In order to win the Second World War and overtake the Germans from creating a weapon of mass destruction, the United States (US) together with Canada and the United Kingdom (UK) launched the Operation Manhattan, also known as the Project Manhattan. The said operation was designed to create the most destructive bombs ever invented during those times. The operation resulted to the creation of the world first atomic bomb which helped end WWII. It should also be noted that the operation was designed to spy on the German’s nuclear weapons project.
It was in the desert of New Mexico at the Los Alamos laboratory where the first ever nuclear bomb was made. It should be noted that this laboratory is just one of the many laboratories involved in the Manhattan project. This laboratory was under the directorship of J. Robert Oppenheimer. It was therefore, under his direction as a theoretical physicist that the bomb was created. The bomb was named Little Boy, and it was the one dropped at Hiroshima, Japan. The bomb’s explosion was equivalent to the explosion of 15 kilotons of TNT that wrecked the city of Hiroshima. The extent of the damage caused by the bomb showed the Japanese the superiority of the Allied’s weaponry. The fear of the nuclear bomb impacted the outcome of the war in favor of the Allied Forces which was led by the US.
The success of creating Little Boy through Operation Manhattan was never possible without sacrifices. In 30 July 1945, U.S.S. Indianapolis was sunk by torpedoes from Japanese submarines. The U.S.S. Indianapolis was heading towards New Mexico carrying some of the parts for the construction of little boy. Almost all of its crew members died.
Bibliography
Atomic Heritage Foundation. “J. Robert Oppenheimer.” Atomic Heritage. Last Modified 2016. http://www.atomicheritage.org/profile/j-robert-oppenheimer.
Bob Hackett and Sander Kingsepp. "Submarine I-58: Tabular Record of Movement". combinedfleet.com. Last Modified 2008. http://www.combinedfleet.com/I-58.htm.
The Manhattan Engineer District. "The Atomic Bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki". Project Gutenberg. Last Modified 2016.http://www.docstoc.com.
