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To: Rockingham

I have not read enough on Oppenheimer to be confident of an opinion. The movie is said to be a reasonably accurate adaptation of the source material, American Prometheus, which I have not read. The movie does show Oppenheimer being approached, more than once, but suggests that he deflected the approaches — while maintaining his ties to the people who had approached him and lying about the particulars later to the FBI.

At the very least, he was monumentally indifferent to security concerns, partly due to personal arrogance and partly because he was a man of the left, comfortable swimming in a red sea. To Oppenheimer, Hitler’s anti-semitism put Germany clearly in the enemy camp. I don’t know that he ever saw Stalin, the USSR, and communism as enemies — which was the default fellow traveler position. The anti-communist liberals of that era were honorable people who despised both Hitler and Stalin. But the “no enemies to the left” types tended to turn a blind eye to communism, and they provided useful cover for the spies and agents of influence.


102 posted on 03/11/2024 11:34:43 AM PDT by sphinx
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To: sphinx
For Soviet intelligence agencies, Oppenheimer was an attractive and logical target. Even if recruited by one agency, others might make a competing pitch to him as well, or he might be tested as to his fidelity and truthfulness by making a duplicate pitch.

Oppenheimer's lack of candor with the FBI and Army counter intelligence is deeply troubling and an indication of conflicted and unreliable loyalty. I believe that his security clearance was revoked for good cause.

103 posted on 03/11/2024 3:52:23 PM PDT by Rockingham (`)
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