The Manhattan Project was the code name for an effort to create an atomic bomb during World War II. It was named for the Manhattan Engineer District of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers because most of the early research was done in New York City . Re

fugee physicists sparked the project soon after German scientists had discovered nuclear fission in 1938. Many American scientists feared that Hitler and the Germans would produce a nuclear bomb; consequently, they contacted Albert Einstein to write a letter to United States President Franklin Delano Roosevelt to help the production of the first nuclear bomb. Roosevelt agreed to assist the scientists and they began the Manhattan Project. The development took place at laboratory at Los Alamos, New Mexico, located on an isolated mesa. The project was to be kept classified under all circumstances. The scientists working at the plant could not even tell their wives about their work, unless they worked there themselves. All the mail in the town was censored; everybody was restricted to a two hundred mile radius and residents were forbidden to tell their friends where they lived. No one in the community had a name; rather everyone was either a "sir" or "mister".

The most serious threat to the security of the project was the hiring of Klaus Fuchs who was found guilty of obtaining top-secret documents and sending them to the Soviet Union. He allowed for the Soviets to create their own atomic bomb and caused fear among the American people.

Throughout the Cold War people feared nuclear war, but the world was never closer to one then during the Cuban Missile Crisis. There would be no winner in a nuclear war; only destruction would remain. For fourteen days in October of 1962 American and Soviet troops were prepared to attack one another and were ready to use nuclear weapons. This was probably the peak of tension during the Cold War.

For the United States the crisis began on October 15, 1962 when reconnaissance photographs were taken of Soviet missile installations under construction in Cuba. The next morning, President John F. Kennedy was made aware of the situation in Cuba and quickly assembled a group of twelve advisors, called EX-COMM, to help him throughout the crisis. After seven days of intense discussion with government officials, he ordered a naval quarantine of Cuba to prevent any more weapons form arriving at the island. On October 22, 1962, President Kennedy made the events public and tensions rose throughout the world. Kennedy demanded that all Russian arms be removed from Cuba immediately. During the crisis Kennedy ordered low-level missions over Cuba every two hours to keep watch over the progress. On the twenty-fifth Kennedy moved the quarantine line back and raised the military readiness level. Then on the twenty-sixth the United States' government received a letter from Soviet Premier Khrushchev promising that the Soviets would retreat form Cuba under the condition that the American government would not plan another attack on Cuba, but the next day was worse. A plane was shot down over Cuba and another letter arrived from Khrushchev. This time the Soviet Premier asked for more in return for the removal of arms from Cuba. Khrushchev now asked that the United States remove all missiles from Turkey in return for the Soviet missiles in Cuba. Attorney General Robert Kennedy suggested that the government ignore the new letter and agree only to the first. On the twenty-eighth tensions began to ease when Khrushchev agreed to remove the missile installations in Cuba confiding in the United States' assurance that they would not attack Cuba. The tensions during the crisis were extremely high and Soviet General and Army Chief of Operations Anatoly Gribkov described it best - "Nuclear catastrophe was hanging by a thread ... and we weren't counting days or hours, but minutes."

In 1962, the Soviet Union was behind the United States in the arms race. The missiles that the Russians had were powerful enough to attack other European nations, but did not have enough distance to travel to the United States, but American missiles were capable of hitting any part of Russ

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