Word: thermonuclear
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...never recaptured for me in the many years of hard work in which atomic bombs were developed . . . I am sure that all the participants in those discussions still remember vividly the days when we thought that the atomic bomb could be easily used for a steppingstone toward a thermonuclear explosion which we called a 'super' bomb...
...Alamos was established under the direction of Oppenheimer, to whom Teller gives unstinted credit for pushing A-bomb development "in time to have an influence upon the war." But Oppenheimer, Fermi and others did not lose sight of thermonuclear possibilities...
...this point, Konopinski settled for the theorists a question that still bothers laymen who worry about chain reactions destroying the planet. "He proved that a thermonuclear reaction, even if initiated on the earth, could not spread under any circumstances. It was necessary to prove, and he did prove, that the 'super' bomb could not ignite the atmosphere or the ocean...
...early 1951 a crude thermonuclear experiment had been set up at Eniwetok in the Pacific-Operation Greenhouse. Says Teller: "What remains most clear in my mind is the contrast between the spectacular explosion, which in itself meant nothing, and the small piece of paper handed to me by my good friend Louis Rosen, which showed that the experiment was a success...
...with the H-bomb, Teller has words of firm faith: "We would be unfaithful to the tradition of Western civilization if we were to shy away from exploring the limits of human achievement. It is our specific duty as scientists to explore and to explain . . . The construction of the thermonuclear weapon was a great challenge to the technical people of this country. To be in possession of this instrument is an even greater challenge to the free community in which we live. I am confident that, whatever the scientists are able to discover or invent, the people will be good...