What More Do You Want from Dr. Oppenheimer?
Robert Oppenheimer was predictably devastated by the withdrawal of his [security] clearance. “I think it broke his spirit, really,” [Robert] Serber reflects. “He had spent the years after the war being an adviser, being in high places, knowing what was going on. To be in on things gave him a sense of importance. That became his whole life. As [I.I.] Rabi said, he could run the Institute [for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey] with his left hand. And now he really didn’t have anything to do.” [Hans] Bethe felt “he was not the same person afterward.” Of the hearing …