Atomic Bomb Quotes - Page 2

• I had been conscious a feeling of depression and so I voiced to [Secretary Of War Stimson] my grave misgivings, first on the basis of my belief that Japan was already defeated and that dropping the bomb was completely unnecessary, and secondly because I thought that our country should avoid shocking world opinion by the use of a weapon whose employment was, I thought, no longer mandatory as a measure to save American lives. It was my belief that Japan was, at this very moment, seeking a way to surrender with a minimum loss of 'face.'

  Dwight D. Eisenhower

  Country, War, Loss

  "Mandate for Change: The White House Years, 1953-1956". Book by Dwight D. Eisenhower, pp. 312-313, 1963.

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• When you see something that is technically sweet you go ahead and do it.

  J. Robert Oppenheimer

  Sweet

  Quoted in In the Matter of J. Robert Oppenheimer: usaec Transcript of Hearing Before Personnel Security Board (1954)

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• When you see something that is technically sweet, you go ahead and do it and you argue about what to do about it only after you have had your technical success. That is the way it was with the atomic bomb.

  J. Robert Oppenheimer

  Sweet, History, Bombs

  Quoted in In the Matter of J. Robert Oppenheimer: usaec Transcript of Hearing Before Personnel Security Board (1954)

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• If atomic bombs are to be added as new weapons to the arsenals of a warring world, or to the arsenals of nations preparing for war, then the time will come when mankind will curse the names of Los Alamos and Hiroshima. The people must unite or they will perish.

  J. Robert Oppenheimer

  War, Science, Names

  J. Robert Oppenheimer's acceptance speech for Army-Navy "Excellence" Award, November 16, 1945.

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• The bulldozer and not the atomic bomb may turn out to be the most destructive invention of the 20th century.

  Philip Shabecoff

  Nature, Environmental, Bombs

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• I always go back to Harry Truman: Should we drop an atomic bomb to save 100,000 lives? That's a hell of a decision to make. Did he make that decision by himself? No, he had advisers.

  Lee Iacocca

  Decision, Harry Truman, Bombs

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• World War II, the atomic bomb, the Cold War, made it hard for Americans to continue their optimism.

  Stephen Ambrose

  War, Hydrogen Bomb, Optimism

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• It is my opinion that the use of this barbarous weapon at Hiroshima and Nagasaki was of no material assistance in our war against Japan. The Japanese were already defeated and ready to surrender... In being the first to use it, we had adopted an ethical standard common to the barbarians of the Dark Ages.

  William D. Leahy

  War, Dark, Ethical Standards

  "Biography/ Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

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• Encouraging underground uranium mining on the Colorado Plateau um, the federal government was the only purchaser of uranium ore to try to manufacture uh, atomic bombs.

  Tom Udall

  Government, Uranium Mining, Trying

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• But when you come right down to it the reason that we did this job is because it was an organic necessity. If you are a scientist you cannot stop such a thing. If you are a scientist you believe that it is good to find out how the world works; that it is good to find out what the realities are; that it is good to turn over to mankind at large the greatest possible power to control the world and to deal with it according to its lights and values.

  J. Robert Oppenheimer

  Jobs, Believe, Science

  J. Robert Oppenheimer's speech to the Association of Los Alamos Scientists in Los Alamos, New Mexico, www.atomicarchive.com. November 2, 1945.

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• After the atomic bombs were dropped, the war ended and we went into Tokyo Bay with the rest of the fleet, the Missouri and the rest of them, while they signed the terms of surrender that ended the war.

  Barney Ross

  War, Bombs, Tokyo

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• We have genuflected before the god of science only to find that it has given us the atomic bomb, producing fears and anxieties that science can never mitigate.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  God, Fear, Science

  Strength Through Love Ch. 13

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• The sight of the first woman in the minimal two-piece was as explosive as the detonation of the atomic bomb by the U.S. at Bikini Island in the Marshall Isles, hence the naming of the bikini.

  Tom Waits

  Islands, Sight, Two

  "Tom Waits Interviews Tom Waits". www.npr.org. May 20, 2008.

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• My piece in One World or None was the description of the effect of a single atomic bomb on New York City.

  Philip Morrison

  New York, Cities, Pieces

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• I think the Internet is the most dangerous thing invented since the atomic bomb.

  John Mellencamp

  Thinking, Bombs, Internet

  "Rocker John Mellencamp likens Internet to A-bomb". www.reuters.com. August 18, 2010.

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• Access to the Vedas is the greatest privilege this century may claim over all previous centuries.

  J. Robert Oppenheimer

  Vedas, May, Atomic Weapons

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• My job was to produce plutonium that was used for atomic bomb.

  Mordechai Vanunu

  Jobs, Bombs, Plutonium

  "Democracy Now!" with Amy Goodman, www.counterpunch.org. August 18, 2004.

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• Some think the worst horrors of war might be avoided by an international agreement not to use atomic bombs. This is a vain hope.

  John Boyd Orr

  War, Thinking, Agreement

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• The atomic bomb certainly is the most powerful of all weapons, but it is conclusively powerful and effective only in the hands of the nation which controls the sky.

  Lyndon B. Johnson

  Powerful, Hands, Sky

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• We had news this morning of another successful atomic bomb being dropped on Nagasaki. These two heavy blows have fallen in quick succession upon the Japanese and there will be quite a little space before we intend to drop another.

  Henry L. Stimson

  Morning, Successful, Blow

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• Today we are rightly in an era of disarmament and dismantlement of nuclear weapons. But in some countries nuclear weapons development still continues. Whether and when the various Nations of the World can agree to stop this is uncertain. But individual scientists can still influence this process by withholding their skills.

  Hans Bethe

  Country, Nuclear Disarmament, Skills

  Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists Journal, 51:6, 3, November, 1995.

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• If surrender could have been brought about in May, 1945, or even in June or July, before the entrance of Soviet Russia into the [Pacific] war and the use of the atomic bomb, the world would have been the gainer.

  Joseph Grew

  War, June, Russia

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• Anyway, I'm sort of glad they've got the atomic bomb invented. If there's ever another war, I'm going to sit right the hell on top of it. I'll volunteer for it, I swear to God I will.

  J. D. Salinger

  War, Swear To God, Volunteer

  J. D. SALINGER (1951). “THE CATCHER IN THE RYE”

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• All the reputedly powerful reactionaries are merely paper tigers. The reason is that they are divorced from the people. Look! Was not Hitler a paper tiger? Was Hitler not overthrown? U.S. imperialism has not yet been overthrown and it has the atomic bomb. I believe it also will be overthrown. It, too, is a paper tiger.

  Mao Zedong

  Powerful, Believe, People

  Mao Zedong (2017). “Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung (The Little Red Book) & Other Works”, p.44, Lulu.com

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• Suddenly, there was an enormous flash of light, the brightest light I have ever seen or that I think anyone has ever seen. It blasted; it pounced; it bored its way into you. It was a vision which was seen with more than the eye. It was seen to last forever. You would wish it would stop; altogether it lasted about two seconds.

  Isidor Isaac Rabi

  Eye, Science, Thinking

  Isidor Isaac Rabi (1970). “Science: the center of culture”

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