The direction that big science projects take is driven by many things, technological virtue being but one.
In the 50's and 60's there was great interest in improving the knowledge of nuclear reaction physics: cross sections, etc. for weapons design. You could fund an unclassified project nominally aimed at creating fusion power, but get a lot of useful data for other purposes out of it.
And, the folks doing this are incurable optimists (you have to be).. I don't think there was any nefarious goal here, just an unrealistic optimism that production power was really "just over the next hill". It wasn't until the economic downturns of the 70's and 80's prompted a closer look at the economic viability, and combined with the growing awareness of the radwaste issue, it got a bit sticky.
Created on Wednesday, December 13, 2000 3:47 PM EDT by James Lux