American Prometheus

by Kai Bird

One evening in March 1944, Rotblat experienced a “disagreeable shock.” General Groves came for dinner at the Chadwicks’ and in the course of casual banter over the dinner table, he said, “You realize of course that the main purpose of this project is to subdue the Russians.” Rotblat was shocked. He had no illusions about Stalin—the Soviet dictator had, after all, invaded his beloved Poland. But thousands of Russians were dying every day on the Eastern Front and Rotblat felt a sense of betrayal. “Until then I had thought that our work was to prevent a Nazi victory,” he later wrote, “and now I was told that the weapon we were preparing was intended for use against the people who were making extreme sacrifices for that very aim.” By the end of 1944, six months after the Allies had landed on the beaches of Normandy, it was clear that the war in Europe would soon be over. Rotblat saw no point in continuing to work on a weapon that was no longer needed to defeat the Germans.15 After saying good-bye to Oppenheimer at a going-away party, he left Los Alamos on December 8, 1944.