A thousand suns

Joseph Schenkelmann realised his attempt at sabotage was too little and probably too late, and doomed to failure if Hauser should decide to read once more his carefully worded instructions, but at this stage it was all he could think to do.

He completed setting the code on the altimeter, and then together he and his assistant Rud began to prepare the bomb for its journey.

Chapter 26

Truman

27 April 1945, Washington, DC

He recalled those days vividly: the day that the ultimatum arrived, and then the chaotic days that followed.

James Irlam Wallace had been plucked from obscurity, studying for his post-doctorate in theoretical physics at Stanford, in his own little study. One day, out of the blue, several stern-faced men in plain suits had entered his study and, with little in the way of an explanation, had escorted him to Washington and the offices of the OSS to meet with Bill Donovan, then the head man of the recently restructured wartime intelligence agency.

Bill Donovan had recruited him then and there in the name of national security. And that had put an end to his academic career. From that point on, James Wallace was an intelligence asset.

There had been disturbing intelligence reports from Europe that the Germans, under the technical direction of Professor Werner Heisenberg, were going for the atom bomb. Donovan had explained to Wallace, after he’d signed a clutch of documents that threatened death and damnation should he utter a word of anything that was about to be revealed to anyone, ever, that they had only small pieces of the puzzle coming over as intelligence on the subject. The OSS needed someone with a keen mind, but more importantly a knowledge of the subject, to pull it all together and answer with some confidence whether the Germans had the capacity to make one yet. Donovan had added that Oppenheimer himself had mentioned Wallace’s name as a suitable candidate to analyse and summarise the German atomic effort, in lieu of providing one of his own team, now working at breakneck speed on Trinity, none of whom he could spare.

And so, after a hurried induction process, Wallace found himself answering directly to Bill Donovan and working in isolation, once more in a study of his own, on the tiny fragments of information that had been acquired thus far on Heisenberg and his team, and their progress.

It was six months after Wallace had started in this job that the event in question occurred. It was in the early hours of 27 April that he was roused by a phone call from Donovan and told to meet him at the White House, where he would be waiting with an emergency security pass to walk him through to meet with the President.

Wallace recalled that particular day with such clarity, the day he met Truman, the man who had been President for only a matter of days, a man who was struggling to find his feet in a role that had been thrust upon him with little preparation or notice in the wake of Roosevelt’s untimely death.

Truman came in and sat down at the conference table without a word. He took a moment to compose himself and then held the telegram in his hand shakily and began to read it aloud: To The President of America, Germany has at her disposal a number of weapons of great destructive power. These have been completed and readied for deployment. It has long been my belief that both America and Britain are our natural allies, and that the war we have been fighting since 1939 has been the wrong war. The real struggle should have always been solely against communism. Now we have these weapons, we are in a position to correct this mistake. You will cease all military action against Germany and declare war on Russia. Allied troops under the command of General Eisenhower in Germany are to be placed under control of General Keitel to assist Wehrmacht forces in the defence of Berlin. These measures are to be carried out within 48 hours. There will be one demonstration of this weapon for the world to see. Failure to comply to the requests made above will result in additional demonstrations. It is with regret that a demonstration is necessary. Adolf Hitler

The men around the conference table were initially as shocked as the President. After a few moments to absorb what the President had read aloud, Truman’s cabinet, all of them, began talking at once.

‘Stop, gentlemen, quiet please,’ Truman muttered, unheard by everyone in the room. His assembly of wise men looked like little more than a class full of unruly children. He steadied himself, breathing deeply.

Here’s the crunch, Harry… now it’s time to act like a leader.

‘Quiet!’ he barked with a voice unused to being raised. The men around the table were instantly silent, finally aware that they had broken rules of conduct and behaviour that they would never have broken in Roosevelt’s presence.