'Nazi nuke' --- Discovered

A.V.

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Historians working in Germany and the US claim to have found a 60-year-old diagram showing a Nazi nuclear bomb.
It is the only known drawing of a "nuke" made by Nazi experts and appears in a report held by a private archive.

The researchers who brought it to light say the drawing is a rough schematic and does not imply the Nazis built, or were close to building, an atomic bomb.

But a detail in the report hints some Nazi scientists may have been closer to that goal than was previously believed.


The Nazis were far away from a 'classic' atomic bomb. But they hoped to combine a 'mini-nuke' with a rocket
Rainer Karlsch
The report containing the diagram is undated, but the researchers claim the evidence points to it being produced immediately after the end of the war in Europe. It deals with the work of German nuclear scientists during the war and lacks a title page, so there is no evidence of who composed it.

One historian behind the discovery, Rainer Karlsch, caused a storm of controversy earlier this year when he claimed to have uncovered evidence that the Nazis successfully tested a primitive nuclear device in the last days of WWII. A number of historians rejected the claim.

The drawing is published in an article written for Physics World magazine by Karlsch and Mark Walker, professor of history at Union College in Schenectady, US.

'Mini-nuke'

The newly uncovered document was discovered after the publication of Karlsch's book, Hitlers Bombe (Hitler's Bomb), in which he made the nuclear test claim.

"The Nazis were far away from a 'classic' atomic bomb. But they hoped to combine a 'mini-nuke' with a rocket," Dr Karlsch told the BBC News website.

"The military believed they needed around six months more to bring the new weapon into action. But the scientists knew better how difficult it was to get the enriched uranium required."

The head of Nazi Germany's nuclear energy programme was the physicist Werner Heisenberg. Though he was highly accomplished in other areas of physics, Heisenberg failed to understand a key aspect of nuclear fission chain reactions.

Heisenberg's uncertainty

Some researchers say this led him to overestimate the amount of uranium - the so-called fissile material - required to build a nuclear bomb.


Hitler was desperate for weapons that would turn the tide of the war
However, the German report contains an estimate of slightly more than 5kg for the critical mass of a plutonium bomb. This is comparatively close to the real figure and may suggest some Nazi scientists had a better grasp of nuclear fission than Heisenberg.

Professor Paul Lawrence Rose, of Pennsylvania State University, US, and author of a 1998 book about the German uranium programme, said he had no reason to believe the report was not genuine, but was dubious about the significance of the critical mass detail.

"Though it's wonderful to find the 5kg figure written on the document, one has to be sceptical about the rationale for it. Even if it's true and [some scientists] did understand it, Heisenberg's group wouldn't have accepted it," Rose told the BBC News website.

He further speculated it was possible the author arrived at this figure by reading the Smyth Report into the development of the US atomic bomb, which was published in July 1945. But Karlsch and Walker reject this claim.

Bombshell claim

In Hitlers Bombe, Dr Karlsch suggests a team of scientists directed by the physicist Kurt Diebner, which was in competition with Heisenberg's group, tested a primitive nuclear device in Thuringia, eastern Germany, in March 1945.

Rose says that this is unlikely. Transcripts of conversations taped by MI6 when the scientists were held captive in England after the war showed Diebner lacked the knowledge to have done this, he says.

"Karlsch revealed some very important details in his book, but I can't go along with the picture he constructs with those details - of a Nazi nuclear test," said Professor Dieter Hoffmann, of the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, in Berlin.

But in their Physics World article, Karlsch and Walker point to evidence of innovations made by Diebner's team, including a nuclear reactor design superior to that produced by Heisenberg's group.

"[Diebner] got the research papers from all other groups and he could control the information flux. Only a few scientists around Diebner knew about his bomb project. Heisenberg was not aware of it," Dr Karlsch explained.


http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4598955.stm
 

lodaxstax

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wow. if this is true this does give credibility to americans and russians moving ahead on german technology and contribution from german engineers.
 

nrj

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wow. if this is true this does give credibility to americans and russians moving ahead on german technology and contribution from german engineers.
US & Soviets have literally looted German technology after entering Berlin. US even brought gang of German scientists to make new weapons.
 

Agantrope

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It is world known secret that US and USSR expedited the german scientists and made many advacned technology weapons. German V2 rocket is the base of all missiles today in the world.

If german would have possessed the nuke bomb they would have bombed the england and made them as their vassal state and the game would have changed another way around
 

nrj

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US not only stole Nuclear technology but the very basics of modern fighter designs & the German innovations to overcome the disadvantages faced by the fighters of that era. Messerschmitt Me 262 is just an example how Germans had knowledge of future fighters. Operations Lusty, Paperclip, Big are known attempts made by US to steal German technology.
 

AJSINGH

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germans are genius after all ,take this hypothetical situation , if albert einstein was indeed caught by germans and they recognised his potential then the next nuclear bomb would be with Nazi and not with America
 

ahmedsid

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The Germans were Awesome, but they were Dumb! A Rare case wherein Awesome Intelligence goes hand in hand with Dumbess. If they had got the Nukes, I shudder to think what would have happened! Us Indians would be cleansed off to make way for Pure Aryans! Hell, who knows, Hitler might have made a Super Race with Blonde Hair and Blue eyes! I shudder at the very thought! I am anyday more confident to give the nukes to Burma, but not Hitlers Germany!!!!

Thank God Hitler bit off more than he could chew, otherwise, I shudder again!
 

Phenom

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Even if the Germans had managed to get a nuke, by 1945 it was too late for them to do anything, the Luftwaffe was pretty much finished by that time, so its unlikely they would have managed to nuke London. They may have dropped one or two on allied soldiers in mainland Europe and the Americans would have flattened all German cities (atleast whats left of the German cities) in retaliation.

IMO, outcome of WWII was decided the day Hitler launched Opn Barbarossa. After that it was just a matter of how and when Germany would lose.
 

nrj

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I agree, Germans did the last mistake by attacking Soviets. But Engineering flourished in Germany, than none other. We have so much to learn from German engineering. Check this tank weighing 1500 ton !!


Landkreuzer P. 1500 Monster



Sadly it never got into production...
 

Agantrope

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I agree, Germans did the last mistake by attacking Soviets. But Engineering flourished in Germany, than none other. We have so much to learn from German engineering. Check this tank weighing 1500 ton !!


Landkreuzer P. 1500 Monster



Sadly it never got into production...
The gun is 800mm gun :) and powered by 2 8000BHP engines, this thing crush anything in it ways, but it again like a CBG.

Germans attacked the Soviet because the Nazi intel got a news that soviet may take over the Berlin in fire also Japs signed a non-aggression pact with the soviet, so they didnt attacked as expected by the Nazis.

It is still horrible and horrifc to think the nukes in the mad man's hand.
 
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