How to overcome the fear of conventional and nuclear war, as well as military service? Don't be afraid of war: neither conventional nor nuclear What if I'm afraid of war

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Could the USSR have acquired an atomic bomb without the help of spies, to what extent did the Star Wars program adopted under Reagan lead to collapse Soviet Union How dissident nuclear scientists lived in closed cities and whether the world will become free of nuclear weapons - these and other questions are answered in the book "Armageddon and Paranoia. Nuclear Confrontation" by the British historian and diplomat Rodrik Braithwaite.

The history of the creation of nuclear weapons and the nuclear confrontation that followed it seems to have been studied up and down: from Einstein's theory, which laid the foundation for the development of human thermonuclear energy, to the "Manhattan Project"; from the "sharashkas" organized by Beria and described by Solzhenitsyn to the efforts of Soviet spies to extract American nuclear secrets; from the first explosions in Hiroshima and Nagasaki to the current tests of North Korean nuclear devices.

Image copyright Profile Books Image caption Cover of the book "Armageddon and paranoia. Nuclear confrontation". The book was shortlisted for the Pushkin House Book Prize.

What made Rodrik Braithwaite turn to a seemingly hackneyed topic?

unknown famous history

RodricBrate: Firstly, I tried for myself to figure out all the intricacies of this one, on the one hand, as you say, it’s good known history which I have been thinking about a lot. And secondly, I wanted to cover this story in more detail from the Russian, Soviet side.

But, most importantly, I was worried about the paradox: how, why worthy, honest, patriotic people in different countries of the world - in Moscow, Washington, London - worked hard and persistently to create weapons systems capable of instantly destroying millions of people. It seemed strange and illogical to me. How could this happen? And what does this mean for us today?

In part, the desire to address this topic was also caused by personal experiences. I was 13 years old when the first atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and I remember it. I remember reading the reports in the Times, I remember how voraciously I devoured all the newspaper reports and analyzes of what happened in the following days.

Yes, you are right, this story is well known, but many of its details are completely unknown. Many aspects and problems arising from the history of the nuclear confrontation are either unknown or misunderstood and misinterpreted. Many details seem too complicated and incomprehensible to non-specialists, although in fact there is nothing super complicated in them, and therefore I tried to find a simple and understandable language of presentation. All the same, it turned out to be a large voluminous book, but the topic is also large and voluminous.

The idea of ​​a superweapon

BBC:The language of the book did not seem too complicated to me at all, although, indeed, a lot of attention and space in it is given to the purely scientific physical aspects of nuclear research in the first half of the 20th century. Something else surprised me. It is quite natural, probably, that already at an early stage, physicists understood the totally destructive power of the atom. You cite the prediction made by the British physicist Frederick Soddy back in 1904: "A person who manages to master the energy hidden in the nucleus of radium and other heavy metals will receive a weapon with which, if desired, he can destroy the entire planet."

But, as you write, not only scientists spoke about the power of the atom, but also writers - in particular, Anatole France and Herbert Wells. What was known to the general public about atomic energy and its destructive power before the fateful day of August 6, 1945?

RodricBrate: Indeed, thanks to such writers as Frans and Wells, there were, by the way, others, including in Russia - we can recall Vadim Nikolsky and his novel "After a thousand years" written in 1937, in which he predicted an explosion atomic bomb The fear gradually spread. The fear of war in the air, the fear of a rain of bombs that could fall on civilians - all this was already there before the First World War. To some extent, during the First World War, these fears came true. And therefore the idea that an entire city could easily be destroyed by an air strike was firmly rooted in the public mind even before the outbreak of World War II.

In addition, there was the idea of ​​a superweapon, and Wells, whose acquaintances included many scientists, knew about it. Yes, Soddy, whose statement you recalled, and many others understood the power locked in the atom. The question was how to unlock this power. This is exactly what happened in the 20-30s - the key to this castle was found.

Chasing the split atom

BBC:In the interwar years, in those very 20-30s that you spoke about, nuclear fission work was carried out in several countries - Britain, Germany, the USSR. America - at least that's the impression I got from your book - joined this process later than others. What, in your opinion, can explain this delay and why, despite it, the Americans still turned out to be winners in nuclear race?

Image copyright Getty Images Image caption Niels Bohr (left) and Albert Einstein. 1920

RodricBrate: The most significant scientific progress in this area was achieved in those years by Britain, Germany, France and, because of Niels Bohr, Denmark. Neither in America nor in Russia at the very beginning of the 20th century was there an advanced physical school. Both of these countries started catching up around the same time. Both of them began to send their scientists to the leading European universities - [Peter] Kapitsa was one of them, [Robert] Oppenheimer was another. They were brilliant scientists, they very quickly got used to a new topic for themselves, returned home (in the case of Kapitsa, not entirely voluntarily: after one of the scientist’s visits to the USSR, Stalin forbade him to leave the country) and became the founders of schools of nuclear physics in their countries.

By 1938-39, when the fission of the uranium atom was achieved for the first time, most of the specialists in these countries, including the USSR, already understood the principles of creating nuclear weapons. It was then that the Americans pulled ahead, fearing that the Germans might get ahead of them. Europe was already engulfed in war, and the US had resources to develop new weapons that were not comparable to those possessed by its competitors in other countries.

Why were Hiroshima and Nagasaki destroyed?

BBC:The first nuclear bombing of the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki - although many argue that there was no military need for it - was still the final chord of World War II. You, however, write in your book: "there was never much doubt that the first atomic bomb would fall precisely on the city." Does this mean, in your opinion, that if the war had ended a month or two earlier, before work on the bomb was completed, then the United States would have found another, more or less justified in its own eyes, reason to use atomic weapon, say in the Korean War?

RodricBrate: I don't think so, but this is the subjunctive mood of history. In fact, the bomb was prepared as a weapon against Hitler, as a guarantee of victory in the war against the Nazis. But Germany was defeated just before the bomb was completed, while the war with Japan was still going on. And in America the debate flared up: should the bomb be used to end the war? If so, should it be dropped on the city, or should it simply be used as a demonstration of a powerful new weapon: this is what we have, and what we can do to you if you do not surrender.

These disputes were conducted within the American political establishment, and, in the end, the conclusion was made: both from the military and political point of view, the bomb should be dropped on the city. One of the arguments, not devoid of logic, although rather cruel, was that we should finally justify the huge money spent on the development and production of the bomb.

Image copyright The Image Works/TopFoto Image caption American atomic bomb "Fat Man" (Fat Man), dropped on the Japanese city of Nagasaki on August 9, 1945

Whether this helped end the war is another matter. There are many arguments to show that Japan was already close to defeat, which would have happened perhaps a few months later.

There is also the question of Soviet intervention in the war with Japan. Even at the Yalta Conference in January 1945, Stalin promised Roosevelt that the USSR would enter the war against Japan three months after the end of the war in Europe.

And so it happened. Despite the fact that at the end of the war with Germany, the Soviet Union was practically destroyed - gigantic human, economic, organizational resources were invested in the victory - within three months Far East a huge army, numbering almost a million people, was assembled, which entered Manchuria and began to successfully fight against the Japanese. In ten days, 670,000 soldiers were captured by the Russians. The Americans realized that they needed to hurry to secure the laurels of victory over Japan.

At this point, the Japanese emperor Hirohito made two appeals to end the war: to the people and to the army. The reasons for the end of the war were given in them different: in the appeal to the people it was about the atomic bombing, in the appeal to the army - about the Soviet invasion.

How did Stalin change his mind?

BBC:Let's go back to what happened in the USSR. To what extent did Soviet nuclear physics suffer during the Great Terror?

RodricBrate: Many outstanding nuclear scientists worked in the Soviet Union: Landau, Joffe, Kapitsa, Tamm, later Kurchatov, many of them were awarded Nobel Prize. However, in 1934-35, Stalin decided that the theory of relativity and quantum theory underlying nuclear physics contradicted the materialistic Marxist vision of the world, and scientists began to be repressed.

Image copyright Getty Images Image caption Prominent Soviet nuclear physicists Pyotr Kapitsa (left) and Nikolai Semyonov. Portrait of the artist Boris Kustodiev, 1921

Already after the publication of the book, I learned about the fate of a brilliant young scientist named Matvey Bronstein. He was one of the pioneers quantum theory, arrested in 1937, despite the requests of Landau, Chukovsky (he was married to the daughter of Korney Chukovsky Lydia), Marshak, in 1938 he was sentenced to death and shot on the same day. He was 31 years old.

Image copyright Profile Books Image caption Photograph of Lev Landau taken during his arrest by the NKVD in 1938

Soon, however, Stalin realized that if he wanted to have nuclear weapons, then the shooting of scientists should be stopped.

There is a well-known conversation between Beria and Kurchatov, when the all-powerful people's commissar asked the scientist: "How important is your theory of relativity?" To which Kurchatov replied: "Without it, the atomic bomb cannot be made."

Could do without spies

BBC: To what extent is the prevailing opinion true that the USSR was able to acquire an atomic bomb, if not exclusively, then mainly thanks to the activities of Soviet spies working in the United States, such as Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, who were executed by the Americans in 1953?

Image copyright Getty Images Image caption American communists Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were sentenced to death and executed on June 19, 1953 for passing classified information about the American atomic bomb to the Soviet Union.

RodricBrate: Completely wrong. With the beginning of glasnost, a discussion broke out in Soviet society between physicists and intelligence officers: both groups tried to assign themselves priority in creating the Soviet atomic bomb. At the same time, Academician Yuli Khariton, one of the leaders of the Soviet nuclear project, published an article in which he recalled how, in the 1940s, he and Kurchatov were brought materials collected by Soviet intelligence for review. He admits that these materials were extremely useful, helped Soviet scientists avoid a number of mistakes and pointed out some simpler solutions.

Image copyright Kurchatov Museum Image caption Igor Vasilievich Kurchatov (left) and Yuli Borisovich Khariton at a reception in the Kremlin

However, as I have already said, the USSR had its own strong school of nuclear physics, and by the end of the 1930s, Soviet scientists came close to solving the problem of atom fission.

Yes, the activity of spies helped, but this help was not decisive. The Russians would have solved the task assigned to them one way or another. When the Americans stopped their developments in the late 40s, and intelligence data stopped coming in, this in no way affected the work of Soviet scientists.

The first test of the Soviet atomic bomb took place in 1949, only four years after the Americans - the gap was very small.

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Nuclear dissidents

BBC: It seemed to me surprising, even to some extent unbelievable fact (you describe it in the book) that already in the early 50s, during the life of Stalin, Soviet nuclear scientists, working under the strictest discipline and under the threat of repression, began, however, to express doubts about the moral viability, the ethics of working on such a destructive weapon. Could you tell us more about this, and are these doubts the roots of the future dissidence of the father of the Soviet hydrogen bomb Andrei Sakharov?

Image copyright Getty Images Image caption Andrey Dmitrievich Sakharov

RodricBrate: Stalin and Beria understood - and for all the sinister monstrosity in their minds, they cannot be denied - that creative productivity from scientists can only be expected if they create at least somewhat tolerable living and working conditions. Scientists were placed in closed cities such as Arzamas-16.

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But inside, behind a barbed wire fence, there was a kind of oasis of freedom of speech, where it was not only about science, and from where - you are right - Sakharov's dissent grew, and even if not so radical and open, but, nevertheless, the dissent of others Soviet scientists.

Image copyright Heritage Image Partnership Image caption The ancient Russian city of Sarov, where the Sarov Monastery was located, was chosen as the location for the Soviet nuclear research center Arzamas-16. Pictured is a visit to the monastery royal family in 1903

It must be said that even in the official Soviet discourse one could encounter manifestations of these doubts. In this regard, two Soviet films come to mind: one, widely known, even the classic "Nine Days of One Year", filmed in the Khrushchev Thaw period. It is about this - about the morality, the ethics of what these scientists were doing.

At the end of the picture, a physicist dying from a large dose of radioactive radiation, his father says: "Maybe they discovered all this in vain? Look, what has it brought you to? Who needs it?" To which the son [actor Alexei Batalov] answers him: "The thought cannot be stopped." And to a direct question: "Did you make a bomb?" says: “I did. And if we hadn’t done it, we wouldn’t have this conversation with you, dad. And half of humanity, too.”

Image copyright ITAR-TASS Image caption Still from Mikhail Romm's film "Nine Days of One Year". From left to right: Alexei Batalov (Dmitry Gusev), Innokenty Smoktunovsky (Ilya Kulikov) and Tatyana Lavrova (Lelya). 1962

And the second film is actually about Kurchatov, "Choice of Target". At the end of the film, Kurchatov, already seriously ill, is talking to a young scientist. The film is fictional, but this scientist could well be Sakharov, who questions the morality of what he and Kurchatov are doing. Kurchatov replies to this: "Over time, people can condemn, even curse me for what I did. But I had to make my choice, the choice of purpose. And the main thing for me was to give my country a weapon with which it could defend itself."

And a Soviet scientist who emigrated from the country - unfortunately I do not remember his name - in his memoirs published after the collapse of the USSR about those scientists who worked on the bomb, says that they "sold their souls to the devil."

There were doubts, and they were not only among physicists, but also among politicians and even among the military.

Crisis as an engine of compromise

BBC:By the turn of the 1940s and 1950s, both major world powers possessed weapons capable of destroying not only the direct enemy, but the entire planet. Everyone was well aware of this. Why do you think it took another decade and a half of total desperate fear, culminating in the Cuban crisis, before the USSR and the USA were able to realize and formulate the doctrine of "Mutual Assured Destruction" with its witty English abbreviation MAD (mad) and start any kind of was it negotiations to reduce the nuclear threat?

RodricBrate: Politicians were aware of the threat - both Kennedy and Khrushchev were aware of it. But only the Cuban crisis exposed it in all its acuteness and forced them to start talking to each other and acting - the first such action was the Treaty on the Cessation of Atmospheric Nuclear Tests signed in 1963, followed by treaties on the reduction of nuclear weapons.

• Half a century of nuclear non-proliferation. How was the contract prepared and is it relevant?

Image copyright Getty Images Image caption The height of the Cuban crisis. Meeting at the White House on October 18, 1962. Left to right: Soviet Ambassador to Washington Anatoly Dobrynin, Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko and US President John F. Kennedy.

But the fear didn't go away. In 1983 there was another very acute crisis. Reagan later recalled in his memoirs that he suddenly realized that the Russians were deathly afraid of the Americans. "Why?" he wondered. "After all, we are not going to attack them at all." And soon after that, he got in touch with the next Soviet general secretary - fortunately, Mikhail Gorbachev was already in the Kremlin at that time. Well, the rest, as they say, is history.

Image copyright Getty Images Image caption Presidents Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev. First meeting November 19, 1985 in Geneva

Paranoia and the military-industrial complex

BBC: The level of "assured destruction" was reached by rivals in the Cold War very early, almost at the very beginning of the nuclear era. Nevertheless, for decades they have continued and continue to build up their nuclear arsenals, which now seems absolutely senseless.

RodricBrate: My book is called Armageddon and Paranoia. Paranoia was and remains on both sides. Each side fears that the adversary will be technologically ahead of it and will be able to blackmail or impose its policy.

Secondly, both in the USSR and in the USA there were many interested parties in the arms buildup. Both countries had their own military-industrial complexes, which, despite the antagonism of political and economic systems, exist according to similar laws. The military always wants more of the latest weapons, which is understandable. Weapons designers are passionate about developing new systems. And, finally, military factories - they make a profit, and in the Soviet system their leaders received bonuses. This whole huge, ramified system pushed the buildup of armaments. Yes, it was irrational, but a person is often, if not always, irrational.

Unstoppable expansion

BBC:You recalled the Treaty on the Termination of Atmospheric Nuclear Tests signed in 1963. More than half a century has passed since then, during which we have witnessed countless treaties on the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons and the limitation of their arsenals. However, the number of weapons is only growing, as is the number of countries possessing them. Is this process unstoppable?

RodricBrate: President Kennedy said back in the early 60s that in the 70s there would be about forty nuclear powers in the world. Today, in 2018, there are nine of them. That is, the situation is not nearly as bad as it could be. The logic by which countries seek to acquire nuclear weapons has not changed. All nuclear powers continue to develop new weapons. We blame Putin for this, but so does Trump, the British, the French, everyone. The reason for this is the same paranoia that we have already talked about. Everyone believes that he cannot allow his opponent to outstrip him in military equipment. Kim Jong-un and the Iranians are guided by the same logic.

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Star Wars and the collapse of the USSR

BBC:To what extent do you think Reagan's proclaimed "Star Wars" program led, as many tend to believe, to the collapse of the Soviet Union?

Image copyright Getty Images Image caption Campaign badge against the Strategic Defense Initiative announced by President Reagan in March 1983, which received the name "Star Wars" after the popular film

RodricBrate: That's a very difficult question. Gorbachev is known to have been assured by Soviet space specialists and the military that the Reagan program was a bluff and that there was no need to worry about it, that it would always be possible to launch a number of missiles with which the Strategic Defense Initiative [the official name of the program known as "Star wars" - BBC] can't handle it.

On the other hand, the then chief of the Soviet General Staff, Marshal Ogarkov, admitted that the USSR was far behind America technologically, and moreover, he said something that seems absolutely incredible today: we will not be able to overcome this gap until our system changes.

There were many reasons for the collapse of the USSR, and one can talk about it endlessly. But I don't think Reagan's "Star Wars" was the main reason. This happened for internal reasons, and would have happened sooner or later without the "star wars".

"Cutlet in Kiev" or how the West did not want the collapse of the USSR

BBC:During the collapse of the USSR, you were the British ambassador to Moscow. Now, more than a quarter of a century later, one hears many theories and evidence that the West as a whole and President George W. Bush were mortally afraid of the collapse of the USSR - precisely because it is a nuclear power.

RodricBrate: Of course we were afraid! I remember well how [then Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard] Shevardnadze said: "Do you want Yugoslavia with nuclear weapons?!" The possibility of the collapse of a huge empire and the acquisition of nuclear weapons by its national fragments was truly frightening.

We diplomats in Moscow understood that the Soviet Union was on the verge of collapse long before this realization came to our governments. By the end of 1991, this became obvious, but Margaret Thatcher did not want the collapse of the Warsaw Pact, she was terribly afraid of disturbing stability. Most people do not want change because of the fear of the unknown.

Image copyright Getty Images Image caption George W. Bush and Ukrainian President Leonid Kravchuk after Bush's famous "Kiev Cutlet" speech at the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine in Kyiv on August 1, 1991

Bush then made his famous speech in Kyiv, which went down in history under the joking title "Kiev Cutlet Speech". He called on Ukrainians to fight not so much for independence, but for the expansion of freedom. The Ukrainians never forgave him for this.

Little island machismo

BBC:One of the chapters in your book is titled "Small Island Strategy". Even in its title, one can see a condescending, if not to say disdainful, attitude towards Britain's nuclear ambitions. Indeed, maintaining and supporting, not to mention further developing and building up, the UK's nuclear arsenal costs the country a lot of money and is the subject of the most heated public debate. The same can be said about France - both countries seem well protected by the US and NATO nuclear umbrella. What is your position on this issue?

Image copyright Sally and Richard Greenhill/Alamy Image caption The famous British philosopher, mathematician and public figure Bertrand Russell at a sit-in anti-war protest demonstration in front of the British Ministry of Defense on February 18, 1961

RodricBrate: One of the reasons Britain has been developing and maintaining its independent nuclear program since the early 1950s is precisely because of its lack of confidence in US protection. The same applies to France - de Gaulle spoke in this sense quite frankly, and, unlike us, publicly.

British nuclear weapons are not fully autonomous, they rely heavily on American technology. But in the short term, we have the ability to make independent decisions - if we want to push the button today, we can do it without consulting America.

BBC:Both technically and politically?

RodricBrate A: Technically yes, politically I think it will be very, very difficult. But in principle it is possible.

• The possibility of a nuclear strike by Russia was discussed in the British Parliament

Interestingly, during the recent Trident debate [the program to deploy and operate the British nuclear deterrent - BBC] there was almost no opposition to her in parliament. Opposition Labor leader Jeremy Corbyn, known for his anti-war speeches in his youth, was forced to justify himself and fend off accusations of unpatriotism. That is, "Trident" has become a symbol of British patriotism, although, as it seems to me, this is not so much patriotism as a manifestation of machismo and an excess of testosterone.

Risk is with us all the time

BBC:We have talked a lot about paranoia, this concept is even included in the title of your book. Perhaps the peak of this paranoia was the height of the Cold War in the 1950s. Since then, the number and destructive power of nuclear weapons have increased many times over, the number of countries possessing them has grown markedly, and among them there is even North Korea, led by the not very balanced Kim Jong-un. However, today's level of fear and paranoia is not comparable to the fear and paranoia of the 50s. Why?

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RodricBrate: Yes this is true. Today everyone is talking about a new cold war, which, in my opinion, is absolute nonsense. In the old Cold War, the time lag for deciding whether to strike back was 15 minutes. That situation was extremely dangerous, and now, fortunately, it looks completely different.

BBC:How does she look now?

RodricBrate: In no way can it be called comfortable. Russia and America still have enough nuclear weapons to destroy the planet, China is constantly building up its nuclear arsenal.

I'll give you an example. The leading nuclear powers came to the conclusion that in order to deter the aggressive intentions of a potential adversary, they must be able to inflict "unacceptable damage" in a retaliatory strike. Russia and the United States proceed from the fact that "unacceptable damage" is two-thirds of the population of the enemy country.

There are opportunities, but the level of confrontation is still completely different. I do not believe that Russia and the US - no matter how worse their relationship - can reach the level of Cold War confrontation. And although paranoia has not gone anywhere, it is still of a different quality. And this is good news.

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BBC: What do you personally think: will nuclear weapons ever be used again?

RodricBrate: I consider this possibility unlikely. Accident cannot be ruled out, but a deliberate act seems unlikely to me.

But at the same time, I do not believe that the governments of world powers will at some point agree and completely abandon nuclear weapons. So the risk - at least the chance - will always remain with us.

Rodrik Braithwaite - diplomat and specialist on Russia

Sir Rodrik Braithwaite, 86, is a career diplomat. He represented the interests of his country in Indonesia, Poland, but his main diplomatic work is connected with Russia. In 1988, Braithwaite was appointed British Ambassador to the USSR. He spent four years in Moscow, and was already leaving the capital of another state - the Russian Federation.

Image copyright Profile Books Image caption The author of the book "Armageddon and Paranoia" Rodrik Braithwaite is a well-known diplomat and historian, one of the leading experts in relations between Russia and the West

Then for several years he was an advisor to foreign policy Prime Minister John Major and chaired the UK Joint Intelligence Committee.

Sir Rodrik's post-retirement historical studies betray his true interest: Russia, its past and present.

He is one of the best-informed specialists in relations between Russia and the West.

Rodrik Braithwaite has several books to his credit: "Russia in Europe" (1999), "Beyond the Moscow River. The World Turned Over" (2002, Russian translation 2004), "Breakthrough to Freedom. On Perestroika Twenty Years Later" (2005), "Moscow 1941: The city and its inhabitants at war" (2006) and, probably, the most famous - "Afghans. Russians at war" (2013).

Increasingly, the world media, experts, historians, analysts and politicians are raising the topics of a possible world war, in which the United States, Russia and China will participate. There is an opinion that a war between the great powers with the use of conventional weapons is inevitable. And you shouldn't be too afraid of it. Not only that, there are pluses: war accelerates progress. Some people are sure that even a nuclear war is not worth being afraid of.

Rick Searle, Associate Professor of Political Science and for Delaware Valley College, writer, analyst and fellow at the Institute of Ethics and Emerging Technologies (IEET), asked the question, "What makes a war between the US and China or Russia inevitable?" The scientist tried to give the answer in an article on the site.

The scientist recalls that there is a dangerous and not new idea, which is still talked about today: they say that a conventional war between great powers is inevitable, and it poses a much lesser threat to the existence of mankind than someone thinks. Moreover, it is even necessary for the progress of mankind.

The advent of such an argument in favor of war has replaced the earlier assertions that the concept of war has become obsolete, since history is characterized by tendencies towards prosperity and peace. However, the same was said in the 19th century. There have been many who have argued that war is becoming unnecessary as peaceful global trade allows profits to be made where war was previously required. Opponents of these “peaceful” ideologists, in turn, stated that war was the main vector of human progress and that without it, people would degrade.

An argument with clearly racist overtones, isn't it? It is precisely because of racism that such statements about the degradation of humanity without war are not accepted in intellectual circles. But instead, the war was associated with technological development: supposedly without war in general and great war for power in particular, people are doomed to a technological impasse. Ian Morris wrote about this, for example, in the book “War What is it Good For?”

Proponents of such technological "progress" for some reason do not take into account one simple thing: the conflict between the great powers can lead to the tragic prospect of an exchange of nuclear strikes. It may be that war drives progress, but it is better to move forward at a snail's pace than to return to the Stone Age through such conflicts.

Nevertheless, some people also make such an argument that a nuclear war will not completely destroy the civilization of earthlings. But it is unlikely that the broad masses will believe in this idea. Another thing is the spread of the idea that the great powers could collide with each other and still miraculously avoid using the full power of their conventional and nuclear forces, even with monstrous losses.

This is written, for example, by Peter W. Singer and August Cole in the book Ghost Fleet: A novel of the Third World War (Peter W. Singer and August Cole's recent novel Ghost Fleet: A novel of the Third World War), in which tells a fictional story about the Third World War using exclusively traditional weapons. The war is fought mainly at sea and is between the United States, China and Russia.

This book has been the subject of many studies. Perhaps it really does a good job of showing what the war will look like in the next ten to fifteen years. If only its authors are right, in the wars of the future, unmanned vehicles will operate underground, on land, in the air and at sea - in short, everywhere. Military operations will be conducted with the help of artificial intelligence.

Cyber ​​attacks will become a natural theater of war in the future. And so is outer space.

In World War III, advances in neuroscience and bioelectronics will be applied, at least where “extended and brutal” interrogations will be required.

The war will begin with a Chinese or Russian attack on American satellites, and this attack will "effectively blind" the US military. Some American equipment is vulnerable because elements of its devices are manufactured in Chinese factories.

As for the war at sea, everything in the book is “standard”: a surprise attack by the Chinese and Russians on US forces in the Pacific Ocean. Most of the American fleet is destroyed, Hawaii is captured.

The problem of the authors is that they are not aware of something. Are people able to control such conflicts? Without thinking about it, the authors do not remind that everything possible should be done to avoid conflicts. The book depicts a conflict bottled up in the waters of the Pacific Ocean. Neither the possibility of an exchange of nuclear strikes nor strategic bombing is taken into account. But how can this be in reality? Rick Searle strongly doubts this.

Uniqueness historical works Herodotus is that at that time for the first time one people tried to really understand their enemies. “The Greeks, as far as I know, were the first and only here,” the analyst notes.

In the book Ghost Fleet, the Chinese are reduced to the level of some kind of cardboard villains, with whom someone like D. Bond must fight. American control over the Pacific Ocean is fully justified, Washington's "heroes" are declared examples of virtue.

The weakness of such book "prophecies" is that their authors do not have access to true imagination. The motives, background, and "deep historical grievances" that would likely lead the Chinese or Russians into any such conflict are not even outlined in the book.

And this is where Rick Searle sees the main problem - "lack of understanding."

It is this misunderstanding that makes the great wars of mankind, if not inevitable, then at least more probable.

Many foreign experts, let us add from ourselves, are now hinting that the leading powers are heading for war right now. However, it is still possible to avoid it.

Recently, one expert considered a way around the military situation in relation to the PRC and the United States.

On the way of the coexistence of two states - China and the United States - there are many "Thucydides traps" in the international arena, says political scientist S.N. Yaffe. He shared his opinion with The National Interest magazine (translation source - site.

The "trap" referred to in the article is described by Thucydides in the "History of the Peloponnesian War". The two sides of the conflict, the Delian League (Athens) and the Peloponnesian League (Sparta), became hostages of an inevitable war caused by Sparta's fear of the growth of Athens' power. Nowadays, theorists use the concept of "trap" to describe the relationship between the United States ("administering power") and China ("rising power"), RIA "" notes.

Falling into the “Thucydides trap” for the US and China does not mean that war is inevitable, but it means that tensions in Sino-American relations will escalate due to the emergence of attractive and dangerous interpretations of “national interest”.

“The Peloponnesian War became inevitable (or, in other words, necessary) when Athens and Sparta no longer saw an alternative,” Jaffe points out. In his opinion, the United States and China should try to avoid just such a scenario in the conditions of a special interconnectedness of their development paths.

According to the scientist, Mr. Obama and Comrade Xi can fall into the "Thucydides trap" in the event that they refuse to recognize deep contradictions that cannot be avoided (and this is not possible already) due to a change in the balance in relations between the two states.

The same, let us add on our own behalf, may be characteristic of the deteriorated relations between the United States and the Russian Federation. If Washington refuses to recognize the changed geopolitical situation and continues to call Russia a “regional power”, then people from the White House, the State Department and the Pentagon, as well as from NATO, where Washington plays the first fiddle, will not be able to avoid the “Thucydides trap”. Russia will also fall into it if it keeps in mind “deep historical grievances” and does not insist on diplomacy.

Oh, the "trap" would have disappeared if the White House, following the model of not Thucydides, but Herodotus, would have tried to "understand its enemies"! But American strategists are accustomed to planning not to understand, but to reject everything that does not fit into their hegemonic doctrine. In addition, understanding the enemy is too difficult and fraught with concessions; another thing is to kill and become a winner, thereby confirming the status of a "great power".

This is why Professor Searle writes that misunderstandings make the big wars of the future more likely.

I decided to contact you for the following reason. The year 2012 has come. On the Internet, as well as in literature (magazines, books, newspapers) it is written that he is the last. My fears and phobias are: I am afraid of the 3rd World War and nuclear war and conflicts. I used to be afraid of supervolcanoes, now they have faded into the background.
The reason is that so many predictions are written on this terrible topic.
Also on the Internet and in books, information is being disseminated that there will be a Third World War. Or it has already begun. I still don't know if it started at all. The years of its beginning are called: 2009, 2010, 2011 (that is, the Third World War has already begun). There are other dates for the beginning of the 3rd World War: 2014 (according to Vanga), 2016, 2018.
Let's get straight to the point.
1. There are a lot of predictions on this topic in the media (especially on the Internet !!!), as well as in books and magazines. Especially a lot about this in modern literature. The fact is that I take everything (both predictions and prophecies) very close to my heart.

For example, a very terrible thing is being written, and I don’t know what to even think:
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Maybe we live in vain?
But the answer is here:
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"I believe that the author's fears about a possible nuclear war are irrelevant. Nuclear parity does not allow unleashing nuclear war and besides, EVERYONE already understands that there will be NO WINNERS in a nuclear war!
In the event of a mass nuclear conflict, the so-called "Nuclear Night" ("Nuclear Winter") may arise and the entire biosphere of the Earth will die and humanity will not survive, the scenario of this has been "calculated" by meteorologists and geophysicists.
With massive and close in time to each other explosions of several thousand nuclear warheads (nuclear conflict), in addition to shock waves from explosions near each of the explosions and radiation damage to significant areas of the planet's surface, another process comes into play - super-powerful dust-steam - smoke pollution by microaerosols of the atmosphere of the planet.

Both "Nuclear Night" and "Nuclear Winter" are not a myth, but a reliable scenario of what will happen to the Earth if humanity commits a nuclear suicide of life, and this is a GUARANTEE that this will NOT happen.

I don’t even know how to feel about the diary (that is, predictions) of this young man (17 years old) and about the French girl who predicted what would happen nuclear explosion. The parents "laugh" (they were especially "surprised" by the boy's age of 17).

If you type "Third World War", "Nuclear War" in Yandex, then there are a lot of sites on this topic. If you do not type anything, then nothing will be found.
I liked the conference, but these materials are outdated, and the prediction is fresh.
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Conference "NUCLEAR WEAPONS: IS A NEW WAR THREATING THE WORLD?"
As you can see, it is written in capitalized Scientific language. Me and my dad really liked it.

Other information is very outdated, but the predictions are fresh.
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This information is not entirely up to date, because it was written 10 years ago.

Now the most important thing. As you can see, there is a war going on in Syria. And a lot of different prophets and predictors write (and wrote before) that the 3rd World War has begun or will begin.

Also in "live journals" blogs, some different people wrote Operation "Big Thunderstorm" will begin:
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Dear psychologists!
Let's drop all predictions. Based on the current political situation, do you think it is possible to use nuclear weapons in the near future and are nuclear wars possible and will the situations described here come true (we close our eyes to any predictions)?

What do you think, who are the soothsayers Michel Nostradamus, Vanga, Casey and other "soothsayers" (modern and who lived before)? And was Nostradamus right?
After all, Vanga predicted the Second world war and the death of the Kursk (submarine).

And one person whom I met on the Internet wrote to me that there WILL BE NO NUCLEAR WAR!!!
So I don’t even know who to believe me (the parents laugh at the young man’s “diary”, but I take everything at face value).
Thank you in advance for your answer!
Sincerely, Alexey Vladimirovich.

Madeleine Sprenneter: I grew up in the shadow of the threat of nuclear war

American writer Madeleine Sprenneter writes that an entire generation of Americans is forced to live in fear of a nuclear threat.

I wouldn't be afraid of nuclear war, but my childhood was spent in St. Louis at the height of the Cold War arms race with the Soviet Union. The nuns at the school showed the children how to duck and hide in the event of a nuclear attack. We were taught to hate the USSR. There was talk in my neighborhood about building bomb shelters in our yards. But their construction was too expensive, and few people could fit there. Therefore, I was very worried.

We had a basement, or rather, a tiny cellar for storing fruit. Maybe it can be used as a shelter? But how will we live there without food and water? And is it possible to wash there? And if we dare to leave our shelter, what will happen to us? Are we all going to be destroyed by radiation? This is what a sensitive eight-year-old girl was thinking.

When the nuclear crisis in Cuba began in the early 1960s, I was a sophomore in college. Then we narrowly avoided a nuclear confrontation with the Soviet Union. In the mid-1960s and 1970s, during the Vietnam War, the US seriously considered using nuclear weapons. Then, in the early 1980s, Ronald Reagan announced the start of the Strategic Defense Initiative program, known as Star Wars.

Born in 1942, before the atomic bombs were used on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, I grew up in the shadow of the threat of nuclear war. But I got over my worries, especially after Reagan and Gorbachev signed the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty. But I have never been completely free from this fear.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union and the signing of the "nuclear deal" between the US and Iran, my fear seemed to disappear completely. But his ghost is still with me.

Does President Trump think that everything that is happening right now is none of his business?

Now the United States is not afraid of the growing power and influence of Russian President Putin. Our president is getting along with Russia while the risk of an escalation of the war with Kim Jong-un is growing. Although Trump once said that meeting with the North Korean leader would be an "honor" for him.

Now Trump insults Kim Jong-un, he - in response - insults Trump. The US president's security advisers are trying to use diplomatic options and also resort to economic sanctions against North Korea. But these measures do not excite Kim Jong-un. Its people have been starving for national identity and "sovereignty," and Pyongyang is ready to make that sacrifice again.

Now, whenever Trump insults North Korea, Kim Jong-un conducts another test of live missiles. Silly and childish words are one thing, but concrete actions are quite another.

This summer I was visiting friends in the San Francisco Bay Area. I was so horrified by this insane and needless escalation of tensions between the US and North Korea that the first thing I did in the morning was turn on CNN to see if we were already in a nuclear war.

I live in Minnesota and I doubt that Kim Jong Un will send his missiles here. Most likely, his first target will be the densely populated west coast: Seattle, Los Angeles or San Francisco. Some of my best friends and colleagues, as well as my daughter, son-in-law and grandchildren, live in this "nuclear risk" zone.

Now we are seeing natural disasters like the world has never seen before: Hurricanes Harvey and Irma, the earthquake in Mexico. Are these shocks not enough for us? Do we really need a nuclear war? Does President Trump think that everything that is happening right now is none of his business?

I wish Trump's advisers convinced him to stop tweeting alarms. And ordinary US citizens must take action to avert catastrophe.