The Tragedy of Dr. Oppenheimer
BOHN, WILLIAM E.
The issues raised in the non-clearance of the famed scientist will plague us all for many years The Tragedy of Dr. Oppenheimer By William E. Bohn The case of Dr. J. Robert Oppenheimer, everyone...
...Oppenheimer committed his silliest blunder...
...Among the supporters of Communist enterprises were long lists of businessmen, professional leaders, clergymen, politicians and intellectuals...
...I refer to Haakon Chevalier's attempt to secure scientific information for the Russians...
...Commissioner Murray said: "It would be unwise, unjust and dangerous to admit as a principle that errors of judgment, especially in complicated situations, can furnish valid grounds for later indictments of a man's loyalty, character or status as a security risk...
...Doubts about the decision are immediately aroused by certain circumstances of the way in which it was reached and announced...
...One of them, I think, has some validity...
...Oppenheimer had had much instruction or experience with regard to security matters, he had sound ideas about loyalty...
...But similar things have happened to other persons, and they will happen to many more unless we learn to think more clearly and reasonably about such matters...
...Until well into the Second World War...
...They placed them beside the twelve years of devoted and discreet service...
...That is what our universities try very hard to teach history students not to do...
...An appeal to the President is still possible, but to those who have followed the case the notion seems futile...
...All the proper motions have been made...
...They have dug up and enlarged a few incidents which belong to Dr...
...He was their meat...
...Oppenheimer's circle...
...It was not until August 1943 that he was sufficiently aroused by association with security officers to give an account of it...
...And, incidentally, the confusion shown in an important case of this sort makes it all the harder to catch the real Communists...
...In regard to this charge, accepted by the majority of the special board, all that is necessary is to quote from Thomas E. Murray of the AEC, who pronounced the strongest verdict against Dr...
...And once he began to realize the implications of Government work in sensitive areas, he told the story with the utmost frankness...
...The Oppenheimer case is important beyond the loss to the Government of the services of a scientist—no matter how brilliant...
...All the rules have been observed...
...In order to shield his friend Chevalier, he gave what he later called "a cock-and-bull story...
...No one has accused him of the least indiscretion so far as the guardianship of scientific secrets is concerned...
...They forgot history, chronology, the course of events...
...Oppenheimer affirmed his loyalty and his discretion...
...The suspicion that a wrong has been done is by no means limited to the scientists of Dr...
...There were occasional contacts with a few of them...
...He did not at first realize its importance...
...The freedom to change, to shed past associations and opinions, to receive credit for present qualities and intentions, is an important aspect of freedom in general...
...They discovered all the activities and contacts of the pre-atom days...
...This widely expressed hope suggests a fear that the issues raised in the case will not, indeed, be forgotten...
...His connection remained at the contribution, banquet-or-cocktail-party level...
...Oppenheimer's security clearance...
...They have disregarded more than a decade of faithful and distinguished service...
...All this went on until about 1942...
...They are, in fact, basic to democratic thought and action...
...In a democratic land, the question regarding any man should not be what he was ten or fifteen years ago, but what he is now...
...yet, the two-man majority on this board considered him unfit to continue as the custodian of future secrets...
...In this Oppenheimer case, the researchers have gone back twelve or fifteen years...
...On the other hand, they pronounced him a "loyal citizen" and reported that he "seems to have had a high degree of discretion reflecting an unusual ability to keep to himself vital secrets...
...He put an end to it and for twelve years, with enthusiasm, devotion and—particularly—discretion, devoted his talents to the service of his country...
...But it was in connection with this incident, which was actually to his credit, that Dr...
...Oppenheimer's early opposition to the speedy, full-scale development of hydrogen weapons...
...In 1936, there burst upon this sensitive, isolated, innocent man a horrible reality...
...The other major charge was Dr...
...Oppenheimer's far-off ivory-tower period...
...He did not drop all his old friends...
...Oppenheimer pictured himself back in those days as a typical ivory-tower inhabitant...
...During that time, the American Government and the American people went through an about-face with regard to Russia and Communism...
...As a diversion from science, he learned Sanskrit...
...They judged words and acts of 1941 and 1942 according to the sharpened and very special standards of 1954...
...They said: This man is good, but he is indiscreet...
...this was a carefree and wide-open country...
...He continued: "During this visit, he came into the kitchen and told me that George Eltenton had spoken to him of the possibility of transmitting technical information to Soviet scientists...
...Straight from the ivory tower, our man was whirled into a mesh of Soviet-centered activity...
...In his letter to General K. D. Nichols, General Manager of the AEC, Dr...
...In this hope there is the hint of a rather ill-defined weight lying on the public conscience...
...This was the time when California swarmed with people who were Communists or thought they were Communists or wanted to be Communists...
...I learned of the Stock Market crash of the fall of 1929 long after the event...
...After explaining that he paid no attention to either economics or politics, he continued: "I never read a newspaper or a current magazine like Time or Harper's...
...After remarking on the fairness with which the investigation had been conducted and especially commending the opportunity afforded the distinguished physicist to present his case and cross-examine his accusers, the writers generally concluded by expressing the hope that we have heard the last of the matter...
...The motive back of it was to protect a friend...
...At that time, Dr...
...In his letter to General Nichols dated March 4, 1954, Dr...
...The American Committee for Democracy and Intellectual Freedom and a whole nest of other organizations more or less tied in with Communists seemed to be busy fighting poverty and unemployment...
...Justice in the courts and before Government commissions is an important aspect of democracy...
...What he read and heard roused in him a "continuing, smoldering fury...
...I had no radio, no telephone...
...Early in 1943, he reported, Chevalier and his wife made a family visit to the Oppenheimer home...
...When asked by the AEC why he had done this, he replied: "Because I was an idiot...
...Organizations to support the Spanish Loyalists seemed to offer a quick and simple way to fight Fascism and Hitlerism...
...the second board threw out all charges relating to the H-bomb...
...Before the year 1943 was out, he had disclosed Chevalier's name...
...the first time I ever voted was in the Presidential election of 1936...
...This is the worst thing that Dr...
...Oppenheimer became connected with the atomic-research project...
...On the one hand, the majority of the Board decided against reinstating Dr...
...The discussion ended there...
...In 1943, he moved to Los Alamos to take charge of one of the basic projects...
...Hitler was persecuting the Jews in Germany...
...As time goes on, thoughtful persons everywhere will more and more come to the conclusion that a great injustice has been committed—not by any one official body, but by the great American public as it has gone through the gyrations of changing opinion while we have moved from peace to war and on to peace and cold war...
...But three scientists who had worked in Russia gave him a true account—and that was enough...
...And on this basis they have denied him security clearance...
...Though it seems so special, the principles involved have application to our ways of thinking about human beings in general...
...In the first place, the verdict of the Special Personnel Seenrily Board on June 1 was leached by a vote of 2 to 1—with the only scientist on the Board voting in favor of Dr...
...Hordes of them were on the alert waiting for the popular young professor who had just inherited money...
...He never joined the party...
...They swarmed about him...
...With regard to their freedom to live, act and serve their country, men should be judged on the broadest common-sense ground...
...Many commentators have noted that the way of thinking proscribed by Commissioner Murray is the Soviet way-and that it runs counter to deep American tradition...
...From that time on, his life changed...
...The first thing to bear in mind is that the story runs for twelve years...
...Then investigators went to work on his case...
...Oppenheimer proved this degree of discretion by carrying about the most vital atomic secrets over a period of twelve years...
...The man had had his United Front period, his fellow-traveling period, his innocent ivory-tower period...
...Oppenheimer's conduct with regard to security matters was beyond criticism...
...But Communism, either as an intellectual system or as a political party, never made much of an impression on Dr...
...Their character should be viewed in relation to their whole history...
...So the significance of Dr...
...In fact, we hardly knew who our enemies were...
...This led to a general awakening to humanitarian causes...
...A dozen years ago, prosperous Communist and fellow-traveling groups carried on conspicuous and loudly advertised activities, including high-class conventions and banquets at the Waldorf-Astoria...
...from 1942 to 1954...
...I made some strong remark to the effect that this sounded terribly wrong to me...
...And then he did not give a true account...
...What could the President do but ratify the judgment handed down by an able and conscientious body set up to deal with just such cases...
...Thus, the first board that tried Dr...
...Oppenheimer gave generously to such groups...
...In the editorial comments which followed the decision, one thought appeared with ominous uniformity...
...He was constantly hearing things in favor of the Soviet system from his encircling friends...
...But, from this time on, Dr...
...And then there occurred in the majority statement two contradictory assertions which have puzzled the country and which, in fact, perfectly mirror our public confusion with regard to this matter of security...
...About the same time, our newly-awakened intellectual became aware of what the Depression was doing to his students...
...Oppenheimer gave a very frank account of this affair...
...Steve Nelson and one or two other prominent Communists came to visit him...
...Oppenheimer did...
...The fact that the country loses one man's services and that he personally suffers humiliation and disappointment is not the most serious aspect of the affair...
...J. Robert Oppenheimer, everyone agrees, ended on June 29 when the Atomic Energy Commission delivered its 4-to-1 adverse decision...
...But consideration of all the circumstances connected with this incident causes it to shrink to insignificance...
...For a time, his brother was a party member...
...we cannot use him...
...Yet, a majority of each board pronounced him a security risk...
...Two sets of facts are cited against Dr...
...Most Americans, including Government officials (but not including The New Leader I, were hardly conscious of the dangers of enemy penetration...
...Before her marriage, his wife had been a member...
...This incident shows that, at the very start, before Dr...
...Oppenheimer's experiences was lost upon them...
...No other act or word affords the basis for a charge half so serious...
...It has a bearing on our whole idea of justice...
...There was no secrecy and no sense of guilt...
...This flouting of logic is the result of a lack of clear thinking about the whole business of Communism...
Vol. 37 • July 1954 • No. 29
