6 ms·

Hmm… I would think history suggests spies were pretty successful bootstrapping the Soviet nuclear program towards the end of WW II. I also recall reading how

by jleyank 13y ago

Hmm… I would think history suggests spies were pretty successful bootstrapping the Soviet nuclear program towards the end of WW II. I also recall reading how various rocket data/details were obtained from foreign countries post-WW II and there's been a lively, two-sided game of spies for things like submarine operations and control. And unless we're only talking about spies working for a government, industrial espionage has been successful in the tech period. As others have already posted, I assume the original author ignores SIGINT (as there's a long, colorful history of its success) and other "collection" based methods.

willvarfar 13y ago
Oh come back and comment when you've read the whole article! There are paragraphs assessing the claims you repeat, even! Geesh.
- wmil 13y ago
  The problem is that he simply states 1-2 years more quickly as if it's an indisputable fact. The USSR's first nuclear test was in 1949. The UK had access to some Manhattan Project data and didn't detonate a test bomb until 1952. France didn't test a bomb until 1960, and that was arguably the first repeat of the Manhattan Project without data and designs from the project. It's entirely reasonable to assume that the USSR wouldn't have had the bomb until 1964 or so without it's spy network. That would have changed the cold war dramatically.
  - philwelch 13y ago
    The UK had fewer resources and many more important things to do. They built the NHS while we built the military industrial complex.
  - willvarfar 13y ago
    Britain was bankrupt after ww2 and focused on domestic issues and the giving up of empire. France was even more dire and reconstructing. But, whilst Russia was shattered, it diverted far bigger resources to gaining some sense of parity with the US after the war than other countries. The USSR looked to the west as a threat; the Brits and the French didn't fear their ally the US, and didn't need to get a bomb of their own with such urgency (until the USSR got the bomb, that is. Suddenly also having the bomb was strategically important.)

by jleyank 13y ago

willvarfar 13y ago

Oh come back and comment when you've read the whole article! There are paragraphs assessing the claims you repeat, even! Geesh.

wmil 13y ago
The problem is that he simply states 1-2 years more quickly as if it's an indisputable fact. The USSR's first nuclear test was in 1949. The UK had access to some Manhattan Project data and didn't detonate a test bomb until 1952. France didn't test a bomb until 1960, and that was arguably the first repeat of the Manhattan Project without data and designs from the project. It's entirely reasonable to assume that the USSR wouldn't have had the bomb until 1964 or so without it's spy network. That would have changed the cold war dramatically.
- philwelch 13y ago
  The UK had fewer resources and many more important things to do. They built the NHS while we built the military industrial complex.
- willvarfar 13y ago
  Britain was bankrupt after ww2 and focused on domestic issues and the giving up of empire. France was even more dire and reconstructing. But, whilst Russia was shattered, it diverted far bigger resources to gaining some sense of parity with the US after the war than other countries. The USSR looked to the west as a threat; the Brits and the French didn't fear their ally the US, and didn't need to get a bomb of their own with such urgency (until the USSR got the bomb, that is. Suddenly also having the bomb was strategically important.)