Castle Bravo: Nuclear Disaster that Inspired Godzilla

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Our historical documentary series on the history of the Cold War continues with a video on the Castle Bravo nuclear test, that led to the wide-ranging disaster, both in terms of ecological effects and human losses. In Japan, the Castle Bravo disaster inspired the idea of Godzilla.
Japanese Economic Miracle: • How Japan Became an Ec...
Japanese Culture in the Cold War period: • How American Occupatio...
Us Occupation of Japan: • Japan and the US Occup...
Kuril Islands: Pacific Hot Spot in the Cold War: • Kuril Islands: Pacific...
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#ColdWar #CastleBravo #Godzilla
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[@TheColdWarTV]

🍘 Use my code COLDWAR20 and link: bit.ly/3ea0q3B to get 20% off your first authentic Japanese snack box from Bokksu! Take advantage of this limited time offer!

[@pyeitme508]

Cool 😎

[@WT.....]

You know you guys should really make an episode on the anti-nuclear movement and how the governments of both sides tried to suppress it.

[@actually_a_circle]

I'm from Arkansas and there are still some marshallese people hear after the relocation

[@accent1666]

Since the Olympics are about to start in Japan in a few days Could you guys do a video about the Tokyo 1964 Olympics Games? Would be cool to know what it meant for post-WW2 Japan and what the US and USSR did in their Cold War rivalry in the Games?

[@fiallachm]

I can't seem to make the code work for a custom box. Is it just for subscriptions?

[@R3dH4z3]

I met 5 of the last Hiroshima survivors a few years back that came to my college to talk about their terrible experience and the horrors of the atomic bombs and its effects. I was lucky enough to be 1 of 30 students in attendance. Although everything had to be done through a translator, emotions are universal. I was crying.

[@Rugged-Mongol]

In high school, we got a chance to visit Hiroshima and the peace museum there, and it was gut-wrenching. Saw a shadow of a little tricycle and a torso left imprinted on the stairs.

[@trizvanov]

@@Rugged-Mongol A visit of the Peace Museum is something that EVERY person must do in her/hist lifetime.

[@jeremiahgabriel5709]

Not quite the same, but I was at a camp one year where they had a woman speak, a survivor of the US's use of Agent Orange speak, and that was brutal enough.

[@MrSpudz2]

Yes because we all know how the Japanese followed the Geneva and Hague conventions during WW 2.

[@cosmolineandgritsforbreakf3795]

Did they tell you about the Nanking massacre? Probably not?

[@donculotta1551]

I have always been political and I am so glad to see the Cold War broken down as comprehensively as you have done this series. You can also tell you truly respect history because you tell it with NO partiality allowing us, the viewers, to judge historical figures with impartiality l. Plus you painstakingly take the time to learn the actual pronunciation of people’s names and place names. That is TRUE respect. Much love and respect from the United States to you, our Canadian neighbor, ally, and friend✊🏼🇨🇦🇺🇸

[@matiasd5216]

I also admire how they take the time to make an effort on the best pronunciation of people's and places names.

[@fredaaron762]

The original Gojira is a classic and had a limited theatrical re-release in 2004. It is a much better film than the English language version with Raymond Burr called Godzilla. Also, not to be too critical, but the giant turtle Gamera was from Toei studios, the main rival to Tomoyuki Tanaka and Ishiro Honda at Toho.

[@whathell6t]

@Fred Aaron Gamera is not property of Toei Studios. Gamera is the property of Studio Daiei and currently in the hands of Kadokawa Studios. Toei has Super Sentai and Kamen Rider in their Tokusatsu hands.

[@fredaaron762]

@@whathell6t thanks! That was my bad.

[@cossacktwofive4974]

"The flash of the explosion was so strong that it would have been visible from the surface of Mars." All Martians would be wondering why the Earthlings have produce their own sun on their own planet.

[@jlvfr]

Or wondering if Earth is still worth invading...

[@External2737]

I'm a big proponent that nuclear weapons are why we had such a prosperous era. Suddenly mass armies could be blunted. It didn't matter who had the greatest quantity of aircraft, tanks, and equipped men. Suddenly, was it worth obliterating enemy cities and likely suffering a counter attack. Suddenly NATO wasn't worth messing with and only proxy wars could occur.

[@maxsmodels]

Ironically, nuclear weapons kept the cold war from going hot. Everybody was justifiably petrified of a nuclear war.

[@Freakingbean]

A fear I hope we keep

[@chrissnyder2091]

MAD an acronym that was true in more than one way

[@jasonkinzie8835]

You're right, but it's a terrible gamble.

[@Andrew-nb9ng]

It's funny that we prevented a war (which would probably kill all or a vast majority of humanity) by fielding weapons which would probably kill all or a vast majority of humanity. Almost as if we're protecting ourselves against ourselves

[@unr74]

I never figured out why Tokyo citizens didn’t realize Godzilla was just around the corner and were shocked to see him even after everything in the area was collapsing and on fire.

[@LukeVilent]

I still can't wrap up my mind, why Godzilla, Alien or the shark from Jaws are considered "antiheroes". All they wanted was to eat to survive.

[@SimpleNobody2420]

Maybe because they're animals, they're were acting on instinct. Although, Godzilla is more of an anti-hero than Alien and Jaws because Godzilla has more movies than the two of them combine.

[@earthwormscrawl]

I didn't think that the Xenomorph from Alien was any kind of a hero, even an antihero. Godzilla, on the other hand, I want to party with that dude!

[@WatcherMovie008]

Godzilla is an anti-hero in the sense that he is not inherently evil. The original movie may have him as the antagonist, but his drive, motive, and unwanted destruction is not premeditated or deliberate, but rather an unfortunate consequence of his primitive nature. The movie makes it clear that Godzilla is driven by nature itself, almost as if Godzilla is mother nature metaphor into a real form. Godzilla has no ill malice towards mankind, yet it was mankind that created Godzilla in the first place. It takes a weapon far worse than Godzilla to stop him, so is Godzilla really a bad guy here when we, desperate to seek self preservation, make weapons of mass destruction that go against the morality of man?

[@JohnDoe-pv2iu]

It's just like Rambo in the movie First Blood. All he wanted was something to eat...

[@nohrianscum9791]

Godzilla becomes an antihero because while he remains destructive and outside the control of humanity, his animalistic instincts drove him to fight monsters that were more dangerous to humanity than him.

[@PlainlyDifficult]

Snap!

[@SonGoku-mj5pq]

I love the south park reference

[@TheColdWarTV]

Robert Smith, Robert Smith, I like you a lot, Robert Smith!

[@rustyrazor1853]

YES! Is its coincidence that Plainly Difficult put out a video about the Daigo Fukuryū Maru and Castle Bravo today??

[@uzairahmed8309]

Great video today keep it up your doing amazing job

[@lisakeitel3957]

20000 sailors from Japan. How many from all those oceanian and asian countries without capacity to make those studies about nuclear poisoning?

[@nohrianscum9791]

Going to point to this video whenever status quo warriors in the Godzilla fandom cry that Godzilla media shouldn't be political.

[@yourstruly4817]

Anybody not wearing two million sunblock is gonna have a real bad day!! Get it?!

[@TheColdWarTV]

Thanks, Sarah Connor!

[@shaider1982]

You mean the one that can cause cancer?😂

[@richardalfaro3890]

Love that remark!

[@nobodyherepal3292]

Hey, my grandpa was at castle bravo. I think we got some of his pictures in storage somewhere

[@davidvanvranken1595]

*Me when he mentions Mecha Streisand* “BARBURA BARBURA!”

[@juanpabloperezgomez4349]

Robert Sumith Robert Sumith...

[@mr.n0ne]

Great work.👍👍. This was very informative. Thx.

[@dreplays3280]

“It’s all over but the crying…”

[@popded]

"they had been exposed to radiation doses as high as 175 rad" me: "not great, not terrible..."

[@fromthefire4176]

Hey you mentioned how the films didn’t impact the arms race. You should do a video on “The Day After” and “Threads”, the former apparently did have an impact on getting another arms control treaty signed, and they’re both practically essential viewing for anyone studying the Cold War, serving great anti-nuclear messages by the fact that they’re super dark and still regarded as probably unrealistically optimistic.

[@fromthefire4176]

Andreas Glad you really believe all that?

[@shaider1982]

18:11 Call Mothra and Gamera😂

[@toxenzz]

Amazing video, had to leave a like especially after the mentioned Mecha-Streisand

[@coffeeNTrees]

saturday morning cartoons for greyhairs! love it! Knowing is 1/2 the battle!

[@wimvanderstraeten6521]

A lot of 50's sci fi movies were clearly inspired by the paranoia of the Cold War era (e.g. Invasion of the Body Snatchers) and the fear of nuclear war and radiation (the many movies in which animals and sometimes people are exposed to radiation and turn into huge monsters). In 50's sci fi movies alien invaders are often stand-ins for the communists.

[@pankajpankaj7041]

Imagine that happened with Tsar bomba . Initially it was designed for 100 MT × 3( mistake in calculations)= 300MT , that could be polluted earth like big volcano eruption.

[@HistoryOfRevolutions]

"Many a calm river begins as a turbulent waterfall, yet none hurtles and foams all the way to the sea" -Mikhail Lermontov

[@AxelPoliti]

Excellent

[@sheldoniusRex]

Interesting timing on this video release. Plainly Difficult dropped his vid on the subject this morning too.

[@Cazz8203]

I've always been a fan of Godzilla and I love what they're doing with the legendary films....but I can't help but find it extremely morbid, that the message of the original gojira movie morphed over time into this silly monster movie franchise. Yeah they've definitely tried to tackle the seriousness of it all here and there....but nothing compares to the story they originally set out to tell at the time as a result of nuclear fall out. People have profited far too much from a horrible tragedy

[@maxwelljw8400]

Please do a video about the Soviet Anthrax outbreak that killed over a hundred people.

[@antonk.2748]

He probably will but if I remember correctly the Sverdlovsk incident was in the late 70s so still some time to cover until then...

[@naracchination5821]

Our favourite Kaiju.

[@jonathankessler7436]

One of the reason there were so many nuclear tests near the end is because he military leadership knew this method of testing would be prohibited soon.

[@Poctyk]

Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty was a decade (and around 100 tests, from USA alone) later

[@Operator8282]

MechaStreisand...

[@the1ghost764]

Impressive.

[@AdSd100]

They received 300 Roentgen. Not great, not terrible.

[@pyrodiscoflash6115]

Those Snacks are Godzilla approved, the Soviets would have their Own Godzilla fuel in the Sixties

[@grrlpurpleable]

There may be a bigger radiological disaster looming with rising sea levels, irradiated atolls and the hastily (and poorly) constructed Runit Dome, already thought to be leaching radiation due to not being lined with concrete.

[@fromthefire4176]

There’s also Fukushima, multiple lost US nukes(that we know of), lost nuclear subs, and that accident the Russians had a couple years back that they won’t talk about but appears to have released radioactive materials maybe an active reactor in the ocean. The oceans future doesn’t look good.

[@blueberrypirate3601]

Was it the crew of the Lucky Dragon who took their case to the UN for compensation in 1954 complete with horrific injuries?

[@andrewedwards2211]

Can you do a Cold War episode on the Cambodia Vietnam war, and how it divided the user and China even more, as well as brutal Khmer’s rouge and Vietnam issues

[@andrewedwards2211]

USSR

[@Baddy187]

Imagine, you go fishing with the boys and get unknowingly hit by the biggest US bomb ever deployed. You think you do science a favor and unknowingly bring back some radiated materials, and fish. Then you get accused of being a spy, are at the centre of a diplomatic dispute and get riddled with health problems. And you thought you had a bad work day or take your work home...

[@webcelt]

Why was Gojira changed to Godzilla when it was marketed outside Japan?

[@MrRenegadeshinobi]

Pronunciation probably. Non Japanese speakers tend to have a hard time pronouncing Japanese words

[@Tfaonc]

Total guess, but: Gojira just sounds like a Japanese name. Godzilla seems like God-Lizard to native English speakers. So it gets the point across a bit better. Also it was the 50s ... "something something something, foreigners" and all.

[@PhillyPhanVinny]

To be fair the crew of the "Lucky DragoN" did ignore the exclusion zone. They entered the first exclusion zone to fish there and were told repeatedly to leave the exclusion zone and chose to remain there. Which is why they were accused of spying for the communists. It was thought they were hired by a communist nation to observe what was going on in the American tests. This was during a time prior to spy satellites and the communist nations didn't have spy planes that could observe the tes t. Their submarines were not stelthy enough to observe the test without getting caught as well.

[@m2heavyindustries378]

What is your source sir? Did you just make the whole comment up?

[@PhillyPhanVinny]

@@m2heavyindustries378 So this is a old video and comment you are reply to now. But I believe the video itself that you are replying to my comment on makes these same accusations. If you just google "lucky dragon communist spies" you can find many other articles about this as well. To be clear, I am not saying they were actually communist spies. I am explaining the story from the other side. That is something that is important when looking into history to do. As many times there is more then one side to a historical story when talking about more recent history. If you only view things from one side you are very often not getting the whole picture of what was happening.

[@syaukibagusmahendra6772]

If this channel never exist i would never know there such tragedy had happened

[@jonathankessler7436]

I would never do anywhere near that work for fishing gear.

[@thomassalois3508]

Perhaps Godzilla's greatest Nemesis was Ghidorah the three-headed monster and he came from outer space Ghidorah did and I think he was controlled by some bad guy aliens

[@christopherconard2831]

I can neither confirm nor deny any association of a Mecha Streisand that is roaming my neighborhood. The huge explosion and hole in my back yard are a complete coincidence.

[@TheColdWarTV]

Robert Smith, Robert Smith, I like you a lot, Robert Smith

[@williamharvey8895]

What about Godzookie?

[@OrbitalAstronaut]

Boom!

[@whathell6t]

Godzilla The King of the Monsters The Planet Guardian The Nuclear Horror Cho Hakai-shin (God of Destruction)

[@brokenbridge6316]

Raymond Burr wasn't even in the very first Godzilla movie. He was added in to make the movie acceptable to Western audiences. Otherwise he didn't do much. My complements to all those who made this video a reality.

[@followerofjulian1652]

Gamera!

[@stevearchtoe7039]

So it’s the fishing boats fault for driving into the fallout. Huh.

[@helio6540]

3:27 can someone give me a source?

[@acemarcola]

I’m glad Japan’s antiwar now but they should tell their children what they did.

[@Kaiju-bm4ts]

Unfortunately as much as I love Japan, they won't tell their own citizens much of the war crimes they committed during ww2. They're just hoping everyone would forget about those crimes but no one (especially China) is going to forget. Even if some countries (like America) are on good terms with japan nowadays

[@GMKGoji01]

GODZILLA!🤩

[@billytrespassers3123]

...im not so sure about being able to see it from mars

[@kiuremneitor5425]

Nice

[@hemidas]

Oh no, there goes Tokyo Go go Godzilla, yeah History shows again and again How nature points out the folly of men Godzilla

[@antonk.2748]

Rinji news o moshiagemasu Rinji news o moshiagemasu Godzilla ga Ginza hoomen e mukatte imasu Daishkyu hinan shite kudasai Daishkyu hinan shite kudasai

[@michaellynes3540]

GOJIRA!!!

[@hanzup4117]

Comment for the algorithm.

[@mrsuns10]

Shrooooooooooooooonk

[@williamharvey8895]

Ya gotta love the Dad jokes

[@caseclosed9342]

Watching this while eating a tuna sandwich… I hope it’s not radioactive…

[@michaeldunne338]

Gamera approves.

[@djjohn2126]

Tsar bomba

[@GUNROCKS1990]

What if Godzilla is real life?

[@Mr.Nichan]

15:04 I notice you're showing scenes from the American version where they edited in a white American guy to be the point of view character.

[@callanhutchison1871]

GODZILLAAAAAA

[@Rexzilla10]

GODZILLAAA EPISODE LETS FUCKING GOOOOOOOOOOO

[@paulyiustravelogue]

Sorry, David... but I sort of tuning you out as soon as I saw those Godzilla clips, lol

[@phnijman]

Free shipping to the US! so what, i live in the EU

[@billhanna2148]

I can't say that I ENJOYED this show but I definitely was satisfied and enlightened with it... thank you 🙏 AGAIN for your excellent work 👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏

[@RikSandstromCalifornia]

Bill Hanna, I agree 100%

[@therearenoshortcuts9868]

Godzilla vs Coffeezilla... who would win?

[@tng2057]

In the 50s and 60s the western nuclear powers had the advantage of having overseas territories as handy nuclear testing grounds. Such privileges were soon either gone or became politically unacceptable.

[@juancana457]

A gratuitous nod to B.O.C.: History shows again and again How nature points out the folly of men Godzilla.

[@DimensionsofChange]

Dang I was hoping Cuba would be the subject today.

[@badluck5647]

Same. Especially if it puts the Cuban protests in context.

[@balaklava6420]

War, war never changes.

[@franciscovarela7127]

We're almost as good at building things as we are destroying them.

[@2bit8bytes]

You're giving us to much credit.

[@sten1939]

Pack your lead underwater

[@nerozero8266]

👍

[@jankowalski3496]

Poor Japaneese psychie...

[@WT.....]

I'm disappointed about how you mentioned the anti-nuclear message behind Gojira, but not mention how that message was eventually lost on the public due to a successful rebranding by the US Government to suppress the growing public support/awareness for the anti-nuclear (weapons) movement. The US Government did this because they knew that if the public knew the dangers of nuclear radiation and started questioning the ethics of nuclear testing, the Government wouldn't even stand a chance. If it weren't for the US's decision to put profits before people, the environment and indigenous Marshallese people would've been in a better state.

[@klardfarkus3891]

So much for those people claiming science is never wrong.

[@prashanthbharadwaj5504]

Even here science is not wrong. The ppl who did the calculations were wrong. Science was precise

[@klardfarkus3891]

@@prashanthbharadwaj5504 how do you define science? Apparently at that time this was the first science of lithium seven in a fission device.

[@ChadwickTheChad]

@@klardfarkus3891 It sucks that you don't have access to a search engine or a dictionary. You can actually look up the definition of science.

[@klardfarkus3891]

@@ChadwickTheChad I know what the definition. Most people like you do not know what it is.

[@WatcherMovie008]

Castle Bravo did not initially inspire Godzilla at first. It was the after effect of Castle Bravo, when it radiation fallout fell on top of a small Japanese fishing boat called Lucky Dragon #5. The incident caused a great controversy in Japan who was still recovering from the atomic destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The US paid Japan a lot of money as repercussion for all of the survivors (sadly, one passed away just a few days after radiation fallout in the hospital) as well as a means to keep the incident as hush and quiet as possible as the US public still were unaware of the realities of nuclear fallout and radiation poisoning. On a plane back to Japan, Tomoyuki Tanaka stared at the ocean, reminded of the incident and dream about how the radiation, the explosion, somehow woke up a monster in the depths of the ocean. When he returned to Toho, he learned that Eiji Tsuburiya, who was black listed from making films due to his propaganda films he made during the war, was trying to pitch the idea of a monster movie with a giant octopus. When Tanaka approach him and told him about what he dream about during his plane ride, Tsuburiya team up with him to make the project a reality. They then were lucky to find a director who was willing to work with their vision as they both went to meet Inoshiro Honda, a veteran of WWII in the Chinese theater (I suggest you read Honda's history about his campaign in China, it a miracle he survived to the end). When Honda was returning back to Japan from the war, he saw the devastation of Hiroshima, and was quoted saying as if a monster came and struck everything down in one blow as divine retribution against mankind. When Honda listened to both Tanaka and Tsuburiya, he agreed to direct the movie as it gave him a chance to allow everyone to see through his eyes on his belief towards nuclear destruction and the consequences of man. "Monsters are tragic beings; they are born too tall, too strong, too heavy, they are not evil by choice. That is their tragedy.” - Inoshiro Honda "My heart and mind are as they were when I was a child. Then I loved to play with toys and to read stories of magic. I still do. My wish is only to make life happier and more beautiful for those who will go and see my films of fantasy" - Eiji Tsuburiya "As long as the arrogance of mankind exists, Godzilla will survive." - Tomoyuki Tanaka

[@youngimperialistmkii]

In a world where nuclear weapons exist, every day is a test of wisdom for mankind. If we ever fail in that test. All of us living now may die in flames.

[@MrTTuguldur]

Nuclear weapon should never be used against any race and in any country.

[@mattjohnson5585]

*shudders* weeboos

[@whathell6t]

@Matt Johnson However! Weaboos are not a monolith. You have your anime weebs and then there’s Tokusatsu weebs. And you’re in Tokusatsu weebs’ turf. Seriously, the minute that the first Akira Kurosawa film was released in 1950s in the USA 🇺🇸, is when the Tokusatsu weebs are born.

[@CoolMan-ig1ol]

First

[@blackpanda7298]

Ouuu, first chileee. Barbara Barbara Barbara😂😂

[@dalekgaming3803]

Bruh us take some damn responsibility

[@TheQuotes21]

Everyone Is First ✊ Until Refresh