What's the difference between an earthquake and a nuclear bomb set off underground?
Turns out, not a whole lot. Hence the stalemate in nuclear disarmament negotiations between the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Soviet Union during the '50s; the Western powers insisted on inspection-based control systems as a means to verify compliance, while the Soviet Union deemed seismic detection equipment sufficient to verify no party was blasting without a pass.
Notwithstanding the lack of trust, it was part of a shared movement towards nuclear disarmament. There was recognition on both sides that more than a decade of nuclear testing had already created environmental repercussions that would be felt for generations, and both parties wanted to prevent a major nuclear fallout.
By July 1963, Khrushchev signaled that he was willing to talk; on the 15th, the three powers held a meeting in Moscow. After nearly a decade of back and forth, the U.S., U.K. and U.S.S.R. wasted little time in agreeing to cease testing in the air, ocean, and outer space—within 21 days, all three governments had signed the treaty.
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