In May 1955, the Soviet Union proposed a cessation of nuclear testing enforced by an international commission as part of an incremental process towards general nuclear disarmament. In that same year, US President Dwight D. Eisenhower concluded that a test ban was not in the national security interest of the United States. In December that same year, efforts to gain better understanding of the repercussions of nuclear testing culminated in the UNGA establishing a Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation.

Well-established peace-oriented organizations were highly active in protesting against nuclear weapons after the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. However, these groups, including the Nobel-prize-winning Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF), the Religious Society of Friends and the Fellowship of Reconciliation, were unable to gain much traction in the mainstream. Although, when the United Kingdom conducted its first hydrogen bomb test in 1957, nuclear testing had received considerable public attention. Soviet Ambassador Valerian Zorin noted that governments and public organizations considered nuclear testing a “burning public issue.”

New groups formed out of the peace movement devoted to addressing nuclear weapons and testing. In the West, some of the more influential groups were the US Women’s Strike for Peace, the US Committee for a SANE Nuclear Policy, the international Pugwash Conference of Scientists and the British Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament. After discovering traces of radioactive isotopes in children’s teeth in the United States and Europe, doctors and dentists together with scientists used their technical and scientific expertise in lobbying against nuclear testing.

Peace groups organized grassroots campaigns to increase public awareness of the issues surrounding nuclear testing. Women’s Strike for Peace, SANE and the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament organized petitions, protests and demonstrations in major cities. These demonstrations attracted tens of thousands of supporters and received considerable attention from the media. Attempting to raise public concern about nuclear weapons, these groups sought to establish direct contact with legislative representatives and influence government policy. The Women’s Strike for Peace and the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament created direct action wings and were willing to break trespassing laws at nuclear test facilities in order to give prominence to the exigency of the situation.