Mankind hating mankind and wishing destruction on a large scale.
...The tests were carried out in watersaround New Caledonia and Auckland during the Second World War and showed that the weapon was feasible and a series of 10 large offshore blasts could potentially create a 33-foot tsunami capable of inundating a small city.
The top secret operation, code-named "Project Seal", tested the doomsday device as a possible rival to the nuclear bomb. About 3,700 bombs were exploded during the tests, first in New Caledonia and later at Whangaparaoa Peninsula, near Auckland.
The plans came to light during research by a New Zealand author and film-maker, Ray Waru, who examined military files buried in the national archives.
"Presumably if the atomic bomb had not worked as well as it did, we might have been tsunami-ing people," said Mr Waru.
"It was absolutely astonishing. First that anyone would come up with the idea of developing a weapon of mass destruction based on a tsunami ... and also that New Zealand seems to have successfully developed it to the degree that it might have worked." The project was launched in June 1944 after a US naval officer, E A Gibson, noticed that blasting operations to clear coral reefs around Pacific islands sometimes produced a large wave, raising the possibility of creating a "tsunami bomb". ...
Wednesday, January 2, 2013
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When anyone laments the destruction caused by the A-bombs that ended WWII, I refer them to two sources: the casualties caused by the conventional bombings of Tokyo and other cities, and "The Night of the New Moon" by Sir Laurens van der Post. Destructive as this would have been, it was an attempt to find an innovative way to end the war.
ReplyDeletePersonally, I am against any kind of war because it's the innocent people who become victims of war through no fault of their own. Having said that, yes ... I do realize that evil has to be defeated one way or another and the collateral damage (innocent lives lost) has to borne with iron resolve.
ReplyDeleteIf not for the bombing of the cities in Japan, WWII would have continued on longer and with direr consequences.