Delmar.

This is coolbert: .

From the comments of Ambassador Bolton:

"Another huge shoe dropped in the espionage dept.: George Koval has been unmasked as a major Manhattan project spy (NYT 12th Nov '07), ~60 years after he fled to Russia. This agent of the GRU had access to several major bomb material production facilities"

Here is the whole story [from the New Duranty Times of all places]. Thanks also to the Steve Sailer blog.

"Just this weekend, we poor dumb Americans finally learned for the first time about one of the most important Soviet atomic bomb spies: George Koval [code name Delmar], a GRU-trained agent who penetrated the Oak Ridge and Dayton atomic bomb manufacturing plants, then fled back to the Soviet Union in, apparently, 1948"

Some comments about the Manhattan Project and the degree to which the Soviets were ABLE to penetrate the most secret weapons program of the war:

* The Manhattan Project had a dire and drastic need for capable manpower. Persons who could perform were needed, and NOW! Persons taken into the project were often done so by recommendation of a sponsor or mentor.

* At the time, being a communist did NOT exclude one from government service or being employed in "war work".

* A bureaucratic apparatus to conduct background checks and issue security clearances of the type done NOW was only in the infancy stage.

* Polygraph exams WERE NEVER DONE. NO such means was available and would not have been availed of even if it did exist.

Also:

* Persons such as Richard Feynman [21 years old] and Theodore Hall [19 years old] found themselves in relatively important positions, their youth not being a barrier.

* Persons such as Koval obtained access to facilities that were vital to PRODUCING WEAPONS ON AN INDUSTRIAL LEVEL. NOT just atomic bombs that were devices or gadgets. Mass produced, elegantly designed deliverable weapons. NOT merely toys.

[processing uranium ore to obtain the fissionable material necessary to achieve a nuclear detonation WAS THE MOST DIFFICULT TASK facing the Manhattan Project? Neither the theoretical physics or obtaining the necessary amounts of yellow cake presented any difficulties?]

The man that was head of security for the atomic bomb project, Peer da Silva, often expressed an opinion that the Manhattan Project was penetrated and compromised in an excess number of ways, and all simultaneously.

I guess he was right!!

OH, and I hope Delmar and his parents enjoyed their communist paradise.

coolbert.