One of the great debates that consumed people in the Cold War was the issue of the morality of nuclear weapons. The opposition to nuclear arms is an opinion held by a wide range of people throughout the world, but the man who started the debate over nuclear arms was famed Polish physicist Joseph Rotblat.

Joseph Rotblat was born in Poland’s capital of Warsaw on November 4, 1908. With his parents unable to afford schooling for him, Rotblat went to work as an electrician in order to support himself while studying at the Free University of Poland. He completed his education at the Free University in 1932, graduating with a degree in science.

After completing his work at the Free University of Poland, Rotblat accepted a position at the Radiological Laboratory of Warsaw. He continued his education, gaining his doctorate in 1938 from the University of Warsaw. Prior to completing his education, Rotblat married Tola Gryn, a relationship, like many others that would be destroyed by the conflict that would engulf Poland in 1939.

In 1939, Joseph Rotblat received an invitation to work in Liverpool, England alongside famed physicist James Chadwick. Although his decision to work in England saved his life from the Nazi invaders that came to Poland later in 1939, Rotblat was unable to get his wife Tola out of Poland, where she fell victim to the war.

As World War II broke out in Europe, Joseph Rotblat learned of the German pursuit of building an atomic bomb. He decided to study this subject as well with Chadwick, in an attempt to possibly create a deterrent to the Germans possibly using the bomb. The work that Rotblat and Chadwick did on nuclear fission brought Joseph to the United States to be one of the scientists working on the Manhattan Project, the secret American nuclear research program.

Rotblat was happy to help the Allies by researching a method to create a nuclear weapon because of his fear of German aggression, but when it became apparent in 1944 that Germany had no chance of creating a nuclear weapon for itself, Rotblat felt the Manhattan Project should end as well. He left the project that year when the Allies did not discontinue their work on the atomic bomb.

Following his departure from the Manhattan Project, Joseph Rotblat became the leading spokesman in the fight against the creation and use of nuclear weaponry. Rotblat established the British Atomic Scientists Association in 1946, which was a collection of scientists that debated issues of nuclear weaponry and published information on the same topic to inform the public.

He also was one of the founders of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament. Rotblat’s greatest achievement in the area of nuclear disarmament was through his work with the Pugwash Conference. Starting in 1957, the Pugwash Conference was an annual conference where scientists from across the world could come and openly discuss issues on nuclear warfare. Although national and international groups, such as the United Nations, were welcome, the scientists did not come representing a country. Rotblat served on the Pugwash Conference as its secretary-general, the chairman of British Pugwash, and as the president of the worldwide Pugwash.

For his lifelong pursuit of peace, Joseph Rotblat was presented with the Nobel Peace Prize in 1995. This however was not the only award he won. In 1992, he won the Einstein peace prize and the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation’s Lifetime Achievement Award for Distinguished Peace Leadership in 1997. Rotblat passed away on August 31, 2005.

Read more about Joseph Rotblat at:
www.guardian.co.uk ,  www.wagingpeace.org , www.ppu.org.uk