Pandora's Keepers

by Brian Van DeMark

  Teller’s superbomb obsession surprised many people because it was so out of character with his flighty personality. “His trouble was lack of concentration on any one problem,” said a colleague. “Then this thing hit him and he seemingly couldn’t let loose of it.” 6 His commitment reflected a personal passion and emotional involvement not uncommon among scientists. No doubt his fear of the Russians, his sense of scientific curiosity and patriotic duty, and his belief that peace could be achieved only through powerful weapons were sincere and genuine. But his personal ambition was even stronger. The superbomb became the territory that Teller staked out as his own, where he could compete successfully against Oppenheimer’s esteem and Fermi’s achievement. More and more, Teller began to identify himself with the superbomb, mentally classifying physicists into those on “his” side and those “against” him. His emotional temperament also came into play, his habit of getting self-blindingly attached to his own ideas leading him on. Teller pressed his idea forcefully and relentlessly, tirelessly ready at each meeting to start again from the beginning. He was impervious to doubt.

  Teller had begun his dogged quest for the superbomb at wartime Los Alamos. In a meeting there with James Conant toward the end of the war, he had pressed for postwar development of the weapon and dismissed moral objections to it as irrelevant to the pursuit of scientific knowledge: “There is among my scientific colleagues some hesitancy as to the advisability of this development on the grounds that it might make the international problems even more difficult than they are now. My opinion is that this is a fallacy. If the development is possible, it is out of our powers to prevent it.” 7 After he moved to Chicago, he kept abreast of theoretical developments by spending summers at Los Alamos as a consultant. Unable to get his mind off the superbomb, he lobbied for it whenever and with whomever he could. His message was insistent but simple: If a superbomb could be built (and he believed that it could), then it also could be built by the Russians. America therefore must undertake a crash program to build the superbomb in order to prevent Russia from getting it first, and then using it to intimidate or blackmail the United States in a crisis. In his insecure mind, greater destructive power meant greater military strength, and greater military strength meant greater national security.

  Ever since the end of the war, Teller had been trying to find a way to get serious work going on his pet project. The challenge of the Soviet bomb seemed to provide the impetus that was previously lacking, and Teller resolved to use every means and argument he could think of to exploit it. This was his moment, he thought.

  Oppenheimer had hoped that Soviet scientists could not soon duplicate what he and his wartime colleagues at Los Alamos had done. Yet even after he learned of the Soviet atomic test, Oppenheimer remained opposed to development of the superbomb. Fission bombs, destructive as they might be, were limited in power. Now, it seemed, scientists such as Teller were seeking to brush even those limits aside and to build bombs whose destructiveness was boundless. Oppenheimer believed that America, as the world’s leading nuclear power, must lead by example. And the example he sought to set was one of restraint.

  Oppenheimer’s concern was not new; two years before the Soviet atomic test, Arthur Compton

  found Oppenheimer reluctant [about the superbomb]. His chief reluctance was, I believe, on moral grounds. No nation should bring into being a power that would (or could) be so destructive of human lives. Even if another nation should do so, our morality should be higher than this. We should accept the military disadvantage in the interest of standing for a proper moral principle.

  He had other reasons—the development of fear and antagonism among other nations, the substantial possibility that the effort to create a [thermonuclear] explosion would fail, questions regarding the H-bomb’s military value. He hoped that no urgent need for its development would arise. 8

  Oppenheimer found the superbomb a weapon out of all proportion to whatever America might seek to accomplish in either peace or war. He believed that most policy makers and scientists such as Teller gave far too high a value to nuclear weapons; and that just as the atomic bomb had given America a false sense of security, the nation was in danger of falling into the same error with the superbomb: the fallacy of a cheap, easy alternative to finding a way to coexist—like it or not—with Soviet Russia.

  Oppenheimer suspected that most advocates of the superbomb were motivated by a reactive fear of the Soviet atomic test. “Having tried to find something tangible to chew on ever since September 23,” he confided to a friend, they “[have] at last found [their] answer: We must have a Super, and we must have it fast.” Privately admitting that “it would be folly to oppose exploration of this weapon”—a prediction his own career would tragically bear out—and that the basic scientific research “had to be done,” Oppenheimer nonetheless refused to accept the enormously destructive superbomb “as the way to save the country and the peace.” Instead, he believed the allure of the superbomb was “full of dangers,” and represented a doomed effort to “return to a state of affairs approximating monopoly.” 9

  Lawrence did not share Oppenheimer’s qualms; he was, as Bethe described him, “a terrific nationalist who was completely devoted to making America infinitely strong.” 10 Like Oppenheimer, Lawrence had opposed development of the superbomb just after the war, but the Soviet atomic test had changed his mind. Lawrence hoped the superbomb would prove impossible, but if such a weapon could be built, then he believed the United States must have it first. A longtime associate of Lawrence noted another motivation: “He welcomed it as not only a matter of duty, but a personal opportunity” to return to the “kind of high” experienced in the making of the atomic bomb, the sense that “you were really part of a great movement, doing things which were interesting and consequential.” 11 Princeton physicist Henry Smyth, who had known Lawrence for many years, characterized him astutely. “Apart from being an expert in his field and a brilliant scientist,” Smyth wrote that fall, “Lawrence was also something of a promoter;… several times in the past he may have overstepped the line in pushing projects which add to his own ‘Empire.’” 12

  Lawrence knew how to build an empire. He was an experienced, effective, and politically savvy promoter of scientific projects. By 1949 Lawrence had spent a decade at the summit of American physics. His Rad Lab had been centrally involved in the Manhattan Project; he had served as a member of the highest scientific advisory councils since the war; and he continued to play a major role in atomic policy through close but unofficial personal contacts in the Pentagon and Congress. Lawrence had made his own laboratory—the only physicist who had—and this put him in a special category. He was used to acting on his own and having his way, though he did not see himself in this light. Rather, he saw himself as simply opposing those—such as Oppenheimer—who, in his mind, were trying to stifle legitimate and patriotic scientific work for their own political, and therefore improper, reasons.

  Although Lawrence often piously cautioned other scientists not to “fool around” with politics, he did not follow his own advice. 13 Soon after Truman announced the Soviet test, Lawrence began lobbying vigorously for the superbomb’s development. He phoned Teller at Los Alamos and said he would stop off to see him on his way to Washington. The next morning, October seventh, Lawrence landed in the predawn hours at the airstrip that ran off the eastern end of the Los Alamos mesa, and went straight to a meeting with Teller, who explained to him in convincing detail that a superbomb was feasible. When Teller finished, Lawrence said simply, “In the present situation, there is no question but that you must go ahead.” 14

  It was late in the day when the two finished their talk. Lawrence needed to leave for Albuquerque because he was going on to Washington the next day. He asked Teller to accompany him, and during their trip down in the small plane that provided service between Los Alamos and Albuquerque, they talked about the importance of enlisting the help of other top physicists. The place to start, Teller thought, was F
ermi—after all, he was undeniably brilliant and he had first suggested the idea of a thermonuclear explosion. But Fermi made it clear that he would not help. “You and I and Truman and Stalin would be happy if further great developments were impossible,” he told Teller. “So, why don’t we make an agreement to refrain from such development? It is, of course, impossible without an ultimate test and when that happens we shall know about it anyway.” “Why should the bomb be bigger?” he asked in conclusion. 15 The intensity of Fermi’s refusal was surprising; he was a reserved man, and it was unusual for him to show emotion.

  Teller was unhappy, upset, and unwilling to take no for an answer. He goaded Fermi by reminding him that he had opposed the Acheson-Lilienthal Report because he distrusted the Russians—yet now he proposed an arrangement with them without guarantees. “Yes,” Fermi shot back, “but what else can we do?” “Go ahead and work on it if you have to,” he added. “I hope you will not succeed.” 16 “I felt clearly,” Teller wrote in a letter after their meeting, that “Enrico wants to be rid of the whole problem. (Why talk about it—why think about it?)” 17

  Having failed to enlist Fermi, Teller turned next to Bethe. If he could convince someone of Bethe’s stature to work on the superbomb, other physicists could be persuaded to work on it, too. Bethe seldom suffered from hesitation or indecision, but he did when Teller arrived in Ithaca in late September 1949 seeking his help. The two sat up late into the night in the living room of Bethe’s home discussing the issue. Autumn had come early to Ithaca that year and the temperature outside was as cool as it was in the room. “I had very great internal conflicts about what I should do,” Bethe remembered. On the one hand, the superbomb was a seductive technical challenge. It meant working with other top scientists and having access to powerful new electronic computers reserved for military research. It also meant the likelihood of exciting discoveries. And there was a political consideration: Bethe worried that Stalin might blackmail the world if he alone had it. “On the other hand,” as he later said, “it seemed to me that it was a very terrible undertaking to develop a still bigger bomb.” 18

  Undecided, Bethe talked things over with his wife, Rose. She reminded him that he had helped make an atomic bomb only because the western democracies were at war with Nazi Germany. Then, motioning toward their two small children, Henry and Monica, asleep in the next room, she asked him if he wanted them to grow up in a world with superbombs. “She felt that the atomic bomb was bad enough, and that increasing its power a thousand times was simply irresponsible,” recalled Bethe. “‘You don’t want to do this.’” 19

  But Bethe was unsure. “It seemed to me that the development of thermonuclear weapons would not solve any of the difficulties that we found ourselves in and yet I was not quite sure whether I should refuse.” He decided to call Oppenheimer, whose judgment he respected, for advice. Oppenheimer suggested he and Teller come visit him in Princeton. Two days later, the three of them met in Oppenheimer’s office at the Institute for Advanced Study. It was a far cry from Oppenheimer’s spartan office at Los Alamos, where the three had met together often during the war. The bright, well-appointed room looked out over broad green meadows fringed with trees aflame with the golden tints of autumn. At Los Alamos, Oppenheimer had resembled the enthusiastic leader of a rugged pioneer settlement. Now he reminded Bethe of a restrained country gentleman receiving his guests at a stately manor.

  Oppenheimer said nothing as Teller presented his case, either out of caution in Teller’s presence or because he did not want to say anything to influence Bethe—or both. When Teller finished, he and Oppenheimer mildly debated, but Oppenheimer did not mount much of a counterattack, which was unusual for him. Perhaps Oppenheimer believed he did not need to argue what he thought was obvious, but it was, at least with regard to the other guest, a tactical mistake. “I did not get from him the advice that I was hoping to get,” Bethe recalled. “I did not get from him advice to decide me either way.” 20 Teller, who was convinced that Oppenheimer had been using his clout to discourage physicists from working on the superbomb, was elated by his silence. Before going to Princeton, he recalled later, “I had expressed to Bethe the worry that we are going to talk to Oppenheimer, and after that you will not come. When we left the office, Bethe turned to me and smiled and he said, ‘You see, you can be quite satisfied. I am still coming.’” 21

  From Oppenheimer’s institute office, Bethe walked over to the university campus, where a conference was underway. When he reached the conference hall, he ran into Szilard, who greeted him by saying, “Ah, here is Dr. Bethe from Los Alamos.” 22 Szilard’s remark was carefully calculated. He knew Bethe was sensitive about his weapons work, and he sought to stir Bethe’s conscience against the superbomb by embarrassing him in front of his peers, many of whom opposed its development. “I protested that I was not at Los Alamos,” recalled Bethe, “and didn’t know if I wanted to go back there.”

  MIT theoretical physicist Victor Weisskopf was also at the conference. A close friend of Bethe since prewar days in Europe, “Vicky” Weisskopf had eschewed weapons work since the war. He and Bethe took a long walk around the Princeton campus the next evening. Weisskopf imagined the horrors of a war fought with superbombs for his friend as they crunched through the autumn leaves. “Vicky vividly described to me what it would mean to destroy a whole city like New York with one bomb,” Bethe recalled. “We both had to agree that after such a war even if we were to win it, the world would not be like the world we wanted to preserve. We would lose the things we were fighting for. This was a very long conversation and a very difficult one for both of us.” But it clarified things for Bethe. “Your discussion with me last weekend was most wholesome,” he wrote Weisskopf. “I felt very much better after talking to you.” 23 Bethe’s struggle with his conscience was over. He phoned Teller with his decision. “Edward, I’ve been thinking it over,” said Bethe. “I can’t come after all.”

  “I felt relieved,” he recalled later. 24 Teller was sad, disappointed, and angry—but not at Bethe or Weisskopf. As he would increasingly do, with or without evidence, he found his enemy in the form of his former boss. “I knew it after the meeting with Oppenheimer,” he grumbled. 25

  Bethe explained his decision later. “It seemed to me then and it seems to me now that it was the wrong thing to do, that we should not have escalated. It seems to me now very clear that we should have developed the atomic bomb during the war when we had a desperate situation with the Nazis. But in 1949 vis-à-vis the Russians we still held the cards of greater production [and] greater delivery capability of nuclear weapons. So I think the right direction would have been to say no, we are not going to do it. We may do some further research on it, but let’s not make it a crash program. We really didn’t need it, but when we embarked on it, I think it was one of the many examples of overkill that we indulged in in those days.” 26

  While Teller sought to enlist Fermi’s and Bethe’s help, Lawrence lobbied for the superbomb in Washington. One of his first stops was Capitol Hill, where he met with the Joint Congressional Committee on Atomic Energy, including its powerful chairman, Connecticut Democratic senator Brien McMahon. Lawrence warned McMahon that Stalin would go all out to develop a superbomb and that the Soviet Union might be ahead in the race. For the first time in his life, he said, he was afraid that America might lose a war—unless Washington undertook a crash program to build a superbomb. Lawrence also lobbied his high-level contacts at the Pentagon. “It would be disastrous,” he warned those close to the secretary of defense and the Joint Chiefs of Staff, “if the Soviets produced a hydrogen bomb before the United States.” 27

  Lawrence’s next stop was New York, where he went to see Rabi at Columbia. Lawrence was accompanied by Rad Lab associate Luis Alvarez, who recounted their meeting with Rabi in his diary that evening. Rabi was “very happy at our plans,” Alvarez wrote. “He is worried, too.” According to Alvarez, Rabi had told them, “It is certainly good to see the first team back in. You f
ellows have been playing with your cyclotron and nuclei for four years and it is certainly time you got back to work.” Rabi’s recollection was more tentative. “I felt that some answer must be made in some form to regain our lead. There were two directions in which one could look: either the realization of the super or an intensification of the effort on fission weapons.” But Rabi felt Lawrence and Alvarez had already made up their minds:

  They were extremely optimistic. They are both very optimistic gentlemen…. They had been to Los Alamos and talked to Dr. Teller, who gave them a very optimistic estimate about the [superbomb]. So they were all keyed up to go bang into it…. I generally find myself when I talk with these two gentlemen in a very uncomfortable position. I like to be an enthusiast. I love it. But those fellows are so enthusiastic that I have to be conservative. So it always puts me in an odd position [where I have to] say, “Now, now, there, there,” and that sort of thing. So I was not in agreement in the sense that I felt they were, as usual, overly optimistic. 28

  When the meeting ended, Lawrence flew back to Washington and urged the Joint Chiefs of Staff to declare their support for development of the superbomb.

  Once Lawrence had brought the superbomb to Washington’s attention, the idea went to the AEC’s General Advisory Committee (GAC) for study and recommendation. Government advisory committees are almost always more show than substance, but the GAC was different. Composed of a panel of nine leading American scientists, the GAC had established itself since its creation in 1947 as the most influential source of advice to the government on atomic weapons. * Its chairman was Oppenheimer, who had been chosen unanimously by his colleagues. The GAC was not Oppenheimer’s puppet, however, because its membership also included Fermi and Rabi. Fermi worked hard and conscientiously on the GAC, but without the pleasure that Oppenheimer felt in counseling on policy—he was a scientist, not a politician. Although the atomic bomb had shaken him up, Fermi remained cold and clinical, even a little ruthless, in the way he disdained human emotions and went directly to the facts in deciding any question. Oppenheimer assessed him cogently: “Not a philosopher. Passion for clarity. He was simply unable to let things be foggy. Since they always are, this kept him pretty active.” 29 Fermi believed the superbomb could be built if America set itself to accomplishing the task, but he feared the devastating consequences of its potential use. It was far wiser, Fermi thought, to try to outlaw this weapon that did not yet exist.