STATEMENT BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES August
6, 1945 The White House Washington, D.C. Sixteen hours ago an American
airplane dropped one bomb on Hiroshima, an important Japanese Army base.
That bomb had more power than 20,000 tons of T.N.T. It had more than
two thousand times the blast power of the British "Grand Slam,"
which is the largest bomb ever yet used in the history of warfare.
The Japanese began the war from the air at Pearl Harbor.
They have been repaid many fold. And the end is not yet. With this bomb
we have now added a new and revolutionary increase in destruction to
supplement the growing power of our armed forces. In their present forms
these bombs are now in production and even more powerful forms are in
development. It is an atomic bomb. It is a harnessing of the basic power
of the universe. The force from which the sun draws its power has been
loosed against those who brought war to the Far East. Before 1939, it
was the accepted belief of scientists that it was theoretically possible
to release atomic energy. But no one knew any practical method of doing
it. By 1942, however, we knew that the Germans were working feverishly
to find a way to add atomic energy to the other engines of war with
which they hoped to enslave the world. But they failed. We may be grateful
to Providence that the Germans got the V-1's and the V-2's late and
in limited quantities and even more grateful that they did not get the
atomic bomb at all. The battle of the laboratories held fateful risks
for us as well as the battles of the air, land, and sea, and we have
now won the battle of the laboratories as we have won the other battles.
Beginning in 1940, before Pearl Harbor, scientific knowledge useful
in war was pooled between the United States and Great Britain, and many
priceless helps to our victories have come from that arrangement. Under
that general policy the research on the atomic bomb was begun. With
American and British scientists working together we entered the race
of discovery against the Germans. The United States had available the
large number of scientists of distinction in the many needed areas of
knowledge. It had the tremendous industrial and financial resources
necessary for the project and they could be devoted to it without undue
impairment of other vital war work. In the United States the laboratory
work and the production plants, on which a substantial start had already
been made, would be out of reach of enemy bombing, while at that time
Britain was exposed to constant air attack and was still threatened
with the possibility of invasion. For these reasons Prime Minister Churchill
and President Roosevelt agreed that it was wise to carry on the project
here. We now have two great plants and many lesser works devoted to
the production of atomic power. Employment during peak construction
numbered 125,000 and over 65,000 individuals are even now engaged in
operating the plants. Many have worked there for two and a half years.
Few know what they have been producing. They see great quantities of
material going in and they see nothing coming out of these plants, for
the physical size of the explosive charge is exceedingly small. We have
spent two billion dollars on the greatest scientific gamble in history-and
won. But the greatest marvel is not the size of the enterprise, its
secrecy, nor its cost, but the achievement of scientific brains in putting
together infinitely complex pieces of knowledge held by many men in
different fields of science into a workable plan. And hardly less marvelous
has been the capacity of industry to design, and of labor to operate,
the machines and methods to do things never done before so that the
brain child of many minds came forth in physical shape and performed
as it was supposed to do. Both science and industry worked under the
direction of the United States Army, which achieved a unique success
in managing so diverse a problem in the advancement of knowledge in
an amazingly short time. It is doubtful if such another combination
could be got together in the world. What has been done is the greatest
achievement of organized science in history. It was done under high
pressure and without failure. We are now prepared to obliterate more
rapidly and completely every productive enterprise the Japanese have
above ground in any city. We shall destroy their docks, their factories,
and their communications. Let there be no mistakes; we shall completely
destroy Japan's power to make war. It was to spare the Japanese people
from utter destruction that the ultimatum of July 26 was issued at Potsdam.
Their leaders promptly rejected that ultimatum. If they do not now accept
our terms, they may expect a rain of ruin from the air, the like of
which has never been seen on this earth. Behind this air attack will
follow sea and land forces in such numbers and power as they have not
yet seen and with the fighting skill of which they are already well
aware. The Secretary of War, who has kept in personal touch with all
phases of the project, will immediately make public a statement giving
further details. His statement will give facts concerning the sites
at Oak Ridge near Knoxville, Tennessee, and at Richland near Pasco,
Washington, and an installation near Santa Fe, New Mexico. Although
the workers at the sites have been making materials to be used in producing
the greatest destructive force in history, they have not themselves
been in danger beyond that of many other occupations, for the utmost
care has been taken for their safety. The fact that we can release atomic
energy ushers in a new era in man's understanding of nature's forces.
Atomic energy may in the future supplement the power that now comes
from coal, oil, and falling water, but at present it cannot be produced
on a basis to compete with them commercially. Before that comes, there
must be a long period of intensive research. It has never been the habit
of the scientists of this country or the policy of this Government to
withhold from the world scientific knowledge. Normally, therefore, everything
about the work with atomic energy would be made public. But under present
circumstances it is not intended to divulge the technical processes
of production or all the military applications, pending further examination
of possible methods of protecting us and the rest of the world from
the danger of sudden destruction. I shall recommend that the Congress
of the United States consider promptly the establishment of an appropriate
commission to control the production and use of atomic power within
the United States. I shall give further consideration and make further
recommendations to the Congress as to how atomic power can become a
powerful and forceful influence towards the maintenance of world peace.