User:RightCowLeftCoast/Sandbox/Robert Wertheim

Robert Wertheim (9 November 1922-29 April 2020) was an American naval officer involved in the development of strategic weapons.

Early life
Robert was born to Joseph and Emma Vorenberg in Carlsbad, New Mexico in 1922. Following the attack on Pearl Harbor, he enrolled into the New Mexico Military Institute; graduating there in 1942, he went on to be appointed to the United States Naval Academy. At the Naval Academy, Wertheim played on the schools fencing team. Wertheim graduated from the Naval Academy in 1945; he graduated with honors.

Military service
Following his graduation from the Naval Academy, Wertheim's first assignment was to the USS Hyman. Transferred to the USS Bordelon at Okinawa, Wertheim served as the ships assistant engineering officer and the communications officer, before being sent to San Francisco to attend electronics school. In April 1946, Wertheim became engaged to Barbara Louis Selig of West Los Angeles; they married in December 1946. Upon completion of electronics school, Wertheim was assigned to the USS Maloy where the ship spent the winter of 1947 providing electricity to Maine. Following his assignment to the Maloy, Wertheim received orders for Sandia Base, where he was a member of the Navy's first nuclear bomb assembly team.

Before being able to advance his education Wertheim completed a sea assignment to the USS Norton Sound, which was used to test guided missiles. In 1954, Wertheim continued his education at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, earning a masters in nuclear physics. That same year, Wertheim was detailed to the USS Los Angeles while it had SSM-N-8 Regulus embarked. In 1955 as a lieutenant, Wertheim headed the group that worked on the design of the atmospheric reentry body of the warheads mounted onto the UGM-27 Polaris. In June 1956, Wertheim was assigned to the United States Navy Special Projects Office, where he stayed until June 1961.

After assignment to the Special Projects Office, Wertheim was assigned to the Naval Ordnance Test Station in California. While there Wertheim worked on the cancelled development of the AIM-9 Sidewinder for naval surface air defense, called Osprey; he was able to take that work and utilize it for usage for the Army and Marine Corps Air Defense Artillery, including having a hand in its naming, MIM-72 Chaparral. Chaparral being the name for a roadrunner in Mexican Spanish, the state bird for Wertheim's home state.

In late 1962, Wertheim was reassigned to the Pentagon, serving under the Director of Defense Research and Engineering Dr. Harold Brown, who he previously met while working on the Polaris missile. That same year, Wertheim was tasked to write a report for the United States to sell the United Kingdom the Polaris missile, instead of the cancelled GAM-87 Skybolt. Wertheim remained at the Pentagon as the Military Assistant for Strategic Weapons until August 1965, which earned him a Joint Service Commendation Medal. During those years, Wertheim was instrumental in having the Strategic Projects Office increase the Poseidon's targeting accuracy by switching the missiles guidance system from only inertial, to stellar-inertial guidance.

After his time in California, Wertheim returned to the Special Projects Office in Washington, D.C. in late 1965.

In 1971, Wertheim is elevated to the rank of rear admiral. That same year, he was awarded the Rear Admiral William S. Parsons Award by the Navy League of the United States. In 1977, Wertheim was elected as a member of the National Academy of Engineering. That same year, Wertheim became the Director of the Strategic Systems Projects. In April 1979, Senator Robert Byrd said of Wertheim, that he "is the Navy's leading authority on strategic missiles". In October 1979, Wertheim was awarded the Navy Distinguished Service Medal.

Post-military life
For seven years, beginning in 1981, Wertheim was the senior vice president of science and engineering of Lockheed Corporation. In 1983, along with several other dozen retired flag officers, Wertheim took out a full page advertisement in the Washington Times condemning the act of retired Rear Admiral Gene La Rocque appearing on television of the Soviet Union and condemning the defense policy of the United States. In 1987, the New Mexico Military Institute inducted Wertheim into their hall of fame. Beginning in 1988, Wertheim became a private consultant to Science Applications International Corporation. He would also do consultation work with the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Los Alamos National Laboratory, United States Department of Defense, and the Draper Laboratory. In 2000, on behalf of the University of California, Wertheim was the lead of a review of Los Alamos National Laboratory after hard drives were missing temporarily. Wertheim was a member of Sigma Xi and Tau Beta Pi.

Retirement
In 2001, Barbara, his wife of 54 years died. In 2005, the alumni association of the Naval Academy awarded Wertheim their Distinguished Graduate Award Medal. By at least 2005, Wertheim had re-married Joan, former Levin. In 2005, Wertheim spoke to The New Mexico Jewish Historical Society. The next year, he was given the Distinguished Submariner Award by the Naval Submarine League. In 2008, Wertheim was a member of the Defense Science Board's Permanent Task Force on Nuclear Weapons Surety. In 2012, one of his two sons died in Pittsburg. On 29 April 2020, Wertheim died; he was buried in Section 11 of Miramar National Cemetery.