One of the most controversial tests, which after some time caused heated discussions and criticism of the military, was the Operation Plumbbob series, implemented in Nevada from May to October 1957. Then, 29 charges of different power and properties were detonated. The military, among other things, studied the possibility of using warheads for intercontinental and medium-range missiles, tested the strength and effectiveness of shelters, and also studied the human response to an atomic explosion from a psychological point of view. Rather, they tried to investigate. Such tests were carried out as part of the Desert Rock VII and VIII exercises.
The operation involved thousands of soldiers, among whom there were many volunteers who were ready to go to the bunker and feel the consequences of a nuclear explosion on their own skin (albeit protected by steel, concrete and equipment). The military was interested in learning not only about the physiological changes in the body of an exposed soldier - they had some information on this topic.
The specialists wanted to understand how the soldier would behave, what was going on in his head, how perception was transformed and the psyche changed on the field of “nuclear battle”.
According to official data, 16 thousand (according to other sources - 14 and 18 thousand) of the American army and personnel took part in Plumbbob. Some of them were placed as close to the epicenter of the explosions as possible - to practice actions in a possible future atomic war. “It’s absolutely harmless,” they were assured that to some extent explains the zeal with which the victims treated the command assignment.
Almost immediately after the explosion on August 31 of the Smoky thermonuclear bomb (it was the 19th charge in the series) with a capacity of 44 kt, the soldiers were sent to "see how it was there." In protective gear from the middle of the last century and with film radiation level indicators. According to a number of organizations, more than 3 thousand people were affected by radiation at that time. It is this achievement that Smoky is still famous for, although she also had a record at that time “power per kilogram” ratio - 6 kt equivalent. By the way, the fact that the bomb is not at all harmless became widely known only in the 70s, and in the next decade it was reported that the risk of leukemia among the participants in the exercises increased almost threefold.
And even before that, in 1954, as part of the Bravo project, the Americans dropped a nuclear bomb on the Marshall Islands, as a result of which 236 local residents were deliberately exposed to radiation. One of them died, the rest fell ill with radiation sickness.
In the USSR, they could not be unaware of these tests. If only because in 1953, the Americans overdid it a bit and arranged radiation pollution in Utah, which caused a loud scandal.
The Soviet Union at that time did not yet have the means of delivering nuclear weapons capable of striking the United States. Nevertheless, in the last years of Stalin's life, preparations for such exercises began. Specialized literature was created on the conduct of hostilities in a nuclear conflict, protection from damaging factors, etc.
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By 1953, the USSR was already ready to conduct military trials. Now in one fell swoop it was possible to catch up and overtake the Americans. Those were limited to the participation of small groups of military personnel, numbering from 10 to 20 thousand people, half of whom did not participate at all in maneuvers in the affected area. The Soviet Ministry of Defense proposed to involve 45 thousand servicemen in the exercises at once.
In addition, the Soviet RDS-2 bomb had a yield of 38 kt, which was more than twice the power of the bomb dropped on Hiroshima, and about 6-8 kt more than in American tests.
Training
The final decision to conduct military exercises using nuclear weapons was made in the fall of 1953. It was originally planned to use the Kapustin Yar test site for these purposes. However, at that time it was the only Soviet ballistic missile test site, and the plan was canceled. The search for a suitable place began.
In the spring of 1954, the Totsk test site in the Orenburg region was chosen as the final target. The military evaluating the test site was based on several of its advantages. First, it was located in a relatively sparsely populated area. Secondly, the rugged terrain was of interest to researchers, since it was possible to assess its effect on damaging factors. Thirdly, the relief was closer to the European one. As already mentioned, the USSR then did not have delivery vehicles capable of reaching America, therefore Western Europe was considered as a potential target.
A few months before the start of the exercise, engineering troops arrived in the area. They had a lot of work to do. It was required to dig trenches 1.5-1.8 meters deep, build dugouts and fortifications, shelters for artillery, ammunition, fuel, etc. For tanks and armored personnel carriers, pit-type shelters were created. The whole situation had to fully correspond to the real combat.
A bombing target was created - a white square, each side of which reached 150 meters. A cross was drawn inside. The pilots were supposed to be guided by this goal. The pilots practiced daily by dropping blanks. Visual aiming was a prerequisite, without which the exercise could not take place.
Troops began to arrive at the training ground. A total of about 45 thousand people. The soldiers did not know about the real purpose of the measures. Only a day before the start of the exercises, they were informed about the use of atomic weapons, warned about the secrecy of the event and took from them a non-disclosure agreement. The exercise also involved 600 tanks, a similar number of armored personnel carriers, more than three hundred aircraft and several thousand trucks and tractors.
Part of the equipment was placed in the affected area, and another part in shelters. This not only had to simulate the situation on the battlefield, but also made it possible to assess the damaging potential of the explosion. In addition, animals were housed both in the shelter and in open areas.
Marshal Zhukov commanded the exercises. Defense ministers of the countries of the socialist camp arrived to observe the exercises.
All troops were divided into two groups: defending and attacking. After delivering an atomic strike and artillery preparation, the attackers had to break through the enemy's defense zone. Of course, at the time of the strike, the team of the defenders was taken to a safe distance. Their participation was envisaged at the second stage of the exercises - they were supposed to counterattack the captured positions. It was planned to simultaneously work out both attacking actions in the conditions of an atomic strike and defensive actions under similar circumstances.
Several settlements were located within a radius of 15 kilometers from the site of the future explosion, and their inhabitants were also supposed to become unwitting participants in the exercises. Residents of villages within a radius of eight kilometers from the explosion were evacuated. Residents of villages within a radius of 8 to 12 kilometers, at an hour of x, had to be ready to carry out the orders of the elders in the group of houses or the soldiers specially left there. By this time, they were supposed to collect things, open doors in houses, drive livestock to a predetermined place, etc. On a special command, they had to lie down on the ground and close their eyes and ears and remain in this position until the command "End". These inhabitants usually took refuge in ravines and other natural hiding places.
Residents of settlements within a radius of 12-15 kilometers did not leave them. All they had to do was move a few tens of meters away from their homes and, on command, lie down on the ground. Residents of more remote cities and villages were planned to be evacuated only if something did not go according to plan.
In addition to one real atomic explosion, two more fictitious ones were planned. Their role was played by barrels of fuel. All for the sake of greater realism of the combat situation and testing the psychological qualities of the soldiers.
The day before the events, the top military leadership arrived, as well as Nikita Khrushchev. They were located in the so-called government town, at a considerable distance from the epicenter of the explosion.
Explosion
At six in the morning on September 14, the Tu-4 bomber left the airfield. The weather was favorable, but the exercises could break down at any moment. If there was no necessary visibility for visual aiming, the operation would have been canceled. In addition, it was required to take into account the direction of the wind (all south and west winds were suitable). The “wrong” wind also put the exercise at risk. If the pilots missed, the consequences would be most serious. If the explosion were not airborne, but ground, a catastrophe would have happened. Then, all participants in the exercises were subject to immediate emergency evacuation, and the surrounding settlements would probably have to be evacuated forever.
However, everything went well. At 9:34 am the bomb was dropped and less than a minute later exploded at an altitude of 350 meters. 10 minutes before that, the soldiers took their places in the shelter. They were forbidden to look at the explosion. The officers were given special glass filters so as not to damage the eyes. The tankers took refuge in the equipment, battening down the hatches.
Colonel Arkhipov was one of the few who saw the moment of the explosion with his own eyes and described it in his memoirs: “Out of fright, I dropped the films from my hands and instantly turned my head to the side. The air around him seemed to glow with a blue light. The flash instantly turned into a fireball with a diameter of about 500 meters, the glow of which lasted for several seconds. It rose quickly upward like a balloon. The fireball turned into a swirling radioactive cloud, in which crimson flames were visible. The command came to lie on the ground, as the shock wave was approaching. Her approach could be seen from the fast "running" of the swaying grass. The arrival of a shock wave can be compared to a very sharp thunderbolt. After the impact, a storm of hurricane wind flew in."
Immediately after the passage of the shock wave, the gunners left the shelters and began artillery preparation. Then the aircraft struck at targets. Immediately after that, radiation reconnaissance went to the epicenter of the explosion. The scouts were in tanks, so the effect of radiation was reduced several times due to the armor. They measured the background radiation on the way to the epicenter of the explosion, setting special flags. Within a radius of 300 meters from the epicenter of the explosion, almost an hour after it, the background radiation was 25 r / h. Servicemen were prohibited from entering these borders. The area was guarded by chemical protection units.
Combat units followed the reconnaissance. The soldiers rode on armored personnel carriers. As soon as the units appeared in the area of radiation contamination, everyone was ordered to put on gas masks and special capes.
Almost all the equipment located within a radius of one and a half to two kilometers from the epicenter of the explosion was very badly damaged or destroyed by the shock wave. Further damage was less significant. In the villages closest to the explosion, many houses were badly damaged.
As mentioned, troops were forbidden to enter the epicenter of the explosion, where the radiation level was still high. Having completed their training tasks, by 16:00 the troops left the range.
Radiation victims
Totsk military exercises were classified for three decades. They became known only at the end of perestroika, already against the background of the recent Chernobyl disaster. This led to a huge number of myths that accompanied this topic. Chernobyl gave rise to strong anti-nuclear sentiments, and against this background, the news of such exercises became shocking. It was rumored that death row inmates were at the epicenter of the explosion, and all participants in the exercise died of cancer within months of its completion.
Even then, two points of view were separated from each other on the consequences of atomic exercises, which still persist. The first says that the exercises were conducted in an exemplary manner, with maximum attention to the safety of the participants, as well as the civilian population from the surrounding villages. No one received not only large, but even significant doses of radiation, and only one person became a victim of the exercises - an officer who died of a heart attack.
Their opponents believe that the exercises caused terrible harm to both the soldiers and the civilian population, not only of the surrounding villages, but of the entire Orenburg region.
The explosion at the Totsk test site was airborne. Air explosions differ from ground-based nuclear explosions in two ways. They have a much greater destructive power due to the shock wave, but at the same time they practically do not leave long-term radiation pollution. Ground explosions, on the other hand, are much less destructive, but they can permanently poison the surroundings, making them uninhabitable.
The main problem in assessing the consequences remains that no serious research has been carried out. In theory, the authorities should have carefully monitored the possible consequences for all participants in the exercises and the civilian population. And to do this for decades. Only then could the specific negative effects of the explosion be assessed with confidence.
However, nothing of the kind was done in the USSR. The main purpose of the exercises was to practice combat operations in a nuclear war, as well as psychological training of troops for such a conflict. For decades, no one was going to monitor the effects of radiation on the body of soldiers.
Even during perestroika, the surviving participants in the exercises tried to get compensation. They stated that out of 45 thousand by the time of the collapse of the USSR, no more than three thousand were alive, and even those were mostly seriously ill. Their opponents argued that in the area adjacent to the epicenter of the explosion, there were no more than three thousand servicemen, and for the rest, the radiation doses were not greater than during fluorography. In addition, the presence of diseases that have appeared in them for more than 30 years cannot be unambiguously associated with exposure to radiation.
Various studies in the Orenburg region also added fuel to the fire, which often, according to the researchers themselves, "raised more questions than answers." The level of cancer in the Orenburg region is higher than the national average, but recently the region has not been included in the top ten regional leaders. It is overtaken by regions where there have never been any atomic explosions or production.
In 1996, a full study of the dose rates received by the participants in the exercises was published in the bulletin of the national radiation and epidemiological register "Radiation and Life". The authors relied on the documents of the Ministry of Defense that were declassified by that time. Taking into account the measurements of radiation pollution, the routes of military units, as well as the time they spent in the contaminated area, the radiation doses received by them were estimated.
The authors came to the study that most of the soldiers participating in the exercises received external doses of no more than two rem. This is an insignificant level that does not exceed the permissible for the personnel of nuclear power plants. As for radiation reconnaissance, it received significantly higher doses. Potential exposure could range from 25 to 110 rem, depending on the routes. Signs of acute radiation sickness begin to be observed in a person who has received more than 100 rem. In smaller doses, a single exposure, as a rule, does not cause serious consequences. Thus, some of the scouts could receive very significant doses. However, the researchers make a reservation that we are talking about approximate calculations, and for more accurate it is necessary to conduct larger studies.
Unfortunately, after the successful conduct of the exercises, the Soviet leadership did not show significant interest in the subsequent fate of potential victims. No research has been done for nearly 40 years. Therefore, it is practically impossible to assess unambiguously the consequences of the Totsk explosion.
Meanwhile, it turns out that the French authorities also deliberately exposed their soldiers to radiation - during the first atomic bomb tests conducted in the Sahara Desert in the early 1960s. This is confirmed by a document provided to the Air Force by researchers at the Arms Observatory in Lyon.
France carried out its first nuclear explosion on February 13, 1960 at the Reggan test site in Algeria. And already the fourth nuclear test, which took place on April 25, 1961, was carried out specifically to study the impact of nuclear weapons on humans. The recruits were sent to the training ground - essentially as guinea pigs.
The infantrymen were ordered 45 minutes after the explosion to approach a distance of several hundred meters to its epicenter and dig in there for 45 minutes. They wore only the standard desert field uniforms.
"The authorities knew they were in danger when they sent them on these maneuvers, and at the very least they should have taken steps to protect their health," Arms Observatory officer Patrice Bouveret told the Air Force.
The French government has long argued that it had nothing to do with it, but in 2009 agreed to a law on compensation for veterans.