Despite strong opposition from the Leningrad faction, the appropriation for the development of nuclear weapons was eventually approved by the National Defense Committee. Since then www.biquge.info Soviet Union has become the third country to begin developing nuclear weapons.

On May 4, 1942, 2 billion rubles of research and development expenses were officially allocated to Laboratory No. 2 for the research and development of nuclear weapons and the construction of supporting facilities.

On that day, the experimental building in the Schukino district was also completed, and all the experimental equipment and furniture were prepared and put into operation.

A ZIS-101B limousine drove in front of a baroque building in the Schukino district.

This baroque building is three storeys high, which looks more beautiful and has a bit of a literary atmosphere. However, this building with a literary atmosphere has nothing to do with literature and art, and the people who work in it are not physicists, but also talented people who studied science and engineering, and their mission is to develop nuclear weapons.

Manturov stepped out of the car, the ZIS-101B sedan was used in his unit, and it looked no different from a contemporary sedan in appearance, and in terms of performance it was not at all comparable to his ZIS-101M sports car.

"Comrade Kurchatov, what direction do you have for research and development now? Are the work schedules and steps arranged? As soon as Manturov got out of the car, he walked into Laboratory Building No. 2 and went straight to the office of the director of the laboratory, Igor Kurchatov.

The arrival of Manturov surprised Kurchatov quite a bit, this is a real national leader, without even notice, he came to a laboratory to learn about the situation, it seems that he attaches great importance to scientific research.

"Comrade Manturov, we have only started work today, and if we want to talk about the direction of research and development, we have already thought of some for the time being, but we have not yet decided on it."

"Tell me about it." Manturov's face was kinder, his tone of voice was more amiable, and his demeanor was more gentle, and on the surface he looked rather like a scholar than a leader with the rank of general.

"We all have a preliminary understanding of the principle of uranium bombs, but how should we apply this principle to a bomb? How should this bomb be designed? These are the main problems, but more importantly, we must have the raw materials to make bombs, such as uranium-235 and plutonium-239 in high concentrations.

As far as I know, our country, and indeed the world, do not have the capacity to produce uranium-235 and plutonium-239 for the time being, and there are not even mines to mine uranium. Before developing a bomb, we should first mine uranium ore and have a device for separating uranium-235 and producing plutonium-239.

When we have the capacity to produce high-concentration uranium-235 or plutonium-239, we can start making uranium bombs. ”

Kurchatov was right that the Soviet Union had not yet exploited uranium resources, and even the United States and Germany, two countries that had already launched nuclear weapons programs, did not have much uranium available.

The Soviet Union mined uranium, and the uranium had to be separated, because it was uranium-235 that was used to make nuclear bombs, but the natural occurrence ratio of uranium-235 was only 0.72%, that is, out of 10,000 tons of uranium, only 72 tons were uranium-235 that could be used to make nuclear bombs, and the remaining 99.28% were uranium-238.

To extract this 0.72% uranium-235, a device is needed to separate the uranium-238 from uranium-235. After extracting a sufficient amount of uranium-235, a nuclear bomb can be made.

In addition to uranium, plutonium can also be used to make nuclear bombs, and the nuclear bombs made from plutonium are no less powerful than those made from uranium. But plutonium is synthesized from uranium, so in any case, a uranium mine must be established first.

The mining of uranium ore is only the first step in the preparations, and with the supply of "raw uranium", there will be uranium separation facilities and plutonium manufacturing facilities to extract uranium-235 or plutonium-239, which can be used to make nuclear weapons.

Historically, the Soviet Union began to develop the atomic bomb as early as 1943, but why did it not succeed in developing and testing the first nuclear bomb until 1949?

It was not until 1945, after the United States dropped the atomic bomb on Japan, that Stalin suddenly realized that he began to build a plutonium-239 production facility in Ozersk, Chelyabinsk Oblast, and only after the completion of the facility in 1948 did he begin to make plutonium-239 from uranium-238 raw materials to provide raw materials for the first nuclear bomb of the Soviet Union.

"Don't worry, Comrade Kurchatov," Manturov said calmly, clasping his hands together, "we will cooperate with the work of Laboratory No. 2 and start the construction of reactors and nuclear processing facilities as soon as possible.

I have already entrusted the construction of these facilities to Comrade Sokolov, Deputy People's Commissar for Construction, and he is responsible for the specific affairs. Comrade Sokolov is a person who is very willing to listen to opinions, and you should communicate more about the construction of nuclear facilities.

As the leading authority of the nuclear program, your laboratory No. 2 has the right to supervise the construction of nuclear facilities, as well as the production of nuclear reactors and centrifuges, and to ensure that the construction of nuclear facilities and the manufacture of nuclear reactors and other equipment meet the required standards.

I won't say much about the rest of the matter, I think you should know how to do it. ”

Kurchatov nodded and said: "Comrade Manturov, we will definitely do our best to complete the tasks assigned to us by the state." ”

Manturov took a drawing from his briefcase and placed it on Kurchatov's desk. "Comrade Kurchatov, this is 2 uranium bomb structures that I myself came up with, you can refer to it.

The first design, which I call a gun structure. We can put two pieces of uranium or plutonium that are both less than the critical mass in the bomb. Since the two are separated by a certain distance and do not reach a critical mass, they will not cause an explosion, and in order for the bomb to explode, the two should be quickly combined.

So how do you bring the two together? We can make one of the uranium blocks into bullets, and when we drop the bomb, this bullet will be fired in the direction of the other uranium block, like a bullet from a gun, and when the two come into contact, the uranium mass is greater than the critical mass, and then it will explode, which is one of my assumptions.

The second design is a bit more complicated, and I'll call it an implosion structure. We can make a spherical device of high explosives with a high explosion velocity, make small balls of plutonium-239 with less than the critical mass, and place some plutonium-239 less than the critical mass on the periphery.

When it is necessary to explode, the electric detonator in the bomb is ignited synchronously, so that all points of the explosive are detonated at the same time, and the peripheral nuclear charge is closed to the center at the same time, so that its density and critical mass are greatly increased.

After that, a controllable neutron source is used, and when the compression wave effect is maximum, the electrons are released to achieve a self-sustaining chain reaction, resulting in an extremely violent explosion. ”

After hearing this, Kurchatov was quite surprised, he never imagined that the vice chairman of the National Defense Committee, who was a party and government cadre in this place, could actually design a nuclear bomb, and there was no mistake in his design concept.

In fact, the design of these two drawings was not at all conceived by Manturov, but by the United States. The first picture is the design of the "Little Boy" atomic bomb, and the second picture is the design of the "Fat Man", the two atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan, respectively, and their internal structure has already been circulated on the Internet in the 21st century.

"In my opinion," Manturov continued, "we should first develop the first structure, which is relatively simple in structure and easier to manufacture, and then we will work on the implosion structure of the atomic bomb after we have made the atomic bomb in the form of a gun." ”