Publication Laka-library:
Atom declassified: Second Collection: Half a century with the bomb (1996)
| Author | A.Yemelyanenkov, IPPNW |
| Date | 1996 |
| Classification | 2.34.0.00/22 (RUSSIA - GENERAL) |
| Front | 
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From the publication:
SIX MINUTES BEFORE DISASTER To the reader What can a physician think of when a mere six minutes are to go before a world disaster? This is precisely the time span humanity will live should nuclear missiles ever be launched. This is the minimum approach time. Fortunately, the missiles have remained on the ground so far. 1t is in our powers to prevent the world disaster. We are not the first to ponder over how that can be done. As early as the beginning of this century the Russian scientist V.I. Vernadsky warned of the potential perils of the then just discovered nuclear fission. With the advent of nuclear arms such scientists as N. Bohr, A. Einstein and L. Szilard, who had been directly involved in the Manhattan project, called for a voluntary ban on their use. In defiance of arguments by scientists and protests from the world public the first terrible experiment was staged In August 1945. Humans used nuclear arms against humans. That triggered a chain reaction in nuclear arms research in other countries, on the one hand, and fermented the anti-war movement, on the other. The largest congress of peace activists took place in Paris in 1949 to bring into being what is now the World Peace Council. The list of its members included scholars, public figures and cultural workers of world renown. F. Joliot- Curie perfectly formulated its main principle: «We are here not to ask peace of war- mongers, but to impose peace on them». About 30 years ago, at the call of Einstein, Russet and F. Joliot- Curie the Pugwash movement of scientists was founded in order to evaluate the dangers posed to humanity by the weapons of mass destruction. A number of other scientists, including physiologist T. Muller and chemist L. Pauling joined in. A Pugwash committee was set up In the USSR, too, Pugwash conferences and discussions on the effects of nuclear explosions on the general radiation of the Earth were a major factor for the conclusion in 1963 of a treaty banning nuclear arms tests in three media - the atmosphere, outer space and ocean depths. Soviet physicians and biologists took an active part in efforts by non- governmental anti- war organizations, and the record of their activity in that field is impressive, indeed. It proved very useful, when at the turn of the 80s Soviet and American physicians came up with the idea of a non- governmental organization called «International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War». Professor Bernard Lown and the member of the USSR Academy of Medical Sciences Yevgeny Chazov were its brain - fathers. They were united by the idea of physicians' responsibility for the future of humanity. The first congress in Arli, near Washington, in 1981 brought together delegates from eleven countries. Later in the same year, in July, the Soviet (currently Russian) committee of the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War was founded and 20 thousand scientists and physicians became its members. The Soviet committee focused on research into the likely health hazards of nuclear warfare and repeatedly briefed the Soviet and International public, governments and International organizations on its most probable effects. Research by medical scientists proved crucial to further research the World Health Organization conducted in 1983.
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