The Day We Lost the H-Bomb: Cold War, Hot Nukes, and the Worst Nuclear Weapons Disaster in History

unfounded fears, and thus to restore normal life and livelihood to the people of Palomares.

Immediately, various government agencies began stumbling over one another, releasing press statements, talking points, and question-and-answer sheets in both Washington and Madrid. The Department of Defense, trying to control the situation, quickly ordered the embassy to coordinate all publicity but permitted General Wilson and Admiral Guest to handle routine public affairs matters on their own.

The press reacted to the sudden surge of information with a mixture of bemusement and sarcasm.

Despite the official stonewalling, reporters had known the main points for weeks. “The news is now official. One of our H-bombs is missing,” said an editorial in The Boston Globe, which then compared the searchers to basketball players looking for a lost contact lens. “One U.S. official insisted that the bomb was not actually lost,” added Newsweek. “‘We just haven't found it,’ he explained.” The Washington Post and The New York Times ran a cartoon of a befuddled military man tipping his hat to two Spanish peasants. “Perdoneme,” he asks, “ha visto un — uh — H- bomb?” Duke was pleased with the new policy. But now that the radioactive contamination was public knowledge, he worried that Soviet propaganda could hurt Spain's largest industry: tourism. Together, Ambassador Duke and Manuel Fraga Iribarne, the Spanish minister of information and tourism, cooked up a publicity stunt to defuse any fears. Fraga was planning a trip to Almeria to dedicate the new parador; Duke and his family would join him at the hotel and then swim in the Mediterranean to prove it wasn't radioactive. “If I could take my children there swimming, and go in myself, why, obviously it could not be all that dangerous,” said Duke. The CBS reporter Bernard Kalb called the swim a Spanish-American effort at “aquatic diplomacy.” “There are lots of things, like money,” he said, “riding on this dip in the Med.”

Something went awry on the morning of the swim, however, and Fraga never showed up. Duke made his chilly dip without the Spanish minister, chatted with newsmen, and posed for photos on the deck of the new parador. Then he changed clothes, threw his bathing suit into the trunk of a car, and headed a few miles down the road to Camp Wilson for a scheduled briefing.

At some point, Fraga and his entourage also arrived at Camp Wilson. Tim Towell, Ambassador Duke's aide, wondered what the Spanish officials were up to. Towell saw Fraga walking along the beach with a Spanish general and some members of the Spanish press. Curiously, the group seemed to be edging toward the water. Suddenly it dawned on him: Fraga was trying to pull a fast one. “He wants to swim alone,” said Towell. “He'll be dipped if he's going to share this with the American ambassador. This is his thing.”

Towell and Duke both realized that Fraga was about to upstage the ambassador. The two men looked at each other and said, “Holy shit!” Towell tore down the beach and burst into a tent. There he found a handful of Navy divers on break, lying on their cots. Towell, huffing and puffing, asked for help.

“The American ambassador needs a bathing suit,” he said. “We gotta go swimming instantly, it's an emergency!” The divers said they had just come in from the water and their suits were dripping wet.

Doesn't matter, said Towell — we'll take what you have.

Moments later, Duke stepped into the tent, peeled off his European clothes, and wriggled into a wet bathing suit that Towell described as a “little damp jock strap.” Emerging from the tent, Duke jogged across the sand and caught up with Fraga just after he had entered the water. “Fraga's been had, so what's he to do?” asked Towell. “And in they go together.” Fraga, Duke, and a few others in the entourage splashed merrily in the sea for a few minutes, then returned to shore and chatted with reporters. Then the two men toured Palomares, greeted by cheering townspeople carrying neatly lettered signs — most likely not the handiwork of peasant farmers — praising America and General Wilson. “The humble of Palomares welcome the illustrious visitors,” read one sign. “We have blind faith in the justice of your plans,” said another. Afterward, Duke gave a short radio interview with Jay Rutherfurd of Mutual News Madrid:

Duke: It was with confidence and pleasure that my family and I enjoyed our swim here this morning. And soon thousands of visitors will follow our example and enjoy the beauties and the pleasures of this coast in Almeria.

Rutherfurd: Mr. Ambassador, have our relations with Spain been affected?

Duke: Well, Mr. Rutherfurd, they were obviously put in jeopardy initially, to the extent that confusion and fears can always disturb relations. The Spanish government, quite understandably, was concerned as well by the possibly adverse effect on tourism, Spain's most lucrative source of income, as you know. But as the facts began to emerge and fears to fade away, a new spirit entered into our relationship. In effect, we were drawn together in our adversity.

The swim was a public relations masterpiece, making news in Europe, the United States, and Latin America. An Associated Press photo of Duke and Fraga waving to the cameras made page one of The New York Times and was reprinted around the globe. American papers praised the ambassador, calling the swim daring and imaginative, a stunt that had taken guts and courage. “We think of our diplomats as men who do not mind being in hot water,” said The Dallas Morning News. “But Ambassador Duke may have been the first diplomat who had to prove the water wasn't hot.” Variety summed up the enthusiasm with this headline: “Duke's ‘Swim-in’ for Spanish Tourism Best Water Show since Aquacade.”

Letters poured in to the embassy from various luminaries:

THE WHITE HOUSE

WASHINGTON

March 9, 1966

Dear Angie:

I'm glad your bathing suit finally got wet. Seeing it splashed all over today's press reminded me that I can always count on you for the dramatic ideas. (Though it did look like you were more in danger of catching pneumonia than radioactive poisoning.)…

Jack Valenti

Special Assistant to the President

March 12, 1966

Dearest Angie—

How happy I was to see you coming out of the ocean — looking marvelous. That was such a wonderful thing of you to do — I was so proud of you. I hope you saw all the nice things that were written about you here….

Mrs. John F. Kennedy

THE INSTITUTE FOR ADVANCED STUDY

PRINCETON, NEW JERSEY

March 15, 1966

Dear Angie:

… I trust that excessive swimming has not made you radioactive. My love to Robin.

Yours ever,

Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.

Some letters arrived from lesser-known parties. Nathan Arrow, a forty-eight-year-old Spanish translator in Flushing, New York, had this to say:

March 10, 1966

Dear Mr. Ambassador:

… I can understand our Government's desire to placate and assure the local residents of the area. I think, however, that it is completely ludicrous for you and Sr. Fraga Iribarne to go bathing in the freezing Mediterranean merely to prove that the waters are not radioactive. It is hardly likely that there will [be], or would have been, a great rush of Europeans and Americans to the bare and forbidding Almeria coastline, particularly in the vicinity of Palomares and Mojacar. You and I both know, since we were there, that Palma, Formentor, Ibiza, Mahon, and many