Posted on 08/10/2007 8:06:29 PM PDT by JACKRUSSELL
Behind a door disguised as the entrance to a post office, beneath ten metres of earth, lies the command headquarters of China’s first nuclear weapons research programme. From the chairs, pencils and air filter machines it seems that the generals left only yesterday, but nowadays the only visitors are curious tourists.
Guides at the long-secret site gesture towards the concrete envelope that encases the remaining radioactive debris, reassuring visitors that it is perfectly safe. The site is all that remains of the complex where scientists took the world by surprise in 1964 by transforming one of the world’s poorest nations into a nuclear power.
China shut the centre after conducting its last nuclear test in 1998 and is now allowing people to glimpse the parts that the Government has not deemed vital for national security. Much of the equipment has been removed. What is left shows the rudimentary nature of China’s first nuclear steps. The room where the button was pressed to detonate China’s first atomic device is barely 10ft square. A wax figure holding a wind-up telephone depicts the general who had to call Zhou Enlai, the Prime Minister, to tell him of China’s success.
But there were risks. In the environmental protection room, a guide points out a photograph of the masks and protective clothing. “The clothes were made from a material like the denim we wear for jeans. But it provided no protection, it was just a psychological comfort.” She says that many of those working at the site must have been harmed by radiation. The number is a secret.
Tibetan herders have returned to the pastures that once formed the 1,170sq km (450sq mile) zone cut off from the outside world for more than 40 years. Dorje, 19, scoffs at the idea of risk from debris buried inside a concrete coffin hidden in a hillside. “It’s like a dumpling made with nine layers. Of course, it’s safe.”
Guides say that inspectors visit once a year to check that all is well. Locals say that in 2001 two young Tibetans bent on theft dynamited their way in. One died at the scene and police did not bother to pursue the second because they were certain he would die swiftly from radiation sickness. Military experts from the nearby Unit 96 in Gansu province were called in to repair the damage.
Visitors seem unconcerned. In a small museum in the town that grew up at the testing centre, one elderly man stopped to look at two crudely painted polystyrene models of the mushroom clouds created by China’s first hydrogen and atomic weapon blasts. He said: “I feel so moved.” Old Kong was an enamel worker at the site in the 1960s but has not been back for 40 years. The opening of the command bunker was his chance to return. “I watched the first test explosion. It was the most exciting moment of my life.”
He hopes the network can be turned into a huge tourist attraction. Those plans may prove overly ambitious. Already China’s cautious bureaucrats are nervous about the opening of one of the nation’s most closely guarded secrets – however outdated.
I wouldn’t be caught touring such a place in China.
“Guides at the long-secret site gesture towards the concrete envelope that encases the remaining radioactive debris, reassuring visitors that it is perfectly safe.”
This is probably one place where Memorex IS better than being there.
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