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The Vanished Golden Submarine’s Final Journey and Fate

Khalid Elhassan December 8, 2024 14 min

I-52 - Underwater wreckage of the Golden Submarine — Underwater wreckage of the Golden Submarine. National Geographic

7. A Japanese Dirty Bomb?

More intriguingly, the cargo for the I-52’s return trip included 1760 pounds of uranium oxide. That amount of unenriched uranium oxide would not have been enough for an atomic bomb – assuming the Japanese knew how to build one, which they did not. However, the Japanese could have used that material to create poisonous fission byproducts. Such byproducts could have then been employed in radiological weapons like “dirty bombs”, for use against the US. Fortunately for the US, and unfortunately for the I-52, the Allies were tipped off about the Japanese submarine’s mission.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.