Physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer led what was called the Manhattan
Project to develop nuclear weapons during World War two. He is perhaps
best known as the father of the atomic bomb. As time has passed,
more details have emerged about his life. And, as William Branham
explains, there are some new assessments of his role in history.
We imagine a future
And our imaginings Horrified IRS Christopher Nolan's upcoming film,
Oppenheimer tells the story of the brilliant physicist and his intense
work to develop the weapons that would help America win the Second
World War. Two of the bombs he and his colleagues helped create were
dropped on Japan, killing several 100,000 people, mostly civilians,
but helping bring the war to a quicker end.
Afterwards, Oppenheimer expressed regret about these weapons and
work to stop their proliferation in 1954 at the height of anti Soviet
fervor. His security clearance was revoked over allegations that
he had ties to communism. But almost 70 years later, long after his
death, Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm reversed that decision,
saying
As time has passed, more evidence has come to light of the bias and
unfairness of the process that Dr Oppenheimer was subjected to. While
the evidence of his loyalty and love of country have only been further
affirmed for more on this complicated man and his role in history,
I'm joined now by Alex. Well, Erstein He's a historian of nuclear
weapons. A professor at the Stevens Institute of Technology and author
of Restricted Data. The History of Nuclear Secrecy in the United
States.
Professor Weilerstein. Great to have you on the news hour for those
of us who are not familiar with Oppenheimer's worked on the Manhattan
project. You just remind us a bit of what role he played in how Central
he was to that.
Oppenheimer was the scientific director of the Manhattan Project
and the director of the Los Alamos Laboratory. And so in this position,
he was in charge of all of the scientific decision, making all of
the advising on the production of the bombs crucial to the planning
for the actual use of the bombs and was credited as sort of the glue
that held together this massive, sprawling new industry that had
been built and unprecedented time in total secrecy during World War
two.
And we certainly know what those nuclear weapons did during World
War two and we are still living decades later, with the specter of
them even in the war in Ukraine, and
Russia's saber rattling Now I mean, as you and others have written,
Oppenheimer was complicated and conflicted man. He built the ultimate
weapons of mass destruction, but then also worked to limit their
use. Is it fair to say that he grappled with the morality of what
he had done? Timer? He's tricky because on the one hand he always
defended making and using the bombs during World War two. On the
other hand, he thought that the appropriate response to
Having made and used those bombs in World War two was to make sure
that they could never be used again and that you might not want to
make even larger bombs like the hydrogen bomb, which was 1000 times
more powerful than the weapons in World War two.
And so on The one hand, he's
uh does seem like he grapples with the ethics and the responsibility.
On the other hand, he doesn't slot into easy categories of, you know,
pro nuclear, anti nuclear or anything like that. He's he's tricky
figure. He tooks really seriously all the dimensions of the entire
problem and didn't see it as a simple one to be solved.
He is famously quoted this line from Hindu scripture where, he said,
Now I am become death. The destroyer of worlds. I mean that that
utterance has been endlessly interpreted. What is your sense of what
he was saying? They're Oppenheimer's relationship to the Bhagavad
Geeta is pretty interesting. I mean, that's his own sort of idiosyncratic
translation from a man who studies Sanskrit, principally to read
the Bhagavad Geeta. The Gator is a story about responsibility. It's
a story about your duty to cause is bigger.
Er than you and to the idea that a soldier is not necessarily the
ultimate cause of the destruction that has caused by war. And so
I am become death destroyer of worlds. It's less probably Oppenheimer
saying.
I am death. It's more Oppenheimer taking the role of the prince and
the story who has just been shown this display by this God who the
God is saying? I'm ultimately why people die. You're just the instrument.
And so that's a very different sort of read on what Oppenheimer is
going for their It's it's less He is the God.
It's more he is now being compelled by this new force atomic energy
to be this instrument of destruction. Whether he would like to or
not so interesting, um, so fast forward to the fifties, The country
is wracked with this fear that the Soviets are coming and that the
Communists are infiltrating everywhere, and he's accused of being
sympathetic or in cahoots with the Communist. Is there any evidence
that that that was the case?
The main charges against Oppenheimer were about his character and
his associations and associations is do you have friends or family
who are Communists? And the answer for Oppenheimer was? Yes. All
of his friends and family and students were either communists or
close to Communists or Jason. He himself was pretty close to communism
in the thirties. You have to put this in the context of the great
Depression of what it meant to be, say pro civil rights in the 19
thirties, the Communists were the ones
Who are often leading those charges, so a lot of what they were advocating
for is not necessarily
Violent revolution or Stalinism or anything like that, but a lot
of things that we would associate with progressive causes. But by
the 19 fifties, the political ones that really shifted and it was
a pretty damning association to have your brother be a member of
the Communist Party or your wife. Being a former member of the Communist
Party and things like that the accusations of his character were
the basically during World War two. He did things that were in retrospect,
pretty irresponsible, including lying.
Two security agents, probably to protect his brother.
Things that don't look good in retrospect, but are understandable
and don't necessarily mean that he was a spy or disloyal or anything
like that. And so I think it's important to sort of separate. The
question of was Oppenheimer Loyal? Was he trustworthy from the question
of did Oppenheimer always have the right resume for somebody in the
19 fifties based on the fears that they had at that time?
So the Department of Energy makes this sort of posthumous reinstatement
of his security clearance. Did that surprise you? When it came out
completely surprised me. I knew that they had had this requested.
I knew that various administrations had thought about this. But it
was surprising because the easiest thing for for a bureaucrat to
do is not do anything right. There was no
Great public outcry or demand for this. There are ways you could
imagine this being spun by enemies of the current political administration.
There's not a lot of obvious need or gain. It's just sort of a writing
of historical wrongs, which unfortunately, is not a usually a priority.
Um, so, yeah, I was surprised It would be much easier for them to
do nothing on this than to do something. And then having done this
is them sticking their neck out a bit.
All right, Alex Wallerstein, historian and Stevens Institute of Technology.
So good to have you thank you very much.