Not true, Amos. The US ratted on the deal with Britain to share nuclear weapons technology. Fortunately for Attlee and Aldermaston, and unfortunately for the British people and the rest of the world, British scientists had been involved in the Manahattan project, and using their know-how an independently developed device was ready by 1952.

Russia got them because once the Americans had them, it was known that it was possible, politically imperative, and technically possible with the armies of Soviet physicists available. Spying was unimportant technically. Read Zhores Medvedev's "Soviet Science" (1978) for details of how the Gulag system was used in this.

Israel probably didn't get nuclear technology from the USA directly, again it being a home- brewed development (involving apartheid South Africa). Similarly, the Chinese and North Koreans made their own up. There's enough information out there for a team of competent physicists to recreate quite sophisticated devices at fairly short notice, given the materials.


Who's next?