Hitler's Terror Weapons (20 page)

The Partial Unloading of
U-234

During May much of the weapons material, the Me 262 jet and containers of documents had been unshipped and taken off to the Brooklyn Navy Yard. On 24 July 1945 Hirschfeld was standing on the conning tower of
U-234
with Captain Hatten, a US Navy Intelligence Officer, watching the six steel loading tubes being lifted by crane from the forward mineshafts and deposited on the quayside. The bosun, Schölch, was put in charge of the unloading because the Americans feared that the containers might be booby-trapped. Hirschfeld saw four men approach the steel tubes carrying small hand appliances and when he asked Captain Hatten for an explanation he was told, “They are scientists. They are testing for the uranium with Geiger counters.”

Apparently the scientists discovered that all six steel tubes were contaminated to such an extent with radiation that they could not determine in which of the tubes the ten cases of uranium oxide listed in the loading manifest had been stowed. Schölch knew, but did not inform the Americans of this. Eventually Lt Pfaff was brought from Fort Mead camp and unloaded the ten cases of uranium oxide in exchange for some sort of inducement. Shortly afterwards he was repatriated and then returned to the United States as an immigrant, as did Schölch. Neither has ever spoken about the uranium shipments, although recently Pfaff is reported to have said that he discussed the
U-234
cargo with the US atom physicist Robert Oppenheimer in the Portsmouth Navy Yard. Shortly afterwards, the war with Japan ended and Hirschfeld spent the ensuing months at Fort Edward camp in Massachusetts until his release in April 1946.

Only one man who sailed on the first and last voyage of
U234
failed to make it home. Fregattenkapitän Gerhard Falck knew everything about the uranium consignment and probably he knew too much for his own good.
¹²⁷
The German justice authorities dealing with the repatriation of Wehrmacht prisoners has no record of his return
¹²⁸
and the US Government has so far been unable to account for his whereabouts in their custody after May 1945. He was a legitimate prisoner of war, having been captured while travelling as a passenger on an enemy warship at the time of it surrender. From there he was taken to Fort Hunt outside Washington DC and the declassified portion of his interrogation report indicates that he was cooperative.

In international law the Unites States as captor has a duty to account for all prisoners taken under Article 118 of the Geneva Convention Relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War of 27 July 1929, to which the Unites States is a signatory, and to date in this case they have declined to do so. If the suspicion exists that Falck met his death unlawfully in their hands, it is not unjustified in the circumstances. The mysterious disappearance of Gerhard Falck is the first of the many secrets pertaining to the cargo aboard the German submarine
U-234.

CHAPTER 12

“In the Interests of National Defense or Foreign Policy …”

I
T IS CURIOUS that, after more than fifty-five years, despite the rules respecting automatic declassification of documents, much of the archive material relating to the cargo of the German submarine
U-234
still has not been made public. In 1985 American journalist Robert K. Wilcox wrote: “Inquiries to government agencies have produced nothing. It is as if the incident never occurred, as if
U-234,
its important passengers and cargo, never arrived”.
¹²⁹
British rocket engineer Philip Henshall wrote in 1995: “Despite requests made to the US naval authorities, the reply has always been that matters relating to nuclear affairs are still subject to official secrecy”.
¹³⁰

Anybody who thinks this is legal should examine American law itself.
¹³¹
In the United States, a request to a Government agency must be answered within ten days, and if denied a reason given. The courts have ruled that the Freedom of Information Act is to be broadly construed in favour of disclosure, and its exemptions are to be “narrowly construed”.

Where a matter is to be “kept secret in the interests of national defense or foreign policy” pursuant to an Executive Order, then the section relating to disclosure does not apply. If this exemption is being used secretly after 55 years, there must have been something extraordinary indeed about the heavy little cases of uranium on board the German submarine
U-234.
There is no blanket exemption by which nuclear matters generally are still subject to secrecy, and many formerly Top Secret documents in the matter have been declassified.

The Japanese Interest in Nuclear Materials

The interest of the Japanese Government in an atom bomb had waned in 1942 once it was realized that the separation of the U
²³⁵
isotope for the purpose of making the bomb would require an enormous labour force, stupendous investment, one-tenth of Japan's annual electricity requirement and half the nation's copper output for a year. Professor Yoshio Nishina was the senior atomic scientist and headed the Army project. In 1943, when a link was established with Germany, Nishina asked for a cover story so that the Germans would not be suspicious of a request for uranium. The need for uranium as a catalyst was the excuse apparently adopted.
¹³²
It is firmly established that Japan did subsequently request uranium from Germany for experimental purposes in 1943
¹³³
, and probably received a few tons. Japan had several hundred tons of uranium ore and had been prospecting successfully in Korea and Burma for more. Unless all this has a double meaning, one infers that Japanese physicists had worked unsuccessfully on an atom bomb project since 1941 and had not progressed beyond the early laboratory stage. The German naval historian Professor Jürgen Rohwer has confirmed from the first Magic decrypts for 1943 and 1944/45 that Japan requested from Germany a “quantity of uranium oxide” in connection with their atomic research into the fissile isotopes including plutonium.
¹³⁴

Accounting for the
U-234
Cargo: the Primary Documents

The initial US Navy Unloading Manifest of
U-234
was a translation carried out by the Office of Naval Intelligence and issued on 23 May 1945. The only item of uranium mentioned was ten cases of uranium oxide. Revised manifests, such as that of 16 June 1945, omit the uranium oxide. No mention was made of any uranium material in the long memorandum to C-in-C Atlantic Fleet of 6 June 1945 describing the
U-234
voyage and cargo arrangements in close detail.

The first manifest showed
“10 cases Uranium Oxide, 560 kilos”
consigned to the Japanese Army. As the item is part of the overall weight of the cargo, 560 kilos means the combined weight of containers and contents.

The next primary document is the copy of a secret cable #262151 dated 27 May 1945 from Commander Naval Operations to Portsmouth Navy Yard on the subject
of “Mine Tubes, Unloading Of”
. Distribution of the memorandum was to the commandant and various duty and orderly officers. It reads:

“Interrogation Lt Pfaff second watch officer U-234 discloses he was in charge of cargo and personally supervised loading all mine tubes. Pfaff prepared manifest list and knows kind-documents and cargo in each tube. Pfaff stated long containers should be unpacked in horizontal position and short containers in vertical position. Uranium oxide loaded in gold lined cylinders and as long as cylinders not opened can be handled like crude TNT. These containers should not be opened as substance will become sensitive and dangerous. Pfaff is available and willing to aid unloading if RNEDT desires. Advise. CTM.”

The third item is US Navy Secret Telephone Transcript 292045 between Commander Naval Operations, Brooklyn Navy Yard, Major Francis J. Smith, and Major Traynor at Portsmouth, NH Naval Yard. This recorded that on 30 May 1945, Lt-Cdr Karl B. Reese, Lt (j.g.) Edward P. McDermott (USNR) and Major John E. Vance, Corps of Engineers, US Army, arrived at Portsmouth Navy Yard in connection with the cargo of
U-234.
Large quantities were unloaded and taken by ship to Brooklyn. The following telephone conversation ensued on 14 June 1945 between Major Smith and Major Traynor:

Smith: “I have just got a shipment in of captured material and there were 39 drums and 70 wooden barrels, and all of that is liquid. What I need is a test to see what the concentration is and a set of recommendations as to disposal. I have just talked to Vance and they are taking it [i.e. the cargo] off the ship and putting it in the 73rd Street Warehouse. In addition to that I have about 80 cases of U powder in cases. Vance is handling all of that now. Can you do the testing and how quickly can it be done? All we know is that it ranges from 10% to 85% and we want to know which and what.”

Traynor: “Can you give me what was in those cases?”

Smith: “U powder. Vance will take care of the testing of that.”

Traynor: “The other stuff is something else?”

Smith: “The other is water.”

The use of the letter “U” as an abbreviation for uranium was widespread throughout the Manhattan Project. The Corps of Engineers to which Major Vance was attached was the parent organization of the Manhattan Project and Major Vance was part of the latter project.

The fourth document originates from the Manhattan Project Foreign Intelligence files and confirms that the remaining cargo was unloaded on 24 July 1945. This included the ten cases of uranium oxide assayed as 77% pure Yellow Cake. The document confirms that the bulk of the
U-234
cargo was held in the custody of Major Francis Smith at the Brooklyn Navy Yard.
¹³⁵

Interpreting the Primary Documents

In the first manifest are listed ten bales of drums containing “confidential material” and fifty bales of barrels containing benzyl cellulose, which latter can be used for biological shielding purposes or as a coolant in a liquid reactor. The thirty-nine drums are said by Major Smith to contain “water” for which he needs a test done “to see what the concentration is”: he knows that it ranges from 10% to 85%. If this is heavy water, the percentage describes the degree to which a consignment of water had been depleted of its hydrogen molecules.

It will be observed from the primary documents that uranium oxide was unloaded from
U-234
on 24 July 1945, while eighty cases of uranium powder had already been unloaded and shipped to Brooklyn by 14 June 1945.
Therefore aboard
U-234
were two different uranium consignments and one of them never appeared at any time in the manifests translated by the Americans.

We now observe that what seem to be discrepancies in the secondary, eyewitness evidence of Wolfgang Hirschfeld actually confirm the existence of two distinct shipments aboard
U-234.
The Unloading Manifest states “10 cases Uranium Oxide” but on the quayside at Kiel Hirschfeld said he saw “at least fifty of the little cases.”
¹³⁶
Obviously, what he saw the Japanese loading at Kiel was not the ten cases of uranium oxide, but the eighty little cases of uranium powder. The little cases he saw were cubic in shape about nine inches along the sides, whereas the uranium oxide described by Pfaff, and unloaded by him on 24 July 1945, was stowed in gold-lined cylinders, the dimensions of which are not known. Hirschfeld did not witness the actual unloading by Pfaff.

As to the eighty little cases of uranium powder, besides the fact that it was shipped in what seemed to be lead radioisotope shipping containers and that Major Vance of the Manhattan Project was going to test it, the American authorities have not been forthcoming.

The Ten Cases of Uranium Oxide

It will be recalled that the Magic decrypts for 1943 and 1944/45 show Japan requesting from Germany “a quantity of uranium oxide” in connection with their atomic research into the fissile isotopes including plutonium.

What is “uranium oxide”? Generally speaking, after the ore is mined, the crude concentrate know as Yellow Cake is recovered by leaching followed by solvent extraction and roasting. The material assays at between 60%-90% uranium oxide. It is poisonous, but not radioactive.

The German Army seized over 1000 tonnes of uranium oxide at Oolen in Belgium in May 1940. It was stored in wooden barrels each containing about 500 kilos. Where a barrel was damaged, the uranium oxide was repacked in a stout paper bag secured at the neck by a knotted wire. To consign this sort of material in gold-lined cylinders makes no sense unless it is radioactive in some way and handlers need biological shielding from the effects.

Experiments can be performed on uranium oxide in sub-critical reactors, and it had been Professor Harteck's idea in 1940 to use about 30 tonnes of uranium oxide to build a rudimentary low temperature nuclear reactor, and in either case some level of biological shielding would be required if the spent material was being shipped.

Gold-lined containers would be used where it was necessary to absorb fission fragments, emissions of gamma radiation or neutron radiation, or a combination of all three. Alpha and beta radiation is easily stopped by a 7mm thickness of aluminium or perspex.

What sense can be made of the fact that the ten cases of uranium oxide were stowed in a secure steel tube upright through the hull casing of the submarine and yet still leaked so much radioactivity that the forward part of the boat gave uniform Geiger counter readings over its entire surface? Men lived for months in close proximity to this radioactive contamination, yet none complained of radiation sickness. How was this to be explained?

Lt Colonel Richard Thurston, a former member of the Manhattan Project radiological team, supplied the answer
¹³⁷
: the radiation could not have been gamma radiation. What occurred to him was that all the reported conditions could only be met if the substance detected was radon gas, which is notoriously difficult to contain. It would seep through the containers and steel tubes and adhere to exposed surfaces but not be particularly dangerous to humans.