German scientists Otto Hahn and Fritz Strassmann discovered fission
while working for the German government. Given the political development
in Nazi Germany, scientists were concerned.
One physicist in particular saw the military potential in the
discovery. Leo Szilard, a Hungarian physicist, wrote: "I
see...possibilities in another direction. These might lead to
a large-scale production of energy and radioactive elements, unfortunately
also perhaps to atomic bombs."
Szilard and another Hungarian, Eugene Wigner, were both Jews
and had left central Europe because of the threat they faced from
Nazism. Convinced that it was vital for the United States to develop
an atomic bomb before the Germans, they prevailed upon the most
famous scientist of the time, Albert Einstein, to write President
Franklin D. Roosevelt. Einstein signed the letter of August 2,
1939, which expressed their concerns and encouraged government
involvement and resources in combating the Nazi threat.
