Decision to Drop the Atomic Bomb: By Jason Chamberlin Essay

There were serious issues of security of documents, due to failure to lock up (Wood 4). <br><br>The one serious incident was the hiring of Klaus Fuchs. He was later found, and convicted of obtaining secret documents and sending them to the Soviet Union. A competent and hardworking scientist himself, Fuchs enabled the Soviet Union to create their own atomic bomb (Beyer 45). <br><br>Names were not allowed to be mentioned outside of the laboratory. Everybody was a "sir" or "mister" instead of their own name (Wood 4). Unless they worked at the lab themselves, wives knew nothing of their husbands' research (Wood 4).<br><br>Decisions to drop the atomic bomb went through several personalities, yet ultimately rested upon president Truman. The man whose decisions created the Manhattan Project, never lived to see the results of his labor. FDR died on April 12, three months before the first successful Trinity test (Beyer 56). The responsibilities were soon placed upon Truman, the next president. Truman knew nothing about the bomb and its effects yet hastily decided that the bomb be used on Japan, considering Germany was no longer a target with the war in Europe over. Initiated by Szilard, a petition was made to offer the opinion that the bomb should be used only if Japan refused to surrender, even after being informed of the bomb's destructive capabilities

The Manhattan Project was a secret problem barely anyone knew about.Many of the scientists that were involved with the Manhattan Project heard about the Axis powers gaining knowledge of how to make nuclear weapons that could destroy a whole nation.The Manhattan Project produced two atomic bombs that were dropped on Japan.The atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.Hiroshima was chosen as the target for the first atomic bomb because it was a large port city with an army base. The bomb dropped on Nagasaki missed its target by over a mile.

It became known that the German knew how to create an atomic bomb and FDR created a committee to study and create atomic bombs, named the Manhattan Project.The Manhattan Project was significant to the war because it led to the end of World War II and caused the Japanese to surrender to the Americans. The amount of people working together along with the cost and time which led to advancements in technology that was far ahead of any enemy. The creation of the bombs delivered a push in the advancement of science, innovation, designing, military and the entire of society into another age. It drew out the powerhouse that we consider today to be the United States of

The dropping of the Atomic Bomb changed not only warfare forever, but also all international relations. With that being said, the decision to do so was one of the biggest decisions made by any government in the history of time. Nuclear warfare was way more destructive and way faster than any other form of warfare preceding. With the United States seemingly always viewed to be “the good guys” it is puzzling that this country is the same one who killed hundreds of thousands of people all at once and essentially ruined not one but two entire cities within minutes of dropping two single bombs. This decision was not taken lightly, and with basically two schools of thought, liberalism vs. realism, insisting to do so or not to do so, and realism won out. Realism and the many counterparts that strengthen this school of thought is what drove the decision to go ahead and drop the atomic bomb.

“ The atom bomb was no ‘great decision.’ It was merely another powerful weapon in the arsenal of righteousness.” This quote was said by Harry S. Truman the first President who used an atomic bomb. The program that was able to create this monstrous power was known as the Manhattan Project. Creating this weapon was their main priority. The United States was in the midst of World War 2. The atomic bomb is considered to be the main factor that ended that war. It was a race against the multiple enemies of the United States, to be the first to acquire this power and use it when necessary. The Manhattan Project was kept strictly confidential and, created the foundation of the future and more powerful nuclear weapons to come.

The process of building the two atomic bombs was long and hard. The Manhattan project employed 120,000 people, and cost almost $2 billion. Although there were 120,000 Americans working on the project only a select group of scientist knew of the atomic bomb development. Vice president Truman never knew about the development of the bombs until he became president. The axis powers did not know what was going on with the development of the atomic bomb; there was a soviet spy in the project. The soviet spy was Klaus Fuchs, and he had become one of the few people who knew of the bombs.

Throughout the Roosevelt administration and later through the Truman administration, it became clear that both had the distinct focus of ending World War II at the earliest possible time. This is a common theme identified throughout J. Samuel Walker’s Prompt and Utter Destruction. While some countries had put moderate effort into researching atomic power and how it could affect the war, the United States was the only country capable of putting full effort into researching and creating an atomic bomb that could be utilized during the war. Following warnings from scientists that informed Roosevelt of the possibility of the Germans making progress on their knowledge of nuclear energy, Roosevelt assigned a lofty and difficult project to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. This project soon became known as “the Manhattan Project” due to the engineer district that was formed to design and build this bomb being originally headquartered in New York. The Manhattan Project was established at a time in the war when the United States was uncertain of its outcome. After the first successful, self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction took place in a squash court at the University of Chicago, the idea of an atomic bomb became more feasible. However, while the idea became more feasible, the transition from experimental knowledge to designing an actual bomb was a huge step that involved many uncertainties and troubles. Although the Manhattan Project was formed during a period of uncertainty, the government had high hopes of the newly formed project, but despite these high hopes, the Manhattan Project faced seemingly insurmountable obstacles as it moved from experimental knowledge to designing the bomb, the most prominent being the design for the new technology and the role the bomb would play in the realm of global diplomacy.

The secret construction was named after the birth place of where the spark was lit by many refugee physicists in the United States. The construction was slowly organized after German scientist had discovered nuclear fission, which worried the US that Hitler would try to create a fission bomb. With the idea of the Germans making the first atomic bomb hanging over our heads, Leo Szilard and many other scientist had urged Albert Einstein to write a letter to the president regarding the need for more help on the research and creation of the bomb. His letters turned out to be a success and President Roosevelt established the Manhattan Project and the physicists wasted no time in finding answers to the questions on how neutrons were emitted into fusion and what elements wouldn’t capture

Necessity is the mother of invention. Michael Blow wrote in his book, The History of the Atomic Bomb, that the United States was building an atomic weapon for the main purpose of beating the Germans to the creation of the bomb (95-96). After uranium was used to create atomic fission in Berlin in 1939, Albert Einstein and other scientists wrote a letter to Roosevelt, talking him into government funding for atomic research in America (Foner and Garraty, “Manhattan” n. pag.). In a bit of irony, American leaders believed that the Germans, in the race to create the ultimate weapon, were beating them. In actuality, however, they never got far in their research, and America defeated them by a sizeable amount (Blow 96). In the United States, research for the “Manhattan Project,” the code name for the secret project to use atomic energy to create a bomb, expanded all around the country. This included universities such as Columbia, Princeton, California, and Chicago. While the research had been independent and government funded up until the middle of 1942, the army took over guidance of the project at that point. The possibility of an atomic bomb had become too realistic to keep the research in the private sector (Foner and Garraty, “Manhattan”).

What is the Manhattan Project?The point of the project was for the U.S to design and create nuclear weapons.The project was running slow until August 1942,where the U.S army took over.The U.S army changed the name of the project to The Manhattan Engineer District (MED)gen.Leslie R.Groves was

The country was still involved in the Pacific theater of World War II and would be for another several months. A larger problem Truman inherited was whether to continue the development of the top secret atomic bomb. Truman did not learn of the Manhattan Project until weeks after the President’s death. On April 24, Henry Stimson, the Secretary of War at the time, sent a coded note to President Truman requesting that the two of them meet and discuss a pressing matter regarding foreign relations. The next day, Stimson arrived at the White House with Brigadier General Leslie Groves, the director of the Manhattan Engineer District.

Many of these men being from New Mexico. Theoretical Physicist Robert Oppenheimer, the leader of this project, led the scientists to success, after about three or four years, in 1945, the first bomb was ready for testing. Since this type of bomb had never been created before, no one was really sure of what would happen. They would soon find out.

After Roosevelts death, Harry Truman became the 33rd president of the United States, where his Presidency is famous for his war-ending actions against Japan. (Whitehouse, Harry). Truman was put in the position to choose if an atomic bomb should be dropped upon Japan to trigger quick surrender from the Japanese. To this day, people question if dropping the atomic bombs was necessary, and if so, to what extent? (nsarchive, The End of World War II)

General Groves and Robert Oppenheimer took the lead with a series of officials and scientist for the initial test. Scientists seemed to be elated at the project, because they expended so much energy on this project that even Oppenheimer, he climbed the tower to give the bomb its final inspection. Once the inspection was complete all of the personnel moved to a protected observation

Earlier in the war, in 1942, the US conducted a secret military project called the Manhattan Project. The making of the first atomic bomb. Fears that Nazi Germany would