us got uranium for the atomic bomb from new mexico.
us got uranium for the atomic bomb from new mexico.
where did the us get uranium for the atomic bomb?
new mexico
on october 9, 1941, shortly before the united states entered world war ii, president franklin d. roosevelt approved a crash program to develop the atomic bomb. the key raw material for the project was uranium, which was used as fuel for the reactors, as feed that was transformed into plutonium, and, in its enriched form, in the atomic bomb itself. there were four known major deposits of uranium in 1940: in colorado, in northern canada, in joachimsthal in czechoslovakia, and in the belgian congo. a professor at columbia university, kerr was seconded to work on the manhattan project, tasked with locating and procuring supplies of uranium. as part of this assignment, he traveled to katanga province in the belgian congo, he also visited and assessed the canadian eldorado deposit on great bear lake, and the vanadium mines of the colorado plateau. kerr's association with the manhattan project and later with the atomic energy commission continued until late in the cold war.
paul f. kerr
soviet scientists, aided greatly by soviet espionage within the manhattan project, would have been able to eventually build their first atomic bomb without exploitation of german technology and scientists. however, the contributions of the german scientists is borne out by the many ussr state prizes and other awards given in the wake of the second soviet atomic bomb test, a uranium-based atomic bomb; awards for uranium production and isotope separation were prevalent. also significant in both the first soviet atomic bomb testa plutonium-based atomic bomb which required a uranium reactor for plutonium generationand the second test, was the soviet acquisition of a significant amount of uranium immediately before and shortly after the close of world war ii. this saved them a year by their own admission.
russian alsos