KNOWS TOO MUCH

Greymouth Evening Star, 21 March 1946, Page 8

KNOWS TOO MUCH

PHYSICIST AND ATOMIC BOMB CHARGE OF ESPIONAGE WASHINGTON, March 20. Dr. Alan Nunn May, the British physicist arrested- in London on a charge of atomic espionage, has general knowledge' of the Construction of the atomic bomb arid some Knowledge' of the operation of the American atomic bomb plants, and could have furnished unauthorised persons with small samples of plutonium and uranium. This is revealed by MajorGeneral Leslie Groves in a letter to Senator Bourke Hickenlooper, who read the letter to the United States Senate.

The letter added that May obtained knowledge during three visits to the University of Chicago’s metallurgical laboratory, to which he was accredited by the British intelligence. However, General Groves' refused May permission' for a fourth visit in the spring of 1945, because he feared May was learning too much, in contravention of the Army policy of “compartmenting” scientists to prevent any single scientist learning more than was necessary to do any particular job. The New York Times says the gravity of General Groves’s disclosures is accentuated by the fact that May also had considerable knowledge of the Canadian atomic energy project, on which he was employed since 1943. Informed American sources reported that the Ottawa river project manufacturing plutonium had progressed to the point where the Canadians could probably now make atomic bombs.

In spite of official American statements that no arrests of American citizens is expected to result ’from the Canadian spy disclosures, informed quarters believe the May case may produce ramifications in the United States. The introduction of General Groves’s letter is the climax to a furious Senate debate over the degree of Army participation in the proposed Atomic Energy Commission .

Senator Hickenlooper supported Senator Arthur Vandenberg’s amendment providing a Military Advisory Board to handle national defence aspects of atomic energy. Senator Hickenlooper said he favoured eventual international control of atomic energy, but until then the United States should be like the Pilgrim Fathers “who went to church with their muskets loaded.”