War and Peace in the Nuclear Age; Interview with Norris Bradbury, 1986 [1]

Item Information

Title:
War and Peace in the Nuclear Age; Interview with Norris Bradbury, 1986 [1]
Description:
Norris Bradbury was a physicist who served as director of the Los Alamos National Laboratory from 1945-1970. In the interview he describes the research and development of nuclear fission weapons, and the challenges the Laboratory faced in the late 1940s after the end of World War II, including the priority of building smaller weapons. He describes the development of the hydrogen bomb as a sort of inevitable necessity, a fact that represented a quandary for Robert Oppenheimer at the time. There was no way to expect universal agreement not to build this bomb, so he and his colleagues were forced to continue his research and development, despite growing anti-nuclear sentiment in America. He explains that the support of the federal government and military in nuclear testing was helpful to their research, although the ideas themselves would have continued to develop even with no support. He explains Edward Teller's research and the subsequent creation of the Livermore Laboratory, which he says functioned in tandem with Los Alamos, each laboratory testing different ideas and reporting back to the other. He defends Klaus Fuchs' actions, saying that it was in fact his loyalty to the country and his hatred of the Nazis that caused him to share information with the Russians, since he did not think the United States was helping enough in the fight against the Nazis. He calls the Oppenheimer hearings "a very sad occasion." He concludes with a discussion of overcoming the challenges of maintaining momentum at Los Alamos after World War II, which included maintaining contact with the rest of the scientific community.
Author:
Bradbury, Norris, 1909-1997
Date:
March 17, 1986
Format:
Film/Video
Location:
WGBH
Collection (local):
American Archive of Public Broadcasting Collection
Series:
WGBH > War and Peace in the Nuclear Age
Subjects:
Hydrogen bomb
Nuclear weapons
Nuclear fission
Los Alamos National Laboratory
Nuclear weapons--Testing
United States
Teller, Edward, 1908-2003
Soviet Union
World War II
Oppenheimer, J. Robert, 1904-1967
Lawrence, Ernest Orlando, 1901-1958
Fuchs, Klaus Emil Julius, 1911-1988
Lilienthal, David Eli, 1899-1981
U.S. Atomic Energy Commission
U.S. Atomic Energy Commission. General Advisory Committee
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
Extent:
00:00:00
Link to Item:
https://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-15-qr4nk36c2x
Terms of Use:
Rights status not evaluated.
Contact host institution for more information.
Publisher:
WGBH Educational Foundation