153-604: The Gouzenko Affair was the name given to events in Canada surrounding the defection of Igor Gouzenko , a GRU cipher clerk stationed at the Soviet Embassy in Ottawa , from the Soviet Union in 1945 and his allegations regarding the existence of a Soviet spy ring of Canadian communists . Gouzenko's defection and revelations are considered by historians to have marked the beginning of
306-550: A German atomic bomb project would develop one first, especially among scientists who were refugees from Nazi Germany and other fascist countries. In August 1939, Hungarian-born physicists Leo Szilard and Eugene Wigner drafted the Einstein–Szilard letter , which warned of the potential development of "extremely powerful bombs of a new type". It urged the United States to acquire stockpiles of uranium ore and accelerate
459-733: A neutron moderator . The S-1 Committee recommended pursuing all five technologies. This was approved by Bush, Conant, and Brigadier General Wilhelm D. Styer , who had been designated the Army's representative on nuclear matters. Bush and Conant then took the recommendation to the Top Policy Group with a budget proposal for $ 54 million for construction by the United States Army Corps of Engineers , $ 31 million for research and development by OSRD and $ 5 million for contingencies in fiscal year 1943. They sent it on 17 June 1942, to
612-649: A "terrible thing" had happened. They told him that someone from the Soviet Embassy had evidence of a Soviet-run spy network in Canada and the United States. However, King was hesitant to risk a diplomatic incident, particularly given that the first session of the Council of Foreign Ministers was scheduled to begin in London on September 11 and a scandal could upset negotiations. King was also suspicious of Gouzenko's motives and told Robertson and Wrong that he would not get involved in
765-607: A AAA rating whenever it was required. Nelson initially balked but quickly caved in when Groves threatened to go to the President. Groves promised not to use the AAA rating unless it was necessary. It soon transpired that for the routine requirements of the project the AAA rating was too high but the AA-3 rating was too low. After a long campaign, Groves finally received AA-1 authority on 1 July 1944. According to Groves, "In Washington you became aware of
918-647: A GRU official who had been tasked with inspecting the Soviet diplomatic missions in North America in the summer of 1944, had grown uncomfortable with Gouzenko's capacity to compromise Soviet espionage activities. In addition to routinely handling secret messages between Moscow and the Embassy, Gouzenko had an unusual degree of access to classified documents, including access to a safe in one of the cipher rooms. Furthermore, Gouzenko's separate living arrangements meant he lived outside
1071-577: A Russian immigrant in Montreal named Nina Farmer. As an expatriate, she would have been considered a traitor and, had Soviet authorities discovered the affair, Zabotin most likely would have been recalled. Zabotin largely delegated management of the individual operatives to his subordinates: Colonel Motinov, Colonel Vasili Rogov, and Sokolov. The GRU was not the only Soviet intelligence agency operating in Ottawa. The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs ( NKVD ),
1224-544: A barbed-wire barrier, which would become the Berlin Wall separating East and West Berlin , was erected by East Germany. Although international movement was, for the most part, strictly controlled, there was a steady loss through escapees who were able to use ingenious methods to evade frontier security. Numerous notable Eastern Bloc citizens defected to non-Eastern Bloc countries. The following list of Eastern Bloc defectors contains notable defectors from East Germany,
1377-613: A comfortable apartment of our own. In Moscow a place that size would have been shared by four or five families." According to his memoir, although he had been carefully screened by the NKVD for his political reliability, Gouzenko quickly developed an affection for Canada and began to grow disillusioned with the Soviet Union soon after his arrival. The freedoms and standards of living he enjoyed in Canada drastically outstripped what he experienced in his home country. Canadians could move freely without
1530-461: A crowbar, and began ransacking the apartment. As the Gouzenkos watched the scene unfold through a keyhole in her door, Elliott called the police. Two officers arrived and confronted Pavlov and his team. Pavlov at first insisted he and his team had a key and permission to enter the apartment, a story that quickly fell apart when the officers noted the broken lock. An argument over jurisdiction ensued, but
1683-414: A family seeking aid would seem more credible than a lone agent peddling stolen documents. Furthermore, he knew Embassy staff would soon discover the missing documents and, if his family were taken into custody by NKVD operatives, he would have no choice but to surrender himself. When the ministry building opened at 9:00 am, the family met briefly with a secretary. Communication was slow, as Gouzenko spoke in
SECTION 10
#17328771035521836-707: A fission bomb was theoretically possible. The properties of pure uranium-235 were relatively unknown, as were those of plutonium, which had only been isolated by Glenn Seaborg and his team in February 1941. The scientists at the July 1942 conference envisioned creating plutonium in nuclear reactors where uranium-238 atoms absorbed neutrons that had been emitted from fissioning uranium-235. At this point no reactor had been built, and only tiny quantities of plutonium were available from cyclotrons . Even by December 1943, only two milligrams had been produced. There were many ways of arranging
1989-476: A labour camp or face execution and he had no way of knowing whether he would be reassigned or shot upon his return. In 1939, Lavrentiy Beria , the newly appointed head of the NKVD, had large numbers of Soviet operatives imprisoned or executed in order to purge any lingering influence of his predecessor. However, Gouzenko had not, in fact, fallen into disfavour with the GRU. Unknown to Gouzenko, Colonel Miklahil Mil'shtein,
2142-856: A liaison office in Washington, D.C., but established his temporary headquarters at 270 Broadway in New York, where he could draw on administrative support from the Corps of Engineers' North Atlantic Division . It was close to the Manhattan office of Stone & Webster , the principal project contractor, and to Columbia University. He had permission to draw on his former command, the Syracuse District, for staff, and he started with Lieutenant Colonel Kenneth Nichols , who became his deputy. Because most of his task involved construction, Marshall worked in cooperation with
2295-477: A meeting called by Stimson, which established a Military Policy Committee, responsible to the Top Policy Group, consisting of Bush (with Conant as an alternate), Styer and Rear Admiral William R. Purnell . Tolman and Conant were later appointed as Groves' scientific advisers. On 19 September, Groves went to Donald Nelson , the chairman of the War Production Board, and asked for broad authority to issue
2448-583: A message to GRU headquarters in Moscow , "Fred, our man in LESOVIA [code name for Canada], has been elected to the LESOVIAN parliament." In June 1943, Colonel Nicholai Zabotin arrived as the military attaché to the Embassy. Officially, he was charged with facilitating the delivery of military technology to the Soviet Union. Covertly, however, he took charge of the GRU's intelligence operations in Canada. Code-named "Grant", he
2601-572: A plant, much less four of them for $ 90 million." A single TNT plant that Nichols had recently built in Pennsylvania had cost $ 128 million. Nor were they impressed with estimates to the nearest order of magnitude, which Groves compared with telling a caterer to prepare for between ten and a thousand guests. A survey team from Stone & Webster had already scouted a site for the production plants. The War Production Board recommended sites around Knoxville, Tennessee , an isolated area where
2754-499: A possible source of bombs with a destructiveness vastly greater than anything now known." In February 1940, the U.S. Navy awarded Columbia University $ 6,000, most of which Fermi and Szilard spent on graphite . A team of Columbia professors including Fermi, Szilard, Eugene T. Booth and John Dunning created the first nuclear fission reaction in the Americas, verifying the work of Hahn and Strassmann. The same team subsequently built
2907-470: A ranch. On 16 November 1942, Oppenheimer, Groves, Dudley and others toured the vicinity of the Los Alamos Ranch School . Oppenheimer expressed a strong preference for the site, citing its natural beauty, which, it was hoped, would inspire those working on the project. The engineers were concerned about the poor access road, and whether the water supply would be adequate, but otherwise felt that it
3060-548: A rare visit to Canada and was staying at the Château Montebello , not far from Ottawa, and persuaded Robertson to intervene. However, excerpts from King's diary, as well as an interview with one of Robertson's deputies, raise questions as to whether Stephenson was in Ottawa at the time. Whatever Robertson's motivation, Gouzenko was taken to RCMP headquarters where he was debriefed by Rivett-Carnac and Leopold, who spoke some Russian. The RCMP ordered Gouzenko's neighbours to keep
3213-462: A reaction becomes self-sustaining became known as "going critical". Compton reported the success to Conant in Washington, D.C., by a coded phone call, saying, "The Italian navigator [Fermi] has just landed in the new world." In January 1943, Grafton's successor, Major Arthur V. Peterson , ordered Chicago Pile-1 dismantled and reassembled at the Argonne Forest site, as he regarded the operation of
SECTION 20
#17328771035523366-598: A reactor as too hazardous for a densely populated area. The new site, still operated by the Metallurgical Laboratory, became known as ' Site A '. Chicago Pile-3 , the first heavy water reactor, also went critical at this site, on 15 May 1944. After the war, operations at Site A were moved about 6 miles (9.7 km) to DuPage County , the current location of the Argonne National Laboratory . By December 1942 there were concerns that even Oak Ridge
3519-515: A reporter. Johnstone listened as Gouzenko translated some of the documents, which she then took to the editor. However, she returned quickly and told Gouzenko that they were not interested in the story, and suggested that Gouzenko go to the RCMP's Bureau of Naturalization to apply for Canadian citizenship. Dejected and still leery of dealing with the RCMP, Gouzenko returned to the Department of Justice where he
3672-629: A research proposal and a paper on air navigation that was set to be presented at an upcoming symposium in London, which the Soviets would be attending. Likewise, Halperin proved to be of limited use to the Soviets. Although he met with Lunan several times, he supplied him only with verbal information on the capacity of Canadian explosives plants, information that was already publicly available. Lunan continued to press Halperin for more information, but Halperin continually refused. Halperin eventually cut off contact with Lunan entirely. Zabotin's most valuable agent
3825-499: A row, Gouzenko was out of options and he had no choice but to return to his apartment with his family. Gouzenko and his wife left Andrei with their neighbour, Harold Main, a corporal with the RCAF. However, the Mains could overhear the panicked tones in their voices through the walls and deduced that the Gouzenkos were in some form of trouble. Gouzenko explained the situation. Main decided to contact
3978-578: A select few government officials were aware of the investigation. King formed a small working group that included Robertson, Rivett-Carnac, St. Laurent, and Wrong, while the RCMP established its own task force under the Intelligence Branch, which included inspectors M.E. Anthony and Clifford Harvison . However, the RCMP was ill-equipped to deal with defectors and they immediately notified British and American authorities of Gouzenko's defection. Both countries quickly dispatched representatives to assist with
4131-567: A senior organizer of the LPP. Filling 6,000 pages, Gouzenko's testimony was not made public until 1981. Prior to the Second World War , the Soviet Union had no diplomatic representation in Canada. However, with the German invasion of the Soviet Union , the two countries suddenly found themselves allies fighting a common enemy. Stories of the Soviets' struggle against Nazi Germany elicited sympathy for
4284-660: A series of prototype nuclear reactors (or "piles" as Fermi called them) in Pupin Hall at Columbia but were not yet able to achieve a chain reaction. The Advisory Committee on Uranium became the National Defense Research Committee (NDRC) on Uranium when that organization was formed on 27 June 1940. On 28 June 1941, Roosevelt signed Executive Order 8807, which created the Office of Scientific Research and Development (OSRD), under director Vannevar Bush . The office
4437-497: A son, Andrei, shortly thereafter. Embassy rules dictated that Embassy staff were to live in the same buildings so that they could all monitor each other. However, Zabotin's wife found Andrei's persistent crying intolerable so Gouzenko and his family were given special permission to rent a separate apartment on Somerset Street West . Gouzenko later recalled, "I heard Zabotin remark more than once that living abroad spoiled some Russians. It had certainly spoiled Anna and me. In Ottawa we had
4590-575: A special account not subject to the usual auditing and controls was used to hold Trust monies. Between 1944 and his resignation from the Trust in 1947, Groves deposited a total of $ 37.5 million. Groves appreciated the early British atomic research and the British scientists' contributions to the Manhattan Project but stated that the United States would have succeeded without them, although not in time for
4743-699: A special assignment. He studied at the Military Engineering Academy in Moscow and, later, the Higher Intelligence School of the Red Army. There, through an intensive ten-month course, he trained as a cipher specialist. He attained the rank of lieutenant . In April 1942, Gouzenko was assigned to GRU headquarters in Moscow where he worked as a cipher clerk. In June 1943, Gouzenko, then 23, accompanied Zabotin to Ottawa, arriving on June 25. He worked at
Gouzenko Affair - Misplaced Pages Continue
4896-493: A thick Russian accent and Anna spoke no English at all. The secretary left the room to make a phone call and, when she returned, she instructed them to go to Parliament Hill where they could meet directly with St. Laurent. However, upon their arrival, they were told to return to the Department of Justice building and await the minister's return. They waited for two hours and, at one point, Gouzenko attempted to elicit attention by threatening to kill himself, but to no avail. Eventually,
5049-475: Is likely to be started." In Serber's account, Oppenheimer mentioned the possibility of this scenario to Arthur Compton , who "didn't have enough sense to shut up about it. It somehow got into a document that went to Washington" and was "never laid to rest". The Chief of Engineers , Major General Eugene Reybold , selected Colonel James C. Marshall to head the Army's part of the project in June 1942. Marshall created
5202-640: The Defence of Canada Regulations of the War Measures Act , found itself newly legitimized and formed the Labor-Progressive Party (LPP), which would go on to receive more than 100,000 votes in the 1945 federal election . In February 1942, Canada and the Soviet Union reached an agreement to establish diplomatic relations. Later that year, the Soviet Union established a legation in Ottawa headed by ambassador Fedor Gusev . However, this relationship
5355-688: The Belgian Government in Exile was in London. Britain agreed to give the United States most of the Belgian ore, as it could not use most of the supply without restricted American research. In 1944, the Trust purchased 3,440,000 pounds (1,560,000 kg) of uranium oxide ore from companies operating mines in the Belgian Congo. To avoid briefing US Secretary of the Treasury Henry Morgenthau Jr. ,
5508-627: The Carnegie Institution of Washington and later the Naval Research Laboratory . Murphree also headed an unsuccessful separation project using gas centrifuges . Meanwhile, there were two lines of investigation into nuclear reactor technology : Harold Urey researched heavy water at Columbia, while Arthur Compton organized the Metallurgical Laboratory in early 1942 to study plutonium and reactors using graphite as
5661-526: The Chief of Staff of the Army , General George C. Marshall . Roosevelt chose the Army to run the project rather than the Navy, because the Army had more experience with managing large-scale construction. He agreed to coordinate the effort with the British and on 11 October sent a message to Prime Minister Winston Churchill , suggesting that they correspond on atomic matters. The S-1 Committee meeting on 18 December 1941
5814-562: The Clinton Engineer Works (CEW) in early 1943. While Stone & Webster concentrated on the production facilities, the architectural and engineering firm Skidmore, Owings & Merrill developed a residential community for 13,000. The community was located on the slopes of Black Oak Ridge, from which the new town of Oak Ridge got its name. The Army presence at Oak Ridge increased in August 1943 when Nichols replaced Marshall as head of
5967-515: The Cold War in Canada , as well as potentially setting the stage for the " Red Scare " of the 1950s. The Kellock–Taschereau Commission was a royal commission that began in February 1946 with the mandate to investigate the veracity of Gouzenko's information. The Commission, appointed on February 5, 1946, by Governor General the Earl of Athlone , on the advice of Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King ,
6120-560: The Eastern Bloc , which consisted of the communist states of Central and Eastern Europe (except for non-aligned Yugoslavia ). Until 1952, however, the Inner German border between East and West Germany could be easily crossed in most places. Accordingly, before 1961, most of that east–west flow took place between East and West Germany, with over 3.5 million East Germans emigrating to West Germany before 1961. On August 13, 1961,
6273-581: The Eastern Front turned in the Soviet Union's favour, the Soviet leader, Joseph Stalin , became convinced that the Western powers would soon return to their pre-war hostility toward the Soviet Union. He was determined to take advantage of their preoccupation with the war and infiltrate what he considered to be his future adversaries. Canada was a prime target for foreign espionage, as the country possessed an abundance of information that would have been valuable to
Gouzenko Affair - Misplaced Pages Continue
6426-462: The Ottawa Journal who looked through Gouzenko's documents and confirmed they appeared genuine. However, he insisted there was nothing he could do considering the editorial staff had already turned Gouzenko away. Coulson contacted the RCMP, who dispatched an officer; however, the officer quickly declined to get involved, informing her that King had issued orders to ignore Gouzenko. Coulson then called
6579-594: The Tennessee Valley Authority could supply ample electric power and the rivers could provide cooling water for the reactors. After examining several sites, the survey team selected one near Elza, Tennessee . Conant advised that it be acquired at once and Styer agreed but Marshall temporized, awaiting the results of Conant's reactor experiments. Of the prospective processes, only Lawrence's electromagnetic separation appeared sufficiently advanced for construction to commence. Marshall and Nichols began assembling
6732-478: The University of Birmingham had made a breakthrough investigating the critical mass of uranium-235 in June 1939. Their calculations indicated that it was within an order of magnitude of 10 kilograms (22 lb), small enough to be carried by contemporary bombers. Their March 1940 Frisch–Peierls memorandum initiated the British atomic bomb project and its MAUD Committee , which unanimously recommended pursuing
6885-532: The Wartime Information Board who served as an editor for Canadian Affairs , a military journal written for members of the armed forces serving overseas. Lunan was recruited by Rose in March 1945 and his career in journalism offered him cover for recruiting informants, some of whom were led to believe they were speaking to him in his capacity as editor of Canadian Affairs . Of Zabotin's subordinates, Rogov had
7038-805: The X-10 Graphite Reactor and the production reactors at the Hanford Site , in which uranium was irradiated and transmuted into plutonium. The Fat Man plutonium implosion-type weapon was developed in a concerted design and development effort by the Los Alamos Laboratory. The project was also charged with gathering intelligence on the German nuclear weapon project . Through Operation Alsos , Manhattan Project personnel served in Europe, sometimes behind enemy lines, where they gathered nuclear materials and documents, and rounded up German scientists. Despite
7191-416: The constant threat of police surveillance and could openly criticize their government without fear of reprisal. He found Canadians to be warm and inviting and even conversed with police officers, whom he found friendly and approachable, something that would have been unheard of in the Soviet Union. In September 1944, Gouzenko learned that he was being recalled to the Soviet Union, just 14 months in to what
7344-565: The fissile material . Research and production took place at more than 30 sites across the US, the UK, and Canada. The project resulted in two types of atomic bombs, developed concurrently during the war: a relatively simple gun-type fission weapon and a more complex implosion-type nuclear weapon . The Thin Man gun-type design proved impractical to use with plutonium , so a simpler gun-type design called Little Boy
7497-703: The Army allowed the crops to be harvested, but this was not always possible. The land acquisition process dragged on and was not completed before the end of the Manhattan Project in December 1946. The dispute did not delay work. Although progress on the reactor design at Metallurgical Laboratory and DuPont was not sufficiently advanced to accurately predict the scope of the project, a start was made in April 1943 on facilities for an estimated 25,000 workers, half of whom were expected to live on-site. By July 1944, some 1,200 buildings had been erected and nearly 51,000 people were living in
7650-671: The Army's component the Manhattan District; Reybold officially created this district on 13 August. Informally, it was known as the Manhattan Engineer District, or MED. Unlike other districts, it had no geographic boundaries, and Marshall had the authority of a division engineer. Development of Substitute Materials remained as the official codename of the project as a whole but was supplanted over time by "Manhattan". Marshall later conceded that, "I had never heard of atomic fission but I did know that you could not build much of
7803-502: The August 1945 bombing of Hiroshima. The British wartime participation was crucial to the success of the United Kingdom's independent nuclear weapons program after the war when the McMahon Act of 1946 temporarily ended American nuclear cooperation. The day after he took over the project, Groves went to Tennessee with Colonel Marshall to inspect the proposed site there, and Groves was impressed. On 29 September 1942, United States Under Secretary of War Robert P. Patterson authorized
SECTION 50
#17328771035527956-566: The Australian physicist Mark Oliphant , flew to the US in late August 1941 and discovered that data provided by the MAUD Committee had not reached key American physicists. Oliphant set out to find out why the committee's findings were apparently being ignored. He met with the Uranium Committee and visited Berkeley, California , where he spoke persuasively to Ernest O. Lawrence . Lawrence was sufficiently impressed to commence his own research into uranium. He in turn spoke to James B. Conant , Arthur H. Compton and George B. Pegram . Oliphant's mission
8109-411: The CPC. Fred Rose , a union organizer and frequently jailed communist activist who would go on to become a member of Parliament under the LLP banner, reportedly approached Sokolov sometime in 1942 and expressed interest in working for the GRU. Together, Rose and Sam Carr , a national organizer for the CPC, actively helped the Soviets whenever possible and served as go-betweens for recruits, as Sokolov
8262-609: The Corps of Engineers to acquire 56,000 acres (23,000 ha) of land by eminent domain at a cost of $ 3.5 million. An additional 3,000 acres (1,200 ha) was subsequently acquired. About 1,000 families were affected by the order, which came into effect on 7 October. Protests, legal appeals, and a 1943 Congressional inquiry were to no avail. By mid-November U.S. Marshals were posting notices to vacate on farmhouse doors, and construction contractors were moving in. Some families were given two weeks' notice to vacate farms that had been their homes for generations. The ultimate cost of
8415-400: The Embassy and Moscow, and various notes written by Zabotin and Rogov, many of which were handwritten in shorthand . Also included was a mailing list that would later prove to be a key piece of evidence against many of the suspects. All in all, the documents showed conclusively that the Soviets maintained a large-scale spy network in Canada that extended into the civil service, the military, and
8568-412: The Embassy. Gouzenko's defection was also ill-timed. September 6 was the first peacetime opening of Parliament since the 1930s. The governor general , the Earl of Athlone , was scheduled to deliver his final throne speech before retirement. There were crowds of people filling the streets awaiting the parade of military bands and the arrival of the governor general and Princess Alice . Nevertheless,
8721-400: The Embassy. The previous morning, Zabotin had informed Pavlov that Gouzenko and a number of important documents were missing. Shortly after midnight, Pavlov dispatched a driver to Gouzenko's now vacant home. He pounded on Gouzenko's door for some time, but left when he did not get an answer. Undeterred, Pavlov led a group of four men to Gouzenko's home a few hours later, forced the door open with
8874-409: The GRU had been successful in obtaining secret information on weapons, radar, high-level political discussions, and atomic research. A list of code names provided by Gouzenko suggested the GRU had as many as 26 agents, including 18 Canadians. Moreover, the documents revealed that the suspects were not professional spies but, rather, ordinary citizens with communist sympathies. Robertson, who would monitor
9027-531: The Manhattan Engineer District. One of his first tasks was to move the district headquarters to Oak Ridge, although the name of the district did not change. In September 1943 the administration of community facilities was outsourced to Turner Construction Company through a subsidiary, the Roane-Anderson Company. Chemical engineers were part of "frantic efforts" to make 10% to 12% enriched uranium 235, with tight security and fast approvals for supplies and materials. The population of Oak Ridge soon expanded well beyond
9180-671: The Manhattan Project conducted weapons testing at Bikini Atoll as part of Operation Crossroads , developed new weapons, promoted the development of the network of national laboratories , supported medical research into radiology and laid the foundations for the nuclear navy . It maintained control over American atomic weapons research and production until the formation of the United States Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) in January 1947. The discovery of nuclear fission by Otto Hahn and Fritz Strassmann in 1938, and its theoretical explanation by Lise Meitner and Otto Frisch , made an atomic bomb theoretically possible. There were fears that
9333-411: The Manhattan Project's emphasis on security, Soviet atomic spies penetrated the program. The first nuclear device ever detonated was an implosion-type bomb during the Trinity test , conducted at White Sands Proving Ground in New Mexico on 16 July 1945. Little Boy and Fat Man bombs were used a month later in the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki , respectively. In the immediate postwar years,
SECTION 60
#17328771035529486-403: The Metallurgical Laboratory, was assigned to assist Oppenheimer by coordinating experimental physics groups scattered across the country. Oppenheimer and Robert Serber of the University of Illinois examined the problems of neutron diffusion—how neutrons moved in a nuclear chain reaction—and hydrodynamics —how the explosion produced by a chain reaction might behave. To review this work and
9639-479: The NKVD had its own cipher clerk. Gouzenko had arrived in Ottawa during a housing crisis brought about by a combination of the Great Depression and a wartime construction lag, so he initially stayed at the Château Laurier . His salary was CA $ 275 per month, a staggering sum for that era, which afforded him a degree of comfort and luxury to which he was unaccustomed. Anna, who was pregnant with their first child, joined Gouzenko in Ottawa in October and she gave birth to
9792-421: The NRC and served as the secretary of the Canadian-American RDX Committee. Boyer was recruited by Rose in February 1943. The United States had vetoed an Allied initiative to share information on RDX with the Soviet Union; however, throughout 1943 and 1944, Boyer provided the Soviets with classified information on a number of chemical compounds, including RDX. Other scientists with communist leanings that had piqued
9945-530: The NRC. Even King's own ministry appeared to have been compromised; Emma Woikin , a young cipher clerk who worked for the department of Department of External Affairs had been named by Gouzenko. Soviet Union defection Soon after the formation of the Soviet Union , emigration restrictions were put in place to keep citizens from leaving the various republics of the USSR, though some defections still occurred. During and after World War II , similar restrictions were put in place in non-Soviet countries of
10098-411: The President, who approved it by writing "OK FDR" on the document. Compton asked theoretical physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer of the University of California to take over research into fast neutron calculations —key to calculations of critical mass and weapon detonation—from Gregory Breit , who had quit on 18 May 1942 because of concerns over lax operational security. John H. Manley , a physicist at
10251-407: The Prime Minister's secretary who promptly advised her to turn Gouzenko away. She called Le Droit , a French-language newspaper, but got nowhere. Finally, she reached out to another contact at the RCMP, an inspector named John Leopold, who reluctantly agreed to meet with Gouzenko in his office in the Confederation Building on Wellington Street at 9:30 am the following day. For the second night in
10404-602: The Quebec Agreement, the Americans' progress and expenditures amazed the British. Chadwick pressed for British involvement in the Manhattan Project to the fullest extent and abandoned hopes of an independent British project during the war. With Churchill's backing, he attempted to ensure that every request from Groves for assistance was honored. The British Mission that arrived in the United States in December 1943 included Niels Bohr , Otto Frisch, Klaus Fuchs , Rudolf Peierls, and Ernest Titterton . More scientists arrived in early 1944. While those assigned to gaseous diffusion left by
10557-417: The RCMP decided to follow Gouzenko's movements to ascertain whether his revelations were genuine. King also authorized the RCMP to attempt to seize Gouzenko's documents if he were to commit suicide. After leaving the Department of Justice, Gouzenko decided to return to the Ottawa Journal . When he arrived with his family, however, the editor declined to meet with him and he spoke instead with Leslie Johnstone,
10710-400: The Soviet Embassy where he was responsible for coding and decoding messages between Zabotin and GRU headquarters in Moscow. He passed along whatever information Zabotin produced through his spy network. Keeping track of code names proved exceptionally tedious, as some agents were given multiple aliases and, in many cases, Gouzenko did not know their identity. He worked exclusively for the GRU, as
10863-408: The Soviet Union, Poland , Bulgaria , Romania , Czechoslovakia , Hungary , and Albania before those countries' conversions from communist states in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Manhattan Project The Manhattan Project was a research and development program undertaken during World War II to produce the first nuclear weapons . It was led by the United States in collaboration with
11016-509: The Soviet Union. Canadian diplomats had close ties with officials in the United States and the United Kingdom. The Canadian Armed Forces had access to American and British weapon systems. Scientists at Canada's National Research Council (NRC) were closely involved with British and American scientists in the development of radar technology, code-breaking, and the explosive RDX . Most notably, the NRC
11169-476: The Soviet cause. Organizations began sending aid to the Soviet Union and a number of Soviet-Canadian friendship societies were formed throughout the country, pushing for greater Canadian-Soviet co-operation. In 1943, the Canadian-Soviet Friendship League held its inaugural rally at Maple Leaf Gardens with Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King as its chair. Public disdain for communism
11322-454: The Soviet secret police and precursor to the KGB , also operated out of the Embassy, headed by Vitali Pavlov, who had arrived in Ottawa in 1942 when the legation was initially established. Additionally, Soviet naval intelligence may also have been operating out of the Embassy. However, the GRU and the NKVD did not share resources or intelligence and their relationship was highly dysfunctional. Infighting
11475-636: The United Kingdom and Canada. From 1942 to 1946, the project was directed by Major General Leslie Groves of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers . Nuclear physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer was the director of the Los Alamos Laboratory that designed the bombs. The Army program was designated the Manhattan District , as its first headquarters were in Manhattan ; the name gradually superseded the official codename, Development of Substitute Materials , for
11628-475: The academic scientists working on the project. Groves' orders placed him directly under Somervell rather than Reybold, with Colonel Marshall now answerable to Groves. Groves established his headquarters in Washington, D.C., in the New War Department Building , where Colonel Marshall had his liaison office. He assumed command of the Manhattan Project on 23 September 1942. Later that day, he attended
11781-486: The attention of the GRU were David Shugar , a sonar specialist with the Royal Canadian Navy (RCN), and Matt Nightingale, a Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) engineer with knowledge of LORAN navigation systems. These men were considered valuable not only for the information they had access to in Canada, but also because they had access to secret research in the United Kingdom and the United States. Igor Gouzenko
11934-442: The best way to get public attention quickly was to go through the media. He hoped the public attention would shield him from being killed by Soviet agents. He was reluctant to approach Canadian law enforcement directly, as, although he was confident the GRU had not infiltrated the RCMP, he had no way of knowing whether the NKVD had its own agents there. Gouzenko's replacement – Lieutenant Kulakov – arrived in July 1945. Gouzenko's time
12087-670: The bomb design team at Los Alamos needed them, despite the risk of revealing weapon design secrets. In August 1943 Churchill and Roosevelt negotiated the Quebec Agreement , which established the Combined Policy Committee to coordinate the efforts of the US and UK; Canada was not a signatory, but the Agreement provided for a Canadian representative on the Combined Policy Committee in view of Canada's contribution to
12240-683: The branch office in Santa Fe, where she met new arrivals and issue them with passes. An Army-OSRD council on 25 June 1942 decided to build a pilot plant for plutonium production in the Argonne Forest preserve , southwest of Chicago. In July, Nichols arranged for a lease of 1,025 acres (415 ha) from the Cook County Forest Preserve District , and Captain James F. Grafton was appointed Chicago area engineer. It soon became apparent that
12393-421: The building was closed for the night and a security guard there advised him to return the following morning. With his options exhausted for the time being, Gouzenko returned to his apartment on Somerset Street West. The following morning, September 6, Gouzenko headed directly to the Department of Justice where he asked to speak with the minister, Louis St. Laurent . He brought Anna and Andrei along, reasoning that
12546-441: The building. The documents included telegrams between Zabotin and GRU headquarters, pages from Zabotin's personal notebook, and information on allied weapons systems, including the atomic bomb. However, the weather that day was unusually warm and Gouzenko would have been lightly dressed. It is doubtful he could have hidden 109 documents – totalling roughly 250 pages – under his clothes without appearing conspicuous. Furthermore, marking
12699-402: The construction camp. As area engineer, Matthias exercised overall control of the site. At its peak, the construction camp was the third most populous town in Washington state. Hanford operated a fleet of over 900 buses, more than the city of Chicago. Like Los Alamos and Oak Ridge, Richland was a gated community with restricted access, but it looked more like a typical wartime American boomtown:
12852-423: The day, and September 5 was his only remaining Wednesday. Much of the story of Gouzenko's defection is steeped in myth and there are contradictions within some of his claims. The popular story is that Gouzenko had been subtly marking secret documents for weeks by folding their corners and, on the evening of September 5, 1945, he entered the Embassy, stuffed 109 documents in his pockets and under his clothes, and left
13005-521: The deuterium concentration in the water from 2.3% to 99.8%. For this process, Hugh Taylor of Princeton developed a platinum-on-carbon catalyst for the first three stages while Urey developed a nickel- chromia one for the fourth stage tower. The final cost was $ 2.8 million. The Canadian Government did not officially learn of the project until August 1942. Trail's heavy water production started in January 1944 and continued until 1956. Heavy water from Trail
13158-597: The development of an atomic bomb. In July 1940, Britain had offered to give the United States access to its research, and the Tizard Mission 's John Cockcroft briefed American scientists on British developments. He discovered that the American project was smaller than the British, and not as advanced. As part of the scientific exchange, the MAUD Committee's findings were conveyed to the United States. One of its members,
13311-473: The documents would have run the risk of detection in an environment where security violations could lead to execution. When he was later questioned, he acknowledged that he had been smuggling documents out of the Embassy for weeks leading up to his defection. At approximately 9:00 pm, Gouzenko arrived at the office of the Ottawa Journal . Chester Frowde, the night editor, had trouble deciphering Gouzenko's thick Russian accent and could understand little of what he
13464-482: The efficiency of the bomb as it exploded. As the idea of the fission bomb was theoretically settled—at least until more experimental data was available—Edward Teller pushed for discussion of a more powerful bomb: the "super", now usually referred to as a " hydrogen bomb ", which would use the force of a detonating fission bomb to ignite a nuclear fusion reaction in deuterium and tritium . Teller proposed scheme after scheme, but Bethe refused each one. The fusion idea
13617-603: The effort. An agreement between Roosevelt and Churchill known as the Hyde Park Aide-Mémoire , signed in late September 1944, extended the Quebec Agreement to the postwar period and suggested that "when a 'bomb' is finally available, it might perhaps, after mature consideration, be used against the Japanese, who should be warned that this bombardment will be repeated until they surrender". When cooperation resumed after
13770-418: The entire project. The project absorbed its earlier British counterpart, Tube Alloys , and subsumed the program from the American civilian Office of Scientific Research and Development . The Manhattan Project employed nearly 130,000 people at its peak and cost nearly US$ 2 billion (equivalent to about $ 27 billion in 2023), over 80 percent of which was for building and operating the plants that produced
13923-418: The fall of 1944, the thirty-five working under Oliphant with Lawrence at Berkeley were assigned to existing laboratory groups and most stayed until the end of the war. The nineteen sent to Los Alamos also joined existing groups, primarily related to implosion and bomb assembly, but not the plutonium-related ones. The Quebec Agreement specified that nuclear weapons would not be used against another country without
14076-655: The family was told that the minister was not available. From Gouzenko's perspective, he had been dismissed with an almost comical degree of disinterest. Unknown to Gouzenko, however, King had been made aware of his defection. The RCMP had learned of Gouzenko's visit to the Ottawa Journal the night before and the head of the RCMP intelligence branch, Charles Rivett-Carnac , had briefed Norman Robertson , undersecretary for external affairs and King's close advisor, that morning. At around 10:45 am, King arrived in his office to find Robertson and his assistant, Hume Wrong , waiting for him. According to King's diary, Robertson told him that
14229-422: The fissile material into a critical mass. The simplest was shooting a "cylindrical plug" into a sphere of "active material" with a "tamper"—dense material to focus neutrons inward and keep the reacting mass together to increase its efficiency. They also explored designs involving spheroids , a primitive form of " implosion " suggested by Richard C. Tolman , and the possibility of autocatalytic methods to increase
14382-486: The four men eventually left. The police did not attempt to detain them. That morning, Robertson ordered the RCMP to take Gouzenko and his family into custody. How Robertson came to this decision is unclear. The popular belief is that the "eminent officer" with whom he had met the night before was William Stephenson , the British Security Co-ordination Chief and spymaster who, by coincidence, had made
14535-568: The general theory of fission reactions, Oppenheimer and Fermi convened meetings at the University of Chicago in June and at the University of California in July 1942 with theoretical physicists Hans Bethe , John Van Vleck , Edward Teller, Emil Konopinski , Robert Serber, Stan Frankel , and Eldred C. (Carlyle) Nelson, and experimental physicists Emilio Segrè , Felix Bloch , Franco Rasetti , Manley, and Edwin McMillan . They tentatively confirmed that
14688-416: The hazardous effects of radiation, stored it unconcernedly in an office safe for two weeks. Motinov then delivered the sample to Moscow, storing it under his waistband. The uranium sample reportedly left him with a painful wound and he required regular blood transfusions for the rest of his life. Another notable agent was Raymond Boyer, an assistant professor of chemistry at McGill University who worked with
14841-401: The head of the Corps of Engineers Construction Division, Major General Thomas M. Robbins , and his deputy, Colonel Leslie Groves . Reybold, Somervell, and Styer decided to call the project "Development of Substitute Materials", but Groves felt that this would draw attention. Since engineer districts normally carried the name of the city where they were located, Marshall and Groves agreed to name
14994-411: The highest rating he could assign was AA-3, although he was willing to provide a AAA rating on request for critical materials if the need arose. Nichols and Marshall were disappointed; AA-3 was the same priority as Nichols' TNT plant in Pennsylvania. Vannevar Bush became dissatisfied with Colonel Marshall's failure to get the project moving forward expeditiously and felt that more aggressive leadership
15147-515: The idea of defecting. However, he suspected the Canadian government would be reluctant to endanger its relations with the Soviet Union by giving asylum to a Soviet citizen who had committed treason and set about gathering information that could be of interest to his prospective hosts. Gouzenko planned to steal documents from the Embassy and take them to the editor of the Ottawa Journal , reasoning that
15300-528: The importance of top priority. Most everything proposed in the Roosevelt administration would have top priority. That would last for about a week or two and then something else would get top priority". One of Groves' early problems was to find a director for Project Y , the group that would design and build the bomb. The obvious choice was one of the three laboratory heads, Urey, Lawrence, or Compton, but they could not be spared. Compton recommended Oppenheimer, who
15453-590: The industrial manufacturing area of Ontario and Quebec, and proximity to a rail head adjacent to a large military base, Camp Petawawa . Located on the Ottawa River, it had access to abundant water. The first director of the new laboratory was Hans von Halban . He was replaced by John Cockcroft in May 1944, who was succeeded by Bennett Lewis in September 1946. A pilot reactor known as ZEEP (zero-energy experimental pile) became
15606-490: The initial plans, and peaked at 75,000 in May 1945, by which time 82,000 people were employed at the Clinton Engineer Works, and 10,000 by Roane-Anderson. The idea of locating Project Y at Oak Ridge was considered, but it was decided that it should be in a remote location. On Oppenheimer's recommendation, the search for a suitable site was narrowed to the vicinity of Albuquerque, New Mexico , where Oppenheimer owned
15759-537: The investigation, including Roger Hollis from MI5, Peter Dwyer and John-Paul Evans from MI6 , and Lish Whitson from the FBI . Due to security concerns, as well as Gouzenko's fragile mental state, only a handful of investigators were permitted access to Gouzenko, including Hollis and Whitson. Dwyer and Evans did not speak to Gouzenko directly and, instead, forwarded questions through Leopold. Gouzenko's documents included three GRU dossiers on agents in Canada, 33 telegrams between
15912-491: The issues involved in setting up a laboratory in a remote area and should be appointed as its director. Groves personally waived the security requirements and issued Oppenheimer's clearance on 20 July 1943. The British and Americans exchanged nuclear information but did not initially combine their efforts; during 1940-41 the British project ( Tube Alloys ) was larger and more advanced. Britain rebuffed attempts by Bush and Conant in August 1941 to strengthen cooperation because it
16065-519: The land acquisition, which was not completed until March 1945, was only about $ 2.6 million—around $ 47 an acre. When presented with a proclamation declaring Oak Ridge a total exclusion area that no one could enter without military permission, the Governor of Tennessee , Prentice Cooper , angrily tore it up. Initially known as the Kingston Demolition Range, the site was officially renamed
16218-474: The local police but, since Gouzenko was worried the building's phone lines might be tapped, he set out on bicycle. While he was gone, another neighbour, Frances Elliott, who had overheard their conversation, offered the exhausted Gouzenkos refuge in her apartment for the night. Main returned with two Ottawa constables. The officers listened to Gouzenko's story and, as Main later noted, they seemed as if they already knew of Gouzenko's situation. The officers said there
16371-536: The luxuries and high standards of living of the West. Staff would exaggerate the value of whatever information they were able to pass on to Moscow, much of which was already publicly available or too vague to be of consequence. Gouzenko repeatedly put off his defection in hopes of coming across something more valuable. Gouzenko was not scheduled to leave until sometime in October; however, in early September, he learned that Kulakov
16524-403: The matter a secret. Gouzenko's interview progressed slowly at first, as his panicked state limited his ability to communicate effectively. According to an RCMP report: Gouzenko was in a highly agitated and emotionally disturbed state. In fact, he appeared close to a nervous collapse. Because of this condition his speech was rather incoherent and his train of thought and expression were confused to
16677-401: The matter. He wrote in his diary: I said to both Robertson and Wrong that I thought we should be extremely careful in becoming a party to any course of action which would link the govt. of Canada up with this matter in a manner which might cause Russia to feel that we had performed an unfriendly act. That to seek to gather information in any underhanded way would make clear that we did not trust
16830-484: The military necessity continues". Wartime land purchases eventually came to 49,383 acres (19,985 ha), but only $ 414,971 was spent. Work commenced in December 1942. Groves initially allocated $ 300,000 for construction, three times Oppenheimer's estimate, but by the time Sundt finished on 30 November 1943, over $ 7 million had been spent. During the war, Los Alamos was referred to as "Site Y" or "the Hill". Initially it
16983-551: The military profile was lower, and physical security elements like high fences and guard dogs were less evident. Canada provided research, extraction and production of uranium and plutonium, and Canadian scientists worked at Los Alamos. Cominco had produced electrolytic hydrogen at Trail, British Columbia , since 1930. Urey suggested in 1941 that it could produce heavy water. To the existing $ 10 million plant consisting of 3,215 cells consuming 75 MW of hydroelectric power, secondary electrolysis cells were added to increase
17136-524: The most demanding job, as he managed the Lunan cell. Lunan (to whom the GRU had assigned the code name, "Back") was tasked with recruiting and managing two NRC engineers: Edward Mazerall (code-named "Bagley") and Durnford Smith (code-named "Badeau"), as well as Israel Halperin (code-named "Bacon"), a mathematics professor at Queen's University who had taken leave to serve in the Canadian Artillery during
17289-505: The mutual consent of the US and UK. In June 1945, Wilson agreed that the nuclear bombing of Japan would be recorded as a decision of the Combined Policy Committee. The Combined Policy Committee created the Combined Development Trust in June 1944, with Groves as its chairman, to procure uranium and thorium ores on international markets. The Belgian Congo and Canada held much of the world's uranium outside Eastern Europe, and
17442-403: The necessary resources. The first step was to obtain a high priority rating for the project. The top ratings were AA-1 through AA-4 in descending order, although there was a special AAA rating reserved for emergencies. Ratings AA-1 and AA-2 were for essential weapons and equipment, so Colonel Lucius D. Clay , the deputy chief of staff at Services and Supply for requirements and resources, felt that
17595-458: The point of being extremely difficult to comprehend... these Headquarters were convinced from Gouzenko's actions and temporary mental instability that the weight of his precarious position would have driven him to the murder of his wife and final suicide. Nevertheless, the information the RCMP was able to obtain was enough to prompt them into action and Gouzenko and his family were taken to a safehouse outside Ottawa. Gouzenko's documents revealed that
17748-489: The rapidly expanding public service. Furthermore, NRC scientists tended to see security measures as arbitrary and often ignored them entirely. One of the first Soviets to arrive at the Embassy in Ottawa was Major Vsevolod Sokolov, an agent of the Main Intelligence Directorate ( GRU ), the Soviet Union's foreign military intelligence agency. He set up a GRU spy ring, expanding upon the existing infrastructure of
17901-544: The research of Enrico Fermi and others into nuclear chain reactions . They had it signed by Albert Einstein and delivered to President Franklin D. Roosevelt . Roosevelt called on Lyman Briggs of the National Bureau of Standards to head an Advisory Committee on Uranium ; Briggs met with Szilard, Wigner and Edward Teller in October 1939. The committee reported back to Roosevelt in November that uranium "would provide
18054-567: The scale of operations was too great for the area, and it was decided to build the pilot plant at Oak Ridge and keep a research and testing facility in Chicago. Delays in establishing the plant at Argonne led Arthur Compton to authorize the Metallurgical Laboratory to construct the first nuclear reactor beneath the bleachers of Stagg Field at the University of Chicago. The reactor required an enormous amount of highly purified graphite blocks and uranium in both metallic and powdered oxide forms. At
18207-528: The site be located far from the existing uranium production facility at Oak Ridge. In December 1942, Groves dispatched Colonel Franklin Matthias and DuPont engineers to scout potential sites. Matthias reported that Hanford Site near Richland, Washington , was "ideal in virtually all respects". It was isolated and near the Columbia River , which could supply sufficient water to cool the reactors. Groves visited
18360-598: The site in January and established the Hanford Engineer Works (HEW), codenamed "Site W". Under Secretary Patterson gave his approval on 9 February, allocating $ 5 million for the acquisition of 430,000 acres (170,000 ha). The federal government relocated some 1,500 residents of nearby settlements, as well as the Wanapum and other tribes using the area. A dispute arose with farmers over compensation for crops, which had already been planted. Where schedules allowed,
18513-416: The supervision of other Embassy staff. Mil'shtein reported his concerns to the GRU leadership who, out of an abundance of caution, issued the recall. In any case, Zabotin was able to postpone Gouzenko's departure by insisting he could not be spared until a replacement was found and trained. Gouzenko knew his departure could not be delayed indefinitely and, sometime in September 1944, he and his wife discussed
18666-528: The time, there was a limited source of pure uranium metal; Frank Spedding of Iowa State University was able to produce only two short tons . Three short tons was supplied by Westinghouse Lamp Plant , produced in a rush with makeshift process. A large square balloon was constructed by Goodyear Tire to encase the reactor. On 2 December 1942, a team led by Enrico Fermi initiated the first artificial self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction in an experimental reactor known as Chicago Pile-1 . The point at which
18819-412: The transcripts of Gouzenko's interviews and provide the prime minister with regular updates, reported to King: "Everything is much worse than we would have believed... [The documents] disclose an espionage system on a large scale... things came right into our country to a degree we could not have believed possible." Gouzenko's defection remained a tightly guarded secret throughout the rest of 1945 and only
18972-438: The two countries were reversed, and in January 1943 Conant notified the British that they would no longer receive atomic information except in certain areas. The British investigated the possibility of an independent nuclear program but determined that it could not be ready in time to impact the war in Europe . By March 1943 Conant decided that James Chadwick and one or two other British scientists were important enough that
19125-422: The war. Smith was the most productive of Lunan's sources and, from March to August 1945, he passed 17 reports on radar systems, totalling about 700 pages. Mazerall was a far more reluctant accomplice. In late July 1945, Lunan approached Mazerall under the guise that the editor of an army newspaper was looking for information on developments in radar technology. Mazerall gave him two documents marked "confidential" –
19278-532: Was Alan Nunn May , a British nuclear physicist who worked at the Montreal Laboratory under the United Kingdom's Tube Alloys project. Nunn May had been passing on information regarding his work on uranium as early as 1942, when he still worked in the United Kingdom. However, the GRU did not inform Zabotin about Nunn May until May 1945, nearly two years after Nunn May arrived in Canada. Zabotin promptly dispatched Lieutenant Pavel Angelov to make contact. Nunn May
19431-569: Was "pervaded by an atmosphere of enthusiasm and urgency" in the wake of the attack on Pearl Harbor and the United States declaration of war on Japan and on Germany . Work was proceeding on three techniques for isotope separation : Lawrence and his team at the University of California investigated electromagnetic separation , Eger Murphree and Jesse Wakefield Beams 's team looked into gaseous diffusion at Columbia University , and Philip Abelson directed research into thermal diffusion at
19584-573: Was already intimately familiar with the bomb design concepts. However, Oppenheimer had little administrative experience, and, unlike Urey, Lawrence, and Compton, had not won a Nobel Prize, which many scientists felt that the head of such an important laboratory should have. There were also concerns about Oppenheimer's security status, as many of his associates were communists , including his wife, Kitty ; his girlfriend, Jean Tatlock ; and his brother, Frank . A long conversation in October 1942 convinced Groves and Nichols that Oppenheimer thoroughly understood
19737-501: Was also tempered by the events of the war. The early years of the war had seen extensive surveillance and arrests of trade unionists and suspected communists. However, as the war progressed, many left-wing groups, who had become disillusioned with the Soviet Union following the signing of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact , took a renewed interest in communism. The Communist Party of Canada (CPC), which had been banned in 1940 under
19890-481: Was based on the need for expediency, not trust, and the Canadian government remained immensely distrustful of the Soviet Union, regardless of public support for the Soviet war effort. The Allies had technically agreed to a free exchange of information on the development of new weapons but, in practice, this agreement was not followed. In particular, the Soviet Union had been left out of the Manhattan Project . As
20043-476: Was born in 1919 in the village of Rogachev near Moscow. He excelled academically and was accepted to the Moscow Architectural Institute where he met Svetlana "Anna" Gouseva, whom he quickly married. His architectural studies were brought to an abrupt end with the onset of the war and he was drafted into the military. However, rather than be sent to the front lines, he was selected by the NKVD for
20196-471: Was developed that used uranium-235 . Three methods were employed for uranium enrichment : electromagnetic , gaseous , and thermal . In parallel with the work on uranium was an effort to produce plutonium. After the feasibility of the world's first artificial nuclear reactor, the Chicago Pile-1 , was demonstrated in 1942 at the Metallurgical Laboratory in the University of Chicago , the project designed
20349-562: Was empowered to engage in research and large engineering projects. The NDRC Committee on Uranium became the S-1 Section of the OSRD; the word "uranium" was dropped for security reasons. In July 1941, Briggs proposed spending $ 167,000 on researching uranium, particularly the uranium-235 isotope, and plutonium , which had been isolated for the first time at the University of California in February 1941. In Britain, Frisch and Rudolf Peierls at
20502-418: Was engaged in atomic fission research at its Montreal Laboratory . Canada also lacked effective security measures and, unlike the United States or the United Kingdom, it did not have the resources to mount effective counterintelligence operations. By the later years of the war, RCMP resources were spread thin guarding military installations and it was unable to provide effective screening for new hires within
20655-478: Was frequent as the two agencies competed for informants. Staff would frequently undermine each other by reporting even minor infractions to Moscow. Responsibility for Embassy staff technically fell to Pavlov, although he and Zabotin rarely spoke to each other. Some of the Canadians recruited by the GRU were charged with managing the activities of other agents. One of these individuals was Gordon Lunan , an officer with
20808-512: Was headed by two judges of the Supreme Court of Canada : Robert Taschereau and Roy Kellock . The investigations led to the arrest of 21 people, along with 11 convictions. Among them was the Labor-Progressive Party (LPP) member of Parliament for Cartier , Fred Rose . Other notable people among those accused of passing over secrets were Canadian Army Captain Gordon Lunan , and Sam Carr ,
20961-547: Was ideal. Patterson approved the acquisition of the site on 25 November 1942, authorizing $ 440,000 for the purchase of pre-calculated 54,000 acres (22,000 ha), all but 8,900 acres (3,600 ha) of which were already owned by the Federal Government. Secretary of Agriculture Claude R. Wickard granted about 45,000 acres (18,000 ha) of United States Forest Service land to the War Department "for so long as
21114-420: Was initially reluctant to provide the Soviets with further aid, as he feared he was under RCMP surveillance, but ultimately agreed to co-operate. He was tasked with obtaining secret information on nuclear technology from the Montreal and Chicago laboratories, which he visited several times in 1944 and 1945. Nunn May was ultimately able to supply the Soviets with samples of uranium. Embassy staff, unfamiliar with
21267-521: Was leery of contacting agents directly. Both men were actively involved in Marxist study groups in Montreal, Toronto, and Ottawa and, as such, had a broad array of connections with civil servants, academics, and scientists with sympathies to the Soviet Union. In August 1943, when Rose was elected to Parliament, Pavel Mikhailov, a GRU rezident based in New York who oversaw GRU activities in North America, wrote in
21420-589: Was nothing they could do, but agreed to patrol the neighbourhood during the night. Meanwhile, the RCMP was maintaining its surveillance and had stationed officers in Dundonald Park across the street from Gouzenko's apartment building. The details of Gouzenko's movements had been filtering back to Robertson throughout the day and, that evening, he consulted an "eminent officer of the British Secret Service." Gouzenko's disappearance had not gone unnoticed at
21573-400: Was originally supposed to be a three-year tour of duty. No explanation was given for the sudden change in plans. Transfers to and from Soviet postings abroad were not uncommon, as the Soviet government was leery of their staff developing ties to the countries to which they were assigned. However, a recall could also have meant his loyalty had been called into question, meaning he could be sent to
21726-443: Was put aside to concentrate on producing fission bombs. Teller raised the speculative possibility that an atomic bomb might "ignite" the atmosphere because of a hypothetical fusion reaction of nitrogen nuclei. Bethe calculated that it was "extremely unlikely". A postwar report co-authored by Teller concluded that "whatever the temperature to which a section of the atmosphere may be heated, no self-propagating chain of nuclear reactions
21879-452: Was quickly running out, but he did not yet feel he was in a position to barter with Canadian officials. The full extent of the Soviet Union's espionage activities within Canada is not known since Russian records remain classified. However, it appears the GRU had limited success in obtaining secret information. Canadian scientists played only a peripheral role in American nuclear research. Furthermore, Embassy staff were more interested in enjoying
22032-408: Was reluctant to share its technological lead and help the United States develop its own atomic bomb. But the British, who had made significant advances in research early in the war, did not have the resources to carry through such a research program into development while a large portion of their economy was engaged in fighting the war; Tube Alloys soon fell behind its American counterpart. The roles of
22185-421: Was required. He spoke to Harvey Bundy and Generals Marshall, Somervell, and Styer about his concerns, advocating that the project be placed under a senior policy committee, with a prestigious officer, preferably Styer, as director. Somervell and Styer selected Groves for the post; General Marshall ordered that he be promoted to brigadier general, as it was felt that the title "general" would hold more sway with
22338-441: Was saying. Gouzenko's frantic state made communication even more difficult. Gouzenko kept repeating in a barely intelligible voice, "It's war. It's war. It's Russia." After ten minutes, Frowde abandoned hope of making sense of the situation and directed Gouzenko to the RCMP headquarters nearby. Gouzenko, still worried the NKVD had infiltrated the RCMP, instead headed to the Department of Justice building on Wellington Street . However,
22491-455: Was scheduled to take over his responsibilities on Thursday, September 6 and, as of that date, he would no longer have access to the secret material stored in the coding room. Furthermore, with his primary responsibilities lifted, he would no longer have an excuse to enter the Embassy after hours. He had decided to defect on a Wednesday, since Zabotin had regular offsite meetings on Thursday so any missing documents would not be noticed until later in
22644-421: Was tasked with gathering information about radar technology, explosives, and, in particular, the atomic bomb. He was also instructed to recruit Canadian researchers and civil servants who would provide information during and after the war. Zabotin was considerably less cautious than Sokolov. He opted to have Embassy staff deal with agents directly rather than through intermediaries. He also struck up an affair with
22797-417: Was therefore a success; key American physicists were now aware of the potential power of an atomic bomb. On 9 October 1941, President Roosevelt approved the atomic program after he convened a meeting with Vannevar Bush and Vice President Henry A. Wallace . He created a Top Policy Group consisting of himself—although he never attended a meeting—Wallace, Bush, Conant, Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson , and
22950-469: Was to have been a military laboratory with Oppenheimer and other researchers commissioned into the Army, but Robert Bacher and Isidor Rabi balked at the idea and convinced Oppenheimer that other scientists would object. Conant, Groves, and Oppenheimer then devised a compromise whereby the laboratory was operated by the University of California under contract to the War Department. Dorothy McKibbin ran
23103-606: Was told they did not deal with immigration and to try the Canadian Crown Attorney's Office on Nicholas Street instead. Gouzenko and his family arrived at the Crown Attorney's Office at around 2:00 pm, but they were told the immigration process could take months. By chance, they encountered Fernande Coulson (née Joubarne), a secretary with several contacts in the media, the RCMP, and the federal government, who took their story seriously. She called over an acquaintance from
23256-410: Was too close to a major population center (Knoxville) in the unlikely event of a major nuclear accident. Groves recruited DuPont in November 1942 to be the prime contractor for the construction of the plutonium production complex. The President of the company, Walter S. Carpenter Jr. , wanted no profit of any kind; for legal reasons a nominal fee of one dollar was agreed upon. DuPont recommended that
23409-520: Was used for Chicago Pile 3 , the first reactor using heavy water and natural uranium, which went critical on 15 May 1944. The Chalk River, Ontario , site was established to rehouse the Allied effort at the Montreal Laboratory away from an urban area. A new community was built at Deep River, Ontario , to provide residences and facilities for the team members. The site was chosen for its proximity to
#551448