Hide Article Text (OCR)
M PACIFIC STARS AND STRIPES TUESDAY, JUNE 3,1997j A PA N ’ S R A C ETHE A-BOMBWWH’s end nailed coffinon Japan’s A-bomb dansBy Richard BenkeThetAssociated PressLOS ALAMOS, N.M. — When a captured Nazi U-boat arrived at Portsmouth, N.H., toward the end of World War II, Americans were never told the significance of its cargo.The German submarine was carrying uranium oxide, ingredients for an atomic bomb, bound for Japan. Two Japanese officers on board were allowed to commit suicide.Two months later, the United States detonated the first atomic bomb, a prelude to the obliteration of two Japanese cities.Unknown to many who built those bombs, Japan was scrambling to build its own.Some of the evidence was the uranium aboard the U-boat that surrendered in the Atlantic May 119, 1945, shortly after Adolf Hitler committed suicide.Documents now declassified show there were 1,235 pounds of uranium oxide in 10 cases destined for the Japanese army.‘‘Germany was collapsing. They had a lot of good uranium. Somebody got this crazy idea of taking it to Japan,” says physicist Herbert York, directoremeritus bf the University of California’s Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation.The uranium oxide is believed to have gone to Oak Ridge, Tenn., bolstering supplies for the ManhattanProject, the U.S. bomb program.It was even possible — but not probable — that some of the uranium headed for Japan reached there aboard the Enola Gay, the B-29 that dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima on Aug. 6, 1945, says U.S. Energy Department archivist Skip Gosling. The bomb dropped on Nagasaki on Aug. 9 used plutonium, not uranium.That Japan was trying to produce a bomb has been known for decades^ How far it got remains unclear.Also unclear is whether President Harry S. Truman knew about Japan’s program when he ordered the bomb dropped on Japan. Several Manhattan Project scientists said in interviews they knew nothing of Japan’s A-bomb program until after the war.‘‘I don’t think anybody knew,” York said. “We didn’t think the Japanese were doing anything. We were worriedabout the Germhns.”Would knowledge of Japan’s nuclear program haye changed the minds Of people critical of Truman’s decision?“I think if there were clear evidence of this, it would indeed help to mollify in some way some of the people who are coming out with criticism of our government in using the bomb,” says Steve Stoddard, ah engineer who worked 30 years at Los Alamos.Greg Mello of the anti-nuclear Los Alamos Study Group counters: “It’s incredibly irrelevant.”The. bomb dropped on fliro-. shima left almost 130,000 people dead or wounded and leveled 90 percent of the city. The Nagasaki bomb left abouti^ 75,000 casualties. ^Military leaders at the time estimated an invasion of Japan would cost 2 million lives. A few months earlier, the U.S. invasion of Okinawa left an estimated, 250,000 dead on both sidesrMello contends Japan's atomic bomb efforts were never a threat. But Robert Wilcox, author of “Japan’s Secret War” (Marlowe and Co.), a book, -v The Associated PressThe world's first atomic bomb explosion near Alamogordo, N.H., is shown in this July 16,1945, file photo.Gomments underscore A-bomb splitThe Associated PressLOS ALAMOS, N.M. — Nearly everyone has an opinion about the atomic bombing of Japan in 1945.In four years, the Los Alamos National Laboratory’s Bradbury Science Museum has collected comments, mostly anonymous, in 10 books packed with passion from both sides of the issue,'No sooner is one entry written than someone scribbles a dagger-sharp response. Many seem divided by generations.“The younger people I find to be wonderfully naive but alto not very well informed,” says museum director Jdhn Rhoades, 54. “They point to the United States as a killer, asking, ‘How can we do that to these innocent women and children?’”Among comments:A Detroit doctor — “This is 4he same industry which has brought us Chernobyl.” *A Detroit youngster — “Why is it so important that we find new ways to kill each other?’’** An anonymous response — “So we all may survive,”A Bataan Death March survivor — “If Japan was invaded, weNvould all be killed. Horrible as it was, as I flew over Nagasaki on way out, all I could think of was how thankful I wasTbe Associated PressJohn Rhoades, Bradbury Science Museum director, stands behind a model of “Little Boy,” the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima.that it was over and the killing had stopped.”A 13-year-old — “I don’t doubt the creators of the atom bomb’s intentions were good ones, and its creation was inevitable, but the knowledge we have gained, although helpful now in many ways, when used carelessly will destroy us.”A German — “Stop it It’s soterrible, and bombing Hiroshima is no better than a Holocaust.”Another enfry — “We.could dismantle the bombs, but we could never erase the knowledge it took to* create them. In essence, we have created a monster that can never be destroyed.”about Japan’s Wmb project, says documents suggests Japan may have gotten further than Germany.“I know the Japanese were trying to make a bomb all through the war and would have done so had we not ended the war,” Wilcox said. “I have documents showing one of the ways they were going to use it was to put it in kamikaze bombers and send it against the invasion fleets.”After Japan surrendered, the U.S. Army found five Japanese cyclotrons, which could separate fissionable material from uranium. The Army smashed the cyclotrons and dumped them in Tokyo Harbor.Most historians and scientists, including York, say Japan never came close to producing an A-bomb.“We had hundreds and hundreds of separators,” says John Hopkins, a retired Los Alamos scientist, “Those were run day and night to separate U-235 from natural uranium. This was separated one atom at a time.” For all that, he says, engineers produced only four bombs’ worth of U-235, a uranium isotope.“So I would be very surprised if the Japanese had enough uranium,” says Hopkins, .who joined Los Alamos National Laboratory in i960 and now is a member of the Los Alamos Education Group, established to counter nuclear misconceptions.But there was a program, Hopkins acknowledges.By most accounts, Japan’s wartime A-bomb efforts were headed by Yoshio Nishina, who had worked in Copenhagen with atomic pioneer Niels Bohr, The diary of Masa Takeuchi, assigned to Nishiha’s thermal' diffusion separation project,; says Nishina wanted to process hundreds of tons of uranium* at the rate of 300 milligrams per day^ according toHhe U.S. journal Sciedce.According to Japanese science historian Tetsu Hiroshige, preliminary research for a Japanese bomb program began m.1940, and the program called Number F (for fission) began at Kyoto in 1942.However, a memoir by Kyoto physicist Bunsabe Arakatsu says the military commitment wasn’t backed up with resources, and the 1978 Science article concluded the danger of a Japanese atomic bomb “was not a real one.”Wilcox says documents suggest Japan’s military took over the program late in the war with help from Japanese industry and built six large separators. He says Japan searched for uranium, buying $25 million worth in China.Wilcox and U.S. researcher Charles W. Stone have documents suggesting Japan might have moved its nuclear operation to Korea after U.S. B-29 incendiary raids on Japan.Postwar documents show U.S. concern about a Japanese plant in Hungnam, now part of Nprth Korea, captured by Sovi- • et troops at war’s end.“Consistent rumors from the Hungnam area have dealt with the possibility of atomic research being conducted there,” says a U.S. Army document. .It says the mysterious output of the Hungnam plant was collected every other month by Sot viet submarines. ‘ ■The document seems td partly corroborate an Oct. 3, 1946, report by The Atlanta Constitution, describing a plant in Hungnam.The writer, David Snell, reported he was an Army 24th Corps investigator when he learned of the plant from a Japanese officer.Snell said the ^officer claimed Japan detonated a small atomic 0 device three days before Japan’s surrender.He said the Japanese destroyed the plant, including incomplete bombs, hours before the Soviets arrived “We lost three months in the transfer” of the plant from Japan, Spell quoted him as saying. “We Would have had (the bomb) three months earlier, if it had not been for the B-29.”
Newspaper Details
Pacific Stars and Stripes
Tokyo, Tôkyô, JP
Tue, Jun 03, 1997
Page 10
Full Page
Clipped by
Caleb B.
NA, 19 Jan 2025
Other Publications Near Tokyo, Tôkyô
Pacific Japan Stars and Stripes
Japan Advertiser
Pacific Stars and Stripes
