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Interesting stuff on their intel of the US A bomb program.

The little that I've read about Sakai shows his first wife dying in 1954.

I added Japanese bombers to the atomic program.

While B-29s are guaranteed to appear - hard wired as replacements - Japanese bombers are the opposite. You must have the right engine plant working, and the right plane factory working - and enough HI points to actually make a plane - or the bombs are useless in game terms. So the Japanese need to dedicate a plane factory to a type of plane that it can use very few of - and that factory, and its engine plant - must actually be able to produce.

But there are two types. The first - the G8N1 - appears (in atomic bomb form) from June, 1945. It is similar to the B-29 - almost stripped of defensive armament - all it retains is a tail gunner position. That permits better airflow - no turrets sticking out - and less weight - for guns and ammo. Like the B-29 silverplate, it has two loads - normal with bomb and extended without one. It carries a camera for use on recon missions - its secondary task. It is intended to fly in pairs - to make it more likely the bomb carrier will arrive - and to photograph the target before and just after the explosion - to get a sense of what was there - and where the bomb went off? But - unlike the B-29s - it only carries the bomb to normal range rather than the extended range of the conventional version. The extended range is longer than before - as when using that it is a recon plane vice a bomber. But its normal range remains as was. [A B-29 silverplate has a new normal range = to extended range of a conventional version while its new extended range is longer than the old one was: de facto radius for recon is 45% of transfer range while bomber radius is 28.5% of transfer range - the values in the fields being 90% and 57% because they will be divided by 2 by code.]

The second type is the Ki-91. It does not appear until October, 1945, at best. It is designed to be an atomic bomber - and so it flies fully armed - to its normal range - with an atomic bomb. At extended range, it carries three 800 kg bombs. The G8N1 carries a Uranium Bomb to 25 hexes. The Ki-91 carries a Uranium Bomb to 40 hexes.
All B-29 Silverplate versions carry their special bombload 36 hexes, for comparison.

For reference, the assumed yield of a US Uranium Bomb is 13.5 kt, a US Implosion Bomb is 21 kt, and a Japanese Uranium Bomb is 10 kt. Both US designs were for 20 kt, but the values used are the measured ones. Japan's design aimed at 10.

ORIGINAL: anarchyintheuk

Interesting stuff on their intel of the US A bomb program.

The little that I've read about Sakai shows his first wife dying in 1954.

Well - his publisher admitted one thing in the biography was made up - a
story from 1945 about shooting down something - and said it was done
by staff to promote the book. Maybe they added or modified other things?

The design was described by three Manhattan Project scientists as "just like ours" -

Their names please and the published source of this information.

See Page 11

This material reposted after significant updating at the end of the thread.

ORIGINAL: khyberbill

The design was described by three Manhattan Project scientists as "just like ours" -

Their names please and the published source of this information.

See Japan's Secret War by Robert K Wilcox
I recommend the Second Edition
ISBN 1-56924-815-X

Are the scientists named in this book?

ORIGINAL: khyberbill

Are the scientists named in this book?

Wilcox's book is based on a journalists interview with an unnamed Japanese counterintelligence agent.[8|]

That sort means it is not very credible.

ORIGINAL: khyberbill

That sort means it is not very credible.

hi, kyber, have you designed a mod. I have noted another AE mod that as modified history to say the japs got a better deal in the WNT when everyone knows the japs were wire tapped. My POV is a mod designer can do what ever they want.

Please tell me, What do u have as a mod for our review and entertainment?

I am not contesting his mod, I am contesting his sources. He can put Klingon Birds of Prey in his mod if it pleases him. He quoted three Manhattan Project scientists, and I asked for their names. I am still waiting for the names.

ORIGINAL: khyberbill

I am not contesting his mod, I am contesting his sources. He can put Klingon Birds of Prey in his mod if it pleases him. He quoted three Manhattan Project scientists, and I asked for their names. I am still waiting for the names.

You have a long wait. Even an official summary of what is said often is sanitized of numbers and of names. And in this case the source is a general officer who was in charge of the investigation at the time - not the sort of person who is likely to falsify what was learned. But also not the sort of person to break the rules - even when speaking on the record for publication. I will only refer you to open source material and/or its author in any matter. You may elect to credit quoted serving US military officers who happen to be formally involved with the matter - or you may discredit what they say - on the record - knowing it is for publication. I choose to believe such statements unless there is compelling evidence, or at least a credible motive, to disbelieve them.

I was asked to create this capability by a tester. I decided there is enough merit to include it and I explained why? I also decided that the Japanese should not have a guaranteed shot at such a weapon - and that any game which proceeds close to history sould prevent its use. Further - the cost should be very high - meaning at the price of other things that would be probably more useful. So I created special planes - needing a dedicated factory - and powerful engines. Neither will produce unless there are enough HI points and supply points in the right hexes. And if they do not - the bomb cannot be used. Allied raids on factories, and Allied use of mine and submarine and air warfare to cut off imports, will - independent of each other - prevent this option from occuring. In a logistical oriented mod - with major resource centers in Japan not present - the Japanese simply must import what they need or industry won't produce.

Even a player of the mod who does not want to do so need never produce the planes required. I have biological warfare Uji bombs in the game - but I do not use them myself - on moral and practical military grounds. They are there if a player wants to do what Gen Ichii did - with the nearest we have to the kind of planes he used to do it. I create options - and do not tell players which to implement. I was willing to give this player -and any others who follow - this option. I made it hard to do even if they want to because I think that is justified - while the US is guaranteed to get both kinds of bombs. I corrected bomb weight so the B-29 isn't so range limited - neither kind weighs 20,000 pounds as it says in stock data. I corrected the B-29s so they were unarmed - all the atomic bombers were unarmed. Time will tell if these devices or planes even work? It is a case of experimenting - and documenting the experiment.

I do not require you believe what there is on the record in these matters. I do not like the facct that these matters are not fully disclosed - which they should be once 30 years has passed -by law. But I do note that official statements made in summary usually are confirmed later when more is released. Still - what you believe is your choice.

ORIGINAL: el cid again

ORIGINAL: khyberbill

I am not contesting his mod, I am contesting his sources. He can put Klingon Birds of Prey in his mod if it pleases him. He quoted three Manhattan Project scientists, and I asked for their names. I am still waiting for the names.

You have a long wait. Even an official summary of what is said often is sanitized of numbers and of names. And in this case the source is a general officer who was in charge of the investigation at the time - not the sort of person who is likely to falsify what was learned. But also not the sort of person to break the rules - even when speaking on the record for publication. I will only refer you to open source material and/or its author in any matter. You may elect to credit quoted serving US military officers who happen to be formally involved with the matter - or you may discredit what they say - on the record - knowing it is for publication. I choose to believe such statements unless there is compelling evidence, or at least a credible motive, to disbelieve them.

I was asked to create this capability by a tester. I decided there is enough merit to include it and I explained why? I also decided that the Japanese should not have a guaranteed shot at such a weapon - and that any game which proceeds close to history sould prevent its use. Further - the cost should be very high - meaning at the price of other things that would be probably more useful. So I created special planes - needing a dedicated factory - and powerful engines. Neither will produce unless there are enough HI points and supply points in the right hexes. And if they do not - the bomb cannot be used. Allied raids on factories, and Allied use of mine and submarine and air warfare to cut off imports, will - independent of each other - prevent this option from occuring. In a logistical oriented mod - with major resource centers in Japan not present - the Japanese simply must import what they need or industry won't produce.

Even a player of the mod who does not want to do so need never produce the planes required. I have biological warfare Uji bombs in the game - but I do not use them myself - on moral and practical military grounds. They are there if a player wants to do what Gen Ichii did - with the nearest we have to the kind of planes he used to do it. I create options - and do not tell players which to implement. I was willing to give this player -and any others who follow - this option. I made it hard to do even if they want to because I think that is justified - while the US is guaranteed to get both kinds of bombs. I corrected bomb weight so the B-29 isn't so range limited - neither kind weighs 20,000 pounds as it says in stock data. I corrected the B-29s so they were unarmed - all the atomic bombers were unarmed. Time will tell if these devices or planes even work? It is a case of experimenting - and documenting the experiment.

I do not require you believe what there is on the record in these matters. I do not like the facct that these matters are not fully disclosed - which they should be once 30 years has passed -by law. But I do note that official statements made in summary usually are confirmed later when more is released. Still - what you believe is your choice.

In other words - No, he cannot produce the names.

In regards to Cid's source - Wilcox's book -

H-JAPAN
May 21, 2005


The book (Japan's Secret War) cites US National Archive sources, but simply as "NARA," as I
recall, with no identifying file numbers, making the notes completely
useless. Shortly after the hardcover edition came out I asked the
legendary John Taylor, chief of Modern Military at the Archives, and one
of the great resources in the field, what he knew of this. He said that if
I came across any material like it in my own research ( I was looking at
OSS X-2 (counterintelligence) in China and Japanese Intelligence at the
time), would I please bring it to his attention, as "nobody's been able to
find any of his sources." That was in 1990; and so far as I know, that is
still the situation. You can contact John Taylor at NARA for an update,
but I don't think anything has changed.

If you have access to JSTOR, the absence of any review would be revealing. My
own campus' connection is down at the moment; as soon as it's restored I'll
check it.

Henry Sirotin
Hunter College/C.W. Post

H-JAPAN
May 25, 2005

(1) From: "wgrund@bgnet.bgsu.edu" <wgrund@bgnet.bgsu.edu>

Here we go again.

I recall about ten years ago when Wilcox's book was reprinted that a
round of similar inquiries was floated on H-Japan. I had just returned
from a trip to DC where I was doing research for my dissertation on
this subject. This is a story that just won't die.

The bibliography in Wilcox's second edition provides a pretty good map
for primary and secondary sources in English on the subject. I was able
to find just about all the sources he used, with only a few exceptions.
To the best of my recollection, Wilcox never actually states that Japan
succeeded in building and testing a nuclear weapon, but he strongly
implies that they did.

After considerable research on the subject, both in the US and Japan, I
am firmly convinced that the Japanese did NOT succeed in testing (or
even building) a nuclear weapon. The Hungnam story likely began when
David Snell, a reporter for the Atlanta Constitution, wrote of his
encounter with a Japanese COUNTER-INTELLIGENCE officer after the war,
who alleged that Japanese scientists had tested a nuclear weapon off
the eastern coast of Korea. Wilcox rediscovered this article many years
ago when researching this subject. Apparently, however, he did not see
Snell's follow up article, where he all but retracted this story.

Nonetheless, Wilcox otherwise got a lot of the story correct, that
Japanese scientists were involved in nuclear research during the war.
Both the army and navy had comparatively small projects. But Wilcox
also neglected to include or account for much of the evidence that
would suggest that Japan DID NOT develop a nuclear weapon. This is
where his book, as work of professional scholarship and history, flies
off the rails. (And not because he isn't tenured somewhere.)

Furthermore, he introduces material referring to the atrocities of Unit
731, and the postwar cover-up, and by inference, suggests that facts
about Japan's nuclear research were similarly suppressed. This is
clearly not the case. Japanese scientists and others began to publish
articles about their wartime nuclear research activity as soon as the
US occupation ended. (The Japanese media had been prevented from
publishing anything about nuclear weapons and research, both US and
Japanese, by US occupation officials.) If you care to do the research,
you can find references to wartime nuclear research in Japan by
scientists, military officials, and historians (in Japanese) from as
early as 1946. But because Wilcox, and others, did not know of these
sources, it was as good as a conspiracy of silence.

I suspect we are seeing another round of interest in this subject
because we will be commemorating the 60th anniversary of the nuclear
attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki this year. We are certain to see
interest in this story emerge again in another ten years, fifteen, and
I suspect, in 2045. And so it goes…

As for Derek Price, he passed away several years ago. On the other
hand, I am happy to report that Eri Yagi is still very much alive and
enjoying her retirement teaching ballroom dancing (to the disabled no
less!)

For reviews of the Wilcox book, I recommend the following: John Dower's
Review of Robert Wilcox, Japan's Secret War, in Bulletin of Atomic
Scientists 43 (Aug.-Sept. 1986), 61-62; and Morris F. Low's, Japan's
Secret War? 'Instant' Scientific Manpower and Japan's World War II
Atomic Bomb Project, Annals of Science 47 (1990), 347-360.

On the Hungnam story, see Walter E. Grunden, Hungnam and the Japanese
Atomic Bomb: Recent Historiography of a Postwar Myth,”Intelligence and
National Security 13 (1998), 32-60.

For a brief, but accurate and scholarly account of Japan's wartime
nuclear research, John Dower's NI and F: Japan’s Wartime Atomic
Bomb Research, in Japan in War and Peace: Selected Essays (New York:
New Press, 1993), 55-100, is a good place to start.

For a more detailed account, see the chapters on science mobilization
and nuclear research in Walter E. Grunden, Secret Weapons & World War
II: Japan in the Shadow of Big Science (Lawrence: University Press of
Kansas, 2005), now available. Also, watch for a follow-up article in
Historia Scientiarum, co-authored by Masakatsu Yamazaki, Keiko-Nagase
Reimer, and Walter E. Grunden on this subject.

For a direct comparison of German and Japanese wartime nuclear research
efforts, see the article by Mark Walker, Masakatsu Yamazaki, and Walter
Grunden in the forthcoming issue of OSIRIS, available in July 2005.

Japanese scholars, such as Masakatsu Yamazaki and Yutaka Kawamura, have
been even busier researching and publishing on this subject, especially
from a more internalist perspective. For selected publications, see the
bibliography in my aforementioned monograph.

A documentary on Japan's wartime nuclear research is under production
by the History Channel and is scheduled for broadcast this summer.

I hope this overly long missive helps to clear up some confusion.

Most Sincerely,

Walter E. Grunden
Department of History
Bowling Green State University

Thanks Treespider. Manhattan Project scientists tended to be rather loquacious so I equate no names as no credibility. Slightly off topic but is Calhouns still going strong in Knoxville? I miss that place and used to do some damage there on Thursday nights when they had an "all you can eat ribs" night.

For a brief, but accurate and scholarly account of Japan's wartime
nuclear research, John Dower's NI and F: Japan’s Wartime Atomic
Bomb Research, in Japan in War and Peace: Selected Essays (New York:
New Press, 1993), 55-100, is a good place to start.

I actually use Dower as a source - since he establishes beyond doubt there there
was some atomic research in Japan - and since he admits a lot of records were
destroyed. But Dower is a Japanese apologist who takes a very minimalist position
in re that research. This has two roots: (1) scholarly - the position that if you don't
have a good original source to cite, nothing is ever credible; and (2) that Japan
was a victim of atomic attacks whose hands were (almost) completely clean in that
it never was seriously in the game.

And clearly Japan didn't drop atom bombs on San Francisco and Seattle (or any similar
combination) - so in the crudest sense - it is true Japan wasn't in the game all the way
to operational delivery of atomic bombs during the war. But that misses the moral
point. IF Japanese scientists with official funding were trying to build atomic bombs,
radiological bombs or hydrogen bombs, THEN what happened is on the same playing
field. If I am not a defender of the decision to use atomic bombs on cities, nevertheless
I do not think their development was unreasonable, nor that their use (for example,
on the target long planned for, the major fleet base at Truk) on a military target would
be illegal. There was good reason to believe Germany was involved in research, and we
knew it had a thousand tons of high grade ore (from Shinklobwe) and a potential of
more from a mine in Europe. Knowing the details of such research was not something we
could expect to do with precision. Never mind what I think about how they were used -
the position of the left that use vs Japan was wrong because they were not a threat in kind
is nonsense. Japan was the first nation in history to achieve technical overkill potential
(the ability to kill the entire human population of the world with a wmd IF it could be
uniformly delivered). [No real overkill exists in my technical opinion - you can never
deliver it everywhere to everyone. But 16 tons of anthrax spores were enough to kill everyone
in the world in theory.] Japan had serious cw programs in both Army and Navy. And both
services planned for aircraft delivery of both radiological and atom bombs in the medium term
(ideally by 1945, but in any case within a couple of years of that) - designing bombers for that
mission. How far they got is details. They were in the game.

As for what the details are, there are severe limits on what we can know, and even more severe
limits on what we can say. Part of the problem is our expectations: a US Navy captain serving with
the USSBS, who lived in retirement near me when I was in Tacoma, said that several IJN officers told
him about atomic research but "at the time, I didn't believe them, which I now believe was a mistake."
But Gen Groves was different - HE thought there at least might be enough to warrant sending a team
to check out the evidence. Unfortunately for us, they could only go where we had control - so they
report well on activities in Japan - but not at all about those in Korea. Even so, we found things rarely
reported that are impressive: In the present day the preferred method for uranium separation is to
use a centrafuge. The designs in most programs today are based on a German development from WWII.
Yet we captured three times as many centrafuges in Japan as we did in Germany, and the Japanese
design was actually better - in at least one way (air suspension vice bearings = less resistence and wear,
greater efficiency). All the literatue about the failed gaseous diffusion plant don't change that, like us,
there were other, parallel lines of development, and not all were failures. We too thought of centrafuges,
but doubted our technical ability to make them - both Japan and Germany never doubted and succeeded.

I have engaged in correspondance with Wilcox for the last three days. He has agreed to both adding citiations
and images of documents in the Third Edition of Japan's Secret War. If all knowledge was bounded by what
has already been documented and published, no new material could ever be written. Authors and researchers
need to have a more open minded approach than to reject everything not already "proven" to scholarly
standards. What people say in interviews, and what documents and physical evidence indicate all count. Over
time, generally more and more material is added. Significant fractions of that are functions of what is allowed
to be released: that is, there is more that someone has decided to hold conficential. Sometimes for personal
or political reasons: Dr Nishina's daughter was ashamed when she learned her father had engaged in atomic
research, saying "father, how could you?" I think there is a formal Allied concern about disclusure of technical
materials related to "low tech" atomic weapons - radiological bombs - and generation of atom bomb fuel
without elaborate physical separation problems. I know four different authors who identified materials of interest,
and McGeorge Bundy records in the introduction of Danger and Survival - that there is official interference with
producing the materials - even when there is Presidential authorization. The whole story has not come out.
But enough has come out that it is possible to say there was an atomic arms race almost from the day fission was
discovered. The Day Man Lost reveals much of the early steps of the Japanese program - at the same time
describing parallel efforts in the Manhattan Project. The critical thing preventing development of anything is the
decision to try. However small the chances were of successful operational deployment during the war, they
were non zero. And no one knew how long it would take, or how long the war might last? It is entirely reasonable
in a game world, with different priorities, to consider the possibility of opertaional weapons in the 1945-6 time
frame - by either side. This is ALL I have tried to say is implied by what we know. Japan tried. Its theoritical
physics was better than in Germany and in some ways better than ours: they calculated 2% enrichment is all
you need to make a light water reactor (we had to make measurements to find out); one of their physicists concieved of fusion before any of ours did - that
kind of thing.

But I do not propose to debate this matter any longer. This is a game mod design thread. It explains the rationale. When asked
for sources, I gave what there is. If you want more - wait. I don't know how much will come out in the long run, but I know more is
going to come out. And believe what you wish. Surely we no longer can sleep better because potential enemies don't have atomic
weapons! Does it matter if that was the case in WWII?

This material reposted after significant updating at the end of the thread.

After a comprehensive review, the documentation supporting RHS aircraft pointers related to air art have
been updated. So have the aircraft files, in order to better exploit the existing filmstrips. But the main
function of these lists is to permit understanding of what we can do better. Mifune will shortly issue revised
filmstrips that address the issues identified in the notes on these documents. The documents also include
identification of air art not used by RHS but which is in the RHS filmstrips - in case anyone wanted to use
it.

In the SW map corner, at hex location 6, 173, is a dot location called Amsterdam Island. It is a real geographical location in approximately its correct position on the map (map edge projection distortion makes it difficult to be certain precisely where it should be?). IRL this place is administered by France, but it is uninhabited. A volcanic cone, it is unsuitable for use as an airfield or as a port. The only attempt at an economic use in history (raising cattle on the narrow coastal strip) failed.

In RHS, Amsterdam Island is shown as IJA and is defined as the Axis Entry Point.
It is used for German raiders (Thor starts there) and submarines (these appear later in the game, along with another raider). This is done so the Germans must transit the Indian Ocean to reach any friendly port - and not (at least at this time) - as a proper Axis base for any Axis ships or submarines. [I would like to have an Axis export point. Until I figure out how to have one, transport submarines and German surface blockade runners have no place to export to - and the German and Italian subs used to that end are generally not in the game. The German blockade runners are restricted to the Far East - where they did run cargoes locally.]

There are unusual House Rules related to Amsterdam Island. Neither side may use the location as a base, nor put ground units on the island. Lacking engineers, this de facto prevents construction of port or airfield facilities, or fortifications. To which add that such construction is itself forbidden. It is ONLY the Axis Entry Point. Its only other theoretical function is that Axis (only) ships or submarines might use it to "enter port" (at the level 0 port with no supplies or naval support) to repair damage. And of course tenders or tankers or repair ships might service a ship present in the hex. [This simulates German use of places like this, but more often Kerguelin Island, which is apparently South of our map, to perform such tasks] Due to location, it is unlikely this function will be germane to most games.

The other special House Rule is that the Allies may not "stake out" the island. That is, since it is the only Axis Entry Point, and since all German reinforcements must use it to enter the map (at known dates), it is unfair to station a task force or ship or submarine there - or close enough for aircraft from ships - to intercept them. Since the Allies have a map edge zone immediately to the west permitting ships exiting the map to move to off map locations (e.g. Capetown), the restriction is minimized: Allied ships (and submarines) may not enter hex 6,173; Allied ships (or subs) with a reaction range greater than 0 may not enter any hex within that number of hexes plus one of hex 6,173; Allied ships with aircraft set for flight operations may not enter any hex within range of hex 6,173 (defined as the range setting of the air unit conducting flight operations plus one). Basically the Allies may transit the area (without entering the hex or being able to react to (or air detect or air attack) any Axis naval unit in hex 6,173 or any hex adjacent to it. Placing naval units so they would cover hexes two or more hexes from 6,173, while not a technical violation of the rule, is "gamey" behavior violating the spirit of the rule. It is not defined as forbidden as a favor to the Allies to minimize the restricted area - mainly to facilitate transits in unforseeable situations to the off map locations. But it isn't intended to have lots of units hang out down there to hunt down enemy units entering the map. Which is not to say patrols in the general area are forbidden. Player discretion is required to make the game work reasonably well. Creating many Axis Entry Points is considered inferior to trusting player good judgement.

Funny, in my personal mod I have included a similar concept. My "Occupied Europe" base is in the SE corner of the map, so the player face the historic choice of sending the Axis ships through the Central Pacific (simulates the Cape Horn route, risking interception when crossing the US-ANZAC "life line") or via the NEI and then hugging the southern border of the map all the way to the SE corner (this should simulate the travel time for crossing the IO and giving Cape Town a wide berth). The base is 0/0 size and receives a very moderate daily allottment of fuel plus has a very small light industry capacity to turn ressources shipped to "Europe" into supplies - it will take some time to cumulate a shipload of supplies (and fuel) which simulates the "off-map" movement time through the Atlantic and the port time in Europe. The Allies get a couple of Omaha class CLs at the Falklands for patrol duty in the vicinity of the "Occupied Europe" base. House rules state no base construction allowed and use of the Omahas only for "distant blockade" of the base. The base serves as entry point for German and Italian subs and blockade runners (I decided to make appear the AMCs Thor and Michel as TFs in the IO). An Allied ground unit is scheduled to appear at "Occupied Europe" in May 1945 to take over ownership.