Lewis Strauss

American banker and chairman of the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission (1896-1974)

Lewis Lichtenstein Strauss (January 31, 1896 - January 21, 1974) was an American government official, businessman, philanthropist, and naval officer. He was one of the original members of the United States Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) in 1946, and he served as the commission's chair in the 1950s. Strauss was a major figure in the development of nuclear weapons after World War II, nuclear energy policy, and nuclear power in the United States. During World War II, Strauss served as an officer in the U.S. Navy Reserve and rose to the rank of rear admiral due to his work in the Bureau of Ordnance in managing and rewarding plants engaged in production of munitions. Strauss was the driving force behind the controversial hearings, held in April and May 1954 before an AEC Personnel Security Board, in which physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer's security clearance was revoked. As a result, Strauss has often been regarded as a villain in American history. President Dwight D. Eisenhower's nomination of Strauss to become U.S. secretary of commerce resulted in a prolonged, public political battle in 1959 where Strauss was not confirmed by the U.S. Senate.

It has been a privilege to have served our country for so many years. I have done the best I knew how to do – to protect and defend the national security even when that was not the recognized, nor easy, nor popular course of action at the time. I leave with the confidence that history will be just.
We are not making weapons for conquest or aggression, or to impose our system on other peoples. Our sole purpose in having them is that we may not fall easy prey to others who have no such reservations, -- and who lack them because they lack the moral springs from which they might arise.

Quotes

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Nuclear energy -- within the brief span of eleven years, commencing as a secret and remote subject -- has become one of intimate concern to every individual. It has an ever-widening influence on our daily living, our well-being -- perhaps even on our destiny.
 
With the advent of nuclear weapons, war has ceased to offer a solution for disputes among nations. War has become, not only out-of-date, but senseless.
  • The President had unequivocally said that we would never use atomic weapons except against an aggressor. None of us like the idea of using them -- not least those of us who are engaged in their production -- but these reservations, which are the result of our moral principles, can be used, and are being used, by our enemies to trap and confound us. We must see the problem in its full perspective. We are not making weapons for conquest or aggression, or to impose our system on other peoples. Our sole purpose in having them is that we may not fall easy prey to others who have no such reservations, -- and who lack them because they lack the moral springs from which they might arise. Our reservations and principles do us proud but we cannot allow them to disarm us. For if ever they did, those principles would disappear from the face of the earth.
  • It has been a privilege to have served our country for so many years. I have done the best I knew how to do – to protect and defend the national security even when that was not the recognized, nor easy, nor popular course of action at the time. I leave with the confidence that history will be just.
  • Despite all efforts to the contrary, there is still confusion in the minds of many people as to the differing and even contradictory meanings of the words "nuclear energy". I am sure that all of you have encountered, in your civil defense work, a rather widespread misunderstanding of the significance of such words as "fallout" and "radioactivity." There is a disposition among some persons to think of what might happen in event of a nuclear attack upon us in terms of what does happen when we test nuclear weapons under strictly controlled conditions affording maximum safety. There also is lack of understanding as to the true meaning of such phrases as "permissible dose levels" as applied to peacetime activities in the field of atomic energy. There is a tendency to regard these peacetime safety standards as being the limits for survival in event of actual attack. Sensational and oftentimes irresponsible articles have no doubt contributed to this confusion.
  • Until a system of comprehensive disarmament is achieved -- based on something more reliable than dramatic gestures and mere promises made by nations which have repeatedly violated their solemn commitments -- our national survival and the security of our homes requires that we have -- in being .. the means of defending ourselves against sudden nuclear attack. There is no other prudent course. Without the ability to defend ourselves, we could not hope to deter an enemy from making war upon us, or to retaliate effectively and decisively once we were under attack. And without that strength, we would have to speak in a small and deferential voice in our efforts to build the foundations of a durable peace. Only so long as we are strong can we negotiate; the weak can only submit.
  • Our civil defense efforts, as I mentioned a moment ago, have been faced with many difficult problems. These problems will continue and no doubt increase. As other nations develop and produce nuclear weapons of still greater efficiency and more destructive capabilities, our current planning for civil defense continuously requires revision lest it become outmoded. If we assume that an enemy can deliver an appreciable fraction of the weapons which we believe he can produce, the delivered cost of any one of those weapons may be almost insignificant compared with its potential damage. Also, an enemy is probably in a position to increase his destructive power of attack faster than we can hope to provide new and better civil defense measures to combat that increase. Civil defense, however efficiently organized it may be, simply cannot expect to keep ahead of the enemy's growing stockpile of more destructive, more diversified and presumably more effective nuclear weapons.
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