Reflections on Oppenheimer.

[Union8448]

Christopher Nolan's movie about J. Robert Oppenheimer is worth viewing in a theater. Its that well done.
It provokes me to think of who were the geniuses of the US Civil War?
Robert E. Lee comes to mind, because he kept the Confederacy alive with very little to work with. But he made such a terrible decision to begin with, when both General Scott and members of his family were against secession, that he is disqualified in my opinion.
Nathan Forrest was a great fighter, but he was easily diverted into small fights that did not matter to the main operation. And in my opinion he was using up livestock resources at a rate the Confederacy could not sustain.
Three men on the US side combined intelligence and efficiency and achieved results beyond what any replacement could have achieved.
The immigrant from Scotland, Daniel McCallum, applied the management system he had developed to the management of the USMRR in the Kentucky/Tennessee/Georgia theater and his success there shortened the war and saved lives.
David Farragut never lost track of modernizing forces in naval warfare. He was not voluminous reader, but between lectures and conversations with other captains, he knew steam powered vessels could achieve things that were impossible for sail powered vessels.
The man most similar to Oppenheimer was probably B.F. Isherwood. And Isherwood's post war experience had much in common with Oppenheimer's post WWII experience. Isherwood's contribution was to steam engineering. And his insistence that everything had to measured and compiled kept the US naval program on track when the administration listened to him.
Christopher Spencer should be considered. He realized that in the age of the mechanical revolution, anything was possible. He combined features of the existing carbines, and reversed the feeding mechanism used in what was then the Henry's 16 shot rifle, and developed a workable magazine rifle which had an enormous impact on US cavalry battles starting in September 1864.
Nominate your favorite. Have fun.

 

[5fish]

done.
It provokes me to think of who were the geniuses of the US Civil War?

I want to point that Oppenheimer's great genius was at administration. Oh, Leslie Groves was a great administrators. You can say Eisenhower and Nimitz were great administrators. You can say Halleck and McClellan were great administrators, along with Lee and Great. The Union and the Confederacy had great administrators at Quartermaster.

 

[5fish]

The Union and the Confederacy had great administrators at Quartermaster.

I need to rephrase the statement the union had a great Quartermaster of the Army.

Montgomery Cunningham Meigs (/ˈmɛɡz/; May 3, 1816 – January 2, 1892) was a career United States Army officer and civil engineer, who served as Quartermaster General of the U.S. Army during and after the American Civil War. On May 14, 1861, Meigs was appointed colonel, 11th U.S. Infantry, and on the following day, promoted to brigadier general and Quartermaster General of the Army. The previous Quartermaster General, Joseph Johnston, had resigned and become a general in the Confederate Army.

The Confederacy never had enough resources for their two different Quartermasters to be good or great.

Abraham Myers (also Abram Myers; 14 May 1811 – 20 June 1889) was a military officer in the United States and Confederate States Armies. He was made the Confederacy's first acting quartermaster-general on 25 March 1861; the role was made official that December, with a promotion to colonel on 15 Feb 1862.[1 As quartermaster-general, Myers was hampered by insufficient funds, the failure of the Confederate States dollar, and the poor railroads in the South; the Confederate States Army was never adequately supplied by Myers, especially with regard to clothing and shoes.

Alexander Robert Lawton (November 4, 1818 – July 2, 1896) was a lawyer, politician, diplomat, and brigadier general in the Confederate States Army during the American Civil War. In August 1863, Lawton became the Confederacy's second Quartermaster-General. Although he brought energy and resourcefulness to the position, he was unable to solve the problem of material shortages and poorly regulated railroads

 

[5fish]

Here is the Conferate I was thinking of as a great administrator Josiah Gorges, Chief of Ordinance.

Josiah Gorgas (July 1, 1818 – May 15, 1883) was one of the few Northern-born Confederate generals and was later president of the University of Alabama.[1] As chief of ordnance during the American Civil War, Gorgas managed to keep the Confederate armies well supplied with weapons and ammunition, despite the Union blockade, and even though the South had hardly any munitions industry before the war began. In this effort he also worked closely with the Fraser, Trenholm shipping company that brought in shipments of ordnance by means of blockade runners. He kept diaries during the Civil War which are now a popular subject of study for historians

 

[5fish]

Here is another great union administrator Herman Haupt and who spent one year running military railroads. He had an impressive record in that one year.

Herman Haupt (March 26, 1817 – December 14, 1905) was an American civil engineer and railroad construction engineer and executive. As a Union Army General during the American Civil War, he revolutionized U.S. military transportation, particularly the use of railroads.[

 

[Union8448]

I want to point that Oppenheimer's great genius was at administration. Oh, Leslie Groves was a great administrators. You can say Eisenhower and Nimitz were great administrators. You can say Halleck and McClellan were great administrators, along with Lee and Great. The Union and the Confederacy had great administrators at Quartermaster.

Oppenheimer had good enough credentials in Quantum Mechanics that other scientists were willing to listen to him. The fact that they built a working device without obviously killing lots of workers was a great achievement.
The comparable people in the US Civil War were probably McCallum and Ishwerwood.
They were not geniuses, but experienced officers, referring to Scott and Farragut. Scott at the strategic level and Farragut at the operational level were significant contributors. One was from Virginia and the other was from Knoxville, TN I believe.

 

[5fish]

The fact that they built a working device without obviously killing lots of workers was a great achievement.

Here a article about all the death during the Manhattan project...

Article on Deaths during the Manhattan Project - Nuclear Museum

At the Atomic Heritage Foundation, we receive many inquiries about the history of the Manhattan Project. One question we get asked a lot is, how many people died during the Manhattan Project?Historian Alex Wellerstein has discovered a list of all the fatal accidents that occurred at Los Alamos...

ahf.nuclearmuseum.org

Historian Alex Wellerstein has discovered a list of all the fatal accidents that occurred at Los Alamos in 1943 through September 1946. There were 24 deaths during this period. They include the criticality accidents that killed Harry Daghlian and Louis Slotin, but other deaths included a child who drowned in the pond and several construction, driving, and horse riding accidents.

 

[5fish]

@Union8448 , Was the death of these two scientists in the movie?

How Radiation Sickness Works

Radiation sickness can be terrifying, painful and -- in some cases -- fatal. Learn about the causes and symptoms of radiation sickness.

science.howstuffworks.com

 

[Union8448]

@Union8448 , Was the death of these two scientists in the movie?

How Radiation Sickness Works

Radiation sickness can be terrifying, painful and -- in some cases -- fatal. Learn about the causes and symptoms of radiation sickness.

science.howstuffworks.com

They didn't blow the place up. That could have happened.

 

[Joshism]

It provokes me to think of who were the geniuses of the US Civil War?

I forget who, but one author called Rosecrans "possibly the only true genius of the war" or something to that effect (not someone who was an apologist either - not Varney or Moore or Rose).

 

[Union8448]

I forget who, but one author called Rosecrans "possibly the only true genius of the war" or something to that effect (not someone who was an apologist either - not Varney or Moore or Rose).

Maybe a defective genius. He lacked communication skills. Most people knew he was very capable.

 

[Joshism]

Maybe a defective genius. He lacked communication skills. Most people knew he was very capable.

Most geniuses are defective. They're operating on a different level from those around them. Autism or personality disorders are usually involved.

 

[5fish]

For those who remember the 80s the nuclear freeze movement.

 

[5fish]

If you read this the Nuclear Freeze movement had more success that one thinks...

The Nuclear Freeze and Its Impact | Arms Control Association

www.armscontrol.org

Nevertheless, the nuclear freeze campaign was considerably more successful than it appeared. Under enormous political pressure, the Reagan administration dramatically reversed its rhetoric. In April 1982, shortly after the freeze resolution was introduced in Congress, Reagan began declaring publicly and repeatedly that “a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought.” He added, on the first occasion that, “[t]o those who protest against nuclear war, I can only say: ‘I’m with you.’”[17] Increasingly rattled, Reagan, who had opposed every nuclear arms control and disarmament agreement negotiated by his Democratic and Republican predecessors, also began reversing his nuclear policies. In the fall of 1983, as anti-nuclear protests swept across the United States and Western Europe, he told his startled secretary of state, George Shultz, “If things get hotter and hotter and arms control remains an issue, maybe I should go see [Soviet leader Yuri] Andropov and propose eliminating all nuclear weapons.”[18] Although Shultz and other members of the administration were horrified by this turnabout, Reagan persisted with it and eagerly searched for a Soviet negotiating partner.

 

[5fish]

Here is s look at modern nuclear weapons...

The Devastating Effects of Nuclear Weapons

Richard Wolfson and Ferenc Dalnoki-Veress reveal the most horrifying realities of nuclear war.

thereader.mitpress.mit.edu

What can nuclear weapons do? How do they achieve their destructive purpose? What would a nuclear war — and its aftermath — look like? In the article that follows, excerpted from Richard Wolfson and Ferenc Dalnoki-Veress’s book “Nuclear Choices for the Twenty-First Century,” the authors explore these and related questions that reveal the most horrifying realities of nuclear war.

The fallout produced in a nuclear explosion depends greatly on the type of weapon, its explosive yield, and where it’s exploded. The neutron bomb, although it produces intense direct radiation, is primarily a fusion device and generates only slight fallout from its fission trigger. Small fission weapons like those used at Hiroshima and Nagasaki produce locally significant fallout. But the fission-fusion-fission design used in today’s thermonuclear weapons introduces the new phenomenon of global fallout. Most of this fallout comes from fission of the U-238 jacket that surrounds the fusion fuel. The global effect of these huge weapons comes partly from the sheer quantity of radioactive material and partly from the fact that the radioactive cloud rises well into the stratosphere, where it may take months or even years to reach the ground. Even though we’ve had no nuclear war since the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, fallout is one weapons effect with which we have experience. Atmospheric nuclear testing before the 1963 Partial Test Ban Treaty resulted in detectable levels of radioactive fission products across the globe, and some of that radiation is still with us.

 

[5fish]

The Nuclear Age...

History of nuclear weapons - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Building on major scientific breakthroughs made during the 1930s, the United Kingdom began the world's first nuclear weapons research project, codenamed Tube Alloys, in 1941, during World War II. The United States, in collaboration with the United Kingdom, initiated the Manhattan Project the following year to build a weapon using nuclear fission. The project also involved Canada.[1] In August 1945, the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were conducted by the United States, with British consent, against Japan at the close of that war, standing to date as the only use of nuclear weapons in hostilities.

A Brief History of Nuclear Weapons States

A chronology of nuclear weapon technology proliferation.

asiasociety.org

In subsequent years, the United States, the Soviet Union and Great Britain conducted several nuclear weapons tests. In 1954, President Jawaharlal Nehru of India called for a ban on nuclear testing. It was the first large-scale initiative to ban using nuclear technology for mass destruction.

 

[5fish]

Did you know about the Elephant Foot of Chernobyl... Deadly...

The Famous Photo of Chernobyl's Most Dangerous Radioactive Material Was a Selfie

The Elephant’s Foot would have killed anyone within a couple of minutes.

www.atlasobscura.com

Why Corium Is the Most Dangerous Radioactive Waste in the World

Learn about what corium is, the nuclear accidents that produced it, and whether the Elephant's Foot at Chernobyl is still hot and dangerous.

www.thoughtco.com

The Elephant's Foot of Chernobyl is a toxic mass of corium that was created during the initial Chernobyl accident when reactor number 4's fuel rods cracked and the cooling water turned to steam. The corium is a blackish-oxide material that's similar to lava and becomes very viscous as it cools, flowing like sticky molten glass. The Elephant's Foot is still active and emits radiation that's fatal after 300 seconds of exposure. As of March 2018, fears that the Elephant's Foot would penetrate deeper into the ground and reach groundwater had proven unfounded. However, if it were to reach groundwater, it could cause a catastrophic explosion or contaminate the water that nearby residents drink with radioactive material.