The Final Storm

by Jeff Shaara

  “You have no idea, son. But there’s one I’ve made that wasn’t difficult at all. It has to be done.”

  “Yes … sir.”

  Truman felt a dangerous need to talk about it, a simple conversation, letting off some of the pressure. But his brain held him back, and he looked back out toward the moon, the low swells, heard the hum of the engines beneath his feet. Those damn scientists will keep chewing on this, he thought. But the decision has been made, and it might be the only time in this job when I’m completely sure I’m right. Just tell me that the son of a bitch works.

  BABELSBERG, NEAR POTSDAM,

  SOUTHWEST OF BERLIN, GERMANY

  JULY 16, 1945

  No matter what other goals could be met by a face-to-face meeting with both Churchill and Stalin, for the Americans the primary goal was to secure Soviet cooperation in the redevelopment of Europe. It was hoped, of course, that Stalin would allow those countries he now occupied to accept Western influence along with Western aid. But there was one other critical matter that Truman intended to put before Stalin. The Soviets had yet to declare war on Japan, for complicated reasons of their own that made almost no practical sense to anyone in the West. Truman intended to change Stalin’s mind, and hoped, in the spirit of Allies, that the Soviets would understand that if the war was to drag on for another year or more, it was essential that the Soviets do their part. The carrot Truman offered was one he knew would matter significantly to the Soviets, one way to smooth over a major sore point for the Russians since their embarrassing defeat by the Japanese in the Russo-Japanese War, which ended in 1905. Russia had lost territory, islands north of the Japanese mainland, which no doubt Stalin wanted back. But if Americans were going to carry the load in any invasion of Japan, Truman was adamant that the Russians would have to make some significant contribution before they received any kind of reparations of their own. He went to Potsdam knowing that Stalin could not really be forced into backing away from anyplace he now controlled in Europe. But at least the Americans and the British might have something to offer that would soften the Soviet demeanor.

  Stalin had not yet arrived at the conference, and Truman had received a carefully worded intelligence report that the Soviet leader might have suffered a mild heart attack. The news had inspired a cascade of feelings, some of them distinctly unsympathetic, but very quickly after Truman’s arrival, Soviet officials had come to call, assuring him that Stalin would arrive the following day. No one mentioned a heart attack.

  The house Truman occupied was called the Little White House, a diplomatic nicety from the Soviets that mattered little to anyone, not the least because the house was yellow. But Truman’s entourage was busy in every available space, spread out in other houses down the street. The officials who had accompanied Truman included Secretary of State James Byrnes and Truman’s press secretary, Charles Ross. Military men were there as well, most prominently his chief of staff, Admiral William Leahy, who for a while had held the same position under Roosevelt. Leahy was the one loud voice close to Truman who objected completely to the construction and use of the atomic bomb, an unexpected voice against using a weapon of such magnitude. Truman respected Leahy, as had Roosevelt, but Leahy’s viewpoint was distinctly in the minority, and the admiral seemed to accept that with a grudging acknowledgment, though he never failed to be a bug in Truman’s ear about the fatefulness of the decision. I sure as hell don’t need that right now, he thought.

  Truman held the note in his hand, glanced at it one more time. For the moment all the important matters that the conference was to address seemed utterly trivial. He knew Churchill was housed about two blocks away, wondered about making another visit, this one unofficial, just to … talk. He studied the note again, thought, Churchill will know of this soon enough. This isn’t about gossip, after all. Hey, Winny, look what we did!

  He sat, but couldn’t stay still, rose again, went to the window. Babelsberg had been a German resort town, thick woods, something of an artists’colony. But all that had been erased, the three-story house where he stood just one more piece of the Soviet occupation. The house faced a lake, and he stared at that now, imagined Germans swimming, a holiday, full of joy and whatever passed for carefree to Germans. But his heart was racing, and his eyes rose past the water, staring into blank sky, any thoughts of carefree far removed. He tossed the paper on the table, realized, right now, I have to just … shut up. But by damn, this is a day we will remember. Maybe the whole world. The paper seemed to float slightly, pushed by a gentle breeze from some open window beyond the door. He moved quickly, picked it up, folded it, stuck it in his pocket. He couldn’t help the shivers, the strange excitement, knew that Leahy’s doubts were about to be realized with as much gravity as the enthusiasm of the men who had pushed so very hard for the creation of the massive weapon.

  The note had come to him in a specially coded message from the secretary of war, Henry Stimson. The wording had been cryptic and vague, lest any Soviet agent might examine it, but the code had been prearranged, and Truman knew exactly what Stimson was saying. It had happened at 5:30 A.M., in the bleak desert near Alamogordo. Under the gaze of the men who had created it, watched by military men and carefully chosen newspaper reporters, the first atomic bomb had been exploded. It had worked.

  The man who could rightfully be called the Father of the Bomb, Dr. Robert Oppenheimer, had observed the extraordinary flash with one thought rolling through his mind, the words from the ancient text of the Hindu people, the Bhagavad Gita.

  I am become death, the destroyer of worlds.

  27. TIBBETS

  HEADQUARTERS, 509TH COMPOSITE GROUP, TINIAN

  JULY 18, 1945

  The B-29 was warming up, the shimmy from the four massive engines shaking him down to his toenails. He checked the gauges, knew that Lewis, beside him, was doing the same. On the panel in front of him the instruments sprang to life, needles pointing where they should, temperatures and pressures rising. Behind him, he knew that Blanchard was watching every move both men made, making mental notes, or even paper ones, jotting down anything Tibbets and his co-pilot were doing wrong. Tibbets tried to ignore the man’s presence, thought, asshole.

  He pushed the throttle forward, the plane rolling toward the taxiway, the last stretch of pavement before the runway. The plane rumbled, shaking still, the roar of the engines growing louder, and Tibbets pressed the transmission button on the radio mike, said, “Dimples Eight Two to North Tinian Tower. Ready for takeoff on Runway Able.”

  The response was immediate, the voice crackling in his ear.

  “Roger, Dimples Eight Two. Cleared for takeoff, Runway Able.”

  He didn’t hesitate, jammed the throttles forward, the plane responding after a slight hint of delay, lagging just behind the immediacy of the command from Tibbets’s hand. But the speed increased quickly, the plane bouncing, a slight swerve that Tibbets corrected. The B-29 continued to gain speed, the bounces more undulating now, no glance at Lewis. For now there was nothing for the co-pilot to do but watch, as he was, staring straight ahead toward the far end of the field, 8,500 feet away. He waited for it, felt it now, the nose rising slightly, the plane seeming to pause, gathering air beneath the massive wings, then smoothness, the wheels clear of the runway, the plane rising, pulling his stomach down, the sensation so familiar. He shifted his hands on the throttles, pulled one backward, heard the roar of the engines drop by a quarter, one engine shutting down, the prop feathering. He spoke into the intercom now.

  “Engineer, confirm engine number one is shut down. Then feather engine number two.”

  The engineer, Duzenbury, replied, “Yes, sir. Confirmed. Number one feathered. Shutting down number two.”

  Tibbets smiled, would not look back at Blanchard, knew the man would be puzzled, possibly a full-blown panic. Just handle it, you jackass. I’ve got no time for chitchat, not right now. He struggled slightly with the plane’s controls, compensated for the sudden loss of half the plane’s power. To one s
ide the props on the two idle engines had slowed considerably, propelled only by the wind speed of the plane, the B-29 held aloft now by only two of its engines. It had been Tibbets’s plan, and his flight engineer had been prepared for the order, the entire crew knowing that their special guest was being given a demonstration of what the B-29 was capable of, and more important, what her pilots could do about it.

  He looked to the altimeter, the plane rising past a thousand feet, then eleven hundred, gaining altitude far more slowly with half power. Suddenly Tibbets banked the plane hard, the silent engines now downhill, one wing pointing toward the blue ocean, and he said into the intercom, “Nice view, Colonel? Tinian’s the hottest airfield in the Pacific. More B-29s fly out of here than anywhere in General LeMay’s command. It’s not the prettiest place, but we’re making do.”

  He looked over to his co-pilot, saw Lewis glancing back toward Blanchard, a smile, no response from the guest behind him. Tibbets returned Lewis’s smile, his eyes moving to the gauges again, keeping the plane in a steep bank. There was little drop in altitude, but he knew that wouldn’t last, the bank too steep, the flight characteristics of the B-29 only allowing for so much lift before the plane simply fell out of the sky. The voice came now, high and tight, a slight stutter, Blanchard.

  “Okay, Colonel. I’m satisfied. The engines are performing well. Can we complete the mission?”

  Tibbets turned to Lewis, winked, said, “Certainly, Colonel. I thought I might shut them all down, show you our glide characteristics, but that can be a risky maneuver, especially at low altitude.”

  “No … not necessary. Please proceed with the mission.” Tibbets focused on the restart of the two silent engines, heard a final word from Blanchard. “Please?”

  The two engines restarted, belching smoke for a brief second, their props fully engaged. Tibbets pushed the throttles forward, the plane surging, climbing again, straight and level. After a long silence, Tibbets spoke into the intercom.

  “Navigator, give me a time to target.”

  “Twenty-one minutes, sir.”

  “Roger, twenty-one minutes. Colonel Blanchard, please note your watch.”

  Blanchard didn’t respond, but Tibbets knew the colonel would do exactly that. He leaned back, pressed himself into the seat, flexed his shoulders. Immediately behind him the gap was too small for a regular seat, and he knew that Blanchard’s jump seat was far more uncomfortable. On Tibbets’s order the crew had made a minimal effort to soften the man’s ride by adding cushions to the meager padding. He felt Blanchard shifting around, a bump against Tibbets’s shoulder. The thought came again. Asshole.

  The meeting with Blanchard’s boss, Curtis LeMay, had been on Guam, hours after Tibbets had learned that the test explosion at Alamogordo had been successful. Tibbets had expected to be there for the test, to see for himself just what this new weapon was supposed to do, but there had been an urgency about his return to Tinian, a sudden change of plans that infuriated Tibbets, and made Tibbets’s own commander more nervous than either of them needed right now. Tibbets’s superior was Major General Leslie Groves, the man who had headed up the Manhattan Project since its inception in 1942, and the one man who had more authority over the mission to drop the atomic bomb than anyone but the president. It was Groves who had transmitted the coded message to Tibbets, already back on Tinian, that the bomb’s test had been an extraordinary success. Tibbets had enormous respect for Groves, especially for the man’s hard-nosed resemblance to a bulldozer. The military chiefs respected Groves as well, appreciating that Groves was a problem solver, and a man who would pursue any project, no matter how complicated, to its conclusion. Though it had not been Groves’s decision to name the pilot who would carry the atomic bomb over Japan, Groves had welcomed Tibbets immediately, quick to understand what many in the air forces already knew. Paul Tibbets was most likely the best man for the job. To the relief of both men, they had quickly forged a working relationship that rested on a firm foundation of mutual respect. Tibbets had not always agreed with the way Groves wanted things done, but even those arguments were never severe. Tibbets especially respected that if Groves saw he was wrong, he would listen to that and make corrections. Groves certainly had an ego, but he had been trained primarily as an engineer, with an engineer’s mind. If the problem required a new solution, and that solution could be explained in ways an engineer’s mind would appreciate, changes would be made. It had never hurt their relationship that Groves’s office was in Washington, while Tibbets managed the intense training of the 509th in far-distant bases. The 509th had been established in the late fall of 1944, with its first base at Wendover, Utah. Security had been astoundingly tight, with a small army of highly screened guards, both in uniform and plain clothes, who kept a tight watch over the base and the men of the 509th, a tighter watch than most of them even knew about. But Tibbets knew that a host of unexpected security problems could plague any base located on American soil. With the enormous airstrips now fully operational on the island of Tinian, in the Mariana Islands chain, a few miles from Saipan, Tibbets had pushed hard for the 509th to relocate that much closer to their eventual target. Groves had not objected. The security of a base so far removed from prying eyes was only one reason Tibbets appreciated the move. He knew what many other commanders knew, that there was one enormous advantage being in the Pacific. You were no more than a teletype message or a radio relay from your superiors, but you didn’t necessarily have to endure them looking over your shoulder.

  The exception to that was Curtis LeMay, whose headquarters on Guam kept him too close for Tibbets to avoid. LeMay had known nothing of the Manhattan Project until a few weeks before Tibbets and the 509th had arrived on Tinian in early July, and even now LeMay knew very little of the specifics of just how this bomb was supposed to work. LeMay was far more concerned that a very special mission was to take place beneath the umbrella of his command, and he most definitely wanted to be included. That inclusion carried a heavy price for Tibbets. LeMay had begun to make loud noises that any special mission from Tinian should be flown by a flight crew selected by LeMay himself. With a nagging crisis possible from LeMay’s increasing growls, Tibbets had been forced to fly to Guam himself, and had suffered through an explosion of a different kind, facing the caustic general by keeping a demeanor of calm that impressed even Tibbets himself. No matter what kind of demands or tirades LeMay might pour over him, Tibbets knew that he always had the upper hand. A single call to Groves, or better yet, to Groves’s superior, the air corps chief Hap Arnold, would immediately produce the desired order for LeMay to leave his hands completely off of Tibbets and his mission. But orders or not, that kind of antagonism would never sit well with a bulldog like LeMay, and Tibbets knew that with so much at stake, it would be unwise to make an enemy out of Curtis LeMay. Tibbets had his hands full just keeping his own men segregated from anyone else on Tinian while he monitored their training and the ongoing secrecy of their mission, no simple task. None of the other wing commanders who flew missions out of the huge airfields had any idea what the 509th was doing there, and why they were not participating in the usual bombing runs over Japanese targets. Since the 509th’s mission could not be revealed in any detail to anyone on Tinian, there was considerable hostility from the other bomber groups that these new guys were receiving some kind of cushy special treatment. And, of course, the rumors flew along with the B-29s. To many it seemed as though Colonel Paul Tibbets was being given plush special treatment for no better reason than that he had powerful friends in Washington.

  It seemed to matter little to LeMay that Tibbets had once been the most sought-after pilot in Europe, had been the primary pilot for Generals Eisenhower and Mark Clark, and had scored more than forty successful bombing missions in the workhorse B-17. LeMay had his doubts that a pilot with no experience in the Pacific had any business commanding this kind of critically important mission over a target area he had never seen. LeMay knew that Tibbets had received a very definite order th
at he was never to engage in any kind of practice run over any part of Japan. Should something go wrong, from anti-aircraft fire or mechanical failure, Tibbets’s capture by the Japanese could become a security disaster that might jeopardize the entire project. Tibbets took no insult from that. He had no interest in finding out just how much torture he could take from a sadistic Japanese officer, or whether his moral backbone could withstand the worst kind of interrogation the Japanese might inflict on him.

  Even LeMay knew that Tibbets’s orders came directly from Washington, and LeMay was sharp enough not to make enemies in places where his own career path might be decided. After the rage had passed, LeMay had reluctantly agreed that Paul Tibbets might be the right man after all, though LeMay had one request. For at least one training mission, LeMay wanted Colonel Butch Blanchard, his operations officer, to go along for the ride, just to see if these boys who had done most of their work over Utah knew anything about what it took to handle a B-29 in the Pacific.

  The voice came through the intercom from his navigator.

  “Target dead ahead, sir.”

  “I see it, Captain.”

  Tibbets leaned back, made a slight glance at Blanchard, said into his intercom, “Note the time, if you will, Colonel. Unfortunately, my navigator has miscalculated. We’re ahead of schedule by four seconds.”

  Blanchard said nothing, the message very clear. Tibbets looked to the altimeter, the plane straight and level at thirty thousand feet. He spoke into the intercom again.

  “Major Ferebee, it’s your bird.”

  The bombardier responded, “Got her, sir.”

  Tibbets pulled his hands back from the controls, scanned the skies to the front for any sign of Japanese anti-aircraft fire. The island of Rota was still in enemy hands, though no one, including the Japanese, seemed to give that much thought. The island was less than a hundred miles to the south of Tinian and for now made the perfect target for test bombing runs. Today, they carried a single five-hundred-pound bomb, and other than giving the B-29’s crew one more opportunity to test their skills, Tibbets had designed this flight to serve only one purpose: a demonstration of the prowess of the men Tibbets already knew to be the best he had ever flown with. Impressing Colonel Blanchard would be fun.