Atomic Bombs

It had not been fully developed or tested until after Germany had surrendered. 1st test was July 16, 1945. http://www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/atomictest.htm

He stated the bomb was needed to end the war.

Trueman decided to drop the bomb on Japan because if they did an invasion, the United States would lose more men and Trueman did not want to take that chance.

The atomic bomb is important because it was what ended World War II. If the bomb was not dropped there would have been many more lives lost in the war. More than 100,000 Japanese people would have been killed cause the U.S. would have invaded Japan. It was a sorta kill 1 to save 100 thing.

Germany was working on an atomic bomb, but got diverted up a blind alley of a wrong approach to the problems, so they were nowhere near as close as the Allies feared they might be to having the bomb. The great German physicist, Werner Heisenberg, headed the German bomb program. Ironically, many of the scientists working in the US bomb program had fled Nazi Germany. Some of them were Jews. If the Nazis had been less crazed these people might well have stayed home and developed the bomb for Germany.

Heisenberg had published an article in a physics journal in the mid 30s, an implication of which was that an atomic bomb was possible. Soon after Heisenberg dropped from sight in the international scientific community. It was this article that made physicists in the US think that it was quite possible that Heisenberg was at work on a bomb for Germany, and worry over this possibility was the reason Einstein and his colleagues wrote a letter to President Roosevelt warning him of this danger, which was little understood outside physics labs at the time.

it would prevent high casualties that would be caused by an invasion of mainland Japan

The U.S. dropped an atomic bomb on Nagasaki, Japan on August 9, 1945.

The mission to drop the atomic bombs on Japan to motivate Japan into surrendering was called Operation Downfall. The bombs were created in the Manhattan Project. The planes that carried the bombs were the Enola Gay and the Bocscar which were both Boeing B-29 bombers.

Atomic bombs (and all nuclear weapons) are not actually used in the sense that a country actually drops/fires/launches a nuclear weapon against a foe. Their massive destructive potential has caused them to be moved from a purely military device into the political arena.

Nuclear weapons today are political tools - that is, the possession (or implied attempt to possess) these weapons is considered a political statement, rather than a military one. As such, the quantity, location, and capabilities of a country's nuclear weapons take on significant political meaning. The ability to potentially use such weapons adds a completely new dimension to international relations.

Primarily, nuclear weaponry is used for three purposes: to discourage the use of any Weapon of Mass Destruction (nuclear, chemical, biological, toxin, etc.) by threat of immediate retaliation via nuclear arms, as a moderating influence on aggression by other nuclear-equipped countries, and as a brake (via implied threat) on non-nuclear countries attempts to acquire nuclear weaponry themselves. The second of the above has been the most successful political use, while the first has seen modest success as a strategy, and the third is mostly a failure.

The Manhattan Project itself cost over 3 billion dollars. That includes the research and enrichment of uranium. I believe each bomb cost around 30 million dollars. This is mainly due to the amount of silver used in the bombs. Since we have found cheaper material to use.

The key elements to making fission bombs are: Uranium and Plutonium. The specific isotopes of interest are: Uranium-233, Uranium-235, and Plutonium-239.

The key elements to making fusion bombs are: Hydrogen and Lithium. The specific isotopes of interest are: Hydrogen-2 (aka Deuterium), Hydrogen-3 (aka Tritium), Lithium-6, and Lithium-7.

But many other elements are needed to make a functional bomb of either type. As a very rough guess, about a quarter of the elements on the periodic table are needed somewhere in the bomb, roughly 23 different elements in total, for either type of bomb.

Crossing Southampton Road in London while taking a walk on September 12, 1933.

Aug 6, '45 - Hiroshima and Aug 9 - Nagasaki Not dropped by US troops but by USAAF ( Army Air Forces ) bombers.

The USS Indianapolis carried the trigger and radioactive core of the atomic bomb later dropped on Hiroshima (the Little Boy device). The Indy is also well known for the circumstances of its sinking, on the return voyage from dropping off the bomb components. The Indianapolis was torpedoed on 29 July, and sank quickly with the second greatest overall loss of life for any single US Navy ship sinking -- approximately 800 men in total. The Indianapolis disaster is also known for the huge number of shark related deaths as a large compliment of the crew remained alfoat in excellent survival conditions for about 3 days. It turns out that the Indianpolis' cargo had been so secret, there was no record conveyed to its destination, and thus the ship was not reported as overdue, and no rescue was started until the remaining crew were spotted on August 2 by a passing patrol plane. Shark deaths were roughly 500 souls.

The Manhatten Project was the code name of the United State's atomic weapons development program during World War II.

At the end of World War II, few questioned Truman's decision to drop the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Most Americans accepted the obvious reasoning: the atomic bombings brought the war to a more timely end. They did not have a problem with over one hundred thousand of the enemy being killed. After all, the Japanese attacked America, and not the other way around. In later years, however, many have begun to question the conventional wisdom of "Truman was saving lives," putting forth theories of their own. However, when one examines the issue with great attention to the results of the atomic bombings and compares these results with possible alternatives to using said bombs, the line between truth and fiction begins to clear. Truman's decision to use the atomic bomb on Japan was for the purpose of saving lives and ending the war quickly in order to prevent a disastrous land invasion.

When he assumed office as President he received his first briefing on the Manhatten Project. When Japan failed to respond to the Potsdam Declaration he authorized the use of atomic weapons and the Enola Gay bombed Hiroshima on 6 August 1945 about four months after he took office.

Hiroshima and Nagasaki

On August 6 and 9, 1945, the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were destroyed by the first atomic bombs used in warfare. The first atomic bomb ever to be used in a military operation was dropped on the city of Hiroshima, Japan On August 6, 1945 at 8:16:02 a.m. Hiroshima time. The bomb, affectionately named "Little Boy," exploded 1,900 feet above the courtyard of Shima Hospital, with a force equivalent to 12,500 tons of TNT. By the end of 1945, 140,000 people had died as a direct result of the bombing. Within the following five years, another 60,000 would die of bomb-related causes.

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The bomb killed men, women, and children indiscriminately. It killed both military personnel and civilians. Although the city produced military items and housed soldiers, it was not selected as a "purely military target" as President Truman had promised. There were six civilians in Hiroshima to every soldier.

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The second bomb, called "Fat Man," exploded over Nagasaki, Japan, at 11:02 a.m. on August 9, 1945. It exploded at 1,650 feet with a force of 22,000 tons of TNT. 70,000 people lost their lives in Nagasaki by the end of 1945 due to the bombing. A total of 140,00 died within two weeks.

Hiroshima and Nagasaki were bombed to end WWII.

Ended WW2. Japanese were clearly losing, but due to their culture and tradition they refused to surrender. The US in dropping the A-bomb debatably saved more lives then they killed, as without it the war in Asia would have continued.

The Soviet Union exploded their first atomic bomb for multiple reasons. Firstly, they wished to test their nuclear capabilities, and further refine their nuclear weapons. Secondly, they wished to say to the world, 'We have nuclear weapons!' This would allow them to have an extra bargaining chip in world discussions, and weakened the bargaining power of the US' nuclear weapons.

These are the only two nuclear bombs ever used in war, and with good reason. The devastation from the bombs was unfathomable, and as the extent of the destruction became public knowledge, the bombs themselves became a symbol of the atrocity of war.

Sadly, the threat of nuclear weapons seems to have faded from the public consciousness, even as the fear of terrorist attacks looms large. With all the talk of "dirty bombs" and "suitcase bombs," the fact is that more than 30,000 nuclear weapons remain in the arsenals of the eight countries that admit to having any.

Japan did not drop any atomic bombs. Rather, the US dropped two atomic bombs on them. The cities that were hit were Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

The first atomic bomb dropped in World War II was dropped by the United States, on Hiroshima, Japan. The name of the plane that dropped the first atomic bomb is Enola Gay, and it was piloted by Colonel Paul Tibbets.