In his first official statement after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, President Harry Truman claimed the new weapon as a fundamental breakthrough in military capability and a uniquely American achievement. The Hiroshima bomb, he said, was “more than two thousand times the blast power of…the largest bomb ever yet used in the history of warfare,” drawing its enormous destructive force from “a harnessing of the basic power of the universe.” With the bomb, Truman declared, “We have now added a new and revolutionary increase in destruction to supplement the growing power of our armed forces.” It was made possible, he claimed, only because “the United States had available the large number of scientists of distinction in the many needed areas of knowledge. It had the tremendous industrial and financial resources necessary for the project.... It is doubtful if such another combination could be got together in the world.”

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