Standing for Peace Without Weapons. Guest post by Maria Flora Mangano.
In 2025, we are celebrating the eightieth anniversary of several events related to the end of World War II, including the launch of the bombs which devastated Japan. Oppenheimer immediately realized the need to avoid global destruction, and soon he stepped back from atomic weapons, instead promoting disarmament and peace among the international community of physicists and scientists. His commitment to peace encountered strong opposition among the political and government contexts of that time. At the end of the war, he was removed from government and academic positions, and he charged with supporting communism through his pacifist ideas. He was rehabilitated, teaching in the US before his death. A few months after the creation of the atomic bomb, Oppenheimer delivered a speech in the same place where the group of physicists worked and helped to create the Association of Los Alamos Scientists. They, in turn, mobilized the scientists of the world to support a peaceful use of science and knowledge, arguing for global disarmament.
What may his words suggest to us, in this tragic and dark time for the whole world, when it seems that history has taught us nothing?
Are we really powerless and inexorably in the hands of our politicians’ choices, as the obvious vision of the world seems to suggest? Do we really believe that the end of the wars come from those with the loudest voices and as a result of weapons?
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