How did the world agree to keep Antarctica for science?

Antarctica is governed by a treaty that twelve nations, several of them close to conflict over the continent, opened for signature on 1 December 1959.

After the Second World War tension rose. The United States considered a claim and ran Operation Highjump, with 13 ships and 4,700 men, to test equipment in extreme cold for a hypothetical war in the Antarctic. In 1948 it proposed that Antarctica be placed under United Nations guardianship, which Argentina, Australia, Chile, France and Norway rejected. In 1950 the Soviets said they would accept no agreement in which they were not represented, and fear that they would then claim land and bring the Cold War south led the United States to make no claim. There were incidents too: in February 1953 British royal marines landed on Deception Island and captured two Argentine sailors.

The turning point was science. The International Geophysical Year of 1957-58 drew 66 countries, and twelve of them were active in Antarctica. Scientific bases, however, increased international tension, and fear that the Cold War would spread to the continent led President Eisenhower to call those twelve to a conference. Their representatives met in sixty sessions in Washington before the treaty was ready.

It prohibits nuclear testing, military operations, economic exploitation and new territorial claims, is monitored by on-site inspections, and allows only scientific research stations as permanent structures. It was the first arms control agreement of the Cold War. Seven of the twelve signatories claim parts of the continent and five do not, and the treaty avoided the internationalization of Antarctic sovereignty. It came into force on 23 June 1961; as of 2024 it has 58 parties, 29 of them with a vote.