Brighter than a Thousand Suns

 Brighter than a Thousand Suns by Robert Jungk

With the release of the movie Oppenheimer, Phillip Adams relived a 2013 interview with Ray Monk (https://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/latenightlive/oppenheimer/102625158), the author of a definitive biography of J. Robert Oppenheimer, published in 2012. I had read this book some years ago (see http://timsbestreads.blogspot.com/p/blog-page_18.html) and was keen to do a bit more reading before seeing the movie. So I decided to reread Brighter than a Thousand Suns, published by Austrian Robert Jungk in 1956. It was in fact the first published account of the Manhattan Project and the German atomic bomb project.

I have the 1965 Penguin softback edition, left over from when my brother Terry studied it in 1966 as part of his Year 12 English curriculum. I read it years ago but have just finished a refresh.

The book studies the making and dropping of the atomic bomb from the viewpoints of the atomic scientists. The book is largely based on personal interviews with the key players in the construction and deployment of the bombs.

The book's title is based on the verse from the Bhagavad Gita that Oppenheimer is said to have recalled at the Trinity nuclear test. The title quote suggests that this book is more exciting than any novel and it is so true. It's as exciting as it is scary, with detailed depiction of choices, circumstances and small incidents, all of which led to the destruction of two cities, the extinction of almost 300000 people and contamination by both atomic and thermonuclear weapons.

Although the author does not refrain himself from exploring personal stories, it is more of “the bigger picture” book. Starting as a history of brilliant physicists at the dawn of the 20th century, this book slowly reveals historical, political and human aspects to the problems of nuclear weapon in the most unstable time.

Since the book was published in 1956, it covers a bit of the conflict between Teller and the other scientists regarding whether to build a "super" or thermonuclear bomb (which of course they do in the end) and concludes with an account of the fall of Oppenheimer.

Oppenheimer comes across as the giant in the whole process, without whom the Manhattan Project would probably not have been successfully completed.

Unsurprisingly, the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission bagged the book as hopelessly inaccurate, understandable since it was so critical of the US Government and the US military. I'm prepared to take it more at face value and regard it as a basically accurate account of what was a significant historical period. The heroes are the atomic physicists, giants both intellectually and scientifically. We will not see their like again.

Definitely worth a read (or a reread).

Now onto the Oppenheimer movie!