World War II (1931-1945)
“The Second World War presented a mirror to the human condition which blinded anyone who looked into it.” — Norman Mailer, “The White Negro: Superficial Reflections on the Hipster” (1957)
Of the endless ocean of books on the Second World War, we have dozens and dozens of new and carefully chosen titles. I define it as beginning with the Japanese Empire’s invasion of Manchuria and ending with not only V-E and V-J Days but also the immediate crises of displaced people, the Soviet Union’s creation of the Iron Curtain, and the growing revelations of the extent of the Holocaust.
In significant ways the Second World War was the defining crucible of the 20th Century. The First World War was prelude, the legacy of the 19th Century’s imperialism, and the Cold War was the sequel. Of the making of books about it there is no end — but the persistence of good research and good writing, and good publication underscores the war’s centrality of the world we live in today and the world our descendents will live in for the foreseeable future.
Hitler's Atomic Bomb: History, Legend, and the Twin Legacies of Auschwitz and Hiroshima
Hitler's Atomic Bomb: History, Legend, and the Twin Legacies of Auschwitz and Hiroshima
Who were the German scientists who worked on atomic bombs during World War II for Hitler's regime? How did they justify themselves afterwards? Examining the global influence of the German uranium project and postwar reactions to the scientists involved, Mark Walker explores the narratives surrounding 'Hitler's bomb'. The global impacts of this project were cataclysmic. Credible reports of German developments spurred the American Manhattan Project, the nuclear attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and in turn the Soviet efforts. After the war these scientists' work was overshadowed by the twin shocks of Auschwitz and Hiroshima. Hitler's Atomic Bomb sheds light on the postwar criticism and subsequent rehabilitation of the German scientists, including the controversial legend of Werner Heisenberg and Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker's visit to occupied Copenhagen in 1941. This scientifically accurate but non-technical history examines the impact of German efforts to harness nuclear fission, and the surrounding debates and legends.
Reviews
‘Hitler’s Atomic Bomb is a masterful account of the German nuclear program in history and mythology. Based on the latest research, Walker demonstrates that Nazi Germany never had the resources to build a bomb, but that possibility haunted and divided physicists long after the war.’
Michael J. Neufeld - author of Von Braun: Dreamer of Space, Engineer of War
‘In the most comprehensive history yet of the German wartime nuclear fission project, Mark Walker masterfully explores the origins of the project and its failure to achieve an atomic bomb; the scientists’ difficulties and dilemmas encountered before, during and after the Third Reich; and the valuable lessons for us all.’
David Cassidy - author of Beyond Uncertainty: Heisenberg, Quantum Physics, and the Bomb
‘There’s more to the story of Hitler’s scientists than whether they knew how to build an atomic bomb. They navigated the politics of the Third Reich, kept working as their world collapsed, and later tried to rebuild their reputations. Mark Walker weighs in on this controversial history and offers a scathing portrait of science under National Socialism.’
Jacob Darwin Hamblin - author of The Wretched Atom: America’s Global Gamble with Peaceful Nuclear Technology