Having lost 27 million of its citizens during the Great Patriotic War, our country in the late 40s and early 50s achieved breakthroughs in the field of new knowledge, technology and education in record time. In the devasted post-war conditions, he built the nuclear industry, a nuclear weapons center, a testing ground and solved the most complex scientific, technical and production problems.
The starting point for the creation of a nuclear shield was the successful test on August 29, 1949 of the first atomic bomb RDS-1. The entire country participated in its creation. And the final link that ensured the solution to this problem was the specially created KB-11, currently the Russian Federal Nuclear Center, the All-Russian Research Institute of Experimental Physics.
The activities of Soviet intelligence played a leading role in creating the scientific base for the development of nuclear weapons in the USSR. He was able to obtain valuable information on fundamental ideas, as well as specific scientific and technical data on the atomic project. In the period from 1941 to 1945, the role of intelligence information in the development of the Soviet atomic project was paramount, and in 1946-1949, own efforts were of paramount importance.
The rapid implementation of the achievements of fundamental science through the correct choice of priorities and the concentration of resources on them, the selection and education of talented personnel, the maximum responsibility and enthusiasm of all nuclear weapons specialists have allowed and allowed for many decades, with significantly less financial and economic resources of our country compared to the United States, effectively maintain a strategic balance in the world and thus guarantee peace.
The combination of free scientific and technical creativity with the unconditional implementation of plans at the highest level, powerful organizational support for new ideas and important projects, conscious risk in “innovations” – these basic principles of the work of RFNC-VNIIEF were established and developed. and strongly supported by academician Yu.B. Khariton.
The creation of nuclear weapons in the USSR was a historical necessity in conditions of acute political and ideological confrontation with the United States, which grew into a global confrontation. And this is the only example of creating means of armed struggle when the main objective is to achieve conditions that make war impossible. On this basis, politicians formulated a thesis about peaceful existence.
The situation with the birth of nuclear weapons is unique in the sense that nothing similar has ever arisen in world politics and, apparently, will not arise. It will remain in world history as a phenomenon of the unusual political influence of scientists directly on politics and directly on the adoption of political decisions by the leaders of different states.
Today, Russia is still capable of ensuring nuclear deterrence and preventing the proliferation of nuclear weapons and critical technologies. This allows us to preserve the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the country and gives our people the opportunity to live in accordance with their historical choice.
At the same time, we must always remember that the material component and the main factor in ensuring strategic stability in the world was, is and will remain in the foreseeable future the Russian nuclear weapons system. Ensuring national security consists of ensuring that there is no gap between the actual nuclear weapons situation and the proclaimed doctrine; This was and is the mission and responsibility of the specialists of the Russian nuclear weapons complex.
Russia’s nuclear weapons concentrate the talent and knowledge of several generations of outstanding scientists and engineers. This intelligence should fully serve Russia in these difficult times. And the key to this is the continuity of generations, based on a combination of wonderful traditions and new scientific and technical capabilities.
About the Author
Ilkaev Radiy Ivanovich – Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences, in 1996-2008 – director, now – honorary scientific director of RFNC-VNIIEF, laureate of the State Prizes of the USSR and Russia, holder of the Order of Merit to the Fatherland . The publication was prepared from the materials of his speech at the “Atomic Project and Domestic Science” conference on April 9, 2024.
