? starter activity

1
?
? starter activity
Watch this famous US public information film
about the perils of a nuclear attack on America.
What does it tell us about the way the government
responded to the threat of nuclear war in the
1950s and 60s? ?Extension. How would this film
differ today?
2

• Extension task
• Read Raymond Briggs story or watch the film
  adaptation of When the wind blows and note down
  what it tells us about the state of readiness of
  the UK for an all-out nuclear war.

3
Why did an arms race develop?
? Aims

• To identify the causes of the arms race
• To compile a timeline of the development of
  nuclear weapons

4
? Your task

• Read p.99-101 of Phillips and list the reasons
  why an arms race developed between the super
  powers.

5
Causes of arms race

• Growth of international tensions keeping ahead
  in the technology race helped safeguard the
  interests of the nation
• National pride way of measuring the
  achievements of East or West
• Political insecurities of leaders e.g.
  Eisenhower Kennedy increased defence spending
  in reaction to public demands
• Insurance policy use of nuclear weapons was so
  unimaginable war could be avoided
• Military-industrial complex arms race provided
  jobs
• New technology hydrogen, lithium, ICBM etc.

6
? Role play

• Divide the class in two. Appoint someone to be
  the US president. One half of the class has to
  argue a case for continuing the arms race. The
  other half must explain why the arms race is so
  futile and needlessly expensive. The US president
  will decide who wins the argument on the basis of
  the evidence put forward.

7
? Your task

• Read p.102-104 carefully. Close your books. See
  if you can sequence the events on the cards
  chronologically.
• On a sheet of flip chart paper draw a line from
  across the centre and label it 1945-1965. On the
  line in a red pen chart the achievements of the
  Soviets and the US in blue. Plot major
  achievements higher above the line. Who appears
  to have won the arms race?

8
I am become death the destroyer of worlds
(Robert Oppenheimer)
9
?
Eniwetok, 1st hydrogen bomb, 1952
10
Secret image of testing of lithium bomb,
Semipalatinsk
11
B52 Stratofortess bomber
12
TU20 Bear
13
Konstantin Tsiolkovsky (1857-1935)
14
Sputnik ?
15
Laika, 1957
16
Yuri Gagarin, 1961 ?
17
Polaris, 1960
18
This house believes that nuclear weapons made war
less likely during the Cold War?
19
? Extension

• Read and supplement your timeline with notes from
  Isaacs, p. 161-83.
• Explore the IWM website What lies beneath and
  note down the reactions of the British government
  and civilians to the arms race as well as the
  threat of nuclear war.

20
? Plenary

• Key stages in the arms race?
• Who won the arms race?
• Discuss the following idea By the beginning of
  1962 the arms race had made nuclear war unlikely

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