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Editorial Review Amazon.com
It would be difficult to identify three American scientists whose work had a greater effect on world politics than Robert Oppenheimer, Ernest Lawrence, and Edward Teller. This exhaustive account of how they worked together (and competed against each other) on the development of the atomic and hydrogen bombs is more a story of people than science. Author Gregg Herken of the Smithsonian Institution informs us, for instance, of Oppenheimer's "riotous parties" in the 1930s, in which latecomers would see "the top physicists of their generation, drunk and crouched on all fours, playing a version of tiddly-winks on the geometric patterns of Oppenheimer's Navajo rug." Despite a few light touches, Brotherhood of the Bomb is no breezy profile of three great minds. Instead, it is a serious look at invention, rivalry, and betrayal. One of the central episodes involves Oppenheimer's too-cozy relationship with radical-left politics--he carelessly associated with Communists, even though he occupied one of the most sensitive jobs in the U.S. government during the cold war--and Teller's momentous decision to testify against him. This event is one of the most controversial in the annals of American science, and Herken tells it straight, with barely a word of editorial comment. Fans of Richard Rhodes will enjoy this triple biography, as will anybody with an interest in science, politics, and top-secret security clearances. --John J. MillerBook Description
The story of the twentieth century is largely the story of the power of science and technology. Within that story is the incredible tale of the human conflict between Robert Oppenheimer, Ernest Lawrence, and Edward Tellerthe scientists most responsible for the advent of weapons of mass destruction.How did scienceand its practitionersenlisted in the service of the state during the Second World War, become a slave to its patron during the Cold War. The story of these three men, builders of the bombs, is fundamentally about loyaltyto country, to science, and to each otherand about the wrenching choices that had to be made when these allegiances came into conflict.Gregg Herken gives us the behind-the-scenes account based upon a decade of research, interviews, and newly released Freedom of Information Act and Russian documents. Brotherhood of the Bomb is a vital slice of American history told authoritativelyand grippinglyfor the first time. ... Read more Customer Reviews (18) 
The most Interesting Book You Never Want To Read
...a copy of this belongs in every major library, not necessarily in everyone's library. Excessively detailed and turgid, it is yet another story of the bomb(s) and the major players who developed it.
Better reads would be Richard Rhodes' amazing books on the atomic bomb and hydrogen boms and various biographies of Oppenheimer.
And don't forget the terrific mini-series on Oppenheimer, by the same name, re-released on dvd by the BBC, unfortunately in Region 2 format only. Watch this if you can.
Opje was an Elfin King of Many a Thing...
Thunderous clouds, brilliant purple and multicolor radioactive plumes jettisoning what were once precious sought after kilograms of chemistry's beyond bizzare materials.Such is the ballad that was played one mid-July morning, 1945, at Trinity Test Site, some 20 miles east south east of San Antonio, NM, after years of ingenius experimental and theoretical work, computation, sweating, rivalry, and finally utterly destructive convergeancey into one of modern science's most awe inspiring gadgets.'The gadget' as it would come to be called, set off much else than meagerly its own wired and machined self - in the process of self-detonation, the world's first atom bomb brought about, unexpectedly and unforseen, a world's first feat, an end to a world conflict, - Pacific front - a murky arms race with juxtaposed cold war, and, in the end one of mankinds most thrilling achievements.Insofar as today's youth can but arbitrarily surmount such things as 'shock waves' or 'nonlinear implosionary ballistics dynamics,' fresh-faced prodigys, physics phenoms, and other human wonder-brains pulled off not only calculations of destiny, but together made Los Alamos into the 'biggest collection of eggheads ever assembled.'The conflict-laden tale of Robert Oppenheimer (head of Project Manhatten, razor-sharp intellect, lead bomb scientist), Ernest Lawrence (brilliant, charismatic, enthusiastic, well-liked Rad Lad originator and Nobel Laureate for his cyclotron radiation experiments), and 'the only monomaniac to suffer from multiple manias, Beethoven piano playing in nothing but fortissimo, Hungarian figurehead, H-bomb creator (sort of)' Edward Teller.Three characters starkly in contrast to each other's standout, signature diacritics: Oppenheimer as excessively learned linguist and rapid assimilator; Lawrence as driven lab leader with a taste for breaking particle accelerator barriers; Teller as European half-scientist, half-artist idea maker.What was to be born in each of these men's dreams - however much in contrast those drifting epiphanies may have been - manifested themselves first on paper as drawing or formulae, then as physical device or working instrument.Brotherhood of the Bomb is indeed a story of the tangled correspondances and relationships forged and endured throughout the war, but it is more than that.It delves deep into personal convictions, dilemmas, creativity, mystifying outcomes of the scientific method and journey, and controversial until-now-unspoken tid bits from an era of Top Secrecy.Remembering such times is difficult to say the very least even for the men, and women, directly involved.This is perhaps so because the people at the fore, engrossed in whatever field of research, were themselves in every way imaginable enigmas - contradictions in motion in several instances.Loyalties would become circumspect, motives would held under microscope, but inevitably the real impact of a product of incomprehensible physics is to be realized most dismayingly.Costs and benefits aside, a history of an odyssey only meant for storybooks is casually uncovered via the recorded conversations and testimonies of some of America's cleverest progenitors of atomic energy and its later fabrications (i.e. Three Mile Island incident frenzy).If anything, the clueless sees an open door into the realm of nuclear technology's immemorial upbringing(s) and drama(s).Even six decades later, the actual underpinnings of the bomb are little understood except in major institutions and classified memos/docs.This title's innards unearth a memoir so shockingly abstract, it has to be reread repeatedly in order to grasp any certain feel for what occured, what prompted its occurence, and what eventuated beyond zero hour in New Mexicos vaguely populated regions - similar to spotting a haystack enveloping a needle, you pick the size.
In a land of enchantment, one may yet find green-hued intense-heat-fused silicates of that moment in history when thermodynamicist, hydrodynamicisit, theoretist in general all let out a gargantuan 'Yahoo!' predating Google's punching bag companion of a search engine.
Echoes no longer may be detected in now and then restricted spaces, but on that morning just following a timely (to them painstakingly unwelcomed) foreshadowing thunderstorm of nature's ever present wrath, the genie was unleashed...never to be resealed.Loose for purposes unknown and grandiose.Rustically elegant though the desert may be, a flash of a thousand suns was never intentionally in store, or until it became apparent by sight and sound... as well as indetectible rays of near cosmic intensity and proportion.
This book is so well written I don't dare try to emulate or mimic its prose.Intimate details of the three protagonists nearest the atom bomb's core are intriguingly lurid, stunning in places, still somehow comforting to those who care about science and its indisputable power and constant legacy.One physicist I would like to have seen mentioned more is John Von Neumann, who essentially single-handedly - by rigorously furthering the conceptual drafts of Neddermeyer through mathematical construct and logical proof - theorized implosion, amongst a vast array of other topics and subjects only a rare but true polymath could conjure (Claude Shannon is another).Without Von Neumann there is no Super, no computer architecture, no game theory, no quantum mechanics (or at least its 'Group Theory' aspects) and no non-fictional inspiration for generations succeeding.
Also, of due notoriety is the background and determined leadership of General Leslie R. Groves - lead construction planner of the Pentagon and Project Manhatten organizer possessing immense profundity of temperance and sensibilty.
Worthy of a Shakespearean Drama
The overwhelming egos which worked together on the bomb and became a part of the fallout after Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Informative, unbiased, a bit turgid
"Brotherhood of the Bomb" is very good for its first hundred pages as it details the early careers of physicists Ernest Lawrence, Robert Oppenheimer, and Edward Teller.Thereafter, the book gets a little too fact-laden and turgid, but it is still a worthwhile book to make your way through.The author strives for, and mostly achieves, an objective account of the scientific and political controversies surrounding Robert Oppenheimer.
The book is good in that it gives recognition to Lawrence as a pioneering atomic energy physicist and assigns only secondary roles to Oppenheimer and Teller in the early part of the book. The charismatic Oppenheimer, however, received the assignment of leading the team that built the first atomic bomb -- although General Leslie Groves, decidely uncharismatic, was really the man who managed the multi-faceted project and deserves at least equal credit with the scientists. Teller, also decidely uncharismatic, later managed the hydrogen bomb project and was a prominent voice in the scientific community until the 1980s.
The fascination of all the science is enhanced by Oppie's politics and the eventual denial of a security clearance for him to work for the U.S. government.The author describes Oppie's many leftist and Communist friends and contacts -- as investigated by the FBI and military security -- in great detail.In most accounts, Teller is the dastardly villain who declines to recommend Oppie for a renewal of his security clearance -- and Oppie forever after will be a hero to those who see this as a vast injustice.I hardly think it was all that big a deal.Oppie didn't go to jail, he didn't lose his job, he wasn't disgraced in the scientific community -- if anything his reputation and fame were enhanced.All that happened to Oppie was that he was denied the opportunity to work on bigger and better bombs within the US government.
Teller, in one divergent view, was the man of conscience who expressed his view and will be forever punished for it. While I would be surprised to learn that Oppie was a spy, rational people could certainly believe that he was a potential security threat; many of his closest associates and relatives were Communists and his past political behavior had been reckless for a man entrusted with the most sensitive secrets of the U.S. government. As the old saw goes, you are judged by the company you keep -- and nobody in his right mind would have shared atomic secrets with many of Oppie's friends. (The Teller vs Oppenheimer controversy will undoubtedly continue through the ages.)
If you like this book, you might also look at Richard Rhodes' two monumental volumes on the development of the atomic and hydrogen bombs.
Smallchief
Interesting Subject - Not An Easy Read
This is the story of the atomic bomb and the hydrogen bomb and the brotherhood of men whose genius created the bomb. While the story is very interesting, the text is difficult to read. The book has excellent photographs of the period which are just amazing to see. The book has over 80 pages of notes and looks like some kind of legal paper.
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