Editing Manhattan Project (section)

=== Censorship ===
[[File:Are your drawers closed? Manhattan Project security poster.png|thumb|Security poster, warning office workers to close drawers and put documents in safes when not being used]]
Voluntary censorship of atomic information began before the Manhattan Project. After the start of the European war in 1939 American scientists began avoiding publishing military-related research, and in 1940 scientific journals began asking the [[National Academy of Sciences]] to clear articles. [[William L. Laurence]] of ''[[The New York Times]]'', who wrote an article on atomic fission in ''[[The Saturday Evening Post]]'' of 7 September 1940, later learned that government officials asked librarians nationwide in 1943 to withdraw the issue.<ref>{{harvnb|Sweeney|2001|pp=196–198}}.</ref> The Soviets noticed the silence, however. In April 1942 nuclear physicist [[Georgy Flyorov]] wrote to [[Joseph Stalin]] on the absence of articles on nuclear fission in American journals; this resulted in the [[Soviet Union]] establishing its own atomic bomb project.<ref>{{harvnb|Holloway|1994|pp=76–79}}.</ref>

The Manhattan Project operated under tight security lest its discovery induce Axis powers, especially Germany, to accelerate their own nuclear projects or undertake covert operations against the project.<ref>{{harvnb|Jones|1985|pp=253–255}}.</ref> The Office of Censorship relied on the press to comply with a voluntary code of conduct it published, and the project at first avoided notifying the office. By early 1943 newspapers began publishing reports of large construction in Tennessee and Washington, and the office began discussing with the project how to maintain secrecy. In June it asked newspapers and broadcasters to avoid discussing "atom smashing, atomic energy, atomic fission, atomic splitting, or any of their equivalents. The use for military purposes of radium or radioactive materials, heavy water, high voltage discharge equipment, cyclotrons."<ref>{{harvnb|Sweeney|2001|pp=198–200}}.</ref><ref name="ap19450808">{{cite news |url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=8CZdAAAAIBAJ&sjid=0loNAAAAIBAJ&pg=1159%2C1605869 |title=No News Leaked Out About Bomb |newspaper=Lawrence Journal-World |date=8 August 1945 |agency=Associated Press |access-date=15 April 2012 |page=5}}</ref>