After the war ended, the Manhattan Project supported the nuclear weapons testing at Bikini Atoll as part of Operation Crossroads in 1946. One of Secretary of the Navy James Forrestal's aides, Lewis Strauss proposed this series of tests to refute "loose talk to the effect that the fleet is obsolete in the face of this new weapon."[2] The nuclear weapons were handmade devices, and a great deal of work remained to improve their ease of assembly, safety, reliability and storage before they were ready for production. There were also many improvements to their performance that had been suggested or recommended, but that had not been possible under the pressure of wartime development.[3]