“OPPENHEIMER AT LOS ALAMOS,” Bethe said, “was very different from the Oppenheimer I had known. For one thing, the Oppenheimer before the war was somewhat hesitant, diffident. The Oppenheimer at Los Alamos was a decisive executive.” Bethe was hard-pressed to explain the transformation. The man of “pure science” he knew at Berkeley had been entirely focused on exploring the “deep secrets of nature.” Oppenheimer had not been remotely interested in anything like an industrial enterprise—and yet at Los Alamos he was directing an industrial enterprise. “It was a different problem, a different
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