Fear of nuclear weapons was backed in as part of the Cold War Mutually Assured Destruction stand off doctrine - rather hard to achieve when pushing the Atoms For Peace warm fuzzy alternative.

Didn't help that nukes didn't make good civil engineering tools or help conquer space by farting out tiny bombs.

Even Carl Sagan was pushing the nuclear should not be used primal back brain reaction by over hyping (?) nuclear winter for a disarmament argument.