elite circle of neo-Malthusians tors wrote articles stating that fear and guilt fantasies about founded the Pugwash Conference, the "peace and disar­ the atomic bomb, among scientists and populations, could mament" network that has since that time, in fact, formu­ be used to force one empire, an Anglo-American world lated all U.S.-NATO nuclear doctrines and all U.S.-Soviet government, on the nations of the world. In their view, arms agreements. In addition, the Pugwash group has nuclear science and technology would be driven complete­ founded or controlled all "nuclear freeze" institutions then ly into the jealous and secretive control of a world agency or since, including the Union of Concerned Scientists, the that would have a monopoly of uranium and nuclear arms. Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, and the In 1946, Russell and Szilard demanded that the Soviet Council for a Livable World, as well as today's "nuclear Union be blackmailed out of its attempts to become an freeze" and "green" peace movements. independent nuclear power by threatening it with a nuclear attack! Pugwash's 'Two Empires' By 1953-1956, when this "preventive war" scheme had Since 1957, the Pugwash doctrine has specified world irreversibly failed and it was clear that the Soviets had de­ government by "two empires," the Eastern (Russian) and veloped thermonuclear bombs, the great men of peace Western (American) divisions. Such a world government around Russell stopped threatening Russia and instead would destroy the sovereignty and the rights to nuclear started courting the "Eastern Empire." technology development of all other nations in the name That decision marks the start of the public celebrity of of "peace" and "metastable tension," to use the words of Henry Kissinger as a sucker for the Soviet Union, a liar to Leo Szilard. U.S. presidents, and an advocate of decline in U.S. world From 1946 to 1952, Russell, Szilard, and their collabora­ influence to "25 percent of its postwar level." While Kissin- July-August 1983 FUSION 3 ger has styled himself as the agent of Lord Carrington and Schlesinger, Robert Strange McNamara, and the Rand Cor­ the British intelligence factional tradition of Bertrand Rus­ poration, were fully elaborated by Szilard in 1958. As he laid sell, he has continuously acted on behalf of the Soviet Union it out, the two imperial superpowers would pursue wars of in arms policy debate and direct arms negotiations for 20 conquest with nuclear-armed rapid deployment forces, years. destabilizing and destroying the nations of the Mideast and Africa in particular, and conducting periodic limited nucle­ Kissinger's Treachery ar wars to maintain the level of "metastable tension. "Szilard It is the direct responsibility of Henry Kissinger that the wrote out Henry Kissinger's entire career in advance. Soviet Union today has a nationwide infrastructure for anti­ Here is Szilard's 1958 "Strangelove" update of Lord Rus­ missile defense, which is being prepared for operation and sell's 1946 doctrine of "preventive war": upgrading to laser and particle beam defense, while the United States has no such infrastructure and is years behind Let us now assume, for the sake of argument, that in in the drive to develop directed energy beam weapons. This the long-range rocket stage there may occur some ma­ is the result of what Kissinger admitted to Congress in 1982 jor disturbance affecting the Arabian Peninsula which were his own unilateral interpretations of the SALT I (ABM) threatens to cut off Western Europe from its Mideast- and SALT II Treaties—interpretations never agreed to but ern oil supply.