The Manhattan Project Essay

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.

The beginnings of the Nuclear Age started when Albert Einstein wrote to President Franklin Roosevelt warning him of a dangerous weapon the Nazis had begun researching, known as the atomic bomb. (1) Though, when President Roosevelt first read this letter, he was too preoccupied with events in Europe to be bothered with such ideas. He at the time did not take the creation of such weapon to seriously, nor did he believe America had the resources for such a task. (2) Finally, on October 19, 1939 President Roosevelt wrote back to Einstein stating that the United States had begun to research the power of uranium. (2) With the help of the British, whom reluctantly gave the United States leadership on this project, in June of 1942 the Manhattan Project had begun, though most of the world had no idea that this was even happening, not even Vice President Truman. (2)

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 difference between the two bombs was the method of detonation. The methods of fusion in both of them were the same. The positive result of using plutonium was it was much more abundant than U-235. The discovery of plutonium was made at Berkley College in California. This discovery was very important because it decreased the time it was going to take the to make the bomb by an unimaginable amount of time. Not hundreds of years, but in time to use against the Japanese before we lost the war. In about a year a workable atomic pile had been created at the University of Chicago. This project was supervised by Enrico Fermi, but he had quite an intelligent group of scientist working with him. The military part of this project was called the “Operation Silver Plate”. The leader of this mission was Lieutenant Colonel Paul W. Tibbets, Jr. The place picked for this operation was Wendover Field, Utah, and it was one of the most miserable places on earth. About late September 1944, the best of the best men in our military started arriving at Wendover Field. These men were the ingredients of the 509th squadron and together they were one of the best units ever to have been put into war. The standards for this group would almost be impossible if they were not who they were. They had to drop the bomb from about 30,000 feet and could only have 200-foot margin of error. They could only have a navigational margin

). Like in 1945 once years of life analysis and testing by 2 main man of science physicist and molecular biologist the US was able to drop 2 atomic bombs on japan in this town still not fix to the current day within the reasons for America to form atomic weapons was as a result of Nazi was creating some in different axis power in they was on there list to hit with their bombs that why America created there bomb faster and additional deadly than different they was prepared for war, however this wasn't simple it took America one hundred twenty,000 individuals in virtually two billion greenbacks within the method of creating the primary 2 atomic bombs in no one knew regarding not even the vice chairman Harry S Truman did not grasp till he became President.There wasn't one however 2 styles of atomic bombs used throughout warfare II one was gun-type fission weapon and implosion-type weapon of mass destruction.They created a gun known as skinny Man victimization element that was impractical, so that they created another one very little Boy created of uranium-235 and atom that is created of zero.7 % of natural metal.Three strategies were

After the U.S. dropped both bombs it brought an end to World War II, after that no nuclear bombs have been used in war. Many decades after, the U.S.S.R used spies to get ahold of secret information containing blueprints to an atomic bomb, and the files also showed the uranium in Eastern Europe. This then ushered in the cold war. During this time, many world superpowers would make upon 100’s of nuclear warheads. The U.S. and Soviet Union agreed to a treaty that would halt all nuclear weapons. This was called the Nuclear Non-Proliferation treaty (History.com

The Manhattan Project was to see if making an atomic bomb possible. The success of this project would forever change the world forever making it known that something this powerful can be manmade. The Manhattan Project’s success was something that had an impact on everybody involved since they helped create something with so much destructive power it could destroy a city within seconds.

On July of 1945, J Robert Oppenheimer tests the first bomb at Trinity State, near Alamogordo, New Mexico. All the scientists readied themselves to watch the detonation of this atomic bomb which stood on top of a tower. Once exploded, there was a blinding flash which could be seen from 200 miles away. It also grew up to 40,000 feet and damaged some of the homes near it that were 100 miles away. After this explosion President Truman, all the way from Postdam, Germany, declares that the project was successful.

After the end of the first world war, Germany was in a catastrophic state. With a worthless economy and a confused political scene, it was only a matter of time for Hitler to take power. He argued for revenge on the allies. This obviously was very disturbing to Americans. As the Germans prepared for war, the allies were also preparing. In 1939 the scientific community learned that the Nazi’s were on the verge of discovering the power of the atom. Out of fear of persecution, scientist Albert Einstein left Germany and Enrico Fermi left Italy. With this new knowledge that the Nazi’s were developing an atom bomb, Fermi went to Washington to express his concerns. Initially the government ignored his warning, but when Einstein wrote President Roosevelt, he took Einstein 's warning seriously and agreed to start atomic energy research. The Manhattan Project originated out of fear of world destruction. The Germans were rumored to be developing nuclear warheads, and this was the reason that Roosevelt was justified in approving the Manhattan Project. Much like in any other war, rumor are taken seriously. It is unknown if the Nazi’s actually developed a nuke. Historians

The discovery of nuclear fission in 1938 concluded that with this knowledge the second World War outcome could be determined if the Nazi’s had the ability to create a nuclear bomb. One of the scientists that discovered nuclear fission, thought if

The United States government was shocked by the news of German scientists discovering nuclear fission. The news came to the United States from Albert Einstein. Einstein found out the nuclear fission information from a German physicist named Leo Szilard. He then told it to President Franklin D. Roosevelt and urged him to start an investment toward atomic research. The research would then help construct an atomic weapon of mass destruction. Roosevelt was not especially concerned about investing in atomic weapon research because he didn 't plan on getting involved in the War.

Did you know that there are multiple types of uranium? The team of scientists who worked on the first atomic bomb used the “advanced” type U 235 instead of U 238. Many scientists worked on the bomb, but not many of them received credit. The project was called “Manhattan Project” which was based in Los Alamos, New Mexico. The people who helped with the Manhattan Project explored uranium, in result they exchanged many lives to win a war.

The idea that nuclear fission could be a significant producer of electrical power and a powerful military weapon occurred to many physicists, engineers and scientist around the world. Due to the escalating conflict in Europe, many scientist no longer published their discoveries and advancements for fear of it aiding enemy scientist. There was one difficulty encountered early on in the development of Manhattan Project, this problem was the difficulty of mining or creating the proper uranium isotope. Uranium-235 was the only isotope of uranium that underwent fission and only 0.7% of the uranium found in nature was of this isotope. More commonly uranium-238 was found, which actually inhibited the nuclear chain reaction. There were however several techniques which will be mentioned later for enriching the uranium. Do to how rare and expensive uranium-235 was it was first necessary to determine how much would be needed to create fission reactor or bomb.

There were three main sites used during the Manhattan Project to produce plutonium and enriched uranium; The Hanford site in Hanford, Washington, the Y-12 site in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, and the K-25 site in Oak Ridge as well. On January 16, 1943 General Groves selected Hanford, Washington as the site for the production of plutonium. Plutonium was identified on February 24, 1941 by Glenn T. Seaborg’s research group. It was discovered that plutonium is two times a likely to produce fission than uranium. Before General Groves decided to create a plutonium processing plant in Hanford, three production reactors were already built by engineers and the University of Chicago (atomicarchive.com). Hanford was the largest plutonium production reactor

Nuclear knowledge has existed for a long time. Nuclear Engineering U.S. Department of Energy relates, ―By 1900, the physicists knew the atom contains large quantities of energy‖ (par 11). Many others formed good theories, such as Ernest Rutherford and Einstein’s contribution with his equation E=mc^2. In 1934