the night, I received a message that you had responded affirmatively to my

that you might find it interesting and an opportunity for constructive

humanitarian service for you to join my staff here in Vienna. I had in mind that

your presence on our staff would attract more competent scientists to us, that you

could serve as a sort of roving ambassador of the agency." Sterling Cole

recounted his dream to Robert Oppenheimer on April the 11th 1960.

I finally woke up with the result that my sleep for the rest of the night was

pretty well ruined.

As director of the newly founded International Atomic Energy Agency,

Kohl was trying to persuade Oppenheimer, the downfall and leader of the Manhattan

project,

to join the agency. On June 22nd 1960,

Oppenheimer paid a visit to the headquarters in Vienna.

Although he never became an IAEA informal ambassador as Kohl wished,

Oppenheimer remains one of the most emblematic figures in post-war science diplomacy.

Was Oppenheimer's case unique? Definitely not.

Right after the Second World War, scientists and technical experts assumed significant and influential roles in international affairs.

The Berkner Report on Science and Foreign Relations to the US Department of State, published in 1950, made this crystal clear.

Science and technology have an increasingly significant role in the modern world.

Awareness of this fact has led to an intensive assessment by the government of the part it should play in relation there too.

The scientists on their side have become increasingly conscious of the interrelation of scientific achievement and world affairs.

International diplomatic organisations were also assuming fundamental roles in settling controversial scientific issues worldwide.

The International Atomic Energy Agency, the World Health Organisation, UNESCO and numerous United Nations specialist agencies

transformed the world through programmes of technical assistance and international scientific activities.

Political cooperation among nations became a precondition for any scientific collaboration.

Vasily Yemelyanov, Soviet representative to the first IAEA Board of Governors in 1960,

wrote in Foreign Affairs,

We have joined the agency not to compete, but to cooperate.

The involvement of diplomats proved crucial in resolving complex political and technoscientific tensions.

The scientists gave them the necessary background.

During the long drive, we had time to initiate the diplomats into the mysteries of the atom and of nuclear fission.

This was how Bertram Goldschmidt described it.

He was the Parisian physicist who became France's representative to the IAEA,

moving from Marie Curie's laboratory right to the centre of nuclear cold war politics.

But although the cold war is long over, the challenge of the recent pandemic proves that

science, technology and medicine play an even more crucial role in international affairs

and multilateral diplomatic negotiations today.

The Gordon-Kane Conference 2021 focuses on the fascinating interplay of science,

technology and international affairs after the Second World War.

By doing so, it marks the emergence of diplomatic studies of science as a field at the intersection of science and technology studies,

history of science, diplomatic history and international politics.

The Science History Institute and the Gordon-Kane Conference organiser, FAU Professor Maria Rentezi,

provide contributions that explore the ways in which science and diplomacy have been co-produced throughout the second half of the 20th century, up to the present.

Thank you.