Books like Heisenberg's War by Powers, Thomas

Explains the vision of the universe behind string theory, including new dimensions, black holes, and mysterious phenomena in the cosmos.

A biography of the prolific mathematician Paul Erdős, detailing his restless travels, groundbreaking collaborations, and the mathematical problems that shaped his legacy.

An exhaustive account of the discovery, design, and deployment of the atomic bomb, tracing its rapid development from early nuclear science to the Manhattan Project and the first bombings of Japan.

A detailed account of Allied sabotage operations in occupied Europe, highlighting covert actions in Germany and Norway during World War II.

After World War II, the U.S. secretly recruited former Nazi scientists for Cold War research in a program called Operation Paperclip.

For the first three decades of the twentieth century, Germany held the premier position for science throughout the world. German scientists were the most accomplished and honored in their fields, winning the lion's share of Nobel prizes. But in 1933 came Hitler. Jewish scientists were dismissed from their positions in laboratories and at universities, and the Nazi ideology began to dominate Germany's science communities. Some scientists enthusiastically collaborated with the Nazis; most merely acquiesced, arguing that science lies outside politics and morality. By the end of the Second World War, few German scientists remained untainted by a regime bent on genocide and racial conquest. - Jacket flap.

Digging deep into the archival record among formerly secret technical reports, Rose examines early thinking about the atomic bomb not only on the German side but also among Allied scientists. He finds that the early history of fission bomb physics had no shortage of false starts and fumbles in both camps. But, whereas the Allied physicists' ideas crystallized into a realistic prospect for a bomb toward the end of 1940. Heisenberg's basic misconceptions persisted, influencing the German leaders not to push for atomic weapons. In fact, Heisenberg never had to face the moral problem of whether he should design an actual bomb for the Nazi regime. Rose's exploration of the German mentality that made it quite reasonable for "unpolitical" scientists to support the regime in power, whatever its form, shows the extent to which Heisenberg and others could devote themselves to research they regarded as patriotic.