destruction of the world: June 2008

Book Review: "The Last Wave From Port Chicago" by Peter Vogel

by The Anonymous Physicist

Vogel’s book is freely downloadable here. http://www.portchicago.org/

Port Chicago was a WWII munitions port about 35 miles northwest of San Francisco, traversed through various waterways. The massive explosion that occurred there, at 10:19 P.M. on July 17, 1944 has been the subject of debate ever since. Wikipedia has this summary of the superficial info: “The Port Chicago disaster was a deadly explosion that took place on July 17, 1944 at the Port Chicago Naval Magazine in Port Chicago, California ... killing 320 sailors and civilians, and injuring more than 400 others. Most of the dead and injured were African American recruits, and the continuing unsafe conditions even after the disaster resulted in a number of servicemen refusing to work, known as the Port Chicago Mutiny, a month later ... Two hundred and eight sailors were convicted in summary courts-martial, and received bad conduct discharges. The remaining 50 men, known today as The Port Chicago 50, were found guilty of mutiny in a subsequent court martial, and were sentenced to dishonorable discharges and prison sentences of 8 and 15 years of hard labor... Thurgood Marshall sued the Navy on behalf of the 50 sailors. Although he was unable to get the convictions overturned, Marshall succeeded in winning clemency for the 50 sailors, but not until after the war in 1946.”

In The Last Wave From Port Chicago, author Peter Vogel, details his over 20-year quest to prove that the Port Chicago explosion was a nuclear one. The book attempts to show that Port Chicago was the one and only “proof firing/test” of the Mark II [Uranium Hydride Autocatalytic Lateral Implosion] atomic bomb. Vogel starts off his tale with his own history of being a rebel and being anti-establishment, and even being arrested at a protest rally for assaulting a policeman. He then became a reporter at the “San Francisco Chronicle”, and subsequently an editor for “Electronics” magazine. At the latter, he wrote, or edited, at least one piece on electronic component reliability in ICBMs shot into the Van Allen Radiation belts! Vogel ends up in 1980 in New Mexico, appointed by Governor King to be Secretary of the Board of Directors of NMERDI--the New Mexico Energy Research and Development Institute. He writes that Gov. King liked him so much, that he appointed him to be an honorary Colonel in the NM National Guard.

This is how Vogel ended up in New Mexico where, for 25 cents, in 1980, at a Santa Fe Church rummage sale, he purchased a box of donated tools that had in its bottom, a photocopy of a remarkable document. The document was titled “History of 10,000 ton gadget.” [Gadget was code for the fission bomb.] It included information on “fireball,” “detonation,’ and “radiation.” Vogel traced the document to Paul Masters, who worked at Los Alamos, during the Manhattan Project. Masters was involved with photography and copying. Masters had apparently copied this secret document, and taken it home with him, in his “shirt pocket.” The penalty for doing this was quite severe, and gives pause. Curious also, is the fact that Masters’ wife, Charlie, was in “counterespionage,” and “connected” to the Secret Service! Vogel reads the document and begins researching the Port Chicago explosion, and related Los Alamos matters.

One of the first people he interviewed, at Los Alamos, was Dr. Edward Teller. Vogel had actually taken a course from Teller in California years earlier. Teller, of course, is notorious as the right-wing “father of the H-Bomb.” Except that that claim is false. (See the book, “Dark Sun: The Making of the Hydrogen Bomb” by Richard Rhodes, read here.) Teller was also involved in the so-called SDI or “Star Wars” development of shooting down missiles, high above the Earth. Vogel arranges to meet Teller at Los Alamos--and lies and says the interview will be about the energy crisis--and photographs him, after he surprised Teller with the “History of 10,000 ton gadget” document. This photo shows Teller looking at the document. Teller stops and tells Vogel, “I believe you have a classified document. You should take it immediately to the Classification Office. I will deny I have ever seen this document. I will deny I have ever discussed Port Chicago with you.” The two go off to that office with the document, but Vogel keeps a copy, of the classified document.

Shortly after this, as Vogel begins his in-depth research into the possible, deliberate nuking of Port Chicago, by the American gov’t, an important Los Alamos report on Port Chicago gets re-classified, after it had been de-classified. Nonetheless, there is a massive store of documents on Port Chicago at Los Alamos. Officially Port Chicago could not be a nuclear explosion, in part, because there was not enough Uranium-235 [U-235] available for this in July, 1944. Vogel attempts to show that this is incorrect, and that every book saying this is wrong. He takes particular aim at Richard Rhodes’ Pulitzer Prize winning book, “The Making of the Atomic Bomb.” (Read here.) Vogel shows numerous errors of commission and omission, and says the book must have won its awards for its mass, not its veracity. Vogel writes that he is told, by physicists, to help prove his case, he should ascertain the amount of U-235 that was available at the time of the Port Chicago blast. This too remains classified, even though this is now six decades later. The book thus has numerous chapters and appendices related to the amount of U-235 the Govt’s labs had produced at different times. Curiously again, Vogel gets two Los Alamos Manhattan Project scientists to tell him the answers to this question. They tell him that there was enough U-235 in July, 1944 for the Port Chicago blast--even though this information is classified, and has serious penalties for Manhattan project scientists to reveal to anyone. (Assuming those scientists’ responses were truthful.)

Let me now summarize the findings of this book, and articles by Vogel and others that try to prove that the Port Chicago explosion was a nuclear one, as opposed to an explosion of the munitions at the pier, or on board the two ships (the SS E.A. Bryan and the SS Quinault Victory,) in the water near the pier at Port Chicago. The explosion was massive--the pier was leveled and much of the nearby town was also--and had a large white fireball visible for several hundred miles. People for over 20 miles reported seeing a bright white light as bright as several Suns. Reports state that the column of flame rose to approx. 10,000 feet before the night sky prevented observation of any further rising. The flame from the Trinity test, a year later, also rose to that altitude, with its subsequent mushroom cloud rising to nearly twice that height. The resultant cloud at Port Chicago was described as being a “mushroom cloud”--the first time that term was used in public discourse in the English language. The document Vogel found which was written after Port Chicago, but before Trinity, correctly predicted the 18,000-foot altitude of the Trinity mushroom cloud “in typical Port Chicago fashion.” Vogel shows these things did not occur in other huge munition ship explosions, that he details in the book. All seismograms were immediately seized, and not allowed to be published for several years. Were they re-done, as I have asserted the WTC seismic recordings were? Eyewitnesses said some of the many missiles that flew to great distances were of various colors indicating they were in a molten state due to what we lately call “extraordinarily high temperatures.” The official report itself says many missiles were molten. The Navy was even there across the pier making a film of the explosion. This was revealed some years later when they began showing a nuclear explosion that some recognized as being of Port Chicago. The military then said this was not an actual film, but was “special effects” [sound familiar?] created much later. Others examined the film itself, and proved that this was false, as the film was made of nitrate that was used in 1944, but was no longer used because of its own flammable nature.

Of particular importance is the following: 1. Reports from Los Alamos, and other places, about subsequent fission bomb detonations contain the phrase, “in Port Chicago fashion,” when referring to the rising mushroom cloud or fireball. Even when the British regime exploded its first atomic bomb, in 1952, off the coast of Australia, their report stated, the bomb was placed in a forward hold of the HMS Plym and detonated "Port Chicago style." 2. Crucially, before the Port Chicago explosion, there are Los Alamos reports (at the highest levels--Dr. Conant and General Grove) on the need for a test/proof firing of the Mark II nuclear device--before further development or use of this type of A-bomb. But just after the Port Chicago explosion, Los Alamos reports (between the same top people) state that this is no longer necessary, and that they can go on to other things. 3. Los Alamos scientists were immediately sent to Port Chicago, and the Navy’s three man Court of Inquiry on the matter, which began a few days later, included the brother-in-law (Capt. J.S. Crenshaw) of one of the top Los Alamos people, Captain Parsons. Parsons would fly in the Enola Gay to arm the Bomb before its dropping on Hiroshima. 4. At the time of the Port Chicago blast, Los Alamos physicists thought the bomb to be used on Japan would be too heavy for airborne use, and therefore had to be taken in by ship. 5. There was a massive 800-foot diameter crater created under the S.S. Bryan.

Out of 320 dead, only 81 bodies were recovered. Out of these 81, only 30 bodies could be identified. However, we cannot assume any vaporization of people, as these figures could possibly result from conventional explosions in ships. The long lasting effects of the Port Chicago blast are also telling. In 1968, the federal govt bought up all the buildings in Port Chicago, and demolished them, and later erected a monument. There has been a high cancer incidence in Contra Costa County, CA for the last several decades.

Curiously, Vogel did not suffer a strange car accident, nor surprise heart attack, nor rapid cancer, nor was he brutally assaulted nor had his home contaminated with a very toxic form of mercury, as was done to me, for just once speaking out on how SS agent Greer shot both Connally and Kennedy. Vogel meets with many Los Alamos scientists and tells each one that he is researching Port Chicago, and that he is trying to prove that the U.S. Govt deliberately nuked this American pier and town, and suffers no harmful consequences for this. There is much else in the book that gives me pause. Much else seems to be establishment dogma. There is the omission of what the Ottawa agreement really was about (British control of American nukes), standard nonsense about Osama bin Laden is thrown in, immense praise for one of the members of NMERDI, Dean McGee, Chairman of Kerr McGee. I have written of the jury verdict against Kerr McGee in the Plutonium poisoning and car ramming murder of Karen Silkwood. There is an establishment view on many things in the book, even saying there was a need to nuke an American town, and American sailors, to “save 100,000 American lives” in the invasion of Japan. When the truth is that Japan had tried to surrender for months prior to Hiroshima. Some of the reports on Port Chicago at Los Alamos, and other Los Alamos reports, show one parameter the Manhattan Project was always concerned with, was destruction of “dwelling houses.” So the mass murder of innocent civilians was always the goal.

Recently I have seen what is likely an intel Hangout regarding Port Chicago. Now it is claimed, by some, that Port Chicago was indeed a nuclear explosion, but it was an accident! All sorts of specious arguments are used. But the history of American nuclear bombs is that, from the outset, various fail-safe mechanisms were employed that made it virtually impossible for an accidental explosion to occur. If the SS E.A. Bryan held an atomic bomb in its hull, it would not have been armed until it was ready to be “proof/test fired” and also studied and filmed at its “anointed place.”

A related matter is that I have read another book on some of these matters that has a very different take on them. This book is "Critical Mass: How Nazi Germany Surrendered Enriched Uranium for The United States' Atomic Bomb" by Carter Plymton Hydrick. It may not be readily available, but is highly recommended here. It demonstrates that both the fissile material, and even the advanced detonator mechanism used on Hiroshima were of German origin, and taken from the submarine that officially was intercepted on its way to Japan, which had set sail near the end of Hitler’s reign. I thought the book did a good job of demonstrating its hypotheses. Now the regime’s intel assets have gone crazy both in regards to Hydrick’s book and Vogel’s. (See the use of foul ridicule that would be recognized, even here, as coming from intel entities.) But here you can read how some of the strongest critics of “Critical Mass” changed their minds when presented with the evidence. I have a different take than Hydrick on this, going to my Ultimate Truths here: http://anonymous-physicist.blogspot.com.

If the Atomic Bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki had German fissile material and advanced detonators, this wasn’t by accident that this came into the hands of the Manhattan Project people. Rather the PTB intended this destination for these materials, and not Japan. Similarly, the Uranium for the Port Chicago blast may have been delivered from Germany, or elsewhere in 1944, as well. This could be the reason that the American Govt won’t release its 1943-45 Uranium production amounts still, over 60 years later! And the PTB do not want the People to know how they controlled WWII for that purpose--creating nuclear bombs for use on Humanity; and the different “sides” of that war, and all wars, have been a ruse. “Critical Mass” also reveals some strangeness regarding the physicist given credit for the advanced detonators that also had been a great stumbling block to implosion fission devices. This was Luis Alvarez, PhD. Decades later, this Alvarez (who would also receive a Nobel Prize) would write some impossible Physics that President Kennedy’s body could be slammed backward against the incoming momentum of a bullet fired from behind him. Alvarez wrote this claptrap, and got it published in a Physics Journal--shades of Bazant and Seffen--after the Zapruder film was first publicly shown in 1975. It’s a violation of the fundamental Law of Conservation of Momentum. Before this, the regime/media just lied and said Kennedy’s body went forward in the limo. So Hydrick’s book and Vogel’s book are similar, but different. Unlike Hydrick’s book, Vogel’s ignores the issue of the detonation difficulties that also held up testing and use of fission bombs, and asserts that there was enough fissile material (U-235) by July 1944, let alone August 1945. I recommend people read both, and make up their own minds.

Vogel shows that the Hiroshima nuke used only 1.14% of its contained fissile material--the rest of the U235 did not undergo fission--due to the geometry and Physics of the implosion/explosion. Thus its efficiency is about 1%. The Port Chicago type A-Bomb had even less efficiency--about 0.5%. More recently, 6% efficiency for updated nuclear bombs is cited. This will be important in another (upcoming) article.

My conclusion is that there is much circumstantial evidence that the Port Chicago explosion was a nuclear fission explosion that was deliberately perpetrated by the U.S. regime. One could argue that circumstantial evidence is not proof, but trials have resulted in murder convictions based solely on circumstantial evidence. But one could say that there is no absolute proof, unless that film is of the Port Chicago nuking. Or unless some Los Alamos scientists who know the truth, would come forward. Of course, if they did, they could face charges of releasing secret information on the one hand. And on the other hand, they could (if the People ever got control of the regime again) face charges of Mass Murder, Treason, Conspiracy, maybe even genocide of a race, as the use of Afro-Americans, and removing the white Coast Guard detail that night is also telling. So we are not likely to get a confession from the perps.

Peter Vogel’s "The Last Wave From Port Chicago" presents much evidence that the July 17, 1944 Port Chicago explosion was a deliberate nuking of our own citizens, and sailors, and an American town and pier, by our own government. It should be read by all. It also fits in with the evidence that the WTC destruction on 9/11/01, was the deliberate nuking of America’s largest city by its own regime, and that the China Syndrome resulted, as detailed here http://wtcdemolition.blogspot.com and here wtc-chinasyndrome.blogspot.com.

But going beyond this level, I consider it a strong possibility that the PTB wanted the deliberate nuking of Port Chicago to get out! While they deny it officially for the masses, they want others to know. There is too much “coincidence” here. Vogel’s early anti-establishment, and so much later recitation of establishment dogma, the finding of the document, the strangeness of its owner and his “secret service, counterespionage” wife. The lack of prevention/retribution rained down on Vogel. The two scientists who told him there was sufficient Uranium--IF that is true. We have both too many coincidences, and also many people who could have, and maybe still could, face severe penalties for their parts in this. Would anyone but a spy--or someone starting this “revelation” want to photocopy a top-secret document, and then take it home, and face severe penalties? The document would be available from then on, at such time as the PTB would want to promulgate it. Likewise for the scientists who faced severe penalties for revealing Uranium-235 production amounts. They were not arrested or harmed. But all these “coincidences” in Vogel’s tale may be genuine.

Finally, in light of the distinctions of the two above books in regards to available amounts of fissile material and advanced detonators, I can not know for sure which is right. But this is not the main issue. Regardless of whether the Uranium-235, or the detonators, in a nuclear bomb at Port Chicago came from an American lab, or a German lab, or elsewhere, the evidence itself reveals that it is very probable that the American and British regimes ordered the nuking of Port Chicago, in furtherance of its plans for more massive nukings on other civilians in Japan, and so on.

Did the perps, still at Los Alamos, and Lawrence Livermore observe the nuking of the WTC on 9/11, and say that the rising smoke, photographed going up into space, was in ... “Port Chicago fashion”?

IMPORTANT UPDATE:
The Pt Chicago date is July 17, 1944.

That’s 7/17/1944.

Adding up the digits: 7, 1, 7, 1, 9, 4, 4 adds up to 33!
All things nuclear! Especially the first one in modern times!