Joseph Rotblat

Speaker 20:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive. For rights reasons, we've had to shorten the music.

Speaker 20:09

The programme was originally broadcast in nineteen ninety eight and the presenter was Sue Lawley.

Presenter0:30

My Castaway this week is a scientist. More than half a century ago, he helped invent nuclear weapons. He spent the rest of his life urging their destruction.

Presenter0:39

He came to Britain from Poland before the war, then joined the British and American team developing the atomic bomb. When he quit, alarmed at the possible consequences of his work, the CIA tried to brand him a spy. He joined up with other eminent scientists, helping to found the Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs. He's also worked as a professor at Barthes Hospital in London, using his considerable knowledge of radiation to help find a cure for cancer.

Presenter1:06

Three years ago he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, and earlier this year he was knighted at the age of eighty nine. He is Professor Sir Joseph Rotblat. It's been a long time coming, this recognition of your work, Professor, the Peace Prize and the Knighthood. How surprised were you that they finally got around you?

Joseph Rotblat1:25

Well, I think if you live long enough, then everything will come to you. In my case, it came late because what I'm working for, namely the elimination of nuclear weapons, we had to wait till the end of the Cold War when this became a reality rather than a fancy. And this I think this is the reason why the Nobel Prize came to me fairly late.

Presenter1:45

They you didn't get much notice of it. I mean, you don't, do you? It's a rather Byzantine process, isn't it? The Nobel Committee.

Joseph Rotblat1:50

I knew that I'd be nominated for it, but it came as a complete surprise. And actually, for that particular year, ninety-five, I was convinced that I will not get the prize because, like everybody else in Britain, we knew who was going to get the prize for that particular year. Which was John Major. John Major. I don't know how the rumour started, but somehow the rumour started the rumour was there that it has been decided that he is going to get uh the prize.

Presenter2:10

I don't know how

Presenter2:18

Because his of his work towards peaceful ceasefire

Joseph Rotblat2:19

Because of the ceasefire on the Northern Island at the time, yes.

Joseph Rotblat2:23

This interesting story.

Joseph Rotblat2:24

Perhaps you remember this was what happened to be this fi fatal day, Friday the thirteenth of october ninety five, the last day of the annual Tory Party Conference.

Joseph Rotblat2:35

The story which I'm telling was told to me by the Swedish ambassador, who vouches for its authenticity.

Joseph Rotblat2:42

And the Torre Party was already at that time at a very low level, and they needed urgently a Philip.

Joseph Rotblat2:49

And the the award of the Nobel Prize would have been such a thing.

Joseph Rotblat2:53

Apparently, John Maiter prepared three versions of his acceptance speech.

Joseph Rotblat2:59

One was if you were to be the only recipient of the prize. The second, if you had to share it with Albert Reynolds, the the Prime Minister of Ireland at the time. And the third,

Joseph Rotblat3:12

If you had to share it with Jerry Adams.

Joseph Rotblat3:14

So you can well imagine the anti-climax.

Joseph Rotblat3:17

When the last minute came, it was me and not John Major about it.

Presenter3:21

Prime Minister

Joseph Rotblat3:22

Boom.

Presenter3:22

The ch

Joseph Rotblat3:22

Him in the

Presenter3:22

The Tory party congratulates you?

Joseph Rotblat3:24

No, nobody, not the Prime Minister, the actor in Shemmis, the total party happened to be a professional colleague of mine, also a medical physicist, who.

Presenter3:31

Brian Moore

Joseph Rotblat3:32

Thank you.

Presenter3:32

Uh

Joseph Rotblat3:32

Yes, why am I winning, but he never, never showed any sign at all of congratulating me.

Presenter3:36

Uh

Joseph Rotblat3:36

And of course it was this government, the Labour Government, that gave you your knighthood. Very recently, yes. And I'm very pleased about this, I must say, because I like to see it as a recognition.

Joseph Rotblat3:47

Well, you know, the citation for my knighthood is for services to international understanding. And this pleases me, because indeed most of my work was for us for international understanding.

Presenter3:57

But of course there was criticism even when you got that knighthood from the right wing that that somehow your work for the Pugwash Conferences made you something of an apologist for the former Soviet Union. That was always the the the slight taint that that came from the right towards you.

Joseph Rotblat4:13

Well it goes right to the very beginning because we started in the the Pagbos conferences at the time, the height of the Cold War, and at that time anybody who was prepared to sit down with Russian scientists and talk about disarmament, about peace, was immediately branded as a fellow traveller.

Presenter4:29

Do you think that's why recognition has come to you so late? I mean, you weren't even made a f a fellow of the Royal Society until a few years ago.

Joseph Rotblat4:35

No, no, this goes back to another event, namely, after the Hiroshima bomb.

Joseph Rotblat4:43

It had a very big effect on my life, and I decided one of the uh results was I decided to change my line of research. This is the reason why I decided to go into medical physics.

Presenter4:53

Tell me about your first record.

Joseph Rotblat4:55

Well, my first record is really paying a tribute to my Polish origin.

Joseph Rotblat5:00

Important music is first and last chopper.

Joseph Rotblat5:05

All of Chopin, whether you have sonatas and waltzes and the tudes and polonaises, but this particular piece which I've chosen to polonaise here.

Joseph Rotblat5:13

It reminds me of a very happy event in my life, namely the award of the Nobel Peace Prize. It was placed especially for me.

Joseph Rotblat5:21

in Oslo during the ceremony of receiving the the prize.

Presenter6:25

John Ogden, playing the opening of Chopin's Polonaise in A-flat. August the sixth, nineteen forty-five, was the day the Americans dropped the A bomb on Hiroshima, a bomb which you, Joseph Rotblatt, had helped invent. You were part of uh a team of scientists brought together in Los Alamos in New Mexico. Do you remember where you were when you heard the news?

Joseph Rotblat6:46

Yes, I was back at the time in Liverpool after coming back from Los Alamos, where I worked for uh most of nineteen forty-four.

Joseph Rotblat6:54

And to me, it was a really a terrible shock, one of the greatest shocks which I had in my life.

Joseph Rotblat7:01

Because

Joseph Rotblat7:02

I had hoped that even if the bomb did work, it would not be used directly against civilian populations.

Joseph Rotblat7:10

And this was the the terrible shock. But not only shock, it was

Joseph Rotblat7:14

Furthermore it was fear.

Joseph Rotblat7:16

Fear for the future.

Joseph Rotblat7:19

of mankind.

Joseph Rotblat7:20

because already at that time I knew

Joseph Rotblat7:23

said the atom bomb was only the first step.

Joseph Rotblat7:26

in the development of nuclear weapons. I already knew at that time that a weapon a thousand times more powerful, the hydrogen bomb, was already being being worked on.

Presenter7:36

Are you saying in a sense that you foresaw the whole arms race, as it were?

Joseph Rotblat7:40

This was the point, yes, for I knew that now that the Americans have shown their enormous new military might, that the Soviet Union Stalin will not let it go like this, that he will then try also to get his own bomb, and this will result in the nuclear arms race.

Presenter7:56

But all of this begs the question, why did you begin in the first place? Why did you go and work on the creation of the thing in the first place, if you felt so deeply, so morally about

Joseph Rotblat8:04

Well, strangely enough, I I began to work in order that the bomb should not be used. I had the idea of the bomb quite early, even before I came to England.

Joseph Rotblat8:14

But being a humanitarian scientist, as I described myself, it never occurred to me that I would do any work on any weapon, not only let alone a weapon of mass destruction. However, I was afraid that other scientists may not have the same moral scruples. In particular, I was afraid that German scientists may develop the bomb, because some of the work began in Germany.

Joseph Rotblat8:39

And he was afraid that if

Joseph Rotblat8:41

German scientists managed to make the bomb. And if Hitler knew then s uh starts the war as we knew it was going to happen, then he will win the war.

Presenter8:49

You invented for yourself the concept of deterrence, did you?

Joseph Rotblat8:52

To a large extent, yes, this is I'm I may be the first person to bring in the the concept of the tenant, because I felt that the only way in which we could prevent Hitler from using the bomb against us and thus win the war would be if we also had the bomb and threatened with retaliation. In other words, the purpose of my starting the work

Joseph Rotblat9:11

was that the bomb should not be used, not even by and against the Germans.

Presenter9:14

And when you discovered that the Germans weren't working on the bomb any more, that was when you left the project.

Joseph Rotblat9:20

Which is exactly as soon as I've heard, and the whole purpose of my being of my starting the project was no longer valid. And this is the reason why I said.

Joseph Rotblat9:27

In this case, I I will resign from the project.

Presenter9:29

But of course others went on and the genie was out of the bottle and the bomb was used against civilians.

Presenter9:36

The argument there, of course, is that it did end the war. It ended the war in France.

Joseph Rotblat9:39

It definitely ended it was a very dramatic end to the war. Whether it was needed to end the war is a different matter.

Joseph Rotblat9:47

There are different versions. Depending on the historian to whom you talk, you'll find different answers.

Joseph Rotblat9:52

Because I'm told

Joseph Rotblat9:54

by some historians that the Japanese were already defeated militarily and they tried in in fact they wanted to surrender.

Joseph Rotblat10:01

And they tried via the Russians to reach the Americans, say we want to surrender. But apparently, by that time, Truman was then President, and he felt there's a new weapon which he can demonstrate to the Russians that now

Joseph Rotblat10:15

America is the mass of the world.

Presenter10:16

It's a show of strength to be able to do that. But you you had heard, had you not, some private conversation that led you to believe that exactly that was the truth.

Joseph Rotblat10:17

Dual slings.

Joseph Rotblat10:25

Well, yes, this was another shock when I came to Los Alamos quite early. It was in March 1944, long before the bomb was made, while still the war in Europe is going on. And there was a private dinner, and General Leslie Groves, he was the overall in command of the whole Manhattan Project. From time to time, he will come to visit Los Alamos. On this occasion, he came to have dinner with us, a private dinner. And after dinner, sort of casual conversation, he remarks, You realize, of course, that the main purpose of the project is to subdue the Russians. I'll never forget this, the terrible shock which came to me, because here I thought we hear we are at war with Hitler, even with Nazism. And the Russians, however, I dislike their regime, they were our allies, and they are preparing there. Thousands of Russians who were dying every day keep giving us time for the preparation for the invasion of the continent. And here I'm told all the project is against the Russians. You can even imagine how unhappy I was.

Joseph Rotblat11:22

Tell me about your second record.

Joseph Rotblat11:24

Well, this is about war.

Joseph Rotblat11:27

But this particular one, where have the flowers gone? It's for me very moving.

Joseph Rotblat11:32

Because it shows the futility of war. Whole generations in the first world of war died for what?

Joseph Rotblat11:39

And still we think even now about the bone. This is why I f I feel very greatly moved by the song.

Speaker 411:46

All the flowers gone.

Speaker 411:49

Long time passing.

Joseph Rotblat11:49

Under

Speaker 411:53

Where have all the flowers gone?

Speaker 411:57

Long time ago

Speaker 412:01

Where have all the flowers gone?

Speaker 412:05

Young girls pick them, everyone, when will they?

Presenter12:13

Joan Byer, singing Where Have All the Flowers Gone. The fact is, of course, Joseph Rotblatt, that you have more than enough reason to be anti-German. You and your family suffered um in two world wars. Tell me about the first one. You'd have been about five when it broke out. You were living in Warsaw. What do you remember of family life there?

Joseph Rotblat12:34

Well, my early recollections of my being a young child were very happy ones. We lived in the center of a big city, Warsaw, but it was really like living in the country. My father's business was haulage, but in those days transport was not by automobile, but by cart and horse. So he had a big fleet of of horses and were stables there. And I had my own pony, and this was very, really idyllic life.

Presenter13:03

The law changed all that.

Joseph Rotblat13:04

All of a sudden, almost overnight, you might say, we went from relative opulence.

Joseph Rotblat13:09

to complete tenure.

Joseph Rotblat13:11

Because

Joseph Rotblat13:12

In my bi my father's business collapsed immediately because all the horses were requisitioned by the army.

Speaker 213:18

The army

Joseph Rotblat13:19

We really suffered. So happened at the time that we moved to another house, to not from the bankler to a big tenement house, a flat there. And there was a new house and there was a place for a bathroom, but no plumbing at all. So the only say place where you could wash was a cold tub in the kitchen. And for toilet we have to go outside. Very pr extremely primitive conditions and only sort of conducive to all sorts of diseases. And indeed, I suffered almost all the children's diseases at the time, including typhus and typhoid.

Presenter13:51

And hunger.

Joseph Rotblat13:51

In hunger, of course, yes, we have this ever since I can't eat potatoes, because I remember the taste of bitter taste of the potatoes dig up after being frozen. You can't imagine. Even now, when I think about this period, I shudder with horror. War has put an indelible stamp on my mind, obviously. But later on I began to see which way can we prevent this happening, even in those days. I thought I was a great enthusiast for science from the beginning, and I believed that the solution lies in science, that science and technology will help to improve the lot of people so they wouldn't suffer the sort of misery which I went through and with many people at the other end of the world.

Presenter14:33

But the circumstances of the family were so reduced. How did you how did you get an education?

Joseph Rotblat14:38

Well, I didn't I didn't get a proper what you call a proper education. I always wanted to be a scientist, but I knew this that the road is completely closed to me.

Presenter14:46

Because you had no qualifications, you know.

Joseph Rotblat14:47

Because in order to get to a university you have to get a certificate of maturity, it's called a matura in Poland. And for this you have to go to a secondary school where it's a number of years. And of course I couldn't do this.

Presenter14:58

But eventually you did you managed to go to university by night, as it were.

Joseph Rotblat15:01

Yes, well this is really after a certain time I found out that there exists a place where you the the teaching is done in the evenings and you don't need a matura for entrance. And almost made for me.

Presenter15:14

This was the Polish Free University, and you got a science degree. And if we move on through a little, by the early thirties you were working in a laboratory on radioactivity. And am I right in thinking you met you actually met Mary Guri?

Joseph Rotblat15:28

Once, yes, I met her just once. I was still a student just finishing his first degree.

Joseph Rotblat15:35

She was the honorary director of the Institute in which I worked, and she came to Warsaw. This is the last time she came, two years before she died. She was already ill at the time, mostly illness resulting from the exposure to radiation, but she was a grand lady indeed, and I always cherished this memory.

Presenter15:51

Tell me about your name.

Joseph Rotblat15:52

Straycom.

Presenter15:52

Uh

Joseph Rotblat15:53

Well, my my next record refers to scientific work, actually to problems which

Joseph Rotblat15:59

It came to my mind later on this the responsibility of scientists for their work. And here with Paul Ducas, the socialist apprentice.

Joseph Rotblat16:08

He describes this very most of the people know about this from the Fant from Film Fantasia. And there we have this scientist who lives in his ivory tower and doesn't care what happens to the result of his activities. He allows these other people to use it for catastrophic results.

Presenter17:24

Part of The Sorcerer's Apprentice by Paul Ducas, played by the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Sir Charles McKerris. So we come to the Second World War, Professor. You'd left Poland for Britain for Liverpool just before it broke out, hadn't you? What was the job? What was your work?

Joseph Rotblat17:39

Well, first I came there.

Joseph Rotblat17:41

Because I received a fellowship for one year to do the research.

Joseph Rotblat17:47

I was invited by that time was a little bit already known in among scientists in in the field of radioactivity, so I had two invitations to spend the year. One was in Liverpool with uh Chadwick, and the other one was with the in Merie Curie's Institute in Paris.

Presenter18:03

James Chadwick, who discovered the neutron and indeed won a Nobel Prize in the United States.

Joseph Rotblat18:07

Yes, yes, that's right, yes.

Presenter18:08

But in effect, taking that job saved your life, didn't it? Because

Joseph Rotblat18:12

Eventually, yes. However, I must tell you one thing, that it it was ver again life very hard, mainly because uh of my the language problem. You see, I thought that because I could understand uh paper, scientific paper in nature, therefore I knew English. And I thought that I knew all about English people because I read the Polish translations of P G Woodhouse.

Joseph Rotblat18:36

So you can well imagine

Joseph Rotblat18:38

My feeling was came to Liverpool. I couldn't understand a word of the Liverpool.

Presenter18:39

Watch out, change.

Joseph Rotblat18:45

Accent there. And really, it was looking back, it was a very hard time, so much so.

Joseph Rotblat18:50

that at one stage I felt I'll never make it, never give myself of course after all I knew a bit of French, it would be much easier for me to live in Paris than there. So I s I I wrote to my wife and I said, I'm I'm going to leave and take up my other uh invitation.

Speaker 218:53

Better

Joseph Rotblat19:06

But she said, No, you must never do it. You'll never forgive yourself if you if you just didn't stand up to the difficulties. And the truth is, of course, that you're.

Speaker 419:12

Yeah.

Presenter19:12

And the truth is, of course, that your colleagues in Poland were exterminated.

Joseph Rotblat19:16

were exterminated. The whole my generation, all my all my my colleagues in physics were all exterminated, as you say, either executed or or died in their gas chambers. Following physics was completely destroyed.

Presenter19:27

Wiped out. And indeed, had you been in Paris, you would also have to be able to do it.

Joseph Rotblat19:30

Probably, yes, yes, that's what I'm saying. That I um actually survived, I took the advice of my wife.

Joseph Rotblat19:36

I survived, but she did not.

Presenter19:38

She didn't. You went back to try and get her, I think, in the August of 39, just before the outbreak of the city.

Joseph Rotblat19:43

Yes. Well, you see, when I came to Liverpool, I had a fellowship.

Joseph Rotblat19:48

which amounted to the princely sum of a hundred and twenty pounds a year.

Joseph Rotblat19:53

But I did quite a good piece of work during the first few months in Liverpool, and Chadwick liked it. And he told me then in August, he said, well, I am going to offer you from the new academic year the Oliver Lodge Fellowship, which is a very coveted sort fellowship. But as it happens also,

Joseph Rotblat20:12

£120 a year. So when he told me, I said, Oh, good, now I should be able to bring my wife And he said, Good God, you can't get your wife to live for one hundred and twenty pounds a year and I said, I do And so I went uh to Poland in order to make it easier for her to to come and this is where the tragedy really um struck. It so happened she had a very appendicitis with complications, operation just then and she couldn't travel. So I decided I will go back and she will follow me uh soon afterwards. As it happens, my trains through Germany was almost last before the war and I arrived in England back two days before the war started on September the first.

Joseph Rotblat20:55

And of course immediately the the post started with the invasion of Poland and of course all all contacts were cut off.

Presenter21:00

But you tried to get around.

Joseph Rotblat21:01

It took several months before I could establish contact via the International Red Cross, and as soon as I found that she was alive,

Joseph Rotblat21:09

I made efforts to get her out.

Joseph Rotblat21:12

I tried through my acquaintances in Denmark, Niels Bohr, the great physicist there, and I asked him and he made arrangements that if she could come uh to Denmark, she'll get then she'll get from there she'll be able to go to England.

Joseph Rotblat21:26

But as soon as I began the the the getting the documents, German Germany invited Denmark.

Joseph Rotblat21:33

At about the same time I tried to have some cousins in Belgium. I tried to do the same through there, and indeed, when we began further proceedings,

Joseph Rotblat21:41

Belgium was invaded by the Germans.

Joseph Rotblat21:45

Only at that time when I thought about Italy, because Italy was still not at war at the time with Britain. And I s and I had some through my professor in Poland, some people in Milan, and I contacted them, and she actually started the journey to Italy.

Joseph Rotblat22:00

on the day when Mussolini declared war on Britain.

Joseph Rotblat22:05

And this is almost at the end of it because she has turned back from from the frontier already there, and this is the last ahead of her.

Presenter22:13

Tell me about your fourth record.

Joseph Rotblat22:17

This

Joseph Rotblat22:18

Tune that was the plaintive tune of Col Need Ray by Max Bruch.

Joseph Rotblat22:23

is based on an ancient

Joseph Rotblat22:26

Prayer, a Jewish prayer, um, which is done on the Day of Atonement. It goes back uh to the days of the Inquisition.

Joseph Rotblat22:36

But in my mind it is

Joseph Rotblat22:39

associated with the Holocaust, which is the the greatest crime

Joseph Rotblat22:44

ever perpetrated in cold blood, almost in a in a scientific manner.

Joseph Rotblat22:50

by a civilized country.

Joseph Rotblat22:52

I think such a monstrous act.

Joseph Rotblat22:56

But the recent past should never be forgotten.

Presenter23:58

Pablo Casal's playing part of Bruch's Col Nidre Opus forty seven, and that was recorded in nineteen fifteen.

Presenter24:05

You are, Professor Rotblatt, to use your own phrase, the spy who never was. You'd gone out, as you've said, with other British scientists in 1941 to join the Americans in Los Alamos, in New Mexico, working on this secret project to create the bomb, because Churchill and Roosevelt had decided the two nations should work together, hadn't they? How important was the British contribution? Could the Americans have done it without us?

Joseph Rotblat24:28

In the end, yes. But actually you have to go back a little bit earlier than that. The work started in Britain.

Joseph Rotblat24:35

And the first the scientific foundations for the bomb were actually carried out in Britain, in Liverpool and in Birmingham.

Presenter24:43

In Chadwick's laboratories, where you are.

Joseph Rotblat24:45

Marked in Chetvix, yes.

Presenter24:46

Yes, yes. So the atom bomb started life in Liverpool, did it?

Joseph Rotblat24:48

Exactly, yes. I mean the scientific basis. But we also realized at the time that to make it in practice would be impossible for Britain during the war time because it required a very big industrial effort, the separation of isotopes, which Britain couldn't afford.

Joseph Rotblat25:03

Money and manpower too.

Joseph Rotblat25:05

Anyhow, I don't think we should particularly claim credit for this.

Presenter25:08

Yeah.

Joseph Rotblat25:09

But uh this is this is the reason why we we joined.

Presenter25:13

But you left, as you said, in nineteen forty four because of that very specific reason that you learned that the Germans were no longer working on the bomb, and for you, therefore, the purpose of the whole thing had gone.

Presenter25:24

It it was inevitable, wasn't it, that they should be suspicious about you. I mean, there you were, walking away with all of that knowledge, you know, wa turning your back on it. It was inevitable they should think you were potentially a spy.

Joseph Rotblat25:36

Well, you wouldn't believe it. And I tell you, the reason why they say I was wanted to leave uh Los Alamos was to go back to England, get myself enrolled in the Royal Air Force, and then at a certain time to commandeer an aircraft to take me over onto the part of Poland occupied by the Russians, get myself parachuted down, and then in order to get to give all the secrets of the bomb to the Russians.

Joseph Rotblat26:00

I mean, you know, anybody thinking how long, how many years, even if you had this intention, that this route was complete nonsense.

Presenter26:06

But the irony is, of course, that there was a spy, it wasn't you, and and and it was the information was being passed directly from La Solomon.

Joseph Rotblat26:09

Exactly.

Joseph Rotblat26:13

Directly from there, there's no need to do all this. Yes, and they missed him completely. It is not until much later, 1950s, they find out that he was a spy. So think about Karl Fuchs. Klaus Fuchs, yes.

Presenter26:17

It is a

Presenter26:20

Yeah.

Presenter26:22

And he was eventually tried and convicted, of course, of espionage.

Presenter26:26

How important do you think the information was that he passed on to the Russians from there?

Joseph Rotblat26:30

I think very important, yes, because uh the Russians actually began to work quite early on the bomb.

Joseph Rotblat26:37

and they make their own soul type.

Joseph Rotblat26:39

But they are not quite sure whether it is going to work.

Joseph Rotblat26:43

And the the Russian scientists were really in fear. Again, I learned this much later on, because if they m made a bomb and test it and there was a failure, they would all be shot.

Joseph Rotblat26:52

And therefore what they did was to use the the design of the bomb which was used in in in Nagasaki, the plutonium bomb. And Klaus Fuchs sent them the exact

Joseph Rotblat27:03

the the description with all dimensions.

Joseph Rotblat27:07

Record number 5.

Joseph Rotblat27:09

Here I this is an Old Man River sang by Paul Robson. I think this sort of unforgettable renderation by Paul Robson expresses

Joseph Rotblat27:20

In a way, my philosophy about life, about evolution.

Joseph Rotblat27:25

of man, it expresses my awe for the majesty of nature, the nature, the laws of nature which we all all obey, which have been guiding our lives since the Big Bang.

Joseph Rotblat27:36

But now we begin to learn to master these these forces of nature.

Joseph Rotblat27:42

to our great benefit, but also

Speaker 427:49

Man revolt at once.

Speaker 427:53

Man River, he must know something, but don't say nothing, he just keep

Speaker 428:03

Rollin', he keeps on rolling along

Speaker 428:13

He don't plant tears, he don't plant cotton.

Presenter28:19

Paul Robeson singing Old Man River from Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein's musical Showboat. So you arrived back in Liverpool and as we've heard you obviously had to come to terms with the fact that you'd lost your wife, you were alone in a foreign country, your reputation was damaged, and then the bomb was dropped on Hiroshima.

Presenter28:38

You must have felt that life had reached a

Presenter28:42

How what are the words? A devastatingly low point.

Joseph Rotblat28:45

Well, apart from the personal tragedy, I did not give in in any way. On the contrary, I felt this is after the bomb, particularly when I heard about the bomb, that we must do something about it. And this is where I made a decision to change my life completely in two ways. One was to change my direction of my research work and I went into medical applications. And the other is to get scientists to become aware of the dangers which may result from the development of science. And this is where I began first in England and later on on the international arena to get scientists to get together.

Joseph Rotblat29:20

To be irresponsible for their work.

Presenter29:22

Exactly, to be responsible for their work. But how what do you mean when you say that? Because the minute you think about it, only for two minutes, it becomes it sounds impossibly idealistic.

Joseph Rotblat29:32

I believe that not only science, everyone, you and I, we are responsible for our deeds, but in particular this applies to science nowadays, because of the dominant role that pl science plays now in every walk of life. It affects us each individually, it d determines the fate of nations. Therefore scientists have got to be responsible. Now how could they do it? What I'm saying is they should often they could foresee well in advance of other groups in society what might be the result of their work.

Presenter30:00

But is there a research scientist worth his salt who would say, Hang on, I can see that this could be used to devastating effect. I think I'll pretend I haven't spotted this. I'll I'll disinvent it, as it were.

Joseph Rotblat30:11

Well, science cannot be disinvented, of course, but what I'm saying before this thing, we should be responsible for what may be the likely outcome. We don't need to do everything in science. There are plenty to do without covering certain items which may be of harm. Let me give you an example which I have in mind about what scientists can do. Say if you take in medicine, for example, medical practice, clinical practice, research is being carried out there. And often this research involves patients. But whenever a scientific project, medical project is being done put forward for work involving patients, then there's an ethical committee which has to look into this to make sure that the patient is not being harmed by this research.

Joseph Rotblat30:51

And the same sort of thing should apply to science in general. If a scientist, particularly in fields where one can foresee it, may have dangerous applications.

Joseph Rotblat31:00

They should be they should submit their project to some international authority, to specialists in this field, and let them look at it and see they can see what can be the foreseeable or later on the consequences of this work. And advice.

Joseph Rotblat31:12

Give similar advice as the ethical committers do, I think it can be done.

Joseph Rotblat31:17

Record number six.

Joseph Rotblat31:20

Pete Seeger is singing last night I had the strangest dream.

Joseph Rotblat31:25

When this was written, I think in nineteen fifty six,

Joseph Rotblat31:28

A a vote without a war was certainly the strangest dream.

Joseph Rotblat31:32

But I think by now, m more more people now begin to realize that we need to aim for it. It's much less of a utopian dream now than it was at the time.

Speaker 431:42

Last night I had the strangest dreams. Last night I had the stranger

Speaker 431:48

Dream before. I never dreamed before. I dreamed the world is all a dream. I dreamed the world.

Speaker 432:00

To put into all

Presenter32:03

Pete Seeger singing last night, I had the strangest dream. You became, as a result of all your beliefs you've been describing, a founder member of the Pugwash Conferences, named after the town in Nova Scotia where the first conference was held, set up in the fifties during the Cold War. Conferences which I think set out to foster relations between scientists, whatever their nationality, scientists from across the world, hoping that that kind of understanding would rub off on the politicians. That was the fundamental.

Joseph Rotblat32:33

Yes, it was the main reason. In fact, it was more than that. It was a channel of communication between scientists from both sides of the Iron Curtain at a time when no official channels existed, at the time of the Cold War, the height of the Cold War, where the an atmosphere of hatred

Speaker 232:47

Yeah.

Joseph Rotblat32:51

and hostile propaganda.

Joseph Rotblat32:53

And there's a real

Joseph Rotblat32:55

fear that the Cold War will turn into a hot war. It's at that time when we felt scientists, particularly those who were involved in the project, should see do something, see if they can sort of avert the danger.

Presenter33:07

And the politicians weren't talking, of course, then, but you're saying the scientists weren't.

Joseph Rotblat33:09

We have been talking, yes, we have set up this algorithm. But the main sort of importance of the Pakbush movement is it brings together scientists who come as individuals. They do not come as representatives, as delegates, not even of a scientific institution, just representing themselves. This is in private, but then we went back to our countries. We would then advise our governments on these issues.

Presenter33:34

It's said that Pugwash played an important role in the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962. How how true is that?

Joseph Rotblat33:42

Well, it's very difficult to say how big the role was, because many, many Chinese were active there. What I did at the time I was at the time the Secretary General of Pagarush, I immediately went on the telephone and to Moscow and to Washington, to my colleagues there, and I said we must do something to prevent the catastrophe which is imminent. And of course they talked to their governments.

Joseph Rotblat34:04

putting their views what the the enormity of the c of the effect would be if if really it came to an exchange with nuclear weapons. How close do you think it came to? Very close. Very, very close indeed. We are a hairbreadth away from total uh destruction of civilization.

Presenter34:20

And have there been other occasions I mean, that one we know about. Have there been others that we haven't known about?

Joseph Rotblat34:25

Well, there were several occasions when we came very close to a nuclear exchange, yes. For example, the case of Berlin, and then the Russians stopped closed down and the linear access to Berlin, and so on. There are several occasions, yes. But most of our effort at that time was in Pagbosh was more of damage limitation. Try to put a break onto the relentless arms race which is going on. And of course, later on, when we persuaded Gorbachev to stop the the Cold War, and then we could go back to the main idea of eliminating nuclear weapons.

Presenter35:02

Yeah.

Joseph Rotblat35:02

Code number seven.

Joseph Rotblat35:04

Well, in this record probably this is what you call a a drill will be a stream and a stream will be a flat. This record's probably quite unknown to any of your audiences here because it was prepared, written and sung specially for by Swedish doctors.

Joseph Rotblat35:24

For a conference which was held by the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War.

Joseph Rotblat35:29

And it shows the idea that all of us need to do something about preventing a nuclear war. If we all go together,

Joseph Rotblat35:37

work together because we are afraid. It happened to once.

Joseph Rotblat35:41

It could happen again. But if we are together, then the rill will be a stream and the stream will be a flood.

Speaker 435:49

It has happened once It may happen again It has happened It has happened again

Joseph Rotblat36:00

Because

Presenter36:46

Rolf Leanderson singing part of A Rill Will Be a Stream and A Stream Will Be a Flood by Ingmar Tessin and Lars Larsen, accompanied by the choir and orchestra of the Swedish Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War.

Presenter36:59

Your ambition, though, Joseph Rotblatt, goes beyond a nuclear weapons free world. You want to see a world free of war. Do you believe that it it will happen, or do you simply dream that it might? Step.

Joseph Rotblat37:13

My I I've got two objectives in my life, what's the left of it, a short-term objective and a long-term objective.

Joseph Rotblat37:21

The short term objective is the elimination of nuclear weapons.

Joseph Rotblat37:25

And the long term objective is the elimination of war. And the reason why I felt that one is important.

Joseph Rotblat37:32

Because even if we eliminate nuclear weapons, we cannot disinvent them.

Joseph Rotblat37:38

Should there be a serious conflict in the future between great powers, that could be reintroduced.

Joseph Rotblat37:43

Moreover,

Joseph Rotblat37:44

And if I come back to the responsibility of scientists,

Joseph Rotblat37:47

Further progress in science and certain other fields of science I feel I've admitted particularly genetic engineering.

Joseph Rotblat37:54

could result in the development of another weapon of mass destruction, maybe more readily available than nuclear weapons. And therefore, the only way is to prevent war. So there will be no need at all, any type of war. We have got to remove

Joseph Rotblat38:10

war as a recognized social institutions. We've got to learn to solve our disputes with others and military confrontations.

Presenter38:18

I believe we

Joseph Rotblat38:20

I believe we are already moving towards it. In my lifetime I have seen the the changes that have occurred in in society.

Joseph Rotblat38:28

You see, I I've lived through two world wars. In both of these wars France and Germany, for example, were mortal enemies, they killed each other off.

Joseph Rotblat38:36

No

Joseph Rotblat38:37

The idea of a war between these countries is quite inconceivable.

Joseph Rotblat38:41

And this applies to the other nations in the European Union. And this enormous revolution which happened.

Joseph Rotblat38:46

People don't realize how big a change it occurred.

Joseph Rotblat38:49

We have to educate ourselves to the culture of peace rather than the culture of violence in which we live now.

Presenter38:56

Last record

Joseph Rotblat38:57

And this is in fact the last my last record is from the Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, The Ode to Joy, and it does indeed present the idea which I want to aim to, that we can all live in a world of harmony, a world of peace. You see, in the words of Frederick von Schiller, he said, Alley mentioned were the brother, all men will be brothers, and this is which I hope will be achieved.

Presenter40:21

Andrei Previn conducting the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and the Ambrosian Singers in part of Beethoven's Symphony No. Nine, The Choral.

Presenter40:28

If you could only take one of those eight records.

Joseph Rotblat40:31

But it's the last one.

Joseph Rotblat40:33

I think this is probably the best known tune since it's been adopted by the United Nations, so I hope that in course of time not only the tune, but the idea behind it will also be adopted.

Presenter40:42

What about your book?

Joseph Rotblat40:44

Well, I'll have plenty of time in the in the island, and I'll like to do the thing which I've been trying to do all along, and this is to learn more. There's so much to learn. So I would like, in principle, to take the Encyclopedia Britannica. But of course,

Joseph Rotblat40:57

The luggage will be too heavy, but I would like to take the C D ROM, which is now being produced. Take it with me.

Presenter41:04

And your luxury.

Joseph Rotblat41:06

related to it, because in order to play it I will need a a computer, a laptop computer and solar batteries.

Presenter41:12

Very logical and very fair, and you can have them both. Professor Sir Joseph Rotblat, thank you very much indeed for letting us hear your desert island discs.

Speaker 241:27

You've been listening to a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive. For more podcasts please visit bbc.co. uk slash radio four.