The Making of the Atomic Bomb: 25th Anniversary Edition

by Richard Rhodes

Thus in the first months of 1940 it was already clear to two intelligent observers that nuclear weapons would be weapons of mass destruction against which the only apparent defense would be the deterrent effect of mutual possession. Frisch and Peierls finished their two reports and took them to Oliphant. He quizzed the men thoroughly, added a cover letter to their memoranda (“I have considered these suggestions in some detail and have had considerable discussion with the authors, with the result that I am convinced that the whole thing must be taken rather seriously, if only to make sure that the other side are not occupied in the production of such a bomb at the present time”) and sent letter and documents off to Henry Thomas Tizard, an Oxford man, a chemist by training, the driving force behind British radar development, the civilian chairman of the Committee on the Scientific Survey of Air Defense—better known as the Tizard Committee—which was the most important British committee at the time concerned with the application of science to war.