"I have doubts about the Einstein quote. Atoms had been split at will for decades by then."
Not in a chain reaction. When Szilárd described the concept of a chain reaction to Einstein, Einstein was shocked. He said "I never thought of that!"
Until then, nuclear physics was purely an academic enterprise. There were few applications for radioactive materials. Radioactive decay just happened at its own slow pace, and not much could be done with it. X-rays could be used to pump the process, but less energy came out than what was put in. Suddenly the nuclear physicists realized they had a tiger by the tail. This was going to change the world, not necessarily for the better.
Like @TheOtherHobbes above, I had disbelief about the Einstein quote ("Wasn't Einstein presciently aware of where nuclear fission technology was going?").
But, poking around a bit, I came to the same understanding you have. Here's some more of the time line:
The quote in the OP (which I can't find online; the Einstein archives at Caltech are, alas, not indexed) about Einstein's skepticism about nuclear energy is dated 1932. The first demonstrations of nuclear fission were years later, in late 1938 and into 1939. And as you said, Einstein is reported to have said, "I had not thought of that." -- regarding the chain reaction.
The fabled Einstein-Szilard letter to Franklin Roosevelt, warning about the Nazis getting the atomic bomb, was written in August 1939 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Einstein–Szilárd_letter), and then relayed to Roosevelt in October after the flurry of activity due to the Nazis invading Poland had died out.
Not in a chain reaction. When Szilárd described the concept of a chain reaction to Einstein, Einstein was shocked. He said "I never thought of that!"
Until then, nuclear physics was purely an academic enterprise. There were few applications for radioactive materials. Radioactive decay just happened at its own slow pace, and not much could be done with it. X-rays could be used to pump the process, but less energy came out than what was put in. Suddenly the nuclear physicists realized they had a tiger by the tail. This was going to change the world, not necessarily for the better.