Atomic Bomb

On August 6, 1945, the world changed forever. On that day the United States of America detonated an atomic bomb over the city of Hiroshima. Never before had mankind seen anything like. Here was something that was slightly bigger than an ordinary bomb, yet could cause infinitely more destruction. It could rip through walls and tear down houses like the devils wrecking ball. In Hiroshima it killed 100,000 people, most non-military civilians. Three days later in Nagasaki it killed roughly 40,000. The immediate effects of these bombings were simple. The Japanese government surrendered, unconditionally, to the United States. The rest of the world rejoiced as the most destructive war in the history of mankind came to an end. All while the survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki tried to piece together what was left of their lives, families and homes. Over the course of the next forty years, these two bombings, and the nuclear arms race that followed them, would come to have impact on almost every man, woman and child on this Earth, including people in the United States. The atomic bomb would pierce every fabric of American life. Historians have called this period in our history for the way it has changed and guided our world politics, relations, and culture.

The entire history behind the bomb itself is embedded in Twentieth Century physics.   Scientists now had a clear picture of what the atomic bomb world was like. They new the structure and the makeup of atoms, as well as how they behaved. During the 1930’s it became apparent that there was an alot of energy that would be released. Scientists began to realize that if captured, this energy could be something bigger than ever before seen to human eyes. They also saw that this energy could possibly be harnessed into a weapon of amazing power.

A letter from Albert Einstein, about the possibilities of creating a controlled nuclear chain reaction, and that harnessing such a reaction could produce a bomb of...