AT THE APEX of the McCarthyite hysteria, Oppenheimer had become its most prominent victim. “The case was ultimately the triumph of McCarthyism, without McCarthy himself,” the historian Barton J. Bernstein has written. President Eisenhower appeared satisfied with the outcome—but unaware of the tactics Strauss had used to obtain it. In mid-June, seemingly oblivious to the nature and import of the hearing, Ike wrote Strauss a short note suggesting that Oppenheimer be put to work solving the problem of the desalinization of seawater. “I can think of no scientific success of all time that would
...more
