The American atom: A documentary history of nuclear policies from the discovery of fission to the present
In selecting these historical documents the authors have applied three general tests: first, does the document help tell the story of the development of American nuclear policy in a nontechnical way; second, is the source primary rather than secondary, written by an actor in the drama rather than by a member of the audience; third, does the document provide coverage of the major chapters in the story. The Manhattan Project was America's $2 billion secret project to build an atomic bomb. Many documents associated with the project have come to light only in recent years. In Section II they use the letters of J. Robert Oppenheimer and the recently declassified minutes of policy committees to tell the story of how the bomb was designed and built and how the decision was made to drop the first uranium and plutonium devices on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. How did a weapon of war become the key to a peacetime industry. In considering atomic energy after World War II, they focus in Section III on the legislative enabling acts that established the Atomic Energy Commission, the short-lived dream of international control of nuclear weapons under the Baruch Plan, and the ''atoms for peace'' program of President Dwight D. Eisenhower. By 1954 the highly classified work on nuclear weapons paralleled a new development of nuclear energy and power reactors. Knowledge was shared with both private industry and other countries. The fruits of this program are considered in the later section on nuclear power.
- OSTI ID:
- 6460015
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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Related Subjects
POLICY AND ECONOMY
NUCLEAR ENERGY
HISTORICAL ASPECTS
USA
NUCLEAR POWER PLANTS
NUCLEAR WEAPONS
ATOMIC ENERGY LAWS
DECISION MAKING
ENERGY POLICY
FISSION
HIROSHIMA
NAGASAKI
NATIONAL DEFENSE
POWER REACTORS
UNITED KINGDOM
US AEC
WARFARE
ASIA
ENERGY
EUROPE
GOVERNMENT POLICIES
JAPAN
LAWS
NATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS
NORTH AMERICA
NUCLEAR FACILITIES
NUCLEAR REACTIONS
POWER PLANTS
REACTORS
THERMAL POWER PLANTS
US ORGANIZATIONS
WEAPONS
WESTERN EUROPE
290600* - Energy Planning & Policy- Nuclear Energy
290200 - Energy Planning & Policy- Economics & Sociology
293000 - Energy Planning & Policy- Policy
Legislation
& Regulation