Interview with Thomas A. Tombrello - Caltech Oral Histories

Tombrello–150
were more cylindrical, which has nothing to do with bombs. But they still contained the
ingredients that would give us some new mathematical tools for modeling. I think Dan [Daniel
I.] Meiron [Jones Professor of Aeronautics and Applied and Computational Mathematics] had
the strength of ten. He was wonderful. Did a good job. Interestingly enough, this whole project
dragged people like Dan Meiron and Mike Ortiz [Hayman Professor of Aeronautics and
Mechanical Engineering] into the weapons community as really trusted, knowledgeable advisors
on things that had to do with weapons. I think that was important, a breath of fresh air—a
number of people who just thought about things different ways and were just smarter than hell.
ASPATURIAN: You worked with Koonin to bring this off? And you worked together well on
that?
TOMBRELLO: Yes. Very, very well. He never doubted the boundaries I drew. Steve’s
experience with weapons was mostly through the JASON group. I consider that—to be
opinionated—a bit superficial. That says nothing about Koonin; it says more about the JASONs.
They looked at things from the top of the mountain, and there I was, where the plutonium met
the whatever.
ASPATURIAN: Where the plutonium met ground zero?
TOMBRELLO: Something. My perspective was always at the level of the details. It was not a
view from above. It was not about policy. It was strictly, Will X do Y? And what happens
when X gets thirty years old? Will it still do Y? So it was a very successful program for
Caltech. It ran for a number of years.
ASPATURIAN: And obviously you consider it a key contribution.
TOMBRELLO: I thought it was a key thing Koonin did for the nation. I think it did a lot for
various groups at Caltech, including providing a view of how some very important things in U.S.
weapons policy are dependent on having smart people comment and know something about the
technologies underneath it. It is not all just an engineering problem. Engineering solutions are
fine. We got a long way with that. I do not denigrate them. But, at the same time, if you’ve got
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