Sakharov's H-bomb.

Reveals how Andrei Sakharov's ideas were the basis for both the first and second Soviet hydrogen bombs. Andrei Sakharov's memoirs, excerpted in Time magazine last May, are deeply moving. The 1953 test of a big boosted fission bomb at Semipalatinsk was celebrated by the scientists and hailed by Stalin's successor, Georgi Malenkov. Thus, it was three years after the first U.S. test before the Soviets' first test of a corresponding design. This refutes the conventional wisdom--still frequently offered--that the interval between successful U.S. and Soviet H-bomb tests was barely 10 months, from November 1952 to August 1953, and that it was high time for the U.S. government to decide in 1950 to pursue H-bomb development. Sakharov dismissed the suggestions of Oppenheimer's colleagues on the General Advisory Committee, I.I. Rabi and Enrico Fermi in particular, that the United States try to conclude an agreement with the Soviet Union not to develop the H-bomb.