Heisenberg and the Nazi Atomic Bomb Project, 1939-1945

A Study in German Culture

Paul Lawrence Rose

• Publisher: University of California Press
• Year: 2023
• Print ISBN:
  9780520229266
• Edition: 1
• eBook ISBN:
  9780520927162
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: European History
• Index: History

No one better represents the plight and the conduct of German intellectuals under Hitler than Werner Heisenberg, whose task it was to build an atomic bomb for Nazi Germany. The controversy surrounding Heisenberg still rages, because of the nature of his work and the regime for which it was undertaken. What precisely did Heisenberg know about the physics of the atomic bomb? How deep was his loyalty to the German government during the Third Reich? Assuming that he had been able to build a bomb, would he have been willing? These questions, the moral and the scientific, are answered by Paul Lawrence Rose with greater accuracy and breadth of documentation than any other historian has yet achieved. Digging deep into the archival record among formerly secret technical reports, Rose establishes that Heisenberg never overcame certain misconceptions about nuclear fission, and as a result the German leaders never pushed for atomic weapons. In fact, Heisenberg never had to face the moral problem of whether he should design a bomb for the Nazi regime. Only when he and his colleagues were interned in England and heard about Hiroshima did Heisenberg realize that his calculations were wrong. He began at once to construct an image of himself as a "pure" scientist who could have built a bomb but chose to work on reactor design instead. This was fiction, as Rose demonstrates: in reality, Heisenberg blindly supported and justified the cause of German victory. The question of why he did, and why he misrepresented himself afterwards, is answered through Rose's subtle analysis of German mentality and the scientists' problems of delusion and self-delusion. This fascinating study is a profound effort to understand one of the twentieth century's great enigmas.
No one better represents the plight and the conduct of German intellectuals under Hitler than Werner Heisenberg, whose task it was to build an atomic bomb for Nazi Germany. The controversy surrounding Heisenberg still rages, because of the nature of his w

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Abbreviations
• A Note on Three New Sources
• Preface: Why Heisenberg?
• A Note on Historical Terminology of the First Nuclear Age, 1939-45
• PROLOGUE The Heisenberg Problem Deception and Self-Deception
• PART I History: The Heisenberg Version and Its Critics
• CHAPTER 1 The Heisenberg Version and Its First Critic, 1945-49
• CHAPTER 2 Elaborating the Heisenberg Version, 1945-76
• CHAPTER 3 Criticizing the Version, 1948—94
• PART II Science: Conceptions and Misconceptions of Physics
• CHAPTER 4 The Atomic Bomb Problem, 1939
• CHAPTER 5 The Frisch-Peierls Solution, 1940
• CHAPTER 6 Heisenberg’s False Foundations, 1939
• CHAPTER 7 The Bomb as Reactor The Bomb Misconceived, 1940
• CHAPTER 8 The Reactor as Bomb Explosive Reactor-Bombs, 1940
• CHAPTER 9 The Reactor and the Bomb Plutonium, 1940-41
• CHAPTER 10 The Reactor-Bomb Patent and the Heisenberg/Bohr Drawing, 1941
• CHAPTER 11 The Weapons Research Office Report of 1942 Plutonium and the Reactor-Bomb
• CHAPTER 12 The Two Conferences of 1942 Loose Details, Non-decisions, and Pineapples
• CHAPTER 13 Reactor-Bombs, Plutonium Bombs, and the SS The Report of Activities of 1944
• CHAPTER 14 The Truth Farm Hall, August 1945
• PART III Culture: German Patriotism, German Morality, and the Truth of Physics
• CHAPTER 15 The German Context Unpolitical Politics
• CHAPTER 16 The Unpolitical Heisenberg Patriot and Physicist, 1918-33
• CHAPTER 17 Collusion and Compromise under Hitler, 1933-37
• CHAPTER 18 The Himmler Connection Heisenberg’s “Honor” 1937-44
• CHAPTER 19 Justifying Nazi Victory, 1941—45
• CHAPTER 20 Decency and Indecency at Farm Hall, 1945
• CHAPTER 21 Heisenberg’s Peculiar Way, 1945-48
• Select Bibliography
• Index