The Devil Reached Toward the Sky: An Oral History of the Making and Unleashing of the Atomic Bomb by Garrett M. Graff ISBN 9781668092392, 1668092395 instant download

The Devil Reached Toward the Sky: An Oral History of the Making and Unleashing of the Atomic Bomb by Garrett M. Graff ISBN 9781668092392, 1668092395 instant download

On the eightieth anniversary of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings, the Pulitzer Prize finalist whose work is “oral history at its finest” (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette) delivers an epic narrative of the atomic bomb’s creation and deployment, woven from the voices of hundreds of scientists, generals, soldiers, and civilians. The building of the atomic bomb is the most audacious undertaking in human history: a rush by a small group of scientists and engineers in complete secrecy to unlock the most fundamental power of the universe. Even today, eighty years later, the Manhattan Project evokes boldness, daring, and the grandest of dreams: bringing an end to World War II in the Pacific, a conflict that already had stretched from Pearl Harbor to Guadalcanal to Leyte Gulf to Iwo Jima and Okinawa. As Marines, soldiers, sailors, and airmen fight those battles, men and women strive to discover the atom’s secrets at laboratories and plants in places like Chicago, Berkeley, Oak Ridge, Hanford, and Los Alamos. On August 6, 1945, the world discovers what the end of the war—and the new global age—will look like. Science and politics will never be the same again. The road to the first atomic bomb ends in Hiroshima, Japan, but it begins in Hitler’s Europe, where brilliant physicists following the path that Einstein blazed are forced to flee fascism and antisemitism—bringing to America their determination to harness atomic power before it falls into the Führer’s arsenal. The Devil Reached Toward the Sky traces the breakthroughs and the breakneck pace of atomic development in the years leading up to 1945, then takes us inside the B-29 bombers carrying Little Boy and Fat Man and finally to ground zero at Hiroshima and Nagasaki. From Pulitzer Prize finalist Garrett M. Graff, The Devil Reached Toward the Sky is the panoramic narrative of how ordinary people grapple with extraordinary wartime risks, sacrifices, and choices that will transform the course of history. Theorists and engineers da