In the years following the end of World War
II, the United States gradually found itself confronting
a new enemy: the Soviet Union. At the outset of the Cold War, as
the new period of international tension was called, the United
States had a single, gigantic advantage, since it maintained a
nuclear monopoly. As long as the United States had the bomb and
the Soviets did not, there could be no question as to which country
was the world's number one superpower.
Oppenheimer had originally argued that the United States should
tell its Soviet allies about the bomb project during the war, partly
in the hopes of avoiding a future arms race. But the government
rejected this idea, choosing instead to keep the bomb program a
secret and eventually relishing their nuclear superiority.
But as the physicists knew, there was no big secret to
nuclear power, only some fundamental physical principles and a
large number of technical problems to figure out. This meant that
it was only a matter of time before the Soviets were able to construct
their own atomic bomb. Estimates of how long this would take varied;
some argued it would take the Soviets ten years, others suggested
it might only be four or five. It seems, however, that no one was
listening to their warnings, for when the Soviet Union set off
a nuclear explosion in September of 1949, the United States was
taken by complete surprise.
The country was shocked, and the always-cautious government assumed
that this must mean there had been Soviet spies within Los Alamos.
Oppenheimer, once again, became a prime target of suspicion. But
as investigators tried to determine exactly how the Soviet bomb
program had gotten its information, government officials were scrambling
to decide on an appropriate American response to the new Soviet
nuclear threat.
One suggestion set off a year's worth of top-secret debate
and controversy among the highest levels of the government, military, and
scientific community. It was the suggestion that the only way to appropriate
way to react to the Soviets getting the bomb was to one-up them
by developing what scientists liked to call "the Super," or, more
technically, a hydrogen bomb.
After the war, physicist Edward Teller had stayed at Los
Alamos, working with a team on a new type of bomb, the hydrogen
bomb, which would generate energy by fusing together hydrogen atoms. Such
a bomb would be hundreds of times more powerful than the ones dropped
on Japan. While a hydrogen bomb was theoretically possible, there
was still some question as to whether the physicists could actually
build one.
The question was passed to the Atomic Energy Commission
to ponder–should the United States begin a crash program to build
a hydrogen bomb. The debate was fierce. Supporters of the Super argued
that if the United States didn't build one, the Soviets inevitably
would and put us in an unacceptable position of nuclear inferiority.
But Oppenheimer's GAC eventually rejected this assertion, deciding
that even if the Soviets did construct a hydrogen bomb, the United
States' stock of atomic bombs would provide enough retaliatory
power to ensure the country's safety. Deciding that the Super was
not necessary to national security, the GAC then rejected the bomb
on the grounds that its development would simply be morally unacceptable.
As Oppenheimer and his fellow commissioners wrote in an addendum
to the committee's final report, "If super bombs will work at all,
there is no inherent limit in the destructive power that may be
attained with them. Therefore a super bomb might become a weapon
of genocide. We believe a super bomb should never be produced."
But the AEC spoke in vain. On January 31, 1950, President
Truman announced that he had decided to sponsor a program to develop
the Super. It was a decision in tune with the political climate,
and, in fact, the New York Times pointed out that at the time it
was the most popular decision in Truman's. The program was a success:
in 1952, the United States exploded the first hydrogen bomb, "Mike,"
in the South Pacific. The explosion released ten megatons of energy,
which made "Mike" one thousand times as powerful as the bomb that
was dropped over Hiroshima.
Oppenheimer had been on the winning side of so many arguments
that it must have come as somewhat of a surprise to find himself
in the minority, but it would be a position to which he would soon
have to be accustomed. After fighting the losing battle of the Super,
Oppenheimer would find himself continually marginalized in future
government discussions. Suddenly, at least in the government's
eyes, he no longer represented the scientific community, but instead
he represented a dangerous liberal who was to be ignored, if not
silenced. When Washington did turn its attention to Oppenheimer,
they were in no mood to listen. Even after years of service to his
country, Oppenheimer's position on the Super was enough to knock
him from his public pedestal, and the government was about to kick
him while he was down.
