Three of the Most Expensive Weapons Used In WWII
via C-SPAN / YouTube
World War II was a huge conflict that stretched across many countries and involved millions of people. To win this massive fight, countries had to create lots of powerful weapons. Some of these weapons were not only super strong but also very costly to make. In this article, we’re going to talk about three of the most expensive weapons that were made during World War II. These weapons played big roles in how the war ended.
1. The Manhattan Project ($1.9 billion)
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The first on our list is The Manhattan Project, and boy, was it a big deal! Imagine a world where atomic bombs were just something people talked about in science fiction books. Then in 1938, a smart physicist told President Roosevelt a scary story: Germany could possibly make an atomic bomb. The United States didn’t want to be left behind, so they started their own secret project to make one first.
This project was named after the place it started, in New York, but the real work happened in different laboratories across the country. The most important lab was in Los Alamos, New Mexico. A man named Robert Oppenheimer was in charge there, and he worked with all sorts of experts. Over 600,000 people eventually helped with the project. Their hard work paid off on July 16th, 1945, when they tested the world’s first atomic bomb. It worked, and the explosion was huge, making a giant mushroom cloud in the sky. This bomb, and the ones used after, played a big part in ending the war.
2. The Boeing B-29 ($3.0 billion)
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The second weapon we’re talking about is the Boeing B-29 Superfortress. This was a massive airplane that could fly higher, faster, and farther than any other bomber used in the war. The United States needed a plane that could carry bombs all the way to Japan and back without being stopped by enemy planes. Boeing, an airplane company, was given the job to make this super bomber.
Building the B-29 was not easy. It had a pressurized cabin, so people inside could breathe at high altitudes, and it had four huge engines. However, these engines had a bad habit of overheating. After a prototype plane crashed, the people making it had to fix a lot of problems. But they did, and by the end of the war, they had made 2,766 of these super bombers. These planes played a key role in bombing missions over Japan, thanks to their ability to fly far and drop lots of bombs.
3. The Norden Bomb Sight ($1.5 billion)
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The last weapon on our list is not a bomb or a plane but a special tool called the Norden Bomb Sight. Imagine trying to hit a tiny spot on the ground from a plane flying high in the sky. Sounds impossible, right? Well, a man named Karl Norden thought he could make a device that would let bombers do just that. The United States spent $1.5 billion to put his invention in their bombers.
This bomb sight was supposed to be amazing, promising to drop bombs right on target. But in reality, it wasn’t as good as everyone hoped. Even with this fancy equipment, hitting the target was still tough. However, it was used a lot during the war. Over 90,000 of these bomb sights were made. In the end, when atomic bombs were dropped, they didn’t need any bomb sights because those bombs caused massive damage wherever they landed. This marked the end of the bomb sight’s importance.
