The German Atomic Bomb Project

1
The German Atomic Bomb Project
2
A Timeline

• January 1993 Hitler came to power
• December 1938 Hahn, Meitner, and Strassmann
  discovered fission
• September 1939 WWII started and German military
  started uranium project with subsequent active
  participation by Heisenberg and other physicists
• 1941 German physicists discussed plutonium bomb,
  speculated critical mass (10-100kg) Heisenberg
  visited Bohr in Copenhagen
• 1945 War in Europe ended without Germans
  succeeding in building a bomb

3
Key Debates

• Why did the Germans fail to make the bomb?
• Did Heisenberg and his colleagues deliberately
  sabotage the German bomb project?
• What was Heisenberg trying to tell Bohr in their
  meeting in Sept. 1941?

4
Michael Frayns Copenhagen

• Key point both historical and epistemological
• What did happen in Copenhagen?
• Can we ever know what actually happened?
• Release of Bohr letters http//www.nba.nbi.dk/rel
  ease.html

5
Most Recent Developments

• Farm Hall Transcript of conversations of
  Heisenberg and other German physicists upon
  hearing the news of Hiroshima
• http//germanhistorydocs.ghi-dc.org/sub_document.c
  fm?document_id2320
• Claim of Germans testing a crude nuclear device
  during WWII
• http//germanhistorydocs.ghi-dc.org/sub_document.c
  fm?document_id2320