The Manhattan Project and public communication

The Manhattan Project was the largest government sponsored research and development project of its time.  Some things worth noting, in light of the present US government attitude toward science:

• It's hard to overstate the role played by immigrant scientists in this story.  Szilard, Einstein, Fermi, Wigner, Teller, von Neumann, and many more.  
• I was trying to remember when the Manhattan Project became publicly known in any detail.  It turns out, within three days of the US bombing of Nagasaki, the US released a tidily written report headlined by Henry DeWolf Smyth on all the essentials, including the administrative story of how the project came to be and was managed.  That report is available in many forms, including this cute version on the internet archive and simple pdf files at DOE and Princeton.  It's an outstanding piece of clear, spare writing.  It almost boggles the mind: Here was a technical topic that the national leadership considered important for the public to understand (!), so a highly readable report was prepared and released basically immediately following public knowledge of the bombs. (!!)
• The National Academies played a pivotal role in this story.  On page 51:  "In the spring of 1941, Briggs, feeling that an impartial review of the problem was desirable, requested [presidential science adviser Vannevar] Bush to appoint a reviewing committee. Bush then formally requested F. B. Jewett, president of the National Academy of Sciences, to appoint such a committee. Jewett complied, appointing A. H. Compton, chairman; W. D. Coolidge, E. O. Lawrence, J. C. Slater, J. H. Van Vleck, and B. Gherardi."  Once upon a time, the national leadership respected the National Academies and trusted them to provide impartial, accurate scientific advice to inform policy.  Somehow I doubt that Frank Baldwin Jewett, president of the NAS at the time, was worried that the government would cut off funding to the Academy if they didn't toe the line.  (As far as I know, no one from the Roosevelt administration was taking “donations” for lucrative government contracts on the bomb, and no one from the cabinet or the Department of War were personally betting for profit on whether it would work, either, but I digress.)

Just some food for thought.