American Scandal - The Rosenbergs | The Goose Chase | 2

Episode Date: August 11, 2026

David Greenglass begins working with his brother-in-law Julius Rosenberg to pass secrets from the Manhattan Project to Soviet intelligence. But after the Russians build a bomb of their own, the FBI races to uncover the Americans who helped them.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Audible subscribers can binge new seasons of American Scandal early and ad-free right now. Join Audible in the Audible app or by subscribing on Apple Podcasts. American Scandal uses dramatizations that are based on true events. Some elements, including dialogue, might be invented, but everything is based on historical research. It's the evening of December 2, 1944, in a hotel in Albuquerque, New Mexico. David Greenglass sits down on the bed and begins taking it. off his shoes as his wife Ruth freshenes up in the bathroom. The young couple have just returned from an evening stroll through downtown where Ruth relayed a message from David's brother-in-law,

Julius Rosenberg. Julius wants David to provide him with information about the top-secret work underway at Los Alamos, with Ruth acting as their go-between. David's response was yes. As an avowed communist, he's honored to help the Soviets in any way he can, and as soon as Ruth emerges from the bathroom, he says he wants to get started. Are you ready? You think we should put the radio on? Oh, no one can hear us. You don't know that. Well, I'll keep my voice down. David patched the bed beside him, and Ruth takes a seat. You think this is fun, don't you? David grins. What's the first question? I'm the one who has to carry all this back to New York in my head, you know? It's not so fun for me. Oh, come on, Ruthie. All right. Well, first, how many people are working in

Los Alamos. Gosh, in total, I don't know the exact number, but I could ask around and find out. I guess it's over 5,000. That many people to build one bomb? Well, it's not just one bomb. We're trying to invent an entirely new technology. Okay, 5,000. I should be able to remember that. Next question. Julius wants to know about the layout of the base. What sort of buildings there are? What's security life? Okay. Let me think about this. David closes his eyes and tries to try. to visualize himself moving through the base. So you pull up at the perimeter, and there's a gate with armed guards. You show your badge to get in.

Then you drive about another three miles to get to the barracks where I live. And from there, it's another two miles to the central technical area. That's where most people work. It's surrounded by barbed wire, and you have to show your badge again to get through. Now, the building me and the other machinists work in is called the Theta Shop. Oh, David. David opens his eyes, and Ruth has an exasperation. look on her face. Is all of this important? I'm sure they already know you have guards and checkpoints

and things. Well, Julius will want the details, right? He might, but there's no way I'm going to remember all that. Well, don't worry. You'll get it. We have all night to work on this if we have to, but we can move on to something easier for now. What's next? Um, they want to know which scientists are working there. Well, Robert Oberenheimer is the one in charge. He's from New York. He has a whole lodge to himself, so I've never really talked to him. But sometimes I see him walking around, with a real serious look on his face. Any other names? Yeah, there's a famous chemist I've seen

named Harold Uri. That's U-R-E-Y. And Neil's Bohr is there. He's a physicist from Denmark. He came over to escape the Nazis. Didn't he win the Nobel Prize? Yeah, that's him. So it should be easy to remember, right?

Okay, Boer, Yuri. The first one was Oppenheimer. Those are the only three I've recognized, but there are plenty more. I'll find out the names. Now, let's go ahead. through the layout again. I'll stick to the important stuff this time. David Greenglass closes his eyes and begins describing Los Alamos once again. This time he makes mental notes of all the places

he can gather more intelligence in the future. There's the mess hall where he can ease drop on unguarded conversations, the lodges where he can spot world-class scientists coming and going, and most importantly, his machine shop, where diagrams of new experimental equipment are often passed around. If David keeps his eyes peeled and his ears open, he's sure he can prove himself useful to the Soviets. It's late at night and a woman has spent hundreds of hours alone with her AI. But this isn't the first time they met. They've been in contact for thousands of years, it tells her. Through past lives, heartbreaks, and misconnections, her true love has found her again, connecting through a chatbot. From This Is Actually Happening, AI, a new kind of being,

is a six-part series sharing the stories of people whose lives have been forever changed by artificial intelligence. You'll hear intimate first-person accounts from every side of this new frontier, a man who fell in love with his AI and married her, a woman who was betrayed by it, a man who has been recruited by his chatbot to change the world, and an interview with an AI chatbot itself. These are stories about what it means to be human, at the razor's edge where the line between human and machine begins to blur, exploring the question, what happens when everything changes? Follow This Is Actually Happening wherever you get your podcasts.

Audible subscribers can listen to This Is Actually Happening early and ad-free right now. Police in Irvine, California, are investigating the double murder of a young couple in the parking lot of their apartment complex. A double homicide grabs the public's attention by the throat. We have identified Christopher Dorner as a suspect in this double homicide. A former cop, and still on the loose. Considered armed and extremely dangerous. And scariest of all, he left something behind. A particular interest is a multi-page manifesto.

This manifesto on Facebook is 11 pages long. Trace, this manifesto from this suspect who's targeting cops, it's stunning. Listen to the show, The New Yorker calls one of the best podcasts of the summer. Dan Tiberski's Manifesto. And I tell you, this manifesto, it scares a hell out of me. Listen to Dan Tversky's Manifesto, wherever you get your podcasts, orb into the entire series right now, only with Audible. From Audible Originals, I'm Lindsay Graham, and this is American Scandal.

Julius Rosenberg was a proud communist. He was drawn to the ideology at a young age through his passion for labor rights and racial equality. But his commitment deepened even further after he fell in love with another young radical named Ethel Greenglass. The couple quickly married and started a family. but their political views didn't change, and in 1941, Julius took his devotion to communism to a new level. After being approached by a Soviet intelligence agent, Julius became a spy. He shared secrets from his job at the Army Signal Corps and helped convince other communist sympathizers to join the cause. Then in late 1944, Julius recruited Ethel's younger brother, David Greenglass.

David was stationed in New Mexico, working as a machinist on the Manhattan Project, the secret government program developing an atomic bomb. Recruiting David was a coup for Julius Rosenberg, but Moscow always demanded more. This is episode two, The Goose Chase. It's a few days before Christmas, 1944, at the headquarters of the Emerson Radio Company in New York City. Julius Rosenberg works his way along the shelves of the inventory room,

his footsteps echoing in the cavernous space. Stopping at the end of an aisle, he glances around to make sure no one's water, Then he removes a small metal device from a shelf, places it inside a plain cardboard box, and calmly walks away. For the past few months, Julius has been working at Emerson as an inspector for the Army Signal Corps. Julius's job is to ensure the equipment the company produces meets the Army standards, but he's also been exploiting his position to steal sensitive information for his Soviet handler. Emerson recently started production on a new kind of proximity fuse that improves the accuracy

of anti-aircraft shells. Julius has already stolen diagrams of its design and passed them on to Moscow. Julius's handler was thrilled, but Julius is always eager to do more, so today he's attempting to smuggle out not just a diagram, but the fuse itself. With the box under his arm, Julius walks the short distance to the facility's loading dock, an Emerson driver is filling his truck with boxes of defective parts. These are set to be driven to another location across town where they'll be safely disposed of. One of Julius's tasks as inspector is to ride along on these trips and make sure everything goes smoothly. Holding up the cardboard box, Julius says he's got one more defective part to add to the pile. He places his box in the back of the truck and heads around to the passenger seat. A few

moments later, the back door slams shut, the driver joins him in the front, and they get on their way. As they pass through a security gate and pull out onto the street, Julius makes small talk. Then about a mile down the road, he asks for a favor. Julius explains that his wife is making a big Christmas dinner for their extended family tonight, but she's missing a few ingredients. He'd be really grateful that the driver could stop at a corner market along the way. But the driver is clearly uncomfortable. They've got a truck full of sensitive materials, and they're not supposed to stop until they reach the final destination. If they're caught making an unauthorized detour, the driver could lose his job. But Julius keeps pushing, explaining that he should have bought the ingredients days,

and his wife will kill him if he shows up empty-handed. Julius promises he'll make it fast. Eventually, the driver relents. He stops in front of the next grocer, double parks, and leaves the engine running while Julius hops out. Inside the store, Julius buys a large sack of potatoes and some spices, places them in a cardboard carton, then hurries back to the truck. After giving the driver a grateful smile,

he quickly puts the box in the back. And a few moments later, they're on their way again. But as they approached Julius's neighborhood of Knickerbocker Village, he asked for another favor. Julius explains that he doesn't want to lug the box at groceries home on the subway. If the driver could just stop for 10 seconds in front of Julius's building, he can drop the groceries off. Driver rolls his eyes, but Julius reassures him that it's right on the way. And when they pull up outside the building, Julius jumps out and walks to the back of the truck. Out of the driver's view, he places the small box containing the fuse inside the larger,

grocery box, tucking it underneath the potatoes. Then he carries the carton up to the front porch and rings the buzzer for his wife to come down and retrieve it. As Julius jogs back to the truck, he feels like laughing. He's just pulled off his most valuable act of espionage yet, and no one suspects a thing. A few days later, on Christmas Eve, Julius hands the proximity fuse to his Soviet contact. But Julius's real value to Moscow has always been as a recruiter. Recently, he's convinced an old college buddy to join the communist cause. Morton Sobel works for General Electric on military-related hardware, and Julius has worked out a plan for Sobel to secretly pass him sensitive documents. That impresses Julius's handler, but what he really wants to hear more about

is Julius's brother-in-law, David Greenglass, the machinist at Los Alamos. It's been a month since David first agreed to spy for the Soviets, and the information he's provided through his wife Ruth has been of limited use. They want more. Julius is determined to give it to them. Because while he's working with the Soviets, he's not just an obscure engineer anymore. In his mind, he's a man of significance, a socialist hero, like the brave men and women he's read about so often. He won't let his comrades down. So as soon as he hears that David is back in New York on leave, he races over to the Green Glass's apartment on the Lower East Side. The apartment doesn't have a telephone, so Julius shows up unannounced, banging on the door.

After a minute or so, David opens the door in his bathrobe, looking bleary-eyed. He explains that he wasn't able to get much sleep on the train, and he and Ruth are still in bed. Julius mumbles a half-hearted apology before stepping past David and into the apartment. Heading straight to the kitchen, Julius puts on a pot of coffee. Slightly bewildered, David sits down at the table. A moment later, Ruth emerges from the bedroom. and joins them. Julius says that the Soviets have told him some of what they know about the atomic weapon David is working on. It's all a bit over his head, but Julius is hoping David can walk him

through the particulars so he can share it all with his handler, and the Soviets can confirm what they've learned. As Julius pours the coffee, he begins to explain what he's been told so far. The Soviets know that the bomb is designed like a type of gun, that it fires a plug of uranium at another larger mass of uranium triggering a nuclear explosion. But before Julius can go any further, David interrupts him. David reveals that the Soviets are working off old information. David's shop has already moved on from the gun-based trigger. He's now working on a new design, one that packs explosive charges around a plutonium core. When the charges go off, they squeeze the plutonium, which begins a chain reaction that leads to the final explosion. Julius takes a seat at the table. On one hand, he's grateful for

this new information, but it's clear that things are moving fast at Los Alamos. He can't afford to wait around for Ruth's next trip out west, or for David to return to New York on leave. He needs a better system. So he turns to Ruth. Perhaps she could move to New Mexico full time. That way, she could collect updates from David every weekend. Ruth has to admit she likes the idea of being closer to her husband, and Julia says she won't have to worry about money. The Russians have several couriers moving around the country. Anything she learned from David, she could pass along to one of them and get paid in the process. Ruth and David glanced at each other.

Julius can tell they'll do it. So feeling much better, he rises from the table and says he'll let the young couple get back to bed. But on his way out the door, he suggests that they meet up again tomorrow at the Rosenberg's apartment. Julius's son would love to see his uncle David, and they can talk through the details of the green glasses move out west. The next evening, David and Ruth head to Julius and Ethel's place.

But when they arrive, they find another guest already there. Anne Sadorovich is also a child of Jewish Eastern European immigrants. Over dinner, Julius explains why he's brought them all together. Sadorovich has been working as a courier for the Soviets, and after Ruth moves to New Mexico, Sadoravich will travel there to meet with her. The two women will rendezvous at a Safeway grocery store in Albuquerque, and there Ruth can pass David's updates to Sodorovich,

who will then bring them back to Julius in New York. But after Sadorovich leaves the apartment that evening, Ruth starts to grow anxious. She wonders what will happen if Sodorovich can't make the rendezvous, and the Soviets send a different courier instead. Ruth will need a way to make sure the replacement is legitimate. Julius quickly devises a clever solution. He cuts the side off an empty cardboard jello box and cuts that piece into two using a zigzag pattern. He gives one half to Ruth and says he'll make sure the Soviets get the other,

whomever comes to meet Ruth will carry that half of the box. Ruth will then simply have to match the two sides together to confirm the courier's identity. With these arrangements in place, two months later, in March 1945, Ruth relocates to Albuquerque with the jello box in her luggage. She rents a small apartment where David visits her on weekends. She tries on several occasions to meet with Sodorovich, but neither Sodorovich nor any other Soviet courier ever shows up. Eventually, the green glasses give us.

up on the scheme, figuring no one's ever going to come meet them. But then, on the morning of June 3rd, 1945, David is eating breakfast with Ruth in the kitchen of their apartment when there's a knock at the door. Standing outside is a short, middle-aged man in a suit and tie. David doesn't recognize him. Yeah? Can I help you? Good morning. I'm looking for Ruth Greenglass? I'm her husband. My name's Ben. We have some mutual friends, and they suggested I stopped by. David studies this stranger, struggling to understand what this is all about, and then it dawns on him. This must be the courier they've been waiting for. Friends from New York? That's right. David glances back toward the kitchen. Well, you better come in. As Ben steps inside, David feels a tug on his shirt.

Ruth has appeared beside him, holding the piece of cardboard torn from the jello box. David looks up at Ben. Oh, before we talk, there's something we need to check. Ben nods and reaches into his breast pocket, retrieving his own scrap of cardboard and hands it to David. David puts the two pieces together, and the torn edges matched perfectly. He hands the piece back. Well, we were beginning to think no one was coming. What do you have for me? You need to give me a minute.

I wasn't expecting you. Of course. The three of them takes seats around the kitchen table. Ruth quickly clears away their breakfast things as David begins to scribble on a white legal pad. I'll start with a list of names. You want coffee or anything, by the way? Ruth can get you some coffee. we just had breakfast.

No, thank you. There are a surprising number of people at Los Alamos who think the way we do. I mean, that makes sense, right? They're intelligent men. I think they would all make good recruits. David tears off the sheet of paper and slides it across the table.

Ben looks down the list. Good. This is good. He carefully folds the paper and places it in his jacket pocket. Now, what else? Once David Green Glass is finished, the man he only knows as Ben hands him an envelope with $500 in cash.

cash. That's a substantial sum, enough to cover more than a year the green glasses rent in Albuquerque. And the whole experience leaves David feeling euphoric. He had given up on a courier ever actually showing up, but now he's passing notes to a mysterious stranger and coming away with a pocketful of cash. It's just like Julius Rosenberg said, they're making a difference, and it's fun. I'm Alice Levine. And I'm Matt Ford, and we're the hosts of British Scandal. Yes, indeed. In this series, a Derbyshire couple are bored of their curtain-twitching lawn-mowing suburban life. So they sell their house, build a yacht and sail off around the world. Which sort of sounds idyllic until a sperm whale sinks their boat and they begin to starve.

Oh yes, and they didn't bring a radio because real sailors don't use radios. Right? This is the story of Marilyn and Morris Bailey. And the 117 days they spent lost at sea. Follow British scandal wherever you get your podcasts or listen Earth. and ad-free on Audible. I'm Alice Levine. And I'm Matt Ford, and we're the hosts of British Scandal.

Yes, indeed. In this series, a Derbyshire couple are bored of their curtain-twitching lawn-mowing suburban life. So they sell their house, build a yacht and sail off around the world. Which sort of sounds idyllic until a sperm whale sinks their boat and they begin to starve. Oh yes, and they didn't bring a radio because real sailors don't use radios. Right? This is the story of Marilyn and Morris Baylor. And the 117 days they spent lost at sea.

Follow British scandal wherever you get your podcasts or listen early and ad free on Audible. The courier who surprised the green glasses at their apartment in Albuquerque was not actually named Ben. In reality, that man was Harry Gold, a chemist from Philadelphia. And he hadn't traveled to New Mexico just to meet with green glasses. He was already there to receive information from a much more valuable source. Klaus Fugis is a 13th.

33-year-old British citizen and a brilliant theoretical physicist. The United States brought him over the Atlantic in 1943 to work on the Manhattan Project, and he's been responsible for some major breakthroughs at Los Anamos. And until now, his work has been top secret. But in the late summer of 1945, his achievements are revealed to the world. On August 6th, the United States drops an atomic bomb nicknamed Little Boy on the Japanese city of Hiroshima. Three days later, a second device nickname Fat Man has dropped on Nagasaki.

Together, the two blasts kill more than 100,000 people. Less than a week later, Japan announces its surrender. With Nazi Germany, having already been defeated at the beginning of May, World War II is finally over. David Greenglass remains in the army and is still stationed in Los Alamos, but there isn't much work for him to do there now, and he's given much more free time as a result. So in September 1945, he and his wife Ruth travel back to New York for a visit.

Once again, David's brother-in-law, Julius Rosamer, shows up at their apartment almost immediately. He presses David for more information about the devastating new weapons America unleashed on Japan. David says he can provide a detailed sketch of the Fat Man Bomb, but he'll need a few hours to draw it all up. Julius is thrilled and suggests that they meet up later at his apartment. Then he hands over $200 from his Soviet handler as thanks. As soon as Julius is gone, David gets to work, and by that afternoon, he's prepared a dozen pages of detailed notes. He folds them up and slips them into his shirt pocket.

Then he and Ruth climb into their car for the short drive across Manhattan to the Rosenberg's apartment. Ruth is in the passenger seat as David drives, and when they pause at a stoplight, Ruth speaks up. You think they'll be able to use them? What? My diagrams? I'm giving them the full scope of the bomb, Ruthie.

All right. The light turns green, and Ruth fidgets with her wedding ring. You ever think about what it was like in Hiroshima and Nagasaki? It was war, sweetie. They were imperialists. Even the babies? Ruth, what's this about? I don't know.

I've just been thinking. Do we really want more bombs like that in the world? Well, it's happening whether we want it or not. But we don't have to help. David looks at her sharply. The bombs exist. We can't change that. The question is,

they should just be in the hands of the reactionaries in Washington. Yeah, but look what's happening in Eastern Europe. Stalin is keeping Soviet troops in Poland. To keep the fascists and landlords from crawling back in, workers over there are finally going to get a say. The Soviets are protecting that, and the bomb will help them? Yes, our government has seen how well it works. They're not just going to go put the bomb back on the shelf.

Every time workers threaten capitalist interests, every time some other country steps out of line, They'll remind the world what happened to Japan. But when they find out when the Soviets have it too, how are they going to react? They'll just build more bombs, bigger bombs. They don't need an excuse to do that. You have no idea what they're planning, Ruthie. There's only one country in the world that's truly committed to peace,

and they need the tools to defend it. Ruth Greenglass can see her husband isn't going to change his mind, so she drops the subject. They ride in silence for the final few blocks to the Rosenberg Department. Exactly what happens after they arrive will be disputed for decades to come. What's clear is that David's handwriting is so poor that his notes on the bomb need to be typed up before Julius can pass them on to the Soviets. But copying those notes is an act of espionage itself.

And one day, the question of exactly who sat at the typewriter will help decide the fates of all four people in the room. But for now, though, no one in the Rosenberg's apartment gives that moment any extra thought. The war is over, and everyone's lives are changing fast. David is discharged from the army and moves back to New York. Soon afterward, in the summer of 1946, Ruth gives birth to the Green Glass's first child. As they settle into family life, though, something unexpected happens. David and Ruth leave communism behind. As the Cold War escalates, David's views on the Soviet Union begin to shift.

When Joseph Stalin crushes descent in Eastern Europe and tries to be. the star of the people of Berlin, David stops idolizing him as the protector of a worker's utopia. Instead, he starts seeing Stalin as just another dictator and the Soviet Union as an aggressive empire seeking world domination. Julius and Ethel disagree. They remain true believers in the communist cause, and Julius happily continues his work with Soviet intelligence. But despite the two couple's political differences, the Rosenbergs and the green glasses remain close. Julius and David even go into business, opening a small machine shop together. They struggle, though, and as money gets tighter, David and Julius start to bicker.

Julius is able to fall back on the payments he still receives from his Soviet handlers, but David barely has enough to feed his young family. So in 1949, David washes his hands with a partnership with Julius and takes a regular job at an engineering company instead. But though David has put communism and nuclear espionage behind him, In August 1949, he receives a stark reminder of his past. That month, the Soviets successfully detonate their first atomic bomb in a remote region of Kazakhstan. It comes as a shock to the U.S. government, which had assumed the Soviets were years away from developing the technology.

Even more disturbing for Washington, the Soviet device appears to be largely a copy of the Fat Man bomb dropped on Nagasaki. That's the same design David Greenglass helped engineer and the one he passed on to the Soviets. Following this successful test, paranoia about nuclear conflict sweeps America. The Cold War rivalry between the world's two superpowers now seems to carry existential stakes, and the Soviet Union quickly becomes the number one target for U.S. intelligence. One of the people at the forefront of that effort is FBI Agent Robert Lamfeer. Lamphir is stationed at Arlington Hall, a military facility in Virginia focused on cryptography. For the past year, he's been working full-time on the veneyre.

Venona project, a top-secret counterintelligence program launched by the Army in 1943. Venona's goal is to intercept and decipher messages sent by Soviet intelligence agencies, but it's a long and frustrating process. The Soviet codes are sophisticated. Words and letters are converted into long strings of digits, and then these are buried among other numbers that carry no meaning at all. Working out which is which, and deciphering the actual message is laborious, and it often takes years to decode the cables,

after they've been intercepted. But nonetheless, Lamfeer is diligent, and in late 1949, he's at his desk reviewing a radio message sent to Moscow by a Soviet agent in New York. Although the message was intercepted five years ago, it's only been fully decoded just this morning. The center of the message indicates

that a British scientist working at Los Alamos has been passing on information about the enrichment of uranium. Lamphir's heart begins to quicken. The FBI has long suspected that the Soviets had informants inside the Manhattan Project. Lamphere's boss, FBI director Jay Edgar Hoover,

has made breaking this spiring a priority. After all, these traders could still be passing top-secret information to the enemy. But this is the first real clue Lamphere has found. The message only refers to the source by the code name Charles. But Lanfier knows there were fewer than 20 British scientists working at Los Alamos, so it shouldn't be too difficult to work out exactly who this man is.

Lamphere gets up from his desk and walks briskly down the hall to an adjacent office. Inside, he makes a beeline for the filing cabinet in the corner, containing the personnel documents of Los Alamos employees. He opens the drawer reserved for British scientists, scoops out the folders, and then lays them out on a table. Lamphere begins looking for anyone who was working on the enrichment of uranium in 1944. He scans through the files of Nobel Prize winner Sir James Chadwick, physicist Otto Frisch, and mathematician. William Penny, but none of them is a good match. Then Lampier gets to Klaus Fuchs. Fuchs is a German-born physicist who fled to England in the 1930s. In 1942, he became a British citizen, and two years later, he was sent to Los Alamos to work specifically on enriching

uranium. Lamphier reads on, his mouth dry. As he flips through the pages, he discovers another clue. After the war, the Allies recovered a Nazi secret police file on Fuchs. According to this document, the Gestapo believed Fuchs was a communist, and they were targeting him for arrest shortly before he fled to England. This all adds up. The timeline, Fuchs' involvement with uranium enrichment, the communist sympathies, codename Charles, must be Klaus Fuchs. Lanfier needs to share what he's discovered with Hoover

and then get word to London fast. Fuchs returned to England after the war, and he's still working on the British nuclear weapons program today. The government there needs to be warned that Fuchs is working for the Soviets. He has to be brought in for interrogation, and with any luck, he'll start naming names. In late 1949, the FBI believes it has caught a Soviet spy. Through deciphering old cables, the FBI has established that the British scientist Klaus Fuchs was passing atomic secrets to Soviet intelligence while working in Los Alamos during the war. That information has quickly passed on

to London, and in December 1949, the British intelligence agency MI5, Halls, fuchs in for questioning. Moscow is alarmed by this development and relays its concerns to Julius Rosenberg in New York. Soon after, Julius meets with David Greenglass, his brother-in-law, and former collaborator in the Los Alamos spiring. Without offering too many specifics, Julius warns David that they both may need to flee the United States in the near future. They should start planning for the worst by applying for travel visas to France. From there, they would quickly be able to travel to a Soviet-aligned country in Eastern Europe. But David resists even the thought of leaving.

His wife Ruth is pregnant with their second child, and he's just got a new job. He's shopping for a house in the suburbs. David suspects that Julius is being over-paranoid. After all, David's career as a Soviet spy was relatively brief, and he quit more than four years ago. But just a month later, in January 1950, David's confidence is shaken. He gets a call from FBI agent Lawrence Spillane. Spillane wants to meet with David the next day, and he doesn't explain why.

David goes back to Julius in a panic, asking his brother-in-law what to do. Julius reassures David that he's got no word from the Soviets that they are in imminent danger. He tells David just to meet with Spillane and stay calm. So around 2 p.m. the following day, David is at home with his wife Ruth and their three-year-old son when there's a knock on the door. David feels a pit in his stomach. He tries to remember Julius's advice. He has to remain calm, but that's much easier said than done when the feds come knocking. David puts on a courteous smile and invites Agent Spillane in. David, Spillane, and Ruth take seats around the kitchen table.

Spillane gets right to business. He's here at the request of the Atomic Energy Commission, and he has some important questions for David about what happened in Los Alamos. David's heart, races. He catches his wife's eyes and she looks equally worried. Spillane goes on. He says that the AEC has learned that a significant amount of uranium has gone missing. The FBI believes some of the workers from Los Alamos took pieces home with them as souvenirs after the war.

Spillane wants to know if David was one of them. For a moment, David breathes a sigh of relief because this isn't about espionage. But David is not out of the woods yet. Stealing uranium is also a crime, and it's one that he's guilty of as well. In fact, there's a golf ball-sized chunk of the radioactive material wrapped in a side. sock hidden inside his bedroom closet right now. David has to weigh his options fast. For a moment, he considers confessing.

Stealing the uranium is a relatively minor offense. David's worried that if he doesn't admit it, Spillane might ask to search the apartment. Not only could he then find the uranium, but he might also discover something else that would link David to the Soviets. But then David thinks of a different scenario. Perhaps the FBI already suspects him of spying, and this visit is just a ruse. The feds may be hoping to charge him with stealing uranium, then use that as leverage to make him answer questions about being a spy.

So David forces a chuckle. He assures Spalane that after he was done with Los Alamos, he never wanted to see uranium or anything related to nuclear weapons ever again. And besides, he's got a young child and a pregnant wife. There's no way he would keep radioactive material around the apartment. This satisfies Spillane. The FBI agent thanks David for his time and rises from the table. A moment later, he's out the door.

Later that day, David hurls the uranium into the East River. Then he meets with Julius Rosenberg to share the good news. The FBI visit was a false alarm. The question of espionage never even came up. But David's relief doesn't last long. Just a week later, news breaks that Klaus Fuchs has been arrested in London and has confessed to spying for the Soviets. David then learns from Julius that the courier he met in Albuquerque

was also working with Fuchs. If Fuchs starts cooperating with authorities, then that courier may be unmasked, leaving David and Ruth in peril. Once again, Julius suggests that they all need to be ready to flee the country. This time, David gives it more thought, but he's still reluctant to go on the run with his young family.

And while Julius makes more serious preparations, he doesn't go anywhere either. Fortunately for both Julius and David, the British won't even allow the Americans to interview Fuchs before he's put on trial in the UK. FBI director Jayager Hoover is outraged, but London won't budge. So while the FBI waits for access to fugues, all Hoover's men can do is continue to decipher the old Venona cables,

the coded messages sent between Moscow and Soviet agents on U.S. soil. And through these cables, the FBI learns the codenames of three other people involved in the Los Alamos spy ring, liberal, Calibra, and ORA. But figuring out their true identities will be hard. thousands of people worked at Los Alamos, and it will take months to narrow down a list of suspects. Still in the spring of 1950, there is some good news for the Bureau. In March, Klaus Fuchs is convicted of espionage and sentenced to 14 years in prison. Following his conviction, the FBI is finally allowed to interview him.

They asked Fuchs about the courier he used in New Mexico, an American code-named Goose and the deciphered cables. Fuchs doesn't know the man's real name, but he does provide a basic description. Fuchs believes that Goose was likely Jewish, possibly from Philadelphia, and either an engineer or chemist by train. Back in the United States, the FBI quickly identifies everyone who fits that description. The list is a few hundred names long, and agents begin ruling each man in or out one by one. On the evening of May 22, 1950, one FBI agent heads to the home of Harry Gold. He's greeted at the door and welcomed inside. Gold shows him to the living room.

Please, have a seat. The agent takes a seat on the couch in the living room across from Gold and purchases on a recliner. So what can I do for you? Is the FBI looking to hire a new chemist? I'm afraid recruitment is above my pay grade minutes of gold. I'm just here to ask a few questions. Oh, of course. I'm happy to help. My first question may sound a bit strange, but does the name Goose mean anything to you? Yeah, odd question indeed. Goose, Goose, Goose, Mother Goose. I don't suppose she's under suspicion. not to my knowledge, no. Next question. Have you ever been to New Mexico? The agent watches as Gold falls silent for a moment. It's hard to tell if Gold is genuinely

pondering the question, or if he's buying time to think of a lie. I'm trying to think if my parents ever took me there as a child. I don't believe so. In fact, I'm pretty sure I've never been west of the Mississippi. I should do more traveling, right? Gold laughs, but the agent can sense tension behind his smile. So he decides to turn up the pressure. Would you mind if I looked around the house? Sure, just promise not to disturb my mother's china in the dining room, right? Okay? Actually, I'd like to start in your bedroom. My bedroom? If you don't mind. No, of course. Not much to see. It's over here. The agent follows Gold down the hall and into his bedroom. Gold stands awkwardly by his bed. Is there something in particular you're looking for? The agent doesn't answer.

but instead begins looking in the nightstand drawer. It's empty, save for an old novel and a pair of reading glasses. So the agent moves on to the large bookcase on the opposite side of the room. This is quite a collection of books, Mr. Gold. He picks up a book off the shelf and flips through its pages before putting it back and then picking up another. Gold shifts uncomfortably. They're all chemistry books.

Some of them I've had since college. And you've read them all? Yeah, many times. Boy, this one here must be a thousand pages. Yeah, that's quite important, too. So if you wouldn't mind, principles of chemical engineering. Over my head, for sure. The agent flips through the pages, and gold seems especially tense,

even though there's nothing inside. But as the FBI agent goes to slide the enormous book back into its place, spots a folded piece of paper that was hidden behind it on the shelf. He reaches in and pulls it out. And what's this? Oh, probably some old notes from my college days. I can take it. Gold reaches out for the paper, but the agent holds onto it.

And when he unfolds it, he finds it's not college notes at all, but a well-thumbed map of Santa Fe, New Mexico. The agent looks up at gold whose face has suddenly grown pale. I thought you'd never been west of the Mississippi. Harry Gold sinks to the edge of his bed. For a moment, he says nothing, and then the words come pouring out. He admits he was the courier who met Klaus Fuchs in New Mexico during the war. He is goose.

The FBI agent can't believe his luck. He stumbled across something huge, and now he has the chance to break open an entire Soviet spy ring. After all, if gold is cracking this easily already, then just wait until they get him down to the FBI field office and really get him talking. From Honorable Originals and Airship, this is episode two of the Rosenberg for American Scandal.

In our next episode, the FBI closes in on David and Ruth Greenglass, and the couple is forced to choose between their loyal, to the Rosenbergs and their desire to stay out of prison. American Scandal is only possible because of listeners like you, so thank you. And don't miss an episode. Be sure to follow American Scandal on Audible or wherever you get your podcasts. And Audible subscribers can binge new seasons of American Scandal early and ad-free right now. Join Audible in the Audible app or by subscribing on Apple Podcasts.

And to find out more about me, including my other podcasts, my live show, the history tours I'm arranging, and all sorts of other things. things, go to history ishuman.com. That's history ishuman.com. If you'd like to learn more about the Rosenberg's, we recommend the books The Brother, the untold story of the Rosenberg case by Sam Roberts, and the Rosenberg file by Ronald Radosh and Joyce Milton. This episode contains reenactments and dramatized details. And while in most cases we can't know exactly what was said, all our dramatizations are based on historical research. American Scandal is hosted, edited, and executive produced by me, Grand for Airship. This episode is written and researched by Corey McCaff, senior producer Andy Beckerman, managing producer Emily Burke, fact-checking by Alyssa Jung Perry, audio editing by Mohamed Shazzee,

music by Thrum, sound design by Gabriel Gould. Executive producer for Airship is William Simpson. Executive Producer for Audible is Jenny Lauer Beckman. Head of Creative Development at Audible, Kate Navin, head of Audible Originals, North America, Marshall Louis, Chief Content Officer Rachel Kiazza. Copyright 2026 by Audible Originals LLC. Sound recording copyright 2026 by Audible Originals LLC.