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Anglo-American Atomic Cooperation 1940-1948

Gruffudd Llewelyn Ifor200861990

History (V100)Dr Michael Hopkins

Word count: Submitted on May 18th, 2015

Contents

List of Figures………………………………………………………………....……3Introduction………………………………………………………………..………..4Chapter 1: The changing nature of cooperation…………………………..……9Chapter 2: Collaboration to non-cooperation………………………….....……33Conclusion……………………………………………………………......…….…44Bibliography………………………………………………...……………………..48

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List of figures

Figure 1 - A simplified chart showing the organisational structure of the Manhattan Project from L. R. Groves, Now It Can Be Told: The Story of the Manhattan Project (New York: Harper, 1962), p.2.

Figure 2 - Map showing the locations of the Manhattan Project’s main sites. <http://content.wow.com/wiki/Manhattan_District> [accessed 2 May 2015]

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Introduction

“Great events have happened. The world is changed and it is time for sober

thought. It is natural that we should take satisfaction in the achievement of our

science, our industry, and our Army in creating the atomic bomb, but any

satisfaction we may feel must be overshadowed by deeper emotions.

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The result of the bomb is so terrific that the responsibility of its possession

and its use must weigh heavily on our minds and on our hearts. We believe

that its use will save the lives of American soldiers and bring more quickly to

an end the horror of this war which the Japanese leaders deliberately started.

Therefore, the bomb is being used.

No American can contemplate what Mr. Churchill has referred to as ‘this

terrible means of maintaining the rule of law in the world’ without a

determination that after this war is over this great force shall be used for the

welfare and not the destruction of mankind.”

- H. L. Stimson, ‘Memorandum for the press’, August 9, 19451

The detonation of the atomic bombs ‘Little Boy’ and ‘Fat Man’ over the

Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki by the United States in August

1945 remains the only use of nuclear weapons in the history of warfare. The

unprecedented scale of the destruction caused has led to prolonged disputes

over the morality and wisdom of the use of these bombs, and continues to

divide opinions today.

Over the course of my dissertation I will explore the events that led up to this

cataclysmic course of action, as well as those that followed it, examining

closely the atomic cooperation between Great Britain and the United States of

America. I will assess the closeness of the relationship and deduce whether it

1 Quoted in H. L. Stimson and M. Bundy, On Active Service in Peace and War (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1948), p. 376.

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was a positive affiliation that benefited both countries in the long run, while

also observing the nature of the communication between them. While the

Manhattan Project is largely portrayed as an American achievement, British

scientists and their work had a significant influence on it. Up until late 1941,

British research was substantially ahead of that of the United States, and

British scientists made crucial breakthroughs that paved the way for further

discoveries. The Frisch-Peierls memorandum, for example, provided the

catalyst for an increased sense of urgency in their research, and led to the

creation of the MAUD committee, whose reports later inspired President

Roosevelt to approve an American atomic bomb project.

My study seeks to contribute to the existing literature by building on existing

works and filling a gap in the knowledge. By emphasising Britain’s role in the

Anglo-American atomic relationship of the 1940s, I will focus on the

importance of the early atomic research and the effect that it had later on. My

work is focused on the period 1940-48, as it is offers a clear idea of the

beginning and end of this period of Anglo-American atomic cooperation. The

period starts with Frisch-Peierls memorandum of 1940, which founded the

basis of early British atomic research, and concludes at the Modus Vivendi of

1948, which saw the termination of the wartime agreements. While limiting the

period to 1940-46 and ending my work with the McMahon act of August 1946

was a possibility, I chose instead to finish with the Modus Vivendi, as I feel

that it is an agreement that not only signifies the end of this period of atomic

cooperation, but also the beginning of a new one, as it grants Britain access

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to new atomic information that would prove important to their own

independent atomic bomb project.2

My work shall be divided into two chapters and will be arranged

chronologically, centring on the Quebec Agreement of August 1943. The first

chapter will look at the early collaborative relationship between Britain and the

United States, comparing and contrasting the changes in attitude that both

countries experienced as their roles changed during the early years of the

war. This chapter shall be the main focus of my work, as it covers a period in

which a significant power swing occurred in the Anglo-American relationship. I

will emphasise each nation’s individual desire for collaboration, firstly the

United States in 1941, and then the British in 1942, whilst also interpreting the

significance of the sea of mutual suspicions and misgivings that enveloped

atomic relations at the time. This chapter will explore the significance of the

early progress made by the British atomic research programme, before

moving on to assess the series of events that ultimately led to a collaborative

agreement between Great Britain and the United States.

My second chapter will begin with the Quebec Agreement of 1943, which saw

both nations agreeing “to bring the Tube Alloys project to fruition at the

earliest moments.”3 This agreement outlined the terms of the coordinated

development of the basic science and advanced engineering related to

nuclear energy and weapons. As a result, British atomic research was

subsumed into the Manhattan Project, signalling the beginning of a truly

2 “Modus Vivendi” of 1948: accord between UK, US and Canada on cooperation in field of atomic energy, NA, PREM 11/786.3 Copy of Quebec Agreement 1943, National Archives (hereafter NA), FO 800/540.

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combined effort. The second chapter will then look at the atomic relationship

between Britain and America throughout the rest of the war, which culminated

in the dropping of the atomic bombs ‘Fat Man’ and Little Boy’ on Hiroshima

and Nagasaki respectively. While the bombing of these Japanese cities

signalled the end of the Second World War, it did not signal the immediate

end of the Anglo-American atomic relationship. I will consider the

repercussions and consequences of the use of the atomic bomb, and the

effect that it had on the relationship between the two countries, and how

Anglo-American atomic collaboration was gradually disbanded. The Atomic

Energy Act of 1946, or the McMahon Act, which placed control of the nuclear

technology developed by the Manhattan Project firmly in American hands will

be examined closely, as it was a significant indicator of how the relationship

would deteriorate over the next fifteen months. I will close the chapter with a

focus on the Modus Vivendi of January 1948, in which the United States

signalled their intent to terminate the secret agreements that had been in

place since the war, as they believed them to be constrictive and in conflict

with their own interests.4 Upon agreeing on the Modus Vivendi, Britain and

America signalled the end of their first collaborative relationship, and gave

way to the birth of the next one.

While the United States was the driving force behind the success of the

Manhattan Project during the Second World War, it was Britain’s early

breakthroughs in atomic research that made the atomic bomb project

possible. This paper will argue that it was the early British work that led to the

4 “Modus Vivendi” of 1948: accord between UK, US and Canada on cooperation in field of atomic energy, NA, PREM 11/786.

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success of Anglo-American atomic cooperation, and that it was American

isolationist behaviour towards the end of the period that led to the breaking up

of the relationship.5

Chapter One

The changing nature of cooperation

At the outbreak of war in 1939, physicists on both sides were fully aware of

the potential of nuclear fission, but remained unsure as to how it could be

utilised in a bomb. Although there was nothing to show that it was impossible,

5 J. Baylis, Anglo-American Defence Relations 1939-1984: The Special Relationship (London: Macmillan, 1984), p. 32.

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neither was there incontrovertible evidence that it was possible.6 In January,

Austrian physicist Otto Robert Frisch had experimentally confirmed Otto Hahn

and Fritz Strassman’s discovery of nuclear fission, but the prospect of using it

in warfare remained a distant fantasy. Charles Percy Snow, the editor of

popular British journal Discovery, wrote in September 1939 that if the idea

were practicable it would be a watershed moment for scientific influence on

warfare.7 The general attitude towards the feasibility of utilising nuclear fission

as a weapon can be summed up in the MAUD Report of 1941, which states

that those involved in the MAUD committee “entered the project with more

scepticism than belief”.8 However, the further that atomic research

progressed, the more that scepticism began to wane, and as the possibility of

creating weapons of mass destruction began to look real.

The completion of the Frisch-Peierls memorandum in March 1940 provided a

clear technical exposition of a nuclear weapon for the first time, and with it a

real sense of urgency into British research. Otto Frisch and Rudolf Peierls,

two refugee scientists working at the University of Birmingham, recognised

the destructive capability that an atomic bomb would possess, and believed

that it was imperative that research efforts be increased. In their report they

“suggested how U-235 could be separated, analysed the critical size of a

bomb, discussed how it could be detonated, and predicted the enormous

radiation effects”, all of which served to catch the eye of a certain Henry

Tizard, who was the chairman of the Committee on the Scientific Survey of Air

6 L. A. Turner, Reviews of Modern Physics, Vol. 12, No. 1 (January 1940)7 C.P. Snow, ‘A New Means of Destruction?’ Discovery, New Series, Vol. II, No. 18 (September 1939), p. 443.8 Report of M.A.U.D. Committee, NA, AB 1/238

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Warfare (CSSAW).9 Margaret Gowing stated in her 1964 work, Britain and

Atomic Energy, that it was the “first memorandum in any country which

foretold with scientific conviction the practical possibility of making a bomb

and the horrors it would bring”.10 Gowing’s glowing assessment of the Frisch-

Peierls memorandum underlines its importance in its field. Without any

experimental aid, these two scientists had been able to correctly predict the

applied possibility of harnessing nuclear fission to create a bomb, bringing up

and answering important new questions, such as “What fraction of collisions

between neutrons and uranium-235 nuclei would lead to fission?”11 German

physicists working on a similar project for the Nazi government did not ask the

same questions at all, and subsequently made little progress in their

endeavours. Indeed, the noted theoretical physicist Werner Heisenberg

refused to believe that an atomic bomb was possible, even after it was

reported that the Allies had dropped one on Japan. In a conversation with

Otto Hahn, who discovered nuclear fission, he stated:

“I am willing to believe that it is a high pressure bomb and I don’t believe that

it has anything to do with uranium, but that it is a chemical thing where they

have enormously increased the whole explosion.”12

Frisch and Peierls’ work paved the way for further progress in atomic

research, showing an incredible scientific breadth that was unparalleled at the

time. The questions they raised and answered in their memorandum were 9 A. J. Pierre, Nuclear Politics: The British Experience with an Independent Strategic Force, 1939-70 (London: Oxford University Press, 1972), p.14.10 M. Gowing, Britain and Atomic Energy, 1939-45 (London: Macmillan, 1964), p. 42.11 Ibid.12 L. Groves, Now It Can Be Told: The Story of the Manhattan Project (New York: Harper, 1962), p. 334.

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unprecedented in their field, as evidenced by the fact that the Germans did

not come close to answering them over the course of the war. It should also

be noted that the Americans did not make the same queries for months

afterwards, and even then it was only after the British work was made

available. Stephane Groueff states that Peierls’ confidence that an atomic

bomb was possible “had been an important factor in convincing American

scientists in the early days.”13

In the conclusion to their memorandum, Frisch and Peierls stated that “it must

be realized that no shelters are available that would be effective and that

could be used on a large scale.” Making the assumption that the Germans

were already in the process of building an atomic bomb, they made it clear

that they believed that the most effective defence would be a counter-threat

with a similar bomb. Therefore, they strongly advocated a significant increase

in atomic research, and for production to start on a weapon as soon as it was

possible, stressing its extreme urgency.14

Their memorandum was passed on to Henry Tizard via Marcus Oliphant, who

was the professor of physics at the University of Birmingham. Tizard then sent

it on to G. P. Thomson, who was in charge of uranium research within the

CSSAW. This ultimately led to the establishment of the MAUD committee to

investigate the feasibility of producing an atomic bomb. Upon reading the

Frisch-Peierls memorandum, Thomson asked the CSSAW for permission to

13 S. Groueff, Manhattan Project: The Untold Story of the Making of the Atomic Bomb (Boston: Little Brown, 1967), p. 209.14 Frisch-Peierls Memorandum, March 1940, reproduced at <http://www.atomicarchive.com/Docs/Begin/FrischPeierls.shtml> [accessed 26 May 2015]

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discuss it with Professor John Cockcroft, who worked for the Ministry of

Supply, and Professor Oliphant.15 Informal enquiries were made via Professor

A. V. Hill, who was an attaché to the British Embassy in Washington DC, to

see how American atomic research was progressing.16 The news from the US

was that the Americans believed that research into uranium, whilst most

interesting scientifically, was not deemed a priority as a line of research in

wartime. Despite these misgivings, a uranium sub-committee of the CSSAW

was set up, with Thomson as its chairman. By June, the CSSAW no longer

existed, and the committee existed independently within the Ministry of

Aircraft Production. However, even before its independence from the CSSAW,

it was decided that a less conspicuous name was required for the committee,

and following the misinterpretation of a message from Danish physicist Niels

Bohr to his former colleague Otto Frisch, the code name ‘MAUD’ was decided

upon.17

The MAUD committee met for the first time on the 10th of April, and began its

research on fast fission and isotope separation. As well as G. P. Thomson,

the committee consisted of Marcus Oliphant, John Cockcroft, Philip Moon,

James Chadwick, and Patrick Blackett. Despite the fact that it was their paper

that had inspired the creation of the MAUD committee, Frisch and Peierls

were excluded from it on the basis that refugees could not be included in

scientific wartime work. While Peierls had become a naturalised citizen in

15 Gowing, Britain and Atomic Energy, p.43.16 Pierre, Nuclear Politics, pp. 13-4.17 Niels Bohr, who had undertaken some important research on uranium, sent Frisch a telegram from German-occupied Denmark. The telegram signed off with ‘Tell Cockroft an Maud Ray Kent’, the final three word of which were misinterpreted as being an anagram for ‘radium taken’, and evidence for Germany’s advancement in the field of atomic research. In later years it was made evident that Maud Ray was a former governess of Bohr’s children who lived in Kent.

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February 1940, Frisch was still classified as an enemy alien, which made it

nearly impossible for them to be part of a top-secret committee. In an

interview in August 1969, Peierls stated that “people think [during] wartime

[that having] an enemy sitting on the committee that conceivably might

discuss some delicate information [is] the wrong thing”, which was a

reasonably accurate assessment of the attitudes in Britain at the time, despite

the fact that he quite clearly was not an enemy.18 Gowing states that ‘the

international ramification[s] of science were mistrusted’, and gives an example

of how Frisch could vaguely be connected to Professor Otto Hahn, who was

still in Nazi Germany, further proof of the increased vigilance that such a

covert operation required.19 20 Although a case could be made for the pair’s

exclusion from the committee on the grounds of a possible security breach, in

terms of completing the work in the shortest possible time, it made no sense

whatsoever. Peierls wrote to the chairman of the committee, whose identity he

did not know, stating that both Frisch and himself would be able to answer

many of the questions that would be raised, and pointing out the futility of

trying to keep their own secret from them. Upon reading this letter, Thomson

decided that both scientists, although not members of the committee, should

be consulted on its matters.

When Thomson met with Frisch and Peierls for the first time, Peierls pointed

out to him that separating the uranium-235 isotope was their biggest obstacle,

and urged that Professor Franz Simon be brought in to work on it. In June,

18 Sir Rudolf Peierls to C. Weiner, 12 August 1969, American Institute of Physics, reproduced at <http://www.aip.org/history/ohilist/4816_2.html> [accessed 29 April 2015]19 Frisch had worked closely with his aunt Lise Meitner, and although she had fled Germany for Stockholm, she had worked in close proximity with Hahn. 20 Gowing, Britain and Atomic Energy, p.46.

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Simon, a German physicist, physical chemist and thermodynamicist working

in the Clarendon Laboratory at the University of Oxford was commissioned to

investigate the viability of separating uranium-235 by gaseous diffusion.

Simon had fled Germany in 1933 in order to escape the increasing anti-

Semitism that ensued following the rise to power of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi

party, as had many other renowned scientists such as Leo Szilard, Albert

Einstein and Hans Bethe. This exodus of scientists would eventually prove

extremely costly to the German war effort, as many of them proved invaluable

to the Allies’ scientific programmes, most notably the Manhattan Project.

By December 1940, Simon had completed his research, and concluded that

isotopic separation was indeed possible. His work included technical

specifications and cost approximations for a sizeable uranium enrichment

plant. James Chadwick, who wrote the report's final draft, later noted that

when he "realised that a nuclear bomb was not only possible, it was

inevitable”, he had to start taking sleeping pills, maintaining that it was the

only remedy.21

During the autumn of 1940, Henry Tizard, accompanied by John Cockcroft,

led a mission to Washington DC in order to exchange scientific information

with the Americans.22 They discovered that American research was not

proceeding as quickly as the British work, and that it was in fact several

months behind.23 Cockcroft was of the opinion that the US was not devoting

21 Sir James Chadwick to C. Weiner, 20 April 1969, American Institute of Physics, reproduced at <http://www.aip.org/history/ohilist/3974_4.html> [accessed 29 April 2015]22 V. Bush, Modern Arms and Free Men: A Discussion in the Role of Science in Preserving Democracy (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1949), p. 39.23 R. Rhodes, The Making of the Atomic Bomb (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1986), p. 337.

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sufficient time and resources to their research on uranium, and believed they

should employ a more vigorous approach. As it was clearly beneficial to both

countries that there should be closer contact as well as further exchange of

information between their scientists, an agreement was concluded. In the

spring of 1941 it was decided that there would be a British Central Scientific

Office attached to the British Supply Council in Washington, and in turn, a

Liaison Office for the American National Defense Research Council (NDRC)

was established in London.24

The British knew that if they wanted their atomic research project to succeed,

it was crucial that they got the Americans on board. While they felt that an

atomic bomb was an urgent need, the United States thought otherwise,

remaining unconvinced that it was even possible. However, in his capacity as

part of the liaison team in England, Harvard nuclear physicist Kenneth

Bainbridge sat in on a meeting of the MAUD committee in April, and

discovered that they were at an advanced stage in their research. They were

convinced that the work undertaken on the development of the atomic bomb

had gone beyond the realm of speculation, and Bainbridge commented that

the committee had “a very good idea of the critical mass and [bomb] assembly

[mechanism].”25 His subsequent report on the meeting ultimately led to a

report by Nobel Prize winning physicist Arthur Compton in May, which stated

that an atomic bomb was possible, but not before 1945, whilst also

emphasising uranium’s possible capabilities in producing energy.26 27 24 Gowing, Britain and Atomic Energy, pp. 64-6.; S. H. Paul, Nuclear Rivals: Anglo-American Atomic Relations 1941-1952 (Columbus, OH: Ohio State University Press, 2000), p. 19.25 Rhodes, Making of the Atomic Bomb, p. 337.26 Compton was appointed the head of a review committee under the NDRC by Vannevar Bush in April 1941.27 Paul, Nuclear Rivals, pp. 20-1.

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John Cockcroft’s visit to Enrico Fermi’s laboratory at Columbia University in

the autumn of 1940 had shown that the Americans’ uranium research was

focused on atomic energy rather than the atomic bomb, and Compton’s

findings would do nothing to change that.28 Given that Britain did not have the

resources necessary for such a bomb, they were heavily reliant on the

Americans. While the Americans were undoubtedly behind in terms of overall

research, they possessed more elaborate apparatus than their British

counterparts, and therefore were able to conduct experiments much more

efficiently. As a country at war and under siege from the Germans, Britain’s

resources were becoming more and more strained, which made it increasingly

hard for the atomic research programme to make the necessary progress.

This led British scientists to look to the United States and its ‘immense

productive capacity’ to undertake expensive development work, and before

long the MAUD committee was deliberating the option of moving the main

developmental work over the Atlantic.29

After 15 months of intense work, the MAUD committee culminated in the

production of two reports in July 1941. They were titled ‘Use of Uranium as a

Source of Power’, and ‘Use of Uranium for a Bomb’. The conclusions and

recommendations of the MAUD committee’s reports were as follows:

1. The committee considers that the scheme for a uranium bomb is

practicable and likely to lead to decisive results in the war.

28 Gowing, Britain and Atomic Energy, p. 65.29 Gowing, Britain and Atomic Energy pp. 66-7.

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2. It recommends that this work be continued on the highest priority and

on the increasing scale necessary to obtain the weapon in the shortest

possible time.

3. That the present collaboration with America should be continued and

extended especially in the region of experimental work.30

The MAUD committee’s reports stated that a weapon could be made with 25

pounds of pure uranium-235, and that it would be ‘equivalent as regards

destructive effect to 1,800 tons of T.N.T.’, which was used as the yardstick for

explosive comparison throughout the course of research on the atomic

bomb.31

The report detailed that they were still exchanging information with the

Americans, and that some laboratory work had been carried out on Britain's

behalf across the Atlantic. It came to the same conclusion that the Tizard

mission had done, namely that work undertaken in both countries should be

shared. The MAUD report also entertained the possibility that the uranium-

235 separation plant could well be located in the United States, and stated

that a trip to discuss the option would soon be underway, an indication that full

collaboration was most certainly on their minds.32

However, the Americans did not necessarily reciprocate the MAUD

committee’s enthusiasm for wide-scale collaboration. As they were not

militarily involved in the war, they had no urgent reason to pursue the

30 Report of M.A.U.D. Committee, NA, AB 1/23831 ibid. 32 ibid.

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possibility of producing an atomic bomb. When Franz Simon was

commissioned to undertake his research on gaseous diffusion in the summer

of 1940, the committee had assigned R. H. Fowler to send progress reports to

the director of the American Uranium Committee, Lyman Briggs. Despite the

significant findings of Simon and the rest of the committee’s work, by August

of 1941, a month after the completion of the MAUD report, they still had not

received any response. While the United States did not receive an official

copy of the MAUD report until October, Charles C. Lauritsen, a Caltech

physicist, was in London with the NDRC and present at the meeting where the

report was presented. He relayed the information to Vannevar Bush, the head

of the newly formed Office of Scientific Research and Development, to whom

the NDRC now reported to upon his return to the US a week later, but failed to

provoke a reaction. Lauritsen’s report stated that the MAUD committee had

concluded that due to the risk of aerial bombardment, as well as the costs, it

would be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to undertake the atomic bomb

project in Britain, and that many of the committee members believed that the

United States should take on the project.33 This is further indication of the

importance that the committee placed on the Americans’ ‘immense productive

capacity’, and their belief that full cooperation would be an essential element

in the atomic bomb project and any success that it might have.34

In August Marcus Oliphant, who was travelling to the US to discuss the radar

development program, was assigned to find out why their findings were not

33 Paul, Nuclear Rivals, p. 22.34 Gowing, Britain and Atomic Energy, p. 24.

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being acknowledged. He visited Lyman Briggs and was extremely critical of

him:

“I called on Briggs in Washington [DC], only to find out that this inarticulate

and unimpressive man had put the reports in his safe and had not shown

them to members of his committee. I was amazed and distressed.”35

Whereas previous efforts to persuade the United States to shift their focus

from atomic energy to the atomic bomb had adopted a more patient approach,

Oliphant had no such tolerance. Samuel K. Allison, a member of Briggs’

committee recalled how he came to a meeting and told them in no uncertain

terms that a bomb should be their priority.

"He told us we must concentrate every effort on the bomb, and said we had

no right to work on power plants or anything but the bomb. The bomb would

cost 25 million dollars, he said, and Britain did not have the money or the

manpower, so it was up to us."36 

The MAUD report, coupled with Oliphant’s visit, had a profound effect on the

nature of American atomic research, and led to a re-examination of their

approach towards uranium.37 Oliphant’s impact was such that Leo Szilard, the

Hungarian-American physicist who played an important role in kick-starting

American research into nuclear fission, commented after the war:

35 M, Oliphant, ‘The Beginning: Chadwick and the Neutron’. Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 38:10 (December 1982), pp. 14-8.

36 Rhodes, The Making of the Atomic Bomb, p. 373.37 Pierre, Nuclear Politics, pp. 22-3.

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“If Congress knew the true story of the atomic energy project, I have no doubt

but that it would create a special medal to be given to meddling foreigners for

distinguished services, and Dr Oliphant would be the first to receive one.”3839

Attitudes had changed, and the feasibility of an atomic bomb had become

apparent, thus spurring the Americans into action. Although Bush remained

largely passive until Thompson forwarded an official copy of the report in

October, he then used it to win the support of President Roosevelt for a

nuclear project.40 On the 11th of October, Roosevelt cabled Churchill

suggesting a coordinated, or ‘jointly conducted’ atomic program, a suggestion

that did not go down well in London.41 Although the MAUD report had strongly

advocated a combined project with the United States, Lord Cherwell,

Churchill’s atomic energy adviser did not agree, suggesting that the power

that the bomb would possess would give its holder unprecedented influence

over the rest of the world, and that it was therefore desirable for it to be an

independent undertaking.42 Despite acknowledging the difficulties that would

surround the construction of a uranium plant in Britain, as British research

was ahead of the Americans’, he believed it unwise and unnecessary to allow

them in on it, stating that he was ‘very much averse’ to putting the country at

the mercy of the United States.43 Following endorsement of the project by the

38 The Einstein-Szilard letter of August 1939 explained the possibility of atomic weapons, and warned that Germany had already begun work on such weapons. The letter encouraged the establishment of a US atomic bomb program, and signalled the beginning of what would eventually turn into the Manhattan Project.39 Rhodes, Making of the Atomic Bomb, p. 372.40 Pierre, Nuclear Politics, p. 23; Paul, Nuclear Rivals, p. 22.41 President to Prime Minister, October 11, 1941, NA, AB 1/207.42 Paul, Nuclear Rivals, pp. 23-4.43 Cherwell to Prime Minister, August 27, 1941, NA, AB 1/170.

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Chiefs of Staff, the British atomic bomb project was formed, and was assigned

the code name ‘Tube Alloys’.

In November, American scientists Harold Urey and George Pegram visited

Great Britain on a diplomatic mission in a further attempt to establish

cooperation on the atomic bomb project. While they were both impressed by

the progress of Britain’s research, they found themselves having to defend the

United States’ objectives in the face of accusations that they were entirely

focused on the potential of atomic energy rather than the creation of an

atomic bomb.44 Another concern that the British had about any potential

collaboration was that the United States would not be able to preserve the

secrecy of any such project due to them not being at war. They were

extremely wary of the danger of any information leaking to the Germans, as

they would then be able to accelerate their own atomic bomb project.

Considering the enormity of the project, as well as the impact that its success

could have, secrecy was absolutely essential, and as such the British were

right to be wary.45

A further report from Compton and the National Academy of Sciences on

November 27th served to convince Bush that a joint project was most certainly

in the Americans’ best interests. However, Britain still held back, as evidenced

by the two months that it took Churchill to respond to Roosevelt’s October

suggestion of a ‘jointly conducted’ effort.46 Even then, Churchill’s response

only came after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, when it was clear to

44 Gowing, Britain and Atomic Energy, p. 119.45 Paul, Nuclear Rivals, pp. 26-7.46 President to Prime Minister, October 11, 1941, NA, AB 1/207.

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him and his advisers that the Anglo-American alliance was about to be

formalised, and therefore pertinent to ensure that Britain did not alienate itself

from the Americans.47

By the late spring of 1942, Britain faced the stark realisation that the

Americans’ research had now surpassed theirs.48 A visit to the United States

by Wallace Akers and Professors Halban, Peierls and Simon from the Tube

Alloys Technical Committee had reported on the impressiveness of the

Americans’ uranium research labs, and made the British recognise the

progress that they had made in a relatively short period of time.49 In addition,

when the US army took control of the Manhattan Project, security was

tightened, and the flow of information to Britain dried up. Soon they would be

faced with the tough decision of whether to soften their stance on

collaboration, or stay strong, and face the possibility of failure in their

endeavours. While Cherwell remained confident that Britain could

successfully conduct their own atomic bomb project during the course of the

war, despite the massive constraints on both finance and manpower, others

were more realistic.

On the 30th of July, the Lord President of the Council, John Anderson made

the following statement to Churchill:

47 Paul, Nuclear Rivals, p. 24.48 Gowing, Britain and Atomic Energy, p. 132.49 Akers was the director of the Tube Alloys project, while also holding the position of research director for British chemical company Imperial Chemical Industries.

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“Sir… We must face the fact that… [our] pioneering work is a dwindling asset

and that, unless we capitalise it quickly, we shall be outstripped. We now have

a real contribution to make to a ‘merger’. Soon we shall have little or none.”50

Over the course of a year, both nations’ roles had been reversed, with the

British now the ones actively seeking collaboration while the Americans tried

to distance themselves. As signalled by Anderson’s statement, Britain was

now in real danger of seeing the possibility of participating in a successful

atomic bomb project pass them by. Michael Perrin, the secretary general of

the Tube Alloys project, commented upon his arrival in the US in June that

they were not far from completely outstripping Britain in every aspect of

atomic energy and that when they did, the would ‘see no reason for our

butting in.’51 The Americans were fully aware of the huge progress that they

were making, and as such were no longer so eager to pursue a combined

project, which posed a problem for the British.

As soon as realised that an atomic bomb could realistically be built before the

end of the war, and that they could develop it with very minimal British

assistance, the Americans began to distance themselves from any sort of

collaboration. The proposed transfer of the French physicist Hans von

Halban’s team to work in parallel with Compton’s team in Chicago was vetoed

by Vannevar Bush on the grounds that it would compromise the ‘narrow

vertical American secrecy organization.’52 Despite this resistance from Bush,

50 J. B. Bernstein, ‘The Uneasy Alliance: Roosevelt, Churchill, and the Atomic Bomb, 1940-1945’, The Western Political Quarterly (University of Utah) 29.2 (June 1976), pp. 202-30.51 Gowing, Britain and Atomic Energy, p. 139.52 Halban to Akers, May 13, 1942, NA, AB 1/357.

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the British still considered the decision on whether or not the two nations

would collaborate to be in their hands. Evidence of this came with Anderson’s

letter to Bush on the 5th of August. In this letter he explained that as Britain

would not be able to complete their proposed diffusion plant within two years,

both Churchill and himself had decided that the plant should be constructed in

the United States. This plant, whose design and construction would be the

responsibility of the Americans, would then be added to their atomic program.

Additionally, he proposed the transfer of several key British researchers

including Simon and Peierls to work alongside the American project, with the

expectation that they be added to Dr James Conant’s executive committee.53

54

Bush’s reply, which came four weeks later, was an extremely diplomatic one,

just as Churchill’s reply to Roosevelt’s cable in late 1941 suggesting a ‘jointly

conducted’ atomic program had been.55 However, a follow up memo that he

sent on the 1st of October regarding the building of a British diffusion plant in

the United States was not quite so. In it, he ‘emphatically turned down’ the

idea, stating that it was not possible as the American atomic project had been

put under the supervision of the army.56

In September 1942, the Manhattan Project had been placed under the control

of General Leslie Groves, with the promise of the highest priority AAA rating

on necessary procurements.57 The project was set up in such a way that 53 Dr. James Conant was the chairman of the NDRC, and an important figure within the American atomic project. He was not in favour of combining their work with that of the British.54 Paul, Nuclear Rivals, p. 33.55 President to Prime Minister, October 11, 1941, NA, AB 1/207.56 Paul, Nuclear Rivals, p. 34.57 Groves, Now It Can Be Told, p. 16.

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Groves was central to all developments, and both Bush and Conant were

pushed to one side. In his role as Secretary of War, Henry Stimson instigated

the creation of the Military Policy Committee, which consisted of Bush,

Conant, Admiral W. R. E. Purnell from the Navy, and General Wilhelm D.

Styer of the Army.58

Figure 1:

A simplified chart showing the organisational structure of the Manhattan

Project from L. R. Groves, Now It Can Be Told.

Groves had a reputation for being a resolute character who got the job done,

and was determined to oversee a successful project. He was horrified to

discover how many people knew about parts of the project that were outside

their own individual areas, and set about the compartmentalising of it. During

58 Groves, Now It Can Be Told, pp. 21-3.

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a November visit to the United States; Tube Alloys director Wallace Akers

commented that he did not believe that the scientists involved with the project

would accept Groves’ airtight security measures, and that they would

cooperate with the British.59 Additionally, he believed Bush and Conant to be

unhappy with the restrictions placed upon the project by the army, when in

fact they were pleased to be supplied with an excuse for their lack of

collaboration with the British.60 61 What Akers did not comprehend was that

Groves’ security policies were directed as much towards the British as they

were towards the Germans. By December, the Americans did not believe that

they needed British assistance to be able to build an atomic bomb. While they

acknowledged that an ending of cooperation would certainly delay the

process, they believed it could still feasibly be completed before the end of

1945.62 This made the sharing of information with the British both

unnecessary and unwise, and therefore pertinent to push forward with a policy

of noncollaboration.

However, Martin Sherwin argues that the main reason for this push towards a

cessation of cooperation was that any continuation would not be in the United

States’ best interests after the war.63 If they were to replace the British as a

dominating world power after the war, collaboration with them would be

counterintuitive. As Britain was a once great power on the decline, it was in

59 Akers to Perrin, November 16, 1942, NA, AB 1/128.60 As Groves was renowned as a strict regulator of others, and held a more senior position than both Bush and Conant in the Manhattan Project, it was easy for them to shift the blame for anything that displeased the British by claiming that the order had come ‘from above’. This also served to bring Akers to the conclusion that the American scientists did not agree with Groves’ methods, giving him confidence that they would only be temporary measures. 61 Akers to Perrin, November 5, 1942, NA, AB 1/357.62 Paul, Nuclear Rivals, p. 38.63 M. Sherwin, A World Destroyed: The Atomic Bomb and the Grand Alliance (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1975), p. 172.

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the Americans’ best interests to facilitate that decline, rather than show

solidarity towards them. They had, as Lord Cherwell had done in 1941,

recognised the overwhelming power that an atomic bomb would give them,

and did not intend to allow Britain to ‘cling to American coattails as it was

edged aside.’64 Churchill’s atomic energy adviser’s worst fears were now

being realised, as he had predicted in August 1941: the British could well find

themselves ‘completely at [the Americans’] mercy’ if they were completely

excluded from further atomic developments.65

During the Trident Conference in Washington in May, Churchill received a

note from Anderson, which stated that the United States had agreed a

contract with Canada to purchase the entire output of their uranium mines as

well as their entire production of heavy water.66 This American monopoly on

Britain’s only feasible source of both of these resources served to end any

lingering notions that they could conduct their own independent program, and

made reaching an agreement on collaboration an even more urgent

requirement. Churchill, a man renowned for his bullish, uncompromising

nature, was forced to swallow his pride and sent various telegrams to Harry

Hopkins, Roosevelt’s trusted advisor, before sending the following to the

President on the 9th of July:

“Since Harry’s telegram of 17th June I have been anxiously awaiting further

news about Tube Alloys. My experts are standing by and I find it increasingly

64 J. Hershberg, James B. Conant: Harvard to Hiroshima and the Making of the Nuclear Age (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1993), p. 183.65 Cherwell to Prime Minister, August 27, 1941, NA, AB 1/170. 66 Lord President to Prime Minister, May 15, 1943, NA, PREM 3/139/8A.

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difficult to explain delay. If difficulties have arisen, I beg you to let me know at

once what they are in case we may be able to help in solving them.”67

This clear indication of the importance of the matter to the British left

Roosevelt with an increasingly tough decision. In the context of the war, he

could not afford to alienate Churchill, as he still needed his cooperation for the

proposed invasion of Nazi controlled Europe, which he hoped to launch from

Britain itself. Following discussion with Hopkins on the issue, Roosevelt wrote

to Bush on July 20th declaring his wish that ‘the full exchange of information

with the British Government regarding tube alloys’ be resumed. While it was a

decision that may not have been in the best interests of the United States in

terms of the atomic bomb project, he believed it to be in their best interests in

the wider context of the war.68

Although it is true that it was the United States who did a significant portion of

the developmental during the first phase of the Manhattan Project, between

1940 and 1943 Britain more than played its part as well. The Frisch-Peierls

memorandum, as well as Franz Simon’s work for the MAUD committee, was

crucial in both kick-starting the atomic research program and in providing a

solid base for further work. While the Americans provided the industrial

workforce and the funding needed to carry out their objectives, British

scientists undertook a large amount of the research work. In the case of the

mooted separation plant for the production of uranium-235, there were

discussions in the spring of 1941 about doing all of the research work in

67 Prime Minister to Hopkins, July 9, 1943, NA, PREM 3/139/8A.68 Hershberg, James B. Conant, pp. 188-9.

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Britain, and the large-scale development work in the United States.69 Although

this idea failed to materialise, it does confirm the continuing influence of the

British in terms of experimental work.

The Americans however, did not acknowledge the significance of the stimulus

that Britain’s early research had provided to their project, nor the impact that

the MAUD report had had, which made the British feel underappreciated. As

they believed themselves to be a vital component of any combined project,

Britain were perhaps not as tactful as they could have been in their approach,

and could have been careful not to antagonise the volatile character that was

Groves. However, it was not altogether unreasonable for them, as the nation

that had provided the majority of the initial research work to demand parity

with the United States on the Manhattan Project. While it did not give them

equal status, the Quebec Agreement certainly improved the standing of the

British in their collaboration with the Americans.

69 Gowing, Britain and Atomic Energy, pp. 73-4.

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Chapter Two

Collaboration to non-cooperation

Churchill and Roosevelt signed the Quebec Agreement on the 19th of August

1943, agreeing to collaboration between Britain and the United States on the

matter of Tube Alloys. They established five separate points, one of which

was that Britain would cede control of the commercial rights to atomic energy

to the Americans.70 This decision had been made by Churchill in July, prior to

his meeting with Stimson, in a further attempt to obtain approval for a

combined project that Roosevelt had already approved. Both Anderson and

Cherwell had expressed their belief that atomic energy would not hold any

significance in any potential industrial application, and had supported the

ultimately unnecessary sacrifice of what would later prove to be an important

economic asset.71

70 ‘Appendix 4: The Quebec Agreement’ in Gowing, Britain and Atomic Energy, pp. 439-40.71 Akers to Perrin, August 19, 1943, NA, AB 1/376.

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The other significant undertaking of the Quebec Agreement was the

establishment of the Combined Policy Committee ‘to ensure full and effective

collaboration between the two countries in bringing the project to fruition’.72 It

was agreed that the committee would consist of Stimson as its chairman,

Bush, Conant, the British representatives Colonel Llewellin and Field Marshal

Dill, as well as the Canadian representative C. D. Howe.73 The committee met

for the first time on the 8th of September, when they established the Technical

Subcommittee.74 In the two years between its forming and the dropping of the

atomic bombs on Japan, the CPC only met eight times, but despite this,

achieved much in this time, such as the establishing of the Combined

Development Trust in March 1944.75 76

Groves was a tough, single-minded character, and did not take well to being

rushed, therefore he was not best pleased when Akers instructed that

Chadwick, Simon, Peierls and Oliphant should be sent over to the United

States before the CPC had put the necessary security protocols in place.77

This placed further strain on an already uncertain relationship. Due to his

position within ICI, the Americans did not trust Akers, believing that his

objective was to corner the atomic business for his company.78 In December

Akers arrived in the United States with a diffusion team consisting of fifteen 72 Appendix 4: The Quebec Agreement’ in Gowing, Britain and Atomic Energy, pp. 439-40.73 Llewellin was the Minister of Aircraft Production, while Dill, in his capacity as Churchill’s personal representative was the Senior British Representative on the Combined Chiefs of Staff. 74 American Major General Wilhelm Styer chaired the Technical Subcommittee, and its members consisted of James Chadwick, Groves’ scientific advisor Richard Tolman, and C. J. Mackenzie, who was the head of the Canadian National Research Council. The committee was able to act without the approval of the CPC if its decision was unanimous. 75 The Combined Development Trust was a joint Anglo-American-Canadian venture created to deal with issues surrounding the raw materials needed for the Manhattan Project.76 Groves, Now It Can Be Told, pp. 170-6; Gowing, Britain and Atomic Energy, pp. 234-5.77 Paul, Nuclear Rivals, pp.57-8.78 Gowing, Britain and Atomic Energy, p. 172; ibid, p. 176; Paul, Nuclear Rivals, p. 59.

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British scientists, while Chadwick, Oliphant and Peierls also came to take up

permanent residence.79 Chadwick, in his roles as technical advisor to the CPC

and head of the British mission was in many ways the antidote to Akers, and

was able to establish a good relationship with Groves. He was discerning

enough to recognise that the head of the Manhattan Project would be crucial

for any possible post-war collaboration, and thus ensured that he did

everything in his power to make the relationship run smoothly.80

Figure 2:

Map showing the locations of the Manhattan Project’s main sites.

Chadwick realised that if Britain were to undertake a major atomic project

after the war was over, it would be advantageous for them to have as many

scientists as possible in the United States. After the Quebec Agreement was

79 Gowing, Britain and Atomic Energy, p. 241.80 Chadwick to Anderson, February 22, 1945, NA, FO 800/524; Gowing, Britain and Atomic Energy, pp. 236-8.

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signed, he had visited each of the main atomic energy research centres, and

was mightily impressed by the extent of the Americans’ progress.81 He

realised that the British contributions to the Manhattan Project henceforward

were far from crucial, and therefore reasoned that they should try and gain as

much knowledge as possible from their involvement. As a result, he urged

that the best scientific minds available be transferred to America, regardless

of whether or not they were involved with Tube Alloys.82 83 Given the huge

scale of the project, as evidenced by Figure 2, British scientists were

distributed all over America, and rarely got to see the part that they were

working on in its entirety. The British recognition that the part that they played

in the Manhattan Project would be subsidiary to the American contribution

was received favourably by Groves. In fact, he attributed it as being largely

responsible for the success of the Combined Policy Committee, referring to it

as “awareness on the part of the British delegates of the magnitude of the

American contribution in comparison to theirs.”84 The British had learnt from

their early mistakes in dealing with Groves, and had recognised that he was

an individual who needed to be dealt with carefully. Acknowledging the role

that he might play in any post-war collaboration, they were keen to do

whatever they possibly could to maintain a positive relationship.

Post-war collaboration was agreed following a meeting between Churchill and

Roosevelt at the President’s Hyde Park residence in New York on the 17th and

18th of September 1944. The Hyde Park Aide-Memoire was signed, detailing

81 Pierre, Nuclear Politics, p. 51; Gowing, Britain and Atomic Energy, p. 241.82 Scientists sent over to the Manhattan Project from Britain would typically have already been involved in atomic research with the Tube Alloys programme. 83 Pierre, Nuclear Politics, p. 51.84 Groves, Now It Can Be Told, p. 136.

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that “full collaboration between the United States and the British Government

in developing Tube Alloys for military and commercial purposes should

continue after the defeat of Japan unless and until terminated by joint

agreement”, whilst also rejecting the notion that information should be shared

with other parties.85 Sherwin believes that Roosevelt’s acceptance of this

agreement was recognition of Britain’s value as an ally in the post-war world,

and states that “Great Britain would be America’s outpost on the European

frontiers, the sentinel for the New World in the Old.”86 However, unlike

Churchill, the President did not share information on the existence of the Aide-

Memoire with his advisors, choosing instead to give what Paul describes as

the “key to world security and American global power” to a clerk and simply

instructing him to file it away without giving any indication of its importance.87

88 This would cause problems at a later stage, as the authenticity of the British

copy of the document was called into question. Neither Stimson nor Groves

knew about the agreement until after the war, and the fact that the United

States’ copy of the Aide-Memoire was not located until many years later.89

After Roosevelt’s death on the 12th of April 1945, no Americans were aware of

the Aide-Memoire, least of all the new President Harry Truman.

When Germany officially surrendered to the Allies on the 7th of May 1945, full

focus was given to the Manhattan Project and ending the war with Japan. In

April, the Target Committee had been established by Groves in order to

85 Hyde Park Aide-Memoire, NA, PREM 3/139/8A.86 M. J. Sherwin, A World Destroyed: Hiroshima and the Origins of the Arms Race (New York: Vintage Books, 1975), pp. 290-1.87 Paul, Nuclear Rivals, p. 68.88 Given that the Aide-Memoir was titled ‘Tube Alloys’, the clerk in question made the assumption that it was a naval issue, and as such filed it amongst the files of Roosevelt’s naval aide.89 Groves, Now It Can Be Told, p. 402.

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determine which Japanese city best fitted the criteria for bombing, and by its

third meeting the list of targets had been finalised. The targets decided upon

were Kokura, Hiroshima, Kyoto, and Niigata.90 Meanwhile, significant progress

had been made in the construction of the atomic bomb, and on the 16th of

July the US Army was able to conduct the first ever detonation of an atomic

weapon, codenamed the Trinity Test, on the Alamogordo Bombing and

Gunnery Range in the New Mexican desert. The test was a success, and the

go ahead was given for the bombing of Japan. Upon witnessing the

devastation caused by the explosion, Robert Oppenheimer, the man often

referred to as the ‘father’ of the atomic bomb, famously recalled the following

passage from the Bhagavad Gita, the Hindu scripture:

“Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.”91 92

This quotation is often used in connexion with the Manhattan Project, and

perfectly conveys the astounding destructive power that the Allies now

possessed.93

By the 24th of July, a plan of operation for the atomic bombing of Japan had

been put in place, and on July 26th, the Potsdam Declaration was issued to

Japan. This declaration outlined the terms for their surrender, as had been

90 Nagasaki was added to the target list after Stimson insisted on removing Kyoto from it due to its historical significance. The second atomic bomb was intended for Kokura, but as clouds obscured it on the 9th of August, it was dropped on Nagasaki, the secondary target.91 Oppenheimer was appointed to head the Manhattan Project’s secret weapons laboratory by Groves in September 1942, and was considered one of the key figures in the construction of the atomic bomb.92 L. Giovannitti and F. Freed, The Decision to Drop the Bomb (New York: Coward McCann, 1965), p. 197.93 J. A. Hijiya, ‘The Gita of J. Robert Oppenheimer’, Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, 144.2 (2000), pp. 123-4.

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agreed at the Potsdam Conference, and warned that if they did not comply,

they would be faced with “prompt and utter destruction.”94 When the Japanese

rejected the ultimatum, the decision to drop the bomb was finally taken, and

on the 6th of August the uranium bomb ‘Little Boy’ was dropped on Hiroshima,

and was believed at the time to have killed between seventy and eighty

thousand civilians.95 When Japan still refused to surrender, a plutonium bomb

by the name of ‘Fat Man’ was dropped on Nagasaki on the 9th of August,

leaving “over 35,000 dead and somewhat more than that injured.”96 In the

aftermath of this overwhelming destruction, Japan announced their surrender

on the 15th of August, and by the 2nd of September it had been formally

signed.

On July 26th, the same day that the Potsdam Declaration was made, Clement

Attlee had replaced Winston Churchill as Prime Minister, both Britain and the

United States now had new heads of state. Upon becoming aware of the

atomic bomb project, Attlee perceived it as being an equal project, and wrote

to Truman on the 8th of August expressing a desire that they should issue a

joint statement of their intentions.97

94 ‘Potsdam Declaration: Proclamation Defining Terms for Japanese Surrender, July 26, 1945’, reproduced at <http://www.atomicarchive.com/Docs/Hiroshima/Potsdam.shtml> [accessed 4 May 2015]95 ‘U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey: The Effects of the Atomic Bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki’, reproduced at <http://www.trumanlibrary.org/whistlestop/study_collections/bomb/large/documents/pdfs/65.pdf> [accessed 2 May 2015]96 ‘U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey: The Effects of the Atomic Bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki’, reproduced at <http://www.trumanlibrary.org/whistlestop/study_collections/bomb/large/documents/pdfs/65.pdf> [accessed 2 May 2015]97 F. Williams, A Prime Minister Remembers: The War and Post-War Memoirs of the Rt. Hon. Earl Attlee (London: William Heinemann, 1961), p. 95.

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By October, both men were in accordance that the atomic weapons that they

possessed should be put under the control of the United Nations, and it was

agreed that they should meet in early November. It was at this meeting on the

15th of November that Truman, Attlee, and the Canadian Prime Minister

Mackenzie King signed the Washington Declaration.98 This declaration agreed

to keep both the CPC and the CDT intact, and encouraged the creation of a

United Nations commission to control the use of atomic energy, and by

January 1946, the United Nations Atomic Energy Commission had been

established, with its main directive of "[dealing] with the problems raised by

the discovery of atomic energy."99 However, private discussions between the

advisors of the British and American governments were taking place on the

same date. These discussions were geared towards the reformulation of the

Quebec Agreement, and “the basic principle of all-round collaboration” was

agreed.100 The parties decided not to draw up a formal agreement that would

have to be submitted to the US Senate, choosing instead to present the

President and the Prime Minister with a brief informal document that

confirmed “full and effective cooperation in the field of atomic energy between

the United States, the United Kingdom and Canada.” This “flimsy piece of

paper”, which was signed by Truman and Attlee in great haste before the

close of their conference, promoted a close three power agreement hoping to

monopolise the raw materials required for atomic energy, and greatly

98 Paul, Nuclear Rivals, pp. 80-3; Baylis, Anglo-American Defence Relations, p. 31.99 ‘Declaration on Atomic Bomb by President Truman and Prime Ministers Attlee and King’, reproduced at <http://www.nuclearfiles.org/menu/key-issues/nuclear-energy/history/dec-truma-atlee-king_1945-11-15.htm> [accessed 1 May 2015]; ‘Establishment of a Commission to Deal with the Problems Raised by the Discovery of Atomic Energy’, United Nations General Assembly, January 24, 1946, reproduced at <http://www.un.org/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbol=A/RES/1(I)> [accessed 2 May 2015]100 M. Gowing, Independence and Deterrence: Britain and Atomic Energy, 1945-1952. Volume 1: Policy Making (London: Macmillan, 1974), p. 75.

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contradicted the Washington Declaration’s lofty ideals of laying aside

nationalist ideas in order to save the save the world.101 Once Truman, having

not fully realised the implications of the document, recognised the

inconsistencies between it and the Washington Declaration, it became

apparent that the Americans did not intend to implement the agreement of full

collaboration with the British.

By April, there had been no progress in terms of collaboration, with the

American representatives of the CPC claiming that a secret agreement was

no longer possible due to the presence of the UNAEC. Byrnes, the US

Secretary of State referred the members of the CPC to article 102 of the UN

Charter, which read as follows:

“Every treaty and every international agreement entered into by any member

of the United Nations after the present Charter comes into force shall as soon

as possible be registered with the Secretariat and published by it.”102

As both nations wished to avoid the ignominy that would surround the

disclosure of any secret agreement, an alternative was needed. Lord Halifax,

who was the British Ambassador to the United States, proposed at a CPC

meeting on the 15th of April that they simply make significant amendments to

the existing Quebec Agreement instead of drawing up a new one.103 However,

both the American and Canadian delegates considered that these

101 Ibid., pp. 76-7.102 Atomic Energy, December 8, 1945, NA, FO 800/541.103 Roger Bullen and M. E. Pelly, eds., ‘Prime Minister to Lord Halifax’, March 6, 1946, no. 45, in Documents on British Policy Overseas, series 1, vol. 4 (London: Her Majesty’s Stationery Office, 1987)

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amendments would constitute a new agreement, and it was decided that the

matter should be referred back to the heads of state.

This continued lack of agreement from the CPC led Attlee to send a cable to

Truman the following day, in which he expressed that he was “gravely

disturbed” by the fact that Britain was being placed in a position that was

inconsistent with the agreements made in Washington in November. He was

adamant that there should be full and effective cooperation between both

countries, and that he expected the full disclosure of technological and

engineering information, as well as a fair division of the raw materials.104

Truman’s response came swiftly, on the 20th of April, and argued that the

agreement that stood between them referred only to cooperation in “the field

of basic scientific research”, rather than an obligation to furnish the

engineering and operational assistance required for another atomic energy

plant. He then went on to state that the full and effective cooperation that

Attlee had referred to was only applicable in the field of basic scientific

research, and nothing more.105 By making this statement, Truman was

denying the meaning of the words ‘full and effective cooperation’ by virtue of a

technicality, and utilised the nuances of diplomatic language to such an extent

that the Canadians dubbing his telegram to Attlee as a ‘solicitor’s letter’.106 By

the time Attlee sent a response voicing his displeasure at Truman’s seeming

abandonment of the “special relationship” that had been developed in the field

of atomic energy during the war, the McMahon Act was passing through

104 Bullen and Pelly, ‘Prime Minister to Lord Halifax’105 U.S. Department of State, ‘President Truman to Mr. Attlee’, April 20, 1946, in Foreign Relations of the United States: General; the United Nations, 1946, vol. 1, pp. 1235-7.106 Gowing, Independence and Deterrence. Vol. 1, p. 101.

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Congress, and Truman had decided against any further exchanges of

information.107

The Atomic Energy Act of 1946, or the McMahon Act, came into law on

August the 1st, 1946, and determined how the United States would control and

manage the nuclear technology it had jointly developed with its wartime allies.

It also established the United States Atomic Energy Commission, which would

take over nuclear development from the Army.108 David Reynolds describes

the McMahon Act as being the result of “a nationalistic, secrecy-conscious

Congress, anxious that the United States alone should control the

‘superbomb’.”109 By passing this act, which prohibited the exchange of any

atomic information to a foreign government, the Americans had shut down

any further possibility of collaboration between themselves and the British.

Following the dissolution of the atomic relationship with the United States as a

result of the McMahon Act, Britain decided in January 1947 to go ahead with

an independent program to develop an atomic bomb. However, Gowing

believes that the decision to go ahead with the project was more down to

Britain’s desire to continue being considered a great power than it was a

direct response to the McMahon Act. While it is certainly true that Britain

would inevitably have undertaken an atomic bomb project at some point, it

would not necessarily have done so independently. The McMahon Act acted

107 Baylis, Anglo-American Defence Relations, p. 33.108 Atomic Energy Act Of 1946 (Public Law 585, 79th Congress), reproduced at <https://www.osti.gov/atomicenergyact.pdf> [accessed 1 May 2015]109 D. Reynolds, From World War to Cold War: Churchill, Roosevelt, and the International History of the 1940s (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), p. 321.

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as a catalyst for British bomb production, just as the MAUD report had done

for American atomic research.

Despite the seeming finality of the McMahon Act, Britain was eager to be in a

position to renew the Anglo-American collaborative relationship if the

opportunity arose. By undertaking the independent manufacture of an atomic

bomb, they would put themselves in a strong position to be able to resume

cooperation.110 Additionally, Ernest Bevin, the British Foreign Secretary

believed that possessing its own atomic capabilities would provide Britain with

an increased influence in foreign affairs, and re-establish its identity as a great

power.111 As the MAUD report had stated, complete disarmament would be

the only event in which the production of an atomic bomb could be deemed a

waste, as “no nation would care to risk being caught without a weapon of such

decisive possibilities”, especially in the increasingly hostile post-war climate.112

When the United States showed interest in reopening talks on atomic matters

with Britain in late 1947, the prospect of a renewed collaboration looked fairly

good. At a CPC meeting on the 7th of January 1948, an agreement known as

the Modus Vivendi was concluded. In order to circumvent Article 102 of the

UN Charter, the document was not signed, with both sides instead agreeing to

adhere to its terms.113 The Modus Vivendi agreement provided that; all

wartime agreements not related to raw materials became void, the United

States no longer required British ‘consent’ before using the bomb, all of the 110 Gowing, Independence and Deterrence. Vol. 1, p. 115; Baylis, Anglo-American Defence Relations, p. 33.111 I. Clark and N. J. Wheeler, The British Origins of Nuclear Strategy, 1945-55 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1989), pp. 43-51.112 Report of M.A.U.D. Committee, NA, AB 1/238.113 Baylis, Anglo-American Defence Relations, p. 42.

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uranium produced in the Congo was allocated to the US between 1948 and

1949, that atomic information would be exchanged in mutually agreed areas,

and that the US would be provided with raw materials from the British

stockpile if they needed it.114 This agreement gave the Americans legislative

control over their usage of their atomic weapons, while the British gained

access to the atomic information that they required for their own bomb project.

Although Cockcroft described the Modus Vivendi as a new beginning, a first

step in post-war atomic collaboration, it also signalled the final step in wartime

atomic collaboration.115 While the secret agreements of the war still stood, any

atomic relationship between the United States and Great Britain would be

inherently tied to the Manhattan Project and their combined efforts on it. By

signalling the beginning of a new atomic era, it simultaneously marked the

end of the first atomic era.

Conclusion

114 ‘Minutes of Combined Policy Committee’, January 7, 1948, in Foreign Relations of the United States: General; the United Nations, 1948, vol. 1, pt. 2 (Washington D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1973), pp. 679-86: “Modus Vivendi” of 1948: accord between UK, US and Canada on cooperation in field of atomic energy, NA, PREM 11/786.115 G. Hartcup and T. E. Allibone, Cockcroft and the Atom (Bristol: Adam Hilger, 1984), p. 221.

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British contributions to the Manhattan Project from the Quebec Agreement

onwards can best be described as helpful, but not vital. By the time that they

were fully introduced to the work, American research had significantly

surpassed that of their own. They were unable to have as big an impact on

the project as they would have liked, but was this indicative of their role in the

wider context of the decade?

When assessing the balance of atomic cooperation between Britain and the

United States, the insight of General Leslie Groves is a useful one. As the

central figure in the central organisation of the collaborative relationship

between 1940 and 1948, he is extremely well placed to comment. While he

witnessed first hand their struggle to significantly impact the development of

the atomic bomb, Groves “cannot escape the feeling that without active and

continuing British interest there probably would have been no atomic bomb to

drop on Hiroshima.”116 Almost begrudgingly, he praises their determination to

ensure that the work was completed by any means necessary, and applauds

the fact that they recognised that they could accomplish their purpose through

the United States. The British started off with the intention of completing the

project independently, before seeking collaboration once it became evident

that they could not complete it by themselves. The Americans on the other

hand, paid no real attention to the atomic bomb project until the British

research team had done all of the hard preliminary work. Admittedly, the

peaking of their interest also coincided with the Japanese bombing of Pearl

Harbor and the United States’ subsequent entry into the war, but they had

116 Groves, Now It Can Be Told, p. 408.

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already began indicating that they would be in favour of a collaboration of

some sorts.

In his 1962 account, titled Now It Can Be Told: The Story of the Manhattan

Project, Groves describes a “chance meeting between a Belgian and an

Englishman” in May 1939 which could well have been directly responsible for

the success of the Allied atomic program over that of the Axis powers. The

Englishman in question was Henry Tizard, at the time the director of the

Imperial College of Science and Technology, while the Belgian was M. Edgar

Sengier, the managing director of Union Minière du Haut Katanga, a Belgian

mining company. After unsuccessfully attempting to convince Sengier to grant

the British Government an option on all of the radium-uranium ore extracted

from the Shinkolobwe Mine in the Belgian Congo, Tizard took him by the arm

and said to him:

“Be careful, and never forget that you have in your hands something which

may mean a catastrophe to your country and mine if this material were to fall

into the hands of a powerful enemy.”117

Tizard’s portentous statement, coupled with his status as a renowned scientist

made a lasting impression on Sengier, and made him recognize the strategic

value of the ore that resided in the mine. When war broke out a few months

after his encounter with Tizard, he ordered that all of Union Minière’s available

radium be sent to Great Britain and the United States, and towards the end of

1940 he directed the shipment of all of the Shinkolobwe mine’s uranium ore to 117 Groves, Now It Can Be Told, p. 33.

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the United States. The materials transported included about 120 grams of

radium, and over 1,250 tons of uranium ore.

Sengier’s importance to the Allied cause is unquestionable, and therefore the

lasting impression made on him by Henry Tizard’s warning in 1939 can be

considered a critical part of the Manhattan Project’s success. Without their

meeting, it is entirely possible that Sengier would have remained oblivious to

the strategic importance of the resources that he possessed, and that the

Germans could have gained access to them. Had they obtained these vast

quantities of uranium ore before the Allies did, it is certainly possible, if not

probable that their atomic bomb project would have succeeded first.

This intervention by Tizard is further evidence of the important role that the

British played in the collaborative relationship. Although it is not an example of

atomic research that formed the foundation for the Manhattan Project, it is

nonetheless an additional case of Britain making life easier for the United

States. By planting the seed in Sengier’s mind, Tizard helped create the ideal

conditions for the pursuit of a large-scale atomic programme, just as various

scientific discoveries did.

Without the initial research undertaken by Britain in the early 1940s it is

extremely doubtful that the Manhattan Project would have succeeded within

the timeframe of the war, if at all. Admittedly, Britain would not have been able

to complete their own project without American assistance, but as they were

the lesser power that is to be expected. That the United States, on the other

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hand, was unable to succeed without the preliminary work of the British

programme, is altogether more remarkable.

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