Three nations
build atomic
power plants

Three countries, Britain, the
Soviet Union and the United
States, are now working on
programs to harness atomic
vower for industrial use.

The Soviet Union built the
first atomic power plant, with
a capacity of 5,000 kilowatts,
“to accumulate technical and
economic experience.” A much
larger plant of 100,000 kilo-
watts is under construction.

Now Britain has announced
plans for the world’s largest
atomic power plant (see ar-
chitect’s drawing at top left)

= . to be built for the South Scot-

land Electricity Board. The
plant will have a generating
capacity of 360,000 kilowatts
and ifs total output of electric
power will be not Jess than
300,000 kilowatts.

.Canada too, is preparing to
investigate the peaceful uses
of atomic energy and the new
atomic reactor to be installed
at the big nuclear plant of the
government - owned Atomic
Energy of Canada Ltd. at
Chalk River is intended for
this purpose. A-new $40 mil-
lion building to house the re-
actor is now under construc-
tion (see third picture from
top at left).

At Vallecitos atomic labora-
tory at Pleasanton, California,
a 50-ft. capsule is being built
to house an atomic reactor
(see picture at bottom left).
Research at the $10 million
laboratory will be directed to
producing atomic energy for
industrial use. The findings
will be. used in building the
planned 185,000 kilowatt
atomic power plant near Chi-

cago.

The Soviet Union is placing
all the knowledge it has giin-
ed at the disposal of the other
socialist countries through the
Joint Nuclear Research Insti-
tute established in the newly-
built town of Dubno. In_ this
institute (second picture from
top at left shows the control
room of the synchrocyclotron),
scientists of — the socialist
couniries work on an equal
basis conducting theoretical
and experimental research in

nuclear physics.

Soviet Union records
pension, pay boosts

By SAM RUSSELL

MOSCOW

The pensions of nearly 15 million people in the Soviet
Union have been considerably increased since the new pensions

law came in‘b operation last year.

This is one of the many

rises in living standards reported by the central statistical
board of the USSR in its survey on the fulfilment of the state

plan for 1956.

Total number of factory and
office workers in the country
reached the 50 million mark
by the end of the year, an
increase of 2,100,000. Their
average earnings increased
three. percent compared with
1955.

Pensions and allowances in-
creased by 19 percent. Farm-
ers’ incomes in cash and kind
increased by 12 percent.

The report again records
considerable achievement in
education with a total of 50
million people attending school
or other educational institu-
tions, with three million stud-
ents in universities and insti-
tutes of higher learning.

A total of 760,000 newly
trained specialists graduated
from the universities and in-
stitutes, 126,000 more than in
1955, and the number of
scierttists who graduated in-
creased by over 15,000, bring-
ing the total number of scien-
tists in the Soviet Union: to
239,000 by the end of 1956,

Although new housing ac-
commpdation was provided in
the cities for about five mil-
lion people, and another 700,-
000 houses were built in the
countryside, new housing fell
short of the target by eight
percent. This means that 400,-
000 people who should have

been rehoused in 1956 were
not.

This is on the basis of an
allocation of about 70 square
feet of housing space per per-
son in the cities (excluding

halls, bathrooms and_ kitch-
ens).
In heavy industry output

was 11 percent higher than in
1955.

The survey notes, however,
that there were serious short-
comings in development of
some sections of industry.
While production of coal, metal,
cement and lumber showed
increases, all fell short of the
plan.

Iron and steel production,
nevertheless, increased by 7
percent, coal by 11 percent,
oil by 18 percent, and electric
power by 13 percent.

The 1956 figures were 385,-
800,000 tons of pig iron, 48,-
600,000 tons of steel and 429
million tons of coal.

In agriculture, the total crop
area in 1956 amounted to 487
million acres, an increase of
more than 22 million acres
over 1955..The area under
grain had increased by 55 mil-
lion acres in the past three
years.

The harvest was 20 percent
above that of 1955 and the.
greatest in Soviet history.

Europe approaching
situation of 1939’

“MOSCOW

The most serious indication of the worsening of East-West
relationships that has been made for many months came in a
joint Soviet-Czechoslovak s#atement issued in Moscow last week.

The statement, signed after a three-day conference between

Soviet leaders and a Czechoslovak

@ Western policies are bring-
ing Europe to a situation
“similar to that existing
before the Second World
War.”

® The Warsaw Pact will be
strengthened because of
‘the Western refusal to ac-
cept Soviet peace pro-
posals and disband the
North Atlantic Treaty ‘Or-
ganization.

The Warsaw Pact is the de-
fensive alliance formed by the
socialist countries as a reply

Attack on Egypt cost
Britain $140 million

LONDON
Military cost to Britain of
the attack on Egypt was $140
million, apart from the incal-
culable economic cost and its
consequences, says Socialist
Digest, a monthly publication
of the British Labor party.
For that money Brittain
could have built 31,000 three
bedroom houses, or two new
atomic power plants.

delegation, said:

to NATO.

Britain, the United States,
France and West Germany
were the countries named in
the statement as responsible
for the deteriorating situation.

The statement declared that
the main aim of Soviet and

*Czechoslovak policy was “the

maintenance of peace, easing
international tennsion and con-
solidating of the forces of
peace against the warmong-
ers,”

The foreign policy of both
governments was based on

‘ peaceful coexistence with all

states, irrespective of their so-
cial and political regimes,
The only way of ensuring
peace in Europe was by estab-
lishing a general collective
security system which would
render any aggression impos-
sible. This would at the same
time solve the German prob-
lem on a peaceful and demo-
cratic basis, a question of vital
interest to both the Soviet and
Czechoslovak peoples.

FEBRUARY 8, 1957 — PACIFIC TRIBUNE—PAGE 3