This was a book I read a long time ago when I was a history major at a major university. With the release of a movie about Oppenheimer, I thought it might be nice to revisit one of the more interesting aspects, or should I say, elements of the Second World War. This is not a book of light reading. The majority of this book is a history lesson on physics. This was something I enjoyed but then again, I have a strong interest in the history of physics in the early 20th century. This is good stuff with some of the most brilliant minds of the twentieth century all focused on trying to end the war. They will forever change the world. The second main theme in the book is the project management process of the Manhattan Engineering District Project. It clearly shows that Oppenheimer was as much a genius in physics as he was in administering a massive project. General Lesly Groves was a master at the art of project management. In fact, he wrote his own book on the topic many years after the war. I found the personalities with both topics fascinating and could only imagine that dealing with such strong personalities and minds it was a very difficult situation to manage the resources and people to encourage the development of the bomb. Obviously, the remaining theme, and this is strangely a smaller portion of the book concerns the test at Trinity and then the decision-making process to attack Japan with the Bomb. The actual bombing of Japan is covered a space number of pages as compared to the pages devoted to the making of the bomb. I suspect that was the point of the author. This book is one hell of a read. I do have some minor issues I wonder if have been edited out of new version of the book. But none-the-less the book is nearly thirty years old and holds its weight quite well. Considering it’s over 1,000 pages, that’s a lot of weight. Realistically speaking this is a magnum opus of a work. But one expects that from Richard Rhodes. When he explores a topic, it’s done without leaving anything left on the table. He is a very strong writer and explores big topics in an approachable manner. If you are interested in this topic, I would suggest reading American Prometheus. This may be the finest history book I have ever read and would match perfectly with The Making of the Atomic Bomb. Between the two you will have a solid foundation in the topic and a great understanding of the political and military changes that faced the world after August of 1945. If you want to know more about how the project was managed, then you might want to read Now It can be Told by General Leslie Groves. If you want a more personal perspective of the bombing, then Enola Gay by Col. Paul Tibbits is an excellent read.

When this book was published 25 years ago it was immediately recognized as a true classic, a history that was unlikely to be ever surpassed for the sheer amount of detail in it, the amazing breadth of the narrative and the spellbinding language and almost epic style that Rhodes brought in describing an earth-shattering event in human history. 25 years later this fact still rings true and it is inconceivable that anything of this caliber can ever be written. The new anniversary edition has a poignant foreword by Rhodes in which he traces the history of the book, examines our nuclear world and makes a heartfelt and yet commonsense plea for the ultimate abolition of these weapons of mass destruction. There are three things about the book which make it a timeless classic. The first is the sheer, staggering amount of meticulous research and attention to detail that Rhodes brings to his narrative. One simply marvels at the wealth of sources he must have plumbed and the time he must have spent in making sense of them, the mountains of material he must have assimilated and sorted and the number of people he must have interviewed. This book stands as a model of exhaustive research on any topic. A related aspect is the immense breadth and sweep of events, people and places that Rhodes covers. He paints on a canvas that's expansive enough to accommodate everything from quantum mechanics to the human psyche. In this book he doesn't just give us the details of the first atomic bombs but also holds forth on, among other things: the fascinating political and military personalities of the era (FDR, Truman, LeMay), a history of physics in the first half of the twentieth century, ruminations on war and peace including accounts and interpretations of key events during both World Wars, an account of anti-Semitism in Europe, the beginnings of "Big Science" in the United States, the psychological aspects of scientific personality, the moral calculus of bombing, the political history of Europe between the wars and the detailed engineering that went into building weapons of war. There are sections on each of these topics and more, and even the digressions are deep and riveting enough to temporarily immerse the reader into an alternative topic (for instance, a six page account on Jewish history and persecution transports the reader). Long paragraphs of direct quotation allow the characters to speak in their own words. What is remarkable is that Rhodes makes the material utterly gripping in spite of the extraordinarily broad coverage and the level of detail and holds the reader's attention from beginning to end through an 800 page work. This is an achievement in itself. The second aspect of this book that makes it such a fantastic read is the elegant, clear explanation of the science. It is no easy feat to describe the work of Rutherford and Oppenheimer on nuclear physics while at the same time dissecting the political manipulations of Churchill and Roosevelt. Yet Rhodes accomplishes a beautifully simplified (but not oversimplified) version of the momentous scientific ideas developed during the early twentieth century. He seems to have read the original papers on the neutron, radioactive transformations and nuclear fission and these sources are thoroughly documented in the extensive bibliography; key experiments and theories unravel into clear explanations supported by quotes from the original participants. In fact the first half of the book would be a first-rate introduction to the development of atomic physics and the life and times of brilliant scientists like Fermi, Heisenberg, Rutherford, Bohr, Chadwick, Einstein and the Curies who contributed to this discipline. These remarkable scientists are really at the center of Rhodes's account and their personalities and work come alive under his pen. This was physics during its most glorious age of discovery and nobody knew just how enormously it would impact politics and society; indeed, one of Rhodes's goals is to demonstrate how even the purest of science can have the most far-reaching practical and social ramifications. The work of all these scientists is set in revealing detail against the backdrop of growing anti-Semitism and political turmoil in Europe, and their subsequent emigration to the United States and England constitutes a very important chapter in this story. But the introduction of nuclear energy was primarily an act of science, and Rhodes excels in describing this science in patient and marvelous detail. Finally, what ensures this book's place in history is Rhodes's mesmerizing prose, of the kind employed by the select few historians and novelists like Shakespeare, Tolstoy and Herodotus who opened our eyes to world-changing historical events and to the human condition. In Rhodes's hands the making of the atomic bomb turns into an epic tale of triumph and tragedy akin to the Greek tragedies or the Mahabharata. He brings a novelist's eye to his characters and portrays them as actors in a heroic drama of victory and woe; a great example is the unforgettable opening paragraph of the book in which the physicist Leo Szilard first thinks of a chain reaction while waiting for a traffic light in London. The leading lights of the narrative are Niels Bohr and Robert Oppenheimer, brilliant men who also saw deep into the future. And there are many others, human beings laid bare in all their glorious folly, frailty and greatness, struggling to comprehend both natural and human forces. There are no saints and sinners here, only complex humans struggling to understand and control forces that are sometimes beyond their immediate comprehension, often with unintended consequences. Rhodes relentlessly drives home the point that man's greatest gifts can also be the cause of his greatest evils. He makes it clear that science, politics and human nature are inextricably linked and you cannot perturb one without perturbing the other. Taming this combustible mix will be a struggle that we will always grapple with. I first read "The Making of the Atomic Bomb" about fifteen years ago and consider it the most influential book I have ever come across. I am a scientist and the book completely changed my understanding of the inextricable relationship between science and society. Since then at any given moment I have about three copies of the book on my shelf, ready to be lent or gifted to anyone I feel might be interested. I consider it one of the best chronicles ever written about what human beings are capable of, both as creators and destroyers. In the making of the atomic bomb are lessons for all of humanity.