Solution Unsatisfactory
Encyclopedia
"Solution Unsatisfactory" is a 1940 science fiction
short story
by Robert A. Heinlein
. It describes the US effort to build a nuclear weapon
in order to end the ongoing World War II
, and its dystopian consequences to the nation and the world.
The story was first published in Astounding Science Fiction magazine, with illustrations by Frank Kramer
. The time of writing (at least of the final draft) can be bracketed by the fact that the story contains a reference to the highly destructive bombing of Coventry
by the Luftwaffe
, which occurred on November 14, 1940. The story appeared in The Worlds of Robert A. Heinlein
in 1966 and Expanded Universe in 1980.
Manning hears of fish dying in Chesapeake Bay
where the by-products of Dr. Estelle Karst's research into artificial radioactive materials are being dumped. She was a laboratory assistant of Otto Hahn
, the first man to characterize induced fission in uranium, and fled Germany "to escape a pogrom
". Karst is working on radioactive materials for medical uses
, but Manning sees its potential as a radiological weapon
. Over Karst's objections, by Christmas 1944 the United States is in possession of nearly 10,000 "units" of radioactive dust, a "unit" being defined as the quantity which "would take care of a thousand men, at normal dispersion"; enough to kill the entire population of a large city such as Berlin.
Manning seriously considers ordering that all people aware of the secret, including himself, be put to death and all records destroyed. He rejects that course because someone else, perhaps German or Russian, is certain to rediscover it. Instead, Manning in 1945 convinces the President
to use the dust against Germany. Since America is officially not in the war, the Americans give the dust to Britain but at the price of the British accepting a complete US ascendancy in the postwar world
.
The Americans warn the Germans by demonstrating what the dust does to cattle, dropping leaflets over Germany, and having the President speak to the Führer, but the Germans refuse to surrender. RAF bombers
scatter the dust over Berlin and leave no survivors. The Nazi regime collapses and the new government surrenders. Karst commits suicide by exposing herself to the dust.
Manning warns the Cabinet
of the great dangers of the new situation, introducing the concepts of the nuclear arms race
, mutual assured destruction
, and second strike
capability. He convinces the President and Cabinet that the only solution is to use the American nuclear monopoly while it still exists. Any other world power, such as the Eurasian Union, might create such dust and bomb the United States within weeks. Still a congressman, Manning convinces the President that there is no time to get congressional approval and that the Constitution must be bypassed.
The United States issues a "Peace Proclamation" which essentially demands the immediate and unconditional surrender of the rest of the world. All other states are required to disarm and to hand over all long-range civilian and military aircraft, since any airplane can spread the dust. The prohibition on commercial airlines applies to America also; the Army will manage any required civilian air travel. Most of the world complies.
The Eurasians did invent the dust for themselves as Manning had warned, and launch a surprise attack. The American victory in the "Four-Day War" owes much to Manning, who had arranged for Congress and President to be outside Washington ahead of the attack, and false rumors of plague to empty New York; nonetheless, 800,000 are killed in Manhattan alone. Eurasian documents completely vindicate Manning's unconstitutional policies; had the President waited for congressional approval, America would have lost the war.
Manning becomes lifetime head of the new Peace Patrol, with a worldwide monopoly over the radioactive dust and the aircraft which can deliver it. He opens schools for the indoctrination of cadet patrolmen from any race, color, or nationality. They will patrol the sky and "guard the peace" of any country but their own, and would be forbidden to return to their original country for the entire duration of their service; "a deliberately expatriated band of Janizaries, with an obligation only to the Commission and the race, and welded together with a carefully nurtured esprit de corps."
Manning does not have time to complete his original plans for the Patrol. In 1951, the President dies in a plane crash; his isolationist successor demands Manning's resignation and intends to dismantle the Patrol. As Manning argues with the President, planes loaded with radioactive dust and piloted by non-Americans appear overhead. Manning is willing to kill himself and treat the capital of the United States as he would treat any other place which he perceives a "threat to world peace". He wins the standoff and becomes the undisputed military dictator of the world. DeFries doubts that Manning, now the most-hated man on Earth, can succeed in making the Patrol self-perpetuating and trustworthy. There is no way of knowing how long Manning will live, given his weak heart. The narrator concludes:
, "Solution Unsatisfactory" accurately predicted many aspects of the development of nuclear arms and the dilemmas they pose, a year before President Roosevelt authorized the Manhattan Project
led by General Leslie Groves
. Scientific advisors wrote a 1943 memo to Groves entitled "Use of Radioactive Materials as a Military Weapon":
While not part of Heinlein's Future History
, the story also marks the first appearance of a "Patrol" in Heinlein's works. The concept of a distinct order of pilots totally dedicated to preserving the peace reappears in Heinlein's later works, including the short story "The Long Watch
". The juvenile
Space Cadet
describes the training and indoctrination of Patrol cadets. Cadets are taught not to ask about another's country or planet of origin, and to admire and seek to emulate Rivera, a legendary Patrolman who ordered the nuclear bombing of his own hometown and died himself in the blast.
"Solution Unsatisfactory" marked the beginning of Heinlein's concern with nuclear weapons. After World War II, Heinlein believed that a nuclear arms race was an urgent problem. He wrote several works on nuclear warfare in the mid-1940s, such as "The Last Days of the United States", "How to be a Survivor", and "Pie from the Sky" but, except for "Back of the Moon," they were rejected by publishers. Heinlein wrote: In 1980, he published them in Expanded Universe along with "Solution Unsatisfactory".
by Vernor Vinge
features a "Peace Authority" created when military research scientists develop a device called a "bobbler" and use it to take over the world and enforce world peace in a very similar fashion.
Science fiction
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
short story
Short story
A short story is a work of fiction that is usually written in prose, often in narrative format. This format tends to be more pointed than longer works of fiction, such as novellas and novels. Short story definitions based on length differ somewhat, even among professional writers, in part because...
by Robert A. Heinlein
Robert A. Heinlein
Robert Anson Heinlein was an American science fiction writer. Often called the "dean of science fiction writers", he was one of the most influential and controversial authors of the genre. He set a standard for science and engineering plausibility and helped to raise the genre's standards of...
. It describes the US effort to build a nuclear weapon
Radiological weapon
A radiological weapon or radiological dispersion device is any weapon that is designed to spread radioactive material with the intent to kill, and cause disruption upon a city or nation....
in order to end the ongoing World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, and its dystopian consequences to the nation and the world.
The story was first published in Astounding Science Fiction magazine, with illustrations by Frank Kramer
Frank Kramer (artist)
Frank Kramer was an American artist known chiefly for his illustrations forJack Snow's two Oz books, The Magical Mimics in Oz and The Shaggy Man of Oz, founded on and continuing the famous Oz stories by L. Frank Baum. He also illustrated Robert A...
. The time of writing (at least of the final draft) can be bracketed by the fact that the story contains a reference to the highly destructive bombing of Coventry
Coventry Blitz
The Coventry blitz was a series of bombing raids that took place in the English city of Coventry. The city was bombed many times during the Second World War by the German Air Force...
by the Luftwaffe
Luftwaffe
Luftwaffe is a generic German term for an air force. It is also the official name for two of the four historic German air forces, the Wehrmacht air arm founded in 1935 and disbanded in 1946; and the current Bundeswehr air arm founded in 1956....
, which occurred on November 14, 1940. The story appeared in The Worlds of Robert A. Heinlein
The Worlds of Robert A. Heinlein
The Worlds of Robert A. Heinlein is a collection of science fiction short stories by Robert A. Heinlein published in 1966.It includes an introduction entitled "Pandora's Box" that describes some of the difficulties in making predictions about the near future...
in 1966 and Expanded Universe in 1980.
Plot
John DeFries, the narrator, is the campaign manager of Clyde C. Manning, a freshman congressman and military veteran who received a medical discharge for a "weak heart". DeFries chose the congressman because "he was liberal [but] was tough-minded" enough to attract conservative support. In 1941 Manning is recalled to active duty with the rank of Colonel, and takes deFries as his adjutant. He is appointed to head a secret, top-priority project with unlimited funding, with the aim of developing a nuclear weapon before the Nazis do so. The project makes little progress into 1944. The war has degenerated into a stalemate; the British and Germans continue to bomb each other's cities, while the United States, Soviet Union (renamed "The Eurasian Union"), and Japan stay out.Manning hears of fish dying in Chesapeake Bay
Chesapeake Bay
The Chesapeake Bay is the largest estuary in the United States. It lies off the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by Maryland and Virginia. The Chesapeake Bay's drainage basin covers in the District of Columbia and parts of six states: New York, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, and West...
where the by-products of Dr. Estelle Karst's research into artificial radioactive materials are being dumped. She was a laboratory assistant of Otto Hahn
Otto Hahn
Otto Hahn FRS was a German chemist and Nobel laureate, a pioneer in the fields of radioactivity and radiochemistry. He is regarded as "the father of nuclear chemistry". Hahn was a courageous opposer of Jewish persecution by the Nazis and after World War II he became a passionate campaigner...
, the first man to characterize induced fission in uranium, and fled Germany "to escape a pogrom
Anti-Jewish legislation in prewar Nazi Germany
Antisemitism and the persecution of Jews represented a central tenet of Nazi ideology. In their 25-point Party Program, published in 1920, Nazi party members publicly declared their intention to segregate Jews from "Aryan" society and to abrogate Jews' political, legal, and civil rights. Nazi...
". Karst is working on radioactive materials for medical uses
Nuclear medicine
In nuclear medicine procedures, elemental radionuclides are combined with other elements to form chemical compounds, or else combined with existing pharmaceutical compounds, to form radiopharmaceuticals. These radiopharmaceuticals, once administered to the patient, can localize to specific organs...
, but Manning sees its potential as a radiological weapon
Radiological weapon
A radiological weapon or radiological dispersion device is any weapon that is designed to spread radioactive material with the intent to kill, and cause disruption upon a city or nation....
. Over Karst's objections, by Christmas 1944 the United States is in possession of nearly 10,000 "units" of radioactive dust, a "unit" being defined as the quantity which "would take care of a thousand men, at normal dispersion"; enough to kill the entire population of a large city such as Berlin.
Manning seriously considers ordering that all people aware of the secret, including himself, be put to death and all records destroyed. He rejects that course because someone else, perhaps German or Russian, is certain to rediscover it. Instead, Manning in 1945 convinces the President
President of the United States
The President of the United States of America is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president leads the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces....
to use the dust against Germany. Since America is officially not in the war, the Americans give the dust to Britain but at the price of the British accepting a complete US ascendancy in the postwar world
Pax Americana
Pax Americana is an appellation applied to the historical concept of relative peace in the Western hemisphere and, later, the Western world, resulting from the preponderance of power enjoyed by the United States of America starting around the turn of the 20th century...
.
The Americans warn the Germans by demonstrating what the dust does to cattle, dropping leaflets over Germany, and having the President speak to the Führer, but the Germans refuse to surrender. RAF bombers
RAF Bomber Command
RAF Bomber Command controlled the RAF's bomber forces from 1936 to 1968. During World War II the command destroyed a significant proportion of Nazi Germany's industries and many German cities, and in the 1960s stood at the peak of its postwar military power with the V bombers and a supplemental...
scatter the dust over Berlin and leave no survivors. The Nazi regime collapses and the new government surrenders. Karst commits suicide by exposing herself to the dust.
Manning warns the Cabinet
United States Cabinet
The Cabinet of the United States is composed of the most senior appointed officers of the executive branch of the federal government of the United States, which are generally the heads of the federal executive departments...
of the great dangers of the new situation, introducing the concepts of the nuclear arms race
Nuclear arms race
The nuclear arms race was a competition for supremacy in nuclear warfare between the United States, the Soviet Union, and their respective allies during the Cold War...
, mutual assured destruction
Mutual assured destruction
Mutual Assured Destruction, or mutually assured destruction , is a doctrine of military strategy and national security policy in which a full-scale use of high-yield weapons of mass destruction by two opposing sides would effectively result in the complete, utter and irrevocable annihilation of...
, and second strike
Second strike
In nuclear strategy, a second strike capability is a country's assured ability to respond to a nuclear attack with powerful nuclear retaliation against the attacker...
capability. He convinces the President and Cabinet that the only solution is to use the American nuclear monopoly while it still exists. Any other world power, such as the Eurasian Union, might create such dust and bomb the United States within weeks. Still a congressman, Manning convinces the President that there is no time to get congressional approval and that the Constitution must be bypassed.
The United States issues a "Peace Proclamation" which essentially demands the immediate and unconditional surrender of the rest of the world. All other states are required to disarm and to hand over all long-range civilian and military aircraft, since any airplane can spread the dust. The prohibition on commercial airlines applies to America also; the Army will manage any required civilian air travel. Most of the world complies.
The Eurasians did invent the dust for themselves as Manning had warned, and launch a surprise attack. The American victory in the "Four-Day War" owes much to Manning, who had arranged for Congress and President to be outside Washington ahead of the attack, and false rumors of plague to empty New York; nonetheless, 800,000 are killed in Manhattan alone. Eurasian documents completely vindicate Manning's unconstitutional policies; had the President waited for congressional approval, America would have lost the war.
Manning becomes lifetime head of the new Peace Patrol, with a worldwide monopoly over the radioactive dust and the aircraft which can deliver it. He opens schools for the indoctrination of cadet patrolmen from any race, color, or nationality. They will patrol the sky and "guard the peace" of any country but their own, and would be forbidden to return to their original country for the entire duration of their service; "a deliberately expatriated band of Janizaries, with an obligation only to the Commission and the race, and welded together with a carefully nurtured esprit de corps."
Manning does not have time to complete his original plans for the Patrol. In 1951, the President dies in a plane crash; his isolationist successor demands Manning's resignation and intends to dismantle the Patrol. As Manning argues with the President, planes loaded with radioactive dust and piloted by non-Americans appear overhead. Manning is willing to kill himself and treat the capital of the United States as he would treat any other place which he perceives a "threat to world peace". He wins the standoff and becomes the undisputed military dictator of the world. DeFries doubts that Manning, now the most-hated man on Earth, can succeed in making the Patrol self-perpetuating and trustworthy. There is no way of knowing how long Manning will live, given his weak heart. The narrator concludes:
Themes
Though it deals not with fission bombs, but rather with a radioisotope dust weaponDirty bomb
A dirty bomb is a speculative radiological weapon that combines radioactive material with conventional explosives. The purpose of the weapon is to contaminate the area around the explosion with radioactive material, hence the attribute "dirty"....
, "Solution Unsatisfactory" accurately predicted many aspects of the development of nuclear arms and the dilemmas they pose, a year before President Roosevelt authorized the Manhattan Project
Manhattan Project
The Manhattan Project was a research and development program, led by the United States with participation from the United Kingdom and Canada, that produced the first atomic bomb during World War II. From 1942 to 1946, the project was under the direction of Major General Leslie Groves of the US Army...
led by General Leslie Groves
Leslie Groves
Lieutenant General Leslie Richard Groves, Jr. was a United States Army Corps of Engineers officer who oversaw the construction of the Pentagon and directed the Manhattan Project that developed the atomic bomb during World War II. As the son of a United States Army chaplain, Groves lived at a...
. Scientific advisors wrote a 1943 memo to Groves entitled "Use of Radioactive Materials as a Military Weapon":
While not part of Heinlein's Future History
Future History
The Future History, by Robert A. Heinlein, describes a projected future of the human race from the middle of the 20th century through the early 23rd century. The term Future History was coined by John W. Campbell, Jr. in the February 1941 issue of Astounding Science Fiction...
, the story also marks the first appearance of a "Patrol" in Heinlein's works. The concept of a distinct order of pilots totally dedicated to preserving the peace reappears in Heinlein's later works, including the short story "The Long Watch
The Long Watch
"The Long Watch" is a science fiction short story by Robert A. Heinlein. It is about a military officer who faces a coup d'état by a would-be dictator....
". The juvenile
Heinlein juveniles
"Heinlein juveniles" are the 12 novels written by Robert A. Heinlein and published by Scribner's between 1947 and 1958. The intended readership was teenage boys, but the books have been enjoyed by a wide range of readers...
Space Cadet
Space Cadet
Space Cadet is a 1948 science fiction novel by Robert A. Heinlein about Matt Dodson, who joins the Space Patrol to help preserve peace in the Solar System. The story translates the standard military academy story into outer space: a boy from Iowa goes to officer school, sees action and adventure,...
describes the training and indoctrination of Patrol cadets. Cadets are taught not to ask about another's country or planet of origin, and to admire and seek to emulate Rivera, a legendary Patrolman who ordered the nuclear bombing of his own hometown and died himself in the blast.
"Solution Unsatisfactory" marked the beginning of Heinlein's concern with nuclear weapons. After World War II, Heinlein believed that a nuclear arms race was an urgent problem. He wrote several works on nuclear warfare in the mid-1940s, such as "The Last Days of the United States", "How to be a Survivor", and "Pie from the Sky" but, except for "Back of the Moon," they were rejected by publishers. Heinlein wrote: In 1980, he published them in Expanded Universe along with "Solution Unsatisfactory".
Echoes in later fiction
The 1984 novel The Peace WarThe Peace War
The Peace War is a science fiction novel by American writer Vernor Vinge, about authoritarianism and technological progress. It was first published as a serial in Analog in 1984, and then appeared in book form shortly afterward. It was nominated for the Hugo Award for Best Novel in 1985...
by Vernor Vinge
Vernor Vinge
Vernor Steffen Vinge is a retired San Diego State University Professor of Mathematics, computer scientist, and science fiction author. He is best known for his Hugo Award-winning novels and novellas A Fire Upon the Deep , A Deepness in the Sky , Rainbows End , Fast Times at Fairmont High ...
features a "Peace Authority" created when military research scientists develop a device called a "bobbler" and use it to take over the world and enforce world peace in a very similar fashion.
External links
- "A Flight of Speculation" by Edward M. Wysocki, Jr.
- "Sympathy for the Devil" by Alexei Panshin