Government Films and Photographs Depict Test "Able" on 1 July

Government Films and Photographs Depict Test "Able" on 1 July 1946
Removal of 167 Bikinians from the Atoll Preceded the Atomic Tests
National Security Archive Electronic Briefing Book No. 553
Posted - July 1, 2016
Edited by William Burr with Stav Geffner
For more information contact : William Burr at 202/994-7000 or [email protected].
VİDEO LİNK : https://youtu.be/8XYurHiXpQA
Able, the first test of the Crossroad series, as seen from a tower on Enyu Island, Bikini atoll,
1 July 1946 (excerpt from 428-NPC-18358, see video 5 below)
The July 24, 1946 Baker Test in the initial seconds of the explosion, shrouding its formidable
height over the U.S. Navy’s test fleet. The Baker bomb, suspended 90 degrees below the
land ship LSM-60, spewed a column of water that hoisted the 10-mile wide, 520-foot tall
mushroom cloud. The battleship Arkansas was located 100 feet from the explosion in the
right foreground, next to the dark spot of soot from the ship’s stacks and boilers. (Colorized
photo courtesy of National Nuclear Security Administration/Nevada Field Office)
A color film of the Baker test is available.
The Atomic Tests at Bikini Atoll, July 1946*
Washington, D.C., July 1, 2016 - Seventy years ago this month a joint U.S Army-Navy task
force staged two atomic weapons tests at Bikini atoll in the Marshall Islands, the first
atomic explosions since the bombings of Japan in August 1945. Worried about its survival in
an atomic war, the Navy sought the tests in order to measure the effects of atomic
explosions on warships and other military targets. The test series was named Operation
Crossroads by the task force’s director, Rear Admiral William Blandy. The first test, Able,
took place on 1 July 1946. Of the two tests, the second, Baker, on 25 July 1946, was the
most dangerous and spectacular, producing iconic images of nuclear explosions. A third test
was scheduled, but canceled. Photographs and videos posted today by the National
Security Archive document Crossroads, focusing on the Able test.
Also documented is the U.S. Navy’s removal, in early March 1946, of 167 Pacific islanders
from Bikini, their ancestral home, so that the Navy and the Army could prepare for the
tests. The Bikinians had the impression that the relocation would be temporary but the
islands remain uninhabitable due to subsequent nuclear testing in the atoll.
To stage the tests the Navy sought a remote site under U.S. control where it could assemble
old and retired ships and detonate atomic weapons above or below them. By December
1945, Navy planners had decided that the most suitable location was Bikini, part of the
Marshall Islands group, which had been captured from the Japanese in early 1944. The
atoll’s people were descendants of communities that had lived there for thousands of
years, subsisting on coconuts and seafood. So that Admiral Blandy’s task force could
prepare for Crossroads, the Navy took over the atoll. Therefore, in February 1946,
Commodore Ben Wyatt, the Marshall Island’s military governor, informed the Bikinians that
they must leave so that the U.S. government could conduct military tests “for the good of
mankind.” On 7 March the Navy transported the Bikinians to Rongerik Island where, as it
turned out, food and water were in short supply.[1]
Over 42,000 U.S. military and civilian personnel, of whom 38,000 were naval personnel,
participated in preparations and activities relating to Crossroads. The task force included
eight task groups with such responsibilities as communications and electronics,
photography, instrumentation, safety/security, and inspection of target ships, among
others. Fifteen universities were involved and so were many corporations and
nongovernmental organizations. Part of the work included deploying military equipment to
be exposed to the tests (the Army alone had 3,000 personnel assigned to measure damage
to army equipment exposed to the explosion). The fleet of target ships included 94 aircraft
carriers, battleships, cruisers, destroyers, submarines, and landing craft, among other ships.
Some of the vessels had been declared excess inventory after the Navy had scaled down its
forces, and others had been damaged during World War II. Three German and Japanese
warships captured during the war were among the ships to be targeted.
Stressing the “defensive” aspects of Crossroads, the Navy organized a massive publicity
campaign but public criticism emerged, domestically and internationally, leading to an
intensified public relations effort. During 1946 the Cold War had not yet emerged, but U.S.Soviet relations were uneasy, and among the concerns expressed by U.S. critics was that a
“grandiose display of atomic power” (Sen. Scott Lucas, D-Ill.) would increase international
tensions. Moreover, the first test, scheduled for 15 May, would send the wrong signal when
Washington was involved in United Nations discussions over international control of atomic
energy. Some opponents worried about a waste of resources while plans to expose test
animals to radioactivity generated protest letters, with the Society for the Prevention of
Cruelty to Animals playing a leading role. Skeptical scientists argued that the tests would
produce no new information and in a letter to President Truman, former Manhattan Project
director J. Robert Oppenheimer argued that mathematical calculations and model tests
would produce better data. In light of the conflict with the U.N. discussions, President
Truman ordered the first test to be postponed until 1 July.
The multi-camera filming of Commodore Wyatt “consulting” the Bikinians about their
evacuation on March 6, 1946. (NARA, Still Pictures Unit, Record Group 374-G, box 7, folder
60 “Tests: Operation Crossroads”)
Some senior advisers to the U.S. government believed that the atomic tests were
diplomatically useful. In a discussion at the Council on Foreign Relations, Harvard University
president James B. Conant, who had served as wartime chairman of the National Defense
Research Committee during World War II, argued that the “Russians are more likely … to
come to an effective agreement for the control of atomic energy if we keep our strength
and continue to produce atomic bombs.” Truman administration officials may well have
seen the tests as bolstering the U.S. position in international negotiations; certainly, senior
U.S. military officials at the time believed the bomb was vital to maintaining “a position of
paramount military power” and possibly a “crucial factor in our effort to achieve first a
stabilized condition and eventually a lasting peace.”[2]
The first test, Able, which occurred on 1 July, involved an air burst directly above the
assembled ships. “Dave’s Dream,” the B-29 Superfortress which carried out the Able test
run, dropped a “Fat Man” plutonium bomb (the type dropped on Nagasaki), with an
explosive yield of 23 kilotons. The bomb missed its target by several thousand feet,
destroying inadvertently one of the ships carrying measuring instruments. The error
created a storm of criticism, but it was never fully explained, although the poor ballistics of
“Fat Man” were probably a factor. The blast did not destroy large numbers of target ships
but five sank and some 40 others were damaged, many of them rendered useless. For
understating the damage, the Navy was criticized by the media and the Army Air Force
(which regarded naval forces as obsolete). Others in the media, on ships at far distances
from the test, did not feel Able’s shock waves and expressed disappointment, treating it as
virtually a dud.
The Crossroads tests were the subject of intense media coverage with scores of journalists
from the U.S. and overseas covering the Able test (somewhat fewer attended the second
test). Members of Congress also attended as did a cabinet member (Secretary of the Navy
James Forrestal). Ten nations on the United Nations Atomic Energy Commission, including
the Soviet Union, accepted U.S. invitations and sent observers. The plans for the tests
influenced newspaper and radio coverage for months before July 1946 and when the tests
occurred, they dominated the front pages. Even though basic information about atomic
weapons (e.g., production, design, yield, and effects) was highly classified, as was
information about the results of the tests, according to the Manhattan Project’s report on
Crossroads, "it has been truly said that the operation was ‘the most observed, most
photographed, most talked-of scientific test ever conducted.’ Paradoxically, it may also be
said that it was the most publicly advertised secret test ever conducted."[3]
The second test, Baker, on 25 July 1946, was an underwater nuclear detonation which
disastrously spread radioactive fallout on nearby ships, eventually putting a halt to
decontamination efforts because of the danger to naval personnel. The third test, also
underwater, was subsequently cancelled, partly to save on scarce plutonium. An upcoming
National Security Archive posting, to be published later in July 2016, will document the
Baker test and the decision to cancel the third test, providing more background material,
including additional photographs, government films, and declassified reports and
memoranda.
* Thanks to Martha DeMarre, Nuclear Testing Archive, National Security Technologies, LLC
(contractor to the United States Department of Energy) for invaluable help with sources.
Video gallery
Video 1: Joint Task Force One, “Operation Crossroads Able and Baker Day Tests, Bikini Atoll,
Summer 1946”, unclassified.
This 30 minute narrated film was the official Operation Crossroads documentary, prepared
at the direction of Task Force One director, Admiral William Blandy. It may have been
prepared for internal U.S. government use.
Source: U.S. National Archives, Motion Picture Branch, RG 428, Department of the Navy,
428-MN-6817 R 1-2.
Video 2: U.S. Navy film footage depicting the removal of Pacific Islanders from Bikini atoll
on March 6/7, 1946.
Source: U.S. National Archives, Motion Picture Branch, RG 428, Department of the Navy,
428-NPC-18023.
Video 3: Unedited and visually poor quality footage of the Navy’s staging of Commodore
Ben Wyatt’s official request to the Bikini population to leave their atoll. The meeting took
place on 10 February 1946 and the Navy restaged it on 3 March 1946. Wyatt, King Juda and
the Bikinians did repeated takes of the meeting during which Wyatt asked Juda and his
people to “be willing to sacrifice their island for the welfare of all men.” King Juda, shown
wearing a military uniform, restated his lines of acquiescence a number of times and by the
last few minutes of the scene (ending at 7:41) was plainly unhappy with the situation. The
performances concluded with the Bikinians having their last church service on the atoll and
then meeting at the graveyard.[4]
Source: U.S. National Archives, Motion Picture Branch, RG 428, Department of the Navy,
428-NPC-18022.
Video 4: This footage, excerpted from a longer film, depicts pre-test aerial activity and the
detonation of Able as seen from the air.
Source: U.S. National Archives, Motion Picture Branch, RG 111, Records of the Chief Signal
Officer, 111-ADC-7179.
Video 5: As shown by the slate at the first few seconds of this film, this footage of the Able
shot was taken from a tower on Enyu island.
Source: U.S. National Archives, Motion Picture Branch, RG 428, Department of the Navy,
428-NPC-18358.
Video 6: This U.S. Navy film, an excerpt from a longer film, depicts the Able detonation
from the perspective of sailors aboard an observation ship.
Source: U.S. National Archives, Motion Picture Branch, RG 428, Department of the Navy,
428-NPC-18301.
Photo gallery
Click on photo to enlarge
King Juda (central figure on the right) and the Bikinians shown during a meeting,
presumably with Commodore Ben Wyatt [undated photo]. (NARA, Still Pictures Unit,
Record Group 374-G, box 7, folder 60 “Tests: Operation Crossroads”).
According to the Navy's caption, "Natives going aboard LCM [Landing craft
mechanized]." According to the photo this event was in July 1946 but it was probably in
late February or early March. (NARA, Still Pictures Unit, Record Group 374-G, box 7,
folder 60 “Tests: Operation Crossroads”)
Two minutes after Able’s detonation, a group of experts civilian technicians and
scientists stand on the Bikini shoreline. (NARA, Still Pictures Unit, Record Group 374ANT, box 5, folder 26 “Detonation”)
The Able cloud forming above Bikini. (NARA, Still Pictures Unit, Record Group 374-G,
box 7, folder 59 “Tests: Operation Crossroads”)
The Able test’s damage to the USS Skate (SS 305). (NARA, Still Pictures Unit, Record
Group 80-G, box 1724, folder 627483-627519)
Members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff’s Evaluation Board looking over the damaged fleet
on July 3, 1946, accompanied by Captain Horacio Rivero of the Navy’ s Special Weapons
Staff, who had played a key role in selecting Bikini. Shown in the photo from left to right
are: Rivero, Vice Admiral John H. Hoover, Bradley Dewey, General Joseph W. Stilwell
(after his death replaced by General Albert C. Wedemeyer), Lt. General Lewis H.
Brereton. (NARA, Still Pictures Unit, Record Group 80-G, box 1724, folder 627483627519)
Destroyed automatic-tracking microwave radar on the USS Independence from the Able
Test on July 1, 1946 (CVL 22). (NARA, Still Pictures Unit, Record Group 80-G, box 2228,
folder 627520-627549)
Wrecked flight deck of the USS Independence (CVL22) caused by the Able test. (NARA,
Still Pictures Unit, Record Group 80-G, box 2228, folder 627520-627549)
Damaged USS Independence (CVL 22) target ship from the Able test. (NARA, Still
Pictures Unit, Record Group 80-G, box 1724, folder 627483-627519)
Notes
[1]. This text relies heavily upon the most comprehensive and wide-ranging account of
Crossroads, Jonathan M. Weisgall’s Operation Crossroads (Annapolis, Naval Institute Press
1994). Also helpful was the chapter on Crossroads in James P. Delgano’s Nuclear Dawn: the
Atomic Bomb from the Manhattan Project to the Cold War (Botley, Oxford, Osprey
Publishing, 2009), 138-162.
[2]. James B. Hershberg, James B. Conant: Harvard to Hiroshima and the Making of the
Nuclear Age (Stanford, Stanford University Press, 1995), 267. Quotations by Assistant Chief
of Naval Operations Admiral Robert Lee Dennison and Army Air Force commander Carl
Spaatz, Melvyn P. Leffler Preponderance of Power: National Security, the Truman
Administration, and the Cold War (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1992), 116.
[3]. Manhattan District History, Book VIII, Los Alamos Project (Y) – Volume 3, Auxiliary
Activities, Chapter 8, Operation Crossroads (n.d., ca. 1946), as cited in Restricted Data: The
Nuclear Secrecy Blog.
[4]. For a troubling account of the Navy’s staging of the meetings, see Peter Bacon Hales,
Outside the Gates of Eden: The Dream of America from Hiroshima to Now (Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 2014)
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