mr. sherwin: ok. thank you. soviets.n and the truman becomes president on april 12, 1945, and he says to reporters, you know, guys, i feel like the moon, the stars, and the sun have fallen on my head. i mean, or harry truman, he has been vice president for 82 days. t cell roosevelt once, more -- he saw roosevelt once more or less for a photo op. since then a senator 1930's, but he focused mostly on domestic issues. he was head of the truman committee, which was a committee designed to prevent waste in war production activities, and he does that very well. and that is one of the reasons he is chosen to be roosevelt's vice president when roosevelt runs for his fourth term, but he knows absolutely nothing about foreign policy. hisbasically, all of information is inherited from roosevelt's advisors, but he does have views. he has strong views about the soviet union. this was a senator who said, when reporters asked him after the germans attacked the soviet union -- well, what you think "well,hat, and he said if the

mr. sherwin details the development of the atomic bomb, beginning with the discovery of vision in 1938 -- fission in 1938. the smithsonian associates hosted this in washington, d.c. our speaker tonight's martin sure when, professor of history at george mason university. his biography of j robert oppenheimer won a pulitzer prize , the national book critics circle award -- he's also the ."thor of "the world destroyed it was the 1976 finalist for both the national book award and a pulitzer prize. the current paperback edition is subtitled "hiroshima and its legacy."