Shortly before supper on the sixth of August, Major T. H. Rittner, the British officer-in-charge at Farm Hall, where the German scientists were quartered, informed Otto Hahn that an announcement had just been made by the BBC that an atomic bomb had been dropped on Japan. Hahn was completely shattered by this news and said that he felt personally responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people, since it was his original discovery that had made the bomb possible. He went on to tell Rittner that he had contemplated suicide when he first saw the full potentialities of his discovery, and now that these had been realized, he felt that he personally was to blame. After bracing himself with alcoholic stimulants he became calmer, and went down to supper, where the news was announced to the assembled guests.
It was greeted with incredulity. The discussion revolved excitedly about how the United States must have produced Element 93.
HAHN: An extremely complicated business; for “93” they must have a machine which will run for a long time. If the Americans have an uranium bomb then you’re all second-raters. Poor old Heisenberg.
HEISENBERG: Did they use the word uranium in connection with this atomic bomb?
HAHN: No.
HEISENBERG: Then it’s got nothing to do with atoms, but the equivalent of 20,000 tons of high explosive is terrific. ... All I can suggest, is that some dilettante in America knows it has the equivalent of 20,000 tons of high explosive and in reality, it doesn’t work at all.
HAHN: At any rate Heisenberg, you’re just second-raters, and you may as well pack up.
HEISENBERG: I quite agree. . . . I am willing to believe that it is a high pressure bomb and I don’t believe that it has anything to do with uranium, but that it is a chemical thing where they have enormously increased the whole explosion.1
I took pleasure in Dr. Hahn’s statement: “If they have really got it, they have been very clever in keeping it secret.” Soon there crept into the discussion the question of morality, which has been so violently debated in all scientific circles ever since. The words of the German scientists speak for themselves on this subject:
WIRTZ: I’m glad we didn’t have it.
WEIZSäXCKER: I think it’s dreadful of the Americans to have done it. I think it is madness on their part.
Heisenberg: One can’t say that. One could equally well say, “That’s the quickest way of ending the war.”
Hahn: That’s what consoles me.
There followed long and intensive discussions on how we could have built the bomb. In the light of later claims to the contrary, Heisenberg’s remarks at this point were most significant: “There are so many possibilities, but there are none that we know. That’s certain.”
All of them agreed that they could have succeeded had they been able to make the necessary effort. They finally broke up on a note of wishful thinking and solace:
HAHN: Well, I think we’ll bet on Heisenberg’s suggestion that it is a bluff.
Heisenberg: There is a great difference between discoveries and inventions. With discoveries one can always be skeptical and many surprises can take place. In the case of inventions, surprise can really only occur for people who had not had anything to do with it. It’s a bit odd after we have been working on it for five years.
At nine o’clock the guests were assembled to hear the official radio announcement. They were completely stunned to learn that the news was, in fact, true. Immediately, intensive discussions began on the magnitude of the American effort. My first impressions of Goudsmit’s shrewdness as an interrogator were confirmed by Bagge’s remark: “Goudsmit led us up the garden path.”
The Germans seemed most impressed that we were able to accomplish the vast amount of work that they realized we must have done, and that they had been unable even to begin under the Third Reich.
KORSHING: That shows at any rate that the Americans are capable of real co-operation on a tremendous scale. That would have been impossible in Germany. Each one said that the other was unimportant. . . . Heisenberg: One can say that the first time large funds were available in Germany was in the spring of 1942, after that meeting with Rust, when we convinced him that we had absolutely definite proof that it could be done.
Heisenberg lamented his inability to devote an effort to the German nuclear project that was commensurate with the effort made on the V-l and V-2 missiles. However, in the final analysis he seemed to realize that this was in large part the fault of his own group.
HEISENBERG: We wouldn’t have had the moral courage to recommend to the government in the spring of 1942, that they should employ 120,000 just for building the thing up.
Then up cropped the apology that the reason the Germans had not succeeded was because they had not really wanted to succeed.
WEIZSÄXCKER: I believe the reason we didn’t do it was because all the physicists didn’t want to do it, on principles. If we had all wanted Germany to win the war we could have succeeded. Hahn: I don’t believe that, but I am thankful we didn’t succeed.
In the course of the evening Gerlach said that the Nazi party seemed to think that they were working on a bomb. The party people in Munich were going around from house to house on April 27 or 28, 1945, telling everyone that the atomic bomb would be used the following day. But the most surprising statement came from Heisenberg. He wondered how we were able to separate the two tons of U-235 needed for a bomb. This confirmed Goudsmit’s belief, founded on his interrogations, that the Germans had not thought of using the bomb designs we used. Ours took advantage of fast neutrons; the Germans thought that they had to moderate them as in a pile. In effect, they thought that they would have to drop a whole reactor, and to achieve a reasonable weight they would need this enormous amount of U-235.
More discussion followed and finally the group broke up for the night. However, conversation by pairs continued far into the early hours of the morning. In the course of these exchanges it became apparent that Gerlach was the only one who was completely grief-stricken about their lack of success. The others seemed glad to claim that their goal had been atomic power rather than a bomb. A prophetic remark on the international implications of the bomb came from Weizsäxcker.
WEIZSÄXCKER (to Wirtz): Stalin certainly has not got it. If the Americans and the British were good imperialists they would attack Stalin with the thing tomorrow, but they won’t do that. They will use it as a political weapon. Of course, that is good, but the result will be a peace which will last until the Russians have it, and then there is bound to be war.
A feeling swept over the group that perhaps now they would be allowed to go home; then a reaction to the apology advanced by Weizsäxcker began to grow:
BAGGE : I think it is absurd for Weizsäxcker to say he did not want the thing to succeed. That may be so in his case, but not for all of us.
The next morning our guests read their newspapers avidly, and devoted themselves throughout the remainder of the day to drawing up a memorandum to clarify the press reports on their progress in atomic development. In its final form, this memorandum read:
As the press reports during the last few days contain partly incorrect statements regarding the alleged work carried out in Germany on the atomic bomb, we would like to set out briefly the development of the work on the uranium problem.
Throughout the remainder of the period during which they were in our custody, the professors continued to speculate about how we had succeeded in producing the bomb. Heisenberg and others of his colleagues periodically gave scientific lectures. V-J Day led to expressions of considerable relief and intensified their feeling that they would soon be going home.
We were now in a dilemma about what to do with these men. We did not want them to come to America or to remain in England for they would inevitably learn a great deal about our work and would not for sometime make any contribution in return. We did not want them to come under Soviet control, as with their background they would be of great value to the Russians. The only satisfactory solution was to return them to West Germany and make certain that conditions for them there would be such that they could not be tempted by Russian offers. This would take time to arrange.
At about this time they began to have a few visitors. Sir Charles Darwin was the first and he was soon followed by Professor P. M. S. Blackett. Blackett came ostensibly to discuss a revival of science in postwar Germany, but, in the course of their conversation, he proposed announcing all the details of our work. Heisenberg replied promptly and emphatically that this should not be done, because the Russians would never co-operate in any attempt at international control.
I had made arrangements for one of my lieutenants to deliver letters from the scientists to their families in Germany and pick up the replies. This did a great deal to improve their morale. It was interesting to note throughout this period that the professors considered themselves still to be Herrenvolk and continued to feel that uranium was a German monopoly. They were most indignant that the wife of one of them, who lived then in the French zone, was cooking for French soldiers. However, gnawing away at them all the time, consciously and subconsciously, was the distress of knowing that others had succeeded where they had failed.
HEISENBERG: Well, how have they actually done it? I find it is a disgrace if we, the professors who have worked on it, cannot at least work out how they did it.
After Blackett’s visit the professors, particularly von Weizsäxcker, became interested in the impact of atomic energy upon diplomacy.
Weizsäxcker: There is a certain trend in the world which is now beginning to appear; let us call it “internationalism.” There are quite a number of people, especially in England and America, who think that way and I don’t know at all whether they’re doing their countries any good. But, they are the people to whom it is best for us to attach ourselves, and we’ll have to support that. Those people who don’t want to keep any secrets about the atomic bomb are the people who are useful to us.
On October 2, Heisenberg, Hahn and von Laue met with a number of British scientists at the Royal Institution in London, to discuss their return to Germany. It was made clear to them at that time that we wanted the German atomic scientists to live in either the American or British zones of occupation. The professors replied that this might present problems, since they would have to have laboratory facilities available if they were to perform any useful work and that the institutes existing in the United States and British zones were limited and inadequate.
In the meantime, we had been having trouble with Marshal Montgomery, who flatly refused to accept any of the scientists in the British zone under the condition that we specified—protective custody without confinement. Montgomery stated most emphatically and quite understandably, I might add, that anyone who was to be placed under his custody for safekeeping must be confined and kept under close surveillance. Negotiations on this point dragged on and the professors became apathetic. They discussed the possibility of withdrawing their parole, but eventually they became overwhelmed by their frustration.
HEISENBERG: I just think that talks with the Captain are somehow futile. He listens to us, and then passes it on to the Commander, already with certain reservations. Then they have a talk about it, air their feelings a bit as to how unpleasant the whole thing is, and with that things have really come to an end as already the Commander does not pass this on to a higher authority any more. Perhaps if we are very lucky the Commander tells the competent Colonel or General who is sitting here in London. It is impossible that it will ever reach America where a decision will be made.
It may not be too late yet for Dr. Heisenberg to derive a little solace from knowing that his words to the Captain always reached me in Washington promptly, and that I took action to secure his immediate release as soon as we had accomplished our purpose with him.
A brief furor was stirred up on November 16, when the scientists read in the newspaper of the award of the Nobel Prize to Dr. Hahn. A considerable amount of tension arose when this announcement was not immediately confirmed. When the invitation finally did arrive from Stockholm, Hahn was required to reply that he accepted the prize, but would be unable, for the present, to receive the award in person.
On the twenty-second of December, the scientists were finally notified that they were about to return to Germany. By this time we had been able to adjust matters so that reasonably suitable laboratory facilities were available for their use in the American and British zones. It is noteworthy that not a single one of these men left for the East despite the quite attractive offers they must have received from the Soviet Union. Just before they left, I was most amused to read a report from Captain Brodie, who was Major Rittner’s assistant at Farm Hall, entitled “Wirtz Hauls Down His Colours, or He Who Fights and Runs Away, Lives to Fight Another Day.” The Captain reported that on the day of their departure, the professors decided that, all things considered, their treatment had not been so bad after all, and that perhaps now would be a good time to mend their political fences.
WIRTZ: There is a lot to be said for the Commander after all, no matter how much we may have cursed him. In any event, it may be wise to be in his good books. We never know when we may have another use for him.
1 All reported conversations were translated from the spoken German.