THE A-BOMB

http://nobelprize.org/physics/laureates/1949/index.html

The Nobel Prize in Physics 1949
"for his prediction of the existence of mesons on the basis of theoretical work on nuclear forces"


Hideki Yukawa

Japan

Kyoto Imperial University
Kyoto, Japan; Columbia University
New York, NY, USA
b. 1907
d. 1981

 

This meticulous recreation of U-234's final voyage sheds new light onto one of World War Two's enduring mysteries. Departing Germany in late March 1945, U234's mission was to deliver cutting-edge German military technology to Japan; its payload included V-2 rocket and jet fighter components, and about 1,200 pounds of uranium oxide, a key ingredient in Japan's own atomic weapons program. After weeks of evading Allied attacks, the ship's crew surrendered to the U.S. Navy upon learning of Germany's defeat; the ship was escorted to an American port and its cargo carefully scrutinized. The uranium oxide however quickly vanished without a trace. One of this film's key revelations comes from Major John Lansdale, a Manhattan Project official who apparently confiscated the uranium for America's own bomb-building program; he and others argue persuasively that U-234's uranium shipment, intended by Germany for its Japanese ally, was ultimately delivered by America, in the bombs that were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Combining sharp archival detail with exhaustive interviews including U-234 crew and officers, the Manhattan Project's Hans Bethe, Lansdale and others, this film provides powerful answers to one of the war's most intriguing chapters.
USA/Germany, 2001, B&W/Color, 56 minutes, English commentary.


http://www.ihffilm.com/840.html



We used the Japanese U-235, they must of known we had enough for more bombs--

 

Life is Life , it saved lives if you can believe that , so I dunno.

 

well i doubt a japanese a bomb programm
like ricky said even germany and britain faild and the technological not so developed japan managed it ??
your post is the first time that i heard something of a jap bomb

 

I doubt they could have kept up with the USA, our plan was for a bomb every month...

I supposed this was hastened by Germanys U-235 stockpiles...

 

Well the Nobel prize in 1949 indicates they had one qualified scientist, he got it for work obviously prior to 1949

http://nobelprize.org/physics/laureates ... a-bio.html


references to Japan

http://www.ask.ne.jp/~hankaku/english/np3y.html

from a Japanese website

 

As a point of National pride I must point out that Britain didn't fail to develop the bomb as such, more we realised that with the available resources and (Admittedly increasingly receding) threat of invasion we were far better concentrating on conventional weapons, whilst the US was in a far better position to carry the project through to fruition, so British scientists were apparently instructed to pass their research over to the US.

Before I cop any criticism for this one, no I am not trying to claim that the success of the Manhattan project was down to the British at, just pointing out that Britain did not so much fail to to develop the bomb as stopped bothering because other projects were more immediately pressing.

 

For those in the UK, the last episode of 'The Warlords' is on C4 on Sunday 8pm - might be something new in it.

 

Britain didn't stop with bothering with an atomic bomb project, they actively participated int he development of the bomb, which is one reason why they were the given complete access to everyhting in the US project except fissionable material.

The Japanese project has been chronicled before, but has always been presented as theorectical concept type work that never moved beyond basic lab demonstrations. This is the first claim of any type that I've seen that says Japan was on the verge of having their own bomb, let alone exploding a test device. It's interseting to note that the US never tested the Little Boy (Hiroshima) type design as all the scientists and engineers were certain it would work the first time. Even the Fat Man (Nagasaki) bomb was tested more to prove the implosion and timing aspects of the design more that any doubt that the nuclear fission would occur.