In the aftermath of World War II, an American B-29 fighter jet dropped an atomic bomb on the present-day Japanese city of Hiroshima in 1945. The atomic bomb, which has never been used in the history of war, immediately killed 80,000 people and caused tens of thousands more to die from radiation exposure. Three days later, a second B-29 nuclear attack on another Japanese city, Nagasaki, killed at least 40,000 people. A few days after this devastating attack, Emperor Hirohito of Japan, quoting this new and extremely brutal atomic bomb, announced that he had withdrawn from World War II and that Japan had surrendered.
World War II began in 1939, when Britain and France declared war on Germany. Two years later, Germany invaded the Soviet Union, exposing the ambitions of Nazi Germany and Adolf Hitler to the world. Although Italy and Japan were seen as the same power to support Germany, their main purpose was to attack the emerging United States as a world power. Germany, Italy, and Japan were on one side of the battlefield, while France, Britain, the United States, and the Soviet Union were on the other. The nuclear genocide in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the diseases caused by World War II, the famine and the bombings have killed at least 70 million people, including 40 million civilians and 30 million soldiers.
Oppenheimer, who considered the Bhagavad Gita as his role model, was like Arjuna, who was engaged in battle, even though he was divided on the field of Kurukshetra. He began to make his position public through anti-war rhetoric.
In the 76 years since the United States dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, there has been no evidence of nuclear weapons being used in any war or military operation. During a visit to Japan in 2016, then-US President Barack Obama laid a wreath at the Hiroshima Peace Monument in Hiroshima to express his condolences to the families of the victims of the nuclear attack. However, he did not apologize for the heinous act committed by the United States. On the contrary, he went on to preach the need for a “moral revolution” among the powers competing for nuclear weapons. A team of scientists and engineers, including the American physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer, known as the “father of the atomic bomb,” had been building nuclear weapons since World War II. The atomic bomb was born out of fear that Hitler would develop nuclear weapons with the help of German scientists.
The technology, which was secretly developed inside a laboratory, was code-named the Manhattan Project. The first successful test of a nuclear bomb was carried out at a test site in the United States before the attack on Hiroshima. That morning, Oppenheimer, the director of the laboratory and the father of the atomic bomb, saw the formation of a 40,000-foot-tall mushroom-like cloud in the distance. Soon after, he said that he remembered the verses of the Bhagavad Gita. ‘Kalo Asmi Lok Kshay Kritapraviddho’ means ‘and now I have become death and the destroyer of the world.’ Oppenheimer was a famous scientist in the field of physics and also a great scholar of Sanskrit language. Most of the books on Hindu scriptures, including the Bhagavad Gita, were studied in Sanskrit by the father of these atomic bombs.
Born into a Jewish family living in the United States, Oppenheimer was neither Hindu nor religious. Confused and confused when he had to fight against his close friends, family members and acquaintances on the battlefield of Kurukshetra, Lord Krishna reminded Arjuna that this fight against the Kauravas was his religion and that he should only do his duty. Similarly, as head of a scientific and nuclear program, Oppenheimer was convinced that Germany was building nuclear weapons against its enemies in World War II. He therefore agreed to enter a “new era of nuclear genocide” by signing a letter prepared by then US President Franklin Roosevelt to investigate and produce nuclear weapons. Oppenheimer regretted his decision for the rest of his life.
Oppenheimer was a famous scientist in the field of physics. Most of the books on Hindu scriptures, including the Bhagavad Gita, were studied in Sanskrit by the father of the atomic bomb.
Among the various destructive weapons mentioned in the Mahabharata, the most powerful ‘Brahmastra’ has been described as the most deadly weapon and the weapon capable of destroying the entire earth. The use of this powerful weapon, which emits thousands of suns of light and covers the whole earth with terrifying mushroom-shaped clouds, makes the land barren and inanimate, the rains end and the problem of infertility in humans and animals as mentioned by Brahmastra. Together, Oppenheimer lived in dilemma and regret.
After Hitler’s suicide in 1945, Germany surrendered. After the massacres of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan also fell to its knees and World War II ended. Although the war ended, Oppenheimer was still wounded by the wounds of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The atheist Oppenheimer acknowledged the Gita as one of the books that influenced his philosophy of life. In the days after the war, the world witnessed the unimaginable human suffering and psychological trauma caused by the atomic bomb massacre in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Due to his surprisingly wide range of interests and abilities, he was equally interested in both science and Sanskrit, but personally lived a life of contradiction. In the post-war days, Oppenheimer did not want to use destructive nuclear weapons under his direction and leadership. To that end, the US Agency for International Development (USAID) has been linked to the use of nuclear weapons. While there, he flatly rejected US President Harry Truman’s proposal to build a hydrogen bomb in 1949.
Oppenheimer was more concerned about sophisticated weapons that could be used in future nuclear war between powerful nations. His concern and interest was confirmed by the conflict between communism and capitalism and the Cold War over time. Oppenheimer, who considered the Bhagavad Gita as his role model, became like Arjuna, who fought in the battlefield of Kurukshetra. As he began to publicize his position through anti-war rhetoric, he was viewed with suspicion. In the latter half of his life, he became involved in pacifist campaigns. Aiming to promote creative thinking, protect human dignity and egalitarian development through art and science, Oppenheimer founded the World Academy of Art and Science in 1960 with the help of his close friends and contemporary scientists Albert Einstein and Bertrand Russell.
Oppenheimer, who saw the Western approach to Sanskrit and Eastern philosophy as one of the greatest achievements of the 20th century, blamed himself for the massacres of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. But he believed that the use of science and technology in the future should be for the betterment of human civilization and not for its destruction. Renowned writer and playwright Balakrishna Sam described the eternal truth of human consciousness as ‘knowledge dies with laughter, science dies with cry’.
