Wild Flays Army Atom Philosophy

Although it is not usual Crimson policy to report lectures, the Editors judged the following to be of such interest as to justify its reproduction.

Accusing the United States of being "too old fashioned in its thinking on the atomic bomb," Payson S. Wild, associate professor of Government, demanded recognition of the "qualitative and revolutionary changes in our position," and the immediate need for an international atom control commission, in his Tuesday lecture to the 400 students of Government 4c.

"The world balance of power has been upset," he declared. "In five years, any moderately large nation will probably have the capacity to produce the bomb. No nation will be safe. No longer will there be any discrepancy between the three super-powers and the rest of the world. We are all small nations."

Repercussions in U. S. Policy

If the proposed commission is not created and set to work immediately, Wild foresees an international armament race that will not only lead to eventual destruction; if, by some chance, the nation should survive, there would only be drastic change in the internal liberties of the American citizen.

"A gestapo situation is definitely possible. If we live in such a tense world community as an atom race will produce, the national security must be placed paramount to all other considerations. Control of atomic information would have to be handed to the military, and then cloaked in secrecy. The more afraid we become, the tighter will become the secrecy. And the tighter the secrecy, the tighter the totalitarianism," he pointed out.

"Sovereignty today means nothing. That the United States wants to project its sovereignty by keeping the 'secret' means nothing. The sovereign state idea is out of date. All it means today is the privelege of being attacked by a nation with the atomic bomb. With the terrible advance in warfare and the cheapening of the cost of war, such an attack is no longer a speculation. We used it on Japan, and we are considered humanitarian."

In the future world neurosis surrounding an armament race, any nation would be just as easily tempted to use it on us. Once this happened there could be no war as we know it today. There could be no retaliation. "The nation that attacks first will win. We could not survive," Wild insisted.

"In the face of United States public opinion against Russia, any nation could easily plant a bomb in Chicago, and be sure that the "reds' would be blamed fo