The Soviet Alsos or Russian Alsos is the western codename for an operation that took place during 1945–1946 in Germany, Austria, and Czechoslovakia, in order to exploit German atomic related facilities, intellectual materials, material resources, and scientific personnel for the benefit of the Soviet atomic bomb project. The contributions of the German scientists is borne out by the many USSR State Prizes and other awards given in the wake of the second Soviet atomic bomb test, a uranium-based atomic bomb; awards for uranium production and isotope separation were prevalent. Also significant in both the first Soviet atomic bomb test – a plutonium-based atomic bomb which required a uranium reactor for plutonium generation – and the second test, was the Soviet acquisition of a significant amount of uranium immediately before and shortly after the close of World War II. This saved the Soviets at least a year by their own admission.
Background Near the close and after the end of World War II in Europe, the Soviet Union and the Western powers had programs to foster technology transfer and exploit German technical specialists. For example, the United States had Operation Paperclip and the Soviet Union had "trophy brigades" advancing with their military forces. In the area of atomic technology, the U.S. had Operation Alsos and the Soviet Union had their version. While operational aspects of the Soviet operation were modeled after the trophy brigades, a more refined approach was warranted for the exploitation of German atomic related facilities, intellectual materials, and scientific personnel. This was rectified with a decree in late 1944 and the formation of specialized exploitation teams in early 1945. However, the Soviet "Alsos" had broader objectives, which included wholesale relocation of scientific facilities to the Soviet Union. Authorized by the Council of People's Commissars and the State Defense Committee to receive reparations entrusted to Germany by the decision of the Potsdam Conference, the return of valuables and property taken out during the war was Iosif Titovich Tabulevich.
Specialized teams On 18 September 1944, a decree established a specialized task force within the 9th Chief Directorate (Главное Управление, Glavnoe Upravlenie) of the NKVD to support the work of German scientists "invited" to the Soviet Union. The head of the Directorate was Colonel General Avram Pavlovich Zavenyagin. On 23 March 1945, in Stalin's office, Lavrentiy Beria suggested that specialized teams be sent to Germany to search for atomic technology and related personnel. The next day, he instructed Igor' Vasil'evich Kurchatov, head of Laboratory No. 2, to submit requirements on the formation of the specialized search teams to be sent to Germany, Austria, and Czechoslovakia. That very day, Beria also signed a directive appointing his deputy, Zavenyagin, in charge of the operation to locate and deport German atomic scientists or any others who could be of use to the Soviet atomic bomb project. Operational issues for the teams were assigned to SMERSH military counterintelligence. Two members of Laboratory No. 2, Lev Andreevich Artsimovich and Yulij Borisovich Khariton, were assigned to provide scientific guidance to the operation. While the entire scientific staff at Laboratory No. 2, the only atomic laboratory at that time, numbered less than 100, close to 40 of them were sent to Germany.
Main search team – Germany The Battle of Berlin proved one of the last major engagements of World War II in Europe. With a great majority of German scientific facilities in Berlin and its suburbs, this area became a major target of the atomic-search teams. Haste was necessary, as the American military forces were rapidly approaching Berlin. Soviet troops broke the Berlin defense-ring on 25 April 1945, and the Soviet Union announced the fall of Berlin on 2 May. The main search team, headed by Colonel General Zavenyagin, arrived in Berlin on 3 May; it included Colonel General V. A. Makhnjov, and nuclear physicists Yulij Borisovich Khariton, Isaak Konstantinovich Kikoin, and Lev Andreevich Artsimovich. Georgij Nikolaevich Flerov had arrived earlier, although Kikoin did not recall a vanguard group. Targets on the top of their list included the Kaiser-Wilhelm Institut für Physik (KWIP, Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Physics), the University of Berlin, and the Technische Hochschule Berlin. The search teams occupied an entire building in Berlin-Friedrichshagen, which was large enough to also house German scientists recovered by the team. Unfortunately for the Soviet effort, the KWIP had mostly been moved in 1943 and 1944 to Hechingen, on the edge of the Black Forest, which eventually became part of the French occupation zone. This move and a little luck allowed the Americans to take into custody a large number of German scientists associated with nuclear research (see Alsos Mission and Operation Epsilon). The only section of the institute which remained in Berlin was the low-temperature physics section, headed by Ludwig Bewilogua, who was in charge of the exponential uranium pile.
German scientists
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