Atomic Disaster?

In 1942, after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, President Franklin Roosevelt started the Manhattan Project under the Army Corps. of Engineers with Robert Oppenheimer as the leading physicist. The Manhattan Project, lasting from 1942 to 1946, was the program in the United States to develop nuclear weapons: specifically, the atomic bomb. Then, on August 6 and 9 of 1945, the US bombed Hiroshima and Nagasaki with atomic bombs devastating the cities.

Some see the bombings as a necessary end to World War II on the Asian Front. However, others saw the bomb for what it really was and not a necessity. The scientists wrote a letter explaining the known impacts of the bomb; mainly the radiation poisoning. However, the scientists also say that they do not know all of the effects such as on the environment and what role it plays after the bomb is detonated. Dr. Szilard was one of the scientists that discovered neutron emissions from uranium and, according to Einstein, "He was greatly disturbed by the potentialities involved" in using uranium for national defense. Oppenheimer quoted "I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds." Instead, the scientists were pondering the idea of nuclear power instead because they did not believe it should be used in warfare and would be more beneficial providing power to the US. In a memorandum to the President: "[We] completed the most terrible weapon ever known in human history...the world...would be eventually at the mercy of such a weapon...modern civilization might be completely destroyed."

Some citizens of the United States signed and send a petition to the president against dropping the bomb because they were concerned that "There is no limit to the destructive power which will become available in the course of their future development" and our "nation which sets the precedent of using these newly liberated forces of nature for purposes of destruction may have to bear the responsibility of opening the door to an era of devastation on an unimaginable scale." The US would be responsible for every life that ended by those bombs and anyone that falls to nuclear weapons. Was the atomic bomb the right answer?

Finally, in a draft statement dated for July 30, 1945, the author wrote: "It is an atomic bomb. It is a harnessing of the basic power of the universe. The force from which the sun draws its power has been loosed." The power of the universe. Enough said.