What do you know about the Einstein letter to Roosvelt

It is well known that on August 2, 1939, Albert Einstein wrote a letter to then President Roosevelt informing him of recent developments in the field of atomic research and the potential for developing a weapon based on that research. What is not as well known, however, is the history of how that letter came to be written and what happened after it was sent.


In the early 1930s, as Hitler was coming to power in Germany, many Jewish scientists began to emigrate to other countries. Einstein was one of them, moving first to Princeton, New Jersey in 1933. He kept abreast of developments in atomic research and was disturbed by the possibility that the Nazis might develop a weapon using this new technology.


In 1938, German chemists Otto Hahn and Fritz Strassmann discovered nuclear fission, which is the process of splitting an atom into smaller particles. This discovery set off a race among physicists around the world to see who could develop a working atomic bomb first.

Einstein became friends with two other leading physicists working on this problem, Leo Szilard and Enrico Fermi. Together they realized that an atomic bomb was indeed possible and that the Nazis were probably working on one too. They also realized that if such a weapon were developed, it would be catastrophic for humanity.

In 1939, Szilard drafted a letter to Roosevelt urging him to start an American atomic bomb project before the Nazis could develop their own. Einstein agreed to sign the letter even though he knew it might make him unpopular with the American public because he was a pacifist.

The letter warned Roosevelt that "it may become possible to set up a nuclear chain reaction in a large mass of uranium, by which vast amounts of energy will be released." It urged him to provide funding for research into this possibility "on an adequate scale."

The letter had an immediate effect. Roosevelt created an advisory committee on uranium and authorized $6,000 for research (a large amount of money at that time). In 1941, construction began on a secret government facility in Los Alamos, New Mexico where work on the atomic bomb would eventually take place.


Einstein never worked on the development of the atomic bomb himself but his letter played a vital role in its creation. After the war, he expressed regret over this decision saying "Had I known that the Germans would not succeed in producing an atomic bomb, I would have never lifted a finger."

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