British Atom Experts Doubt China Can Build Big Bomb
Page 5
Bv K. C. Thaler
LONDON — (UPI)— British experts, unimpressed by Peking's latest nuclear boasts, believe it will still be a "long time" before Red China will have atomic weapons of any consequence.
Nor is an atomic explosion by Red China considered imminent.
BEST AVAILABLE information reaching here from behind the Bamboo Curtain suggested Peking may be able to explode "some nuclear device" sometime in the near future—in a year or two—but that it will take up to ten years for Red China to develop nuclear capabilities.
The Atoms-for-China problem was spotlighted anew by a boast from a Peking spokesman recently that the nuclear monopoly of the big powers will "certainly be smashed in the not-too-distant future."
The boast was made by Kuo Mojo, the chairman of the China Peace Committee, it coincided, significantly, with the three-power nuclear test accord which Peking has opposed as a Soviet sellout to so-called imperialism.
Marshal Nieh Jung-chen then claimed that "we should and absolutely can master in not too long a time the newest techniques concerning atomic fission, thermonuclear reaction, the use of atomic energy in all fields . . . rockets and the conquest of outer space."
INCIDENTALLY, the same boast —almost in the same terms—was voiced by Red China as far back as August, 1958.
That was five years ago and so far Peking has not even had—as far as can be ascertained—its first nuclear explosion.
RUSSIA'S withdrawal of experts and scientists, including physicists, from Red China in 1960 has, according to best available information, further slowed down the nuclear drive of the Peking regime. Peking, last week, at the height of its quarrel with Moscow, disclosed that Russian experts even took with them blueprints for development schemes mapped for Red China when they returned to the USSR.
Unofficial reports reaching here lately said the departing scientists took with them essential "ingredients" for atomic development.
BUT THERE is reason to believe, according to the informants, that even at the height of the Sino-Soviet friendship, Moscow was careful to keep the atom know-how to itself, limiting information to the sector of atomic development for peaceful uses.
Red China built, with Russian aid, a nuclear reactor near Peking in 1958 which may by now have produced, in the experts' view, sufficient plutonium for the production of an atom bomb.
Experts do not dispute Red China's ability to produce a nuclear device before long for a test explosion. Red China is said to have good scientists. Some were trained in Russia. There were exchanges of scientists and of scientific information between the two countries when they were still friends.
Other reports suggested that Red China has developed another reactor in remote Sinkiang province. Uranium deposits also have been reported to exist in Sinkiang. But neither of these reports has been confirmed.
LAST YEAR. Red Chinese Foreign Minister Marshal Chen Yi was quoted as saying it will be "some more time" before Peking has an atomic bomb.
Peking's anxiety to get the bomb at all costs is no secret. Earlier this month, British opposition leader Harold Wilson reported that Premier Nikita S. Khrushchev claimed he could have had a settlement-with Red China if he had given her the nuclear deterrent.
Estimates here suggested that it will be a year or two before Red China will explode her first nuclear device. From then it may take several more years—from three to five—to improve the process, as it has in the case of France, for instance. Several more years will be required subsequently to produce nuclear weapons.
It was this consideration that anything up to ten years will be required by Red China to muster the deterrent which apparently encouraged the United States, Britain and Russia to go ahead with the test ban accord. They have taken into account the likelihood of Chinese nuclear testing but they are apparently not worried for the time being by its military implications.
A further point is, according to the experts, that Red China is a long way from possessing the vehicles for the delivery of the deterrent which are almost as important as the bomb itself.
Pakistan President's View Of Political Parties Change
By John F. Barton
KARACHI, Pakistan — (UPI) — President Mohammad Ayub Khan, who less than a year ago discouraged resumption of political parties, has done an about face and joined a political party.
national collapse and sparked Ayub's military coup of October, 1958. All political parties were banned during martial law.
THROUGHOUT his martial law regime Ayub denounced former politicians and blamed political parties for corruption which brought Pakistan to the brink of complete
By joining the Conventionist Muslim League recently, the President has come full swing around from the opposition he expressed to political parties when he ended nearly four years of martial law June 19, 1962.
When Ayub announced a new constitution for Pakistan on March 1, 1962 he strongly urged that political parties not be resumed. He said Pakistan would be better off without them, that they concentrated too frequently on political differences and distracted the people from the primary job of building a stable nation.
Despite his strong pleas, however, the National Assembly passed an act permitting creation of political parties.
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