Charles Oppenheimer, a grandson of Oppenheimer, contests that apple scene though. From an interview: "The part I like the least is this poison apple reference, which was a problem in American Prometheus [the book on which the film is based]." "I definitely would have removed the apple thing," before adding context to where the sequence comes from: "If you read American Prometheus carefully enough, the authors say, 'We don't really know if it happened.' "There's no record of him trying to kill somebody. That's a really serious accusation and it's historical revision. There's not a single enemy or friend of Robert Oppenheimer who heard that during his life and considered it to be true."
Poetic license to repurpose the apple. Very interesting remark. Jews don’t name kids after living relations. Jewish individualism is such that there cannot be two of someone. That would be like a wish to kill the doppelgänger. So J. Robert might have taken offense.
Correction: the film acknowledged that Tatlock may have been killed by a government agent. There was a hand in black glove behind her neck in the bathtub if you looked closely
Thanks for that. I'll have to look for that detail. It's a tough one. Jean certainly could have been murdered due to her relationship with Oppenheimer. But something the movie doesn't go into but this short discussion does is that part of Jean's push-pull with Oppie was possibly related to her sexuality. She may have been a closeted lesbian and this discussion posits that she waa at least bisexual. As she also studied psychology Jean would have known that psychology at that time considered homosexuality aberrant. She was a serious psychologist and that might have been a great internal battle for her. That could also have contributed to her feelings of depression and eventual suicide. As her father burned her papers after her body was found, we really don't know.
@@gusadicoYes. In the film Oppie mentions the medicines to Kitty. But it's also possible that Jean simply took different medications to overdose. As a psychologist she could prescribe medications and would have known what to use.
I loved the scene where Oppie says to President Truman "I feel like I have blood on my hands". The look on Truman's face and reaction was downright evil. Gave me shivers..
Well, think of this. Oppenheimer felt like he killed a lot of people making the bomb. Truman pulled the trigger. Truman also had to find a way to end WW2. So, yes, Truman's 'Don't give me that' look and attitude might have been appropriate. It probably also gave Oppenheimer a way to move forward without feeling fully responsible too.
At the same time i agree with Truman. "no one is going to remember who build the bomb. They are going to remember the man who dropped it". He was absolutely right. You really think japanese were point fingers at oppie when it was dropped?...all the heads turned to Truman.
@@PrimitiveAK "No one is going to remember who built the bomb." -Harry "I've had lot of films made about me but none are as good as the IMAX movie named after you." S. Truman.
@@lornestein7248 not the exact quote that Truman said since that was from the movie but Truman was referring to the Japanese after the bomb was dropped. Japan only knew at the time who authorized it. So you’re kinda right in what you’re trying to say but you’re misinterpreting who the quote was directed towards.
Henry Stimson's resistance to Kyoto being on the top of the target list was much more complicated than whether he honeymooned there or not. He did have an understanding of Japanese psychology via trips to Japan and his associations with various people, and his main concern with Leslie Groves' focus on Kyoto was that destroying the biggest center of Japanese culture would be counterproductive to the war effort. Not only would there likely be international condemnation for attacking a city with no significant military infrastructure, which would play into Japan's favor, but Stimson also thought that it would either delay Japan's surrender or instigate a significant military insurgency afterwards. Imagine bombing Mecca in retaliation to 9/11. Also, did the war in Iraq in 2003 end immediately after the capture of Baghdad? Groves reported to Stimson, but he went over Stimson's head to recommend Kyoto to Truman to be at the top of the target list. Stimson then convinced Truman to remove Kyoto from the target list, but the story didn't end there. The Potsdam Conference was coming soon, and Stimson was denied an invitation to attend the conference by the maneuverings of various people who wanted to restore Kyoto to the target list. Much of the final planning of the atomic bomb missions was going to be discussed there, and they wanted to make sure that Stimson was left out of the proceedings. However, Stimson was so convinced of the folly of destroying Kyoto that he bought tickets to travel to Potsdam using his own money. He showed up without warning but he wasn't turned back, and he was able to stay close enough to Truman to make sure that Kyoto stayed off the target list completely. It should be noted that if Kyoto had been attacked with an atomic bomb, and if it did cause a delay of only one week in Japan's decision to surrender, this would have allowed the USSR to implement its firm plans to invade the northern main island of Hokkaido on August 22nd 1945. With most of Japan's home defense forces focused in Kyushu in the south, awaiting the US, the Red Army might have had a much easier time prosecuting the invasion than was expected. Stalin might not have stopped once he reached his initial goal of taking the northern half of Hokkaido, perhaps capturing the entire island or even invading the biggest island of Honshu. The result would probably have been a polarized North/South Japan similar to North/South Korea, significantly complicating the US's security posture in the Pacific after the war. Many people say the US's possession of an atomic bomb would have convinced Stalin to stop, but Stalin and Roosevelt already had an agreement for the USSR to enter the war against Japan three months after the end of the war in Europe. What would the US have done, then? Form an immediate alliance with Japan, who they were bombing just the day before, to confront the USSR, which was formerly an ally? It doesn't seem likely. Any successful invasion of Hokkaido by the USSR would have been a big threat to Japan. The biggest internal opposition to the Japanese government during the war was considered to be the Japanese Communist Party. The success of the Red Army in the north may have triggered a rebellion and possible Communist coup in Tokyo, and Stalin would surely have exploited this. If the US had finally gotten around to invading Kyushu in November 1945, it's conceivable that the army that met them there might not have been the Japanese Imperial Army, but the Red Army. This is of course is a stretch, but we can't underestimate the significance of Kyoto in the planning for the atomic bomb missions, and what had to be done to remove it from the target list.
This is such a fascinating alternative historical scenario, and I've never seen it covered before. I've held the belief that the atomic bombings were primarily to hasten the end of the war (before the Soviets got super involved) but I never considered the deeper reasoning behind not bombing Kyoto, or that it could go to this level and result in the first true front of the Cold War. Do you have any historical resources on this (or in another way, what were your sources?) I've always been interested in the morality and political reasonings for the atomic bombings, and with Oppenheimer out it's only renewed my interest. Any extra input would be greatly appreciated!
@@owenreynolds9599 There is an extensive bibliography in the book "Racing The Enemy" by Tsuyoshi Hasegawa which was published in 2005. Hasegawa is a Japanese historian who is also fluent in English and Russian. Fluency in all three languages is necessary to correlate events from relevant documents that became declassified or otherwise available in Japan, the US, and Russia in the 1990s. Also, the book "The End of the Pacific War" was edited by Hasegawa and it basically represents a peer-review of Hasagawa's data and conclusions by four other historians who specialize in this period of history. These historians' attitudes range from progressive to conservative regarding the effect and necessity of the atomic bomb attacks on Japan in August 1945. Because of the controversial nature of this subject and the somewhat entrenched attitudes of the public at large, Hasegawa and the other four historians are very careful to avoid speculation on issues that do not have an absolutely solid foundation in available documentation. However, I do take some of their ideas a bit further based on other evidence I've seen. For example, nowhere in these books is it mentioned that Stalin had firm plans to capture the entire island of Hokkaido starting on August 22nd 1945, just that he intended to capture approximately the northern half of the island. My statement on him going further than that is my speculation, based on the fact that Japan had such a huge fraction of its forces in Kyushu waiting for the US that the Red Army would probably have had an easier time than was expected in Hokkaido. It could perhaps have paralleled the ease with which the Red Army swept aside the Japanese Kwantung Army in Manchuria following the August 9th declaration of war by the USSR on Japan. I also use an article presented in John W. Dower's book "Japan in War & Peace" (1993) to justify my thinking about the effect of the Red Army's invasion on the stability of the Japanese government had it occurred. The article mentions how the Japanese Government meticulously recorded and tabulated popular opposition to the government via things such as graffiti in public places, and how they determined the strength of the local Communist Party from this data. They saw the Communist Party to be the biggest internal threat in terms of their potential ability to stage a coup or destabilize the government in other ways, and I tied this to the possibility of the Red Army's invasion acting as a catalyst. I have also visited the Matsushiro Tunnel complex in the mountains of Nagano Prefecture in Japan, which was an underground facility that was constructed at the end of WW2 as a place for the government to be able to retreat to should Tokyo be threatened. Neither Hasegawa nor the other four historians in "The End of the Pacific War" directly mention these tunnels, but based on other testimonials I've read about aborted plans for the US to use atomic bombs to help the French in similar mountainous terrain in North Vietnam in the early 1950s, it seemed feasible to me that the Matsushiro Tunnels might have provided decent protection from nuclear attack from the air. Japan had its own nuclear program, and while they didn't get very far with it they had a good idea of what an atomic bomb could do and how difficult and time-consuming it would be to create a significant inventory of them. (This is based on another of the articles in "Japan in War & Peace"). The only indirect reference to the Matsushiro Tunnels by Hasegawa was from the meeting minutes of one of the war cabinet meetings after the Nagasaki attack, when Army Minister Anami made a brief comment suggesting the emperor leave Tokyo, due to intelligence he claimed he had received from captured US airmen regarding a planned atomic bomb attack on Tokyo. This plan was never substantiated, and Anami seemed to withdraw or at least not press his recommendation for the emperor to leave Tokyo. It certainly would have been an option for the Japanese government to retreat to Nagano, and I think it emphasizes the idea that they didn't consider the atomic bombs to be as decisive to the war as many now assume. They considered the USSR's declaration of war to be the most important factor in their decision to surrender, according to Hasegawa, with the atomic bombs being more of a side-show.
Since Emperor Hirohito was so fundamental to the surrender of Japan, and since the exact target of a Kyoto bomb drop would have been the palace (I'm assuming the emperor lived in Kyoto, I think I can assume that), it is likely that Hirohito would have been killed, thus meaning he was no longer there to voice opposition, and quite probably no surrender for a long time. In fact, I doubt the war could have ended with the Japanese accepting defeat, but eventually as a draw or a cease fire.
There’s a really quick cut to Janes Suicide scene where you see a hand pushing her underwater! That was an interesting hint on what really happened to her
Given that the scene was in color, and the scenes in color represented Oppenheimer's (subjective) perspective, I take it to mean he was stewing over whether she died at her own hand or someone else's.
One thing we know - there was no British or Canadian input to Manhattan Project. Not one tiny fragment at all. 100% USofA only. I suspect the movie is precise on this point.
If they included all these other points, this would have been a messy movie. That is why screenwriting and story telling is important. We didn't need the full apple fallout. Its inclusion is enough to point out that Oppenheimer though brilliant had issues
Exactly, you can't include everything in a movie, that's why the books that the movies are based on are often better. Having just watched this, I'm more excited to see the movie.
The movie whitewashes some awful people who belonged in prison or on death row. Trying to poison someone with an apple, adultery, being an accessory to mass murder, driving drunk repeatedly, being god-awful parents...c'mon. Just more Hollywood filth covering for filth.
It already is messy! And making a "historic" film whilst having historical inaccuracies is downright bad writing imo. Like, nobody forced Nolan to make a movie about Oppenheimer, if you're gonna do it, do it accurately.
And couple of historical corrections. First, there’s a little evidence that the scientist at Los Alamos opposed using the bomb on Japan at the time. They were claims to have argued against it all seem to have appeared after the war was over, and the horrors of Hiroshima became widely known. It’s a lot like the officials that claim they were always against the Vietnam war when they were strongly supporting it up until the Tet Offensive. Secondly, once the purple and magic decrypts were declassified in the 1970s, it’s clear that Japan was not going to surrender even with an offer to keep the emperor. The supreme war council actually voted to continue the war even after Nagasaki and it was only the emperors personal intervention that turned things around. This is clear from the historical record it might’ve been debatable up until the 70s but the declassified records tell the story.
The use of Little Boy and Fat Man was instantly approved by the US government once Germany surrendered. Casualties in the Pacific theatre were appalling so an alternative to the scheduled invasion of Japan was chosen.
The debate over their intentions is more complex than that because it was not just the US vs Japan. They had been using the USSR as a way to discuss terms/as a mediary, at least that was their aim, not completely aware of all of the plans that the USSR had for them, though very aware there was a chance they would invade at some point, which was probably why they did it. There are also many who believe that the main issue at first was a miscommunication because of a fucked up translation. After the first bomb, they would have surrendered if they could have kept their emperor. Not only that, the atomic bomb was more destructive for the rest of the world in the long run than for Japan at the time. Because of the construction of Japan, fire bombing was destroying it at an insane pace. They actually had to direct bombers to stay away from the two cities they chose for the bombs, or it wouldn't have seemed that destructive, as a bunch of the city would have been destroyed already. Right after the second bomb, Russia invaded, no longer being an option for negotiations for one, and two, they were known for their brutality. Between Russia, which Japan had feared for a very long time, the US that was ritualistically slaughtering civilians and burning the cities to the ground, and a new weapon that had new catastrophic medical effects that they hadn't seen from a weapon before, the emperor made the decision. But the generals could have shut him down. The emperor staying in power was the one thing that kept the US from accepting, because how else would they show off their bomb on a bunch of citizens before anyone else? And in the end the emperor stayed for a while anyway. It was all stupid and a waste of human life. Children vaporized or killed slowly and painfully, then born with deformities, for nothing. Leading to a cold war of constant fear. Now tons of countries have nukes, and our tank piercing rounds and shit have radioactive material in them. People in places where we wage war have people suffering where we have murdered their families and left our military trash all over to poison them on top of it. Burn pits have also poisoned troops because of it if you don't particularly care about any "enemies." Our fight with the nazis was over. The fight with the Japanese was close to done. But we are too eager to destroy ourselves.
5:03 In the film you can see a hand with black gloves push her head under the water in one shot with the next showing her drowning herself Perhaps Nolan was hinting at the assassination conspiracy?
I agree it was for all reasonable purposes, historically correct as far as it went. There were some things left out but I thought the movie was very good. I have watched, and own, every documentary DVD available on the subject of Oppenheimer and the Manhattan project and the following detonations of nuclear weapons around the globe. I was very influenced as a child by my uncle who was a isotope chemist at ORNL. He paid my way thru college and I spent most of my work career with NASA and WSMR as a contract engineer. As a young teenager, I spent the summers with my uncle in Oak Ridge, TN starting in 1963 and I remember my uncle very much disagreeing with Oppenheimer's statement of the physicist's knowing sin from the creation of the bomb. My uncle was taken directly out of college from the University of Alabama with his degree in chemistry and whisked off to the then being built, town of Oak Ridge. People of that era, the WWII days, were very dedicated to their work. My uncle died in 1972 at the age of 52 from a life dedicated to chemistry at ORNL. Possibly too much exposure to too many dangerous environments. They always wore dosemeters as was also their security badge. I remember seeing all this as a somewhat romantic time in life where technology and very bright people came together to build fantastic instruments and to end a war. There will always be debate as to whether or not the bomb should have been used on Japan. One thing that can be said for sure, not one American life was lost in those final times whereas a land invasion of Japan was estimated to lose as many as a million American servicemen.
@@johncollins7062 No, I did not know of Mr. Nobles. I started at MSFC in 1970 and left there in 1976 for WSMR. There is a NASA site at WSMR where I worked that reports to Houston but I don't remember hardly anyone nowadays. I left WSMR in 1996 for a contact with DHS.
Something that the movie makes no mention of, that I think might influence people's impression of how Harry Truman reacts to Oppenheimer's feeling he has blood on his hands, is that Truman was a war veteran, having gone to Europe to fight in World War I. I think it puts his referring to Oppenheimer as a "cry baby" (which I understand he did in real life, calling him a "cry baby scientist" at one point) in perspective, since Oppenheimer had never so much as fired a shot in anger in his life while Truman had not just given the order to drop the bomb, but at one point personally commanded an artillery battery in action against German troops. Whatever you thought of Oppenheimer himself, it would make sense that Truman might think of that as a bad joke.
Excellent points. But Christopher Nolan clearly felt that there were political machinations behind the dropping of the atomic bombs (as do I). He presents Truman's reaction as a moment of ego, and in the movie it plays into Oppenheimer's increasing sense of dread about scientists having given the military and politicians enough rope to destroy us all. It's probably not a truly fair picture to Harry, but who knows? Truman didn't have Roosevelt's relationship with Stalin and the creation and dropping of the atomic bombs waa major muscle to flex on the international stage.
The bottom line is that all main-stream movies are, in the last analysis exactly that: movies. The ultimate, only criterion for success is whether they tell a good story. Think of any other (supposed) “historical” movie: to take some obvious examples “Amadeus”; “Belle of Amherst”; “Inherit the Wind”. Each might have been good - even great- movies but 1) any historical accuracy inevitably and necessarily 11:44 takes second place to its needs as a piece of entertainment; and 2) the vast majority of their viewers inevitably come away apparently truly believing that they now understand “the facts” supposedly depicted More seriously, because most of these viewer think they already understand the issues, they are all the more likely not to follow up by trying to learn what really happened. In short, not only is the real history obscured, but it _replaced_ by the story told in movie,
" More seriously, because most of these viewer think they already understand the issues, they are all the more likely not to follow up by trying to learn what really happened. In short, not only is the real history obscured, but it replaced by the story told in movie, " Excellent point .
I need to point out one thing. I adore "Amadeus"; it's a remarkable movie. But it's not at all very historically accurate. Especially compared to "Oppenheimer," which is far more so.
@@cherylhulting1301 : We’ll, yes and no. The point here, of course, is that while both films may be quite entertaining, _neither_ of them is particularly historically accurate. And, unfortunately, many (most?) viewers nonetheless come away from them apparently believing that they’ve actually learned some “history”.
The movie goes so far to be accurate but I can’t figure out why they changed the final bomb assembly. Instead of the chain-hoist used to put the hundred-pound arming cylinder in, they show a couple of guys doing it by hand, which would be impossible as shown. Same problem with the assembling of the explosive blocks, which were almost as heavy as concrete but shown moved around by hand.
Easy. For dramatic effect. Doing it with machines removes a degree of trepidation that exists when human hands are much closer to it. He even changed why they chose Nagasaki. Not a big deal. Those are minor details.
I agree it wouldn’t matter much if they were just changing how stuff was moved around - but they’re also changing the physical properties of the materials used, changing the weight of uranium and explosives to a fraction of what they are. They could have still had two men realistically lower the hundred pound plug by having them stand directly above and using all four arms.
@@Real28 Using a machine could have turned it into a bigger deal. Its a huge metal device that spreads death, unmovable by hand. A heavy burden etc. A crane would have worked out fine. The sound of the winch taking its time could have been used for dramatic effect as well.
One thing to point out that was incorrect. In the film the countdown clock for the Trinity test was shown using Nixie tubes. While cool looking, Nixie tubes weren't invented until the mid 1950's.
No, the fact that Oppenheimer makes the comment about his name very clearly shows that they had him explain the pronunciation because of him rejecting his being jewish.
@@gertjan3329Yes. RDJ also said that in his read, Strauss was the kind of man who would want everyone to know the correct pronunciation of his name or to remember to call him "Admiral Strauss."
I saw this yesterday, Aug 6th, on the 78 anniversary of the actual event. It was a long 3 hours and a very complicated move. These 12 min really helps me to comprehend what I saw. Only I don't know if I should have watched it before the movie, or after? But thanks,, you just let me get to sleep tonight.
Nagasaki wasn’t the intended primary target for the second atomic bomb - that was Kokura. The third bomb would have been dropped on Kokura on either August 18th or 19th with the fourth and fifth in September. Twelve more would have been dropped on Kyushu and the Kanto plain around Tokyo in November 1945 and April 1946…
The 3rd bomb was a bluff. We had no more plutonium for several years and just claimed to have more bombs ready. The Japanese were tricked in this sense but then getting nuked prob. has that effect of panic
I really enjoyed the movie as a whole, although I think they did not do the famous “I have become death” line justice. I think first bringing up the line while he is having sex diminished its power. I think they did it to show that he read it in its original Sanskrit, but they could have just had them put the book down after he said he was learning to read Sanskrit. Then after the trinity test I think they should have used the full quote. “A few people laughed; a few people cried. Most people were silent. I remembered the line from the Hindu scripture, the Bhagavad Gita; Vishnu is trying to persuade the prince that he should do his duty, and to impress him, takes on his multiarmed form and says, ‘Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.’ I suppose we all thought that, one way or another.”
I see what you mean, i think it could also have hit harder. But i think most of us knew that line prior to even watching the movie so thats why it seems off to have it mentioned in the beginning. But for Oppie, this phrase didnt mean as much to him at that time and Nolan wanted to show him knowing this phrase prior to the end of the film (would have been weird if he just said it out of nowhere). For the argument that this could have been something he said in a different scene, i see your point; however, the sex scene has a lot more meaning than most people are giving. This line also eludes to his troubling relationship with Tatlock and her unfortunate "demise". I think overall it was done well.
@@introverse7167 Looking deeper into it I found out her apparent suicide has always been suspicious. Even in the movie, he was followed to the hotel and she didn't sign the note.
Hiroshima is also beautiful. Ironically, it was chosen because it had not been bombed, thus, the US could easily tell how effective the atom bomb was by what was damaged.
For me, there are two main ideas and concepts in this movie: It revolves around a man who created the atomic bomb. We get to witness his experiences, the process of its creation, and the various influences on him, such as his wife and more. The movie also delves into the broader societal perspective, where the entire world seems to blame this great scientist (we can view the world as a representation of Strauss himself). In the beginning, Strauss explicitly stated that he was not a scientist, and the film reflects on how the world, unable to create something similar, blames the genius who could potentially make a wrong decision but is unjustly judged. The brilliance of the last scene lies in the fact that it serves as a pivotal moment for both concepts. Strauss becomes completely obsessed with Robert, while Robert himself realizes the full implications of what he has created. This is why I believe it is a great movie
No single man created the atomic bomb. These pop movies just simply make the audience dumber by making a caricature of events as important as the creation of the bomb.
I wanted more science! Oppenheimer was a manager more than anything. Others had the breakthroughs and I wanted that as well. I would have loved a big screen representation of how the atoms and electrons were interacting.
A plot that covers very important historical facts and at the same time manages to deal with individual dramas; all this combined with a cast of high-level artists; a creative film direction, a director who is an expert at using different time perspectives when telling a story (like in Dunkirk); visual and sound effects that mobilize the viewer. Director Cristopher Nolan achieved everything that cinematographic art allows in what in my opinion is a masterpiece of contemporary cinema: Oppenheimer.
Appreciate this video, it helps to calibrate the movie's historical accuracy. One thing the movie depicts but doesn't focus upon is the intellectual grunt work involved with getting the explosive lenses needed for that implosion design to work correctly. (Oppenheimer's Gamble - The Plutonium Crisis) is the title of a recent video which delves into the work needed to make this happen. It gave me a bit more of a sense of what the scientists would have been working on in a day to day sense of things. Lots of repeated calculations needed to achieve a smooth spherical implosion shockwave.
That's a great video, and after watching it I do have a greater appreciation for the difficulties in ensuring that the explosives would all detonate together, creating the necessary energy for the activation of the implosion device. It helps us to really appreciate all the tense scenes at the Trinity test about whether the implosion would work.
I love the subtle hint at a possible murder, not suicide when Oppenheimer tells Kitty about his lovers death. you see her drowning herself, and the camera goes back and forth between him and her, and eventually you see a glimpse of a gloved hand on the back of her head.
I feel like a big point people miss is the fact that Oppenheimer felt guilty because he thought he might have gotten her killed. He tells Kitty they found a drug that the CIA used in assassinations in Gene's blood, which means he was at least aware of the possibility that him going to see her during the manhattan project made her a target for assasination. Obviously the truth is lost to history, and I don't know if the real Oppenheimer was aware of this possibility, but it recontextualizes that whole scene in the movie where he's crying to Kitty about it.
How does it compare to the movie 'Shadow Makers' - made in 1989 I believe. That covers the same subject matter, and received very positive reviews. BTW - The title left to the shadows left behind by incinerated humans on walls and pavements when they interrupted the thermal radiation emerging from the bomb.
If Japan was thinking of surrendering they would have surrendered the first time the super weapon of a kind no one has ever seen before was dropped..... instead Japanese military command risked waiting for the third one to be dropped before surrendering. If they lost the same number of military personal in a standard war they would have kept on fighting that is how close to surrendering they were, they were still hoping the west couldn't stomach the loss's while invading Japan so they thought they had some bargining power while they resisited surrendering. Their Emperor literally had to beg the military to surrender.
The small flags waved in the auditorium after Japan’s surrender had 50 stars. Gawd that bothered me as larger flags were the accurate 48 star flags. Lazy prop master.
There's a really good biography of of Oppenheimer that is on PBS. that is about as good as I've seen it really tells all the facts about Oppenheimer. and has amazing footage to back it up.
The Trinity countdown nine - eight - seven ...etc. was shown on a Nixie tube display. Wikipedia says Nixie tubes weren't available until 1955 from the Burroughs corporation.
The color scenes were said by Nolan to be subjective where black and white was objective, so Oppenheimer's memory of the flags was from the point of view of his statement before the board inquiry regarding his security clearance, so he would have just injected 50 star flags into the memory.
Oppenheimer's brother was present at the Trinity test and stated in his book the only thing he said out loud after the detonation was "I guess it worked".
8:54 Correction " Concerning the atomic bomb , the US had 3 committees 1) Truman's Intern Committee , 2) the target Committee and 3 ) the Scientific Committee . Oppenheimer was on the Scientific Committee . The official recommendation of the Scientific Committee was submitted on June 16th , 1945 . " we can propose no technical demonstration likely to bring an end to the war; we see no acceptable alternative to direct military use. "
Bruuuuuh, I thought Lawrence looked so familiar but for the life of me I couldn't place the actor while watching the movie. Josh Hartnett, wow.. well, makes sense, last movie I saw him in was probably Black Hawk Down, decades ago at this point. o.O
This piece (and the movie) really missed things about Kitty. She wasn't a housewife when she met Oppenheimer, though it was true that she was married. She was a graduate student studying biology and she later earned her degree in botany. (Oppie apparently had a habit of getting involved with female graduate students). Kitty reportedly used the latter skills in working with Oppie to study the effects of radiation on plant life in the area of NM after the Trinity test.
There is one subtle but major inaccuracy at the ending of the film: Ernest Lawrence shouldn't have been at Oppenheimer's award ceremony in 1963- he died 5 years prior to that.
Yes, Truly. That Film was extremely Well Done. The cast was amazing. Paul Newman as Groves nailed it. The Physics and the process of developing a workable implosion mechanism was very well portrayed. A truly great film. Another, was a joint Canadian/ Japanese production called Hiroshima. A very interesting film that gets into the political debate about the bomb, it’s use and development. Very well presented from the Japanese side as well. Great Japanese cast. Truman, was very well portrayed, I think by Kenneth Arnold. (?) Canadian Actor. Great great performance. Also touches on Jimmy Byrnes Sec of State and Defacto Vice President. Really a great find on DVD.
You state in the audio comment that Oppenheimer's father "fled" from Germany to the USA in 1888. What did he flee from? In the Kaiserreich founded in 1871 there was neither more nor less antisemitism than was in the USA. On the contrary, in the newly formed German national state there were enormous business opportunities also for Jewish people. Jewish people from Eastern Europe actually immigrated into Germany because of this. Oppenheimer himself regularly visited his father's relatives in Germany before 1933, and also studied in Germany himself. His relatives were maybe not as rich as his father, but also not doing badly. Please look more closely at the facts and avoid propaganda and stereotyping. Thank you!
Famous Jewish business families doing very well under the Kaiser include HAPAG CEO Albert Ballin, the Rathenau family who formed AEG, a major competitor of US Companies such as General Electric, and e.g. the Warburg family, bankers from Hamburg. Gerson Bleichröder was one of the most important financial supporters of Bismarck and his projects abroad!
The film is very explicit that Oppenheimer never joined the communist party. He was drawn to communist ideas but stopped short of joining the party. He says as much when he first meets Chevalier and Jean Tatlock. I don’t know how you could watch the film and conclude that Oppenheimer was definitely a communist.
I’ll just mentioned, that if anyone is interested in seeing an actually pretty good (albeit fictionalized) piece about these issues, they should try to find the PBS multi-part series “Oppenheimer” (starring Sam Waterson) originally broadcast in, iirc, the ‘80s.
@@dougball328 said "But I think the broadcast in the '80s in the US was on PBS. BBC didn't have a channel here then." I'm sure you're right. I watched it sometime in the mid-late 80s and I'm sure I watched in on PBS for the reason you said.
Whether Japan would have surrendered was not quite as clear-cut as this commentary makes it out to be. In fact, when a certain faction of the Japanese Military got wind of efforts to negotiate peace with the US, a group of hardliners tried to kidnap the Emperor to prevent him from agreeing to it, though the plot was discovered and they were arrested. Meanwhile, Japan had 4 million troops stationed in the Japanese homeland itself prepared to fight to the death as they had proved they did in previous major battles that killed thousands of Americans such as the Marshall Island campaigns and Okinawa. The Japanese rulers were also training tens of thousands of civilians in warfare skills so the US would even have to face intense guerilla war upon invading Japan. Also, I wish the video, as well as the film Oppenheimer, would have mentioned that the US did not simply drop the bombs without warning, which is the impression the film gives as well as related commentary such as this video. In fact, the US gave the Japanese High Command a clear warning the US now had a super weapon that could destroy cities with a single bomb, but they ignored the warnings and continued to wage war. The US also dropped tens of thousands of leaflets onto the ten target cities warning the civilians the US was prepared to drop a super weapon on them which would kill them all, and urged all civilians to leave those cities. These warnings were also ignored.
Some bad history here. The worst at 9:30. Japanese surrender wasn't considered on just preserving the Emperor. Japan wanted to preserve their military establishment as well including their complete control of the government.
When the lights approaching the tower for the Trinity test are turned on they make a booming sound. In reality lights don't make a booming sound until Close Encounters of a Third Kind in the 80's.
No, Japan was not likely to surrender in the summer or fall of 1945 (or later). The Japanese military were committed to a defense of slaughtering the American landing troops on the beaches, even if it meant millions of Japanese deaths. No, stating that the emperor system would not be disturbed would not have been sufficient to get a surrender. Debate among the 'Big Six' (the Japanese inner cabinet) hinged on the military's insistence on three additional conditions, none of which would have been acceptable to the Allies.
Not an accurate model of the high explosive internal components of the bomb. It was two layers, not one, and the 32 explosive lenses, the crucial, brilliant innovation, were not shown at all.
@@allangibson8494 the lenses were at the locations of the detonators, around the periphery of the sphere. They were in direct contact with the Duralumin shell, and reshaped the blast wave into an implosion just as it began to form. The team at Los Alamos regarded the lenses as part of the outer layer of explosives.
@@honorguardsfencingclub7322 The lenses weren’t. They were about halfway through the explosive stack to shape the shock front, slowing it at the middle and less at the wedge edge where they thinned to nothing. The blast wave needed room to form first. The shape of the lens is the single hardest part of the design of an implosion weapon.
@@allangibson8494 you are misinformed as to the placement of the lenses. The implosion wave needed to be shaped immediately upon ignition, not halfway through the process. Read "The Making of the Atomic Bomb" by Richard Rhodes.
@@honorguardsfencingclub7322 You need a fast explosive followed by a slow explosive lens - the third stage is possibly optional but probably necessary to achieve the required compression. Any discontinuity and it fails…
In an interview he gave later, he says that the destroyer line, as well as another line from Hindu scripture, was running through his mind as he witnessed the test (although you’re right that the actual words he said out loud were “It worked, I guess”
I was disappointed that this movie dealt more with the political/legal issues surrounding Oppenheimer. than it did the bomb and WW2. The movie was more of a biography about Oppenheimer, much different than the trailer depicted.
It's a biopic, not a movie solely about the Manhattan Project. Movies and documentaries have already been produced about the Project. With respect, it was called "Oppenheimer" for a reason.
Oppenheimer and Einstein not only “knew each other”, but likely interacted on a daily basis during the last 8 years of Einstein’s life since Oppenheimer became the director of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton after WWII, where Einstein was a resident scholar.
There are some questionable representations in this video's questioning of the accuracy of the film. It's pronounced Straws, not Strauss, which is clear enough if you see the film.
Marvin Minsky, the “father of AI” told a story from when he was very young, perhaps even an undergrad still, in which Oppenheimer invited him to lunch with a few friends. Ended up sitting at a table with Oppenheimer, Einstein, and Gödel. It’s wild that these guys took such an interest in the next generation - true lovers of science who wanted to pass the torch to good hands.
So everything wrong seems to be that Looper wants a 3 hour movie to be even longer, so that more of the backstory to each and every character can be shown...
Where does it say that? This is not a criticism of the movie, but additional information so that audiences can differentiate between artistic depiction and historic fact.
Japan wouldn’t surrender. They would fight well past defeat. There was even an plot to kidnapping, overthrow the emperor to keep the war going. It was thought that millions would have to die on both sides to win the war. The bomb had to be dropped. Plus, the firebombing of Tokyo killed more than the bombs on either city did. It was a demonstration of the technological advance that was meant to demoralized them. It almost didn’t work. Why? They didn’t surrender after Hiroshima. And it was only a week after Nagasaki, that they finally surrendered.
But in between the bombings in Hiroshima and Nagasaki the Soviets entered the Pacific War. They subsequently did major damage to Japanese troops in Manchuria. The Russian entry to the war was something the Japanese greatly feared. And with several good reasons. Moreover, the US's heavy conventional bombing was leaving thousands of Japanese homeless, and fall and winter would be coming. The naval blockade was also squeezing Japan effectively and robbing the country of necessary resources. With the added pressure of the Soviets Japan might end up fighting a two-front war. It's fair and necessary to ask whether, with these conditions, the bombs needed to be used at all.
Japan was not ready to surrender prior to Hiroshima. They had trained millions of civilians in the use of deadly force to oppose the American invasion. They had thousands of remaining combat aircraft, and I believe over 2,000 of them were made into kamikaze craft, to be used against the American fleets. Even after the second bombing, of Nagasaki, the War Council was deadlocked on the question of surrender.
I wonder if it would have been different if america just said “you can take your chances with surrendering to us or the bolsheviks, remember they massacred their own royal family, what would they do to you?”
@@CorePathway Nazi Germany is done, Russia and US is on Japan and you think they are not willing to surrender? How is it possible to drop a bomb on a country who is willing to surrender? Soo yes the narrative is Japan was not willing to surrender no matter what.
Even after the bombs were dropped, there was a significant chance that the Allies would have had to invade the Home Islands. There was an attempted coup (the "Kyujo incident") by army hard-liners to arrest the Emperor and force him to abandon issuing his unprecedented surrender the following day. Had they succeeded, probably millions more lives would have been lost.
The setting for Los Alamos and Oppenheimer's ranch wasn't in the correct climate zone. There are at least 6 zones in New Mexico. Los Alamos is in the transition zone characterized by mixed conifer woodland, principally ponderosa pine, situated on a plateau, and not in a depression between mesas.
Good information to have. But we know the Los Alamos film location was really chosen more for the vast sense of "nothingness" it would convey. Moreover, Los Alamos is quite built up today and the crew picked a new location that would be easier to manipulate while providing excellent cinematographic possibilities. Speaking of woods, the crew actually did use the Oppenheimers' house in Los Alamos for the shoot. Tree brush and bushes were placed around it to obscure the more modern buildings and cars surrounding it.
It’s rare that I’ve seen more than one of the movies up for Oscar best picture before the award is announced. This year I’ve seen Maestro & Oppenheimer (I assume both are nominated). Oppenheimer is a thinker, with intricate exposition and fleshing out a plethora of characters. It’s an epic biopic, thus a shoe-in for best picture. Nolan brings it home, with his usual blaring music score, to a poignant awareness end. The final Earth burning image is the startling horror we live with every day - - especially considering the number of nations and rebels firing missiles at each other this week. The best we can do is put the terror out of our minds for a spell in order to achieve happiness in this life .. but it’s always there. I’m hesitant to write this, but considering how many annual inside jokes are routinely made about the number of Jews in attendance at Oscar ceremonies, I wonder what personages will say this year. I suppose as little was said about USA slaughter of Iraqis at such award shows at the time, Palestinians dying wholesale won’t get much mention. Someone may invoke the lame “peace in the Middle East” - - as though we’ve had it at home - - or the CIA hasn’t been orchestrating death of innocent human beings all over the planet since its inception. The deadly Hamas attack was horrrible, but I don’t see how killing over tenfold innocents in response, and destroying the already debilitated infrastructure and homes of millions does any good. It’s madness. The movie Oppenheimer mentions Jews and communists a lot. It’s intriguing that fervent anti-communists then and now seem oblivious to what progress domestic communists provided the USA considering labor rights, and their part in finishing WWII. The actions of such leftists weren’t directed by Soviet or Russian mentality, but by human compassion and the knowledge that working together - united - we prevail. By the same token, folks have to be mindful differentiating the actions of Israel from Jews in the USA. Heartfelt opinions about the destruction of Gaza are divided in both demographics. What’s assured is any scientist or politician who expressed hope nuclear bombs would deter war was way off the mark. We’re on the world brink now more than ever. What’s most agonizingly evident is no matter how brazen immoral financial, political, and war corporation corruption is apparent in the USA, in domestic and foreign battlefields, we are powerless to stop it. The scales are tilted too far in favor of those who are insane with avarice and power. Who could ever defeat those who bank the trillions of dollars that disappear with regularity from the Pentagon budget. History shows those with the most destructive weapons use them. We muddle thru, and concern ourselves with entertainment.  I don’t see how Cillian Murphy deserves best actor when there’s at least one actor in the same film giving a better performance. Robert Downey Jr evoked more depth of character in every scene he was in. Murphy, who was stellar in Peaky Blinders, played shades of the same stoic notes over and over, and Oppenheimer, though the genius in charge of Trinity, often appears as a character the movie is happening around. Bradley Cooper should win the Oscar for best actor. The scenes between him and Carey Mulligan are riveting. No two actors could bring their pivotal Thanksgiving argument to life better. Thru the film, they bring the nuances of their characters’ love, and their struggle within it, to the fore. His conducting scene is a triumph. What Cooper did, embodying a person so fully, is above the acting Jamie Foxx and Rami Malek delivered in their Oscar winning performances. It’s a shame if he doesn’t get the trophy. I guess I’m watching Barbie next.
Actually "Oppenheimer" has a fairly high rate of historical accuracy. And it has seemed to inspire people to read more historical accounts of the period. I know I am, as I enjoy history in general.
Long movie short: Jean Tatlock really gets inside Kitty Oppenheimer's head; Oppie Oppenheimer really, really gets inside Strauss's head. Everything they made the big screen for. And the explosion of the nuclear bomb... can't forget about that.
I saw the movie yesterday & didn't like it. I was expecting more of science & his life than never ending courtroom dramas. New movie needs to be made from scratch. Only saving grace was Matt Damon with exceptional acting.
It's not a good movie at all. The timeline switches are the only one that try to hide how boring it really is. And for someone, who didn't read just one biograhy, the factual twists raised the hair on my neck. This could have been made MUCH MUCH better. I mean with a better screenplay.
Actually, no. It gets few things wrong, has to condense some material for time or budget constraints, and if one understands the stakes involved, it's actually pretty riveting.
When Jean Tatlock is killed in the film, It shows flashes of a hand holding her head under the water. Then, it shows her doing it herself. I'm pritty sure during the scene, Oppenheimer feels responsible for her death, not just for not being there for her, but because the government scrutiny brought into his life through the project might have lead to a volatile, "commy" leak like Tatlock to be killed. The film does this quite a bit, giving multiple accounts of what happened. A lot is left up to what you think happened and knowing the American government, they killed her.
Julius Oppenheimer did not have to flee Germany. In the 1880s Germany was one of the most progressive countries and most accepting of Jews. Julius and his family immigrated, as millions of people were doing at the time.
I saw that too. Jews comprised 0.5% of the German population in 1934. Today, they're 2% of the USA, four times the percent. Their presence in Germany was never a problem.
During the hearings about the revocation of Oppenheimer's security clearance Edward Teller made it clear that it was Oppenheimer's lack of judgment that he was questioning. He opposed the development of the H-bomb because he naively believed that if the USA decided not to build it, the USSR wouldn't either. This view was contradicted by Andrei Sakharov, the father of the Soviet H-bomb. In his memoirs he wrote that Stalin and the later Soviet leaders were determined to build an H-bomb no matter what Truman did. Imagine what a hellishly precarious position the Western world would've found itself in if Oppenheimer's advice had been followed and we'd had no deterrent.
That doesn’t mean that the outcome would’ve been nuclear warfare. Every country has nukes now so I personally believe the outcome would’ve been the same.
7:29 - He didn't "quote" he *misquoted* . It is not "Death destroyer of worlds.." - what kind of a botched translation is that ?? Guys please do your homework when you are reporting something factual.
Sorry, the Japan was going to surrender meme is nonsense. It comes from mistaking current Japanese culture, influenced by Shinto and the American occupation, for what existed during the war. The WWII Japanese were held in thrall by rabid death culture form of Bushido, metastasized from Samuri code. They had no intention of surrendering. They ran the war like there was no chance they could lose, ignoring international norms. Fortunately, enough of them maintained loyalty to the Emperor to end the war, though it was touch and go. Most of the Army high command died, by their hands or by execution.
If a chicken coop is on fire it makes no difference if the chickens don't want to come out. Japan was effectively ablaze and wiped out industrially already. The talk about sparing U.S. lives by making an invasion unnecessary is utterly false. From the excellent book Lawrence and Oppenheimer, by Nuel Pharr Davis, we read, "At that time nothing was going in or out of Japan. Their navy and merchant marine were all but wiped out. American cruisers and battleships were already bombarding coastal industrial facilities with impunity. The Japanese were desperately trying to distill fuel from pine trees, and reduced to eating bees. In other words, they were already utterly defeated, and no invasion was necessary whatsoever. The bombings were to prove what damage would truly result and to frighten the Russians, who had already, unbeknownst, been handed the Los Alamos secrets not just by Fuchs and the Rosenthals, but even more importantly by the teenaged (!) physicist Ted Hall who had been allowed to travel to NYC and was then ineptly tailed. In fact Stalin learned about the bomb long before Truman who never even knew what was going on until April 1945.
@@budlanctot3060 That's true enough (and the ultimate irony), but realistically, a lone-wolf event, and doubtful if the sub could ever have even been re-supplied. My father in law was on the heavy cruiser, U.S. Quincy, just one of several that were bombarding the hell out of coastal Japan, with no opposition whatsoever at the time, before the A-bombing. There was no need to invade whatsoever. They were finished.
" Sorry, the Japan was going to surrender meme is nonsense. " Yes this revisionist nonsense has its origins when Diplomat Sato was sent to Moscow to see if the Soviets were willing to negotiate terms . As the US was intercepting Japanese Communications , revisionists claim the US knew Japan was willing to surrender . But the " Big Six " never offered any terms . Sato told Togo one of the "Big Six " the best they could hope for is surrender , except to keep the Emperor . But This was rejected by Togo of the " Big Six. " The first date the Big Six offered to negotiate terms was on August 10th 1945 , when they responded to the Potsdam Declaration . .
one massive wrong thing that happened in the movie.. When Oppenheimer is in Leiden (The Netherlands) they speak German in the lecture even do Dutch People don't speak native German but Dutch. So that's a wrong fact. Funny to hear how the audience reacted to that scene haha
@@scottbrower9052 yes correct, but if you have seen the movie they say: how did you learn Dutch so well? Implicit that they have spoken Dutch even do its is clearly German.
My native language is Dutch and i did not understand any of it lol (sounded more like German), maybe i would ve been able to decipher it if i had listened more closely ?
'It was a typical Hollywood movie, great photography, quick scenes, sex etc. What it did lack was a leading figure that was interesting, Oppenheimer was without emotion a sort of empty can through most of the movie even his wife got tired of his act. The so called give and take between him and the Army Lt. Colonel wasn't much, the only memorial dialogue is with Truman and the interesting idea that Truman didn't believe that Russia could generate a Bomb. The underlying plot of forces out to discreet him came late and by that time his character and place in history seemed less secure anyway. The movie keep depending on other characters to make the movie interesting but it was to little to late.
Topic of the video: Everything Oppenheimer Gets Right And Wrong About The True Story First thing it does: Butchers the pronunciation of the name Strauss--- something that is mentioned in the movie.
wow. This was the era of top secret papers to die for. All the real life 007 spy rings. Now, the classified documents are stuck in a bathroom. 😎 Great movie.
Noticed that every man with a tie is wearing the same style of shirt. A bright white pressed “spear point” collared shirt. Is this going to be the next big thing for today’s man?
The movie was good up to when the bomb went off. They could had made it 2 hours long instead of 3 hours. There was so much talking back and forth that I felt like leaving. I actually saw some getting up and leaving. No offense but not Nolans best.
Agreed. It was just too much arguing between who is communists and who is not. Too much flash backs, cut backs, fast dialogue and too many characters. And every character looked a like and I couldn't remember who is who.
The apple incident was changed to reflect creating something deadly, and then regretting it; foreshadowing his feelings about the bomb.
Yes, forgot about that but ,also i wonder what was point of dropping marbles in the bowel?
@@michaelyork7844They mentioned that bit in the film, each marble represents how much Uranium and plutonium was being refined daily.
Charles Oppenheimer, a grandson of Oppenheimer, contests that apple scene though. From an interview: "The part I like the least is this poison apple reference, which was a problem in American Prometheus [the book on which the film is based]."
"I definitely would have removed the apple thing," before adding context to where the sequence comes from: "If you read American Prometheus carefully enough, the authors say, 'We don't really know if it happened.'
"There's no record of him trying to kill somebody. That's a really serious accusation and it's historical revision. There's not a single enemy or friend of Robert Oppenheimer who heard that during his life and considered it to be true."
It would have been better to accueratley portray the apple incident.
Poetic license to repurpose the apple. Very interesting remark. Jews don’t name kids after living relations. Jewish individualism is such that there cannot be two of someone. That would be like a wish to kill the doppelgänger. So J. Robert might have taken offense.
Correction: the film acknowledged that Tatlock may have been killed by a government agent. There was a hand in black glove behind her neck in the bathtub if you looked closely
It was one short cut
They talk also quickly mention that the substances they found on her body were not compatible with the medicine she allegedly took if I'm not mistaken
I remember that. But to be fair it was a small detail that would have been easy to miss if you weren't paying close attention.
Thanks for that. I'll have to look for that detail.
It's a tough one. Jean certainly could have been murdered due to her relationship with Oppenheimer. But something the movie doesn't go into but this short discussion does is that part of Jean's push-pull with Oppie was possibly related to her sexuality. She may have been a closeted lesbian and this discussion posits that she waa at least bisexual.
As she also studied psychology Jean would have known that psychology at that time considered homosexuality aberrant. She was a serious psychologist and that might have been a great internal battle for her. That could also have contributed to her feelings of depression and eventual suicide. As her father burned her papers after her body was found, we really don't know.
@@gusadicoYes. In the film Oppie mentions the medicines to Kitty. But it's also possible that Jean simply took different medications to overdose. As a psychologist she could prescribe medications and would have known what to use.
I found the most enjoyable part of the movie the delay between seeing the explosions and the sound of them.
I loved the scene where Oppie says to President Truman "I feel like I have blood on my hands". The look on Truman's face and reaction was downright evil. Gave me shivers..
Well, think of this. Oppenheimer felt like he killed a lot of people making the bomb. Truman pulled the trigger. Truman also had to find a way to end WW2. So, yes, Truman's 'Don't give me that' look and attitude might have been appropriate. It probably also gave Oppenheimer a way to move forward without feeling fully responsible too.
At the same time i agree with Truman. "no one is going to remember who build the bomb. They are going to remember the man who dropped it". He was absolutely right. You really think japanese were point fingers at oppie when it was dropped?...all the heads turned to Truman.
@@PrimitiveAK "No one is going to remember who built the bomb." -Harry "I've had lot of films made about me but none are as good as the IMAX movie named after you." S. Truman.
@@lornestein7248 not the exact quote that Truman said since that was from the movie but Truman was referring to the Japanese after the bomb was dropped. Japan only knew at the time who authorized it.
So you’re kinda right in what you’re trying to say but you’re misinterpreting who the quote was directed towards.
@@chiokehart-kelly3481 you misinterpreted who Truman was referring to and this was also during 1945 🤣
Henry Stimson's resistance to Kyoto being on the top of the target list was much more complicated than whether he honeymooned there or not. He did have an understanding of Japanese psychology via trips to Japan and his associations with various people, and his main concern with Leslie Groves' focus on Kyoto was that destroying the biggest center of Japanese culture would be counterproductive to the war effort.
Not only would there likely be international condemnation for attacking a city with no significant military infrastructure, which would play into Japan's favor, but Stimson also thought that it would either delay Japan's surrender or instigate a significant military insurgency afterwards. Imagine bombing Mecca in retaliation to 9/11. Also, did the war in Iraq in 2003 end immediately after the capture of Baghdad?
Groves reported to Stimson, but he went over Stimson's head to recommend Kyoto to Truman to be at the top of the target list. Stimson then convinced Truman to remove Kyoto from the target list, but the story didn't end there. The Potsdam Conference was coming soon, and Stimson was denied an invitation to attend the conference by the maneuverings of various people who wanted to restore Kyoto to the target list. Much of the final planning of the atomic bomb missions was going to be discussed there, and they wanted to make sure that Stimson was left out of the proceedings.
However, Stimson was so convinced of the folly of destroying Kyoto that he bought tickets to travel to Potsdam using his own money. He showed up without warning but he wasn't turned back, and he was able to stay close enough to Truman to make sure that Kyoto stayed off the target list completely.
It should be noted that if Kyoto had been attacked with an atomic bomb, and if it did cause a delay of only one week in Japan's decision to surrender, this would have allowed the USSR to implement its firm plans to invade the northern main island of Hokkaido on August 22nd 1945. With most of Japan's home defense forces focused in Kyushu in the south, awaiting the US, the Red Army might have had a much easier time prosecuting the invasion than was expected. Stalin might not have stopped once he reached his initial goal of taking the northern half of Hokkaido, perhaps capturing the entire island or even invading the biggest island of Honshu. The result would probably have been a polarized North/South Japan similar to North/South Korea, significantly complicating the US's security posture in the Pacific after the war.
Many people say the US's possession of an atomic bomb would have convinced Stalin to stop, but Stalin and Roosevelt already had an agreement for the USSR to enter the war against Japan three months after the end of the war in Europe. What would the US have done, then? Form an immediate alliance with Japan, who they were bombing just the day before, to confront the USSR, which was formerly an ally? It doesn't seem likely.
Any successful invasion of Hokkaido by the USSR would have been a big threat to Japan. The biggest internal opposition to the Japanese government during the war was considered to be the Japanese Communist Party. The success of the Red Army in the north may have triggered a rebellion and possible Communist coup in Tokyo, and Stalin would surely have exploited this.
If the US had finally gotten around to invading Kyushu in November 1945, it's conceivable that the army that met them there might not have been the Japanese Imperial Army, but the Red Army. This is of course is a stretch, but we can't underestimate the significance of Kyoto in the planning for the atomic bomb missions, and what had to be done to remove it from the target list.
Love the detail man! There is always so much depth to history. No movie can ever fully represent it.
This is such a fascinating alternative historical scenario, and I've never seen it covered before. I've held the belief that the atomic bombings were primarily to hasten the end of the war (before the Soviets got super involved) but I never considered the deeper reasoning behind not bombing Kyoto, or that it could go to this level and result in the first true front of the Cold War. Do you have any historical resources on this (or in another way, what were your sources?)
I've always been interested in the morality and political reasonings for the atomic bombings, and with Oppenheimer out it's only renewed my interest. Any extra input would be greatly appreciated!
@@owenreynolds9599 There is an extensive bibliography in the book "Racing The Enemy" by Tsuyoshi Hasegawa which was published in 2005. Hasegawa is a Japanese historian who is also fluent in English and Russian. Fluency in all three languages is necessary to correlate events from relevant documents that became declassified or otherwise available in Japan, the US, and Russia in the 1990s.
Also, the book "The End of the Pacific War" was edited by Hasegawa and it basically represents a peer-review of Hasagawa's data and conclusions by four other historians who specialize in this period of history. These historians' attitudes range from progressive to conservative regarding the effect and necessity of the atomic bomb attacks on Japan in August 1945.
Because of the controversial nature of this subject and the somewhat entrenched attitudes of the public at large, Hasegawa and the other four historians are very careful to avoid speculation on issues that do not have an absolutely solid foundation in available documentation. However, I do take some of their ideas a bit further based on other evidence I've seen.
For example, nowhere in these books is it mentioned that Stalin had firm plans to capture the entire island of Hokkaido starting on August 22nd 1945, just that he intended to capture approximately the northern half of the island. My statement on him going further than that is my speculation, based on the fact that Japan had such a huge fraction of its forces in Kyushu waiting for the US that the Red Army would probably have had an easier time than was expected in Hokkaido. It could perhaps have paralleled the ease with which the Red Army swept aside the Japanese Kwantung Army in Manchuria following the August 9th declaration of war by the USSR on Japan.
I also use an article presented in John W. Dower's book "Japan in War & Peace" (1993) to justify my thinking about the effect of the Red Army's invasion on the stability of the Japanese government had it occurred. The article mentions how the Japanese Government meticulously recorded and tabulated popular opposition to the government via things such as graffiti in public places, and how they determined the strength of the local Communist Party from this data. They saw the Communist Party to be the biggest internal threat in terms of their potential ability to stage a coup or destabilize the government in other ways, and I tied this to the possibility of the Red Army's invasion acting as a catalyst.
I have also visited the Matsushiro Tunnel complex in the mountains of Nagano Prefecture in Japan, which was an underground facility that was constructed at the end of WW2 as a place for the government to be able to retreat to should Tokyo be threatened. Neither Hasegawa nor the other four historians in "The End of the Pacific War" directly mention these tunnels, but based on other testimonials I've read about aborted plans for the US to use atomic bombs to help the French in similar mountainous terrain in North Vietnam in the early 1950s, it seemed feasible to me that the Matsushiro Tunnels might have provided decent protection from nuclear attack from the air. Japan had its own nuclear program, and while they didn't get very far with it they had a good idea of what an atomic bomb could do and how difficult and time-consuming it would be to create a significant inventory of them. (This is based on another of the articles in "Japan in War & Peace").
The only indirect reference to the Matsushiro Tunnels by Hasegawa was from the meeting minutes of one of the war cabinet meetings after the Nagasaki attack, when Army Minister Anami made a brief comment suggesting the emperor leave Tokyo, due to intelligence he claimed he had received from captured US airmen regarding a planned atomic bomb attack on Tokyo. This plan was never substantiated, and Anami seemed to withdraw or at least not press his recommendation for the emperor to leave Tokyo.
It certainly would have been an option for the Japanese government to retreat to Nagano, and I think it emphasizes the idea that they didn't consider the atomic bombs to be as decisive to the war as many now assume. They considered the USSR's declaration of war to be the most important factor in their decision to surrender, according to Hasegawa, with the atomic bombs being more of a side-show.
Since Emperor Hirohito was so fundamental to the surrender of Japan, and since the exact target of a Kyoto bomb drop would have been the palace (I'm assuming the emperor lived in Kyoto, I think I can assume that), it is likely that Hirohito would have been killed, thus meaning he was no longer there to voice opposition, and quite probably no surrender for a long time. In fact, I doubt the war could have ended with the Japanese accepting defeat, but eventually as a draw or a cease fire.
Actually it looks like the emperor's palace is in Tokyo, which was leveled after the fire raids. So I'm not sure where Hirohito was living.
There’s a really quick cut to Janes Suicide scene where you see a hand pushing her underwater! That was an interesting hint on what really happened to her
i think there was one with the hand and one without, as to say the truth is ambiguous.
Given that the scene was in color, and the scenes in color represented Oppenheimer's (subjective) perspective, I take it to mean he was stewing over whether she died at her own hand or someone else's.
The CIA killed her because Opie had sex with her. Talk about a guilt trip
@@cicihoustonsudholt1452or his own hand. In that his rejection of her caused her suicide.
@@jtothecc2421 oooh... good thought!
In the film Oppenheimer is credited with conceiving the idea of the chain reaction. He didn’t. Leo Szilard did that.
One thing we know - there was no British or Canadian input to Manhattan Project. Not one tiny fragment at all. 100% USofA only. I suspect the movie is precise on this point.
If they included all these other points, this would have been a messy movie. That is why screenwriting and story telling is important. We didn't need the full apple fallout. Its inclusion is enough to point out that Oppenheimer though brilliant had issues
Exactly, you can't include everything in a movie, that's why the books that the movies are based on are often better. Having just watched this, I'm more excited to see the movie.
Lol the film was three hours long!
The movie whitewashes some awful people who belonged in prison or on death row. Trying to poison someone with an apple, adultery, being an accessory to mass murder, driving drunk repeatedly, being god-awful parents...c'mon. Just more Hollywood filth covering for filth.
It already is messy! And making a "historic" film whilst having historical inaccuracies is downright bad writing imo. Like, nobody forced Nolan to make a movie about Oppenheimer, if you're gonna do it, do it accurately.
@@InTimeTravellermovies are entertainment before everything
I finally watched it in IMAX
That is one of the best casting I’ve never seen… wow wow wow
10:44 at first I thought that it was RDJ, but then I paused and saw Einstein, and realised that this is real Strauss. That’s that’s uncanny!!!
And couple of historical corrections. First, there’s a little evidence that the scientist at Los Alamos opposed using the bomb on Japan at the time. They were claims to have argued against it all seem to have appeared after the war was over, and the horrors of Hiroshima became widely known. It’s a lot like the officials that claim they were always against the Vietnam war when they were strongly supporting it up until the Tet Offensive. Secondly, once the purple and magic decrypts were declassified in the 1970s, it’s clear that Japan was not going to surrender even with an offer to keep the emperor. The supreme war council actually voted to continue the war even after Nagasaki and it was only the emperors personal intervention that turned things around. This is clear from the historical record it might’ve been debatable up until the 70s but the declassified records tell the story.
The use of Little Boy and Fat Man was instantly approved by the US government once Germany surrendered. Casualties in the Pacific theatre were appalling so an alternative to the scheduled invasion of Japan was chosen.
A Pandora's Box that could never be closed once opened...
"Mankind" = Oxymoron...
Madmen all over the World who weren't interested in...Restraint !
Yet the stupidity continues to this day, with morons arguing that the Japanese would have surrendered regardless. Which is complete bullshit.
The debate over their intentions is more complex than that because it was not just the US vs Japan. They had been using the USSR as a way to discuss terms/as a mediary, at least that was their aim, not completely aware of all of the plans that the USSR had for them, though very aware there was a chance they would invade at some point, which was probably why they did it. There are also many who believe that the main issue at first was a miscommunication because of a fucked up translation. After the first bomb, they would have surrendered if they could have kept their emperor. Not only that, the atomic bomb was more destructive for the rest of the world in the long run than for Japan at the time. Because of the construction of Japan, fire bombing was destroying it at an insane pace. They actually had to direct bombers to stay away from the two cities they chose for the bombs, or it wouldn't have seemed that destructive, as a bunch of the city would have been destroyed already. Right after the second bomb, Russia invaded, no longer being an option for negotiations for one, and two, they were known for their brutality. Between Russia, which Japan had feared for a very long time, the US that was ritualistically slaughtering civilians and burning the cities to the ground, and a new weapon that had new catastrophic medical effects that they hadn't seen from a weapon before, the emperor made the decision. But the generals could have shut him down. The emperor staying in power was the one thing that kept the US from accepting, because how else would they show off their bomb on a bunch of citizens before anyone else? And in the end the emperor stayed for a while anyway.
It was all stupid and a waste of human life. Children vaporized or killed slowly and painfully, then born with deformities, for nothing. Leading to a cold war of constant fear. Now tons of countries have nukes, and our tank piercing rounds and shit have radioactive material in them. People in places where we wage war have people suffering where we have murdered their families and left our military trash all over to poison them on top of it. Burn pits have also poisoned troops because of it if you don't particularly care about any "enemies."
Our fight with the nazis was over. The fight with the Japanese was close to done. But we are too eager to destroy ourselves.
That plus the Russians overrunning Japan's best remaining army in Manchuria in only one week.
5:03 In the film you can see a hand with black gloves push her head under the water in one shot with the next showing her drowning herself
Perhaps Nolan was hinting at the assassination conspiracy?
Minor note: narrator called the US War Dept. DoD. DoD was created from the War Dept after WW2.
Stimson did not visit Kyoto for his honeymoon. He visited Kyoto in 1926, 30 years into his marriage. This is a common misconception.
I agree it was for all reasonable purposes, historically correct as far as it went. There were some things left out but I thought the movie was very good. I have watched, and own, every documentary DVD available on the subject of Oppenheimer and the Manhattan project and the following detonations of nuclear weapons around the globe. I was very influenced as a child by my uncle who was a isotope chemist at ORNL. He paid my way thru college and I spent most of my work career with NASA and WSMR as a contract engineer. As a young teenager, I spent the summers with my uncle in Oak Ridge, TN starting in 1963 and I remember my uncle very much disagreeing with Oppenheimer's statement of the physicist's knowing sin from the creation of the bomb. My uncle was taken directly out of college from the University of Alabama with his degree in chemistry and whisked off to the then being built, town of Oak Ridge. People of that era, the WWII days, were very dedicated to their work. My uncle died in 1972 at the age of 52 from a life dedicated to chemistry at ORNL. Possibly too much exposure to too many dangerous environments. They always wore dosemeters as was also their security badge. I remember seeing all this as a somewhat romantic time in life where technology and very bright people came together to build fantastic instruments and to end a war. There will always be debate as to whether or not the bomb should have been used on Japan. One thing that can be said for sure, not one American life was lost in those final times whereas a land invasion of Japan was estimated to lose as many as a million American servicemen.
I know this is a long shot; but, did you happen to know Richard Nobles, at the Johnson Space Center?
@@johncollins7062 No, I did not know of Mr. Nobles. I started at MSFC in 1970 and left there in 1976 for WSMR. There is a NASA site at WSMR where I worked that reports to Houston but I don't remember hardly anyone nowadays. I left WSMR in 1996 for a contact with DHS.
Something that the movie makes no mention of, that I think might influence people's impression of how Harry Truman reacts to Oppenheimer's feeling he has blood on his hands, is that Truman was a war veteran, having gone to Europe to fight in World War I. I think it puts his referring to Oppenheimer as a "cry baby" (which I understand he did in real life, calling him a "cry baby scientist" at one point) in perspective, since Oppenheimer had never so much as fired a shot in anger in his life while Truman had not just given the order to drop the bomb, but at one point personally commanded an artillery battery in action against German troops. Whatever you thought of Oppenheimer himself, it would make sense that Truman might think of that as a bad joke.
Excellent points. But Christopher Nolan clearly felt that there were political machinations behind the dropping of the atomic bombs (as do I). He presents Truman's reaction as a moment of ego, and in the movie it plays into Oppenheimer's increasing sense of dread about scientists having given the military and politicians enough rope to destroy us all.
It's probably not a truly fair picture to Harry, but who knows? Truman didn't have Roosevelt's relationship with Stalin and the creation and dropping of the atomic bombs waa major muscle to flex on the international stage.
The bottom line is that all main-stream movies are, in the last analysis exactly that: movies.
The ultimate, only criterion for success is whether they tell a good story.
Think of any other (supposed) “historical” movie: to take some obvious examples “Amadeus”; “Belle of Amherst”; “Inherit the Wind”. Each might have been good - even great- movies but
1) any historical accuracy inevitably and necessarily 11:44 takes second place to its needs as a piece of entertainment;
and
2) the vast majority of their viewers inevitably come away apparently truly believing that they now understand “the facts” supposedly depicted
More seriously, because most of these viewer think they already understand the issues, they are all the more likely not to follow up by trying to learn what really happened. In short, not only is the real history obscured, but it _replaced_ by the story told in movie,
" More seriously, because most of these viewer think they already understand the issues, they are all the more likely not to follow up by trying to learn what really happened. In short, not only is the real history obscured, but it replaced by the story told in movie, "
Excellent point .
I need to point out one thing. I adore "Amadeus"; it's a remarkable movie. But it's not at all very historically accurate. Especially compared to "Oppenheimer," which is far more so.
@@cherylhulting1301 : We’ll, yes and no.
The point here, of course, is that while both films may be quite entertaining, _neither_ of them is particularly historically accurate. And, unfortunately, many (most?) viewers nonetheless come away from them apparently believing that they’ve actually learned some “history”.
The movie goes so far to be accurate but I can’t figure out why they changed the final bomb assembly. Instead of the chain-hoist used to put the hundred-pound arming cylinder in, they show a couple of guys doing it by hand, which would be impossible as shown. Same problem with the assembling of the explosive blocks, which were almost as heavy as concrete but shown moved around by hand.
Easy. For dramatic effect. Doing it with machines removes a degree of trepidation that exists when human hands are much closer to it.
He even changed why they chose Nagasaki. Not a big deal. Those are minor details.
I agree it wouldn’t matter much if they were just changing how stuff was moved around - but they’re also changing the physical properties of the materials used, changing the weight of uranium and explosives to a fraction of what they are. They could have still had two men realistically lower the hundred pound plug by having them stand directly above and using all four arms.
I think the explosive blocks were white in color and they showed them to look like charcoal.
@@Real28 Using a machine could have turned it into a bigger deal. Its a huge metal device that spreads death, unmovable by hand. A heavy burden etc. A crane would have worked out fine. The sound of the winch taking its time could have been used for dramatic effect as well.
One thing to point out that was incorrect. In the film the countdown clock for the Trinity test was shown using Nixie tubes. While cool looking, Nixie tubes weren't invented until the mid 1950's.
It’s pronounced “stross”, not the typical Germanic “Strauss.” That’s why they had the character explain within the film how to pronounce the name.
No, the fact that Oppenheimer makes the comment about his name very clearly shows that they had him explain the pronunciation because of him rejecting his being jewish.
@@gertjan3329Yes. RDJ also said that in his read, Strauss was the kind of man who would want everyone to know the correct pronunciation of his name or to remember to call him "Admiral Strauss."
I saw this yesterday, Aug 6th, on the 78 anniversary of the actual event.
It was a long 3 hours and a very complicated move.
These 12 min really helps me to comprehend what I saw.
Only I don't know if I should have watched it before the movie, or after?
But thanks,, you just let me get to sleep tonight.
Absolutely love TH-cam, lots of channels and people devoted to taking the fun or enjoyment out of anything.
Not everyone watched this movie just for fun and enjoyment. If that was your reason, ok then.
huh?? wtf are you on
Nagasaki wasn’t the intended primary target for the second atomic bomb - that was Kokura.
The third bomb would have been dropped on Kokura on either August 18th or 19th with the fourth and fifth in September. Twelve more would have been dropped on Kyushu and the Kanto plain around Tokyo in November 1945 and April 1946…
The 3rd bomb was a bluff. We had no more plutonium for several years and just claimed to have more bombs ready. The Japanese were tricked in this sense but then getting nuked
prob. has that effect of panic
I really enjoyed the movie as a whole, although I think they did not do the famous “I have become death” line justice. I think first bringing up the line while he is having sex diminished its power. I think they did it to show that he read it in its original Sanskrit, but they could have just had them put the book down after he said he was learning to read Sanskrit. Then after the trinity test I think they should have used the full quote. “A few people laughed; a few people cried. Most people were silent. I remembered the line from the Hindu scripture, the Bhagavad Gita; Vishnu is trying to persuade the prince that he should do his duty, and to impress him, takes on his multiarmed form and says, ‘Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.’ I suppose we all thought that, one way or another.”
I see what you mean, i think it could also have hit harder. But i think most of us knew that line prior to even watching the movie so thats why it seems off to have it mentioned in the beginning. But for Oppie, this phrase didnt mean as much to him at that time and Nolan wanted to show him knowing this phrase prior to the end of the film (would have been weird if he just said it out of nowhere). For the argument that this could have been something he said in a different scene, i see your point; however, the sex scene has a lot more meaning than most people are giving. This line also eludes to his troubling relationship with Tatlock and her unfortunate "demise". I think overall it was done well.
I think they did it that way for "sexposition" - the practice in GOT (game of thrones) to reveal major plot points during sex scenes.
Regarding Jean’s death…anyone else catch the one shot of a black gloved hand on her head in the movie?
Yeah. I think it indicates that Oppie doubted it could be a mere suicide.
@@introverse7167 Looking deeper into it I found out her apparent suicide has always been suspicious. Even in the movie, he was followed to the hotel and she didn't sign the note.
Boy, Am i glad kyoto was saved... Beautiful Place...
Hiroshima is also beautiful. Ironically, it was chosen because it had not been bombed, thus, the US could easily tell how effective the atom bomb was by what was damaged.
For me, there are two main ideas and concepts in this movie:
It revolves around a man who created the atomic bomb. We get to witness his experiences, the process of its creation, and the various influences on him, such as his wife and more.
The movie also delves into the broader societal perspective, where the entire world seems to blame this great scientist (we can view the world as a representation of Strauss himself). In the beginning, Strauss explicitly stated that he was not a scientist, and the film reflects on how the world, unable to create something similar, blames the genius who could potentially make a wrong decision but is unjustly judged.
The brilliance of the last scene lies in the fact that it serves as a pivotal moment for both concepts. Strauss becomes completely obsessed with Robert, while Robert himself realizes the full implications of what he has created.
This is why I believe it is a great movie
Great interpretation! I would also add that this aligns with the whole Prometheus metaphor woven into the fabric of the story
No single man created the atomic bomb. These pop movies just simply make the audience dumber by making a caricature of events as important as the creation of the bomb.
Theres like 3 plot points all going on at the same time. Film is a mess.
@@eveneliasedvardsen7271 totally agree
I saw the movie, and there is an uncanny resemblance between Cillian Murphy and Robert Oppenheimer!
He's creepy. Sam Waterston nailed it 43 years ago.
I wanted more science! Oppenheimer was a manager more than anything. Others had the breakthroughs and I wanted that as well. I would have loved a big screen representation of how the atoms and electrons were interacting.
A plot that covers very important historical facts and at the same time manages to deal with individual dramas; all this combined with a cast of high-level artists; a creative film direction, a director who is an expert at using different time perspectives when telling a story (like in Dunkirk); visual and sound effects that mobilize the viewer. Director Cristopher Nolan achieved everything that cinematographic art allows in what in my opinion is a masterpiece of contemporary cinema: Oppenheimer.
except for the incorrect portrayal of Germans again
@@Maimai-ef6fe In which aspects?
Appreciate this video, it helps to calibrate the movie's historical accuracy. One thing the movie depicts but doesn't focus upon is the intellectual grunt work involved with getting the explosive lenses needed for that implosion design to work correctly.
(Oppenheimer's Gamble - The Plutonium Crisis) is the title of a recent video which delves into the work needed to make this happen. It gave me a bit more of a sense of what the scientists would have been working on in a day to day sense of things. Lots of repeated calculations needed to achieve a smooth spherical implosion shockwave.
Yeah, the explosive lenses were crucial and I'm surprised they weren't in the movie.
The development work on the explosive lenses does get quite a bit of screen time in the 1980 BBC television drama series: Oppenheimer.
That's a great video, and after watching it I do have a greater appreciation for the difficulties in ensuring that the explosives would all detonate together, creating the necessary energy for the activation of the implosion device. It helps us to really appreciate all the tense scenes at the Trinity test about whether the implosion would work.
I love the subtle hint at a possible murder, not suicide when Oppenheimer tells Kitty about his lovers death. you see her drowning herself, and the camera goes back and forth between him and her, and eventually you see a glimpse of a gloved hand on the back of her head.
I feel like a big point people miss is the fact that Oppenheimer felt guilty because he thought he might have gotten her killed. He tells Kitty they found a drug that the CIA used in assassinations in Gene's blood, which means he was at least aware of the possibility that him going to see her during the manhattan project made her a target for assasination. Obviously the truth is lost to history, and I don't know if the real Oppenheimer was aware of this possibility, but it recontextualizes that whole scene in the movie where he's crying to Kitty about it.
How does it compare to the movie 'Shadow Makers' - made in 1989 I believe. That covers the same subject matter, and received very positive reviews.
BTW - The title left to the shadows left behind by incinerated humans on walls and pavements when they interrupted the thermal radiation emerging from the bomb.
If Japan was thinking of surrendering they would have surrendered the first time the super weapon of a kind no one has ever seen before was dropped..... instead Japanese military command risked waiting for the third one to be dropped before surrendering. If they lost the same number of military personal in a standard war they would have kept on fighting that is how close to surrendering they were, they were still hoping the west couldn't stomach the loss's while invading Japan so they thought they had some bargining power while they resisited surrendering.
Their Emperor literally had to beg the military to surrender.
The small flags waved in the auditorium after Japan’s surrender had 50 stars. Gawd that bothered me as larger flags were the accurate 48 star flags. Lazy prop master.
There's a really good biography of of Oppenheimer that is on PBS. that is about as good as I've seen it really tells all the facts about Oppenheimer. and has amazing footage to back it up.
One thing they got wrong - in the scene where people are waving small flags - the flags have 50 stars, whereas the US flag had 48 stars at the time.
The Trinity countdown nine - eight - seven ...etc. was shown on a Nixie tube display. Wikipedia says Nixie tubes weren't available until 1955 from the Burroughs corporation.
There was no Ladder present at the Christmas party. Apparently they couldnt afford a ladder in the 150 million budget
Also, they said that the 1939 paper on "black holes" was published. That term wasn't used until at least 10 years later.
The color scenes were said by Nolan to be subjective where black and white was objective, so Oppenheimer's memory of the flags was from the point of view of his statement before the board inquiry regarding his security clearance, so he would have just injected 50 star flags into the memory.
Oppenheimer's brother was present at the Trinity test and stated in his book the only thing he said out loud after the detonation was "I guess it worked".
Could we clarify that? In the movie Frank makes that statement. But waa it actually Oppie who said it?
8:54 Correction " Concerning the atomic bomb , the US had 3 committees 1) Truman's Intern Committee , 2) the target Committee and 3 ) the Scientific Committee . Oppenheimer was on the Scientific Committee . The official recommendation of the Scientific Committee was submitted on June 16th , 1945 . " we can propose no technical demonstration likely to bring an end to the war; we see no acceptable alternative to direct military use. "
His father didn't flee Germany. He left to follow the American Dream as his relatives had done.
Bruuuuuh, I thought Lawrence looked so familiar but for the life of me I couldn't place the actor while watching the movie. Josh Hartnett, wow.. well, makes sense, last movie I saw him in was probably Black Hawk Down, decades ago at this point. o.O
Holy cow, didn't realize Kitty was so bad-ass AND bat-shit crazy!
This piece (and the movie) really missed things about Kitty. She wasn't a housewife when she met Oppenheimer, though it was true that she was married. She was a graduate student studying biology and she later earned her degree in botany. (Oppie apparently had a habit of getting involved with female graduate students). Kitty reportedly used the latter skills in working with Oppie to study the effects of radiation on plant life in the area of NM after the Trinity test.
There is one subtle but major inaccuracy at the ending of the film: Ernest Lawrence shouldn't have been at Oppenheimer's award ceremony in 1963- he died 5 years prior to that.
Thanks for pointing that out. Looks like Mr. Nolan kept him alive to be part of Oppie's past, welcoming him back into the "fold."
Before this gets buried, everyone who liked Oppenheimer should go and see "Fat Man and Little Boy" from '89.
Saw that movie ,great film ,Paul Newman
Yes, Truly. That Film was extremely Well Done. The cast was amazing. Paul Newman as Groves nailed it. The Physics and the process of developing a workable implosion mechanism was very well portrayed.
A truly great film.
Another, was a joint Canadian/ Japanese production called Hiroshima.
A very interesting film that gets into the political debate about the bomb, it’s use and development.
Very well presented from the Japanese side as well. Great Japanese cast.
Truman, was very well portrayed, I think by Kenneth Arnold. (?) Canadian Actor.
Great great performance.
Also touches on Jimmy Byrnes Sec of State and Defacto Vice President.
Really a great find on DVD.
See both Those other Films on DVD. They are great.
You state in the audio comment that Oppenheimer's father "fled" from Germany to the USA in 1888. What did he flee from? In the Kaiserreich founded in 1871 there was neither more nor less antisemitism than was in the USA. On the contrary, in the newly formed German national state there were enormous business opportunities also for Jewish people. Jewish people from Eastern Europe actually immigrated into Germany because of this. Oppenheimer himself regularly visited his father's relatives in Germany before 1933, and also studied in Germany himself. His relatives were maybe not as rich as his father, but also not doing badly.
Please look more closely at the facts and avoid propaganda and stereotyping. Thank you!
Famous Jewish business families doing very well under the Kaiser include HAPAG CEO Albert Ballin, the Rathenau family who formed AEG, a major competitor of US Companies such as General Electric, and e.g. the Warburg family, bankers from Hamburg. Gerson Bleichröder was one of the most important financial supporters of Bismarck and his projects abroad!
The guy kept singing the hoopy hoopy bing bang doobie doo song at 7am every day! Now thats atomic thrust flange at best,,strange man!😮
The film is very explicit that Oppenheimer never joined the communist party. He was drawn to communist ideas but stopped short of joining the party.
He says as much when he first meets Chevalier and Jean Tatlock. I don’t know how you could watch the film and conclude that Oppenheimer was definitely a communist.
I’ll just mentioned, that if anyone is interested in seeing an actually pretty good (albeit fictionalized) piece about these issues, they should try to find the PBS multi-part series “Oppenheimer” (starring Sam Waterson) originally broadcast in, iirc, the ‘80s.
I agree completely.
The Waterston series was great!
BBC not PBS . It's on TH-cam.
@@Eldooodarino But I think the broadcast in the '80s in the US was on PBS. BBC didn't have a channel here then.
@@dougball328 said "But I think the broadcast in the '80s in the US was on PBS. BBC didn't have a channel here then." I'm sure you're right. I watched it sometime in the mid-late 80s and I'm sure I watched in on PBS for the reason you said.
Whether Japan would have surrendered was not quite as clear-cut as this commentary makes it out to be. In fact, when a certain faction of the Japanese Military got wind of efforts to negotiate peace with the US, a group of hardliners tried to kidnap the Emperor to prevent him from agreeing to it, though the plot was discovered and they were arrested. Meanwhile, Japan had 4 million troops stationed in the Japanese homeland itself prepared to fight to the death as they had proved they did in previous major battles that killed thousands of Americans such as the Marshall Island campaigns and Okinawa. The Japanese rulers were also training tens of thousands of civilians in warfare skills so the US would even have to face intense guerilla war upon invading Japan.
Also, I wish the video, as well as the film Oppenheimer, would have mentioned that the US did not simply drop the bombs without warning, which is the impression the film gives as well as related commentary such as this video. In fact, the US gave the Japanese High Command a clear warning the US now had a super weapon that could destroy cities with a single bomb, but they ignored the warnings and continued to wage war. The US also dropped tens of thousands of leaflets onto the ten target cities warning the civilians the US was prepared to drop a super weapon on them which would kill them all, and urged all civilians to leave those cities. These warnings were also ignored.
Some bad history here. The worst at 9:30. Japanese surrender wasn't considered on just preserving the Emperor. Japan wanted to preserve their military establishment as well including their complete control of the government.
When the lights approaching the tower for the Trinity test are turned on they make a booming sound. In reality lights don't make a booming sound until Close Encounters of a Third Kind in the 80's.
No, Japan was not likely to surrender in the summer or fall of 1945 (or later). The Japanese military were committed to a defense of slaughtering the American landing troops on the beaches, even if it meant millions of Japanese deaths. No, stating that the emperor system would not be disturbed would not have been sufficient to get a surrender. Debate among the 'Big Six' (the Japanese inner cabinet) hinged on the military's insistence on three additional conditions, none of which would have been acceptable to the Allies.
after iwo and okinawa, the us military were convinced that the japanese were prepared to fight to the last man, woman child
Growing up, he was "indifferent" about money. Much easier to do if you have it.
Not an accurate model of the high explosive internal components of the bomb. It was two layers, not one, and the 32 explosive lenses, the crucial, brilliant innovation, were not shown at all.
Actually three layers - the middle layer was the actual “lens” material of lower velocity explosive.
@@allangibson8494 the lenses were at the locations of the detonators, around the periphery of the sphere. They were in direct contact with the Duralumin shell, and reshaped the blast wave into an implosion just as it began to form. The team at Los Alamos regarded the lenses as part of the outer layer of explosives.
@@honorguardsfencingclub7322 The lenses weren’t. They were about halfway through the explosive stack to shape the shock front, slowing it at the middle and less at the wedge edge where they thinned to nothing. The blast wave needed room to form first. The shape of the lens is the single hardest part of the design of an implosion weapon.
@@allangibson8494 you are misinformed as to the placement of the lenses. The implosion wave needed to be shaped immediately upon ignition, not halfway through the process. Read "The Making of the Atomic Bomb" by Richard Rhodes.
@@honorguardsfencingclub7322 You need a fast explosive followed by a slow explosive lens - the third stage is possibly optional but probably necessary to achieve the required compression. Any discontinuity and it fails…
This video should be “things left out of the screenplay adaptation of the book.” Wouldn’t really say that the movie is wrong, just made into a movie
It's movie. not a documentary. It's a movie, basic rule with movies: they are meant to entertain.
He doesn’t whisper the destroyer line during the scene, they use the audio from the earlier scene… which was an amazing scene that I hope was true 👽👽👽
Shit was perfectly executed
Well, it's not true. He actually said.. "it worked"
In an interview he gave later, he says that the destroyer line, as well as another line from Hindu scripture, was running through his mind as he witnessed the test (although you’re right that the actual words he said out loud were “It worked, I guess”
Shut up
great historical context and details; thanks
Oppenheimer was in an impossible situation.
Germany's antisemitism cursed their own chase for the atomic bomb. No irony there.
The actor cast for Edward Teller looks exactly alike! They really nailed that
I've listened to interviews with Edwatd Teller and his accent is pretty on point too.
Don't eat anything in a chemistry lab. Just don't.
Strauss was actually pronounced by the gentleman himself as “STRAWZ.” No one recalls thus now.
We the public have been lied to that many times that the truth is no longer relevant to most!!
I was disappointed that this movie dealt more with the political/legal issues surrounding Oppenheimer. than it did the bomb and WW2. The movie was more of a biography about Oppenheimer, much different than the trailer depicted.
It's a biopic, not a movie solely about the Manhattan Project. Movies and documentaries have already been produced about the Project. With respect, it was called "Oppenheimer" for a reason.
Oppenheimer and Einstein not only “knew each other”, but likely interacted on a daily basis during the last 8 years of Einstein’s life since Oppenheimer became the director of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton after WWII, where Einstein was a resident scholar.
There are some questionable representations in this video's questioning of the accuracy of the film. It's pronounced Straws, not Strauss, which is clear enough if you see the film.
They should have spent more time vetting Klaus Fuchs instead of Oppenheimer.
So true. But Strauss wanted Oppie discredited so that he could no longer exert meaningful influence on US security policy.
"Spotted a wormhole"
Hmm, is that Nolan doing a cheeky easter egg to Interstellar? He referred to Oppenheimer in Tennet as well.
After reading and watching a lot, until now I found the critiques far more flawed or confused than the film.....which is a masterpiece anyway
Marvin Minsky, the “father of AI” told a story from when he was very young, perhaps even an undergrad still, in which Oppenheimer invited him to lunch with a few friends. Ended up sitting at a table with Oppenheimer, Einstein, and Gödel. It’s wild that these guys took such an interest in the next generation - true lovers of science who wanted to pass the torch to good hands.
So everything wrong seems to be that Looper wants a 3 hour movie to be even longer, so that more of the backstory to each and every character can be shown...
Where does it say that?
This is not a criticism of the movie, but additional information so that audiences can differentiate between artistic depiction and historic fact.
If Looper doesn't whine about something, they have nothing to make a video and get clicks about.
Leslie groves was my grandfather's uncle on my dad's side... Pretty wild seeing Matt Damon play him
@0:38 "fled" to New York. Fled from who?
Japan wouldn’t surrender. They would fight well past defeat. There was even an plot to kidnapping, overthrow the emperor to keep the war going. It was thought that millions would have to die on both sides to win the war. The bomb had to be dropped. Plus, the firebombing of Tokyo killed more than the bombs on either city did. It was a demonstration of the technological advance that was meant to demoralized them. It almost didn’t work. Why? They didn’t surrender after Hiroshima. And it was only a week after Nagasaki, that they finally surrendered.
But in between the bombings in Hiroshima and Nagasaki the Soviets entered the Pacific War. They subsequently did major damage to Japanese troops in Manchuria. The Russian entry to the war was something the Japanese greatly feared. And with several good reasons.
Moreover, the US's heavy conventional bombing was leaving thousands of Japanese homeless, and fall and winter would be coming. The naval blockade was also squeezing Japan effectively and robbing the country of necessary resources. With the added pressure of the Soviets Japan might end up fighting a two-front war.
It's fair and necessary to ask whether, with these conditions, the bombs needed to be used at all.
I'm pretty sure they didn't have sex in that hearing room in front of everyone lol
Glad they coined it Barbenheimer and not Oppenbarber
Japan was not ready to surrender prior to Hiroshima. They had trained millions of civilians in the use of deadly force to oppose the American invasion. They had thousands of remaining combat aircraft, and I believe over 2,000 of them were made into kamikaze craft, to be used against the American fleets. Even after the second bombing, of Nagasaki, the War Council was deadlocked on the question of surrender.
History is written by the victors.
I wonder if it would have been different if america just said “you can take your chances with surrendering to us or the bolsheviks, remember they massacred their own royal family, what would they do to you?”
@@TFQ1fact: Japan did not surrender before the bombs were dropped. Despite the horrific fire bombing of Tokyo. So…what’s yer point?
@@CorePathway Nazi Germany is done, Russia and US is on Japan and you think they are not willing to surrender? How is it possible to drop a bomb on a country who is willing to surrender? Soo yes the narrative is Japan was not willing to surrender no matter what.
Even after the bombs were dropped, there was a significant chance that the Allies would have had to invade the Home Islands. There was an attempted coup (the "Kyujo incident") by army hard-liners to arrest the Emperor and force him to abandon issuing his unprecedented surrender the following day. Had they succeeded, probably millions more lives would have been lost.
The setting for Los Alamos and Oppenheimer's ranch wasn't in the correct climate zone. There are at least 6 zones in New Mexico. Los Alamos is in the transition zone characterized by mixed conifer woodland, principally ponderosa pine, situated on a plateau, and not in a depression between mesas.
Good information to have. But we know the Los Alamos film location was really chosen more for the vast sense of "nothingness" it would convey. Moreover, Los Alamos is quite built up today and the crew picked a new location that would be easier to manipulate while providing excellent cinematographic possibilities.
Speaking of woods, the crew actually did use the Oppenheimers' house in Los Alamos for the shoot. Tree brush and bushes were placed around it to obscure the more modern buildings and cars surrounding it.
It’s rare that I’ve seen more than one of the movies up for Oscar best picture before the award is announced. This year I’ve seen Maestro & Oppenheimer (I assume both are nominated).
Oppenheimer is a thinker, with intricate exposition and fleshing out a plethora of characters. It’s an epic biopic, thus a shoe-in for best picture. Nolan brings it home, with his usual blaring music score, to a poignant awareness end. The final Earth burning image is the startling horror we live with every day - - especially considering the number of nations and rebels firing missiles at each other this week. The best we can do is put the terror out of our minds for a spell in order to achieve happiness in this life .. but it’s always there.
I’m hesitant to write this, but considering how many annual inside jokes are routinely made about the number of Jews in attendance at Oscar ceremonies, I wonder what personages will say this year. I suppose as little was said about USA slaughter of Iraqis at such award shows at the time, Palestinians dying wholesale won’t get much mention. Someone may invoke the lame “peace in the Middle East” - - as though we’ve had it at home - - or the CIA hasn’t been orchestrating death of innocent human beings all over the planet since its inception.
The deadly Hamas attack was horrrible, but I don’t see how killing over tenfold innocents in response, and destroying the already debilitated infrastructure and homes of millions does any good. It’s madness. The movie Oppenheimer mentions Jews and communists a lot. It’s intriguing that fervent anti-communists then and now seem oblivious to what progress domestic communists provided the USA considering labor rights, and their part in finishing WWII. The actions of such leftists weren’t directed by Soviet or Russian mentality, but by human compassion and the knowledge that working together - united - we prevail. By the same token, folks have to be mindful differentiating the actions of Israel from Jews in the USA. Heartfelt opinions about the destruction of Gaza are divided in both demographics.
What’s assured is any scientist or politician who expressed hope nuclear bombs would deter war was way off the mark. We’re on the world brink now more than ever. What’s most agonizingly evident is no matter how brazen immoral financial, political, and war corporation corruption is apparent in the USA, in domestic and foreign battlefields, we are powerless to stop it. The scales are tilted too far in favor of those who are insane with avarice and power. Who could ever defeat those who bank the trillions of dollars that disappear with regularity from the Pentagon budget. History shows those with the most destructive weapons use them. We muddle thru, and concern ourselves with entertainment. 
I don’t see how Cillian Murphy deserves best actor when there’s at least one actor in the same film giving a better performance. Robert Downey Jr evoked more depth of character in every scene he was in. Murphy, who was stellar in Peaky Blinders, played shades of the same stoic notes over and over, and Oppenheimer, though the genius in charge of Trinity, often appears as a character the movie is happening around. Bradley Cooper should win the Oscar for best actor. The scenes between him and Carey Mulligan are riveting. No two actors could bring their pivotal Thanksgiving argument to life better. Thru the film, they bring the nuances of their characters’ love, and their struggle within it, to the fore. His conducting scene is a triumph. What Cooper did, embodying a person so fully, is above the acting Jamie Foxx and Rami Malek delivered in their Oscar winning performances. It’s a shame if he doesn’t get the trophy.
I guess I’m watching Barbie next.
Now people get their history from fictionalized movies rather than reading complex historical accounts or watching nuanced documentaries.
Actually "Oppenheimer" has a fairly high rate of historical accuracy. And it has seemed to inspire people to read more historical accounts of the period. I know I am, as I enjoy history in general.
do you? Why assume that people just ignorantly watch lol
Long movie short: Jean Tatlock really gets inside Kitty Oppenheimer's head; Oppie Oppenheimer really, really gets inside Strauss's head. Everything they made the big screen for. And the explosion of the nuclear bomb... can't forget about that.
I saw the movie yesterday & didn't like it. I was expecting more of science & his life than never ending courtroom dramas. New movie needs to be made from scratch. Only saving grace was Matt Damon with exceptional acting.
It's not a good movie at all. The timeline switches are the only one that try to hide how boring it really is. And for someone, who didn't read just one biograhy, the factual twists raised the hair on my neck. This could have been made MUCH MUCH better. I mean with a better screenplay.
Didn't the title give you a hint?
so....the drama gets lots of things wrong, glosses over details and adds drama to characters.. thats why i dislike drama doing history.
Actually, no. It gets few things wrong, has to condense some material for time or budget constraints, and if one understands the stakes involved, it's actually pretty riveting.
Why do these videos keep saying the Apple incident was fact? Everything I’ve seen on the internet indicates it was an embellishment
Oppenheimer is the Nolanverse's Riddler
Scarecrow
Riddle me this @wjbt3, why u got no bitches?
When Jean Tatlock is killed in the film, It shows flashes of a hand holding her head under the water. Then, it shows her doing it herself. I'm pritty sure during the scene, Oppenheimer feels responsible for her death, not just for not being there for her, but because the government scrutiny brought into his life through the project might have lead to a volatile, "commy" leak like Tatlock to be killed. The film does this quite a bit, giving multiple accounts of what happened. A lot is left up to what you think happened and knowing the American government, they killed her.
Julius Oppenheimer did not have to flee Germany. In the 1880s Germany was one of the most progressive countries and most accepting of Jews. Julius and his family immigrated, as millions of people were doing at the time.
I saw that too. Jews comprised 0.5% of the German population in 1934. Today, they're 2% of the USA, four times the percent. Their presence in Germany was never a problem.
During the hearings about the revocation of Oppenheimer's security clearance Edward Teller made it clear that it was Oppenheimer's lack of judgment that he was questioning. He opposed the development of the H-bomb because he naively believed that if the USA decided not to build it, the USSR wouldn't either. This view was contradicted by Andrei Sakharov, the father of the Soviet H-bomb. In his memoirs he wrote that Stalin and the later Soviet leaders were determined to build an H-bomb no matter what Truman did. Imagine what a hellishly precarious position the Western world would've found itself in if Oppenheimer's advice had been followed and we'd had no deterrent.
That doesn’t mean that the outcome would’ve been nuclear warfare. Every country has nukes now so I personally believe the outcome would’ve been the same.
Oppenheimer never takes off his hat ehen he is indoors. That was not acceptable back then…
Now, was Paul Newman better as Leslie Grove or was Matt Damon?
The modern penchant for euphemisms has the Great Depression referred to as a recession here.
7:29 - He didn't "quote" he *misquoted* . It is not "Death destroyer of worlds.." - what kind of a botched translation is that ?? Guys please do your homework when you are reporting something factual.
Sorry, the Japan was going to surrender meme is nonsense. It comes from mistaking current Japanese culture, influenced by Shinto and the American occupation, for what existed during the war. The WWII Japanese were held in thrall by rabid death culture form of Bushido, metastasized from Samuri code. They had no intention of surrendering. They ran the war like there was no chance they could lose, ignoring international norms. Fortunately, enough of them maintained loyalty to the Emperor to end the war, though it was touch and go. Most of the Army high command died, by their hands or by execution.
If a chicken coop is on fire it makes no difference if the chickens don't want to come out. Japan was effectively ablaze and wiped out industrially already. The talk about sparing U.S. lives by making an invasion unnecessary is utterly false. From the excellent book Lawrence and Oppenheimer, by Nuel Pharr Davis, we read, "At that time nothing was going in or out of Japan. Their navy and merchant marine were all but wiped out. American cruisers and battleships were already bombarding coastal industrial facilities with impunity. The Japanese were desperately trying to distill fuel from pine trees, and reduced to eating bees. In other words, they were already utterly defeated, and no invasion was necessary whatsoever. The bombings were to prove what damage would truly result and to frighten the Russians, who had already, unbeknownst, been handed the Los Alamos secrets not just by Fuchs and the Rosenthals, but even more importantly by the teenaged (!) physicist Ted Hall who had been allowed to travel to NYC and was then ineptly tailed. In fact Stalin learned about the bomb long before Truman who never even knew what was going on until April 1945.
@@scriptsmith4081 Okinawa was in the same state when we invaded. I studied this thoroughly in the ‘60s before the revisionists started taking sway.
@scriptsmith4081 well, they had enough navy to sink the Indianapolis in the last days of the war. Around a 1000 sailors died in that incident alone.
@@budlanctot3060 That's true enough (and the ultimate irony), but realistically, a lone-wolf event, and doubtful if the sub could ever have even been re-supplied. My father in law was on the heavy cruiser, U.S. Quincy, just one of several that were bombarding the hell out of coastal Japan, with no opposition whatsoever at the time, before the A-bombing. There was no need to invade whatsoever. They were finished.
" Sorry, the Japan was going to surrender meme is nonsense. " Yes this revisionist nonsense has its origins when Diplomat Sato was sent to Moscow to see if the Soviets were willing to negotiate terms . As the US was intercepting Japanese Communications , revisionists claim the US knew Japan was willing to surrender . But the " Big Six " never offered any terms . Sato told Togo one of the "Big Six " the best they could hope for is surrender , except to keep the Emperor . But This was rejected by Togo of the " Big Six. "
The first date the Big Six offered to negotiate terms was on August 10th 1945 , when they responded to the Potsdam Declaration .
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Oppenheimer's hearing reminded me of Leiland Olds' hearing which was very well covered in Master of the Senate by Robert Caro.
one massive wrong thing that happened in the movie..
When Oppenheimer is in Leiden (The Netherlands) they speak German in the lecture even do Dutch People don't speak native German but Dutch. So that's a wrong fact. Funny to hear how the audience reacted to that scene haha
German was the language of physics.
@@scottbrower9052 yes correct, but if you have seen the movie they say: how did you learn Dutch so well?
Implicit that they have spoken Dutch even do its is clearly German.
@@freedomholland1455 I haven't seen the film. Sounds like an error, then.
I have seen the german version of the movie and Oppenheimer speaks dutch in that scene.
My native language is Dutch and i did not understand any of it lol (sounded more like German), maybe i would ve been able to decipher it if i had listened more closely ?
'It was a typical Hollywood movie, great photography, quick scenes, sex etc. What it did lack was a leading figure that was interesting, Oppenheimer was without emotion a sort of empty can through most of the movie even his wife got tired of his act. The so called give and take between him and the Army Lt. Colonel wasn't much, the only memorial dialogue is with Truman and the interesting idea that Truman didn't believe that Russia could generate a Bomb. The underlying plot of forces out to discreet him came late and by that time his character and place in history seemed less secure anyway. The movie keep depending on other characters to make the movie interesting but it was to little to late.
Topic of the video: Everything Oppenheimer Gets Right And Wrong About The True Story
First thing it does: Butchers the pronunciation of the name Strauss--- something that is mentioned in the movie.
wow. This was the era of top secret papers to die for. All the real life 007 spy rings. Now, the classified documents are stuck in a bathroom. 😎 Great movie.
Noticed that every man with a tie is wearing the same style of shirt. A bright white pressed “spear point” collared shirt. Is this going to be the next big thing for today’s man?
The movie was good up to when the bomb went off. They could had made it 2 hours long instead of 3 hours. There was so much talking back and forth that I felt like leaving. I actually saw some getting up and leaving. No offense but not Nolans best.
Agreed. It was just too much arguing between who is communists and who is not. Too much flash backs, cut backs, fast dialogue and too many characters. And every character looked a like and I couldn't remember who is who.