Oppenheimer – The Man and his Legacy
How the A-Bomb changed the course of history
“Now I am become Death, the
destroyer of worlds.”
-
J Robert Oppenheimerquoting
the Bhagavad-Gita
Overview
Christopher Nolan’s recent Hollywood blockbuster biopic Oppenheimer
has again brought into sharp focus the legacy of its lead character, J Robert
Oppenheimer, simultaneously vilified and glorified as the ‘father of the
A-bomb’, at least in popular perception. An outstanding theoretical physicist,
of such unqualified reputation as to head the Institute for Advanced Study in
Princeton as the boss of the great Albert Einstein, one who was associated with
the seminal developments of quantum physics in Europe and took them with him back
to America, one who came close to predicting the existence of the blackhole
long before the concept had received serious consideration, and possibly missed
out on a physics Nobel prize, a pacifist at heart with strong leftist
sympathies that made him look like a traitor in the eyes of a myopic and paranoid
administration, something of a polymath and polyglot, including scholarship of the
ancient Sanskrit language and its monumental Bhagavad-Gita, a man with
the organizational and administrative acumen needed to bring together a diverse
group of prima donnas in their respective areas of specialization to work
together and pull off one of the most challenging achievements in the history of human
endeavour, a man of unsteady character and questionable resolve at times, a
libertarian with his personal life, who chain smoked his way to a premature
demise and, above all, a man who happened to be at the right time and place,
with the right skills and competence, to oversee the transformation of one of
the profoundly fundamental discoveries in science into what sadly turned out to
be an existential threat to humanity itself.
This is the American Prometheus who was ‘destined’ to place in the hands
of the US presidency and its military the ultimate weapon, something few had
even dreamed possible, a byproduct of the intellect pushing the frontiers of
science and technology beyond their limits at the time.
Oppenheimer, the movie
Before examining Oppenheimer, the man and his terrible legacy, which is the
primary purpose of this article, I would like to dwell a little on Oppenheimer
the movie, which has been the trigger for such an exercise. It is an epic
biographical film released
this year, written and directed by the renowned producer, Christopher Nolan, based on the 2005 monumental Pulitzer Prize
winning biographical work American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy
of J Robert Oppenheimer, by acclaimed historians Kai Bird and Martin J Sherwin (see picture below). The film
stars Cillian Murphy in the
title role, Matt Damon as General
Leslie Groves, military head of the Manhattan Project, and Robert Downey Jr as the villain of the piece Lewis Strauss, chairman of the U S Atomic Energy Commission, besides
numerous actors playing the roles of a galaxy of nuclear scientists, all part
of the project. In my view, a few of the characters in the movie whose
appearance is disproportionately lowkey compared to their real-life
contributions to the project are: Enrico Fermi, E O Lawrence, Arthur H Compton
and Leo Szilard.
Barring the
cinematic liberties inevitably employed in any work of its type, the three-hour
(unnecessarily) long movie is superbly produced and largely true to the book,
with the focus strongly on the triumphal and tragic personality of a tormented
genius, and the humiliation he had to suffer for exercising his personal
freedom in an ostensibly free society. The movie, its lead actor Cillian Murphy and
director Christopher Nolan have already emerged as strong contenders for next
year’s Oscar awards, as is Robert Downey Jr for his ‘supporting’ role. Matt
Demon is a bit of a disappointment in his role as General Leslie Groves,
certainly missing some of the latter’s rustic dynamism and idiosyncrasies. The two female roles come out as somewhat
incidental and padded up, though they lived more significant roles in real
life. The Bhagavad Gita in the
bedroom scene is certainly in poor taste if not actually insulting to the country
of its origin. Also depicted in poor
light is the great Albert Einstein, notwithstanding the fact that he was way
past his best as a contributing physicist. There is only a passing reference to
his historic letter to President Roosevelt that gave birth to the Manhattan
project. Leo Szilard’s catalytic role is also downplayed, as is the
contribution of Enrico Fermi who made the early pathbreaking discoveries in
Chicago. Indeed, the hectic scientific
activities at Los Alamos and elsewhere don’t find the emphasis they deserve,
possibly to avoid portraying the project as something too technical for general
audiences.
Incidentally,
the book portrays the man faithfully for what he actually was, a multifaceted
genius with a talent for almost anything under the Sun, a piece of a modern-day
Leonardo da Vinci, as adept in other fields as in theoretical Physics for which
he is justly famous. This is missing in the movie, perhaps because it would
otherwise interfere with the cause celebre of the production.
While
Oppenheimer’s depressing encounter with President Truman gets its due billing,
the actual event itself, the dropping of the A-bombs wreaking havoc on Hiroshima
and Nagasaki, goes utterly ignored. How could the actual use of the A-bombs not
be part of any narrative concerning the man who is credited with their making!
The movie
itself is annoyingly fast paced in the first half, with the average viewer
hardly able to keep up with the conversations and understand their significance
despite the excellent subtitling. Apart
from the totally irrelevant confirmation hearings of Lewis Strauss, much of the
second half is given over to the conduct of Oppenheimer’s security ‘hearings’, amounting
to a medieval style inquisition in a modern-day setting, with the accused
expected to prove his innocence, the accusation essentially being that he was
furthering the cause of communism in an endangered society. One does not have to look too far back in
human history to find a Galileo having to prove that he was not an agent of the
devil endangering a god-given belief system enforced by the church. Nolan should have stayed with a vastly more
relevant portrayal of the man and the legacy he left behind, with the
unleashing of an existential threat to human survival, instead of straying into
the purely collateral happenings at the time or thereafter.
Much is made of
the non-use of CGI (computer-generated imagery) in shooting the ultra-expensive
(US$ 100 million) movie. I don’t see much merit in this claim since the same
quality of production could have been obtained employing CGI, and at a
considerably reduced cost as well, since there is so little in this biopic that
demands much use of CGI. James Cameron could have shown how this could have
been achieved, with some of his own blockbusters.
Oppenheimer, the BBC Miniseries
After viewing Nolan’s movie in the first week
of its local release in a thinly attended show, unsurprisingly so because of
its seriously biographical and ‘actionless’ content, set in another society and
at another time, I remembered having viewed the BBC miniseries with the same
title and content produced long ago. I thought it would be inappropriate to
comment on the present movie without seeing the miniseries again. I took to writing this article only after
seeing all seven episodes of the excellent miniseries, each about an hour long.
Barring minor variations, BBC’s Oppenheimer,
spread over seven hours in all, is not much of a match to Nolan’s production in
terms of technical qualities, but otherwise equally good in my assessment. It has an uncomplicated sequential
development of content all through, at a leisurely pace, without perplexing the
viewer in any way. In my view, Sam
Waterston (see picture below) playing the role of a properly lean and lanky Oppenheimer
looks even more realistic and convincing than Murphy, without taking away any
credit from the latter for his current performance. Manning Redwood is definitely better than
Matt Damon as General Groves. David Suchet as Edward Teller with his premature
super-bomb mania has a considerably more impactful role as well. The role of Kitty, Oppenheimer’s wife, finds
a great deal more prominence than in Nolan’s movie. The Los Alamos science
related activities and the nuclear scientists involved get their rightful
representation. To my chagrin the
‘inquisition’ related scenes are produced even more tellingly than in the current
version, with Oppenheimer, backstabbed by Teller in the end, appearing to be
even more of a wrong-doer. This is something on which I find the BBC production
rather guilty of undue wrong doing. Those who detest seeing Oppenheimer in poor
light at the end of his career do well to completely ignore the last episode of
the miniseries. Also, the multifaceted genius that Oppenheimer really was
doesn’t show up any more glaringly here than in Nolan’s production.
Early Life
Born in 1904 to a rich nonconformist liberal Jewish American family in
New York, Oppenheimer was a naturally brilliant student, of almost anything
that he fancied, science taking the front seat.
In 1911, he entered the Ethical Culture Society School, founded on
the Ethical Culture movement,
whose motto was "Deed before Creed". Oppenheimer entered Harvard College in 1922, graduating in 1925. He spent some unhappy time at Cambridge,
England, before moving to Gottingen in Germany to work under the legendary Max
Born (see picture below), a pioneer in quantum mechanics. It was there that he
also studied with some of the greatest names of that era in the fledgling field,
including Werner Heisenberg, Wolfgang Pauli, Paul Dirac, Enrico Fermi, Maria
Goeppert and Edward Teller, most of them future Nobel laureates. In 1927 he got his doctorate degree under Max
Born.
[It is
interesting to note that Max Born was a visiting scientist in 1935 at the
Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, on the invitation of its then director
and Indian Nobel Laureate C V Raman.]
Max Born
Life at
Berkeley
Back in the
USA, Oppenheimer worked alternately at Caltech and the University of
California, Berkeley, both outstanding centres for physics research. At
Berkeley, aside from his research and teaching activities, he became a strong
sympathiser and active supporter of communist ideology, something that was to
haunt him for the rest of his life. He
also had an interest in learning languages and learned Sanskrit in 1933, apart from mastering several European
languages. He eventually read literary works such as the Bhagavad Gita and Meghaduta in
the original Sanskrit, and deeply pondered over them. He later cited the Gita as
one of the books that most shaped his philosophy of life and called it
"the most beautiful philosophical song existing in any known tongue."
Physics
Contributions
The Manhattan
Project
1938 marked the
discovery of nuclear fission by two German scientists, leading to the eventual
development of the Atom Bomb under the leadership of Oppenheimer as part of the
Manhattan Project, and this altered the course of history. The story is told in considerable detail in
one of my previous blog articles, titled “Physics behind the horror of
Hiroshima”, and I strongly urge the reader to go through it before
continuing with the present article.
The implication
of the discovery of uranium fission was quick to be absorbed by the scientific
community, and Oppenheimer was among the first to do so. Urged on by Leo Szilard, Einstein wrote a matter-of-fact
style letter to the American president Franklin Roosevelt, which is now part of
history. The letter was a wake-up call
for some concrete action on the part of the government, with the implication
that the Germans could otherwise steal a march over the USA. This resulted in
the Manhattan Project under the US Army, headed by then Col Leslie Groves, for
a massive developmental effort in great secrecy, recruiting some of the best-known
nuclear scientists in the country. A substantial number of them were immigrant
Europeans who had virtually fled from Hitler’s Germany and other parts of the
troubled continent. Some were also from Britain and Canada.
Albert Einstein with Leo Szilard
Oppenheimer with Einstein
Groves realized
that he had been put in charge of getting sound scientific ideas, but mostly
ideas nevertheless, transformed into speedy action. He needed a highly
competent, brilliant and respected scientist who could get a team of equally
brilliant scientists to work together, make the key discoveries still needed,
design a functional nuclear fission bomb and make it work, all as fast as
humanly possible and before the dreaded Germans could do so. Though the project also involved both Britain
and Canada, Groves understandably needed a ‘native’ American to head such a
developmental effort. After some
exploratory effort, he chose Oppenheimer for the job, overlooking his
well-known communist sympathies as well as the consequent security concerns
that had also been documented. The
two of them got on with each other very well despite some irritants and Oppenheimer’s
reluctance to follow all the security protocols that Groves was trying to impose. Los Alamos in New Mexico state, a place
Oppenheimer used to visit frequently, was chosen to carry out much of the
developmental work under military control, and the desert land was transformed
into a large human habitat in a matter of months.
Key Project
Scientists
Oppenheimer successfully brought together most of the greatest nuclear physicists and chemists of the times to work on the Manhattan Project in an atmosphere they were generally used to, an atmosphere of informal discussions with free interchange of ideas. However, much Groves disliked this lack of ‘discipline’ he had to be accommodative in the interests of ‘getting things done’ as expeditiously as the situation demanded. With the notable exception of Edward Teller, whose interest was primarily and unwaveringly in the development of a Hydrogen bomb even before the A-bomb became a reality, most of the people worked with him as much out of their respect for him as because of compelling necessity, without coercion of any kind.
Oppenheimer with Leslie Groves at Los Alamos
Oppenheimer with Fermi (centre) and Lawrence
Here is a
who-is-who of the key project scientists, the prima donnas in their respective
fields, some of them already Nobel laureates and others soon to be in later
years:
Ernest O Lawrence: A great experimental physicist and pioneer of particle
accelerators at Berkeley, through his invention of the cyclotron. Worked mostly
at Berkeley on the electromagnetic separation of Uranium-235 from natural
uranium. He had an ambivalent attitude
towards Oppenheimer at the end. Won Nobel Prize in 1939.
Enrico Fermi: One
of the greatest physicists of the last century, as brilliant on the
experimental side as on the theoretical, this Italian émigré first achieved the
self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction so necessary for any further work on the
A-bomb. His importance to the success of the project has not been adequately
recognized. He won the Nobel prize in
1938.
Arthur H Compton: A ‘native’ American like Lawrence, and an excellent
administrator, he is known for his
leadership role in the Metallurgical Laboratory at
the University of Chicago during the project.
Winner of the Nobel prize in 1927.
Isidor Isaac Rabi: A long-standing and great friend of Oppenheimer, Rabi was
another mainstay of the project, always supportive and helpful. He won the Nobel prize in 1944.
Robert Serber: A right
hand man and former student of Oppenheimer, Serber played a massive behind-the-scenes
role in the success of the whole project. He was involved hugely in the
dissemination of official project information through his famous Los Alamos
Primer, LA-1.
Richard Feynman: Another one of the greatest physicists of the last century,
the inimitable Richard Feynman also had a role in the Manhattan Project, a fact
not too well known. He won a Nobel Prize
in 1965.
Edward Teller: Despite the tag of
infamy that he acquired in the Oppenheimer ‘security hearings’ affair, this
brilliant though eccentric Hungarian émigré acquired fame through his
pioneering work on the Hydrogen bomb that followed the Manhattan Project.
Hans Bethe: A
refugee from Nazi Germany in 1935, Bethe was the head of the theoretical
physics group at Los Alamos. Won the
Nobel Prize in 1967.
Philip Morrison: As an acclaimed theoretical physicist (later a renowned
astrophysicist as well) and former student of Oppenheimer, this polio victim
had a major role in the project despite his known status as a former member of
the communist party. He has been
euphemistically described as “the man
with one of the most incriminating pro‐Communist records in the entire academic
world.”
[I fondly
recall meeting this savant at the Raman Research Institute, Bangalore, where he
was a visiting professor circa 1978 when I was a research fellow at the same
institute.]
Leo Szilard: Another
Hungarian émigré, this physicist and inventor was not only instrumental in
getting the Manhattan Project initiated through his association with Einstein
but also played a key role in the project itself. He was the first to propose
the self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction, and later worked with Fermi in actually
achieving it.
Niels Bohr:
Another of the foremost physicists of modern times, this father figure of
quantum physics was associated with the Manhattan Project under the assumed
name of Nicholas Baker for security reasons.
He won a Nobel Prize for his revolutionary work on the structure of the
atom in 1922.
James Frank: A German émigré, Franck became a leader of those scientists in the Manhattan
Project who sought to stop the bomb’s use against Japan; they instead suggested
that the bomb be exploded in an unpopulated area to demonstrate its power to
the Japanese government. He had won a Nobel Prize in 1925.
Emilio Segre: A
distinguished Italian émigré and a student of Enrico Fermi in Rome, Segre
played a key role in the project as a group leader in the Los Alamos
laboratory. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1959.
Klaus Fuchs: Fuchs was a German theoretical physicist
who stealthily supplied information from the Manhattan Project to
the Soviet Union during and shortly after World War II. While at the Los Alamos Laboratory,
Fuchs was responsible for many significant theoretical calculations relating to
the A-bomb and, later, early models of the H-bomb. He was convicted
as a spy in Britain in 1950.
[Contrary to popular belief, Albert Einstein was
not involved in the Manhattan Project though he was instrumental in its
initiation; so also, Max Born and the Chicago based astrophysicist of Indian
origin, Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar.]
Bomb
Development
Here are some key points related to the development and first use of the A-bombs:
- The Manhattan Project employed nearly 130,000 people at its peak and cost nearly US$2 billion at that time. Over 90 percent of the cost was for building factories and to produce fissile material, with less than 10 percent for development and production of the weapons.
- Headquartered at Los Alamos, research and production took place at more than 30 sites across the United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada.
- The project led to the development of two types of atomic bombs, both developed concurrently: a relatively simple gun-type fission weapon and a more complex implosion-type nuclear weapon.
- The ‘Thin Man’ gun-type design proved impractical to use with plutonium, so a simpler gun-type design called ‘Little Boy’ was developed that used uranium-235.
- Three methods were employed for uranium enrichment: electromagnetic, gaseous and thermal. In parallel with the work on uranium was an effort to produce plutonium.
- After the feasibility of the world's first artificial nuclear reactor, the Chicago Pile-1, was demonstrated in 1942 at the Metallurgical Laboratory in the University of Chicago, the project designed the X-10 Graphite Reactor and the production reactors at the Hanford Site, in which uranium was irradiated and transmuted into plutonium.
- The ‘Fat Man’ plutonium implosion-type weapon was developed in a concerted design and development effort by the Los Alamos Laboratory.
Trinity was the code name of the first
detonation of a nuclear weapon on 16 July 1945, as part of the Manhattan Project. The test was
conducted in a desert about 56 km southeast of Socorro, New Mexico, on what was then
the Alamogordo Bombing and Gunnery Range. A base camp was
constructed, and there were 425 people present at the time of the test. The
test was of an implosion-type plutonium device,
nicknamed ‘The Gadget’, of the same design as the 'Fat Man' bomb later detonated over
Nagasaki,
Japan, on 9 August 1945. The device was placed on top of a 30m steel
tower pictured below with the device itself shown in the inset. Also shown is
the ‘mushroom’ cloud formed over the test site, engulfing and swallowing up
everything in and around, immediately after the blast.
Bombs on Japan
Oppenheimer’s
post war stance
After the war
ended, Oppenheimer, who had now become the ‘American Prometheus’, was immensely
sad and contrite about the terrible means of destruction he had helped unleash
on humanity. Greatly distressed, he had remarked: “I have blood on my hands.” He
decided not only to take no further part in weapons development, the ‘super’
H-bomb so strongly proposed by Teller being the next on line, but also joined
fellow project scientists in pleading for an embargo on the further use of the
A-bombs in any manner. This stance put him in direct conflict with the
administration, and American president Harry Truman, with his own political
compulsions, fell fowl of him. Oppenheimer suddenly became a persona non
grata of sorts and lost much of the influence and fame he had acquired
through the success of the Manhattan Project.
Strauss and his
chargesheet
Oppenheimer’s miniscule enemies, principally the chairman of the newly formed US Atomic Energy Commission, Lewis Strauss, had an axe or two to grind against his former friend and associate for his refusal to toe the official line and other obscure reasons. He was now in a position to wreak his vengeance on Oppenheimer. Even while outwardly in good terms with him, Strauss was plotting to bring Oppenheimer down for good. The past association with the communist party and a few small indiscretions committed by Oppenheimer suddenly became a national security concern and a witch hunt, reminiscent of medieval times, was initiated. This was perhaps the precursor to something much worse to follow soon in the McCarthy era.
Lewis Strauss
Oppenheimer’s
security clearance with governmental agencies was suspended pending a full
investigation, to be followed by ‘hearings’ to determine if he was a ‘national
security threat’. The man who was
admired and respected as the ‘father of the atom bomb’ not so long ago was
being humiliated and asked to defend himself against a long chargesheet handed
out by Strauss, digging into Oppenheimer’s past that had been fully and
justifiably overlooked by Groves at a time of dire need for a leader of his
stature. The chargesheet was a litany of some 24 allegations, most of them
connected with Oppenheimer’s past that had already been investigated and
cleared.
The Inquisition
and the aftermath
Against
Einstein’s advice, Oppenheimer chose to ‘defend’ himself at the ensuing
hearings. Einstein felt that Oppenheimer’s stature was too high to stoop to
being treated as an accused. In effect, he was advocating defiance, not
defence.
In 1954, a four-week court martial style ‘hearings’ conducted by the United States Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) dug into the background, actions, and past associations of Oppenheimer. The court-room style drama had been carefully orchestrated to make Oppenheimer’s past actions look indefensible and appear like a national threat. With the sole exception of Edward Teller, all the scientists who testified spoke strongly in favour of Oppenheimer, notably the great Fermi.
Edward Teller
The sham hearings
resulted in Oppenheimer’s security clearance being revoked by a 2-1 ‘verdict’.
This marked the end of his formal relationship with the government of the
United States, and generated considerable controversy regarding his treatment. This humiliation also effectively ended his
career and his stature as an internationally famous figure.
By humiliating
a public figure of the stature of Oppenheimer, the US administration was
exposing the hollowness of its claim of guaranteed freedom of expression and
action. The McCarthy trials soon to follow merely exacerbated this. It was not
Oppenheimer the person alone who was being ill-treated. It was indeed the entire
scientific community since they were left with no voice to express themselves
against the horrors that could follow from any unfettered nuclear armaments
programme. Indeed, such fears were well founded considering how fast an
international nuclear armaments race unfolded soon after. The Manhattan Project was not just a triumph
for the world scientific community, it was a tragedy as well, one over which
they had no control, and one they had to suffer in silence.
The terrible
legacy of Oppenheimer
There are few
parallels in history to the terrible nature of the legacy that Oppenheimer left
behind him. Rightly or wrongly, willingly or otherwise, fortuitously or
accidentally, he was instrumental in the creation of a weapon of mass
destruction, indeed even of the possible extinction, of life on earth. With the arsenal of nuclear weapons now
stockpiled by both super and lesser powers, it is estimated that their
simultaneous detonation can wipe out much of life on earth, much the same way
as the dinosaurs became extinct about 65 million years ago as the result of a
gigantic asteroid impact. True, such a
simultaneous detonation is highly improbable, but great deal more probable is
an all-out nuclear warfare that can be triggered by just one such weapon
dropped on enemy territory intentionally or otherwise.
It is true that
there has been no use of nuclear weapons since Hiroshima even in mega scale
conventional wars, including the one in eastern Europe right now between super
power Russia and a defiant Ukraine, but how long can such a nuclear détente
continue? What is the guarantee that a demented leader of a rogue nuclear power
will not provoke even a ‘limited’ nuclear war deliberately or as a last
resort? Even while such existential
threats continue to haunt the post Oppenheimer era, even as questions continue
to be asked without tangible solutions, the whole of humanity is tottering under
a Damocles’ sword hanging over its head! Should we take this as the legacy of
Oppenheimer? Or, should we continue to feel snugly comfortable under the
illusion that a nuclear weapon is so deadly that no nation dares to use it on
another because it would then be open to instant retaliation and may itself
cease to exist as a nation? This would be like assuming that a fear of MAD
(mutually assured destruction) is the ultimate deterrent. The fact that this
illusion has worked so far doesn’t lift it to the status of a (non-existent) universal
law of human behaviour!
Could the
development of a nuclear weapon have ever been prevented or even
postponed? The incredibly fast paced
developments in science and technology in recent history should convince anyone
that this is only a pipedream. The
moment it was discovered that a self-sustaining chain reaction could be
attained in a uranium pile as demonstrated by Enrico Fermi, it was apparent
that it was only a matter of time before a weapon would be developed. If an Oppenheimer was not on hand to assume
the leadership mantle, someone else, like Lawrence or Compton, would have been
available to oversee the development. It
was perhaps the misfortune of Oppenheimer that chance threw him into the
cauldron, and he ended up sharing both fame and blame for his stewardship. That
this happened to someone as sensitive, humane and competent as Oppenheimer is
the real tragedy of the man. The terrible legacy is undeniable and even
unavoidable, but the responsibility is incidental. He was only a cog in a
wheel. Is this what is also described as
‘fate’ or ‘destiny’?
Epilogue
It is appropriate
to take note of a belated vindication of Oppenheimer as recently as December
16, 2022. Jennifer Granholm, the Secretary of the United States Department of Energy (DOE) –
the successor organization to the AEC – vacated the 1954 revocation of
Oppenheimer's security clearance. Her statement said Oppenheimer's
clearance was revoked "through a flawed process that violated the
Commission's own regulations. 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.”
[Postscript: According to Kai Bird, the then Indian Prime Minister Nehru offered Oppenheimer the Indian citizenship after the latter’s disgrace, but Oppenheimer was too much of a patriot to consider such an offer.]
