Talk:Atomic spies

message: The most commonly used term is "Atomic Spies", in my experience with it. This is somewhat backed up through a look at a few major sources:
*JSTOR—"Atom Spies" = 20 hits; "Atomic Spies" = 36 hits
*Google Scholar—"Atom Spies" = 32 hits; "Atomic Spies" = 52 hits
*Google Books—"Atom Spies" = 181 hits; "Atomic Spies" = 172 hits
*Google—"Atom Spies" = 507; "Atomic Spies" = 10,200
With the sole exception of the Google Books search, the use of "Atomic Spies" seems more prevalent than "Atom Spies", especially in the Google search, in which it is an undisputed winner. Additionally, "Atomic Spies" is preferred by a number of high-profile sources, such as the CIA, NOVA, and the DOE. On the other side of things, the FBI is the only prominent place I have seen which uses "Atom Spies".
Hence, I think both usages should be placed in the article itself, but "Atomic Spies" should be the primary one and the title, simply because it is the most prevalent. But I'm perfectly willing to discuss this. I'm aware there was a book called "The Atom Spies", but I don't think by itself that determines the title of the article—especially since the term did not originate in the book to my knowledge. I'm aware this is splitting hairs of course, though, as either one is perfectly valid in a semantic sense. --Fastfission 15:53, 23 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Atom spies vs. atomic spies

message: In The Bomb:A Life (Gerard DeGroot, 2004, chapter 8), it says the first Russian bomb was a copy of Fat Man, (the second, more powerful Russian test was the original Russian design that had been side-lined for the proven Fat Man design)and that the spy information was important in solving the problem of avoiding predetonation with a plutonium bomb; since plutonium was much easier to create than high-grade uranium, it had a decisive impact on the Russian bomb project... it quotes one Russian scientist saying spy info saved them "at least two years." It also discusses KGB efforts at the end of the Cold War to draw attention to their own importance to the Russian bomb project, which they felt had been overlooked/usurped by physicists.
The current state of this article gives the impression that the spy info was not valuable. Thoughts? Discussion?--ragesoss 05:28, 22 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It's odd no one has addressed your point (particularly the primary author of the article). I've also seen strong statements to the effect that the spy info speeded work considerably... Also, this article completely lacks direct citations. JDG 10:09, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

text: The DeGroot book is quite poor—all of the research is from secondary sources, most of which come from the internet (and some parts of which I suspect are cribbed from Wikipedia!). For a better assessment of the value of the spy data, see i.e. Holloway's Stalin and the Bomb which indicates that the biggest hinderance to the Soviet bomb program was the uranium supply, and that the espionage information was not used in a straightforward way (Beria did not trust it, or the scientists). --24.147.86.187 21:26, 6 May 2007 (UTC)

text: Also, while the article lacks direct citations it does, in the references section, indicate its sources for specific claims. The Kojevnikov book addresses this question very directly. --24.147.86.187 21:27, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: how much did spy info matter?

message: Spies (Atom) is a logical title fitting many other WP titles.
Is atomic spying, passing details of physics packages etc to other countries, or obtaining them from other countries, all over now? I doubt it. So a further chapter or at least some cross-referencing is in order. Midgley 11:27, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Mordechai Vanunu is documented. He is partly similar - rather different in the physics level of information, similar in the severity of the sentence and the sustained public obloquy, different in the international sympathy ... maybe politics rather than sympathy. Perhaps he deserves a footnote or a see also? Midgley 15:04, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Hmm, I suppose if we had a separate page on nuclear espionage Vanunu could fit in there though I don't really think of him as "espionage" in the standard sense (the public airing of secrets for the purpose of public discussion seems different to me than the giving of them to an enemy power secretly, but I'm aware that this is a contentious issue and that he was technically convicted of espionage, though I think the 'treason' charge is more on the dot). I don't think we should broaden this page, since we are using Atomic Spies as a proper noun here, but a new page on nuclear espionage is definitely an interesting idea. --Fastfission 15:17, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: OK, I started a nuclear espionage article and populated it with a few cases as a first shot. Feel free to edit it as you please! --Fastfission 15:59, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It will be a pleasure to collaborate with you. Midgley 16:10, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Spies (Atom), a closed book? 

message: Are all those pictures necessary? Can they be sized down? Heck, they take up more vertical space than the article itself. --EEMeltonIV 02:23, 10 June 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Pictures 

message: Some fifteen-year-old obviously over-estimated his sense of humour after his lifetime first beer, so I reverted.Theeurocrat 00:33, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Revert 

message: Of the ten spies listed below, eight were of Jewish American ethnicity, with the remaining two: May and Fuchs, being English and German, respectively. Both of these men were married to Jewish women.
: Doesn't this sentence seem potentially offensive? I'm not sure we need to have this in there. Stonemason89 (talk) 13:11, 27 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text:  Since there hasn't been any feedback, I'm gonna remove it. Stonemason89 (talk) 04:32, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Odd sentence

message: The one thing missing from the article is a treatment of the motivation factor. Several of the spies had gone on record explaining their ideological beliefs and motivations for the espionage. -SC (talk) 02:53, 20 May 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: Motivation

message: Morton Sobell was released from federal prison in 1969. But he could not have been released from Alcatraz since the federal prison there was closed in 1963. MathWBE (talk) 19:02, 14 January 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Accuracy 

message: Erich Gimpel, who was smuggled in the late fall of 1944 by submarine to the United States, claimed in his (partial) autobiography (German edition) that he had received some information about the Manhatan project and radioed to Germany. He claims that he received this information from a Nazi informant in New York. I'm not sure whether the presentation by Gimpel is reliable. (In contrast to the Quirin process the transcripts have not been published for Gimpel process online.) --93.129.81.97 (talk) 09:45, 1 August 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Erich Gimpel 

message: — Assignment last updated by In vino veritas 01 (talk) 04:16, 26 April 2023 (UTC)
thread_title: Wiki Education assignment: Cold War Science

message: While the lead does well to present the nuances of this matter, the first paragraph remains too obscure. It presents too many details and justification, before introducing the subject. I think this article needs a more on-point first paragraph on the lead explaining what "atomic spies" means, before dealing with the nature of the uncertainty of the matter. ReyHahn (talk) 09:11, 21 July 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Lead 

message: The Klaus Fuchs article is far more skeptical about the degree of impact Fuch's information actually had than this one. This is especially true of the H-bomb Intel, as that article claims it had virtually no impact at all. This should be resolved. -- Calion | Talk 14:53, 19 January 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  Conflict about Fuchs' effectiveness 

message: — Assignment last updated by Dylxnphan (talk) 22:09, 19 April 2024 (UTC)
thread_title: Wiki Education assignment: Cold War Science