Howard Hughes and the atomic bomb
In the lore of the nuclear arms race, the Central Nevada Test Area has occupied a special place of mystery. Only one test was ever conducted there, and even for aficionados, the reasons have never been entirely clear. Philip Coyle, the former test director of the Nevada Test Site and currently senior advisor to the Ploughshares-funded Center for Defense Information, has rarely spoken about the issue, but he does know the answer. It involves a peculiar effort by the government to placate one of the wealthiest men in the world. Every time a big hydrogen bomb was detonated on the Nevada Test Site, the tremors would shake the penthouse suite atop the Desert Inn in Las Vegas about 75 miles away and the frayed nerves of its sole resident, multibillionaire Howard Hughes. And before there was a national environmental movement, Hughes became the most unlikely -- and no doubt most powerful -- opponent of nuclear weapons testing during the Cold War, complaining about the practice to the AEC. "It is surreal to look back on some of these things," Coyle said. "It was a different time."
Los Angeles Times
