BIKINI ATOLL
Four years ago I wrote a post on the two A Bmb tests on Bikini Atoll that formed Operation Crossroads. This was followed in 2023 by another post on the subject by Michael Wohltman.
Today's post is a refresh and update post again by Author Michael Wohltman. Michael is the author of
Looking back to See the future: A Revisionist History of Woomera, 1947-1980 / by Michael Wohltmann.
Bikini Atomic Testing and its significance for Australia
Bikini Atoll is one of two sites in the northern Marshall Islands that was used by the United States [US] as testing grounds for the atomic and nuclear weapons program from 1946-1958.
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Map of Bikini Atoll
Operation Crossroads was a program at Bikini Atoll in which two nuclear weapon tests were conducted by the United States in the Marshall Islands in 1946. Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands of the central Pacific was selected as the location for the nuclear tests as they were far from major population centres. Operation Crossroads was established at the end of WW2 and approved by President Harry S Truman on January 10, 1946, and was the first public demonstration of America's atomic arsenal after the atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the end of WW2.
The purpose of Operation Crossroads was to investigate the effect of nuclear weapons on naval warships and military equipment. The first test at Bikini Atoll, codenamed ABLE, occurred on July 1, 1946, when an implosion-type atomic bomb was dropped from a B-29. The second test of Operation Crossroads at Bikini Atoll, codenamed Test BAKER, was the first underwater test of an atomic bomb. After the initial nuclear weapons tests Bikini Atoll was used for 23 atomic and hydrogen bomb blasts in the 1940s and 1950s.
The US totally bungles the tests and the Bikinians became the second nuclear nomads.
In introducing the Atomic Energy [Control of Materials Bill 1946, on 12th July 1946, John Dedman in reading the Bill for the second time stated:
‘With the outbreak of war, this condition of secrecy became much more complete as between the belligerent groups, but the final allied achievement of the atomic bomb was directly attributable to a magnificent instance of scientific cooperation between Britain, Canada and America more immediately, though Australian scientists had a hand in the work and Australian raw materials were amongst those upon which experimental work was performed. With the bursting of atomic bombs on Japan a stage of wild popular speculation, recently stimulated by the much-publicized Bikini tests, has followed, though for the time being secrecy continues to be the rule regarding the processes of harnessing the new power. At the same time, however - and this is the central point before the House today - there is a general realization that the problem of control of atomic developments and raw materials is one of immediate and inescapable urgency.’
The second reading of the Atomic Energy Bill, highlights Australia’s eagerness to be involved in atomic bomb development, and atomic energy. Interestingly it supports a previous assumption that Australian uranium was supplied for the atomic bomb dropped on Japan. What were these ‘Australian raw materials,’ used for experimental work on atomic bombs?
The "Baker" atomic bomb explosion at Bikini Atoll on July 25, 1946—the last of three American tests—blasted a water column 5,000 feet into the air.
Australia sent two observers to the Bikini Atoll, Mark Oliphant and Captain Stanley Herbert King Spurgeon, RAN. Spurgeon wrote a report on his fact-finding mission and recommended that Australia support atomic research.
From an Australian standpoint, atomic weapons were seen as a stabilising force in international relations, provided they were wielded by responsible great powers. A belief that atomic weapons and the deterrence they provide are instruments that help to hold world order in place, and thereby serve Australian strategic interests, in her backyard. These central tenets were very much endorsed and promoted by both sides of politics. Both Chifley and Menzies, embraced the atomic age, both in terms of atomic weapons and atomic energy.
The atomic tests at Bikini also had serious implications for Australia.
Australia would be front and centre of atomic and nuclear development throughout the Cold War period.
The events at Bikini would force the United Kingdom to fast-track its atomic ability and develop an atomic deterrent. Hence the signing of the Anglo-Australia Joint Project in 1947.
On 27/2/1947. Cabinet endorsed the establishment of facilities in Australia for R&D work on guided missiles and supersonic Pilotless aircraft. Australia was flung into playing its role in developing atomic and future nuclear weapons in Australia.
As early as December 1946, due to the atomic experiments at Bikini Atoll, the Commonwealth government set up the Atomic Energy Research Advisory Committee, with the intent to develop atomic energy in the future.
Importantly. Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research [CSIR] would now play an important role in the military application of atomic energy with the newly established body New Weapons and Equipment Development Committee.
Finally, Australia did not learn anything from the atomic fallout from Bikini Atoll.
Australian reports noted this site was only 3,200 miles away from Sydney. Troubling reports of radioactive clouds as far away as the French Alps and the known shocking health effects appeared. All these mistakes would be repeated at Maralinga.
The atomic question came home in 1952, when the first of 12 British Tests began on the Montebello Islands, off Western Australia.
Australia’s involvement in atomic testing expanded again in 1954 when it began supplying South Australian-mined uranium to the US and UK’s joint defence purchasing authority, the Combined Development Agency. Port Pirie in South Australia had a uranium processing plant.
It should be remembered this bilateral relationship has an atomic history too. Australia supported the US testing program, assisted with data collection, and voted in the UN for its continuation when Marshallese pleaded for it to be stopped. It is also likely that Australian-sourced atomic waste lies within the Marshal Islands, cementing Australia in this history. (The radioactive fallout from these tests provides us with yet another possible cause of the issues related to the Somerton Man's teeth.)