New evidence of a german nuclear weapon project?

westminster said:

Evidently, The Germans did build an atomic bomb, likely more than one. Those in the U.S. may wish to contact the National Archives for this document:

A.P.W./U (Ninth Air Force) 96/1945, 373.2 of 19 August 1945, Investigation, Research, Developments and Practical Use of the German Atomic Bomb, Pkts Nos 47 to 53, published by COMNAVEU, 1946.

Also see the book, Critical Mass by Carter Plymton Hydrick. The author shows that the Manhatten Project would not have had enough uranium for the planned drop date of the bombing of Japan, or a working fuze. It contains many supporting documents and indicates the needed uranium came from U-234 which surrendered to the U.S. There is also a reproduction of an article from the New York Times, dated August 26, 1945, which states, in part, "Besides an atomic bomb, on which, as has been made known, the Germans had made considerable progress..." I don't think I need to place any emphasis here. The source of the information was the Office of War Information, based on CIOS (Combined Intelligence Objectives Subcommittee) reports as Intelligence teams swept into Germany and German held territory.

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I have read up on this and yes the Germans did build some kind of atomic bomb device but it did not have eneogh explosive power. A nuclear bomb is considered anything over the equivelent of 500 tons of TNT. The German devices had about 475kg which would make it know more then a dirty bomb. There were several of them found in near my hometown near Stuttgart.

Okey, I am back from Bad Saarow. The structure can be found in 150 m distance to the north part of the hospital. There is no acces into it but you can easily go around. I would find it difficult to make any statements without excavation. The structure seems to be circular, as Karlsch mentioned, but that´s all. I found pretty much Baccalit, early plastics, and I´m sure that Baccalit was used in post war times. I will have to look if it was used in the mid 40´s, too. (..I doubt...) The soviet forces have stationed in the mid 80´s some nuclear middle range missiles there, that could explain the Uranium-traces, which Karlsch says to have found here.
The pictures, Adler, seems to belong to an early nuclear reactor project, maybe G IIIa or L IV. A dirty bomb of that type is pure fiction because that geometry (Uranium in plates) was used by Heisenberg for his reactor tries, only. The drawing of such a bomb was widely published in post war times (because all concentrate to the group of Heisenberg, who never intended to build a nuke). Diebner´s group focussed (in caese, Karlsch is correct) on implosion bombs. But he need Plutonium (of which probably none was produced) or enriched Uranium. With the Betatrons of v. Ardenne or the other 10 Betatrons constructed by Wideröe and Gerlach / Hachmann, he could have acces to some Kg of low enriched Uranium (debatable). To think that the US bombs was build from german nuclear material is silly. They had non need for the material, since they had Oak Ridge. Another point is the construction of the fuse, even in april 45 the construction of a working fuse for the US bomb was far away from beeing ready. Alsos was ordered to investigate the german fuse program and they inprisoned Dr. Rohnert. His informations and some infrared fuses were bought back to Washington. Other fuses were found in U-234. Dr. H. Schlicke, a fuse expert, was invited for a colloqium of navy scientists in early june 1945. His informatins proved to be valid. However, we simply don´t know if these informations contributed in any way to the fuse construction of the US bombs, because the documents are still classified. In the end I would disagree with Lunatic that a working nuclear bomb with critical mass could be build as soon as 1949. With the reactors in mind, they could build a nuke quite earlier. (v. Ardenne proved that for the soviets)

To me, the real questions are:

1) Would the device go super-critical? If not, its a dirty bomb not a real atom-bomb.

2) How much fissionable material was involved and how enriched was it? Less than about 40 kg of 80% enriched uranium implies a dirty bomb.

3) If it was a dirty bomb, did it utilize a sub-critical reaction to dispense the radioactive material, or did it simply use conventional explosives to do so? The former kind of dirty bomb is much nastier than the later (which I believe was what the Germans did have).

4) Is there any evidence of any plutonium based German bombs?

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Lunatic

I think the Germans only were able to get dirty bombs but they were working toward a real nuke as we all know.

delcyros said:

Okey, I am back from Bad Saarow. The structure can be found in 150 m distance to the north part of the hospital. There is no acces into it but you can easily go around. I would find it difficult to make any statements without excavation. The structure seems to be circular, as Karlsch mentioned, but that´s all. I found pretty much Baccalit, early plastics, and I´m sure that Baccalit was used in post war times. I will have to look if it was used in the mid 40´s, too. (..I doubt...)

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Bakelite plastic was around since the turn of the century, maybe earlier. In fact, a byproduct of bakalite plastic production which was dumped into rivers and the sea in large quantities has been linked to a form of Parkinson's disease (it's not really Parkinson's, but for a long time people were diagnosised as having Parkinsons when really it was exposure to this by-product).

Bakelite plastic was the primary resin used in Russian aircraft construction. It has nasty burning properties.

delcyros said:

The soviet forces have stationed in the mid 80´s some nuclear middle range missiles there, that could explain the Uranium-traces, which Karlsch says to have found here.

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It sure would!

delcyros said:

The pictures, Adler, seems to belong to an early nuclear reactor project, maybe G IIIa or L IV. A dirty bomb of that type is pure fiction because that geometry (Uranium in plates) was used by Heisenberg for his reactor tries, only. The drawing of such a bomb was widely published in post war times (because all concentrate to the group of Heisenberg, who never intended to build a nuke).

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This claim of Heisneburg's having never intended to build a nuke has been pretty thoroughly debunked. He made some errors in his math and thought it probably was not possible without much more uranium than was really necessary, but private letters he wrote clearly show he was doing his best to build such a weapon. This was self-serving propoganda put forth by Heisenburg after the war, nothing else.

delcyros said:

Diebner´s group focussed (in caese, Karlsch is correct) on implosion bombs. But he need Plutonium (of which probably none was produced) or enriched Uranium.

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Implosion bombs require plutonium. It would require at least 50-100 times the compressive force needed for a plutonium bomb to have even a chance of imploding uranium. It may well be much higher than this, as it could quite likely be a geometric relationship rather than a linear one w.r.t. the rate of fission of the material (since we are talking about a solid form).

delcyros said:

With the Betatrons of v. Ardenne or the other 10 Betatrons constructed by Wideröe and Gerlach / Hachmann, he could have acces to some Kg of low enriched Uranium (debatable). To think that the US bombs was build from german nuclear material is silly. They had non need for the material, since they had Oak Ridge. Another point is the construction of the fuse, even in april 45 the construction of a working fuse for the US bomb was far away from beeing ready. Alsos was ordered to investigate the german fuse program and they inprisoned Dr. Rohnert. His informations and some infrared fuses were bought back to Washington. Other fuses were found in U-234. Dr. H. Schlicke, a fuse expert, was invited for a colloqium of navy scientists in early june 1945. His informatins proved to be valid. However, we simply don´t know if these informations contributed in any way to the fuse construction of the US bombs, because the documents are still classified. In the end I would disagree with Lunatic that a working nuclear bomb with critical mass could be build as soon as 1949. With the reactors in mind, they could build a nuke quite earlier. (v. Ardenne proved that for the soviets)

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The Russian's had several advantages over the Germans in building their nuclear bomb:

1) They knew it could be done. This is a huge advantage - it allows virtually unlimited investment.

2) They had a huge war economy to turn to the task.

3) They had spies in the US who gave them key information.

As for the fuse issue, the little-boy fuse design was frozen back in June or so, before any German research was available. That design worked. The implosion fuse involves timed shaped charges, and there is no evidence I know of that any German information was used in that construction either, or even that they were working on such a fuse - it makes no sense without experiance with actual plutonium in the lab, without that experiance their was no way to know anything about the fission rate of the material. Without that knowlege, there is no sense in thinking about implosion, which is much tricker than a bullet/donut type U235 design.

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Lunatic

All interesting points. This really is an interesting discussion.

Good questions, Lunatic.

1.) Still unclear (as long as official investigations are running). The mass of the Ohrdruf bomb was undercritical. It´s construction, on the other hand, would allow a temporable critical chain reaction. (if Karlsch is correct)
2.) Unclear. The only information we have is the NKVD-spie, who informed Stalin. His report implies that U-235 and Paraffin was used. While this information can be true, it is possible that this case is untrue (the group of Schuhmann and Trinks developed dozens of plans). It remains unknown.
I personally regard 40 Kg high enriched material as unprobable.

3.) The mesurements would indicate a temporable critical chain reaction (traces of Plutonium, Kobalt 60, Cäsium 135). Sub critical?

4.) No. Only on the papers, they probably never left the drawing board.

Okay but as you are saying that bakelite plastic was found which was used in Soviet Aircraft construction and Soviet missles were stationed there, that probably is going to disprove the theory that a bomb was actually tested there.

Good post.

Yes it would require, lets say around 1.500.000-2.000.000 atmospheres pressure for a Uranium based implosion bomb. But all what is known indicates that Schuhmann and Trinks succed to a rate of 1.000.000 atmospheres with hollow charges and global shape. They were working on a elliptical shape for even higher pressures in 1944. It cannot be excluded that Diebner took this knowledge for such a bomb. However, it is unprobable.

And that I will agree also.

Well, Bad Saarow was no testing or construction site for the bomb (as seen by Karlsch). It was a possible UZ-IIIb site, a cyclotron or enrichement facility. The interesting point is that it is located at a Reichspost site. Ohnesorge, the Reichspostminister, build up that site (the russians did overtake it and some parts, as the hospital, are even in use today). There is a very close connection between Ohnesorge and v. Ardenne. V. Ardenne made construction plans for several enrichment facilities. They were very powerful, thanks to the "Ardenne-source". One was realized, as far we know. Karlsch believed that Bad Saarow was another realized site. But I don´t see a proof for that claim. It has to be excavated first. Bakelit was extensivly used in post war times by GDR, but it was invented much earlier, as shown by Lunatic. The Uranium traces can be explained by nuclear soviet missiles, too.
Back to Heisenberg. I generally agree that he and other later tries to turn public opinio in favour to him by delcaring himself beeing uninterested for a nuke. But he never miscalculated the critical mass. He misestimated the critical mass, but that is something different (the first time he calculated was in Farm Hall and he did succeed). Diebner estimated the critical mass correctly in 1940/41. Heisenberg and Diebner worked against each other. And Heisenberg had no concrete plans for a nuke, there are no sources for it. He talked with N. Bohr in 1942 with the intention that no scientist should develop the solution for a nuke (Bohr misunderstood him). However he played some dangerous game with the HWA, where he told that a nuke is possible (and he made the misestimation of the critical mass) but not realizable in this war. I think he was just given a few informations in order to continoue his work on the basics of a reactor.

All possible.

The fuses remain interesting. If Little Boy had time controlled fuses, I would denie that there is a germen influence in this matter.
Not all sources are avaiable, esspecially on the Manhatten project. There is still pretty much evidence that Alsos was more interested in german fuse experts than in germen nuclear scientists. The Schuhmann / Trinks group did succed in a solution for a fusion bomb fuse. There is also evidence, that the pressure needed for Li-6-D fusion could not provided with conventional explosives or hollow charges, so they stopped their tries in late 1944.
And yes, the soviets had it easier, since they had as soon as late 1944 at least two scientists in alamo as spies...

I dont know too much about the Soviet attempts.

Well, they had a huge huge advantage in simply knowing that it could be done.

Also, they did have spies in the US project. Documents have shown beyond any doubt the Rosen's were in fact guilty, along with several others, one of which was far more guilty but was never prosecuted.

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Lunatic

I always thought they were.

I don't suppose you saw the documentary on the Rosenbergs. It's kinda sad, it starts with the grandson trying to prove his grandparent's innocence, and ends with is acceptance they were in fact guilty.

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Lunatic

Rosenbergs tragic. The german nuclear project helped the soviets more than the US, since the soviets did not had enough Uranium to really think about atom bombs earlier that VE-day. Kurchatov gives a very important statement to this issue (compare: L. D. Rjabev, Atomnij Projektij CCCP, Vol. II (Moscow 2002), page 310f., doc.no. 353.) "...until may 1945 we had no hope to build a Uranium-graphit reactor, since we had only 7 to. Uranium (238?235?) and not the needed 100 (so probably U-238), which would become avaible in 1948..." and after they discovered the german material he said to Stalin:"..all in all we send 7 transports with 380 wagons back in the USSR, including 39 german scientists, ingeneuors and 61 members of their families. We have discovered at different german sites 250-300 tonnes of Uranium (probably Uraniumoxyd) and 7 tonnes of metallic Uranium (U-235 and U 238)..." I had made a mistake above. The spie doesn´t belong to NKVD(political spie network), he belongs to GRU (military spie network).
I have read that Claire Werner faded away last week, she was the key eyewitness of the Ohrdruf test. She stayed in the last interview by ZDF to her statements.

delcyros said:

Rosenbergs tragic. The german nuclear project helped the soviets more than the US, since the soviets did not had enough Uranium to really think about atom bombs earlier that VE-day. Kurchatov gives a very important statement to this issue (compare: L. D. Rjabev, Atomnij Projektij CCCP, Vol. II (Moscow 2002), page 310f., doc.no. 353.) "...until may 1945 we had no hope to build a Uranium-graphit reactor, since we had only 7 to. Uranium (238?235?) and not the needed 100 (so probably U-238), which would become avaible in 1948..." and after they discovered the german material he said to Stalin:"..all in all we send 7 transports with 380 wagons back in the USSR, including 39 german scientists, ingeneuors and 61 members of their families. We have discovered at different german sites 250-300 tonnes of Uranium (probably Uraniumoxyd) and 7 tonnes of metallic Uranium (U-235 and U 238)..." I had made a mistake above. The spie doesn´t belong to NKVD(political spie network), he belongs to GRU (military spie network).
I have read that Claire Werner faded away last week, she was the key eyewitness of the Ohrdruf test. She stayed in the last interview by ZDF to her statements.

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Umm, I'm sure they mean "uranium". Uranium ore contains mostly U238 with some U235. I believe some deposites are a little richer in U235 than others. Enrichment is the process of extracting the U235 from the uranium ore (ie, from the U238). 80% enriched means 80% U235, 20% U238.

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Lunatic

I would hardly refer to a dated New York Times article concerning Germany's progress in developing a bomb mythical. You fail to cite sources in your rebuttal.