Rainer Karlsch

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Rainer Karlsch (born April 3, 1957 in Stendal ) is a German economic historian who became known in particular for a controversial study on the development of a German atomic bomb in World War II.

Life

Karlsch studied economic history at the Humboldt University in Berlin and was awarded a Dr. oec. PhD. He then worked at the Chair for Economic and Social History at the Humboldt University in Berlin, the Historical Commission in Berlin and the Free University of Berlin .

plant

Karlsch came to the fore through several publications on economic history.

For his book “Paid alone? The reparations payments of the Soviet occupation zone / GDR 1945–53 ” (1993) he received the First Prize of the Stinnes Foundation in 1996 .

Other books written or edited by him are: Radiant Past. Studies on the history of uranium mining in Wismut (1996), Urangeecheimnisse. The Ore Mountains in the focus of world politics (2002, together with Zbyněk Zeman), Soviet dismantling in Germany 1944–1949 (2002, together with Jochen Laufer) and factor oil. The mineral oil industry in Germany 1859–1974 (2003, together with Raymond Stokes).

Controversy on the development of nuclear weapons in the Third Reich

In his most famous book, Hitler's bomb. Karlsch reinterprets German arms research during the last two years of the Nazi regime in the secret history of German nuclear weapons tests . For a long time the uranium project led by Werner Heisenberg and Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker had been the focus of interest (for a summary of the work of the uranium project, see the study by Mark Walker ). Karlsch shows that other groups also researched nuclear technology and not only focused their attention on a functional reactor, but also worked consciously and purposefully on the development of weapons.

Karlsch found new sources that should support his theses, such as the draft of a patent for a nuclear weapon with plutonium and several reports from the Soviet secret service, which Stalin and a scientific assessment of an allegedly carried out "nuclear test" in Thuringia were brought to the knowledge. There have been successful tests of small atomic test arrangements, although the scientists in the “Third Reich” only managed to produce small amounts of enriched material. Reference is made to the material from the centrifuge tests by Paul Harteck , whose whereabouts have not yet been clarified.

According to current doctrine, several dozen kilos of uranium-235 or plutonium are required, each of which must have an enrichment level of more than 90 percent, in order to generate an explosion that is comparable to the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki . Karlsch postulates a third possibility to manufacture an atomic weapon: by the fusion of light elements, which come about through a nuclear shaped charge . German researchers succeeded in producing a nuclear weapon and successfully testing it in Thuringia in March 1945. With an effective radius of 500 meters, this only had the effect of a tactical nuclear weapon . Many physicists doubt or deny that this is physically and weapon-technically possible.

In a review of this book in December 2005, two scientists from the Max Planck Institute wrote that the bomb claimed by Karlsch “simply didn't exist”: “Contrary to the publisher's announcement, the history of uranium research in the Third Reich does not have to be rewritten - but under the Impression of Karlsch's research results very precisely specified and updated. At the same time, the new legends, which the book at hand encourages, should wander into the orcus of the history of science. "

In 2005, the Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt (PTB) in Braunschweig , on behalf of the ZDF, examined randomly near-surface soil samples from Ohrdruf for radionuclides that would have occurred after a nuclear explosion alleged by Karlsch. In February 2006 the PTB announced that the measured values ​​had not given any indications "that sources other than the fallout of above-ground atomic bomb tests in the 1950s / 1960s and the reactor accident in Chernobyl in 1986 were responsible for the soil contamination"; for a suspected nuclear explosion there are “no findings”. At the same time, a scientific counter-evidence cannot be provided by such random sample analyzes: "A final assessment of the historical connections is still open."

As a result, the historian and journalist Sven Felix Kellerhoff ruled in 2014 that Karlsch, whom he considers a serious scientist, had “completely run off” and “ruined his reputation” with his book Die Bombe . The claim made by Karlsch that the Nazis had successfully tested a tactical nuclear weapon several times shortly before the end of the war is "nonsense".

Publications (selection)

  • Paid alone? The reparations payments of the Soviet occupation zone / GDR 1945–1953. Ch. Links, Berlin 1993, ISBN 3-86153-054-6 , (Reprint Elbe-Dnjepr-Verlag, Klitzschen 2004, ISBN 3-933395-51-8 ).
  • as editor with Harm Schröter: “Radiant Past”. Studies on the history of uranium mining in bismuth. Scripta Mercaturae, St. Katharinen 1996, ISBN 3-89590-030-3 .
  • with Raymond Stokes: The chemistry has to be right. Balance of change. 1990-2000. Edition Leipzig, Leipzig 2000, ISBN 3-361-00508-6 .
  • with Zbynek Zeman: Primal Secrets. The Ore Mountains in the focus of world politics 1933–1960. Ch. Links, Berlin 2002, ISBN 3-86153-276-X (4th, revised edition. Ibid 2010, ISBN 978-3-86153-276-7 ).
  • as editor with Jochen Laufer: Soviet dismantling in Germany 1944–1949. Background, goals and effects. Werner Matschke on his 90th birthday (= research on contemporary history. Vol. 17). Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 2002, ISBN 3-428-10739-X .
  • with Raymond G. Stokes: “Factor Oil”. The mineral oil industry in Germany 1859–1974. CH Beck, Munich 2003, ISBN 3-406-50276-8 .
  • Hitler's bomb. The secret history of the German nuclear weapon tests. Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, Munich 2005, ISBN 3-421-05809-1 (also: (= dtv non-fiction book 34403). Deutscher Taschenbuch-Verlag, Munich 2007, ISBN 3-423-34403-2 ; in Dutch: Hitler's bom. Hoe Nazi-Duitsland nucleaire wapens tested in een laatste wanhopige poging om de oorlog te winnen. Lannoo, Tielt 2005, ISBN 90-209-6299-X ; in Italian: La bomba di Hitler. Lindau, Torino 2006, ISBN 88-7180 -598-4 ; in Polish: Atomowa bomba Hitlera. Historia tajnych niemieckich prób z bronią jądrową. Województwo Dolnośląskie, Wrocław 2006, ISBN 83-7384-512-7 ).
  • with Michael Schäfer: Economic history of Saxony in the industrial age. Edition Leipzig, Leipzig 2006, ISBN 3-361-00598-1 .
  • Demography in the GDR. Social and theoretical aspects of the development of a scientific discipline (= Edition IFAD. Historical series. Vol. 7). Institute for Applied Demography, Berlin 2007, ISBN 978-3-940470-04-1 .
  • as editor with Heiko Petermann: Pros and Cons “Hitler's bomb”. Studies on atomic research in Germany (= Cottbus studies on the history of technology, work and the environment. Vol. 29). Waxmann, Münster et al. 2007, ISBN 978-3-8309-1893-6 .
  • Uranium for Moscow. The bismuth - a popular story. Ch. Links, Berlin 2007, ISBN 978-3-86153-427-3 (3rd, revised edition, ibid 2008).
  • From light to warmth. History of the East German Gas Industry 1855–2008. Nicolai'sche Verlagsbuchhandlung, Berlin 2008, ISBN 978-3-89479-490-3 .
  • with Zbynek Zeman: Uranium Matters. Central European Uranium in International Politics. 1900-1960. Central European University Press, Budapest et al. 2008, ISBN 978-963-977600-5 .
  • with Paul Werner Wagner : The Agfa-Orwo-Story. History of the Wolfen film factory and its successors. Verlag für Berlin-Brandenburg, Berlin 2010, ISBN 978-3-942476-04-1 .
  • as editor with Rudolf Boch: Uranium mining in the Cold War. 2 volumes, Ch. Links, Berlin 2011, ISBN 978-3-86153-653-6 .
  • Leuna - 100 years of chemistry. Janos Stekovics, 2016, ISBN 978-3-89923-355-1 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Vademecum of the historical sciences. Franz Steiner, Stuttgart 1996/97, p. 398.
  2. ↑ Albert Hoffmann, Albert Presas i Puig: Review of the book Hitler's bomb, the secret history of German nuclear weapons tests. ( Memento from April 2, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) In: Spectrum of Science No. 12, 2005.
  3. ↑ No trace of "Hitler's bomb" in soil samples. In: PTB.de , February 15, 2006.
  4. ^ Sven Felix Kellerhoff: Did the USA hide the chief engineer of the SS? In: Welt Online , June 10, 2014.
  5. ↑ Michael Salewski: Hitler's bomb makers . Review. In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung . No. 171 , July 26, 2005, p. 7 ( online [accessed August 20, 2019]).
personal data
SURNAME Karlsch, Rainer
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German economic historian, member of the chair for economic and social history at Humboldt University
DATE OF BIRTH April 3, 1957
PLACE OF BIRTH Stendal