Was Oppenheimer’s Security Clearance Restored Because of the Movie?

J. Robert Oppenheimer is widely known as the father of the atomic bomb that killed hundreds of thousands of Japanese civilians and kicked off the cold war and arms race that continues to this day. Despite the United States government’s willingness to use that weapon and benefit from its power, Oppenheimer himself was subjected to political attacks that stripped him of his security clearance.

The Oppenheimer security hearing took place in 1954 and was held by the United States Atomic Energy Commission. Oppenheimer, who directed the Manhattan Project at Los Alamos Laboratory, was accused of having strong communist ties, due to his past associations with various left-wing individuals. This was just one of many such events in the era of McCarthyism, one of the darkest chapters in American history, which took place during the ’40s and ’50s (though its legacy is still well and alive today).

After numerous secret meetings, the commission decided to revoke Oppenheimer’s security clearance in 1954. This led to significant outcry from the scientific community, but It wouldn’t be until decades later that President Biden’s administration would finally clear his name, reversing the decision on December 16, 2022, as reported by The Guardian.

Oppenheimer himself was never a communist, but he did lean politically left. He was an advocate for social reform, often remarked on the working conditions of his fellow scientists, and even read some left-wing writers like Karl Marx. America has always equated the idea of improving society somewhat with full-blown communist dictatorship, so it’s no surprise he would get lumped in with the Soviet Union. This decision would stand for decades, well after Oppenheimer’s death in 1967. With Oppenheimer left with few fans due to the devastation caused by his and his team’s creation, there wasn’t any real push to overturn the decision in a symbolic gesture, posthumously, unjust as it was.

So why now? What’s pretty wild is that Biden’s decision to reverse the revocation of Oppenheimer’s security clearance happened around the same time Christopher Nolan’s film Oppenheimer first began getting media attention. The first teaser trailer dropped on July 28, 2022; the official trailer dropped December 18, 2022, just two days after the Biden administration made the decision. Another thing to note is that almost every movie depicting the U.S military in some form has likely been viewed and combed by the Pentagon. That means that a major motion picture about one of the most controversial events in U.S history undoubtedly caught the government’s attention.

Now, this might seem a little tin-foil-hat to say, but there’s a good chance that Nolan renewing interest in Oppenheimer’s life influenced the U.S. government to do this. Will we ever know for sure? Probably not. But movies do have the power to profoundly shape public opinion on controversial topics. So, it’s not too far-fetched to think that Nolan just might have helped clear Oppenheimer’s name.

(featured image: Hulton Archive / Getty Images)