Trinity

AMERICA GOES NUCLEAR

At 5:29 a.m. Mountain War Time on July 16, 1945, the United States detonated the first nuclear weapon, an atomic device code named Trinity, in the Jornada del Muerto desert about thirty-five miles southeast of Socorro, New Mexico, on the Army Air Forces’ Alamogordo Bombing and Gunnery Range. Scientists and military personnel had nicknamed the implosion-design plutonium device “the gadget.” Upon seeing the explosion, project leader Dr. Robert Oppenheimer thought of a verse from the Hindu holy book the Bhagavad Gita XI 12: “If the radiance of a thousand suns burst at once into the sky, that would be like the splendor of the mighty one.”

EINSTEIN’S WARNING

The detonation of “the gadget” was the culmination of a process that began in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, DC on October 11, 1939. On that day, Alexander Sachs of Lehman Brothers delivered a letter to President Franklin D. Roosevelt, signed by prominent scientists including the pacifist physicist Dr. Albert Einstein. They advised FDR of “recent work” by Enrico Fermi and Leonard Szilard to develop uranium into a “new and important source of energy” which could be weaponized, and that Nazi Germany was already working on doing so. After reading the letter, the president ordered, “this requires action.”

FDR’S RESPONSE

Following a series of intermediate developmental steps, FDR approved an atomic weapons program on October 9, 1941, before the United States formally entered World War II. Meanwhile, the United Kingdom shared and merged its atomic research with the Americans. Furthermore, the new program included departments led by Oppenheimer, Fermi, and other leading physicists. The Army code-named the new project Manhattan, and then-Col. Leslie R. Groves of the Army Service Forces took command.

THE MANHATTAN PROJECT

Next, Groves built highly secret and intelligently compartmentalized sites across the United States on a massive and unprecedented scale. But the Army and FBI were concerned about scientists with friends and relatives who were communists. And in fact, the Soviet Union did penetrate the project. Groves set up headquarters at Oak Ridge, Tennessee, where a huge facility named the Clinton Engineering Works produced enriched uranium. He set up weapons design and construction at Los Alamos, New Mexico. The Metallurgical Laboratory at the University of Chicago produced plutonium and Hanford, Washington was the site of the world’s first full-scale nuclear reactor.

REVELATION AT POTSDAM

When FDR died on April 12, 1945, Vice President Harry Truman was unaware of the Manhattan Project. Such was the extent and apparent success of the security measures. On Sunday, July 15, 1945, Truman arrived at Berlin’s Gatow aerodrome aboard his Douglas C-54 transport, nicknamed the Sacred Cow. He was joining Soviet premier Joseph Stalin and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill for the first “Big Three” summit since the defeat of Nazi Germany. But Stalin had infiltrated the Manhattan Project and knew of the imminence of Trinity. Likewise, the timing of the New Mexico detonation was no accident. Truman wanted the test to occur before the conference got underway.

ULTIMATUM

Furthermore, when Truman told Stalin about the successful test, the clever Bolshevik feigned ignorance and deadpan, simply replied that he was glad to hear of it. Therefore, at that precise moment, the uneasy wartime alliance between the two new superpowers ended. At the same time, the United States and United Kingdom, in consultation with China, attempted to work out an ultimatum to Japan. Firstly, their goal was to threaten “absolute and utter destruction” unless Japan surrendered immediately and unconditionally. Meanwhile, Truman was eager to save lives and avoid an invasion of Japan. But his advisors were divided. Secretary of War Henry Stimson favored a nuanced declaration that left the possibility His Divine Majesty, Emperor Hirohito, could remain as monarch. Secretary of State James Byrnes disagreed, and Truman sided with Byrnes upon language that did not leave the door open concerning the Imperial status.

JAPAN SAYS NO

Meanwhile, in Tokyo. the Supreme Council for the Direction of the War was also divided. Foreign Minister Shigenori Togo and Prime Minister Kantaro Suzuki had opposed war all along and favored acceptance. However, military chiefs Yoshijiro Umezu, Soermu Toyoda and Korechika Anami held out, believing that the threat was a bluff and sign of fatigue. But it was objectively clear that Japan had lost the war. Unfortunately, the military was intent on an act of national seppuku (hari-kari). Likewise, they were prepared to slaughter millions of souls in their fortified homeland and render Japan effectively extinct. Unfortunately, Japan called the allies’ bluff and said no to the Potsdam Declaration.

THE BIKKO

The ultramodern Boeing B-29 Superfortress was the ultimate symbol of American power. By the fall of 1944, the United States had cleared the Marianas Islands of Japanese occupation. Therefore, Twentieth Air Force B-29s from Guam and Tinian rained havoc down from the troposphere upon the Home Islands. The “Bikko” or “B-San” encountered the phenomenon of the jet stream, which impaired high altitude, precision daylight operations. But Gen. Curtis LeMay shifted to low altitude, night operations using incendiary munitions to indiscriminately ignite highly vulnerable Japanese cities. The cigar chomping LeMay resembled Ulysses S. Grant in both appearance and blunt unconditional surrender tactics. Although some in Washington questioned his decision, President Roosevelt fully supported LeMay. Consequently. this resulted in the March 10, 1945 destruction of vast districts of Tokyo and over 100,000 casualties. Likewise. the attack on Tokyo was reminiscent of the Great Kanto earthquake of 1923.

PREPARATIONS AT TINIAN

However, the AAF was preparing for a far more consequential event at North Field on Tinian Island, where the highly trained 509th Composite Group waited with their B-29s, modified for a special mission. Meanwhile, on nearby Saipan, the U. S. Office of War Information and U. S. Navy radio station KSAI was broadcasting the terms of the Potsdam Declaration to the Japanese people, so they would know the truth of their dire situation. Therefore, when Japan rejected the Potsdam terms, KSAI began broadcasting a repeated 24/7 warning for Japanese civilians to immediately flee thirty-three cities, including Hiroshima, the capital of Hiroshima Prefecture of the Chugoku region of western Honshu.

TENSE PAUSE

Furthermore, thoughtful Japanese leaders, including the emperor, remained terrified of the anticipated allied invasion of the encircled and quarantined Home Islands. Inevitably, the recent slaughter on Okinawa was enough to convince anyone with a conscience that ordering the seventy million citizens of Dai-Nippon to fight further and die at the order of the delusional militarists was both criminal and avoidable. In conclusion, a tense pause settled over the Imperial Palace. And there is more to come with my articles Downfall and Victory. Learn more about Trinity, the Manhattan Project and Potsdam in America Ascendant, The Rise of American Exceptionalism, available from Potomac Books and fine booksellers everywhere.