ABSTRACT
The world's first atomic bomb was exploded at the Trinity Test Site in New Mexico on July 16, 1945. Dr. Robert Oppenheimer, the leader of the team of scientists and engineers who constructed the bomb, watched the bell-shaped fireball mass representing a power greater than any produced before on earth. President Harry Truman signed S.1717 and it became law—the Atomic Energy Act of 1946. The prediction of atomic scientists and engineers that the US monopoly would be short-lived came true when the Soviet Union exploded its first atomic bomb in August 1949. The duality of atomic energy use for war and peace gave the committee a firm base upon which to develop the peacetime uses of the atom. President Dwight D. Eisenhower's formal announcement of Atoms for Peace helped strengthen the growing budget authorizations, which increased the number of programs and the tempo of their implementation.
