Norman Moss - Klaus Fuchs - The Man Who Stole the Atom Bomb

All that followed helped to confirm the ideas I had formed. Not a single party voted against the extraordinary powers which were given to Hitler by the new Reichstag and in the universities there was hardly anybody who stood up for those who were dismissed on either political or racial grounds, and afterwards you found that people whom you normally would have respected because of their decency had no force in themselves to stand up for their own ideals or moral standards.

I was in the underground until I left Germany. I was sent out by the Party, because they said that I must finish my studies because after the revolution in Germany people would be required with technical knowledge to take part in the building up of the Communist Germany. I went first to France and then to England, where I studied and at the same time I tried to make a serious study of the base Marxist philosophy. The idea which gripped me most was the belief that in the past man has been unable to understand his own history and the forces which lead to the further development of human society; that now for the first time man understands the historical forces and he is able to control them, and that, therefore, for the first time he will be really free. I carried this idea over into the personal sphere and believed that I could understand myself and that I could make myself into what I believed I should be.

I accepted for a long time that what you heard about Russia internally could be deliberate lies. I had my doubts for the first time on acts of foreign policies of Russia; the Russo-German pact was difficult to understand, but in the end I did accept that Russia had done it to gain time, that during that time she was expanding her own influence in the Balkans against the influence of Germany. Finally Germany’s attack on Russia seemed to confirm that Russia was not shirking and was prepared to carry out a foreign policy with the risk of war with Germany. Russia’s attack on Finland was more difficult to understand, but the fact that England and France prepared for an intervention in Finland at the time when they did not appear to be fighting seriously against Germany made it possible to accept the explanation that Russia had to prepare its defences against possible imperialist powers. In the end I accepted again that my doubts had been wrong and the Party had been right.

When Germany started the real attack on France I was interned and for a long time I was not allowed any newspapers. We did not know what was going on outside, and I did not see how the British people fought at that time. I felt no bitterness at the internment, because I could understand that it was necessary and that at that time England could not spare good people to look after the internees, but it did deprive me of the chance of learning more about the real character of the British people.

Shortly after my release I was asked to help Professor Peierls in Birmingham, on some war work. I accepted it and I started work without knowing at first what the work was. I doubt whether it would have made any difference to my subsequent actions if I had known the nature of the work beforehand. When I learned the purpose of the work I decided to inform Russia and I established contact through another member of the Communist Party. Since that time I have had continuous contact with persons who were completely unknown to me, except that I knew that they would hand whatever information I gave them to the Russian authorities. At this time I had a complete confidence in Russian policy and I believed that the Western Allies deliberately allowed Russia and Germany to fight each other to the death. I had, therefore, no hesitation in giving all the information I had, even though occasionally I tried to concentrate mainly on giving information about the results of my own work.

In the course of this work I began naturally to form bonds of personal friendship and I had concerning them my inner thoughts. I used my Marxist philosophy to establish in my mind two separate compartments. One compartment in which I allowed myself to make friendships, to have personal relations, to help people and to be in all personal ways the kind of man I wanted to be and the kind of man which, in personal ways, I had been before with my friends in or near the Communist Party. I could be free and easy and happy with other people without fear of disclosing myself because I knew that the other compartment would step in if I approached the danger point. I could forget the other compartment and still rely on it. It appeared to me at the time that I had become a ‘free man’ because I had succeeded in the other compartment to establish myself completely independent of the surrounding forces of society. Looking back at it now the best way of expressing it seems to be to call it a controlled schizophrenia.

In the postwar period I began again to have my doubts about Russian policy. It is impossible to give definite incidents because now the control mechanism acted against me, also keeping away from me facts which I could not look in the face, but they did penetrate and eventually I came to a point when I knew I disapproved of a great many actions of the Russian Government and of the Communist Party, but I still believed that they would build a new world and that one day I would take part in it and that on that day I would also have to stand up and say to them that there are things which they are doing wrong. During this time I was not sure that I could give all the information that I had. However, it became more and more evident that the time when Russia would expand her influence over Europe was far away, and that, therefore, I had to decide for myself whether I could go on for many years to continue handing over information without being sure in my own mind whether I was doing right. I decided that I could not do so. I did not go to one rendezvous because I was ill at the time. I decided not to go to the following one.

Shortly afterwards my father told me that he might be going into the Eastern Zone of Germany. At that time my own mind was closer to his than it had ever been before, because he also believed that they are at least trying to build a new world. He disapproved of many things and he had always done so, but he knew that when he went there he would say so and he thought that in doing so he might help to make them realize that you cannot build a new world if you destroy some fundamental decencies in personal behaviour. I could not bring myself to stop my father from going there. However, it made me face at last some of the facts about myself. I felt that my father’s going to the Eastern Zone, that his letters, would touch me somewhere and that I was not sure whether I would not go back. I suppose I did not have the courage to fight it out for myself and, therefore, I invoked an outside influence by informing Security that my father was going to the Eastern Zone. A few months passed and I became more and more convinced that I had to leave Harwell. I was then confronted with the fact that there was evidence that I had given away information in New York. I was given the chance of admitting it and staying at Harwell, or of clearing out. I was not sure enough of myself to stay at Harwell and, therefore, I denied the allegations and decided that I would have to leave Harwell.

However, it then began to become clear to me that in leaving Harwell in those circumstances I would do two things. I would deal a grave blow to Harwell, to all the work which I had loved and, furthermore, that I would leave suspicions against people whom I loved who were my friends and who believed I was their friend. I had to face the fact that it had been possible for me in one half of my mind to be friendly with people, be close friends and at the same time to deceive them, to endanger them. I had to realize that the control mechanism had warned me of danger to myself, but that it had also prevented me from realizing what I was doing to people who were close to me. I then realized that the combination of the three ideas which had made me what I was, was wrong, in fact that every single one of them was wrong, that there are certain standards of moral behaviour which are in you and that you cannot disregard. That in your actions you must be clear in your own mind whether they are right or wrong. That you must be able, before accepting somebody else’s authority, to state your doubts and to try and resolve them; and I found at least I myself was made by circumstances.