The Cold War between American and Soviet interests that developed in the aftermath of World War II led to an arms race that was unprecedented in its potential firepower. Of the more than two thousand nuclear bombs exploded by seven nations since 1945, the United States and the Soviet Union set off almost half of these during the 1950s and 1960s. Nuclear bombs were being tested at a rate of every other day during 1962. By 1966 the U.S. stockpile of nuclear weapons reached a peak of approximately thirty-two thou- sand. Nuclear weapons installations run by the U.S. Defense and Energy Departments mushroomed in size and scope to the point where today they occupy more land than the state of Maryland.

Beginning in the early 1950s the U.S. government tried to put a more positive face on this fierce nuclear weapons race...