2023-11-04 05:02:26
World War II had something special. During the five years in which both parties settled their military supremacy in much of the world, the way of confronting the enemy evolved to the point of vertigo. Throughout the conflict, revolutionary techniques such as glider attacks were born and agonized; assaults with commandos behind enemy lines are here to stay (determinant, for example, for the British SAS) and a shocking explosive such as the atomic bomb was raised for the first time. And that, in a contest that began more than eight decades ago.
The report that the ABC published on August 16, 1945, with the charred remains of Adolf Hitler fertilizing the Berlin soil, brings together all the previous ingredients and results in a cocktail of those that excite the body; an authentic film from the most famous factory in the United States.
Under the headline ‘How the atomic bomb was taken from the hands of the Germans‘, the journalist from the ‘Daily Express’ in Stockholm, JD Masterman, analyzed in this newspaper the different (and crazy) missions that a group of allied paratroopers carried out to try to destroy the heavy water facilities that the Third Reich was hiding in Norway. All this, under absolute secrecy to avoid leaks. Let’s go there…
Atomic bomb
In Masterman’s words, the search for the atomic bomb, the same one that had been dropped ten days earlier on Hiroshima, was part of “the secret war that, in parallel, was fought with the official war, and whose duration was [también] of five years”. The Third Reich began its nuclear career in Norway shortly after acquiring “a gigantic hydroelectric facility in Rjukan, about 150 kilometers west of Oslo.” From the beginning, Adolf Hitler understood that this complex had to become the heart of Teutonic research into the explosive. “That factory was going to be the cradle of the atomic bomb, the research center for what was its essential principle, ‘heavy water’.”
But… what the hell is this compound, key to the birth of the deadliest weapon of World War II? According to Masterman, heavy water had been discovered in 1930 in the United States and “contains hydrogen atoms twice as heavy as those contained in ordinary water.” The substance alone had no value, but it became determining through a complex process. “In the opinion of scientists around the world, treating uranium metal with heavy water, under extraordinary force, could split the uranium atom and thus release catastrophic energy.” The project was named V-3 in memory of the V-1 and V-2 bombs, designed by the Germans in World War II.
The Rjukan factory thus became Nazi Germany’s best kept secret. At least from the outside, since ministers Fritz Todt (military and engineer) and Albert Speer (Hitler’s favorite architect) received “the site manager” in the capital of the Reich to congratulate him face to face on his projects and progress. . They did not know, however, that the leader in question had enough awareness to warn the allies of what was suspected there. «He raised the alarm among the Norwegians. They responded, and especially one of them, Leift Tronstad, a forty-year-old chemistry professor who had worked on splitting the atom in the factory for several years. “He burned his papers and, with several of his collaborators, he fled to England.”
Hitler poses with Albert Speer after the conquest of Paris ABC
As expected, Tronstad informed the British about Hitler’s plans and they, eager to strike a definitive blow, decided to use their commandos, soldiers trained in the art of infiltration who had already proven their worth in operations such as the raids. in North Africa, to blow up the Nazi dreams of obtaining the atomic bomb. «Immediately a special command was organized, with its headquarters in a small Scottish town. The command included a group of paratroopers with special training, and among the paratroopers there were Norwegians. The operation would consist of launching gliders over the region (a technique used on D-Day) and wreaking havoc on the factory.
The mission began on November 18, 1942, when four commandos descended by parachute on Hardanger to indicate the drop zones to the main unit and prepare the ground. «The four paratroopers set up a radio station southwest of the Moesvaten dam, which is what supplies power to the Rjukan factory. There they waited three weeks, after which the signal was received that two Halifax bombers, each towing a glider, would transport the commandos that same night. It was not a simple task, although it was key to ending the danger of heavy water.
Disaster
But everything ended in disaster. The first of the bombers, which was loaded with all the weapons necessary to undertake the mission, crashed into the North Sea due to a storm that attacked it suddenly. The second was forced to make a forced landing after having dropped the glider over Hardanger. The commandos landed at Jaeren, near Stavanger; a disaster for the mission. «The commandos wandered through that area for a few days, without food, ammunition, or tents to shelter in. “In the end they surrendered to the Germans,” the journalist reported. Shortly after they were hunted and, for the most part, murdered in cold blood by the Germans.
Apparently, two things happened after the German raid. The first, that 6,000 SS soldiers arrived in the area ready to defend the factory. But also that the first four paratroopers broadcast a message to Great Britain to request help. The response was blunt: «Do not move from the place. We will be back”. And they did it, although three months later due to bad weather and with a unit of just six commandos. The mission was no better. «This expedition started as badly as the first. The six paratroopers fell forty kilometers from the place […] prepared. It took them more than a week to find each other and, on the night of February 25, 1943, they all set off towards Rjukan.
If the landing had been a disaster, the mission became a success. One by one, the commandos entered the factory through a hole designated for high-tension cables. Afterwards, they applied plastic explosives to all the barrels of heavy water they found and, in general, to any element that the Nazis could use to make their atomic bomb (including the room where they kept their stock of radium and uranium). “Twenty minutes later, the Germans were left without heavy water, without uranium, without radium and without a laboratory.” Like a flash, the soldiers left there “skiing across Norway.” About 600 kilometers later they were already in safe territory.
But the adventure did not end at that point. That same year, and according to the Norwegian journalist, the Germans managed to repair the facilities and start their investigations again. “In April 1944, Scotland found out that the Germans had managed to store twelve tons of heavy water, which they intended to send to Austria, where the first bombs were going to be manufactured,” adds the author. The precious material left Rjukan on a freight train that the British commandos already had in their sights and soon arrived at the coast, where a ferry was waiting for it. The only chance was to sink the ship in the middle of the lake. “The three commandos dropped a powerful magnetic charge on the lake, and shortly afterwards saw the flames rising above the waters when the drum collided with the mine,” he concludes.
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