China Builds the Bomb (Studies in International Security and Ar) [Paperback]

John Lewis (Author), Litai Xue (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Based on newly released material ("How much the Chinese elected to publish truly surprised us," the authors remark in the preface), this important work of scholarship reveals how the decision was made in China in 1955 to build an atomic bomb, how the project was organized, its leadership and management methods, how uranium was found, mined and processed, how the bomb itself was designed, built and successfully tested at Lop Nur on October 16, 1964. Though the Soviets played a critical role in the initial stages of the effort, the Chinese accomplished the greater part of the task without foreign assistance. It was a remarkable feat, carried out in a poor nation just recovering from three wars during a time of enormous political turmoil. Lewis is chairman of the International Strategic Institute at Stanford; Xue Litai is a researcher at the Center for International Security and Arms Control at Stanford.
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Review

“A pioneering political-scientific history. . . . Lucidly composed, meticulously documented, and handsomely presented.”—The Annals

“A fascinating and compelling story of the beginnings of the Chinese nuclear weapon program.”—Arms Control Today

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Product Details

• Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: Stanford University Press; 1 edition (April 1, 1991)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0804718415
• ISBN-13: 978-0804718417
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 5.9 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #566,466 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars China's insecurity/ Mao's paper tiger !!, April 28, 2001

By 

Stephen H. Chopek (Flat Rock, MI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: China Builds the Bomb (Studies in International Security and Ar) (Paperback)

A rich and facinating account of how China made the decision to build the bomb. The origins of the Chinese nuclear program were made during the Eisenhower administration desion to reduce American troops in Korea. During this period, Eisenhower decided to increase American strategic forces (nuclear), thus adding to Chinese insecurity. According to the book, Mao wanted a paper tiger and the nuclear bomb was the answer.

The book also details how Soviet advisors provided the Chinese with baseline technical information for theroretical experimentation and fabrication of the first bomb. The book makes clear that the Sino-Soviet alliance was a shakey mutual military agreement at best. Moscow wanted total control of Soviet/Chinese military operations and how Chinese military leaders resisted these attempts by Moscow and decided to expel Soviet advisors. The book also explains how the CIA blew the call: They predicated a pultonium core and in fact the Chinese built a uranium-235 core.

A must for anyone interested in understanding American/Chinese Foreign policy in present day Chinese-Amercian relations

8 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Chinese Bomb - Chairman Mao's basic believe., September 26, 2003

By 

Isaac Ho (Canada) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: China Builds the Bomb (Studies in International Security and Ar) (Paperback)

Lest when my review is read, readers will think I'm sympathetic to Chinese socialism. The fact is I am not. I have read the book - China Builds The Bomb - some years ago. This book must be read in the perspective of China's recent history. In the Chinese world of the l960's, internally, China was beset with how to feed her people due to a series of natural calamities and externally, how to defend itself from its neighbour - the unfriendly Soviet Union as well as hostility from United States.

China's intention to build the bomb was basically for self-defense and not to threaten others nor for sable-rattling. I think China had achieved its aim of protecting itself. China's knowledge in building the bomb was based mainly on her core of scientific people, public sacrifices and native innovations. Chinese people realized long ago that the defense of their nation depended on the resolve and determination of themselves. The fact that against seemingly insurmountable odds, both technical and scientific, the Chinese people could build first the atomic bomb and then the hydrogen bomb, prove beyond a shadow of doubt of the saying: "Necessity is the mother of invention." Since then, I have read this acclaimed book several time, and each time when I read it, I couldn't help thinking that my ancestral country - China - despite being bullied and invaded the last 50 years by foreign powers, the people are resolved never to be weak again in the predatory world of today! Thank you.

5.0 out of 5 stars How The Chinese Entered The Nuclear Club, May 15, 2008

By 

Michael A Neulander "Political Philosophy" (VA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: China Builds the Bomb (Studies in International Security and Ar) (Paperback)

I read this book for a graduate history class on Mao's China

The authors John Wilson Lewis, and Xue Litai astutely argued that Mao's decision to acquire nuclear weapons was both a response to what he perceived as repeated nuclear threats from the U.S., particularly during the Korean War and the Taiwan Straits Crisis of the 1950's. Mao also insisted that a nuclear weapon would prove China's military prowess, which would distinguish the "New China" from its humiliated previous governments. The book expertly describes each stage of the nuclear weapons program--mining, processing, and enrichment of uranium and the designing, constructing and assembling, and testing of their first device. The book also delves into the political process including Sino-Soviet relations from 1953 to 1967. The authors used printed sources from China and the U. S. the memoirs of Nie Rongzhen, the father of China's nuclear program, as well as extensive interviews of both Chinese scientists and policy makers.

By 1953 the Chinese, under the guise of peaceful uses of nuclear energy, had initiated research leading to the development of nuclear weapons. The decision to develop an independent strategic nuclear force was made no later than early 1956 and was to be implemented within the Twelve-Year Science Plan presented in September 1956 to the Eighth Congress of the CCP. The decision to enter into a development program designed to produce nuclear weapons and ballistic missile delivery systems was, in large part, a function of the 1953 technology transfer agreements initiated with the USSR.

14 February 1950 China and the Soviet Union sign the "Sino-Soviet Treaty of Friendship, Alliance and mutual Assistance." 1955 Peking signed a secret agreement with Moscow through which China provided uranium ores in exchange for Soviet assistance in the nuclear field (7, 41, 76). China was politically motivated to develop nuclear weapons following the events of the Korean War, French Indochina War, and Taiwan Strait Crisis. During this time, China's military was still largely technologically undeveloped and was receiving large amounts of assistance from the Soviet Union since the early 1950s. Soviet nuclear aid was given to China, and several eastern European nations, under the pretext that it would be used for peaceful purposes. In mid-October 1957, the Chinese and Soviets signed an agreement on new technology for national defense that included provision for additional Soviet nuclear assistance as well as the furnishing of some surface-to-surface and surface-to-air missiles. The USSR also agreed to supply a sample atomic bomb and to provide technical assistance in the manufacture of nuclear weapons. Of the assistance provided, most significant to China's future strategic nuclear capability were an experimental nuclear reactor, facilities for processing uranium, a cyclotron, and some equipment for a gaseous diffusions plant (41-46, 76-86, 90-91, 105-106, 118).

20 June 1959 The Soviet Communist Party Central Committee sends a letter to the Central Committee of China's Communist Party informing China that Moscow will not deliver a prototype atomic bomb to Beijing. The Soviets cite the ongoing negotiations in Geneva for a test ban treaty as the reason for reneging on the agreement to provide an atomic bomb. China names its first atomic bomb "Device 596," which represents the year and month (June 1959) in which the Soviets refused to provide the bomb. Subsequently the Chinese accused Moscow of having abrogated their agreement in 1959, and having refused to supply a simple atomic bomb and technical data concerning its manufacture. This event marked the end of nuclear cooperation between the two socialist nations and China continued independent development of nuclear weapons. Mao Zedong viewed this split as further justification for China committing itself to continue nuclear weapons development to break "the superpowers' monopoly on nuclear weapons," to ensure Chinese security against the Soviet and United States threats, and to increase Chinese prestige and power internationally (60-65).

When China decided in 1955 to develop atomic bombs, it faced a number of technological choices as to the most appropriate route to follow. At that time, China could only work on one path, and had to choose between producing Pu239 from a reactor, or developing the method of producing U235 through isotope separation. Therefore, the chosen path was the physical separation of U235 and U238 isotopes. This method of detonating an atomic bomb was considered more technically advanced, though there were questions as to whether China was capable of producing a uranium bomb detonated by the implosion method.

China made remarkable progress in the 1960s in developing nuclear weapons. In a thirty-two-month period, China successfully exploded its first atomic bomb (October 16, 1964), launched its first nuclear missile (October 25, 1966), and detonated its first hydrogen bomb (June 14, 1967.

The Cultural Revolution disrupted the strategic weapons program less than other scientific and educational sectors in China; however, there was a slowdown in succeeding years. The successes achieved in nuclear research and experimental design work permitted China to begin series production of nuclear (since 1968) and thermonuclear (since 1974) warheads.

The first Chinese nuclear test was conducted at Lop Nor on 16 October 1964 (CHIC 1). It was a tower shot involving a fission device with a yield of 25 kilotons. The 596 test came as a great surprise to the West as the earliest estimates of a Chinese nuclear test were predicted to be at least several months away (241-244). Uranium 235 was used as the nuclear fuel, which indicates Beijing's choice of the path of creating high-yield nuclear weapons right away. China tested an experimental thermonuclear device on May 9, 1966. This was the shortest time span any of the five nuclear nations needed to test experimental thermonuclear devices after its first detonation. China also had the distinction of being the fifth nation to develop nuclear weapons (204-208, 244).

One of the objectives of the final series of Chinese nuclear tests was to miniaturize China's nuclear warheads, dropping their weight from 2200 kgs to 700 kgs in order to accommodate the next generation of solid-fueled missile systems. In addition to the development of a sea-based nuclear force, China began considering the development of tactical nuclear weapons. The PLA exercises featured the simulated use of tactical nuclear weapons in offensive and defensive situations beginning in 1982. In 1988 Chinese specialists tested a 1-5 KT nuclear device with an enhanced radiation yield, advancing the country's development of a very low yield neutron weapon and laying the foundation for the creation of nuclear artillery.

The exact state of China's nuclear arsenal is shrouded in secrecy and only estimates of it exist in the West. The most recent reports in 2006 indicate China possesses only 130 nuclear warheads, deployed on land-based missiles, sea-based missiles, and bombers. China does not have MIRV capability though could quickly develop such a capacity if required as it continues to modernize its nuclear arsenal.

Recommended for all interested in Asian and military history.