The Manhattan Project
The Manhattan Project was the largest, most secret, and most consequential scientific-industrial undertaking in history. It grew from a letter that Albert Einstein signed in August 1939 — drafted by physicist Leo Szilard — warning Roosevelt that Nazi Germany might be developing atomic weapons and urging the US to begin its own programme. Formal organisation began with the creation of the Manhattan Engineer District in August 1942 under Army General Leslie Groves. Groves made two crucial decisions: he hired J. Robert Oppenheimer as scientific director despite FBI concerns about his left-wing associations, and he simultaneously pursued three methods of producing fissile material (electromagnetic separation at Oak Ridge, Tennessee; gaseous diffusion at Oak Ridge; and plutonium production at Hanford, Washington) rather than betting on a single approach. The Los Alamos Laboratory in New Mexico — a mesa community accessible only by unpaved road — assembled the greatest concentration of physics talent in history: Niels Bohr, Hans Bethe, Enrico Fermi, Richard Feynman, Edward Teller, James Chadwick, and dozens of others. Two bomb designs were pursued: a uranium gun-type design ('Little Boy') and a plutonium implosion design ('Fat Man'). The Trinity test on 16 July 1945 — in the New Mexico desert — produced an explosion equivalent to approximately 21 kilotons of TNT. Oppenheimer later recalled that the Bhagavad Gita verse 'Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds' came to mind. The test confirmed that both bomb designs worked; President Truman was informed while attending the Potsdam Conference. On 6 August 1945 a B-29 named Enola Gay dropped Little Boy on Hiroshima; on 9 August, Bockscar dropped Fat Man on Nagasaki. Japan surrendered on 15 August 1945. The Manhattan Project's total cost was approximately $2 billion ($28 billion in 2023 dollars).
- Year: 1942 CE
- Category: Political
