Jun 19, 2023 00:00:00

What is the 'Epsilon Operation' that the Allied Forces did to Nazi German scientists during World War II?

Since the German physicist

Otto Hahn discovered the nuclear fission reaction in 1938, the Axis countries such as Nazi Germany and the Allied countries such as the United States and the United Kingdom have competed in the development of atomic bombs. The Allied side is conducting ' Operation Epsilon ' to investigate how far the development and production of atomic bombs by Nazi Germany are progressing.

Transcript of Surreptitiously Taped Conversations among German Nuclear Physicists at Farm Hall
(PDF file) https://germanhistorydocs.ghi-dc.org/pdf/eng/English101.pdf

Operation Epsilon - Wikipedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Epsilon

When Mr. Hahn discovered the fission reaction in late 1938, the Allies decided that the development of the atomic bomb by the Axis powers, including Nazi Germany, had a head start. With a sense of crisis, the Allies mobilized scientists and engineers from the United States, Great Britain, and Canada to carry out the '

Manhattan Project .'

Nazi Germany was then attacked by Allied forces and signed the Instrument of Surrender in May 1945. A survey of individuals, documents and materials related to the atomic bomb program up to the surrender of Nazi Germany revealed that there were no atomic bombs under construction in Nazi Germany. However, some of the Allies, including the United States, were skeptical about Nazi Germany's lack of atomic bombs.

Therefore, the Allied Forces began with Mr. Hahn, who was thought to have worked on the atomic bomb plan in Nazi Germany from July 3, 1945, and a total of 10 German scientists, including Mr. Erich Budge and Mr. Kurt Diebner. were placed in a facility called 'Farmfall' in Godmanchester, England. A wiretap device was installed in the containment facility, and a survey was conducted aimed at eavesdropping on conversations between scientists to determine how close Nazi Germany was to building an atomic bomb.

Eavesdropping on private conversations between scientists was thought to be easier and more accurate than extracting information by force through interrogation.

Of all recorded scientist conversations, only about 10% containing technical and political information about the atomic bomb were recorded and translated, followed by 24 reports of over 250 pages to the British government and US consulates. Sent. When scientists were informed of

the atomic bombing of Hiroshima , they were recorded in shock, and some were skeptical about the truth of the report. rice field. Also, in the report, there was no mention of ' uranium ' or ' nuclear fission reaction ', and only the information that an atomic bomb had been dropped on the city of Hiroshima was conveyed to the scientists.

When the information of the atomic bombing by the US military was conveyed, scientists exchanged arguments such as 'how the atomic bomb was manufactured by the United States' and 'why did Germany not manufacture the atomic bomb?' Physicists such as Werner Heisenberg cited ``the amount of enriched uranium required to manufacture the atomic bomb was less than expected'' as the reason. The resulting Allied investigation revealed that the German project to build an atomic bomb was at best in the early theoretical stages of thinking about how an atomic bomb would work.

Some of the interned scientists were happy that they had not managed to build an atomic bomb for Nazi Germany, while Kurt Diebner and Walter Gerlach were members of the National Socialist German Workers' Party. It is recorded that he showed sympathy for the defeat. While Mr. Hahn was pleased that Nazi Germany did not succeed in manufacturing an atomic bomb, he said, ``The fact that the United States was the first to manufacture and develop an atomic bomb shows that you are second-rate scientists. It shows,' and cursed the scientists involved in the German atomic bomb project.

The scientists were released on January 3, 1946, but the recordings and transcriptions of the recordings were kept secret for a long time. Declassified recordings of Farmfall conversations in 1992 have contributed to the production of various storytelling and documentary programs.