Now I am Become Death, The Destroyer of Worlds

In 1935,Otto Hahn and Fritz Strassman made a discovery that would forever change the face of warfare. At the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Chemistry in Berlin, Germany. They found that if bombarded by neutrons, atoms of Uranium would split into two roughly equal parts. This process was dubbed “fission.” Hungarian physicist Leo Szilard was the first to realize that fission had the potential to release vast amounts of energy. This power could be used to rapidly boil water into steam and drive the generators in power stations. If uncontrolled, Szilard believed that atomic fission could bring about an unbelievably powerful blast capable of leveling a city. Recognizing the implications of his work, Hahn seriously considered throwing the uranium into the ocean and committing suicide to prevent his research from ever being used for destruction, according to MSN Encarta. Four years later, the American-based Manhattan Project, lead by Enrico Fermi, proved that it was possible to unlock atomic energy in a controlled way by creating a self-sustaining chain reaction. It was generally agreed in scientific circles that this reaction held near limitless benefits for mankind, but that if unchecked, could easily spell the end of civilization. In the prophetic words of Szilard, “This will go down as a black day in the history of Mankind.”Meanwhile in New Mexico, work on the atomic bomb gathered speed. In July of 1945, Robert Oppenheimer’s team tested the first actual bomb near a research facility south of Los Alamos. The heat of the explosion was so severe that sand was turned to glass at ground zero. Upon seeing the fruit of his research, Oppenheimer stoically noted, “Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.” Just three weeks after this test, the Enola Gay departed for Hiroshima with this fledgling technology stowed in the hold. Since its ominous roots in World War II, the atomic bomb hasn’t been used for much more than currency on the black market and the “end all, be all” of scare tactics. Thankfully, not just anyone can gather the elements necessary to create such ridiculously destructive weapons, or DWs. Today, there are two kinds of nuclear bombs. The first, as previously noted, is the atomic bomb. The energy source in such a bomb is a mass of radioactive material like uranium. Uranium is the heaviest naturally occurring element, and is inclined towards decomposition. It falls apart slowly, with a half-life of approximately 4.5 billion years, but can be prompted to split as proven by Hahn and Strassman. In a typical atomic bomb, a casing of TNT surrounds a mass of uranium. When the TNT explodes, it compresses the uranium so densely that the neutrons escaping from the naturally decomposing atoms can’t get free without bumping into other atoms of uranium. These lost neutrons split other atoms, loosing their neutrons and perpetuating the cycle until the radioactive fuel is depleted. Trillions of atoms of plutonium are fissioned this way, and each atom releases energy, reports an educational site on Nuclear Bombs at www.geocities.com/thesciencefiles/nuclear/bomb.htm. This chain reaction is exhausted in fractions of a second, and the damage is absurd.Since the noble discovery of the atomic bomb, a much nastier DW has come into existence. The hydrogen, or thermonuclear bomb, uses not only fission, but also the process of fusion, which has yet to be put towards peacefulness on Earth. A particularly beautiful, self-sustaining fusion reaction powers our sun. The center of this bomb is composed of two different isotopes of hydrogen. Deuterium and tritium are hydrogen atoms that have one and two extra neutrons respectively. This core of isotopes is surrounded by small atomic bombs that, when triggered, compress pairs of the hydrogen isotopes into single atoms. The new atom created is helium, which requires much less energy and one less neutron to stay together. The excess energy escapes as radiation and is much, much more powerful than your average atomic bomb. Explosions of this variety are measured in megatons, which is equivalent to a million tons of TNT. As the atoms fuse and the neutrons escape, they prompt the uranium lining the casing of the bomb to undergo fission, adding not only force, but radioactive fallout, which falls from the atmosphere after the explosion. The most powerful thermonuclear bomb that the United States has ever tested was code-named Bravo, and dropped on the Bikini Atoll a little more than fifty years ago. The fifteen-megaton blast released a fireball four miles in diameter, raining radioactive fallout on ships and islands up to 125 miles away. The explosion generated wind blowing hundreds of miles per hour and stripped the surrounding islands of all life. As powerful as that blast was, the Soviets developed plans for a 100-megaton bomb that was thankfully never tested. Recently, there have been rising concerns of nuclear aggression in the Middle East. It’s speculated that Iran and Syria are close to producing their own DWs, and would no doubt turn them on our allies in Israel. While used to end World War II, atomic weaponry could easily provide the necessary instigation for, and most likely the subsequent conclusion of, World War III. Perhaps Openheimer’s prophecy wasn’t quite as maudlin as we’d like to hope.