Abbiamo già visto che il Piano Baruch per il controllo dell’Energia Nucleare non ebbe successo. Pero’ molte delle idee e delle proposte contenute nel Piano Baruch furono poi riprese in seguito anche se con modifiche importanti. L’8 Dicembre 1953 il Presidente Eisenhower, di fronte all’Assemblea Generale dell’ONU , pronunciò il suo famoso discorso “Atoms for Peace” , in cui proponeva di costituire un’agenzia atomica internazionale sotto l’egida delle Nazioni Unite che avrebbe gestito quantitativi di materiale fissile per la promozione dell’energia nucleare a scopi pacifici e controllato che questo stesso materiale non fosse utilizzato per scopi militari. Il testo del discorso è visibile su:
https://www.iaea.org/about/history/atoms-for-peace-speech
alcuni dei punti salienti del discroso del presidente Eisenhower sono riportati qui sotto:
“I therefore make the following proposal:
The governments principally involved, to the extent permitted by elementary prudence, should begin now and continue to make joint contributions from their stockpiles of normal uranium and fissionable materials to an international atomic energy agency. We would expect that such an agency would be set up under the aegis of the United Nations. The ratios of contributions, the procedures and other details would properly be within the scope of the “private conversations” I referred to earlier.
The United States is prepared to undertake these explorations in good faith. Any partner of the United States acting in the same good faith will find the United States a not unreasonable or ungenerous associate.
Undoubtedly, initial and early contributions to this plan would be small in quantity. However, the proposal has the great virtue that it can be undertaken without the irritations and mutual suspicions incident to any attempt to set up a completely acceptable system of world-wide inspection and control.
The atomic energy agency could be made responsible for the impounding storage and protection of the contributed fissionable and other materials. The ingenuity of our scientists will provide special safe conditions under which such a bank of fissionable material can be made essentially immune to surprise seizure.
The more important responsibility of this atomic energy agency would be to devise methods whereby this fissionable material would be allocated to serve the peaceful pursuits of mankind. Experts would be mobilized to apply atomic energy to the needs of agriculture, medicine and other peaceful activities. A special purpose would be to provide abundant electrical energy in the power-starved areas of the world.
Thus the contributing Powers would be dedicating some of their strength to serve the needs rather than the fears of mankind.
The United States would be more than willing – it would be proud to take up with others “principally involved” the development of plans whereby such peaceful use of atomic energy would be expedited.
Of those “principally involved” the Soviet Union must, of course, be one”.
***
Seguendo le idee del discorso “Atoms for Peace” venne istituita nel 1957 la IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) con sede a Vienna. L’Agenzia ha il compito di promuovere un uso sicuro dell’energia nucleare per scopi civili (o pacifici) e di controllare che le tecnologie nucleari civili non vengano utilizzate per scopi militari. Il sito web della IAEA e’ www.iaea.org.