Heinz Pose
Encyclopedia
Rudolf Heinz Pose was a German
nuclear physicist.
He did pioneering work which contributed to the understanding nuclear energy levels. He worked on the German nuclear energy project Uranverein. After World War II
, the Soviet Union
sent him to establish and head Laboratory V in Obninsk
. From 1957, he was at the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research in Dubna
, Russia
. He settled in East Germany in 1959, and he held teaching posts and directed nuclear physics institutes at the Technische Hochschule Dresden
.
, mathematics
, and chemistry
at the University of Königsberg
, the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, the Georg-August University of Göttingen
, and the Martin Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg. He received his doctorate at Halle, in 1928, under the Nobel laureate in Physics
Gustav Hertz.
, who was doing research in nuclear reaction measurements. In 1929, Pose studied the nuclear reactions of aluminum nuclei bombarded with alpha particles. His experiments showed the existence of discrete energy levels in the nucleus. His pioneering work described for the first time the effect of resonance transformation in a nuclear process. On the basis of these works and his Habilitation
, Pose was awarded a teaching contract for atomic physics in 1934. He continued to study these nuclear reactions in other light (low atomic number) nuclei through the 1930s. In 1939, he was awarded an unscheduled/adjunct (außerplanmäßige) professorship at Halle.
During World War II, Pose was delegated to various organizations to carry on nuclear research and development activities. From 1940, he worked for the Kaiser-Wilhelm Gesellschaft’s
Institut für Physik (KWIP, Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Physics) on the German nuclear energy project Uranverein
. He worked with Werner Maurer on proof of spontaneous neutron emission of uranium
and thorium
. From 1942, he was at the Physikalisch-Technische Reichsanstalt
, where Abraham Esau
was President, and also held the title of Plenipotentiary (Bevollmächtiger) for Nuclear Physics - as such, he controlled German nuclear research. Some of the research was carried out at the Versuchsstelle (testing station) of the Heereswaffenamt (HWA, Army Ordnance Office) in Gottow; Kurt Diebner
, was director of the facility. The testing station is where Pose and Ernst Rexer
compared the effectiveness of neutron production in a paraffin-moderated reactor using uranium plates, rods, and cubes. Internal reports (See section below: Internal Reports.) on their activities were classified Top Secret and had limited distribution. The G-1 experiment performed at the HWA testing station had lattices of 6,800 uranium oxide cubes (about 25 tons) in the neutron moderator paraffin. Their work verified Karl Heinz Höcker’s
calculations that cubes were better than rods, and rods were better than plates. In June 1944, he went to the Physics Institute of the University of Leipzig
to work on cyclotron
development.
sent special search teams into Germany to locate and deport German nuclear scientists or any others who could be of use to the Soviet atomic bomb project
. The Russian Alsos
teams were headed by NKVD
Colonel General A. P. Zavenyagin and staffed with numerous scientists, from their only nuclear laboratory, attired in NKVD officer’s uniforms. In the autumn of 1945, Pose was offered the opportunity to work in the Soviet Union, which he accepted. He arrived in the Soviet Union, with his family, in February 1946. He was to establish and head Laboratory V (also known by the code name Malojaroslavets-10, after the nearby town by the same name) in Obninsk
. The scientific staff at Laboratory V was to be both Russian and German, the former being mostly political prisoners from the Gulag
or exiles; this type of facility is known as a sharashka
. (Laboratory B
in Sungul’ was also a sharashka and its personnel worked on the Soviet atomic bomb project. Notable Germans at Laboratory B were Hans-Joachim Born
, Alexander Catsch
, Nikolaus Riehl
, and Karl Zimmer
. Notable Russians from the Gulag were N. V. Timofeev-Resovskij and S. A. Voznesenskij.)
On 5 March 1946, in order to staff his laboratory, Pose and NKVD General Kravchenko, along with two other officers, went to Germany for six months to hire scientists. Additionally, Pose procured equipment from the companies AEG
, Zeiss, Schott Jena
, and Mansfeld, which were in the Russian occupation zone.
Pose planned 16 laboratories for his institute, which was to include a chemistry laboratory and eight laboratories. Three heads of laboratories, Czulius, Herrmann, and Rexer, were Pose’s colleagues who worked with him at the German Army’s testing station in Gottow, under the Uranverein project. (See below: Internal Reports.) Eight laboratories in the institute were:
While there were many eminent German scientists who went to the Soviet Union willingly, such Manfred von Ardenne
, Heinz Barwich
, Gustav Hertz, Nikolaus Riehl
, Peter Adolf Thiessen
, and Max Volmer
, the Russians were not above intimidation and the outright use of heavy-handed techniques. One can only imagine how intimidating it was to be invited to work in the Soviet Union by a uniformed (NKVD
) officer of a conquering military force, especially in the wake of the devastation and brutality of the Battle of Berlin
, one of the bloodiest conflicts in the closing months of the war and history itself. On the other end of the spectrum, the heavy-handed techniques were clearly demonstrated on a large scale, such as in Operation Osoaviakhim
in late 1946. Since Pose was on the staff of the German nuclear energy project Uranverein, he had intimate knowledge of scientists who would be useful as staff and laboratory heads in his facility in Obninsk. This included personnel such as Rexer, Herrmann, and Czulius, who worked with Pose at the German Army’s testing station in Gottow, under the Uranverein project, and had co-authored a classified nuclear energy report (see below) with him. Czulius, long after the war, remembered how an armed guard invited him to meet with an important Russian general in Berlin. When he got to Berlin, Czulius was told that the general was in Moscow, and he was sent there. When he got to Moscow, Czulius was informed that the general was busy, so he should get to work immediately, which he did.
While in Germany on his recruiting trip, Pose wrote a letter to the Physics Nobel Laureate
Werner Heisenberg
inviting him to work in Russia. The letter lauded the working conditions in Russian and the available resources, as well as the favorable attitude of the Russians towards German scientists. A courier hand delivered the recruitment letter to Heisenberg; Heisenberg politely declined in a return letter to Pose.
In 1947, Alexander Leipunski, scientific liaison of the Ninth Chief Directorate of the NKVD
since 1946, was assigned to Laboratory V. He eventually became the scientific director of the Institute of Power and Power Engineering, which was founded on the basis of Laboratory V. The Reactor Section of the Scientific Council of the First Chief Directorate of the NKVD, in May, assigned Leipunski and Laboratory V the tasking to develop nuclear reactors with beryllium
as a neutron moderator. Later, Laboratory V was charged with the development of a gas-cooled reactor using enriched uranium and beryllium as a moderator. Laboratory V was also assigned tasking for the studies of radiation biology and separation of radio isotopes, similar to the tasking given Nikolaus Riehl’s
Laboratory B in Sungul'.
Other personnel in Pose's Laboratory V were Wolfgang Burkhardt, Dr. Baroni, Dr. Ernst Busse, Dr. Hans Keppel, Dr. Willi Haupt, Dr. Karl-Heinrich Riewe
, Dr. Eng. Herbert Thieme (formerly with Nikolaus Riehl
at Plant No. 12 in Ehlektrostal'
), Dr. Hans Gerhard Krüger (formerly with Gustav Hertz at Institute G), Dr. Helene Külz, Dr. Hellmut Scheffers, and Dr. Renger.
In 1952, most of the German scientists left Laboratory V for a facility in Sukhumi
, where they remained in quarantine until returning to Germany in 1955. However, Pose remained at Laboratory V until 1955, when he then went to the Laboratory for Nuclear Problems, now the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research
, in Dubna
.
In 1957, while still at the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research, Pose became a professor for special areas of nuclear physics at the Technische Hochschule
Dresden.
After closing the Faculty for Nuclear Technology in 1962, Pose transferred to the directorship of the Institut für experimentelle Kernphysik (Institute for Experimental Nuclear Physics) and the teaching chair of the same name at the Technische Hochschule. He held these positions until 1970.
When released from the Soviet Union in 1953, Werner, returned to Germany. Since his family lived in West Germany
, he was sent there. Werner passed through the Friedland Camp upon entering West Germany. There, the Scientific and Technical Intelligence Branch (STIB) of the Control Commission for Germany - British Element, recognized his potential and took an interest in him. So did the “Org”, the Gehlen Organization
, which would later become the Bundesnachrichtendienst
(BND, West German Federal Intelligence Service). Werner was eventually used by the CIA to try to induce Pose to defect to the United States in 1958. Pose rebuffed the attempt.
The Org and STIB had an interest in a chemist in Obninsk who Werner knew. When the chemist was allowed to go to Germany in 1955, Werner introduced the chemist to representatives from the Org and STIB. Unfortunately for Werner, the chemist had been recruited by the Ministerium für Staatssicherheit (MfS, Ministry for State Security) of East Germany. This eventually resulted in Werner being arrested by the MfS when he tried to cross over into East Germany. Werner was tried in April 1959 and sentenced to six years in prison.
(Research Reports in Nuclear Physics), an internal publication of the German Uranverein
. The reports were classified Top Secret, they had very limited distribution, and the authors were not allowed to keep copies. The reports were confiscated under the Allied Operation Alsos
and sent to the United States Atomic Energy Commission
for evaluation. In 1971, the reports were declassified and returned to Germany. The reports are available at the Karlsruhe Nuclear Research Center and the American Institute of Physics
.
Germans
The Germans are a Germanic ethnic group native to Central Europe. The English term Germans has referred to the German-speaking population of the Holy Roman Empire since the Late Middle Ages....
nuclear physicist.
He did pioneering work which contributed to the understanding nuclear energy levels. He worked on the German nuclear energy project Uranverein. After World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
sent him to establish and head Laboratory V in Obninsk
Obninsk
Obninsk is a city in Kaluga Oblast, Russia, located southwest of Moscow. Population: Obninsk is one of the major Russian science cities. The first nuclear power plant in the world for the large-scale production of electricity opened here on June 27, 1954, and it also doubled as a training...
. From 1957, he was at the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research in Dubna
Dubna
Dubna is a town in Moscow Oblast, Russia. It has a status of naukograd , being home to the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research, an international nuclear physics research centre and one of the largest scientific foundations in the country. It is also home to MKB Raduga, a defence aerospace company...
, Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
. He settled in East Germany in 1959, and he held teaching posts and directed nuclear physics institutes at the Technische Hochschule Dresden
Dresden
Dresden is the capital city of the Free State of Saxony in Germany. It is situated in a valley on the River Elbe, near the Czech border. The Dresden conurbation is part of the Saxon Triangle metropolitan area....
.
Education
Pose studied physicsPhysics
Physics is a natural science that involves the study of matter and its motion through spacetime, along with related concepts such as energy and force. More broadly, it is the general analysis of nature, conducted in order to understand how the universe behaves.Physics is one of the oldest academic...
, mathematics
Mathematics
Mathematics is the study of quantity, space, structure, and change. Mathematicians seek out patterns and formulate new conjectures. Mathematicians resolve the truth or falsity of conjectures by mathematical proofs, which are arguments sufficient to convince other mathematicians of their validity...
, and chemistry
Chemistry
Chemistry is the science of matter, especially its chemical reactions, but also its composition, structure and properties. Chemistry is concerned with atoms and their interactions with other atoms, and particularly with the properties of chemical bonds....
at the University of Königsberg
University of Königsberg
The University of Königsberg was the university of Königsberg in East Prussia. It was founded in 1544 as second Protestant academy by Duke Albert of Prussia, and was commonly known as the Albertina....
, the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, the Georg-August University of Göttingen
Georg-August University of Göttingen
The University of Göttingen , known informally as Georgia Augusta, is a university in the city of Göttingen, Germany.Founded in 1734 by King George II of Great Britain and the Elector of Hanover, it opened for classes in 1737. The University of Göttingen soon grew in size and popularity...
, and the Martin Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg. He received his doctorate at Halle, in 1928, under the Nobel laureate in Physics
Nobel Prize in Physics
The Nobel Prize in Physics is awarded once a year by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. It is one of the five Nobel Prizes established by the will of Alfred Nobel in 1895 and awarded since 1901; the others are the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, Nobel Prize in Literature, Nobel Peace Prize, and...
Gustav Hertz.
Early years
From 1928 Pose was an unsalaried assistant and from 1930 a regular assistant to the physicist Gerhard HoffmannGerhard Hoffmann
Gerhard Hoffmann was a German nuclear physicist. During World War II, he contributed to the German nuclear energy project, also known as the Uranium Club.-Education:...
, who was doing research in nuclear reaction measurements. In 1929, Pose studied the nuclear reactions of aluminum nuclei bombarded with alpha particles. His experiments showed the existence of discrete energy levels in the nucleus. His pioneering work described for the first time the effect of resonance transformation in a nuclear process. On the basis of these works and his Habilitation
Habilitation
Habilitation is the highest academic qualification a scholar can achieve by his or her own pursuit in several European and Asian countries. Earned after obtaining a research doctorate, such as a PhD, habilitation requires the candidate to write a professorial thesis based on independent...
, Pose was awarded a teaching contract for atomic physics in 1934. He continued to study these nuclear reactions in other light (low atomic number) nuclei through the 1930s. In 1939, he was awarded an unscheduled/adjunct (außerplanmäßige) professorship at Halle.
During World War II, Pose was delegated to various organizations to carry on nuclear research and development activities. From 1940, he worked for the Kaiser-Wilhelm Gesellschaft’s
Kaiser Wilhelm Institute
The Kaiser Wilhelm Society for the Advancement of Science was a German scientific institution established in 1911. It was implicated in Nazi science, and after the Second World War was wound up and its functions replaced by the Max Planck Society...
Institut für Physik (KWIP, Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Physics) on the German nuclear energy project Uranverein
German nuclear energy project
The German nuclear energy project, , was an attempted clandestine scientific effort led by Germany to develop and produce the atomic weapons during the events involving the World War II...
. He worked with Werner Maurer on proof of spontaneous neutron emission of uranium
Uranium
Uranium is a silvery-white metallic chemical element in the actinide series of the periodic table, with atomic number 92. It is assigned the chemical symbol U. A uranium atom has 92 protons and 92 electrons, of which 6 are valence electrons...
and thorium
Thorium
Thorium is a natural radioactive chemical element with the symbol Th and atomic number 90. It was discovered in 1828 and named after Thor, the Norse god of thunder....
. From 1942, he was at the Physikalisch-Technische Reichsanstalt
Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt
The Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt is based in Braunschweig and Berlin. It is the national institute for natural and engineering sciences and the highest technical authority for metrology and physical safety engineering in Germany....
, where Abraham Esau
Abraham Esau
Robert Abraham Esau was a German physicist.After receipt of his doctorate from the University of Berlin, Esau worked at Telefunken, where he pioneered very high frequency waves used in radar, radio, and television, and he was president of the Deutscher Telefunken Verband...
was President, and also held the title of Plenipotentiary (Bevollmächtiger) for Nuclear Physics - as such, he controlled German nuclear research. Some of the research was carried out at the Versuchsstelle (testing station) of the Heereswaffenamt (HWA, Army Ordnance Office) in Gottow; Kurt Diebner
Kurt Diebner
Kurt Diebner was a German nuclear physicist who is well known for directing and administrating the German nuclear energy project, a secretive program aiming to built weapon of mass destruction for the Nazi Germany during the course of World War II...
, was director of the facility. The testing station is where Pose and Ernst Rexer
Ernst Rexer
Ernst Rexer was a German nuclear physicist. He worked on the German nuclear energy program during World War II. After the war, he was sent to Laboratory V, in Obninsk, to work on the Soviet atomic bomb project...
compared the effectiveness of neutron production in a paraffin-moderated reactor using uranium plates, rods, and cubes. Internal reports (See section below: Internal Reports.) on their activities were classified Top Secret and had limited distribution. The G-1 experiment performed at the HWA testing station had lattices of 6,800 uranium oxide cubes (about 25 tons) in the neutron moderator paraffin. Their work verified Karl Heinz Höcker’s
Karl-Heinz Höcker
Karl-Heinz Höcker was a German theoretical nuclear physicist who worked in the German Uranverein. After World War II, he worked at the university of Stuttgart and was the founder of the Institut für Kernenergetik und Energiesysteme.-Education:From 1935 to 1940, Höcker studied at the University of...
calculations that cubes were better than rods, and rods were better than plates. In June 1944, he went to the Physics Institute of the University of Leipzig
University of Leipzig
The University of Leipzig , located in Leipzig in the Free State of Saxony, Germany, is one of the oldest universities in the world and the second-oldest university in Germany...
to work on cyclotron
Cyclotron
In technology, a cyclotron is a type of particle accelerator. In physics, the cyclotron frequency or gyrofrequency is the frequency of a charged particle moving perpendicularly to the direction of a uniform magnetic field, i.e. a magnetic field of constant magnitude and direction...
development.
In Russia
Near the close of World War II, the Soviet UnionSoviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
sent special search teams into Germany to locate and deport German nuclear scientists or any others who could be of use to the Soviet atomic bomb project
Soviet atomic bomb project
The Soviet project to develop an atomic bomb , was a clandestine research and development program began during and post-World War II, in the wake of the Soviet Union's discovery of the United States' nuclear project...
. The Russian Alsos
Russian Alsos
The Russian Alsos was an operation which took place in early 1945 in Germany, Austria, and Czechoslovakia, and whose objectives were the exploitation of German atomic related facilities, intellectual materials, materiel resources, and scientific personnel for the benefit of the Soviet atomic bomb...
teams were headed by NKVD
NKVD
The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs was the public and secret police organization of the Soviet Union that directly executed the rule of power of the Soviets, including political repression, during the era of Joseph Stalin....
Colonel General A. P. Zavenyagin and staffed with numerous scientists, from their only nuclear laboratory, attired in NKVD officer’s uniforms. In the autumn of 1945, Pose was offered the opportunity to work in the Soviet Union, which he accepted. He arrived in the Soviet Union, with his family, in February 1946. He was to establish and head Laboratory V (also known by the code name Malojaroslavets-10, after the nearby town by the same name) in Obninsk
Obninsk
Obninsk is a city in Kaluga Oblast, Russia, located southwest of Moscow. Population: Obninsk is one of the major Russian science cities. The first nuclear power plant in the world for the large-scale production of electricity opened here on June 27, 1954, and it also doubled as a training...
. The scientific staff at Laboratory V was to be both Russian and German, the former being mostly political prisoners from the Gulag
Gulag
The Gulag was the government agency that administered the main Soviet forced labor camp systems. While the camps housed a wide range of convicts, from petty criminals to political prisoners, large numbers were convicted by simplified procedures, such as NKVD troikas and other instruments of...
or exiles; this type of facility is known as a sharashka
Sharashka
Sharashka was an informal name for secret research and development laboratories in the Soviet Gulag labor camp system...
. (Laboratory B
Laboratory B in Sungul’
Laboratory B in Sungul’ was one of the laboratories under the 9th Chief Directorate of the NKVD that contributed to the Soviet atomic bomb project. It was created in 1946 and closed in 1955, when some of its personnel were merged with the second Soviet nuclear design and assembly facility. It was...
in Sungul’ was also a sharashka and its personnel worked on the Soviet atomic bomb project. Notable Germans at Laboratory B were Hans-Joachim Born
Hans-Joachim Born
Hans-Joachim Born was a German radiochemist trained and educated at the Kaiser-Wilhelm-Institut für Chemie. Up to the end of World War II, he worked in Nikolaj Vladimirovich Timofeev-Resovskij’s Abteilung für Experimentelle Genetik, at the Kaiser-Wilhelm-Institut für Hirnforschung. He was taken...
, Alexander Catsch
Alexander Catsch
Alexander Catsch was a German-Russian medical doctor and radiation biologist. Up to the end of World War II, he worked in Nikolaj Vladimirovich Timefeev-Resovskij’s Abteilung für Experimentelle Genetik at the Kaiser-Wilhelm-Institut für Hirnforschung...
, Nikolaus Riehl
Nikolaus Riehl
Nikolaus Riehl was a German industrial nuclear chemist. He was head of the scientific headquarters of Auergesellschaft. When the Russians entered Berlin near the end of World War II, he was invited to the Soviet Union, where he stayed for 10 years...
, and Karl Zimmer
Karl Zimmer
Karl Günter Zimmer was a German physicist and radiation biologist, known for his work on the effects of ionizing radiation on DNA. In 1935, he published the major work, Über die Natur der Genmutation und der Genstruktur, with N. V...
. Notable Russians from the Gulag were N. V. Timofeev-Resovskij and S. A. Voznesenskij.)
On 5 March 1946, in order to staff his laboratory, Pose and NKVD General Kravchenko, along with two other officers, went to Germany for six months to hire scientists. Additionally, Pose procured equipment from the companies AEG
AEG
Allgemeine Elektricitäts-Gesellschaft was a German producer of electrical equipment founded in 1883 by Emil Rathenau....
, Zeiss, Schott Jena
Schott Glass
SCHOTT AG is a German manufacturer of high-quality industrial glass products, its main markets are household appliances, pharmaceutical industries, solar energy, electronics, optics as well as automotive...
, and Mansfeld, which were in the Russian occupation zone.
Pose planned 16 laboratories for his institute, which was to include a chemistry laboratory and eight laboratories. Three heads of laboratories, Czulius, Herrmann, and Rexer, were Pose’s colleagues who worked with him at the German Army’s testing station in Gottow, under the Uranverein project. (See below: Internal Reports.) Eight laboratories in the institute were:
- Heinz Pose’s laboratory for nuclear processes.
- Werner Czulius’s laboratory for uranium reactors.
- Walter Herrmann’sWalter Herrmann (physicist)Walter Herrmann was a German nuclear physicist who worked on the German nuclear energy project during World War II...
laboratory for special issues of nuclear disintegration. - Westmayer’s laboratory for systematic nuclear reactions.
- Professor Carl Friedrich Weiss’s laboratory for the study of natural and artificial radioactivity.
- Schmidt’s laboratory to study methodologies for nuclear measurement.
- Professor Ernst Rexer’sErnst RexerErnst Rexer was a German nuclear physicist. He worked on the German nuclear energy program during World War II. After the war, he was sent to Laboratory V, in Obninsk, to work on the Soviet atomic bomb project...
laboratory for applied nuclear physics. - Hans Jürgen von Oertzen’s laboratory to study cyclotrons and high voltage.
While there were many eminent German scientists who went to the Soviet Union willingly, such Manfred von Ardenne
Manfred von Ardenne
Manfred von Ardenne was a German research and applied physicist and inventor. He took out approximately 600 patents in fields including electron microscopy, medical technology, nuclear technology, plasma physics, and radio and television technology...
, Heinz Barwich
Heinz Barwich
Heinz Barwich was a German nuclear physicist. He was deputy director of the Siemens Research Laboratory II in Berlin. At the close of World War II, he went to the Soviet Union for ten years to work on the Soviet atomic bomb project, for which he received a Stalin Prize...
, Gustav Hertz, Nikolaus Riehl
Nikolaus Riehl
Nikolaus Riehl was a German industrial nuclear chemist. He was head of the scientific headquarters of Auergesellschaft. When the Russians entered Berlin near the end of World War II, he was invited to the Soviet Union, where he stayed for 10 years...
, Peter Adolf Thiessen
Peter Adolf Thiessen
Peter Adolf Thiessen was a German physical chemist. He voluntarily went to the Soviet Union at the close of World War II, and he received high Soviet decorations and the Stalin Prize for contributions to the Soviet atomic bomb project.-Education:Thiessen was born in Schweidnitz .From 1919 to...
, and Max Volmer
Max Volmer
Max Volmer was a German physical chemist, who made important contributions in electrochemistry, in particular on electrode kinetics. He co-developed the Butler–Volmer equation. Volmer held the chair and directorship of the Physical Chemistry and Electrochemistry Institute of the Technische...
, the Russians were not above intimidation and the outright use of heavy-handed techniques. One can only imagine how intimidating it was to be invited to work in the Soviet Union by a uniformed (NKVD
NKVD
The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs was the public and secret police organization of the Soviet Union that directly executed the rule of power of the Soviets, including political repression, during the era of Joseph Stalin....
) officer of a conquering military force, especially in the wake of the devastation and brutality of the Battle of Berlin
Battle of Berlin
The Battle of Berlin, designated the Berlin Strategic Offensive Operation by the Soviet Union, was the final major offensive of the European Theatre of World War II....
, one of the bloodiest conflicts in the closing months of the war and history itself. On the other end of the spectrum, the heavy-handed techniques were clearly demonstrated on a large scale, such as in Operation Osoaviakhim
Operation Osoaviakhim
Operation Osoaviakhim was a Soviet operation which took place on 22 October 1946, with NKVD and Soviet army units recruiting thousands of military-related technical specialists from the Soviet occupation zone of post-World-War-II Germany for employment in the Soviet Union...
in late 1946. Since Pose was on the staff of the German nuclear energy project Uranverein, he had intimate knowledge of scientists who would be useful as staff and laboratory heads in his facility in Obninsk. This included personnel such as Rexer, Herrmann, and Czulius, who worked with Pose at the German Army’s testing station in Gottow, under the Uranverein project, and had co-authored a classified nuclear energy report (see below) with him. Czulius, long after the war, remembered how an armed guard invited him to meet with an important Russian general in Berlin. When he got to Berlin, Czulius was told that the general was in Moscow, and he was sent there. When he got to Moscow, Czulius was informed that the general was busy, so he should get to work immediately, which he did.
While in Germany on his recruiting trip, Pose wrote a letter to the Physics Nobel Laureate
Nobel Prize in Physics
The Nobel Prize in Physics is awarded once a year by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. It is one of the five Nobel Prizes established by the will of Alfred Nobel in 1895 and awarded since 1901; the others are the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, Nobel Prize in Literature, Nobel Peace Prize, and...
Werner Heisenberg
Werner Heisenberg
Werner Karl Heisenberg was a German theoretical physicist who made foundational contributions to quantum mechanics and is best known for asserting the uncertainty principle of quantum theory...
inviting him to work in Russia. The letter lauded the working conditions in Russian and the available resources, as well as the favorable attitude of the Russians towards German scientists. A courier hand delivered the recruitment letter to Heisenberg; Heisenberg politely declined in a return letter to Pose.
In 1947, Alexander Leipunski, scientific liaison of the Ninth Chief Directorate of the NKVD
NKVD
The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs was the public and secret police organization of the Soviet Union that directly executed the rule of power of the Soviets, including political repression, during the era of Joseph Stalin....
since 1946, was assigned to Laboratory V. He eventually became the scientific director of the Institute of Power and Power Engineering, which was founded on the basis of Laboratory V. The Reactor Section of the Scientific Council of the First Chief Directorate of the NKVD, in May, assigned Leipunski and Laboratory V the tasking to develop nuclear reactors with beryllium
Beryllium
Beryllium is the chemical element with the symbol Be and atomic number 4. It is a divalent element which occurs naturally only in combination with other elements in minerals. Notable gemstones which contain beryllium include beryl and chrysoberyl...
as a neutron moderator. Later, Laboratory V was charged with the development of a gas-cooled reactor using enriched uranium and beryllium as a moderator. Laboratory V was also assigned tasking for the studies of radiation biology and separation of radio isotopes, similar to the tasking given Nikolaus Riehl’s
Nikolaus Riehl
Nikolaus Riehl was a German industrial nuclear chemist. He was head of the scientific headquarters of Auergesellschaft. When the Russians entered Berlin near the end of World War II, he was invited to the Soviet Union, where he stayed for 10 years...
Laboratory B in Sungul'.
Other personnel in Pose's Laboratory V were Wolfgang Burkhardt, Dr. Baroni, Dr. Ernst Busse, Dr. Hans Keppel, Dr. Willi Haupt, Dr. Karl-Heinrich Riewe
Karl-Heinrich Riewe
Karl-Heinrich Riewe was a German physicist. After World War II, he was sent to Russia to work on the Soviet atomic bomb project. After going on strike at a defense related facility in 1948, he was accused of sabotage...
, Dr. Eng. Herbert Thieme (formerly with Nikolaus Riehl
Nikolaus Riehl
Nikolaus Riehl was a German industrial nuclear chemist. He was head of the scientific headquarters of Auergesellschaft. When the Russians entered Berlin near the end of World War II, he was invited to the Soviet Union, where he stayed for 10 years...
at Plant No. 12 in Ehlektrostal'
Elektrostal
Elektrostal , known as Zatishye until 1938, is a city in Moscow Oblast, Russia, located east of Moscow. Population: 135,000 ; 123,000 ; 97,000 ; 43,000 . Town status was granted to it in 1938.-Industry:...
), Dr. Hans Gerhard Krüger (formerly with Gustav Hertz at Institute G), Dr. Helene Külz, Dr. Hellmut Scheffers, and Dr. Renger.
In 1952, most of the German scientists left Laboratory V for a facility in Sukhumi
Sukhumi
Sukhumi is the capital of Abkhazia, a disputed region on the Black Sea coast. The city suffered heavily during the Georgian-Abkhaz conflict in the early 1990s.-Naming:...
, where they remained in quarantine until returning to Germany in 1955. However, Pose remained at Laboratory V until 1955, when he then went to the Laboratory for Nuclear Problems, now the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research
Joint Institute for Nuclear Research
The Joint Institute for Nuclear Research, JINR , in Dubna, Moscow Oblast , Russia, is an international research centre for nuclear sciences, with 5500 staff members, 1200 researchers including 1000 Ph.D.s from eighteen member states The Joint Institute for Nuclear Research, JINR , in Dubna, Moscow...
, in Dubna
Dubna
Dubna is a town in Moscow Oblast, Russia. It has a status of naukograd , being home to the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research, an international nuclear physics research centre and one of the largest scientific foundations in the country. It is also home to MKB Raduga, a defence aerospace company...
.
In 1957, while still at the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research, Pose became a professor for special areas of nuclear physics at the Technische Hochschule
Technische Hochschule
Technische Hochschule is what an Institute of Technology used to be called in German-speaking countries, as well as in the Netherlands, before most of them changed their name to Technische Universität or Technische Universiteit in the 1970s and in the...
Dresden.
In East Germany
In 1959 Pose returned to Germany and settled in Dresden, East Germany. In addition to continuing his teaching at the Technische Hochschule, he became the first director of the Instituts für Allgemeine Kerntechnik (Institute for General Nuclear Technology), whose chair for Neutron Physics of Reactors he also took over. At the same time, he became Dean of the Faculty for Nuclear Technology, which was created in 1955.After closing the Faculty for Nuclear Technology in 1962, Pose transferred to the directorship of the Institut für experimentelle Kernphysik (Institute for Experimental Nuclear Physics) and the teaching chair of the same name at the Technische Hochschule. He held these positions until 1970.
Declined Defection
At the close of World War II, Pose’s brother, Werner, was a prisoner of war of the Russians. Pose arranged for Werner to be transferred to Obninsk and he employed Werner as a technician in Laboratory V.When released from the Soviet Union in 1953, Werner, returned to Germany. Since his family lived in West Germany
West Germany
West Germany is the common English, but not official, name for the Federal Republic of Germany or FRG in the period between its creation in May 1949 to German reunification on 3 October 1990....
, he was sent there. Werner passed through the Friedland Camp upon entering West Germany. There, the Scientific and Technical Intelligence Branch (STIB) of the Control Commission for Germany - British Element, recognized his potential and took an interest in him. So did the “Org”, the Gehlen Organization
Reinhard Gehlen
Reinhard Gehlen was a General in the German Army during World War II, who served as chief of intelligence-gathering on the Eastern Front. After the war, he was recruited by the United States military to set up a spy ring directed against the Soviet Union , and eventually became head of the West...
, which would later become the Bundesnachrichtendienst
Bundesnachrichtendienst
The Bundesnachrichtendienst [ˌbʊndəsˈnaːχʁɪçtnˌdiːnst] is the foreign intelligence agency of Germany, directly subordinated to the Chancellor's Office. Its headquarters are in Pullach near Munich, and Berlin . The BND has 300 locations in Germany and foreign countries...
(BND, West German Federal Intelligence Service). Werner was eventually used by the CIA to try to induce Pose to defect to the United States in 1958. Pose rebuffed the attempt.
The Org and STIB had an interest in a chemist in Obninsk who Werner knew. When the chemist was allowed to go to Germany in 1955, Werner introduced the chemist to representatives from the Org and STIB. Unfortunately for Werner, the chemist had been recruited by the Ministerium für Staatssicherheit (MfS, Ministry for State Security) of East Germany. This eventually resulted in Werner being arrested by the MfS when he tried to cross over into East Germany. Werner was tried in April 1959 and sentenced to six years in prison.
Internal Reports
The following reports were published in Kernphysikalische ForschungsberichteKernphysikalische Forschungsberichte
Kernphysikalische Forschungsberichte was an internal publication of the German Uranverein, which was initiated under the Heereswaffenamt in 1939; in 1942, supervision of the Uranverein was turned over to the Reichsforschungsrat under the Reichserziehungsministerium...
(Research Reports in Nuclear Physics), an internal publication of the German Uranverein
German nuclear energy project
The German nuclear energy project, , was an attempted clandestine scientific effort led by Germany to develop and produce the atomic weapons during the events involving the World War II...
. The reports were classified Top Secret, they had very limited distribution, and the authors were not allowed to keep copies. The reports were confiscated under the Allied Operation Alsos
Operation Alsos
Operation Alsos was an effort at the end of World War II by the Allies , branched off from the Manhattan Project, to investigate the German nuclear energy project, seize German nuclear resources, materials and personnel to further American research and to prevent their capture by the Soviets, and...
and sent to the United States Atomic Energy Commission
United States Atomic Energy Commission
The United States Atomic Energy Commission was an agency of the United States government established after World War II by Congress to foster and control the peace time development of atomic science and technology. President Harry S...
for evaluation. In 1971, the reports were declassified and returned to Germany. The reports are available at the Karlsruhe Nuclear Research Center and the American Institute of Physics
American Institute of Physics
The American Institute of Physics promotes science, the profession of physics, publishes physics journals, and produces publications for scientific and engineering societies. The AIP is made up of various member societies...
.
- F. Berkei, W. Borrmann, W. Czulius, Kurt Diebner, Georg Hartwig, K. H. Höcker, W. Herrmann, H. Pose, and Ernst Rexer Bericht über einen Würfelversuch mit Uranoxyd und Paraffin (dated before 26 November 1942). G-125.
- Heinz Pose and Ernst Rexer Versuche mit verschiedenen geometrischen Anordnungen von Uranoxyd und Paraffin (12 October 1943). G-240.
Selected Literature
- Heinz Pose Experimentelle Untersuchungen über die Diffusion langsamer Elektronen in Edelgasen Zeitschrift für Physik, Volume 52, Issue 5-6, 428-447 (1929)
- Heinz Pose Messung einzelner Korpuskularstrahlen bei Anwesenheit intensiver Gamma - Strahlen, Zschr. Physik Volume 102, Numbers 5 & 6, 379-407 (1936)
- Rudolph H. Pose Vospominanija ob Obninske (Reminiscences of Obninsk) in History of the Soviet Atomic Project - 1996, Proceedings 2 (IzdAt, 1999)
Books
- Heinz Pose Einführung in die Physik des Atomkerns (Deutscher Verlag der Wissenschaften, 1971)
External links
- Pose – Catalogus Professorum Halensis
- Pose Centenary – Dresdner Universitäts Journal 5 April 2005