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Northwest · M
Germany was doomed to fail. Nazis valued ideology over science, leading them to purge what they termed "Jewish Physics", from German textbooks and research. This left them with mostly sub-par scientists as the remaining leading minds did not want to "innovate" for the Nazis. Or I should say the bulk of the latter.

It was only a matter of time, before someone put it together. The Szilard letter was significant, but it only sped things up.

If there was no bomb in Aug of 1945, the war would have added 2M-3M deaths, as part of the invasion of Japan, and Japan would not have emerged from the war as it did. Little solace t the victims of Hiroshima and Nagazaki, but it is what it is. I certainly would not want to be making that decision.
ServantOfTheGoddess · 61-69, M
Few people ever have to face such momentous decisions. And yet as with so many decisions, who can really evaluate the outcome? This letter perhaps led directly to the horrifying deaths of tens of thousands of people in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. But perhaps it also led to the Nazi regime [b]not[/b] developing the bomb, winning the war, extending the holocaust even further... who knows what horrors were perhaps averted.

And it is fascinating that Einstein, working out the theories and equations, had never thought of the evil that could be done with his discoveries 😢
@ServantOfTheGoddess For me it reflects Einstein's innate pacifism. And perhaps his focus on the science, truth. Einstein was roped into this by Szilard really because of his fame and reputation. A letter by Einstein would be read by a POTUS.

One of the remarkable things looking back is really how little was understood and how far they got so quickly. Not the environment for deep moral and philosophical reflection. I don't think it was until seeing it that people understood. As Oppenheimer said at the first New Mexico test, a line from the Bhagavad Gita: "I have become Death, destroyer of worlds."

 
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