When the prospect of World War Two was quietly looming over Europe, German scientists unveiled the possibility of nuclear fission. In the years that followed, horror over the idea of nuclear weapons falling into the hands of Hitler became one of the strongest driving forces behind the US effort to build the bomb – the Manhattan Project – and the man often called the "father of the atomic bomb", J Robert Oppenheimer. But was Nazi Germany actually on the brink of developing a viable atomic weapon? Not really, it turns out. Advertisement Advertisement Nuclear fission was first discovered in 1938...