The Green caldron - University Library

16 The Green Caldron
A Vision
Wolfgang Schulz
KJtctoric 102, Theme 10
At last the great powers of the world made peace and agreed to end the
armament race. They decided to destroy all atomic weapons, their production
centers, and all data and information about the development of nuclear wea-
pons.
Up to that moment, a huge amount of radioactive material waste had been
accumulated and was to be more than doubled by the destroyed arms and
machinery. Some measure had to be found to rid the nations of this material
which would radiate for thousands of years and be a creeping death to all liv-
ing beings. Four different locations in bare mountain regions or deserts, far
from human habitation, were chosen as atomic burial grounds : the Swiss Alps,
and the deserts in Australia, Siberia, and the United States.
In geographical maps, these locations were indicated as white spots. Noth-
ing could better characterize these moon-dead areas. No plant or animal lived
there, no fountain or river existed that could bring water infected with radio-
activity out of these "hot" regions. Airplanes avoided flying over these terri-
tories. True, windstorms sometimes swept over the sands and carried clouds
of deadly dust even as far as to human settlements ; but most of the time they
subsided before they could do substantial damage. The radioactive metal parts
and fluids were stored in concrete buildings or underground tanks. Roasting
in the sun were the bones of their builders—mostly criminals who had been
forced to do the building—like the bones of pirates accessory to a hidden
treasure.
The men who died in the deserts became heroes, saints, saviors of man-
kind. Although in the early stage of planning many scientists and statesmen
bitterly opposed the project which meant to them the destruction of man's most
promising invention, later generations praised it as mankind's greatest achieve-
ment. An immense danger had been averted, an incomprehensible evil had
been destroyed.
Very soon philosophical and religious movements, favored by the uncer-
tain and hazy conceptions that existed about the nature of atomic fission and
radiation, speculated, with the joy and enthusiasm to be expected of people who
felt relieved from the constant threat of atomic war. They declared that the
change of matter to energy was the ultimate step of man's sin, inherited from
Adam and Eve in Paradise and steadily deepened. But at the moment of man's
final aversion from his creator, he came back as the repentant child to his
father. The atomic burial grounds were monuments to his self-denial and
humility. The eternal curse was nullified. God accepted His child and gave