Bomb: The Race to Build—and Steal—the World's Most Dangerous Weapon

The driving force in Bomb is not simply the process of developing the weapon but the urgency behind those efforts. With the discovery of uranium fission in 1938, physicists around the world quickly realized that this could lead to a super-bomb that could win the war brewing in Europe. While both sides planned invasions and counter-attacks, scientists rushed to complete a single weapon that could make all the other battles unimportant.

While the situation likely would have led to an arms race regardless, the nature of this particular conflict raised the stakes. America and Britain correctly guessed that Nazi Germany was working on an A-bomb: They had requisitioned a uranium mine in Czechoslovakia, and they seemed preoccupied with a heavy-water plant in Norway that was vital to their research. Given Hitler’s aspirations towards world domination and obvious disregard for human life, getting the bomb first became an existential matter (Japan also had a bomb program and imperial designs, but a lack of uranium hampered its research). Meanwhile, the Soviet Union craved such a weapon to push back German invaders and perhaps to brandish at the US after the war ended.

This is the backdrop against which research into nuclear weapons unfolded.