r/AmericanEmpire

I recently created a 28-minute history documentary exploring 15 of the most infamous betrayals in history, from Judas Iscariot to Cold War spies. The documentary focuses on the historical background, motivations, and consequences of each betrayal using historical sources and visual storytelling.

I'm looking for honest feedback on the pacing, research quality, narration, and editing. If you have suggestions for improving future documentaries, I'd really appreciate them.

Documentary: https://youtu.be/cVZ5A6DIQPc?si=4Fnu47AS\_nRFTmG8

Disclaimer: the text below is a machine translation, so there may be errors in it.

A repeat of the old text, as required by the date..

At 8 a.m. on August 6, 1945, the air defense of Imperial Japan detected several air targets approaching Hiroshima. However, since there were very few targets — no more than three — the air raid alert was canceled.

Fifteen minutes later, thirty‑year‑old Colonel Paul Tibbets, the commander of the Boeing B‑29 bomber named after his mother, accompanied by the Great Artist and the Necessary Evil, officially ushered our planet into a new era. Into the era of nuclear weapons.

If you’ve somehow forgotten, today is the 81st anniversary of the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima. Which, of course, will be broadcast from every possible source. But since we’re talking about colonies here, let’s leave the top‑tier LOMs to throw a tantrum and remember one small country without which this news story wouldn’t have happened. About Belgium.

To understand how Belgium is connected to the destruction of the Japanese, we need to go back another 20 years and a bit further south. To God‑forsaken place, also known as the Belgian Congo — where else? In one of the local provinces, Katanga, the Shinkolobwe mine, where radium was extracted, had been operating since 1921. The business was very profitable: 1 gram of radium at its peak was worth the same as 265 kg of gold. And by 1940, almost a whole kilogram had been extracted. The money was substantial, and the business was extremely profitable, considering that Congolese workers were employed there for food and a bonus of two chickens and a goat after 9 years — if they lived that long, of course. The problem was that radium is a fragment of the radioactive fission of uranium‑238, and the latter’s half‑life is 4.5 billion years. In nature, there is an average of 1 radium atom for every 3 million uranium‑238 atoms.

Therefore, by the end of the 1930s, a certain amount of uranium ore had accumulated in the tailings of Shinkolobwe, which belonged to the “Union Minière du Haut‑Katanga”. It was a small amount. About 2,500 tons.

Much to the Japanese’s regret, half of these reserves were transported to Europe, closer to the production facilities and markets. No one knew what to do with all this splendor, so uranium began to be used as… a paint for porcelain; it was used to make glass with different colors, and it was alloyed with iron instead of the scarce tungsten.

In total, in 1940, the Nazis got hold of about 1,250 tons of uranium ore with a 60%(!) content of uranium‑238. (Just for the record, a uranium content of 2% is considered a very good indicator nowadays.) This event served as a catalyst for the intensification of the program, which eventually became known as the “Manhattan Project.” The second half of the reserves of the “Union Minière du Haut‑Katanga” was used to implement it. Today, the official results of this project’s work are 81 years old.

As for the uranium seized by the Germans, it brought not only harm but also benefit. Most of these reserves eventually ended up in the USSR and became part of our nuclear shield. By the way, initially it was planned to use this nuclear shield with Tu‑4 bombers, which were almost an exact copy of the B‑29. But that’s another story...

So, how did the Americans thank Belgium? They issued occupation coins for it! Yes, Belgium, like France, is among the countries for which occupation money was minted on both sides of the front lines during the Second World War.

The 2-franc coin was minted in the United States, in Philadelphia, with a circulation of 25 million copies. Despite the impressive print run, it's not easy to find them in decent condition for the price of ice cream. The reason is trivial - extremely poor raw materials. The economic Americans used the blanks from the 1943 cent for the Belgian colonial pennies, which was considered extremely unsuccessful and its production was discontinued. The material of both these coins was zinc-plated steel. As you can imagine, this was not planned for many years.

That's all for today.

In the attached photos:

The Allied occupation of Belgium, 2 francs 1944, KM# 133 (this particular coin is the cover of this type at the Numista)

Baby before loading.

Boeing B-29 Superfortress Enola Gay (B-29-45-MO, serial number 44-86292).

The Little Boy explosion over Hiroshima.