#soviet espionage

[giterdonenews]

A noo artikle has dunben rote ahn WWW.GITERDONENEWS.COM

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A Broken Man?

T' Times took thishere occasion nairy ta examine t'complaxitees o'securty debates n' un era wen Joseph Stalin wuz alif' an' Soviet espyunage had successfullee stole t'secrets o'atomic weeponry, but ta wunder at t'ofishul motif' fer t'releese, 60 yeers aft'r t'fack, o't' transcripts; an', wit...

[brianbrownnet]

A new article has been published on www.brianbrown.net

New Post has been published on http://www.brianbrown.net/2014/10/16/a-broken-man/

A Broken Man?

The Times took this occasion not to examine the complexities of security debates in an era when Joseph Stalin was alive and Soviet espionage had successfully stolen the secrets of atomic weaponry, but to wonder at the official motive for the release, 60 years after the fact, of the transcripts; and, with helpful quotations from partisan authors and commentators, to reflect on the silliness of an exercise to determine whether J. Robert Oppenheimer was a Soviet spy.

In fact, of course, the principal issue in the hearings was not whether Oppenheimer was a Soviet spy, which he was not, but whether someone with strong personal attachments (wife, brother, friends, colleagues) to actual Communists, and who harbored deep reservations about our postwar nuclear program (calling for a ban on weapons as early as 1945), was the right man for the job of advising the government on the subject. This explains both the reams of testimony from fellow physicists on Oppenheimer’s singular character and opinions, and the final decision to erect, in President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s words, a “blank wall” between Oppenheimer and nuclear secrets. 

This judgment strikes The Scrapbook, among others, as a sensible—and entirely comprehensible—conclusion at a difficult time in our history. Whether this left J. Robert Oppenheimer a “broken man,” however, is open to question. His fellow physicist-colleague Edward Teller, whose agonized testimony about Oppenheimer (“his actions frankly appeared to me confused and complicated”) was decisive, really did suffer ostracism from academic science. By contrast, Oppenheimer didn’t lose his berth at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, and certainly gained the admiration of journalists and academics worldwide. He delivered the William James Lecture in philosophy and psychology at Harvard in 1957, and in that same year was awarded the Legion of Honor by the French government. 

During and after his lifetime, Oppenheimer has been the inspiration for more than a few admiring plays, one opera, several television dramas and documentaries, and innumerable friendly biographies. Shortly before his death, President John F. Kennedy awarded Oppenheimer the Enrico Fermi Award. Yet the mythology lives on. 

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[jellobiafrasays]

the rosenberg case: fact and fiction (1953)

[spooky-froll]

Good man. I'm finishing up the Venona Secrets and this book has effectively convinced me that the Soviets truly, had the greatest intelligence apparatus in history. I've never seen any other like it! Seriously, I found myself freaked out at first, but now I'm truly intrigued how genuinely well they ran this network (other than some mishaps).