Klaus Fuchs | The 'Atomic Spy' on Oppenheimer's Manhattan Project

'Klaus Fuchs | The 'Atomic Spy' on Oppenheimer's Manhattan Project'

While Robert Oppenheimer and his team of scientists were developing the first atomic bomb in the Los Alamos desert, there was a spy among them, passing vital atomic secrets to the Soviet Union.

Mark Dunton, Contemporary Records Specialist at The National Archives, explores some of the detailed MI5 files on Klaus Fuchs that we hold in our collection. Fuchs was a brilliant physicist, who played a significant role in the Manhattan Project, but all the while passing atomic secrets to the Soviet Union. With Christopher Nolan’s new film ‘Oppenheimer’ in cinemas, we’ve taken the opportunity to tell the real story of Klaus Fuchs, the ‘atomic spy.’

To hear more about Klaus Fuchs, you can listen to our podcast about him here: https://media.nationalarchives.gov.uk...

To read the rich and detailed files for yourself, take a look at our collection: https://discovery.nationalarchives.go...

Documents used:
KV 6/134: https://discovery.nationalarchives.go...
KV 2/1258: https://discovery.nationalarchives.go...

Images:
Dr. J. Robert Oppenheimer, atomic physicist and head of the Manhattan Project, U.S. National Archives and Records Administration / Wikimedia Commons
Klaus Fuchs, atom spy / https://images.nationalarchives.gov.u...
Berlin, Karl-Liebknecht-Haus am Tag der Reichstagswahl, Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-09424-0006 / CC-BY-SA 3.0 / Wikimedia Commons
Klaus Fuchs, British internment card / https://images.nationalarchives.gov.u...
The gadget in the Trinity Test Site tower (1945), Los Alamos National Laboratory, U.S. Department of Energy / Wikimedia Commons
Klaus Fuchs security pass photo / https://images.nationalarchives.gov.u...
Fuller Lodge at Los Alamos / U.S. Department of Energy / Wikimedia Commons
Trinity Test – 100 Ton Test / U.S. Department of Energy / Wikimedia Commons
'Trinity' explosion at Los Alamos, Alamogordo, New Mexico. July 16, 1945. Photograph taken 9 seconds after the initial Trinity detonation shows the Mushroom cloud. / The Official CTBTO Photostream / Wikimedia Commons

#oppenheimer #history #ww2 #spy