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The Kaiser Wilhelm Society Under National Socialism Susanne Heim, Carola Sachse and Mark Walker Frontmatter More Information Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-87906-4 - The Kaiser Wilhelm Society under National Socialism Susanne Heim, Carola Sachse and Mark Walker Frontmatter More information The Kaiser Wilhelm Society under National Socialism During the first part of the twentieth century, German science led the world. The most important scientific institution in Germany was the Kaiser Wilhelm Society, including institutes devoted to different fields of scientific research. Because these institutions were not connected to universities, researchers in them were not burdened by teaching obliga- tions and enjoyed excellent financial and material support. When the National Socialists came to power in Germany, all of German society, including science, was affected. The picture that previ- ously dominated our understanding of science under National Socialism from the end of the Second World War to the recent past – a picture of leading Nazis ignorant and unappreciative of modern science and of scientists struggling to resist the Nazis – needs to be revised. This book surveys the history of Kaiser Wilhelm Institutes under Hitler, illustrat- ing definitively the cooperation, if not collaboration, between scientists and National Socialists to further the goals of autarky, racial hygiene, war, and genocide. © Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-87906-4 - The Kaiser Wilhelm Society under National Socialism Susanne Heim, Carola Sachse and Mark Walker Frontmatter More information The Kaiser Wilhelm Society under National Socialism SUSANNE HEIM Institute for Contemporary History, Munich/Berlin CAROLA SACHSE University of Vienna MARK WALKER Union College © Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-87906-4 - The Kaiser Wilhelm Society under National Socialism Susanne Heim, Carola Sachse and Mark Walker Frontmatter More information CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS Cambridge, New York, Melbourne, Madrid, Cape Town, Singapore, São Paulo, Delhi Cambridge University Press 32 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10013-2473, USA www.cambridge.org Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9780521879064 © Cambridge University Press 2009 This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place without the written permission of Cambridge University Press. First published 2009 Printed in the United States of America A catalog record for this publication is available from the British Library. Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication data © Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-87906-4 - The Kaiser Wilhelm Society under National Socialism Susanne Heim, Carola Sachse and Mark Walker Frontmatter More information Heim, Susanne, 1955– The Kaiser Wilhelm society under national socialism / Susanne Heim. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. isbn 978-0-521-87906-4 (hardback) 1. Kaiser Wilhelm-Gesellschaft zur fvrderung der Wissenschaften. 2. Science and state – Germany – History. 3. National socialism and science – Germany. I. Title. q49.k14174h45 2009 509.43Ł0904–dc22 2008054455 ISBN 978-0-521-87906-4 hardback Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URLs for external or third-party Internet Web sites referred to in this publication and does not guarantee that any content on such Web sites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate. Information regarding prices, travel timetables, and other factual information given in this work are correct at the time of first printing, but Cambridge University Press does not guarantee the accuracy of such information thereafter. © Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-87906-4 - The Kaiser Wilhelm Society under National Socialism Susanne Heim, Carola Sachse and Mark Walker Frontmatter More information Thanks and Dedication We would like to thank the Max Planck Society, which has generously supported both the original research program and the publication of this book; Reinhard Rürup and Wolfgang Schieder, who oversaw the research program; Birgit Kolboske, who helped organize this book and, together with Susan Richter and Charlotte Hughes-Kreutzmüller, translated the chapters; and of course the contributors themselves. This book is dedicated to all the victims of National Socialism who suffered and sometimes died in the name of science, or through the actions of scientists, or both. © Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-87906-4 - The Kaiser Wilhelm Society under National Socialism Susanne Heim, Carola Sachse and Mark Walker Frontmatter More information Contents Tables page ix Illustrations xi Editors xiii Contributors xv Abbreviations xvii Archives xxi 1. The Kaiser Wilhelm Society under National Socialism 1 Susanne Heim, Carola Sachse, and Mark Walker Section I: Research and Personnel Policies 2. A Success Story? Highlighting the History of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society’s General Administration in the Third Reich 19 Rüdiger Hachtmann 3. “No Time to Debate and Ask Questions” – Forced Labor for Science in the Kaiser Wilhelm Society, 1939–1945 47 Bernhard Strebel and Jens-Christian Wagner 4. Adolf Butenandt between Science and Politics: From the Weimar Republic to the Federal Republic of Germany 74 Wolfgang Schieder Section II: Racial Research 5. Brain Research and the Murder of the Sick: The Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Brain Research, 1937–1945 99 Hans-Walter Schmuhl 6. Two Hundred Blood Samples from Auschwitz: A Nobel Laureate and the Link to Auschwitz 120 Achim Trunk vii © Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-87906-4 - The Kaiser Wilhelm Society under National Socialism Susanne Heim, Carola Sachse and Mark Walker Frontmatter More information viii Contents 7. Racial Purity, Stable Genes, and Sex Difference: Gender in the Making of Genetic Concepts by Richard Goldschmidt and Fritz Lenz, 1916 to 1936 145 Helga Satzinger Section III: Eastern Research, Living Space, Breeding Research 8. Kog-Sagyz – A Vital War Reserve 173 Susanne Heim 9. Raw and Advanced Materials for an Autarkic Germany: Textile Research in the Kaiser Wilhelm Society 200 Günther Luxbacher 10. Political Networking and Scientific Modernization: Botanical Research at the KWI for Biology and Its Place in National Socialist Science Policy 227 Bernd Gausemeier Section IV: Military Research 11. Ideology Armaments, and Resources: The Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Metal Research and the “German Metals,” 1933–1945 253 Helmut Maier 12. Calculation, Measurement, and Leadership: War Research at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Fluid Dynamics, 1937–1945 283 Moritz Epple 13. Chemical Weapons Research in National Socialism: The Collaboration of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institutes with the Military and Industry 312 Florian Schmaltz 14. Nuclear Weapons and Reactor Research at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Physics 339 Mark Walker Section V: The Postwar “Politics of the Past” 15. “Whitewash Culture”: How the Kaiser Wilhelm/Max Planck Society Dealt with the Nazi Past 373 Carola Sachse 16. The Predecessor: The Uneasy Rapprochement between Carl Neuberg and Adolf Butenandt after 1945 400 Michael Schüring Bibliography 419 Index 469 © Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-87906-4 - The Kaiser Wilhelm Society under National Socialism Susanne Heim, Carola Sachse and Mark Walker Frontmatter More information Tables 2.1 Revenues of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society, the Prussian Academy of Sciences, and the German Research Foundation from 1924 to 1944 page 23 11.1 Board of Trustees of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Metal Research in 1939 267 11.2 Members of the Al-Zn-Mg-Alloys Consortium and the Composition of the Proposed Alloys (remainder aluminum) 277 13.1 Research on Gas Defense and Chemical Weapons at Kaiser Wilhelm Institutes during National Socialism 314 13.2 Reich Research Council – Specialized Section for Organic Chemistry (Head Richard Kuhn) Research Contracts on Chemical Weapons in the Years 1943/1944 330 13.3 Scientific Staff of the Chemical Weapons Department at the KWI for Medical Research (status: around March 1943) 334 ix © Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-87906-4 - The Kaiser Wilhelm Society under National Socialism Susanne Heim, Carola Sachse and Mark Walker Frontmatter More information Illustrations 11.1 The great line in the movement of raw materials page 260 11.2 Aluminum consumption per capita in various countries in 1939 264 11.3 Aluminum corner of the Aluminum-Zinc- Magnesium ternary system 275 14.1 Chain reactions in uranium 355 xi © Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-87906-4 - The Kaiser Wilhelm Society under National Socialism Susanne Heim, Carola Sachse and Mark Walker Frontmatter More information Editors Susanne Heim is project coordinator of the documentation project “The Persecution and Extermination of the European Jews by Nazi Germany 1933–1945” at the Institute for Contemporary History in Munich and Berlin, and she has previously been the Charles Revson Fellow at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, Washington, D.C., and research director of the Max Planck Society’s Research Program on the History of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society in the National Socialist Era. She is the author of Plant Breeding and Agrarian Research
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