1952

January 11
The United Nations abolishes the Atomic Energy Commission and establishes the Disarmament Commission in its place.

February 4
The United Nations Disarmament Commission holds its first meeting.

March
The Royal Air Force and the U.S. Strategic Air Command begin flying photographic and radar reconnaissance missions over Soviet Union.

April 22
For the first time, the American media are permitted to cover live, and the public witnesses by television, the detonation of a nuclear device (a 31 kiloton atmospheric test known as Operation Big Shot) at the Nevada Test Site.

September
A second U.S. nuclear weapons laboratory is established in Livermore, California.

October 3
The United Kingdom conducts its first nuclear weapon test, Hurricane , at Monte Bello Island, off the northwest coast of Australia.

November 1
The United States detonates the first hydrogen bomb, 10.4 megaton Mike , at Enewetak Atoll in the Marshall Islands. The explosion is 500 times more powerful than the bomb exploded at Nagasaki.

December
President-elect Dwight Eisenhower and staff develop "New Look" defense policy relying primarily on power of atomic forces.