As a failed German nuclear project

[DARPA]

Nazi nuclear project team wanted to invent the atomic bomb, and it can help to control Hitler. But they did not work: the participants did not have enough experience in experimental physics. Associate Professor, Faculty of Philosophy School of Economics and a columnist for "Novaya Gazeta" Kirill Martynov tells the story of German scientists and their reactions to the atomic bombings of Hiroshima by the Americans.
At the end of the war the majority of German physicists who worked on the atomic project (Uranprojekt) Nazis, was taken prisoner by the Americans. American and British intelligence specifically hunting for these scholars, among whom was Werner Heisenberg, Otto Hahn, Carl Weizsäcker and others. The task of the Americans was that access to knowledge about Uransache not received Russian and French. Monopoly on the bomb was supposed to stay in the Anglo-Saxons, especially since they already had by this time working nuclear technology. The irony of the moment was that Heisenberg and the company had no idea how far advanced the Americans as part of the Manhattan Project. They saw themselves as bearers of unique knowledge, representatives of the front line, the best in the world of German science (in fact, if it were not for Hitler, language knowledge in the XX century could well remain German). In their eyes, they are not equal. The Germans considered themselves accordingly incredibly valuable asset for the Americans and prepared for long negotiations on the terms of cooperation. Many at that time found a pacifist, and more or less it was clear what would happen to the world, where only one country has the most advanced weapons in the history of mankind.

Ten German physicists were arrested as part of Operation "Epsilon" in the May-June 1945, and after a brief, almost a tourist trip to Europe, including a visit to Reims Cathedral, were taken to the Hall Farm, located in England, near Cambridge. Here they were pastoral life in the house, stuffed with listening devices. August 6 radio reported about the bombing of Hiroshima. German first reaction was disbelief and even irony. Americans could not build an atomic bomb without their help, if it was not capable of German science itself, it means that it was impossible in principle. Heisenberg first decided that the Americans blew up a very heavy conventional bomb, which they called the nuclear propaganda purposes. After a new, more detailed reports on the radio physics began to rebound. As developers of the most dangerous weapons and the key technology of the XX century, the nuclear reactor, they were mediocre. Moreover, they have nothing to offer to the Americans, and so there is nothing to bargain with them. Night came physicists recriminations, ressentiment, regret that things could have been different attempts of self-justification, nervous breakdowns.

Physics, apparently, in the first place experienced its incompetence, not the victims of Hiroshima.


In 1993, transcripts of conversations Physicists at Farm Hall were published. Documents show how far are willing to go the smart people in an attempt to come up with a convenient explanation. Weizsäcker, the youngest member of the team, former assistant Heisenberg argued that the Germans really never wanted to make a bomb, but only the reactor (Machine), and that physics deliberately sabotaged the work on the weapon. Already in the 90th octogenarian Weizsäcker recognized that perhaps it was a lie. At thirty, he thought that the appearance in the hands of scientists such a powerful argument as a bomb would make Hitler listen to their opinions and change the course of the war. Weizsäcker dreamed of a peace conference with the French in Aachen, the ancient capital of Charlemagne. Needless to say that this cocktail of theoretical physics, military technology and social theory turned out to be intractable and simply delusional. Until the Germans nobody faced with the problem of this kind.

Baron Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker came from an influential German family and was an assistant professor of philosophy. In twenty years, he could not decide whether to learn on the physics and philosopher, and eventually decided to go both ways. At the beginning of the war, he taught at the "Reyhsuniversitete Strasbourg" - extremely noteworthy exhibition University of Nazi Germany, opened in 1941 in Alsace. There Weizsäcker worked under the direction of Dean Ernst Anriha, the famous historian and national-socialist. On a nearby medical faculty was assembled the largest collection in the field rasologii - remains preserved in alcohol, indicating degenartivnoy nature of the Jewish race. He is familiar with all the key thinkers of his generation, and speaking about his collaboration with Hitler and even attempts to influence it, of course, says Heidegger. In 1939, Weizsäcker, realizing the possibility of military use chain reaction, ie, invented the idea of ​​a bomb, causing hasty night visit to his friend the philosopher George fir. Together they formulate conclusions from this discovery, made in the spirit of the positivist tradition of analytical clarity:

1) If atomic bombs are possible, then someone will make them.

2) If the bombs are made, then there is someone who will use them.

3) If this is the case, then there is a choice before mankind: or it refuses to institute war or destroy itself.

Weizsäcker, which the Americans considered the head of the Nazi nuclear project, and that actually was not, yet can easily claim to be the most dangerous assistant professor of philosophy in history. Interestingly, on the other hand, the excessive detachment of all the leaders of the project led to the bomb as a result has not been created, and the Germans were very far from solving this problem by 1945. Team Heisenberg and Ghana was the most brilliant theorists, who had little experience in experimental physics, industrial technology and administrative struggle for resources. Suffice it to say that the German nuclear project was in charge of the Ministry of Education.

Philosophers of his carelessness saved the world from Nazi nuclear bomb. Recall that Geynezberg also interested in philosophical questions. All thanks to the respectability of our craft in Germany XX century.