Talk:Klaus Fuchs

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Featured on Template:March 1 selected anniversaries (may be in HTML comment)

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Contents 1 Nationality 2 Beria or Kurchatov? 3 The Gentlemen of Venona 4 Technical Work 5 Death Penalty

[edit] Nationality

(William M. Connolley 21:27, 26 Aug 2004 (UTC)) For some odd reason, KF's nationality seems to be in dispute. It seems to me fairly clear that he is german: he was born there; and he was interned in UK during ww2 as a german citizen. The page says nothing about his being naturalised UK.

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I'm new to this and I'm not sure how to edit the page. There is a mistake in it. I corrected this and was accused of vandalism. Please advise me.
  The mistake is in the first paragraph. Fuchs was not born into a Jewish family. His father was a Lutheran clergyman.
  My source is my own book, 'Klaus Fuchs. The Man Who Stole the Atom Bomb.'

- Norman Moss

(Moved from article. -b 20:34, 24 August 2005 (UTC))

I don't understand this one. I have changed the article to state the truth that Fuchs was not Jewish. Is it antisemitism or false association of a Jewish-sounding name and the Jewish Rosenbergs that is responsible for this being asserted? (Norman Moss, by the way, is probably the foremost expert on Fuchs so it's great that he's commented.)

On his citizenship, the page states he became a British citizen in 1942. After all, he had top security clearance with the British nuclear industry. My understanding from Moss's book is that he was charged with treason - so he was British. Don't follow cobbled together Internet sources - they only regurgitate misinformation and misunderstandings.--Jack Upland 22:58, 9 September 2005 (UTC)

I'm not sure who put that in there, but it was probably just a confused error. Emil Fuchs actually is noteworthy enough in his own right to have his own article (which he does here). --Fastfission 18:47, 27 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Beria or Kurchatov?

In "Dark Sun," Richard Rhodes said it was Kurchatov, the science head of the Soviet A-bomb project, who didn't let his charges access the espionage-derived data directly because (a) it may have been disinformation and (b) if the Soviets were to do any better than copy, they had to build up their own team of experts. Beria probably didn't think that deeply; he was all about survival and taking advantage, from what I've read. --MWS 21:00, 2 September 2005 (UTC)

• Kojevnikov's book is newer and based on newly declassified sources, and I'm pretty sure he fingers Beria as responsible for this policy, but I can check. Beria wasn't a deep thinker but he knew how to run a business, so to speak, and he knew how to be suspicious. --Fastfission 22:13, 2 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] The Gentlemen of Venona

Anyone who has any awareness of the "Soviet atom spies" and the Venona transcripts knows this issue is very confused. It is also politically charged. I query whether this much assertion should be placed in an open encyclopedia like this one.

I don't have time to go into the full complexity here - and I think this needs to be the subject of genuine scholarship - suffice it to say that the official sources are not even clear on how the Venona transcripts were obtained (cipher clerk error, captured codebook, blackbag job, telecommunications intercept etc). Then there is the question of why they were only released in the 90s. After all, Kim Philby saw them in the 50s (see his book, The Secret War)!

And that's the other point: much of the official discourse on the "atom spies" centres round the Rosenbergs, overtly or not. A quite different view can be obtained by viewing the Fuchs case or the Cambridge Spies in their own terms. The Soviet sources are tainted in that they are attacked magpie-fashion in order to bolster the official American discourse on this issue.

Overall it is not the accummulation of evidence but the accummulation of assertions.

Bottom line: much of the page on Fuchs is speculation and assertion. The fact that he was a physicist in the Manhattan project spying for the USSR gets buried. The celebrated Rosenbergs never went near Los Alamos!--Jack Upland 22:47, 10 September 2005 (UTC)

I'm not sure I understand what your objection is here -- this article, though it could use more detail, basically says "Fuchs was born; he worked on the project; he testified that he gave secrets the Soviets; a major result of his testimony was the whole famous Rosenberg thing; the data he gave the Soviets may or may not have been extremely helpful." Obviously VENONA is problematic for various reasons but this article isn't really the place to go into that in full detail, and mainstream historical opinion is of the opinion that Fuchs really did do what he said he did (which you seem to agree with). The Rosenberg stuff is complex but I don't think it is asserted too strongly here one way or another, and is covered in plenty of detail on the Rosenberg article.

If you could clarify more specifically which parts of this page you think are "speculation and assertion", it would be very helpful. I think it does a good work of reflecting mainstream critical historical scholarship. --Fastfission 01:23, 10 September 2005 (UTC)

Yes, of course I accept Fuchs was a spy! But seriously, assertions and speculations include:

• Fuchs' identification of Harry Gold. As Norman Moss's Klaus Fuchs states, Fuchs only identified him after he was pressed to do so based on photos and film. Hence this is dubious, and it is clear that he did not - as is often stated - lead to Gold and hence the Rosenbergs. Gold was already a suspect at the very least. As a physicist Fuchs' spying would have been far more useful than the Rosenbergs' (who didn't even go to Los Alamos!), so implying that he's important only as a link to the Rosenbergs is perverse.
• Meeting with Donald Maclean. Just bizarre. Maybe he met Alger Hiss and Jane Fonda too.
• Venona identifying him. As outlined above, Venona is questionable. It is hard to know how much is 'inferred' after the fact.
• The detailed discussion about Soviet use of his spy work. Speculation.

Myself, I would give more indication of the tenuousness of links with other spies alleged or real. After all Fuchs gave a cogent confession which stated he worked alone (which is the most secure policy).--Jack Upland 23:13, 10 September 2005 (UTC)

Duh, correct me if I'm wrong but User:Jack Upland is the editor who claims Fuchs identified Harry Gold.[1]; really, not to be impolite, but all you've posted now in three articles is what the meaning of is "is" "is is" is. nobs 18:02, 11 September 2005 (UTC)

My only change to the page was to correct the assertion that Fuchs was Jewish. I think you're the one posting nonsense.--Jack Upland 03:21, 12 September 2005 (UTC)

This here [2] says User:Jack Upland posted this phrase: "was used to identify Harry Gold, a key witness". Now, this could (a) a mistake (b) bad faith (c) something else I don't understand. Help me out here, what is it? nobs 03:45, 12 September 2005 (UTC)

A regrettable lapse in memory, I'm afraid, compounded by my inability to understand the relevance your comment about the meaning of 'is' - I'm not an American, you see, and don't share your obsession with Clinton. As you have pointed out, in addition to correcting Jewish comment, I made two light edits. In the relevant case, the original said Fuchs 'led to' the Rosenbergs etc. I chose my words carefully and said that Fuchs was used to identify Gold. As I have stated above, I consider this to be a dubious identification but I did not unilaterally insert that into the article. I hope this clarifies the matter.--Jack Upland 10:33, 16 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Technical Work

Fuchs is presumably the K Fuchs of the Fuchs-Nordheim equation, still used today to work out the kinetics of superprompt critical excursions (similar to Bethe-Tait model I think). Anyone confirm please? Linuxlad 20:21, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

I think that reference to Fuchs high technical competence (eg with Fuchs-Nordheim equation) deserves mention in intro (where I put it), not in the middle of the rammle later on.Linuxlad 23:12, 25 September 2005 (UTC)

If there is going to be an extended introduction, it would include a variety of other things as well. I put it not in the middle but on the section related to work he did on the Manhattan Project, which is what it most specifically pertains to. Why should this one aspect be noted in the intro and not, say, the work he did on the hydrogen bomb, or the details about his East German work? I'm not trying to be difficult, but I didn't see why this was particularly more important than his other things, but I'm willing to be convinced otherwise, as I'm not a physicist. --Fastfission 23:17, 25 September 2005 (UTC)

Also, I'd be more convinced of the importance of the Fuchs-Nordheim equation if we had an article about it. ;-) --Fastfission 23:18, 25 September 2005 (UTC)

I chose the Fuchs-Nordheim equation because it's the piece of nuclear work that most often comes up under Fuchs' name on Google, (and is clearly related to bomb work!). Though I am a physicist, this isn't quite my area, but I've certainly heard of Bethe-Tait, to which F-N is broadly comparable. The point is to show that Fuchs had class, and was respected as a hard worker for the project by people like Pieirls (and Bethe) - the intro at present plunges into the espionage as if that were all he did at work - but the irony is he probably also made a significant contribution to making the bomb possible. (And his confused loyalties to the USSR were also not uncommon in European circles - I met several people after Chernobyl who believed that Soviet firemen were braver than UK ones!). Fuchs was not just a supporting act to an American tragedy...Linuxlad

Okay, I'm not fundamentally opposed to putting a note about his technical competence. My only confusion with the current version is the use of the word "ironically" -- what's ironic about it? And I'm not sure that the text of the article bears out your assertion that he significantly aided in the speed of bomb production. --Fastfission 11:32, 26 September 2005 (UTC)q

Google on 'Bethe Fuchs' 'Pieirls Fuchs' to find him described as amongst the leading atomic scientist of his generation. You will also (can't retrace easily) find remarks from Bethe on how the theoretical support for Manhattan was originally surprisingly thin. Then find a (Robert ????) article describing Fuchs in the terms I've indicated. Also read Fuchs confession - the early work he gave was his own. Why ironical? because he is not now given credit for this side of his work. Your remark that he was the most technically competent of all the spies doesn't really cut it - none of the others came anywhere near Fuchs' technical credentials.

Well, I'm happy with what it is now. I was objecting primarily to the most recent version because it specified that he had saved the Soviets a good deal of time on the bomb, which is less historically certain (it wasn't the lack of technical information that determined their timescale, a number of people have argued persuasively). --Fastfission 18:46, 27 September 2005 (UTC)

No! I was trying to say he saved the UK/USA project quite a bit of time! Hence the irony.( And Fuchs himself thought he was indispensible, certainly at Harwell, so would get let off)!

[edit] Death Penalty

Bit confused over new bit saying confessing to (he hoped) avoid the death penalty... but sources imply Fuchs was under the _opposite_ delusion, and thought he would be allowed back to work after the confession...Linuxlad 21:12, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

this page needs work, particularly in grammar.

==tuberculosis== it's misspelled in the article, or maybe it's spelled differently in England. I'll research it, and then change it if needed. Take Care! --Will314159 16:52, 15 April 2006 (UTC)