Spy Suspect Says He Feared Nuke ‘Monopoly’ in 1944

A retired American physicist long suspected of having spied for the Soviet Union in the 1940s has spoken out for the first time on his role in apparently helping the Soviets break an American monopoly on atomic weapons.

In two written statements to the authors of a new book on his case, Theodore A. Hall explained his motive and intentions in contacting a Soviet agent in 1944 when he was a 19-year-old physicist at the Los Alamos, N.M., laboratory where scientists were secretly developing the world’s first atomic bombs.

Hall, now 71 and living in England, did not admit in his statement that he committed any specific act of espionage. But he made it clear that, at the time, he believed the world would be safer if Moscow had the bomb.

“During 1944 I was worried about the dangers of an American monopoly of atomic weapons if there should be a postwar depression,” Hall wrote in a statement.

“To help prevent that monopoly, I contemplated a brief encounter with a Soviet agent, just to inform them of the existence of the A-bomb project. I anticipated a very limited contact. With any luck, it might easily have turned out that way, but it was not to be.”

Hall provided his statement to authors Joseph Albright and Marcia Kunstel for their book, “Bombshell: The Secret Story of America’s Unknown Atomic Spy Conspiracy,” to be published Oct. 1 by Times Books/Random House. The authors are reporters for the Cox Newspapers. The statement was released Sunday.

Historians have long believed that convicted spies David Greenglass and Klaus Fuchs gave the Soviets the first information on the “implosion principle” developed at Los Alamos as a new way to ignite an atomic bomb. Albright and Kunstel say their research shows Hall divulged the information first.

In late 1944, according to the book, Hall arranged a rendezvous in New Mexico with his old Harvard roommate, Saville Sax. Hall gave Sax a piece of paper on which he had written a description of the implosion principle. Sax took the paper to Soviet officer Sergei Kurnakov in New York.

Asked Monday whether the Justice Department was considering any action in the Hall case, spokesman John Russell said: “There is nothing imminent on this. Beyond that, we have no comment.”