“Only lack of mutual trust, and not lack of desire for agreement, can stand in the path of an efficient agreement for the prevention of nuclear warfare.” –The Franck Report, June 11, 1945
The “Magna Carta” of the Pugwash movement is the Russell-Einstein Manifesto. Bertrand Russell was a polymath who led anti-nuclear campaigns in Britain. Spencer Weart describes him in The Rise of Nuclear Fear as a philosopher preacher, looking the part at the end of his life with a “shock of white hair and the grim look of a schoolmaster.” For a great movie on Albert Einstein I recommend “Einstein and Eddington,” with the amazing Andy Serkis, thankfully shorn of computer graphic cover, playing a young Einstein at the peak of his intellectual power and confusion.
In July 1955, Russell, Einstein and several distinguished colleagues issued a manifesto to rally spirits against an accelerating nuclear arms race and to prevent conflict between the United States and the Soviet Union. The times were bleak, and about to become bleaker with Einstein’s death.
Read the full article in Arms Control Wonk.