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1.63k reviews for:
American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer
Martin J. Sherwin, Kai Bird
4.33 AVERAGE
1.63k reviews for:
American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer
Martin J. Sherwin, Kai Bird
4.33 AVERAGE
informative
medium-paced
informative
inspiring
reflective
slow-paced
A very in depth look at the life of Oppenheimer, well written but can be quite dense in some areas which is to be expected due to the complexity of what is being considered.
I enjoyed this book and certainly learned a lot about genius and what that means in relation to others and the world. It certainly leads to the question of genius and madness as two sides of the same coin.
I saw the movie before reading the book and I'm glad that I did. It would have been hard to understand such a dense biography of a person without the movie landmarks. This book is absolutely dense and a serious undertaking to finish. It is incredibly well researched, the authors went through so many government files and completed so many interviews, it is such an unbelievable feat. Every now and then, a famous name popped up and it was mind boggling to think that Oppenheimer had all these close relationships with contemporaries that are now embedded in our history. The government's continued and persistent surveillance of Oppenheimer was particularly disturbing. Of course, if you've seen the movie, you'll find cinematic exaggerations for the sake of time but overall, the movie is surprisingly faithful to the source material.
I did find that there was a bias towards writing off Oppenheimer's Communist connections and while I found some of the argument plausible and reasonable, it did make me question what did not make it into the book that would otherwise hurt the authors' and Oppenheimer's credibility. I wonder if there's anything else that has become unclassified since the publishing of this book.
I did find that there was a bias towards writing off Oppenheimer's Communist connections and while I found some of the argument plausible and reasonable, it did make me question what did not make it into the book that would otherwise hurt the authors' and Oppenheimer's credibility. I wonder if there's anything else that has become unclassified since the publishing of this book.
Thoroughly researched and meticulous in its details of the events surrounding the Father of the Atomic Bomb. Though daunting to approach at first, I became more academically curious about what information Bird and Sherwin chose to prioritize in Oppie's life rather than the actual details of what transpired. This is a great read if you are even remotely interested in physics, weapons technology, WWII or the Cold War, or just J. Robert Oppenheimer himself. But if you're reading this because you want to be briefed before Christopher Nolan's adaptation, save yourself the trouble and just watch the 3-hour book report, as it does an excellent job of capturing all the necessary details of this biography.
Oppenheimer's life is certainly one worthy of scrutiny and study. Not because he was some larger-than-life mythical figure (as the title 'American Prometheus' suggests), but because he was a coward, and his tragic fall following his childhood and adolescence can serve as a warning call.
In the beginning of his academic career, his involvement in sending aid to the republicans in Spain who were fighting Franco's fascists, and his relationship with left-wing intellectuals and various communist-affiliated groups, make for an interesting story. But his inability to commit to the cause can be seen clearly from his positioning two decades later, where he refers to Russians as "barbarians" and communists as "the enemy." A slippery intellectual like this who won't discipline himself to dialectical materialism or historical context is sure to eventually turn on his so-called 'comrades.'
At times it seems Kai covered for his behavior. While they set him up as an intellectual who doesn’t miss anything and can think critically about multiple issues simultaneously, I found it interesting that, when they descended on Los Alamos, they brushed off the damage done to the land by saying: “he only later reflected on the fact that they destroyed a beautiful place." The truth likely lies in Oppenheimer realizing that he could obtain unimagined prestige by integrating into the imperial state, and that was more appealing to him than his loose affiliations with communist politics. That to me is the defining feature of him as a historical figure: he abandoned the communal organizing and solidarity of the early-mid '30s in pursuit of individual glory (only attainable by state co-optation). Oppenheimer knew what he was getting himself involved in, and as a foil, we can look to his close friend Isidor Rabi, who rejected his multiple offers to join the project on grounds that he didn’t want to make “the culmination of three centuries of physics” a weapon of mass destruction.
The treatment of Native Americans in the book was lacking. They describe life on the compound in Los Alamos as “army socialism", the context being that they strived for full employment of the wives of the scientists, which was only possible by busing in Pueblo women to do their domestic work. Finally, in only brief mention, we're told that Oppenheimer thought it might be wise to give the land back to the Natives. No other mention is made of them, as it's seemingly not of interest to either our protagonist or the authors.
The book makes several mention of the uranium that was needed for the production of 'the gadget.' But where did that uranium come from? The naive reader may think the U.S. just had it lying around, waiting for a use. In reality, destabilization of the Congo was a crucial U.S. policy to facilitate looting the African nation of its precious uranium mines. In fact, one of the guys who interrogates Robert (Gordon Gray) was involved in Lumumba's assassination!!! There are so many connections to be made here for a more serious scholar of history. None of this is addressed.
Another unworthy victim of Oppenheimer and the AEC is the hundreds of Americans who were unwillingly subjected to radiation experiments between April 1945 and July 1947. The book 'Medical Apartheid' reports Oppenheimer, Hempelmann, and Warren all "masterminded scores of radiation experiments from the headquarters they carved out of the shimmering rust-colored earth of the New Mexico desert, in Los Alamos.'
Finally, Oppenheimer's clear and extensive relationship with the CIA, mostly through the Congress for Cultural Freedom, is only briefly discussed (I think one paragraph). But the fact that the CCF not only served as a power arm for Cold War attacks on liberation movements in Africa, but also tried to establish 'non-communist left' alternatives akin to social democracy, makes it worth much more serious engagement on what was shaping the development of his politics and the positioning of the U.S. in the ramp-up of the Cold War.
If we're to speculate on the omission of these stories from the otherwise extremely-detailed story of Oppenheimer's life and development of the atom bomb, we may arrive at perhaps the greatest weakness of the book: Kai Bird ultimately sees Oppenheimer as a tortured genius-turned-victim. Yes, there is plenty of pontificating on the moral qualms of the Manhattan Project, and especially the development of a thermonuclear weapon (on which Oppenheimer is on the right side this time, but with caveats). But ultimately, the final third of the book, dealing with the aftermath of the AEC hearing that stripped him of security clearance, constructs a portrait of Robert is one of a victim, and one we should feel at best sorry for, and at worst conflicted sympathy. In short, these stories would just get in the way.
The post-bomb commentary is very interesting, because you can see how Oppenheimer's newfound glory (granted him by the empire) cranked the ideological dial far to the right. Sam Cohen comments that Oppenheimer’s only regret after vaporizing 100,000 Japanese civilians was that it wasn’t ready earlier to use against the Germans. Germany losing the war *without* using an atom bomb was not cause enough to celebrate, because were they to lose it *with* the atom bomb, several hundred thousand more Germans could have been killed (which to him would have been a more desirable outcome).
When the Soviet Union tests their first atom bomb, Oppenheimer reverses his position and accepts the most hawkish policy recommendations on ramping up nuclear arsenal development and the acceptance of their use as tactical weapons in fighting a war. When the U.S. invades the Korean Peninsula in 1950, this was no doubt on the minds of all war planners.
The tragedy of the coward becomes clear when his AEC hearing is about to begin. Here is a man who, despite some youthful attraction to left-wing causes, ultimately gives himself to the rising U.S. empire in creating a weapon of mass destruction that kills hundreds of thousands of people. To further entrench himself in these power structures, he renounces all left-wing ideology, does work for the CIA, calls Russians “a barbarous, backward people,” refers to communism as "the enemy," advocates a massive pileup of nuclear weapons that could be “of much help in fighting a war," and betrays his former students to McCarthy’s vermin in the HUAC trials. And still, he is not accepted. He so desperately wants power that he will shapeshift to whatever he feels the empire needs, and that is the action of a coward.
Oppenheimer lives out his final days having completely abandoned his once-interesting political consciousness. He ignores the U.S. invasion of Vietnam. He makes no comment on race relations in the U.S. And he still felt no regret for the development, defense, and strengthening of the program that has put the entire world on alert. By trying to differentiate 'guilt' with 'regret' and 'responsibility', he only obscured the moral questions of the program.
In the end, Oppenheimer is served an irony that can't be cruel enough: being treated for throat cancer in the comfort of his privileged life, he said that his doctors “attributed [his] discomfort to radiation.”
In the beginning of his academic career, his involvement in sending aid to the republicans in Spain who were fighting Franco's fascists, and his relationship with left-wing intellectuals and various communist-affiliated groups, make for an interesting story. But his inability to commit to the cause can be seen clearly from his positioning two decades later, where he refers to Russians as "barbarians" and communists as "the enemy." A slippery intellectual like this who won't discipline himself to dialectical materialism or historical context is sure to eventually turn on his so-called 'comrades.'
At times it seems Kai covered for his behavior. While they set him up as an intellectual who doesn’t miss anything and can think critically about multiple issues simultaneously, I found it interesting that, when they descended on Los Alamos, they brushed off the damage done to the land by saying: “he only later reflected on the fact that they destroyed a beautiful place." The truth likely lies in Oppenheimer realizing that he could obtain unimagined prestige by integrating into the imperial state, and that was more appealing to him than his loose affiliations with communist politics. That to me is the defining feature of him as a historical figure: he abandoned the communal organizing and solidarity of the early-mid '30s in pursuit of individual glory (only attainable by state co-optation). Oppenheimer knew what he was getting himself involved in, and as a foil, we can look to his close friend Isidor Rabi, who rejected his multiple offers to join the project on grounds that he didn’t want to make “the culmination of three centuries of physics” a weapon of mass destruction.
The treatment of Native Americans in the book was lacking. They describe life on the compound in Los Alamos as “army socialism", the context being that they strived for full employment of the wives of the scientists, which was only possible by busing in Pueblo women to do their domestic work. Finally, in only brief mention, we're told that Oppenheimer thought it might be wise to give the land back to the Natives. No other mention is made of them, as it's seemingly not of interest to either our protagonist or the authors.
The book makes several mention of the uranium that was needed for the production of 'the gadget.' But where did that uranium come from? The naive reader may think the U.S. just had it lying around, waiting for a use. In reality, destabilization of the Congo was a crucial U.S. policy to facilitate looting the African nation of its precious uranium mines. In fact, one of the guys who interrogates Robert (Gordon Gray) was involved in Lumumba's assassination!!! There are so many connections to be made here for a more serious scholar of history. None of this is addressed.
Another unworthy victim of Oppenheimer and the AEC is the hundreds of Americans who were unwillingly subjected to radiation experiments between April 1945 and July 1947. The book 'Medical Apartheid' reports Oppenheimer, Hempelmann, and Warren all "masterminded scores of radiation experiments from the headquarters they carved out of the shimmering rust-colored earth of the New Mexico desert, in Los Alamos.'
Finally, Oppenheimer's clear and extensive relationship with the CIA, mostly through the Congress for Cultural Freedom, is only briefly discussed (I think one paragraph). But the fact that the CCF not only served as a power arm for Cold War attacks on liberation movements in Africa, but also tried to establish 'non-communist left' alternatives akin to social democracy, makes it worth much more serious engagement on what was shaping the development of his politics and the positioning of the U.S. in the ramp-up of the Cold War.
If we're to speculate on the omission of these stories from the otherwise extremely-detailed story of Oppenheimer's life and development of the atom bomb, we may arrive at perhaps the greatest weakness of the book: Kai Bird ultimately sees Oppenheimer as a tortured genius-turned-victim. Yes, there is plenty of pontificating on the moral qualms of the Manhattan Project, and especially the development of a thermonuclear weapon (on which Oppenheimer is on the right side this time, but with caveats). But ultimately, the final third of the book, dealing with the aftermath of the AEC hearing that stripped him of security clearance, constructs a portrait of Robert is one of a victim, and one we should feel at best sorry for, and at worst conflicted sympathy. In short, these stories would just get in the way.
The post-bomb commentary is very interesting, because you can see how Oppenheimer's newfound glory (granted him by the empire) cranked the ideological dial far to the right. Sam Cohen comments that Oppenheimer’s only regret after vaporizing 100,000 Japanese civilians was that it wasn’t ready earlier to use against the Germans. Germany losing the war *without* using an atom bomb was not cause enough to celebrate, because were they to lose it *with* the atom bomb, several hundred thousand more Germans could have been killed (which to him would have been a more desirable outcome).
When the Soviet Union tests their first atom bomb, Oppenheimer reverses his position and accepts the most hawkish policy recommendations on ramping up nuclear arsenal development and the acceptance of their use as tactical weapons in fighting a war. When the U.S. invades the Korean Peninsula in 1950, this was no doubt on the minds of all war planners.
The tragedy of the coward becomes clear when his AEC hearing is about to begin. Here is a man who, despite some youthful attraction to left-wing causes, ultimately gives himself to the rising U.S. empire in creating a weapon of mass destruction that kills hundreds of thousands of people. To further entrench himself in these power structures, he renounces all left-wing ideology, does work for the CIA, calls Russians “a barbarous, backward people,” refers to communism as "the enemy," advocates a massive pileup of nuclear weapons that could be “of much help in fighting a war," and betrays his former students to McCarthy’s vermin in the HUAC trials. And still, he is not accepted. He so desperately wants power that he will shapeshift to whatever he feels the empire needs, and that is the action of a coward.
Oppenheimer lives out his final days having completely abandoned his once-interesting political consciousness. He ignores the U.S. invasion of Vietnam. He makes no comment on race relations in the U.S. And he still felt no regret for the development, defense, and strengthening of the program that has put the entire world on alert. By trying to differentiate 'guilt' with 'regret' and 'responsibility', he only obscured the moral questions of the program.
In the end, Oppenheimer is served an irony that can't be cruel enough: being treated for throat cancer in the comfort of his privileged life, he said that his doctors “attributed [his] discomfort to radiation.”
informative
reflective
slow-paced
Not convinced I had to hear about the emigration patterns of Oppenheimer’s childhood rabbi’s father but I guess that’s what it takes to win a Pulitzer Prize.
informative
medium-paced
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
informative
inspiring
sad
tense
medium-paced