THE REAL STORY BEHIND THE MAKING OF THE FRENCH HYDROGEN BOMB

Abstract

Based on the first-person account of coauthor Pierre Billaud, a prominent French participant, this article describes for the first time in such detail the history of the development of the French hydrogen bomb in the 1960s and the organization of military nuclear research in France. The authors illustrate the extent to which French defense and governmental authorities did not support research on thermonuclear weapons until 1966. Billaud, a project insider, relates the historical episodes that led to France's successful 1968 thermonuclear test, including the names of the individuals involved and how a timely tip from a foreign source hastened the success of the first H-bomb test.

Keywords:

• France
• nuclear weapon
• thermonuclear
• hydrogen bomb

Acknowledgements

The authors wish to thank Catherine Kelleher and Judith Reppy for their careful reading of earlier versions of this article.

Notes

1. Pierre Billaud, “Souvenirs d'un pionnier de l'armement nucléaire français: Les facteurs déterminants du succès de l'engin M1 (Opération Gerboise Bleue 13-2-1960)” [Recollections of a French Nuclear Weapon Pioneer: Determinants of Success of the MI Device (Operation Gerboise Bleue 13-2-1960)], Spring 1989, <pbillaud.club.fr/nuc3.htm>.

2. Jean-Pierre Ferrand, Genèse de la DAM [Genesis of the DAM], 1983, <pbillaud.club.fr/atom4.html>.

3. Jean-Pierre Ferrand, Genèse de la DAM [Genesis of the DAM], 1983, <pbillaud.club.fr/atom4.html>.

4. Bertrand Goldschmidt, Le complexe atomique [The Atomic Complex] (Paris: Editions Fayard, 1980), p. 190.

5. Jacques Chevallier, “Histoire de la Direction des Applications Militaires du CEA, 40ème anniversaire de la DAM” [History of the Directorate of Military Applications of the CEA, 40th Anniversary of the DAM], December 3, 1998, <pbillaud.club.fr/atom12.html>.

6. Jean Damien Pô, Les moyens de la puissance, les activités militaires du CEA (1945–2000) [The Means of Power: The Military Activities of the CEA, 1945–2000] (Paris: Editions Ellipses, 2001), p. 121.

7. Marcel Duval, A la recherche d'un “secret d'Etat” [In Search of a “State Secret”], Défense Nationale, August-September 2004, pp. 84–96.

8. Marcel Duval, A la recherche d'un “secret d'Etat” [In Search of a “State Secret”], Défense Nationale, August-September 2004, pp. 84–96.

9. Alain Peyrefitte, C’était de Gaulle [It Was de Gaulle] (Paris: Fayard, Paris, 1994), Volume I, p. 167.

10. Yvon would serve as CEA high commissioner from 1970 to 1975.

11. Alain Peyrefitte, Le mal français [The French Malaise] (Paris: Plon, 1976), p. 81.

12. Alain Peyrefitte, Le mal français [The French Malaise] (Paris: Plon, 1976), p. 81.

13. Peyrefitte, C’était de Gaulle, Volume III, p. 112.

14. Duval, A la recherche d'un “secret d'Etat.”

15. Peyrefitte, C’était de Gaulle, Volume III, p. 159.

16. Peyrefitte, C’était de Gaulle, Volume III, p. 111.

17. Chevallier, “Histoire de la Direction des Applications Militaires du CEA.”

18. Private communication with Pierre Billaud, “Commentaires de Jacques Bellot sur la véridique histoire de la Bombe H française” [Comments by Jacques Bellot on the True Story of the French H-Bomb], <pbillaud.club.fr/h2bel.html>. See Chevallier, “Histoire de la Direction des Applications Militaires du CEA.”

19. Peyrefitte, Le mal français, p. 82.

20. Robert Dautray (original name Ignace Kouchelevitz) was born in France in 1928 to a family of Russian Jewish migrants. From a very young age, he showed uncommon ability and progressed easily through his studies from 1940 to 1950, despite the adverse conditions in France due to the German occupation and the consequences of the war. In 1949, he entered the high-level advanced scientific school, Ecole Polytechnique, where he graduated first in his class. In 1967, he was appointed to the DAM to spur hydrogen-bomb research. But when the major breakthrough occurred in September 1967, he had not availed himself of the opportunity to participate significantly to the decisive steps. Jean Viard, head of the research department of DAM, charged him in October 1967 with keeping the minister informed of the progress of preparations for the summer 1968 tests. It appeared later that Dautray had taken advantage of his practical monopoly of contact with the minister's assistants to depict himself as the one who directed the studies and led DAM to the successful thermonuclear tests of 1968, thus deserving the title of “father of the French H-bomb.” This was a quite important qualification that opened to him the gates of the prestigious Académie des Sciences and, in 1993, his appointment as high commissioner of the CEA. The title of scientific director attributed to Dautray satisfied the minister, Maurice Schumann (who had replaced Alain Peyrefitte in April 1967), who never asked for a clear explanation of the exact extent of Dautray's responsibilities, and who thus remained convinced that Dautray was truly directing the H research efforts. This version of the facts was first published in 1976 by Peyrefitte in his book Le mal français. In February 2007, Dautray published his memoirs, Mémoires, du Vel d'Hiv à la bombe H [Memoirs, from Vel d'Hiv to the H-Bomb] (Paris: Ed Odile Jacob), in which he claimed his paternity of the French H-bomb. This book contained also a number of other errors that are commented on in Pierre Billaud, “Une insulte à la probité scientifique” [An Insult to the Scientific Probity], April 2007, <pbillaud.club.fr/h2007.html>.

21. Peyrefitte Le mal français, p. 83.

22. Scientific Director “at” the DAM, not “of” the DAM.

23. I was not present at this first meeting; this is according to what Jean Viard told me.

24. In 1996, I (coauthor Pierre Billaud) was contacted by a journalist from the weekly news magazine Le Nouvel Observateur who was planning to write an article on the French H-bomb program following the private printing of my manuscript. He admitted to me eventually that he had learned, through a French non-CEA source, that England had provided secret H-bomb information to which he had found veiled references in my text, and that he was planning to focus his article on that point. I could not help him without breaking my former oath of secrecy. And yet, the events in question had occurred almost thirty years earlier, the usual time for maintaining secrecy on such subjects. Moreover, I was convinced that the foreign source had provided this information to France on the orders of his government, or at least with its agreement; consequently, I was almost sure that such a disclosure would have no negative consequences on his reputation. The journalist, moreover, had incorrectly convinced himself of the existence of the classical elements of such an event, including a mole, a case officer, mysterious letter boxes, suitcases full of banknotes, and so on. I was thus practically obliged to set him straight, fearing an absurd crisis among our British friends, and informed him that it was the British source that had initiated the contact, and had done so in a most banal manner. I didn't convince him, and he and his editors decided to give his article a sensational title. In an effort to correct unjustified deviations, I decided to offer the scientific magazine La Recherche a summary article of a primarily historical nature including the clear identification of the English source. See V. Jauvert, “Comment les Français ont volé le secret de la bombe H” [How France Stole the Secret of the H-Bomb], Le Nouvel Observateur, March 28, 1996, pp. 110-112; and Pierre Billaud et Hervé Kemp, Comment la France a fait sa bombe H [How France Made Its H-bomb], La Recherche 293 (December 1996), pp. 74–78.

25. Duval, A la recherche d'un “secret d'Etat.”

26. Private communication with author (Billaud) by participants of the September 19 meeting.

27. Unfortunately Michel Carayol, Robert Hirsch, Jacques Robert, and Jean Viard have since passed away.

28. Some weeks before, on February 20, 1969, Berger, Bellot, Bonnet, Carayol, Coleau, Dagens, Dautray, and David had been awarded, or promoted in, the Légion d'honneur at Villacoublay.

29. In early 1958, Lewis Strauss, the chairman of the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission, had authorized a secret French mission (Mission Aurore) with a visit to the Nevada Proving Ground. The aim was to learn about the sophisticated methods of analysis related to all aspects of nuclear tests. It did not include any information on the design of atomic bombs. This is discussed in more detail in Pierre Billaud, “Souvenirs d'un pionnier de l'armement nucléaire français” [Recollections of a French Nuclear Weapon Pioneer], September-October 1998, <pbillaud.club.fr/nuc2.htm>.

30. Richard H. Ullman, “The Covert French Connection,” Foreign Policy 75 (Summer 1989), pp. 3–33.