The Fuchs factor: Espionage, the Soviet atomic bomb and Anglo-American relations

Klaus Fuchs, born in 1911, was a communist and theoretical physicist. The Manhattan Project was infiltrated by a quiet, treacherous man who appeared loyal to his country. Fuchs also headed the British atomic bomb project at Harwell from 1946 until his arrest in 1949. The impact of Fuchs in theoretical physics, the atomic bombs of America, the Soviet Union and Britain is unprecedented. The impact of the Bomb did not just inject fear into Western allies and civilians of both the Soviet Union and America; it also resonated through popular culture, architecture, and the technological race which endeavoured space travel. This thesis examines Fuchs’s role in the Soviet atomic bomb project that conceived of Joe-1.

Although Fuchs’s treason is at the epicentre of its analysis, the thesis peripherally considers the successes of the FBI and MI5, and whether their security apparatuses were efficient in catching Fuchs. It also scrutinises Fuchs’s impact on Anglo-American relations and post-war foreign policy. Other spy cases in the early Cold War are addressed, and their overall impact on Anglo-American atomic relations considered. The thesis concludes with a consideration of Fuchs’s impact on intelligence relations between the American and British establishments.

Winner of the Lawrence Lyle Memorial Prize.