Interview with Jerome Wiesner, 1986 [3]

Item Information

Title:
Interview with Jerome Wiesner, 1986 [3]
Description:
Jerome Wiesner was a Science Advisor to Presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Johnson, and an arms control advocate. In the interview he discusses the nuclear arms race. He explains his ideal nuclear strategy, which involves a minimal deterrent, or “a hundred bombs on a hundred cities,” which should be adequate as long as the missiles are protected and precise, and which would greatly limit the number of nuclear weapons in the world. He also explains other nuclear strategies, including first strike, counterforce, and mutual assured destruction. He argues that the development of more precise systems has been destabilizing, and he provides reasons why he grew discouraged over the prospects for missile defense. He goes on to defend his arguments against an anti-ballistic missile (ABM) defense, an expansive civil defense program, and the B-70 bomber.
Interviewee:
Wiesner, Jerome B. (Jerome Bert), 1915-1994
Date:
March 27, 1986
Format:
Film/Video
Location:
WGBH
Collection (local):
WGBH Open Vault
Series:
War and Peace in the Nuclear Age
Subjects:
United States. Joint Chiefs of Staff
MX (Weapons system)
Antimissile missiles
Nuclear weapons
Kaysen, Carl
Mutual assured destruction
United States. Department of Defense. Weapons Systems Evaluation Group
Nuclear arms control
U.S. Atomic Energy Commission
United States. Air Force
Multiple independently targetable reentry vehicles
Soviet Union
Ruina, J. P. (Jack P.)
LeMay, Curtis E.
Kennedy, John F. (John Fitzgerald), 1917-1963
Johnson, Lyndon B. (Lyndon Baines), 1908-1973
McNamara, Robert S., 1916-2009
Carter, Jimmy, 1924-
Places:
Massachusetts > Middlesex (county) > Cambridge
China
Extent:
00:30:04:00
Link to Item:
http://openvault.wgbh.org/catalog/V_25B22303410D4FEE918AE9E080AFDA39
Terms of Use:
Rights status not evaluated.
Contact host institution for more information.
Publisher:
WGBH Educational Foundation
Identifier:
V_25B22303410D4FEE918AE9E080AFDA39