Oppenheimer

I finally watched the Oppenheimer movie that came out last year. Even though there was a lot of hype about it, "greatest movie of the century" etc, I enjoyed it more than I expected.

If you haven't seen it, and are planning to do so, you may not want to read this post as I will dive into the film. 

First, I hadn't remembered, or noticed, who was in the movie, so I was pleasantly surprised a number of times when I realized that Emily Blunt portrayed Kitty Oppenheimer, Matt Damon played General Grove, Gary Oldman was President Truman, and Robert Downey Jr depicted Lewis Strauss, in addition to others who had lesser roles, such as Tom Conti, Josh Hartnett, Rami Malek, Kenneth Branaugh and Casey Affleck. In many cases, I did not recognize the actor, the make-up and character they portrayed overriding the preconceived image of them in my head.

It was truly remarkable, just from this perspective.

More importantly though, the movie presented a story in which the main character, J. Robert Oppenheimer, is a flawed hero, a story line which I truly enjoy. And, to me, one which is far more true to life than the infantile perceptions that seem to permeate our society today, whether be about our founders, our country, or our current leadership. 

I've called this out, even in terms of glorifying the messenger for the message in the case of those who have brought us advanced spiritual lessons, but it is much more overt when people pretend that the founders were connected to the Divine, or that nothing bad has ever happened in America due to our special place in the Creator's eyes, or that every statement and action by our current president must be for the good of Americans just because of his constant statements to that effect and his red hat.

While I recognize that Hollywood alters reality to tell a good tale, I assume that Oppenheimer's struggles with his relationships, and his discipline in terms of the actual, scientific work in which he engaged, are relatively accurate. Certainly, it is true that he was a complicated person, someone who could seemingly listen to and argue for both sides of a debate with equal aplomb. 

As the movie progressed, he seemed wishy-washy at times, jettisoning what appeared to be a strong belief without concern if a new perspective, or influence, on that issue allowed him to move forward with his goal. 

After effectively leading the wide spread teams that eventually created the atomic bomb, an event that the vast majority of Americans at the time thought was justified, despite the horrific loss of life both at the time of the bombing and in the years afterward due to radiation poisoning, Oppenheimer lost his security clearance, along with his job and standing in the scientific community, because his reluctance to fully advocate for the development of the H-bomb, and his insistence that the technology be shared with our allies, in particular Russia, was interpreted as disloyalty to America.

The fact that one of the scientists that he recruited for the Manhattan Project, was indeed a spy for Russia, didn't help his cause, especially with the influence of Joseph McCarthy and his Red Scare tactics that drove hundreds of Americans out of government work, even civilian work in some cases, merely because they had at one time been affiliated with the American Communist Party, or associated with people who did. In Oppenheimer's case, his brother and sister-in-law, his early lover (Jean Tatlock), and even Kitty, his wife, were all at one time, registered members of that party, although, he, while making monetary donations, did not officially join.

It was so bad that in one of the more critical and shameful scenes during his security clearance hearing, General Grove, the man who had chosen Oppenheimer to be in charge of the testing and development of the A-bomb, was asked if he would clear Oppenheimer today, with the new guidelines that presumably included references to past associations with communists. Grove admitted he would not, based on the current protocols, while also expressing his belief that Oppenheimer was loyal to America, then and now. It appears that Grove is pained to admit this, knowing that such a technicality might have produced a different result without Oppenheimer leading the program.

Would America still have mastered the technology that devastated Hiroshima and Nagasaki without Oppenheimer's leadership and inquisitive mind? Probably. Would we still have achieved that goal before the Germans? Less probably. 

Yet, less than ten years later, Oppenheimer loses his security clearance precisely because that same inquisitive mind was able to entertain and discuss different political and economic systems with his friends and family. 

It is this kind of myopic thinking that seems so prevalent in America today, and not just in the GOP. I read an interesting article about the success of Zohran Mamdani in the recent New York City Democratic primary for mayor. The article referred to an alliance between Mamdani and Brad Lander, two people with very different perspectives on the Israel-Hamas war. Yet they were able to focus on those things they had in common, rather than that one issue so that due to the primary using ranked voting, each man encouraged his followers to rank the other second, and/or not rank ex-Governor Cuomo at all. As a result, Mamdani's seven point lead after first votes were counted almost doubled when second and third ranked votes were included in the final tally. 

It is a lesson the extremes in both parties need to heed but especially the Democrats, as it is clear that millions of people who voted for Joe Biden in 2020 stayed home in 2024, while the GOP rallies behind everything Trump says and does, even when they have a history of disagreeing with a particular issue. While I might call that being spineless, it is politically effective, which, in the end, is the basis for a coalition's success. Disagree on the details, but always vote in unison when it matters.

Clearly, the absurd sway of McCarthy in the mid-50's in America, had it occurred in the mid-40's, might have resulted in a completely different ending to WW2 because McCarthy was all about one issue, rooting our communists, regardless of how that process was employed. All or nothing, no deviance.

What is even more interesting, is that in many ways, Oppenheimer was correct in his calls for cooperation and transparency with Russia, in terms of nuclear proliferation, rather than an all out arms war. While many in America might conclude that it was Russia that folded, and that both countries respected the MAD doctrine, even while accumulating enough nuclear weapons to obliterate the world hundreds of times over, it is also true that seven additional countries now possess nuclear weapons, and that others may soon join the list. 

Would things have been different had the adversarial relationship been replaced with one of cooperation and trust? The realist would say no, precisely because America and Russia did not trust each other despite the simple fact that for 80 years we have trusted them to not start a nuclear war, and vice-versa. 

As the movie progressed, Oppenheimer seemed to regret his decision to help unleash the nuclear age, not because he didn't realize it would happen with or without him, and not because he didn't believe in its use, but because he didn't trust governments, and the men who ran them, to grasp the obvious; a nuclear war is not winnable. The movie portrays his struggle with his place in history as someone who thought that once used, any sane person would realize that such power should never be used militarily again. 

Sadly, if we are to believe those who rant that Iran must never get a nuclear weapon, even if we have to bomb the hell out of them, because they will use it at once, then Oppenheimer's regret is proven. Even more so because should Iran develop a nuclear weapon and deploy it, should cooler heads not prevail, and I have zero faith in our current president to reflect such restraint, then the even more absurd proposition that a nuclear war is winnable could be tested. 

In a pivotal scene with Einstein, after WW2 was over and Oppenheimer was still riding high on his fame, there is a discussion between the men that the Downey Jr character had interpreted as the beginning of the campaign by Oppenheimer to turn all the important scientists against him. In reality, the conversation was more a reflection on how awards can sometimes indicate the end of one's career and influence, but mostly two men who knew that their work in physics had fundamentally changed the world, yet whether it was for the better or worse, was still up for debate.

Finally, towards the end of the movie, Kitty admonishes him for believing his one-time brilliance in helping America end the war against Japan, would give him carte blanche to say and do whatever he wished. It is sad that she was right although I don't think Oppenheimer ever really learned that lesson.