The Target Committee (Kindle Single) by Paul Ham Page A

Zola), the history of philosophy, and courses in math, chemistry and physics. “Whatever reading or work you may advise, I shall be glad to do . . .” he told the academic board at Harvard. 2 He was 19.
    The young Oppenheimer styled himself a philosopher-aesthete who affected an interest in literature over science. Marcel Proust’s
À La Recherche du Temps Perdu
left a deep impression on him. He was fond of quoting a favorite passage from memory:
    Perhaps she would not have considered evil to be so rare, so extraordinary, so estranging a state, to which it was so restful to emigrate, had she been able to discern in herself, as in everyone, that indifference to the sufferings one causes, an indifference which, whatever other names one may give it, is the terrible and permanent form of cruelty. 3
     
    There was nothing rebellious or dissipated in the young Oppenheimer; rather something joyless – a space of pure intellect in his “separate prison” from other men, as he put it in a juvenile poem. In a piece of precocious literary criticism he described Joseph Conrad’s
Youth
as “a beautiful novelette on the futility of youthful courage and idealism.” 4 Perhaps, but was not the futile pursuit of ideals a rite of passage for the young? Oppenheimer, on the contrary, strove for perfection – of what use were ideals if one failed to catch and realize them?
    In his mid-20s Oppenheimer suffered from depression, hallucinations and suicidal feelings – “a tremendous inner turmoil.” He self-diagnosed a schizoid personality, but his friends claimed that he overcame the challenges it posed through sheer hard work and strength of mind. At one point, in London, he dismissed his Harley Street psychiatrist as “too stupid”: “[Robert] knew more about his troubles than [the doctor] did,” wrote a friend. “Robert had this ability to . . . figure out what his trouble was, and to deal with it.” 5
    Oppenheimer’s driving psychological impulse was a fear of failure, a fear that somehow his talents would go unrecognized. In this he had something in common with Groves. “Ambitious” is too crude, too obvious, a term for such complex men; they acted in defiance of, or in spite of, the voices prophesying defeat as surely as they pursued the laurels of victory.
    The precocious student grew into a loyal friend, excellent teacher and inspiring leader. Along the way, in the 1920s at Cambridge and the University of Göttingen in Germany, Oppenheimer met the greatest physicists of the day and formed close relations with Max Born, his professor at Göttingen with whom he wrote “On the Quantum Theory of Molecules,” his most cited work. His students at Berkeley and later at Caltech became his admiring disciples. The physicist Hans Bethe, one of his staunchest friends – who would work with him on the atomic bomb – said of him:
    Probably the most important ingredient he brought to his teaching was his exquisite taste. He always knew what were the important problems, as shown by his choice of subjects. He truly lived with those problems, struggling for a solution, and hecommunicated his concern to the group . . . He was interested in everything, and in one afternoon they might discuss quantum electrodynamics, cosmic rays, electron pair production and nuclear physics. 6
     
    Oppenheimer was, in sum, the closest thing to a 20th century Renaissance man. His mature attributes – the rare fusion of scientific excellence, a creative sensibility, self-discipline and organizational flair – marked him for a senior role on the Manhattan Project. He certainly wanted the job, to be inside the tent. It would satisfy his yearning to know the people who presumed to know and control him.
    He wanted not so much to share the nest of the American establishment as to feel free to share it, and then take it or leave it. His family’s wealth could buy yachts, ranches and horses, but not this – the status of welcome insider, free to come