Posted on 08/22/2006 1:06:56 AM PDT by Cementjungle
BALTIMORE - Baltimore’s Pledge of Resistance Wednesday commemorated the anniversaries of the two atomic bombings of Hiroshima (Aug. 6, 1945) and Nagasaki (Aug. 9, 1945), as it has for the last 22 years.
Among the participants were survivors of the Nagasaki blast, who attested to the horrors experienced.
They serve as an important reminder of how the innocent always pay the penalty in war.
The tensions in the Middle East and North Korea, as well as the distinct possibility of a nuclear attack on our own soil underscore the terrifying legacy bequeathed by those who brought warfare to its deadliest level.
But the horror of the blasts must not overshadow the reasons why the U.S. government chose to drop the bombs — some of which have been obscured by time and propaganda.
Let’s look at some of the reasons:
Perhaps the main reason the United States dropped the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima was that we were millions of lives and several years into a global war, instigated in part by the Japanese. They were the aggressors.
By Aug. 6, fellow Axis powers, Germany and Italy, had long since surrendered.
The Japanese High Command, however, refused to surrender, dragging death and destruction in its diabolical wake.
Members advised their people to commit suicide, rather than surrender.
They sent their kamikazes (not all of whom were willing) to certain death after a special ceremony and kudos from their supposedly divine Emperor.
Blinded by nationalism and pride, they intended to fight to the bitter end.
The Japanese still held onto some hope, including the pending arrival of U-234 from Germany.
This special U-boat departed German waters in March 1945 holding a top secret cargo — uranium and heavy water for the Japanese atomic weapons project.
Also on board were key personnel and technology to help the Japanese Empire launch an atomic bomb on San Francisco by a target date of Aug. 17, 1945.
After Germany’s surrender on May 9, German Admiral Karl Doenitz ordered all submarines to surrender.
The commanding officer, Klt. Johann Heinrich Fehler, ironically nicknamed “Dynamite,” opted to surrender to the Americans.
The Japanese passengers aboard immediately committed suicide and were buried at sea.
The ship surrendered to the U.S.S. Sutton on May 14, with an assist by Coast Guard Cutter Forsyth.
It arrived in Portsmouth, N.H., several days later. Some of the passengers went to work for our government.
And many historians believe the government used the uranium for our atomic weapons program.
At first the Japanese High Command could not believe that its precious cargo would not arrive in time for the attack date of August 17.
U-234 crew members believed that there was enough uranium for two atomic bombs — destined to destroy two American cities and untold American lives.
It is certain that had the Japanese possessed a bomb, that they would have used it on us.
At the time of the seizure of the U-234, we did not know if another U-boat carrying a similar load had successfully made the trip to Japan.
We did not know how much time we had, but we knew it was not long.
I, for one, am grateful that if such a ferocious weapon by necessity was unleashed, that it was upon the country that was the aggressor, not ours.
I am grateful that it spared many American lives — both of our troops in the Pacific, as well as our innocent civilians on the West Coast. War is hell, but it is not an altogether unexpected one for the aggressor.Brooke Gunning is the author of several regional best-sellers, including “Maryland Thoroughbred Racing,” “Baltimore’s Halcyon Days” and “Towson and the Villages of Ruxton and Lutherville.” She currently is at work on her next book.
Never heard that story quite like that before.
Which part do you mean?
well my information is that the Japs already had a working reactor up and running somewhere on the Korean peninsula running under the direction of one Dr. Suzuki...and the plan called for them to hide their bomb on board a scuttled Japanese warship on the southern coast and to detonate it while the US 7th Fleet was anchored there and while troop landings were in progress.....
Maybe earlier shipments had already made it through to Japan?
That the Japanese actually had a date for a nuclear attack.
I knew there was a German sub planning on delivering heavy water but not substantial quantities of weapons grade uranium.
I question whether that is true.
...that is my understanding
What were the places where uranium was mined back then? For example, the United Kingdom mined their uranium from Canada. Did the Japanese have to get the uranium from Germany?
What were the places where uranium was mined back then? For example, the United Kingdom mined their uranium from Canada. Did the Japanese have to get the uranium from the Nazis?
Bad connotations.
I prefer to leave it in the full context, thank you...
"The Japs were prepared to use atomic, chemical, biological, suicide attacks and God knows what else..."
I believe they got there uranium from pitchblende ore mined in Czechoslovakia or one of their captive countries....could be wrong about it being Czech....
PC apologists won't like this article.
For the information on where World War 2 Japan got its uranium, much appreciated.
Odd that the United States would get its ore from Africa when it was being mined in Canada.
"In 1922, the UMHK built its first refinery for uranium ore, and by 1926 had a virtual monopoly of the world uranium market (holding most of the deposits known at the time), to be broken only by the German invasion of 1940."
Union Minière du Haut Katanga
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Union_Mini%C3%A8re_du_Haut_Katanga
.....well it's the mere fact that Japan actually had a nuclear program under develpment that I found so intriuging....to me that alone justfies our nuking them twice.....that and the fact that my father was on Okinawa at the time with the USN and they were planning the eventual occupation of Japan subsequent to what surely would have been massive casualties on both sides
It was the afternoon of August 5, 1945. To a group of six hundred army officers assigned to the Hiroshima garrison, Professor Yoshitaka Mimura of Hiroshima Bunri University, a theoretical physicist, was explaining the scientific possibilities of new weapons which might reverse the tide of war. Japan had little Navy or Air Force left. Within months a massive invasion of the home islands seemed likely. “Could you tell us, sir”, a young lieutenant colonel asked, “what an atomic bomb is? Is there any possibility that the bomb will be deployed by the end of this war?”Mimura chalked a rough sketch on the blackboard to illustrate the [nuclear] reactions required. Scientists at Tokyo University, he explained, have “theoretically penetrated” the secrets of nuclear fission. If they could apply their theories practically, an atomic bomb “could be smaller than a piece of caramel candy, but, if exploded five hundred meters above a populated city, it could destroy 200,000 lives.”
“When can we have that bomb?” “Well, it is difficult to say”, Mimura answered, knowing nothing of any Japanese enterprise to apply fission theory to bomb-making. “But I can tell you this much: not before the end of this war.”
Neither the Germans nor the Japanese were in a position to build or deliver an atom bomb in 1945. This is Hooey. The Germans were delivering uranium to the Japs, perhaps they intended to build a dirty bomb.
There was a reactor in Berlin in 1945 and the Japanese understood the principles, but they were years away from building a weapon.
According to the book "Manhattan Project" by Stephane Groueff, some (if not all) of the uranium for the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs was mined in Colorado and was actually a by-product of an existing Union Carbide vanadium mining operation. At the time, uranium had little commercial value, and they were trying to figure out something to do with it. The problem was solved in 1942 when the government purchased 80,000 lbs of uranium oxide from Union Carbide.
Blinded by nationalism and pride, they intended to fight to the bitter end.
Undoubtedly, the same would hold true if America were in the same situation. At least for half of us.
There were no Japaneese innocents.
They were prepared to die for their motherland. That would have cost hundreds of thousands of American soldiers lives.
And the lot of them that died weren't worth one additional American soldiers life.
Maybe not.
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