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experience suggests the venerable aphorism : "Plus ca change, plus 

 c'est la meme chose." The idealism of science and its traditions for in- 

 ternational cooperation were not strong enough to overcome interna- 

 tional political differences. Not even an awareness of the awesome de- 

 structive force of the atomic bomb provided sufficient incentive to 

 nations to agree on a secure form of control over atomic energy. In the 

 face of a new weapon which drastically altered traditional concepts of 

 war, intense rivalries among different national interests prevented a 

 movement toward common ground on international control of atomic 

 energy. 



While exclusive possession of a new technology stemming from a 

 scientific discovery may give a nation an advantage in international 

 affairs, that advantage is likely to shrink quickly. In the case of nuclear 

 energy, the principal disadvantaged country was able to duplicate the 

 discovery of fission and to create a rudimentary initial technology 

 sufficient to permit detonation of a nuclear device while the negotia- 

 tions were still in progress. Yet during this time U.S. negotiators ap- 

 parently assumed that secrecy could preserve their advantage for a 

 comfortably long period of diplomatic accommodation. Thus, another 

 lesson from this study is that it is unrealistic to rely on secrecy, once 

 the application of a new technology has been forcefully demonstrated 

 before the world as in the case of the atomic bombs, to prevent other 

 nations from acquiring or recreating this technology. 



In approaching the problem which the new atomic energy technology 

 imposed on U.S. diplomacy, there was recognition of the need to com- 

 bine elements of both areas to achieve a solution to the problem. While 

 this principle was easily accepted by diplomats and scientists alike, 

 members of each profession were not successful in putting the principle 

 into practice. To a considerable extent, the differences between men 

 like Lilienthal and Baruch were founded on a certain lack of apprecia- 

 tion on each side for the manner in which the members of the other 

 side approached the problem of the international control of atomic 

 energy. Perhaps this case indicates that for science and diplomacy to 

 work together efficiently, the members of each field must express their 

 respective points of view fully and in terms which can be understood 

 and applied by members of the other field. At the same time, there 

 must be a special receptivity by members of each field and a special 

 willingness to accommodate to the outlook of the other, in order to 

 attain the ultimate goal. 



Not only were mistakes made in the course of the interaction of 

 science and diplomacy, but there were also a number of miscalcula- 

 tions by the experts in their respective fields, as described in the previ- 

 ous section. Whether or to what extent these particular elements, 

 contributed to the failure of the negotiations would be difficult to deter- 

 mine. Total accuracy on the part of either scientists or diplomats may 

 be too much to expect, but certainly in areas basic to the solution of 

 critical problems, a high degree of accuracy would seem to be a reason- 

 able and necessary goal. 



The Diplomatic Task : Combining Effectiveness and Acceptability 



The second major portion of this conclusion deals with the tech- 

 nology of control and the diplomatic efforts to cope with it. This ques- 

 tion breaks down further into two features of a control system in which 

 science, technology, and diplomacy became involved: effectiveness and 



