Little Boy failed to detonate

[Geordie]

I like the way you put elastics into the meaning of the word "unlikely" to stretch it beyond the realm of reason. You don't know so leave it at that. You have no way of verifying and your guesses don't constitute absolute truth in the matter.
Here again you talk through your hat. You know nothing of the state of any nuclear program in Germany at that time. We live in a world of possibilities and people ready to do just about anything for money. Sell out their mothers if need be. The Manhatten Project was so secretive they could just as well have been designing M&M candies or ways to get MSG into the food supplies.

If the Germans had spies in the Manhattan Project, they were useless.
I personally have not studied the Reich's nuclear program. On the other hand, I have never seen or read anybody who has argued that they were in danger of getting a working nuclear weapon before 1950.

How are you so sure they would tell anyone that they aquired the information? You assume a lot I find. You assume that history is NOt a set of lies agreed upon. I'll bet in private you agree that history is a lot bull. The victor's truth.

The fact that there are no Brazilian, Greek or Italian atomic weapons suggests this. It took the French until the late 1950s or early 1960s to begin work on such weapons. If their allies had shared this information, Charles de Gaulle would have had a bomb much earlier.

Here again you talk through your hat.

That I may be. If I am, then my hat appears to have more sense than you.

You assume a lot I find.

Indeed I do. I assumed that I could reason with you. I assumed that the others who left this thread were too hasty. I assumed you'd notice that, part from the two of us, the only discussion in here is between RCAF Brat and Blue Max.

They are discussing the fact that, had Little Boy not detonated, the result would have been even more horrific.

Rest assured, I shall take my hat elsewhere, and leave you in peace.

 

[Eleven11]

Enough people have done so. You respond by saying that we are leaving the hypothetical situation. Alternate History is supposed to be plausible, not stick rigidly to an idea.

You have not proven that my scenario is implausible. You just issued a handful of invitations to a blind faith acceptance of your word alone. You are the one assuming too much. Win an argument before going off and gloating victory. You are not the moral authority here, earn your place in the discussion. The Americans had no backup plan for the Little Boy bomb and that is a fact. You did not convince me that they did not need one so, take a number, sit down and chill.

I admit that one of my previous posts was unhelpful.

I was not aware that you did comedy too. You were a pompous arrogant ass not, "unhelpful", lol.

However, you have consistently refused to listen to people who have tried to help you.

I did not come here for your help I came here for discussion. Save your compulsive altruism for someone that needs it.

Frankly, the use of the word 'cowboy' is just as patronising.

He was sitting on his high horse, what else would you have me call him?

Due to what I have already stated, I agree with Shimbo about the title of the thread.

So? What difference does that make? Are you going to round up a posse and force a title change or what? Are you some kind of control freak.

This is also quite dismissive.

When are you going to be dissmissive?

 

[karl2025]

That is evidence that Wiki said so not that it is the truth. We're not talking about mixing fertilizer and diesel fuel. The process is/was tedious. I don't believe they had any backup bombs of THAT type. Unless you show me some compelling evidence.

Of course no backups of that type, that type was already obsolete. They had nuclear weapons in the 21 kiloton range instead of the relatively paltry 13 of "Little Boy."
PDF follows.
www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB162/72.pdf
Col. Seaman speaking with Gen. Hull: "There is one of them that is ready to be shipped right now. The order was given Thursday and it should be ready the 19th...There will be another one the first part of September, then there are three definite. There is a possibility of a fourth one in September, either the middle or the later part...Probably three in October."

 

[Lord Grattan]

You have not proven that my scenario is implausible. You just issued a handful of invitations to a blind faith acceptance of your word alone. You are the one assuming too much. Win an argument before going off and gloating victory. You are not the moral authority here, earn your place in the discussion. The Americans had no backup plan for the Little Boy bomb and that is a fact. You did not convince me that they did not need one so, take a number, sit down and chill.


Maybe not proven as in a court of law; however, the weight of the conversation clearly shows that your scenario is highly improbable. If you want this scenario to be plausable, then you need to have a much earlier POD and show how and when the Japanese planted their spies and how when they saw the dud in Hiroshima they were able to say, "aha, that's the superweapon. Quick let's examine and reproduce it. Oh, and tell the Americans to go do what is impossible for people to do to themselves, because we have their bomb." and why Truman and MacArthur say "okay, we're fu#%$d; let's call it a war and go home."

 

[Earling]

The Americans have a back up, its called more bombs. If they don't have that they have conventional weaponary. If that doesn't work they have an unbreakable blockade.

Should the nuclear weapons fail to function the Americans just shrug their shoulders and continue their planned invasion of Japan. Should that meet with failure due to the storms then they would simply continue to starve the country to death. This was something the Japanese could not prevent. By mid-1946 there isn't much of a Japanese state left.

Suppose the Japanese do find a nuclear weapon intact. It matters not. The Japanese have no ability to launch such a weapon. The Americans would not be overly concerned even if they could. At best it could be employed in a land-mine attack, possibly killing a few thousand. Small change given casualty estimates for the invasion were up in the region of a million (a drastic over-estimation in my view but there you go).

The nuclear weapons may have caused the Japanese surrender. The Soviet declaration of war may have done so. It does not matter. By this point the Japanese are defeated. They have no hope of turning the tide. They could be given a dozen nuclear weapons and a small fleet of B-29s to carry them but they would still have lost. At best they can hope to upset the Americans to the point where they make good on all the war time rhetoric to wipe the Japanese from the face of the earth.

 

[The Militant One]

The Americans have a back up, its called more bombs. If they don't have that they have conventional weaponary. If that doesn't work they have an unbreakable blockade.

Should the nuclear weapons fail to function the Americans just shrug their shoulders and continue their planned invasion of Japan. Should that meet with failure due to the storms then they would simply continue to starve the country to death. This was something the Japanese could not prevent. By mid-1946 there isn't much of a Japanese state left.

Suppose the Japanese do find a nuclear weapon intact. It matters not. The Japanese have no ability to launch such a weapon. The Americans would not be overly concerned even if they could. At best it could be employed in a land-mine attack, possibly killing a few thousand. Small change given casualty estimates for the invasion were up in the region of a million (a drastic over-estimation in my view but there you go).

The nuclear weapons may have caused the Japanese surrender. The Soviet declaration of war may have done so. It does not matter. By this point the Japanese are defeated. They have no hope of turning the tide. They could be given a dozen nuclear weapons and a small fleet of B-29s to carry them but they would still have lost. At best they can hope to upset the Americans to the point where they make good on all the war time rhetoric to wipe the Japanese from the face of the earth.

I agree, even if some how some way the Japanese were to detonate a nuclear weapon at this late in the game, thats just going to give the American's more fuel to nearly raze the entire island with everything they've got and would put the invasion of Normandy to shame...

 

[Eleven11]

If the Germans had spies in the Manhattan Project, they were useless.

How would you know? Gut feeling again?

I personally have not studied the Reich's nuclear program.

You are supposed to say that before masquerading as a specialist in the field.

On the other hand, I have never seen or read anybody who has argued that they were in danger of getting a working nuclear weapon before 1950.

They were so afraid that Hitler would get the atom bomb first that the letter written to the president by Einstein was forwarded to a New York financier that bounced it about town for a week before handing it over to the president. Hows that for feigned paranoia?

The fact that there are no Brazilian, Greek or Italian atomic weapons suggests this.

Suggests what exactly? That they will tell you if they have it, use it if they have it, bury it if they have it or are they saying they don't have any because you can't see them? You always assume people are black or white with no grey areas between. You have been believing too many history fables.

It took the French until the late 1950s or early 1960s to begin work on such weapons.

Did they wait for someone to GIVE it to them? How did they find out how to make one? If the French can make one why can't the Japs?

If their allies had shared this information, Charles de Gaulle would have had a bomb much earlier.
Maybe not. You always assume people want the bomb. That is rediculous.That I may be. If I am, then my hat appears to have more sense than you.
You think this is a contest to see who's been in public school the longest? You win, lol. Maybe you were there WAY too long.

Indeed I do. I assumed that I could reason with you.

By calling me a crackpot, man, you are funny.

I assumed that the others who left this thread were too hasty.

That's not the impression I get when I see the page view counter amigo.

I assumed you'd notice that, part from the two of us, the only discussion in here is between RCAF Brat and Blue Max.

The numbers don't lie.

They are discussing the fact that, had Little Boy not detonated, the result would have been even more horrific.

Who am I to interrupt their coffee clutcher's wishful thinking. If they want to know what I think about that they will ask. Think Operation Olympic (google backup plan for hiroshima) if you want to see how evil those bastards could be. The lying buggers said they forced the release of the details of the plan to kill off 5 million more Japs if the twin bombs failed to persuade them. This backup plan hoax was designed to make people feel better about the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The tyrants were taking a lot of heat for those twin bombings so they faked a worst backup plan as a palliative to quell the public outrage. Read the plan and understand that they are saying they were not sure the twin bombings would make them surrender. So, you see, out of the left side of their mouths they say the bomb is hell incarnate and out of the other side of their mouths they are planning as if the effect will not be sufficient. Operation Olympic also reinforces the Defiance Hoax, that is the hoax whereby the resistance of the Japs at the end was fierce, nothing could be further from the truth. The US knew very well that it is not those they burned alive that take the decision to surrender.

Rest assured, I shall take my hat elsewhere, and leave you in peace.

Your loss not mine.

 

[Derek Jackson]

Assume

1) The bomb was dropped by a parachute (which it probably was not)

2) That some fault prevents it from going off (very unlikely

3) That the Japanese recognize the thing for what it was (Not all that likely)

It would still take a lot of effort to make it into a working bomb. It would still be 1 bomb. I do not see where the Japanese would get other fissile materieals

Further Japan would have no means of air dropping it.


The basic facts of Japan's intolerable situation would remain the same.

I wonder whether some deal allowing the Emporer to remain but the US to occupy might have been done (because the Japanese establisment would NOT want a Soviet controlled 'North Japan'.


Actually although there would be more casualties the ASB'S simply giving all the American nukes to Japan would not alter the outcome of World War 2 in the Pacific.

 

[Hannibal.Caesar]

Especially nukes without backup plans, yeah, real smart them Americans ... Anyways, Americans are not that bright chum.

I take offense to that. I, for one, am an American, and intelligent enough to post threads on this board that are not ripped apart by other members over and over again. Unlike you.

I'd recommend that you stop this thread, and come up with a new one that isn't so ASB. I'd also hope that other members will stop fanning your flames of misinformation, though admittedly this thread has given me a few good laughs.

Oh, and learn how to use quote tags correctly.

 

[Blue Max]

Let's just say that the post war casualties are going to be much worse. Many of those who perished in OTL may survive, but will have been exposed to much much more radiation, and radiation poisoning will kill tens of thousands in the months following the attack, in OTL most of those who would have received a lethal full body dose of radiation were killed by the blast and thermal effects of the bomb immediataly thereafter. (there was actualy very little fallout from either of the bombs used in japan, as they were detonated at a sufficiant altitude so as not to have dirt and dust sucked into the heart of the blast, where all the fission by-products are)

I personaly am conflicted about the existance of nuclear weapons, as they are barbaric, but is an attack with a nuclear weapon any more barbaric than having 1000 airplanes come over and drop an eqiuvalent amount of napalm and explosives? Is it more barbaric than the results of a visit by most modern armies? (especialy if the other side fights tooth and claw for the place?) And do remember that the balance of terror in the Cold War did serve to prevent a repeat of the two Great Wars. The last thing we need is for that deterrant to be removed, as the result would be another disaster like WWII.

OK, so the Long Term effects would be something like this.

Hiroshima and its greater Environs are evacuated, and left empty for 50 years. Unsafe levels of radiation would probably be very limited by the present day, but much of what was once Hiroshima eventually turns into an unwitting nature preserve. By the Present, though, Japan would probably have given the green light to rebuild in the area.

Japan Probably surrenders on OTL schedule, and I suspect that Nuclear weapons are generally seen as a "Necessary Evil". The Horror using them might lead to less nuclear tests and more questions about them in general, but I think the outcome would be a slight positive--Nuclear Weapons would be even more off limits than OTL and probably under better control.

I do foresee a loud chorus of voices opposing nuclear weapons design and research, probably more influential, but not a hard change.

 

[Geordie]

Two points, before I leave this thread for good:

1. I have never set foot in a public school.
2. Viewing a thread is not discussing it.


Good day.

 

[Eleven11]

Maybe not proven as in a court of law; however, the weight of the conversation clearly shows that your scenario is highly improbable.

That's just you saying so. You are not alone here so take a number too.

If you want this scenario to be plausable, then you need to have a much earlier POD and show how and when the Japanese planted their spies

I said the intel could have been harvested from the US bomb project by Germany and forwarded to Japan in their pact of mutual defence. What part of that is not clear to you? Because you feel it improbable we must consider the matter settled?

and how when they saw the dud in Hiroshima they were able to say, "aha, that's the superweapon.

I'm sure many people would hear something like that connecting with the ground and they know what a cow looks like.

Quick let's examine and reproduce it.

The Japanese are the kings of cloning, where have you been?

Oh, and tell the Americans to go do what is impossible for people to do to themselves, because we have their bomb." and why Truman and MacArthur say "okay, we're fu#%$d; let's call it a war and go home."

What is it you are trying to say?

 

[The Militant One]

That's just you saying so. You are not alone here so take a number too.I said the intel could have been harvested from the US bomb project by Germany and forwarded to Japan in their pact of mutual defence. What part of that is not clear to you? Because you feel it improbable we must consider the matter settled?I'm sure many people would hear something like that connecting with the ground and they know what a cow looks like.The Japanese are the kings of cloning, where have you been?
What is it you are trying to say?

Eleven...do yourself a favor... Stop speaking. Every hypothesis you come up with has started with "lets say..." "Some how, someway." That makes this abomination of a thread ASB. You have no true hard facts.

Consider this; In America, the U.S. government were paranoid of Japanese spies and kept an extra set of eyes out for them, hense the internment camps.

The kings of cloning? What the hell did they clone? Even if they had a the technology to clone allied equipment or weapons, by 1944; they no longer had the industry to build them or use them.

What he is trying to say is that, your scenario is implausible. The United States has just spend 3.5 years brutally fighting the Japanese, they are not going to say "fu** it" after one unlikely failed attempt.

 

[HUCK]

I must say, even if the Japanese do get the bomb, this late in the war, where will they drop it? They are completly blockaded. Their airforce is screwed. Their navy is pathetic. They would need to sneak a carrier/submarine out, and frankly, I find that completly impossible.

 

[The Militant One]

I must say, even if the Japanese do get the bomb, this late in the war, where will they drop it? They are completly blockaded. Their airforce is screwed. Their navy is pathetic. They would need to sneak a carrier/submarine out, and frankly, I find that completly impossible.

A this point, what Navy?

 

[HUCK]

A this point, what Navy?

I do not understand what you are getting at.

 

[Abdul Hadi Pasha]

How would you know? Gut feeling again?You are supposed to say that before masquerading as a specialist in the field.

Dude. You need to relax. If you can't take criticism of a scenario you need to keep it to yourself instead of posting it on a recreational discussion board.

I think he's right that if the Japanese had any spies in the Manhattan Project they were useless, because there is no evidence the Japanese had managed to extract any information about the project whatsoever.

A bomb that freefalls and fails to explode is going to be smooshed beyond salvage - you're talking about dropping it from several miles up in the sky. If somehow it coincidentally lands on the Japanese super-silly-putty factory and somehow survives intact, it would still take a long time to reverse engineer it, establish the considerable facilities necessary to build bombs, which would have to be in bomb-proof locations, they would have to located a source of uranium, and then hold off an American invasion long enough to begin production.

If you can come up with explanations for how all this is possible, then I'll accept your scenario.

 

[black angel]

EVERY ONE JUST STOP!

whats the F***ing point talking to this Belligerent it's getting you-all no were so Ignore List him till Ian BANS his ass

 

[The Militant One]

I do not understand what you are getting at.

I was emphasizing you. At this point, their Navy was so pathetic, it was nonexistent.

 

[HUCK]

I was emphasizing you. At this point, their Navy was so pathetic, it was nonexistent.

Ah... Thank you kindly.