
The Hiroshima Men
The Quest to Build the Atomic Bomb, and the Fateful Decision to Use It
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
3 months free
Pre-order for $22.49
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Stephen McGann
-
By:
-
Iain MacGregor
About this listen
An epic, riveting history based on new interviews and research that elucidates the approval, construction, and fateful decision to drop the atomic bomb on Hiroshima.
At 8:15 a.m. on August 6, 1945, the Japanese port city of Hiroshima was struck by the world’s first atomic bomb. Built in the US by the top-secret Manhattan Project and delivered by a B-29 Superfortress, a revolutionary long-range bomber, the weapon destroyed large swaths of the city, instantly killing tens of thousands. The world would never be the same.
The Hiroshima Men’s vivid narrative recounts the decade-long journey toward this first atomic attack. It charts the race for the bomb during World War II, as the Allies fought the Axis powers, and is told through several key characters: General Leslie Groves, leader of the Manhattan Project alongside Robert Oppenheimer; pioneering Army Air Force pilot Colonel Paul Tibbets Jr.; the mayor of Hiroshima, Senkichi Awaya, who would die alongside eighty thousand fellow citizens; and Pulitzer Prize–winning writer John Hersey, who traveled to Japan for the New Yorker to expose the devastation the bomb inflicted on the city and to describe in unflinching detail the dangers posed by radiation poisoning.
This thrilling account takes the reader from the corridors of power in the White House and the Pentagon to the test sites of New Mexico; from the air war above Germany to the Potsdam Conference of Truman, Churchill, and Stalin; from the savage reconquest of the Pacific to the deadly firebombing air raids across Japan. The Hiroshima Men also includes Japanese perspectives—a vital aspect often missing from Western narratives—to complete Iain MacGregor’s nuanced, deeply human account of the bombing’s meaning and aftermath.
People who viewed this also viewed...
-
Midnight on the Potomac
- The Last Year of the Civil War, the Lincoln Assassination, and the Rebirth of America
- By: Scott Ellsworth
- Narrated by: Scott Ellsworth
- Length: 9 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Told with a thrilling pace, New York Times bestselling author and historian Scott Ellsworth has written the most compelling new book about the Civil War in years. Focusing on the last, desperate months of the war, when the outcome was far from certain, Midnight on the Potomac is a story of titanic battles, political upheaval, and the long-forgotten Confederate terror war against the loyal citizens of the North.
By: Scott Ellsworth
-
Fury and Ice
- Greenland, the United States and Germany in World War II
- By: Peter Harmsen
- Narrated by: Eric Jason Martin
- Length: 9 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The wartime interest in Greenland was a direct result of its vital strategic position—if you wanted to predict the weather in Europe, you had to have men in place on the vast, frozen island. The most celebrated example of Greenland's crucial contribution to Allied meteorological services is the correct weather forecast in June 1944 leading to the decision to launch the invasion of Normandy. In addition, both before and after D-Day a stream of weather reports from Greenland was essential for the Allied ability to carry out the bombing offensive against Germany.
By: Peter Harmsen
-
The CIA Book Club
- The Secret Mission to Win the Cold War with Forbidden Literature
- By: Charlie English
- Narrated by: Michael David Axtell
- Length: 10 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
For almost five decades after the Second World War, the Iron Curtain divided Europe, standing as the longest and most heavily guarded border on earth. With the risk of nuclear annihilation too high for physical combat, conflict was reserved for the psychological sphere. No one understood this battle of hearts, minds, and intellects more clearly than Bucharest-born George Minden, the head of a covert intelligence operation known as the “CIA books program.” This initiative aimed to win the Cold War with literature.
By: Charlie English
-
The Killing Season
- The Autumn of 1914, Ypres, and the Afternoon That Cost Germany a War
- By: Robert Cowley
- Length: 10 hrs
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
An in-depth, authoritative account of the fall of 1914 on the Western Front and the First Battle of Ypres, a true turning point in World War I and in modern warfare—by the founding editor of MHQ: The Quarterly Journal of Military History
By: Robert Cowley
-
Eagle Days
- Life and Death for the Luftwaffe in the Battle of Britain
- By: Victoria Taylor
- Narrated by: John Sackville
- Length: 10 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Eagle Days transforms the Luftwaffe’s historical role during the RAF’s ‘Finest Hour’ from a cartoonish antagonist to a multidimensional, flawed-yet-formidable opponent. The narrative contains not just the voices of the air crews who conducted the fighting, but uniquely never-before-translated primary source material of other contemporary eyewitnesses, (Luftwaffe’s paratroopers, anti-aircraft gunners and air signalmen). Eagle Days will offer all fans of this period a refreshing, comprehensive and exciting account of the Luftwaffe’s real experiences during the Battle of Britain.
By: Victoria Taylor
-
Nothing but Courage
- The 82nd Airborne's Daring D-Day Mission—and Their Heroic Charge Across the La Fière Bridge
- By: James Donovan
- Narrated by: Mark Deakins
- Length: 11 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In June 1944, German and American forces converged on an insignificant bridge a few miles inland from the invasion beaches. If taken by the Nazis, the bridge might have gone down in history as the reason the Allies failed on D-Day. The narrow road over it was each side’s conduit to victory. Continued Nazi control over the bridge near an old manoir known as La Fière—one of only two bridges in the region capable of supporting tanks and other heavy armor—would allow the Germans to reinforce their defenses at Utah Beach, one of the five landing areas chosen for Operation Overlord.
By: James Donovan
-
Midnight on the Potomac
- The Last Year of the Civil War, the Lincoln Assassination, and the Rebirth of America
- By: Scott Ellsworth
- Narrated by: Scott Ellsworth
- Length: 9 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Told with a thrilling pace, New York Times bestselling author and historian Scott Ellsworth has written the most compelling new book about the Civil War in years. Focusing on the last, desperate months of the war, when the outcome was far from certain, Midnight on the Potomac is a story of titanic battles, political upheaval, and the long-forgotten Confederate terror war against the loyal citizens of the North.
By: Scott Ellsworth
-
Fury and Ice
- Greenland, the United States and Germany in World War II
- By: Peter Harmsen
- Narrated by: Eric Jason Martin
- Length: 9 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The wartime interest in Greenland was a direct result of its vital strategic position—if you wanted to predict the weather in Europe, you had to have men in place on the vast, frozen island. The most celebrated example of Greenland's crucial contribution to Allied meteorological services is the correct weather forecast in June 1944 leading to the decision to launch the invasion of Normandy. In addition, both before and after D-Day a stream of weather reports from Greenland was essential for the Allied ability to carry out the bombing offensive against Germany.
By: Peter Harmsen
-
The CIA Book Club
- The Secret Mission to Win the Cold War with Forbidden Literature
- By: Charlie English
- Narrated by: Michael David Axtell
- Length: 10 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
For almost five decades after the Second World War, the Iron Curtain divided Europe, standing as the longest and most heavily guarded border on earth. With the risk of nuclear annihilation too high for physical combat, conflict was reserved for the psychological sphere. No one understood this battle of hearts, minds, and intellects more clearly than Bucharest-born George Minden, the head of a covert intelligence operation known as the “CIA books program.” This initiative aimed to win the Cold War with literature.
By: Charlie English
-
The Killing Season
- The Autumn of 1914, Ypres, and the Afternoon That Cost Germany a War
- By: Robert Cowley
- Length: 10 hrs
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
An in-depth, authoritative account of the fall of 1914 on the Western Front and the First Battle of Ypres, a true turning point in World War I and in modern warfare—by the founding editor of MHQ: The Quarterly Journal of Military History
By: Robert Cowley
-
Eagle Days
- Life and Death for the Luftwaffe in the Battle of Britain
- By: Victoria Taylor
- Narrated by: John Sackville
- Length: 10 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Eagle Days transforms the Luftwaffe’s historical role during the RAF’s ‘Finest Hour’ from a cartoonish antagonist to a multidimensional, flawed-yet-formidable opponent. The narrative contains not just the voices of the air crews who conducted the fighting, but uniquely never-before-translated primary source material of other contemporary eyewitnesses, (Luftwaffe’s paratroopers, anti-aircraft gunners and air signalmen). Eagle Days will offer all fans of this period a refreshing, comprehensive and exciting account of the Luftwaffe’s real experiences during the Battle of Britain.
By: Victoria Taylor
-
Nothing but Courage
- The 82nd Airborne's Daring D-Day Mission—and Their Heroic Charge Across the La Fière Bridge
- By: James Donovan
- Narrated by: Mark Deakins
- Length: 11 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In June 1944, German and American forces converged on an insignificant bridge a few miles inland from the invasion beaches. If taken by the Nazis, the bridge might have gone down in history as the reason the Allies failed on D-Day. The narrow road over it was each side’s conduit to victory. Continued Nazi control over the bridge near an old manoir known as La Fière—one of only two bridges in the region capable of supporting tanks and other heavy armor—would allow the Germans to reinforce their defenses at Utah Beach, one of the five landing areas chosen for Operation Overlord.
By: James Donovan