White House Statement Concerning Soviet Plans To Test a 50-Megaton Bomb.

IT IS REPORTED that the Soviet Union plans to explode a giant nuclear bomb--the equivalent to 50 million tons of TNT.

We call upon the Soviet Union to reconsider this decision, if in fact it has been made. We know about high-yield weapons. Since 1957 the United States has had the technical know-how and materials to produce bombs in the 50-100 megaton range and higher. But we also know that such weapons are not essential to our military needs. Furthermore, full-scale tests are not necessary to develop 50 megaton bombs. Such an explosion could only serve some unconfessed political purpose.

We believe the peoples throughout the world will join us in asking the Soviet Union not to proceed with a test which can serve no legitimate purpose and which adds a mass of additional radioactive fallout to that which has been unleashed in recent weeks.