Japanese nukes
- Thread starter tom
- Start date
Xen
Banned
Im not sure if they have access to the raw material needed, but if so, the Japanese refuse to surrendor, the US and UK lead an invasion on the home islands, the invadors are met with "The Divine Wind" killing thousands, unsure how many of these bombs the Japanese have the US and UK rethink their strategy. Stalin now doesnt want to get involved in Japan after the horrors with the bomb on American and British troops.
The allies decide to starve Japan to terms. A few months later Japanese officials place a call to Washington. Officials from the US and UK meet in Tokyo with representatives from the Emperor. The war ends with Japan meeting some terms rather than all terms. Japan keeps its Emperor much in a similiar setting as OTL, the war criminals listed by Britain and the US are turned over for trials. Japan wont be occupied, and wont be forced to disarm but has to turn over control of Korea to the Americans and British and the southern Sakhalin Island to the Soviets (the allies throw Stalin a bone to keep him from howling about Korea). The Americans occupy South Korea, while the British occupy North Korea, they are united in 1946 as a Republic.
The allies decide to starve Japan to terms. A few months later Japanese officials place a call to Washington. Officials from the US and UK meet in Tokyo with representatives from the Emperor. The war ends with Japan meeting some terms rather than all terms. Japan keeps its Emperor much in a similiar setting as OTL, the war criminals listed by Britain and the US are turned over for trials. Japan wont be occupied, and wont be forced to disarm but has to turn over control of Korea to the Americans and British and the southern Sakhalin Island to the Soviets (the allies throw Stalin a bone to keep him from howling about Korea). The Americans occupy South Korea, while the British occupy North Korea, they are united in 1946 as a Republic.
tom said:
Everybody was working on the bomb, but I suspect the Japanese didn't have a prayer short of aliens dropping the plans - and a load of enriched uranium - in their laps.
If it had happened - hmmm. When in the war would it happen? In 1941? 43? 45? I guess that it would be late in the war. Able politicians could have used it to negotiate more favourable peace terms (the 'Unconditional Surrender only' strategy against Japan was never as firm as against Germany). However, given the general detachment from reality that had taken place among the senior leadership I would expect them to use it immediately, in the most aggressive way possible, in the hope of turning the war around. Unless they also get given a miraculous source of fissile material, that will backfire very badly.
Have a look at John Dower's essay on the subject, it's in his collection, JAPAN IN PEACE AND WAR. It concludes: "In the final analysis, however, it seems indisputable that the scale of Japan's wartime work on the uranium bomb was so small as to be virtually meaningless.."
There's a book called "Japan's Secret War" that holds that the Japanese program was fairly advanced, and they even tested a nuclear weapon somewhere in Korea. That supposedly explained why the Russians went for Korea and some northern islands of Japan like they did.
However, most historians tend to discount it (I think). Japan's WMD emphasis seems to be on biological weapons, which are much easier to deal with.
However, most historians tend to discount it (I think). Japan's WMD emphasis seems to be on biological weapons, which are much easier to deal with.
Abdul Hadi Pasha
Banned
Matt Quinn said:
ALL historians discount it. Such an assertion is so outrageous and ridiculous that nobody but the most ardent (and mentally retarded) conspiriacy-theorist could believe that.
Hyperbole font off.
carlton_bach said:
Actually, they did have a prayer of at least part of this happening. In 1945, a U-boat surrender to American forces a week or two after Germany. On board - an entire disassembled Me-262 and all the enriched uranium produced in Germany during WWII. BTW, the boat had been heading for Japan, until its sailors learned of the armistice, killed the two Japanese officers escorting the load, and surrendered to American forces.
Several dirty bombs in shells and bigger bombs would cause major problems for the allies. And that Japan exploded a nuke in Korea, well, I might just use that little tid-bit here soon.
"The number of persons employed in this research full time was never more than a few score. The Tokyo project, which involved a single preliminary isotope separation experiment ended in failure. The Kyoto project never got to the experimental stage. In the end, Japan could show for its pains a few theoretical papers and a wafer of metallic uranium."
Dower: ""NI" AND "F": JAPAN'S ATOMIC BOMB RESEARCH"
Dower: ""NI" AND "F": JAPAN'S ATOMIC BOMB RESEARCH"
LAST SECRETS OF THE AXIS
The HIST CHANNEL documentary LAST SECRETS OF THE AXIS contained some very good info on the Japs' attempts to build a nuclear bomb with German help, including the captured U-Boat at war's end mentioned earlier. CODENAME DOWNFALL by Thomas Allen (which I reviewed on the previous board) also contained a good chapter on Japan's efforts to develop a nuclear weapon, although as Matt Quinn rightly stated, the greater emphasis in Jap WMD efforst was with bio weapons- Ping Fan, Unit 731, etc.
The HIST CHANNEL documentary LAST SECRETS OF THE AXIS contained some very good info on the Japs' attempts to build a nuclear bomb with German help, including the captured U-Boat at war's end mentioned earlier. CODENAME DOWNFALL by Thomas Allen (which I reviewed on the previous board) also contained a good chapter on Japan's efforts to develop a nuclear weapon, although as Matt Quinn rightly stated, the greater emphasis in Jap WMD efforst was with bio weapons- Ping Fan, Unit 731, etc.
Faeelin
Banned
Melvin Loh said:
You mean the channel with UFO's in the Bible, right?
Uhuh. The idea of a nation with a GDP not even equal to the US west coast and blockaded and bombed developing atomic weapons, which took the US, an industrial behemoth, years, is as plausible as Bonaparte rising from the dead in 38 to lead a new Grande Armee.
It is said that a German sub, U-234, with a large "cargo" type left Germany on March 25, 1945 with a disasembled ME 26r, some German experts on rockets and air defence, two Japanese men, and most importantly, 50 lead cases of uranium oxide. It was bound for Japan. The sub was still at sea when Germany surrendered and received orders to return to base. The captain decided not to and eventually surrendered to an American ship, the USS Sutton. The sub was taken to New Hamshire where the cargo of uranium was discovered and the story was out.
Uranium oxide which has not been bombarded by neutrons in a reactor or sub-reactor can be packed up to 500 kilos in a stout paper bag since common-or-garden uranium oxide emits no gamma radiation, and little other corpuscular radiation.
The material aboard U-234 was transported in lead cylinders lined with gold. There is no indication of the size of each container but the weight of the cylinder would have ruled out the quantity of substance transported being very much. Radioactive isotopes are transported in lead isotope containers for biological shielding and do not need an extra gold lining. Gold has a good cross-section for preventing the fragments of fission, but fission would not occur in a small lead cylinder. The dockyard document advises US authorities that the "uranium oxide" may be handled "like crude TNT", suggesting that it had explosive properties, but that the cylinders should never be opened because the substance "would react" (presumably on contact with air) and "become dangerous." One should not necessarily conclude that "become dangerous" is synonymous with "explode".
There is a British BIOS Intelligence document extant which suggests that a catalyst or reagent was added to a normal explosive in tests at Berlin Doberitz in late 1944. Allegedly it vastly magnified the destructive effects of the conventional explosive by creating a lightning storm at ground level over several kilometres. Such a device would kill principally by suffocation after the initial blast had dissipated. Scientists in Germany had not been able to iron out certain lethal side-effects by the war's end and there is some evidence that there might have been a Luftwaffe mutiny against carrying the material in March 1945. It is interesting that the Me 262 bomber alleged by the German crew to be aboard U-234 has never been admitted by US official sources and did not appear on the USN Unloading List. It is unlikely that the German commander and crew were lying and one assumes that the jet had some special significance in connection with the material.
Perhaps this is all bullshit...
http://uboat.net/boats/u234.htm
Uranium oxide which has not been bombarded by neutrons in a reactor or sub-reactor can be packed up to 500 kilos in a stout paper bag since common-or-garden uranium oxide emits no gamma radiation, and little other corpuscular radiation.
The material aboard U-234 was transported in lead cylinders lined with gold. There is no indication of the size of each container but the weight of the cylinder would have ruled out the quantity of substance transported being very much. Radioactive isotopes are transported in lead isotope containers for biological shielding and do not need an extra gold lining. Gold has a good cross-section for preventing the fragments of fission, but fission would not occur in a small lead cylinder. The dockyard document advises US authorities that the "uranium oxide" may be handled "like crude TNT", suggesting that it had explosive properties, but that the cylinders should never be opened because the substance "would react" (presumably on contact with air) and "become dangerous." One should not necessarily conclude that "become dangerous" is synonymous with "explode".
There is a British BIOS Intelligence document extant which suggests that a catalyst or reagent was added to a normal explosive in tests at Berlin Doberitz in late 1944. Allegedly it vastly magnified the destructive effects of the conventional explosive by creating a lightning storm at ground level over several kilometres. Such a device would kill principally by suffocation after the initial blast had dissipated. Scientists in Germany had not been able to iron out certain lethal side-effects by the war's end and there is some evidence that there might have been a Luftwaffe mutiny against carrying the material in March 1945. It is interesting that the Me 262 bomber alleged by the German crew to be aboard U-234 has never been admitted by US official sources and did not appear on the USN Unloading List. It is unlikely that the German commander and crew were lying and one assumes that the jet had some special significance in connection with the material.
Perhaps this is all bullshit...
http://uboat.net/boats/u234.htm