America. Einstein - the "father of the bomb"? As is known, in 1933 the National Socialist Party came to power in Germany, and soon the direct persecution of the supporters of the theory of relativity began. The country has aggravated unprecedentedly social struggle, anti-Semitic and

Oleg Lavrentyev is a nuclear sergeant from the destroyed Pskov. Winner

July 7, 2017 would have marked the 91st birthday of Oleg Alexandrovich Lavrentiev (1926-2011). This name, unfortunately, is little known in Russia, but in the history of the Soviet nuclear project, this modest, hardworking man turned out to be a unique personality. Even when information about him was declassified, and the history of the invention of the hydrogen bomb was published in the media, Oleg Lavrentiev's achievements were not taken seriously by everyone. The fate of this talented person is too unusual. As if his biography was invented by a screenwriter with a wild imagination.

Oleg Aleksandrovich Lavrentiev was born on July 7, 1926 in an old Russian city with great history- Pskov. His parents are from the peasantry of the Pskov province. Father Alexander Nikolaevich, who graduated from two classes of the parochial school, was a clerk at the Vdvizhenets factory, mother Alexandra Fedorovna graduated from four classes of the parochial school and worked as a nurse in a mother and child home. The family lived in Pogankin Lane in an old red brick house. The future scientist studied at the second exemplary school (now it is the Technical Lyceum).

Oleg Lavrentiev is a student of the second exemplary school in Pskov. The building of the second school, now the Technical Lyceum ...

In 1941, Oleg Lavrentiev, a seventh-grader from Pskov, read the book Introduction to Nuclear Physics, which had just been published, and forgot the author. Much later, the scientist wrote: “So for the first time I learned about the atomic problem, and my blue dream was born - to work in the field of nuclear energy.”

The war began, the occupation began. Already on July 9, 1941, the Nazis occupied Pskov. At the beginning of the occupation of Pskov, his bosom friend Volodya Gusarov was executed by the Germans. After the liberation of Pskov on July 23, 1944 from the German invaders, at the age of 18, Lavrentiev volunteered for the front, fought in the Baltic states. He was awarded medals "For the victory over Nazi Germany" and "XXX years Soviet army and Fleet.

Sergeant Oleg Lavrentiev on the coast of the Baltic Sea. Destroyed, but unsubdued to the enemy, ancient Pskov, July 1944 ...

At the end of the Great Patriotic War, immediately after the liberation of Sakhalin Island from the Japanese militarists, he was transferred to the Sakhalin Military District in the 221st Anti-Aircraft Artillery Battalion in the city of Poronaysk. He became a radiotelegrapher, and with sergeant's rubles he was able to order books and magazines on physics from Moscow through Posyltorg.

Without developing the topic, we still note what a powerful social and civilizational force the Soviet Union of the Stalinist model was. Albeit a talented nugget, but formally simple sergeant, serving in the middle of nowhere, could be on a par with the problems of the century and not just think about them, but try on how he would solve them. Systematic self-education began, especially since the command of the unit encouraged this.

And now, dear reader, let's turn to the memoirs and quoting of Oleg Alexandrovich himself.

H-BOMB

“After the end of the war, he served on Sakhalin. It was a good environment for me. I managed to retrain from scouts to radio telegraph operators and take a sergeant's position.

This was very important, since I began to receive allowances and was able to order from Moscow the books I needed, subscribe to the UFN magazine ( "Advances in the Physical Sciences"). The unit had a library with a fairly large selection of technical literature and textbooks. A clear goal appeared, and I began preparations for serious scientific work. In mathematics, I mastered differential and integral calculus. In physics, he worked out the general course of the university program: mechanics, heat, molecular physics, electricity and magnetism, atomic physics. In chemistry - Nekrasov's two-volume book and Glinka's textbook for universities.

occupied a special place in my studies. nuclear physics. In nuclear physics, I absorbed and assimilated everything that appeared in newspapers, magazines, and radio broadcasts. I was interested in accelerators: from the Cockcroft and Walton cascade voltage generator to the cyclotron and betatron; methods of experimental nuclear physics, nuclear reactions of charged particles, nuclear reactions on neutrons, neutron doubling reactions (n, 2n), chain reactions, nuclear reactors and nuclear power engineering, problems of using nuclear energy for military purposes. Of the books on nuclear physics, I then had: M.I. Korsunsky " atomic nucleus»; S.V. Bresler "Radioactivity"; G. Bethe "Nuclear Physics".

As a result, formally not even having a secondary education, Lavrentiev thought like a serious physicist, already in 1948 coming up with ideas thermonuclear fusion and a hydrogen bomb based on lithium deuteride. Thinking about the use of thermonuclear reactions for industrial purposes, he formed the idea of ​​electrostatic traps for plasma.

Sergeant Lavrentiev was a potential brilliant nuclear physicist, because genius is not only abilities, but also work. And from childhood he was taught to work hard by his family and the very way of life of our people of that time. And before the war, an atmosphere of heroism, search and creativity literally reigned in our society - this was the time of the creative take-off of all the best and talented representatives of our society.

23-year-old sergeant Lavrentiev served as a radio operator on Sakhalin and sent Stalin drawings of a hydrogen bomb ...

"The idea of ​​using thermonuclear fusion first appeared in me in the winter of 1948. The command of the unit instructed me to prepare a lecture for the personnel on the atomic problem. That's when the "transition of quantity into quality" took place. Having a few days to prepare, I rethought all the accumulated material and found a solution to the problem that I had been struggling with for many years in a row: I found a substance - lithium-6 deuteride capable of detonating under the influence of atomic explosion, amplifying it many times, and came up with a scheme for industrial use of nuclear reactions on light elements. I came to the idea of ​​a hydrogen bomb through the search for new nuclear chain reactions. Sequentially sorting through various options, I found what I was looking for. The chain with lithium-6 and deuterium was closed by neutrons...

What happened next was a matter of technique. In Nekrasov's two-volume book, I found a description of hydrides. It turned out that it is possible to chemically bind deuterium and lithium-6 into a solid stable substance with a melting point of 700°C. To initiate the process, you need a powerful pulsed neutron flux, which is obtained during the explosion of an atomic bomb. This flow gives rise to nuclear reactions and leads to the release of enormous energy necessary to heat the substance to thermonuclear temperatures ... "

In the above description, the scheme of the bomb in the elements is similar to the one that was transmitted by the American nuclear scientist K. Fuchs Soviet resident, only in it liquid deuterium is replaced by lithium deuteride. This design does not need tritium, and this is no longer a bulky device the height of a two-story house, which would have to be brought on a barge to the enemy shore and undermined, but a real compact bomb, if necessary, delivered by a ballistic missile or heavy bomber. Modern thermonuclear bombs use only lithium deuteride.

Below are excerpts from an article by O. A. Lavrentiev, published in the Siberian Physical Journal No. 2, 1996, published in an edition of 200 (two hundred) copies.

“What was to be done next? Of course, I understood the importance of my discoveries and the need to convey them to specialists dealing with atomic problems. But I had already applied to the Academy of Sciences, in 1946 I sent there a proposal for a fast neutron nuclear reactor. Didn't receive any response. He sent an invention on guided anti-aircraft missiles to the Ministry of the Armed Forces. The answer came only after eight months and contained one sentence reply, where even the name of the invention was distorted. It was pointless to write another message in the "instance". Besides, I considered my proposals premature.

Until the main task is solved - the creation of atomic weapons in our country, no one will be engaged in "pie in the sky". Therefore, my plan was to finish high school, enter the Moscow State University and already there, depending on the circumstances, bring my ideas to specialists.

In September 1948, in the city of Pervomaisk, where our unit was located, a school for working youth was opened. Then there was the strictest order forbidding military personnel to attend evening school. But our political officer managed to convince the commander of the unit, and three servicemen, including me, were allowed to attend this school. In May 1949, having completed three classes in a year, I received a matriculation certificate. In July, our demobilization was expected, and I was already preparing documents for the admission committee of Moscow State University, but then, quite unexpectedly, I was awarded the rank of junior sergeant and detained for another year.

And I knew how to make a hydrogen bomb. And I wrote a letter to Stalin. It was a short note, just a few sentences, that I knew the secret of the hydrogen bomb. I did not receive a response to my letter.

After waiting several months to no avail, I wrote a letter of the same content to the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks. The response to this letter was swift. As soon as it reached the addressee, they called the Sakhalin Regional Committee from Moscow, and a lieutenant colonel came to me from Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk engineering service(organs). As far as I understood, his task was to make sure that I am a normal person with a normal psyche. I talked to him on general topics, without revealing specific secrets, and he left satisfied.

A few days later, the command of the unit received an order to create conditions for me to work. I was given a secure room at the headquarters of the unit, and I got the opportunity to write my first paper on thermonuclear fusion. The work consisted of two parts. The first part included a description of the principle of operation of a hydrogen bomb with lithium-6 deuteride as the main explosive and a uranium detonator.

It was a barrel structure with two subcritical hemispheres made of U235 that were fired towards each other. With a symmetrical arrangement of charges, I wanted to double the speed of the collision of the critical mass in order to avoid premature expansion of the substance before the explosion. The uranium detonator was located in the center of a sphere filled with U6D . The massive shell was supposed to provide inertial retention of matter during the time of thermonuclear combustion. An estimate of the power of the explosion, a method for separating lithium isotopes, an experimental program for the implementation of the project were given ... "

THERMONUCLEAR FUSION

The second part of the letter is the idea of ​​controlled thermonuclear fusion (CNF), on which work has been carried out, so far unsuccessfully, for more than 50 years all over the world.

“In the second part of the work, a device was proposed for using the energy of nuclear reactions between light elements for industrial purposes. It was a system of two spherical, concentrically arranged electrodes. The inner electrode is made in the form of a transparent grid, the outer is a source of ions. A high negative potential is applied to the grid. The plasma is created by the injection of ions from the surface of the sphere and the emission of secondary electrons from the grid. Plasma thermal insulation is carried out by braking ions in an external electric field...

Of course, they hurried me, and I myself was in a hurry to finish the work faster, since the documents had already been sent to the admission committee of Moscow State University and a notification had come that they had been accepted.

After serving in the army, Oleg Aleksandrovich entered Moscow State University.

On July 21, an order came for my early demobilization. I had to wrap up, although the second part of the work was not yet finished. I wanted to include some additional questions related to the formation of a plasma formation in the center of the sphere, and my thoughts on protecting the grid from direct impacts from the particle stream falling on it. All these questions were reflected in my subsequent works.

The work was printed in one copy and on July 22, 1950 was sent by secret mail to the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks addressed to the head of the department of heavy engineering I. D. Serbin. (Serbin Ivan Dmitrievich oversaw the most important branches of the defense industry through the Central Committee, including nuclear and space technology, participated in the preparation of the flight of the first cosmonaut (hereinafter, notes by O.A.).

The drafts were destroyed, about which an act was drawn up signed by the military clerk of the secret office, foreman Alekseev and mine. It was sad to watch how the sheets, into which I had invested two weeks of hard work, were burning in the stove. Thus ended my service on Sakhalin, and in the evening I left for Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk with demobilization documents.

On August 4, 1950, the letter was registered with the Secretariat of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, then it was received by Ad hoc committee under the Council of Ministers of the USSR - a government body created by the Decree of the State Defense Committee of 08/20/1945 to manage all work on the use of atomic energy, the chairman of the committee was L.P. Beria. A letter was received from the Committee for review A. Sakharov, which was written on August 18, 1950."

From the memoirs of Academician A.D. Sakharov:

“In the summer of 1950, a letter sent from Beria’s secretariat came to the facility with a proposal from a young sailor Pacific Fleet Oleg Lavrentiev... While reading the letter and writing a review, my first vague thoughts about magnetic thermal insulation arose... In early August 1950, Igor Evgenievich Tamm returned from Moscow... He reacted with great interest to my thoughts - everything further the development of the idea of ​​magnetic thermal insulation was carried out by us jointly ... ".

Moscow State University student Oleg Lavrentiev.

Lavrentiev continues:

“I arrived in Moscow on August 8. The entrance exams were still going on. I was included in the group of latecomers and after passing the exams I was admitted to the Faculty of Physics of Moscow State University.

In September, already a student, I met with Serbin. I expected to receive a review of my work, but in vain. Serbin asked me to elaborate on my proposals for the hydrogen bomb. He listened to me attentively, did not ask questions, and at the end of our conversation he told me that another method of creating a hydrogen bomb is known, which our scientists are working on. However, he invited me to keep in touch and let him know about any ideas I had.

A month later, I wrote another paper on thermonuclear fusion and sent it to Serbin through the Central Committee expedition. But again I did not receive a response, neither positive nor negative ... "

Serbin Ivan Dmitrievich (1910-1981) party and statesman, head of the defense industry department of the Central Committee of the CPSU.

In October 1950 A. Sakharov and I. Tamm outlined the principle of the design of the proposed magnetic thermonuclear reactor to the First Deputy Head of the First Main Directorate N.I. Pavlov, and on January 11, 1951 I.V. Kurchatov, I.N. Golovin and A.D. Sakharov turned to L.P. Beria with a proposal for measures to ensure the construction of a model of a magnetic nuclear reactor.

"Two months have passed. The winter session has begun. I remember that after the first math exam, we returned to the hostel late in the evening. I go into the room, and they tell me that they were looking for me and left a phone number that I should call as soon as I arrive. I called. The man on the other end of the line introduced himself: "Minister of Instrumentation Makhnev." ( Makhnev Vasily Alekseevich- Minister of Atomic Industry).

Vasily Alekseevich Makhnev (1904-1965) - Soviet statesman, head of the secretariat of the Special Committee No. 1 under the Council of Ministers of the USSR 1945-1953.

This ministry was codenamed "Ministry of Instrumentation" and was located in Kremlin next to the building of the Council of Ministers.

He offered to come to him right now, although the time was later. So he said: "Drive up to the Spassky Gates." I did not understand right away, I asked again, and he patiently began to explain where to go. There was only one other person in the pass office besides me. When I received the pass and gave my last name, he looked at me carefully.

It turned out that we were going in the same direction. When we arrived at the reception, Makhnev left the office and introduced us. So I first met Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov.

On the minister's desk, I saw my second work neatly typed, drawing done in ink. Someone has already gone over it with a red pencil, underlining individual words and making notes in the margins.

Makhnev asked if Sakharov had read this work of mine. It turned out that he had read only the previous work and considered it very important. But we didn't get to talk much. This was only possible a few days later. Makhnev summoned both of us again, and again very late. We had an appointment with the Chairman of the Special Committee, the body responsible for the development of atomic and hydrogen weapons.

HELL. Sakharov 1949

It consisted of ministers, members of the Politburo and Kurchatov. The chairman was Beria, and the secretary Makhnev. The meetings of the special committee were held in the Kremlin, in the building of the Council of Ministers of the USSR.

We had to wait quite a long time, and then we all went to the building of the Council of Ministers of the USSR. We passed three posts: in the lobby of the building, at the exit from the elevator and in the middle of a rather long corridor. Finally, we ended up in a large heavily smoky room with a long table in the middle. This must have been the meeting room of the Special Committee. The windows were open, but the room had not yet aired.

Makhnev immediately went to report, and we remained in the care of young captains with blue shoulder straps. Thirty minutes later, Sakharov was called into the office, and ten minutes later, I was called. Opening the door, I found myself in a dimly lit and, it seemed to me, empty room. Behind the next door was an impressive office with a large desk and a meeting table attached to it in the letter T, from behind which a heavyset man in pince-nez rose ... "

L.P. Beria - First Deputy Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR, Chairman of the Special Committee No. 1.

While working on a book about Beria in 2007, Sergei Brezkun, then a senior researcher at the Department problem analysis of nuclear weapons of the Russian Federal Nuclear Center - All-Russian Research Institute of Experimental Physics (RFNC-VNIIEF), the city of Sarov learned from one of his colleagues the number of the Kharkov telephone of the physicist Lavrentiev, got through to him, and something like this conversation took place between them ...

- Oleg Alexandrovich, as far as I know, you met with Lavrenty Pavlovich Beria.

- Yes, I had one meeting with him ... By the way, I was with Sakharov.

– When was that?

– In 1951…

- What are your impressions of him?

- Good ... Firstly, he was an excellent organizer ...

- I know this, but he interests me as a person ... What can you say about this? Whatever you want, then say ... What impression did he make?

- Good ... Firstly, he left the table, he had a large table ... He came up, shook hands, said: “Hello”, invited me to sit down ...

- His very first question took me aback ... He asked: “Do you have a toothache?” I wondered why? Nothing hurts! And he asks: “Why is the cheek swollen?”.

- And they are always plump for me ...

Oleg Alexandrovich's cheeks were (and still are) really like those of a hamster. But how did a 25-year-old demobilized sergeant get into the office of Beria in 1951 - Marshal of the Soviet Union, member of the Politburo, deputy chairman of the USSR Council of Ministers and chairman of the "atomic" Special Committee? More on this later, but for now let's return to the already long-standing conversation in 2007 ...

- And then what?

- I started asking about my parents. My father was in jail at the time...

- And then?

- And then he wrote a good note to Vannikov, Zavenyagin and Kurchatov.

- And then?

- It was good too. They gave me a room in Moscow. They gave me money - I received the Stalin scholarship as an excellent student. They hired Kurchatov. We have prepared the program...

Silence on the phone...

- And then? - I can't stand it.

- Then Beria died, and all the bumps fell on me ... Although I only met him once.

Another pause, and then:

In the Atomic Energy Bulletin, I think in the summer issues of 2001...

At the end of the conversation with Beria, Oleg Lavrentiev waited for questions related to the development of the hydrogen bomb and prepared to answer them, but no such questions came up.

Let's give the floor to Oleg Alexandrovich himself: “I think that Beria had all the necessary information about me, my proposals for nuclear fusion and their evaluation by scientists, and these were“ bridesmaids ”. He wanted to look at me and, possibly, at Sakharov. When our conversation ended, we left the office, and Makhnev was still late. A few minutes later he came out radiant, in complete euphoria. And then something completely unpredictable happened: he began to offer me a loan. My financial situation was then critical, close to collapse. In the first semester, I did not receive a scholarship, my meager military savings ran out, and my mother, who worked as a nurse, could hardly help me. And the dean of the Faculty of Physics, Sokolov, threatened to expel me from the university for non-payment of tuition fees. Nevertheless, it was inconvenient for a student to borrow money from the minister, and I refused for a long time. But Makhnev persuaded me, said that my situation would soon change and I would be able to repay the debt.

On this day we left the Kremlin at one o'clock in the morning. Makhnev offered us his car to take us home. Andrei Dmitrievich refused, and so did I, and we walked from the Spassky Gates in the direction of Okhotny Ryad. I heard from Andrei Dmitrievich many warm words about myself and my work. He assured me that everything would be fine and offered to work together. I, of course, agreed. I really liked this person. Apparently, I made a favorable impression then. We parted at the entrance to the subway. Perhaps we would have talked longer, but the last train was leaving ... "

Lavrenty Pavlovich Beria

January 14, 1951 L.P. Beria sent B.L. Vannikov, A.P. Zavenyagin and I.V. A letter to Kurchatov, where he notes that the work on the creation of the proposed reactor is of exceptional importance, and gives specific tasks for the deployment of work. “Given the special secrecy of the development of a new type of reactor, it is necessary to ensure a careful selection of people and measures for the proper secrecy of work.”

In the final part of the letter, Beria wrote:

“By the way, we must not forget the student of Moscow State University Lavrentiev, whose notes and proposals, according to the statement of Comrade Sakharov, were the impetus for the development of a magnetic reactor (these notes were in Glavka with Comrades Pavlov and Alexandrov). I received Comrade Lavrentiev. Apparently, he is a very capable person.

Call comrade Lavrentiev, listen to him and make, together with comrade Kaftanov S.V. (Minister of Higher Education of the USSR) everything to help Comrade Lavrentiev in his studies and, if possible, participate in the work. Term 5 days.

Vannikov Boris Lvovich statesman, one of the leaders in the production of nuclear weapons. In 1945-1953 - Head of the PGU under the Council of Ministers of the USSR. Three times Hero of Socialist Labor.

Lavrentiev is invited to Glavk. “We went up the wide stairs to the second floor to N.I. Pavlova. (Nikolai Ivanovich Pavlov, head of the department of the Main Directorate, supervised the work on the creation of atomic hydrogen weapons). I've been waiting for a long time. Pavlov immediately called someone, and we went to the other wing of the building: the general was in front, then I, also in military uniform, but without shoulder straps.

We went, bypassing the reception room, straight into the office to the head of the Main Directorate B.L. Vannikov. I read the sign on the door. There were two people in the office: Vannikov in a general's uniform and a civilian with a salary. black beard.

Igor Vasilievich Kurchatov (1913-1960) an outstanding Soviet physicist, academician.

Pavlov Nikolai Ivanovich (1914-1990), organizer of experimental design work on the creation of nuclear weapons. Since 1950 - the first deputy. Head of the PGU under the Council of Ministers of the USSR, Hero of Socialist Labor.

Pavlov sat down next to a civilian, and they put me opposite. For all the time of my service in the army, I did not even have to see the general from afar, and here I found myself immediately in front of two. I was not presented with a civilian, and after the meeting I asked Pavlov who this man was with a beard. He somehow mysteriously smiled and replied: "You'll find out later."

Later I found out that I had spoken to Kurchatov.

He asked questions. I told him in detail about the idea of ​​using the energy of nuclear reactions between light elements for industrial purposes. He was surprised that the coils of the grid were thick copper pipes cooled by water. I was going to pass a current through them in order to protect it from charged particles with a magnetic field. But here Pavlov intervened in the conversation, interrupted me and said that I was going to insert an atomic bomb there. I realized that they were interested in my first offer ... "

Key Quality L.P. Beria - the ability to quickly and efficiently solve the most complex issues of the national economic complex of the country, involving leaders and specialists of any rank for this.

In 1945-1953 Zavenyagin Avramy Pavlovich (1901-1956) - Deputy L.P. Beria in the Soviet atomic project.

Report addressed to L.P. Beria: “On your instructions, today we called a 1st year student of the Physics Department of Moscow State University Lavrentiev O.A. to PSU. He spoke about his proposals and his wishes. We consider it appropriate:

1. Establish a personal scholarship - 600 rubles.

2. Exempt from tuition fees at Moscow State University.

3. Attach for individual lessons qualified teachers of Moscow State University: in physics - Telesina R.V., in mathematics - Samarsky A.A. (Payment to be made at the expense of Glavka).

4. Provide O.A. L. for housing one room of 14 square meters. m in the CCGT house at Gorkovskaya embankment 32/34, to equip it with furniture and the necessary scientific and technical library.

5. Issue O.A. L. one-time allowance 3000 rubles. at the expense of PGU.

Lavrentiev tells about the results of the conversation: “In order to finish the university in four years, at the suggestion of Kurchatov, I had to “jump” from the first year to the third. I got permission from the Minister of Higher Education for free scheduling so that I could attend first and second year classes at the same time. In addition, I was given the opportunity to study additionally with teachers of physics, mathematics and of English language. The physicist soon had to be abandoned, and I had very good relations with the mathematician Alexander Andreevich Samarsky.

Samarsky Alexander Andreevich (1919-2008) - an outstanding mathematician, academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Hero of Socialist Labor, laureate of the State Prize.

I am indebted to him not only for my specific knowledge in the field of mathematical physics, but also for my ability to clearly state the problem, on which its successful and correct solution largely depended.

With Samarsky, I carried out calculations of magnetic grids, were drawn up and solved differential equations, which made it possible to determine the magnitude of the current through the turns of the grid, at which the grid was protected by the magnetic field of this current from being bombarded by high-energy plasma particles. This work, completed in March 1951, gave rise to the idea of ​​electromagnetic traps...

A pleasant surprise for me was the move from the hostel on Gorkovskaya embankment, to a three-room apartment on the seventh floor of a new large building. Makhnev suggested that I take my mother to Moscow, but she refused, and soon one of the rooms was occupied. By a special government decree, I was awarded an increased scholarship, and I was exempted from tuition fees.

At the beginning of May 1951, the question of my admission to the work carried out at LIPAN (as the Institute of Atomic Energy was then called) was finally resolved by the group of I. N. Golovin.

My experimental program looked rather modest. I wanted to start small, with the construction of a small installation, but, in case of rapid success, I hoped to further develop research on a more serious level. The management reacted favorably to my program, since significant funds were not required to start it: Makhnev called my program “penny”.

But to start work, the blessing of physicists was required. I turned to Pavlov with a request to help me meet with Kurchatov ... "

"Rolling" my ideas, - Lavrentiev recalled about meetings with one of the leaders of the First Main Directorate (PGU) N.I. Pavlov - he arranged meetings for me with scientists, followed with interest our discussions, which were sometimes quite stormy. Then for me there was only one authority - science, and if I was sure of something, then I defended my point of view, regardless of anything.

Once Pavlov said that the "master" had called, he was interested in the affairs of Lavrentiev. Today, the top leaders of Russia do not find time for academicians, and Beria was interested in a talented student!

The circle of acquaintances grew: physicists D.I. Blokhintsev (Oleg knew him in absentia from a textbook on quantum mechanics), I.N. Golovin, mathematician A.A. Samara. Kurchatov offered to graduate from the university in four years, and Oleg jumped from the first year to the third, and soon he was invited to work at Laboratory No. 2 (the future Institute of Atomic Energy).

Everything was fine, but ... Lavrentiev is surprised to learn that Sakharov and There M also deal with issues of plasma confinement, however, due to the magnetic field. It was not until 1968 that Lavrentiev became aware that his first Sakhalin work had been reviewed by Sakharov, Tamm’s recent graduate student, and the ideas formulated in it set off a “chain reaction” of thoughts of Moscow nuclear physicists working on a project to create a hydrogen bomb.

“Our meeting with Kurchatov was postponed and postponed. In the end, Pavlov invited me to meet with Golovin, who was Kurchatov's deputy. In October, a detailed discussion of the idea of ​​an electromagnetic trap took place in LIPAN. In addition to Golovin and Lukyanov, one more person was present at the discussion. He sat quietly in a corner, listened attentively to my explanations, but did not ask questions and did not interfere in our conversations. When the discussion was coming to an end, he quietly got up and left the audience. Later, from a photograph printed in some book, I learned that it was There M. I still do not understand the reasons that prompted him to attend this meeting.

Although not immediately, but after a rather heated discussion, my opponents recognized the idea of ​​an electromagnetic trap as correct, and Golovin formulated the general conclusion that no defects were found in my model.

Igor Nikolaevich Golovin (1913-1997) experimental physicist, doctor of physical and mathematical sciences, professor. In the atomic project since 1944, in 1950-1958. - First Deputy I.V. Kurchatov. Laureate of the Stalin (1953) and Lenin (1958) prizes.

Unfortunately, this was only a statement of the fact that electromagnetic traps are suitable for obtaining and confining high-temperature plasma. There were no recommendations to start research, Igor Nikolaevich motivated this by the fact that there is an easier way to obtain high-temperature plasma - pinches, where there is already a good start, encouraging results have been obtained ...

I did not share Golovin's opinion, but it was useless to argue. Since I could not break through the experimental program, I took up theory. By June 1952, a report on my work was ready, containing a detailed description of the idea of ​​an electromagnetic trap and calculations of the parameters of the plasma contained in it. The report was sent for review to M.A. Leontovich(head of theoretical work on the CTS), and on June 16, 1952, our first meeting took place.

Leontovich began with a compliment: he was very interested in my idea and carried away so much that he himself set to work on the calculations to substantiate it. With these words, Mikhail Alexandrovich, apparently, wanted to sweeten the pill that was already prepared for me. This was followed by critical remarks, correct in form, but deadly in content...

My hopes of participating in the development of my first idea also did not come true. After the unsuccessful meeting with Kurchatov and my illness, the question of my involvement in the work on the creation of the hydrogen bomb was no longer raised. For some time, by inertia, I continued to deal with this problem, but then I completely switched to thermonuclear fusion ... "

On this memoirs O.A. Lavrentiev are ending, but the life of the country and work on a thermonuclear bomb continued intensively. The veil of secrecy will bury for a long time the significance of O. Lavrentiev's letter for the creation of thermonuclear weapons and controlled fusion.

Let's turn to the article by Sergei Brezkun

In mid-May 1951, Oleg received a permanent pass to Laboratory No. 2, also called LIPAN(Laboratory of Measuring Instruments of the Academy of Sciences). They worked a lot, the arrival of Beria was expected, who himself wanted to look at the experiments.

Lev Andreevich Artsimovich (1909-1973), head of the TCB program.

Lavrentiev meets Lev Artsimovich, appointed head of the experimental program for controlled thermonuclear fusion, with a value of scientific world the largest. It turns out that he read his first work, highly appreciates it. And then Oleg meets with G.I. Budker- the future director of the Institute of Nuclear Physics of the Siberian Branch of the USSR Academy of Sciences. He also read the work of a graduate of the evening school of working youth and treated the author very kindly.

At this time, Oleg lived on the Maxim Gorky embankment (several houses were built there for PGU employees). Everything seemed to fit together. At the end of June 1951, he was received A.P. Zavenyagin, asks about life, plans for the future, offers a ticket to a rest home. Meetings with Pavlov and Makhnev are not uncommon - Oleg wanted to implement his own experimental program (due to the insignificance of the required funds, the "curator" called it penny). But something got stuck.

Igor Evgenievich Tamm (1895-1971), an outstanding Soviet physicist, winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics.

In October 1951, a detailed discussion of Oleg's idea of ​​an electromagnetic trap took place at LIPAN. “There was another person present,” Lavrentiev recalled. - He sat quietly in the corner, listened attentively to my explanations, but did not ask questions and did not interfere in our conversations. As the discussion drew to a close, he quietly got up and walked out of the audience. Oleg later realized that it was Tamm. Half a century later, Lavrentiev will write: “The reasons that prompted him to attend our meeting incognito are incomprehensible to me.”

By June 1952, Lavrentiev issued a report with calculations of his trap and the parameters of the plasma contained in it, which he sent for review to Academician M.A. Leontovich, and on June 16, the first meeting of another major authority in physical science and a plump-cheeked stubborn man who recognizes only one authority - truth took place. Leontovich began with compliments, but then began to convince the author of the unrealizability of his ideas - both traps and a jet plasma engine for use in outer space.

Mikhail Alexandrovich Leontovich (1903-1981) - physicist, academician, Lenin Prize Laureate in 1958, author of works on plasma physics, radiophysics.

Leontovich "hacked" the report, although their meetings continued and the academician even wanted to take Oleg to graduate school. Later, Lavrentiev admits: “The conclusion of M.A. Leontovich delayed the start of experimental research on electromagnetic traps by almost five years. It was a great loss not only for me, but for our entire controlled fusion program.”

Moscow State University student Oleg Lavrentiev is a guy with strong nerves.

Oleg was a guy with strong nerves. He only wondered why Sakharov shied away from the topic of that part of Lavrentiev's Sakhalin note, which proposed a "real" hydrogen bomb. The very idea of ​​using lithium deuteride in a thermonuclear charge cannot be recognized as purely Lavrentiev's. The luminaries valued her very highly and admit that boy, devoid of intellectual grace, and even promoted by "it" Beria, also turned out to be on top, not even studying at Moscow State University, it was unbearable for them. However, I had to endure, hiding irritation. On the one hand, the obstinate could throw up interesting ideas, but on the other hand, he needs an eye and an eye ...

In the laboratory, the guy was perceived as a protégé of Beria. When meetings were held, he was often asked to go out for a walk. “Once, in my presence, they said that they had not been delivered capacitors. The capacitors were delivered the next day, and they thought it was me who had tried. But it was a coincidence! - recalled Oleg Alexandrovich. The guy was shunned in the lab. “When they recruited a group of nuclear scientists who went to Arzamas to work on a bomb, I was removed under a stupid pretext - they say, I was in occupation. It was very insulting!.. ”- Oleg Alexandrovich admitted ...

LAUREL AND STARS

Explosion of the first Soviet thermonuclear device RDS-6s

Lavrentiev described the principle of operation of a hydrogen bomb, where solid lithium deuteride. This choice made it possible to make a compact charge - quite "on the shoulder" of the aircraft. Note that the first American hydrogen bomb "Mike", tested two years later, in 1952, contained liquid deuterium, was as tall as a house and weighed 82 tons.

Many in the world today recognize that hydrogen bombs created according to the Lavrentiev scheme. And, oddly enough, these super-powerful bombs showed everyone the absurdity of the emergence nuclear war. It doesn’t matter who would have started it, but there were absolutely no survivors after the activation of the “Kuzka mother”. But in principle, even today the presence of a hydrogen bomb in Russia's arsenal saves us from final destruction by "sworn friends" from across the ocean. Who would doubt it...

Oleg Alexandrovich also owns the idea of ​​using controlled thermonuclear fusion(UTS) in the national economy for the production of electricity. The chain reaction of the synthesis of light elements should not go explosively here, as in a bomb, but slowly and in a controlled manner. The main question was how to isolate the ionized gas heated to hundreds of millions of degrees, that is, the plasma, from the cold walls of the reactor. No material can withstand such heat. The sergeant proposed a revolutionary solution at that time - a force field could act as a shell for high-temperature plasma. The first option is electric.

In the atmosphere of secrecy that surrounded everything connected with atomic weapons, Lavrentiev not only understood the structure and principle of operation of the atomic bomb, which in his project served as a fuse that initiated a thermonuclear explosion, but also anticipated the idea of ​​compactness, proposing to use solid lithium-6 deuteride.

Academician Julius Borisovich Khariton(1904-1996) - one of the creators of the Soviet atomic and hydrogen bomb, three times Hero of Socialist Labor against the background of the layout of the first Soviet atomic bomb - one of the few who did not succumb to pressure and did not leave in his statements and memoirs denigrating words about Lavrenty Pavlovich Beria and his hero of our story...

He did not know that his message was very promptly sent for review then to the candidate of sciences, and later to the academician and three times Hero of Socialist Labor A. Sakharov, who already in August commented on the idea of ​​controlled thermonuclear fusion: “... I believe that the author poses a very important and not hopeless problem ... I consider it necessary to discuss in detail the project of comrade. Lavrentiev. Regardless of the results of the discussion, it is necessary now to note the creative initiative of the author ... "

On the eve of testing a thermonuclear charge - the crown of many years of intense work on a nuclear project, Lavrenty Pavlovich Beria was shot ...

Stalin dies on March 5, 1953, Beria is shot on June 26, and on August 12, 1953, a thermonuclear charge using lithium deuteride is successfully tested in the USSR. Participants in the creation of new weapons receive state awards, titles and prizes, but Lavrentyev, for a reason completely incomprehensible to him, loses a lot overnight.

“At the university, they not only stopped giving me an increased scholarship, but also “turned out” the tuition fee for the past year, in fact, leaving me without a livelihood,” says Oleg Aleksandrovich. – I made my way to an appointment with the new dean of the Faculty of Physics Fursov and in complete confusion I heard: “Your benefactor is dead. What do you want?"

At the same time, my admission to LIPAN was withdrawn, and I lost my permanent pass to the laboratory, where, according to an earlier agreement, I had to undergo undergraduate practice, and subsequently work. If the scholarship was later restored, then I never received admission to the institute ... "

In other words, they were simply removed from the secret fiefdom. Pushed back, fenced off from him with secrecy. The young scientist could not even imagine that this could be so.

Participants in the creation of new weapons receive state awards, titles and prizes, but Lavrentiev, for a reason completely incomprehensible to him, suddenly loses everything. In LIPAN, his permit was withdrawn, and he lost his permanent pass to the laboratory. A fifth-year student had to write a graduation project without an internship and without a supervisor on the basis of the theoretical work he had already done on the CTS. Despite this, he successfully defended himself, receiving a diploma with honors. And another six months (!) It took to get a diploma.

However, the pioneer of this idea was not taken to work at LIPAN, the only place in the USSR where they were then engaged in controlled thermonuclear fusion. Referring to the fact that until 1944 Lavrentiev was in the territory occupied by the Nazis, he was not taken into the composition of young scientists who left for work in Arzamas.

Unable to get a distribution in Obninsk, after graduating from Moscow State University he goes to the Kharkov Institute of Physics and Technology. A young specialist with an unusual fate came to Kharkov with a report on the theory of electromagnetic traps, which he wanted to show to the director of the institute K.D. Sinelnikov. But Kharkov is not Moscow. The inventor of controlled thermonuclear fusion, one of the authors of the creation of the hydrogen bomb scheme, was settled in a hostel, in the room where he lived eleven people.

Kirill Dmitrievich Sinelnikov (1901-1966) experimental physicist, one of the prominent participants in the creation of the Soviet atomic bomb, head of Laboratory No. 1. Active member of the Academy of Sciences of the Ukrainian SSR since 1948.

So why didn't the sergeant, who arrived from Sakhalin, have a full-fledged entry into the society of Moscow's refined physical elite? And why did misunderstanding arise between them? Even worse is rejection. After all, it was clear to them that he was from where the bomb they and he created was needed. - From the Army that will protect peace on earth ...

And he, Oleg Lavrentiev, was simply removed from the secret estate. Pushed back, fenced off from him with secrecy. Naive young scientist! He even wrote a letter to Khrushchev, but the letter had no consequences...

He could not even imagine that this could be so. Oleg did not know that even before his arrival in Kharkov, Kirill Dmitrievich had already called one of the LIPANites, warning that a "scandalist" and "author of confusing ideas" was coming to see him. They also called the head of the theoretical department of the institute Alexander Akhiezer, recommending the work of Lavrentiev to be "cut to death".

But Kharkiv residents were in no hurry with their assessments. Akhiezer asked the young theorists Konstantin Stepanov and Vitaly Aleksin to essentially understand the work. Regardless of them, Boris Rutkevich, who worked with Sinelnikov, also read the report. Experts, without saying a word, gave the work a positive assessment.

Well, thank God! The influence of the powerful Moscow-Arzamas scientific and pseudo-scientific "team" could not spread over one and a half thousand kilometers. However, they took an active part - they called, spread rumors, discredited scientist... So quickly orienting in the changed situation in post-Stalin times, the scientific "fraternity" began to defend "its" territory from the introduction of "outsiders" ...

Gradually, Oleg made friends and like-minded people, and in 1958 the first electromagnetic trap C1 was built at the Kharkov Institute of Physics and Technology, in which a good agreement was achieved between the measured plasma values ​​and the classical ones. This was a major victory in the fight against plasma instabilities.

In the same year, when the secrecy of thermonuclear research was removed, it turned out that dozens of traps had already been created in the world. different types.

Application for opening

Oleg Aleksandrovich found out by chance that it was he who was the first to propose to hold the plasma by the field, having stumbled in 1968 (! 15 years later) in one of the books on the memoirs of I. Tamm (Head Sakharov). His last name was not there, only an indistinct phrase about "one military man from the Far East", who proposed a method for the synthesis of hydrogen, with which "... even in principle it was impossible to do anything." Lavrentiev had no choice but to defend his scientific authority.

Tamm and Sakharov understood perfectly well what was happening. What Lavrentiev came up with is the key that opens access to putting the hydrogen bomb into practice. Everything else, the whole theory has long been known to absolutely everyone, since it was described even in ordinary textbooks. And not only the “brilliant” Sakharov could bring the idea to material embodiment, but also another qualified physicist and techie who has unlimited access to material state resources.

And another interesting piece, in which the invisible the bony hand of the saboteurs with American money: This is already about the “period of stagnation”, when the advanced thoughts and developments of Russian scientists forcibly "stopped"...

Lavrentiev was confident in his idea of ​​electromagnetic traps. By 1976, his group had prepared a technical proposal for a large multi-slot unit "Jupiter-2T". Everything worked out extremely well. The topic was supported by the leadership of the institute and the direct head of the department Anatoly Kalmykov. The State Committee for the Use of Atomic Energy allocated three hundred thousand rubles for the design of Jupiter-2T. The FTINT of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR undertook to manufacture the installation.

“I was in seventh heaven with happiness,” Oleg Alexandrovich recalled. “We can build a facility that will put us on a direct path to thermonuclear Eldorado!” I had no doubt that high plasma parameters would be obtained on it. The trouble came from a completely unexpected direction. While on an internship at England, Anatoly Kalmykov accidentally received a large dose of radiation, fell ill and died.

Electromagnetic traps O. Lavrentiev

And the new head of the department offered Lavrentiev to design ... something smaller and cheaper. It took two years to complete the project of the Jupiter-2 installation, where the linear dimensions were halved. But while his group received positive feedback on this project from Moscow, from the Institute of Atomic Energy, the reserved work site was given to other projects, funding was cut and the group was offered to ... further reduce the size of the installation.

– This is how the project “Jupiter-2M” was born, already one third of the natural size of “Jupiter-2”, – states Oleg Aleksandrovich. - It's clear that it was a step back but there was no choice. The production of a new installation was delayed for several years. Only in the mid-1980s were we able to start experiments that fully confirmed our predictions. But there was no longer any talk about the development of works. TCB funding began to decline, and from 1989 it stopped altogether. I still believe that electromagnetic traps are one of the few thermonuclear systems where it was possible to completely suppress the hydrodynamic and kinetic instabilities of the plasma and obtain particle and energy transfer coefficients close to the classical ones.”

With American physicist Tom Dolan.

In 1968, foreign scientists met Lavrentiev at the Novosibirsk Conference on Plasma Physics. His works are quoted and referenced. The US physicist E. Clevans wrote: "Pioneer work related to electron injection experiments was carried out by Lavrentiev, and later studies were carried out by Dolan et al." However, they do not send abroad, even those invitations addressed to Oleg Alexandrovich, where the readiness of the host side is expressed to bear all the expenses, are ignored.

Only in 1974 did he travel abroad for the first time - to the GDR, to a conference on low-temperature plasma. A year later, he was graciously released to Lausanne. But more often they were denied travel, unlike a classmate and former neighbor in a hostel on Stromynka Roalda Sagdeeva who made brilliant career in the Brezhnev USSR and then "crowned" it with resettlement across the ocean.

In Sarov, at the Museum of Atomic Weapons, Lavrentyev and his colleague from Sarov Lazarev.

That's the fate "Physics from God", creator of nuclear weapons (hydrogen bomb) Oleg Lavrentiev. Despite several publications made by specialists based on the publication in the journal "Uspekhi fizicheskikh nauk" and Oleg Lavrentiev's personal memoirs published in Novosibirsk, V. Sekerin published articles (in "Duel" and in "Miracles and Adventures"), where he professionally proved the existence direct weaning"luminaries from physics" of the decision on the hydrogen bomb, obtained by a simple radio operator. The articles also provide references to L. Beria's secret order to include Oleg Lavrentiev among the developers of nuclear weapons as the initiator of the main concept of the solution. Alas, the recognition of a seemingly obvious fact is still far away ...

Evidence of this is an article by Valentina Gatash (Top-secret physicist Lavrentiev. The idea of ​​thermonuclear fusion was proposed by a sergeant for military service. Izvestia, 08/30/2003). In August 2001, the journal "Uspekhi fizicheskikh nauk" published a series of articles "On the history of research on controlled thermonuclear fusion", in which for the first time the case of O. Lavrentiev was described in detail. Also published here is his proposal, sent from Sakhalin on July 29, 1950, together with A. Sakharov's review and L. Beria's order. Only after these events of the end 2001 of the year Oleg Alexandrovich was able to receive the title PhD...

Lomonosov from Pskov

In 1968, at a meeting in Novosibirsk, Academician Budker said to Oleg Aleksandrovich in his hearts: "Gone good guy...". Recalling this, Lavrentiev wrote: “After these words, my vague guesses took on real shape. They simply “ruined” me, and when they “ruined”, it turned out that I did not enjoy high patronage, did no harm to anyone or anything ... "

Here Lavrentiev just made a mistake. He caused harm by the very fact of his existence. He wanted to live in a family of scientists, and there were clans, if we mean many of those who inhabited the physical Olympus. Lavrentiev was to blame for the fact that he worked at the limit of his strength. He loved physics in himself, and not himself in physics, but his antipodes appreciated in the first place its exclusivity, "selection".

However, Budker was still not quite right ... It’s impossible to say that Lavrentiev was so “ditched” - he was made from the wrong dough. He studied physics, became a doctor of science, launched his Jupiter-2M electromagnetic trap. And he was, without exaggeration, a world-famous scientist, the founder of the most promising direction, which is being developed today by dozens of research groups.

In the end, Lavrentiev's place on the "Golovin list" speaks for itself. This is a recognition of a scientific caliber in one's inner circle, an assessment according to the Hamburg account. He understood physics not through equations, although he knew how to build mathematical models. And the way Archimedes, Pascal, Galileo, Lomonosov felt the idea, feeling or guessing how the processes studied by thought develop in nature.

One of the Pskov fellow countrymen once asked Oleg Alexandrovich: does he see any parallels between himself and Lomonosov? After all, the great Pomor was also not very recognized, and he suffered a lot from academicians like Miller. Lavrentiev thought about it, at first shrugged his shoulders, and then narrowed his eyes and said: “What? Maybe so ... "It is surprising that even before 1973, O. Lavrentiev received answers to all his requests that nothing had been preserved and all the files of that period had been destroyed. He just needed a certificate for the State Committee for Inventions to approve the application for his new solution.

The presence of this work and its content was confirmed in writing by A. Sakharov, but the State Committee for Inventions required the original. And here is the corresponding ending of the article: “The KIPT Academic Council, after publication in the journal “Uspekhi fizicheskikh nauk”, unanimously decided to petition the Higher Attestation Commission of Ukraine to award Lavrentiev a doctoral degree based on the totality of published scientific works He has over a hundred of them. The Ukrainian VAK refused.”

There is another reference in this article proving plagiarism of "luminaries" O. Lavrentiev and in the concept of controlled thermonuclear fusion (CTF). After reviewing the decision on TCB presented by O. Lavrentiev, A. Sakharov decided to do it with Tamm. True, O. Lavrentiev proposed an electric field to hold charged particles, and Sakharov and Tamm decided to use a magnetic field - hence "tokamak". Moreover, O. Lavrentiev learned about the work of A. Sakharov and Tamm on a thermally controlled reactor from secret materials when he worked at LIPAN. A. Sakharov himself never mentioned this in conversations with him.

Today it is already known that "Tokamak" turned out to be a false direction and that it all ended in a huge "zilch" at the cost of tens of billions of dollars ...

Now you understand why Niels Bohr formulated an aphorism: “There is a community in the world worse than a bandit: it is a community of scientists” .

Let us now see what Academician Andrei Dmitrievich himself wrote Sakharov

“I began to think, as I already wrote, about this range of questions as early as 1949, but without any reasonable concrete ideas. In the summer of 1950, a letter sent from the secretariat of Beria came to the facility with a proposal from a young sailor of the Pacific Fleet, Oleg Lavrentiev. In the introductory part, the author wrote about the importance of the problem of a controlled thermonuclear reaction for the energy of the future. What followed was the proposal itself. The author proposed to implement a high-temperature deuterium plasma using an electrostatic thermal insulation system. Specifically, a system of two (or three) metal meshes surrounding the reactor volume was proposed. A potential difference of several tens of KeV had to be applied to the grids, so that the escape of deuterium ions was delayed or (in the case of three grids) the escape of ions was delayed in one of the gaps, and electrons were delayed in the other.

In my review, I wrote that the idea put forward by the author of a controlled thermonuclear reaction is very important. The author raised a problem of colossal importance, which indicates that he is a very enterprising and creative person who deserves all kinds of support and help. On the essence of Lavrentiev's specific scheme, I wrote that it seems to me unrealizable, since it does not exclude direct contact of the hot plasma with the grids and this will inevitably lead to a huge heat removal and, thus, to the impossibility of achieving temperatures sufficient for the occurrence of thermonuclear reactions in this way.

It probably should have also been written that perhaps the author's idea would be fruitful in combination with some other ideas, but I had no thoughts about this, and I did not write this phrase. While reading the letter and writing a review, I had the first, still unclear thoughts about magnetic thermal insulation. The fundamental difference between a magnetic field and an electric one is that its lines of force can be closed (or form closed magnetic surfaces) outside of material bodies, thereby, in principle, the "contact problem" can be solved. Closed magnetic lines of force arise, in particular, in the internal volume of a toroid when current is passed through a toroidal winding located on its surface. This is the system I decided to consider ... "

“This time I went alone. In the waiting room of Beria, however, I saw Oleg Lavrentiev - he was recalled from the fleet. Both of us were invited to Beria. Beria, as always, sat at the head of the table, wearing a pince-nez and a light cape draped over his shoulders, something like a cloak. Sitting next to him was Makhnev, his permanent assistant, formerly head of the Kolyma camp. After the elimination of Beria, Makhnev moved to our Ministry as head of the information department; in general, then they said that the MSM was a “reserve” for former employees of Beria.

Beria, even with some insinuatingness, asked me what I thought of Lavrentiev's proposal. I repeated my review. Beria asked several questions to Lavrentiev, then let him go. I didn't see him again. I know that he entered the Faculty of Physics or some radiophysical institute in Ukraine and after graduation came to LIPAN. However, after a month of being there, he had big disagreements with all the employees. He went back to Ukraine...

In the 70s, I received a letter from him in which he said that he was working as a senior researcher at some applied research institute, and asked me to send documents confirming the fact of his proposal in 1950 and my review of that time. He wanted to issue a certificate of invention. I didn’t have anything on hand, I wrote from memory and sent it to him, having officially certified my letter in the office of the FIAN.

For some reason my first letter didn't get through. At Lavrentiev's request, I sent him a second letter. I don't know anything more about him. Maybe then, in the mid-1950s, Lavrentiev should have been given a small laboratory and given him freedom of action. But all the LIPAN people were convinced that nothing but trouble, including for him, would have come of it ... "

How clearly visible from this passage are the spiritual sufferings of the great "father of the hydrogen bomb"- later the "father of Russian democracy"! At first, Sakharov remained silent, but Lavrentiev sent a second letter. After all, no one except Sakharov can confirm his authorship! The letters were either hidden in the distant Beria archives or destroyed. Well, okay ... Sakharov, after some thought, confirmed the facts of the existence of Lavrentiev's proposals ...

A review and reference by A.D. Sakharov found in 2001 on the work of O.A. Lavrentiev.

And now, as an additional illustration to our story, I want to dwell quite briefly on that segment of the life path that the young physicists Lavrentiev and Sakharov went through before meeting in Beria's office.

Lavrentiev, as we already know, went through a harsh school in a completely ordinary Soviet family, not having time to finish the Pskov school before the war, endured difficult years in occupied Pskov, volunteered for the war, having fought in 1944-1945 and having served as a reconnaissance and radio operator on Sakhalin until 1950, performing official duties and devoting all his free time to the education and study of his beloved physics and eager to study at Moscow State University in order to learn and devote himself to creating a formidable weapon to protect his great, beloved Motherland. He devoted his whole life to his beloved physics and work at the Kharkov Institute of Physics and Technology.

Oleg Lavrentiev - victorious warrior, 1945.

Andrei Sakharov graduated in 1942 from the last course of Moscow State University in evacuation, Ashgabat, until the end of 1944 he worked in a measuring laboratory in Ulyanovsk.

And Andrei Sakharov, who was born into a wealthy Moscow family on May 21, 1921. Father - a teacher of physics Dmitry Ivanovich Sakharov, the author of a well-known textbook on physics. Mother Ekaterina Alekseevna Sakharova (ur. Sofiano) - the daughter of a hereditary military Greek origin Alexei Semyonovich Sofiano - a housewife. Grandmother on the mother's side Zinaida Evgrafovna Sofiano - from the family of Belgorod nobles Mukhanovs. The godfather is the famous musician and composer Alexander Borisovich Goldenweiser. After graduating from high school in 1938, Sakharov entered the Physics Department of Moscow State University.

After the start of the war, in the summer of 1941, he tried to enter the military academy, but was not accepted for health reasons. In 1941 he was evacuated to Ashgabat. In 1942 he graduated from the university with honors. In 1942, Sakharov graduated from Moscow State University and left for the Ulyanovsk Ammunition Plant. Volodarsky, where he first worked at a logging site. In 1943, he got a good job as an engineer in a factory laboratory, invented a very useful magnetic method for controlling the hardening of projectile cores. He also plants potatoes and gets married. In July 1944, he writes an application for admission to graduate school exams.

At the end of 1944, he entered the FIAN graduate school (supervisor - I.E. Tamm). Until his death, he was a member of the FIAN. In 1947 he defended his PhD thesis. At the request of Academician Tamm, he was hired by MPEI. In 1948 he was enrolled in a special group and until 1968 worked in the development of thermonuclear weapons, participated in the design and development of the first Soviet hydrogen bomb according to the scheme called "Sakharov's puff". At the same time, Sakharov, together with I.E. Tamm in 1950-1951 carried out work on a controlled thermonuclear reaction.

So, what do our heroes do in their later years?

Oleg Alexandrovich devoted his whole life to finding a solution to the problems of controlled thermonuclear fusion in order to obtain the energy that is so necessary for mankind. I was deeply worried about the collapse of my once great beloved country - the Soviet Union ...

Ph.D. Sci. Oleg Alexandrovich Lavrentiev at his workplace at KIPT.

And after participating in the creation of a hydrogen bomb and the Tsar Bomba, the so-called "Kuzkin's mother", Sakharov proposed to implement the T-15 nuclear torpedo project with a ramjet engine with a 100-megaton charge to destroy US coastal ports with inevitable very large human casualties, “cannibalistic character” (expressions of Andrei Dmitrievich himself), who were shocked even by the Soviet admirals and marshals who went through the Great Patriotic War ...

According to Valentin Falin, Sakharov proposed a project for placing heavy-duty nuclear warheads along maritime borders Pacific and Atlantic coasts of the USA.

Nobel laureate, human rights activist Sakharov, treated kindly and beloved by the West, at the First Congress of People's Deputies of the USSR during the performance of the USSR anthem...

Since the late 60s of the last century, especially after meeting and marrying Elena Boner, Andrei Dmitrievich turned to the other extreme, he moved away from solving issues and problems of nuclear physics and completely focused on political and human rights activities ... After receiving the Nobel Peace Prize in 1975, Sakharov was actually actively engaged in the destruction of the USSR.

During the years of Gorbachev's perestroika, being a delegate to the First Congress of People's Deputies of the USSR, he wrote a draft of a new constitution in accordance with fashion trends ... the then policy of the US State Department (?!) towards the USSR - the "Law on Enslaved Peoples". According to him, Russia itself (not to mention the USSR and its constituent republics) was proposed to be divided into at least seven puppet pseudo-states.

Sakharov acted like a real Enemy of the people when he began to voice "great plans" for the reorganization of Russia. The essence of all his plans was to destroy the USSR (Great Russia). At the first stage, Sakharov proposed to divide the state into small independent regions, and at the second stage, to put them under the control of the world government. HELL. Sakharov called it "a political expression of rapprochement with the West."

Draft constitution, compiled by Sakharov, proposed declaring the complete independence of all national-territorial republics and autonomous regions of the USSR, including Tatarstan, Bashkiria, Buryatia, Yakutia, and Chukotka. Yamal-Nenets autonomous region. Each republic was to have all the trappings of independence - a financial system (printing their own money), armed forces, law enforcement agencies, etc.

The rest of Russia seemed to the academician too big, so he suggested dividing it into four parts as well. In addition, Sakharov proposed dividing the world community into a “clean” part (environmentally friendly, favorable for living), and exporting all “dirty”, harmful industries to other regions. It is clear that the areas former USSR should have been the location of "dirty" industries ...

Both heroes have life results worthy of their fate, they fully correspond to what they have gone through. life path... Who is more valuable to mother history?

For you, dear Reader, I have no ready answer...

Think and decide for yourself...

Good luck to you, prosperity and a peaceful sky!

Today, Oleg Aleksandrovich Lavrentiev is best known to nuclear scientists - both gunsmiths and those who deal with the peaceful problem of controlled thermonuclear fusion (CNF). This is due to the fact that Oleg Alexandrovich expressed two fundamental ideas in his youth. One fundamentally changed the appearance of atomic weapons, transferring them into the "thermonuclear" category. But the same idea was independently expressed by V.L. Ginzburg, a young theorist from the group of I.E. Tamm, and it was she who gave impetus to the practical creation of the first Soviet thermonuclear bomb. On the other hand, Lavrentiev's priority in relation to the second idea, related to the energy dream of mankind - controlled thermonuclear fusion, is absolute and is now universally recognized.

In 2009, the so-called Golovin's list, found by the son of the largest Soviet physicist L.A. Artsimovich Denis in the papers of the late father. Entitled "The creators of the Soviet thermonuclear", it was compiled by I.N. Golovin, who himself was one of the founders of this direction, and included fifty names. Among them are academicians I.V. Kurchatov, L.A. Artsimovich, A.M. Budker, M.A. Leontovich, K.D. Sinelnikov, V.D. Shafranov, E.P. Velikhov, R.Z. Sagdeev, R.A. Demerkhanov ... However, they were taken out separately and stood immediately under the heading only three names, joined by a curly brace and marked "initiators": Lavrentiev, Sakharov, There M. Moreover, the first name stood in this place by no means only in alphabetical order.

The “thermonuclear” priority of Lavrentiev was peculiarly recorded by Academician V.D. Shafranov. In 1967, parodying The History of the Russian State from Gostomysl to Timashev, he wrote "The history of the opium fusion". Opiysky - this is from the OPI - the Department of Plasma Research of the Institute of Atomic Energy. I.V. Kurchatov. The story began like this:

Listen guys
Your history.
It all started with a soldier
Serving in the ranks.

Himself thick-cheeked,
Lavrenty name,
In the Far East
The man served.

This is the uncle
That he served in the army
No nuclear fusion explosion
Offered to arrange.

He imitates the sun
Thinking about thermonuclear...

That's the way it was- it all started with the soldier Lavrentiev, who from a young age puzzled over how to curb "solar" processes on Earth. His early idea, dating back to the late 40s, about the possibility of confining high-temperature plasma electrostatic field was completely independent. With its comprehension, both Soviet and world research in the field of thermonuclear energy began.

This was followed by the Sakharov-Tamm magnetic toroidal reactor, "Tokamak" Artsimovich, who made this word international, the world's passion for "tokamaks" ... Lavrentiev's idea was for the scientists of the world the same as for a traveler who does not know where to go in the pitch darkness of the night steppe, it turns out to be a distant light. He flashed, and the direction of movement was determined.

Not immediately, but this was officially recognized in the 70s, including by Academician A.D. Sakharov, who is considered the father of not only the Soviet hydrogen bomb, but also the Soviet thermonuclear. However, this honorary informal title should also be attributed to Oleg Alexandrovich Lavrentiev.

In August 2001, Lavrentiev's personal file and his proposal to B.L. Ioffe. Siberian Physics Journal. No. 2. 1966. P. 70, sent from Sakhalin on July 29, 1950, reviewer Sakharov's review and Beria's instructions, which were stored in the Presidential Archive Russian Federation in a special folder classified as secret.

It should be noted that Lavrentiev, along with Ginzburg, proposed to use lithium deuteride ( LiD) as a thermonuclear fuel, and the idea of ​​a hydrogen bomb was formulated, which served to some extent as a catalyst for the movement of our nuclear physicists in the right direction in its practical implementation. Lavrentiev himself directly to work on the hydrogen bomb in Arzamas was not admitted under the formal pretext that until 1944 he was in the territory occupied by the Nazis in Pskov.

The indisputable role of Lavrentiev lies in the initial initiation of work on controlled thermonuclear fusion. Unfortunately from practical work in this direction after the death of his “well-wisher L.P. Beria" from, too, was, as it were, more correctly expressed - physically pushed aside and removed, by a "voluntary" move to Kharkov to work at the KhPTI. In many countries of the world, research is being carried out on CTS. The key idea behind these studies is idea of ​​O.A. Lavrentiev 1950 on the thermal insulation of the plasma field.

This is how the plasma inside the START tokamak looks like.

I will give an excerpt from the book of B.S. Gorobets “Nuclear Revenge of the USSR”, published in 2014: “To the question of a journalist, but they say that Sakharov invented the hydrogen bomb, Vitaly Lazarevich Ginzburg answered: “No. After all, where was the difficulty? It is necessary that the atoms of deuterium and tritium unite, and the reaction starts. How to bring them closer? Sakharov proposed his own method of compression - using layers of solid matter and deuterium. And I suggested using lithium-6. The fact is that tritium is needed for the reaction - radioactive element, which is extremely difficult to obtain. So I proposed to use such a reaction, as a result of which tritium is obtained by itself - already in the bomb. And this idea went ... "

Vitaly Lazarevich Ginzburg (1916-2009) theoretical physicist, doctor of physical and mathematical sciences, professor. Academician of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR, Nobel laureate for the creation of a semi-phenomenological theory of superconductivity. Quote: “I understand patriotism as follows: to the best of his ability, a person should try to educate the population. Do whatever is good for your country. The state and the country should strive to educate the population.”

Really went. Stated by Ginzburg for the first time in a report dated March 3 1949 the idea of ​​a solid product - lithium deuteride(more precisely, in Ginzburg - lithium deuteride-tritide) as the main thermonuclear "fuel" was correct, but by no means obvious. Suffice it to recall that in the United States the first thermonuclear explosive device "Mike", detonated on November 1, 1952 at Bikini Atoll, gave a yield of 10 Mt, but contained a cryostat with a liquid tritium-deuterium mixture and weighed 74 tons. It was a demonstration of a principle that was in no way converted into an aviation version. Sakharov's Sloyka and Ginzburg's lithium idea gave us the first Soviet thermonuclear bomb RDS-6s.

But sergeant Lavrentiev came to the most important "weapon" idea on his own - back on Sakhalin, and before Ginzburg - in the winter 1948 years, reflecting on the possibility of using thermonuclear reactions for energy purposes. Lavrentiev immediately focused on radiation-safe lithium deuteride 6LiD, promising and for the bomb. And his idea was not lost on a real time scale - the liveliest interest was shown in Moscow to it and to its author.

It is unfortunate that in our time it is even difficult to imagine that, for example, the Prime Minister of Russia or the Deputy Prime Minister will spend his personal time, seek funds and resources to resolve issues of arranging the studies of a talented young man or girl at Moscow State University or another leading Russian university for state account, as did the First Deputy Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR, Chairman of the Special Committee in the difficult post-war period Lavrenty Pavlovich Beria...

“To regret the past is empty. The main thing is that I did what I was interested in!” - said in his declining years, our compatriot, an outstanding physicist Oleg Alexandrovich Lavrentiev. Getting used to the history of the life and work of the Russian physicist Lavrentiev, it is easy for the interested reader to understand that he was an outstanding scientist who lived in science, and at the same time an outstanding son of the Fatherland, a Russian Soviet patriot.

On September 4, 2007, Patriarch Alexy II of Moscow and All Russia presented a letter to Oleg Alexandrovich Lavrentiev for sacrificial service to the Fatherland and a significant contribution to the creation of a nuclear weapons complex.

The scientist died on February 10, 2011 at the age of 85. He was buried in a cemetery in the village of Lesnoye near Kharkov, next to his wife.

It is easy to come to the conclusion that the name of Oleg Alexandrovich Lavrentiev is worthy of the widest popularization and reverence. We need to understand this at least now, when Russia needs the memory of the physicist Lavrentiev more than the late Oleg Alexandrovich, an organically modest person, as, in fact, it should be for a personality great not only in his professional talents, but also in human essence.

His name is becoming more and more honored in Sarov, where he could and should have worked and where, better than anywhere else, they are able to appreciate the essence of his pioneering weapons ideas, even if they did not become the practical basis for the development of domestic thermonuclear charges.

After all, the phenomenon of Lavrentiev does not detract from the merits of Andrei Sakharov and his colleagues in KB-11. The purely scientific scale of Oleg Alexandrovich's ideas is first-class. It is not for nothing that one of the leading theoreticians of Sarov, Doctor of Technical Sciences, wrote about him warmly and respectfully more than once. B.D. Bondarenko- the person himself is non-standard and ruffy.

On the occasion of the 90th anniversary of the scientist in Pskov, on the basis of the State Technical University, scientific and practical conference- a possible prototype of the annual Laurentian readings, but this is only the beginning of the return of one of its great names to Russia.

Boris Paton congratulates O.A. Lavrentiev Happy Anniversary. In March 2004, when visiting the NSC Kharkov Institute of Physics and Technology, President L.D. Kuchma met with Oleg Lavrentiev.

Gradually, his name becomes popular in his homeland - in the ancient Pskov, a city so close to Russian history that the birth of Lavrentiev here can be considered symbolic. After the "black redistribution" of 1991, Kharkov was outside the Motherland, there was no way to leave, and the years were not the same. But when Lavrentiev began to be courted, hinting at the possibility of conferring the title of Hero of Ukraine, he rejected all advances. But he was proud of the title honorary citizen Pskov, and now there on the house where O.A. Lavrentiev, installed memorial plaque in honor of the outstanding Russian nuclear physicist.

Commemorative plaque in Pskov on the house where the outstanding nuclear physicist Oleg Lavrentiev lived until 1944 in the future.

Deputy head of the Pskov city administration Alexander Kopylov and lecturer at the Pskov State Pedagogical University open a memorial plaque on the house of Oleg Alexandrovich.

It was once pointed out that talent by itself only property of the mind, and even a scoundrel can be talented. Also important is the character, the moral core, only they create a genius. Oleg Lavrentiev was a talent with a strong human core in his soul. There are never many such people, and to pay tribute to them is not only a duty, but also the right of descendants.

Young Lavrentiev dreamed of giving people energy abundance, but he, a soldier of the Great Patriotic War, could not help but think about how to protect the peace and security of Russia from a thermonuclear threat. And a similar synthesis of the two sides scientific life Oleg Alexandrovich Lavrentiev only enhances the greatness of his figure.

Declassification expert, nuclear anti-aircraft charge designer B.D. Bondarenko appreciated the genius of Pskov and wrote the book “How the student decided world problem”, which is awarded to all those who entered the Moscow Engineering and Technical Institute (MEPhI - the forge of nuclear scientists in Russia).

The people of Pskov collected signatures on awarding Oleg Alexandrovich the title of Hero of Russia (posthumously) and the creation of the Oleg Lavrentiev Center in Pskov. Unfortunately, I don’t know how this initiative ended, but the Lavrentiev Center did not appear on Pskov land ...

LIST OF LINKS

1) http://vpk-news.ru/articles/31...

2) http://bookre.org/reader?file=...

3) "Siberian Physical Journal" No. 2, Novosibirsk, 1996.

4) G.A. Goncharov. UFN 171. No. 8. 2001.

5) "Atomic Energy Bulletin" TsNIIUEI Rosatom, Moscow, No. 7, 2001

6) B.D. Bondarenko. UFN 171. No. 8. 2001.

7) V.D. Shafranov. UFN 171. No. 8. 2001.

8) http://www.zn.ua/3000/3760/414...

9) http://www.sakharov-archive.ru...

10) https://topwar.ru/34956-mif-ob...

11) B.L. Ioffe. Siberian Physics Journal. No. 2. 1966, p. 70

12) http://velikieberega.blogspot....

Oleg Lavrentiev. In the beginning there was a soldier

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In 1948, Oleg Lavrentiev, a sergeant in one of the units located on Sakhalin, sent a letter to Stalin with a single phrase: "I know the secret of the hydrogen bomb." At that time, the USSR did not even have an atomic bomb, while the idea of ​​a hydrogen bomb, according to Sakharov's memoirs, had "a very vague outline." The first letter in the secretariat of the leader was ignored, and after the second, a colonel of the NKVD was sent to the unit where the young sergeant served, who, having checked the adequacy of the author, took him to Moscow to Beria.

In 1950, Lavrentiev formulated the principle of thermal insulation of plasma by an electrostatic field "for the purpose of industrial utilization of thermonuclear reactions." The fathers of the Russian hydrogen bomb rejected the idea of ​​an inventor with a seven-year education, however, and proposed to hold the plasma with an electromagnetic field.
In 1950, Sakharov and Tamm carried out calculations and detailed studies and proposed a scheme for a magnetic thermonuclear reactor. Such a device is essentially a hollow donut (or torus), on which a conductor is wound, forming a magnetic field. (Hence its name - a toroidal chamber with a magnetic coil, in abbreviated form - tokamak - became widely known not only among physicists).

In order to heat the plasma in this device to the required temperatures, a magnetic field is used to excite electricity, the power of which reaches 20 million amperes. It is worth recalling that modern man-made materials deal with a maximum of 6 thousand degrees Celsius (for example, in rocket technology) and after a single use they are only suitable for scrap. At 100 million degrees, any material will evaporate, so a very high magnetic field must keep the plasma in a vacuum inside the “donut”. The field does not allow charged particles to fly out of the “plasma cord” (the plasma is in a tokamak in a compressed and twisted form and looks like a cord), but the neutrons formed during the fusion reaction are not delayed by the magnetic field and transfer their energy to the internal walls of the installation (blanket), which are water cooled. The resulting steam can be sent to a turbine, just like in conventional power plants.

In the early 1950s, Lyman Spitzer, an American astronomer and physicist who worked at the Princeton Laboratory, had similar thoughts on curbing the thermonuclear reaction. He proposed a slightly different way of magnetically confining the plasma in a device called the "stellarator". It holds the plasma magnetic fields, created only by external conductors, in contrast to the tokamak, where a significant contribution to the creation of the field configuration is made by the current flowing through the plasma itself.

In 1954, the first tokamak was built at the Institute of Atomic Energy. At first, they did not spare money for the implementation of the idea: the military saw in such a reactor a source of neutrons for enriching nuclear materials and producing tritium. At first, even Sakharov believed that ten to fifteen years remained before the practical production of energy on such installations. The first to understand the ambiguity of prospects using controlled thermonuclear fusion was the military, and when in 1956 academician Igor Kurchatov asked Khrushchev to declassify this topic, they did not object. It was then that we learned about stellarators, and the Americans - about tokamaks.

Yes, the rise of our science in the post-war period was colossal, and when I entered the Faculty of Physics of Moscow State University in 1955, I took the advanced laboratory equipment for granted, and when I did an internship in Obninsk at the first nuclear power plant, I generally lived in paradise and mastered in the library and even kept the latest Western magazine and book production, including the most authoritative English and German-language publications on philosophy.

And what was the fate of Oleg Lavrentiev after the execution of his patron Lavrenty Beria in 1953. By the way, Lavrentiev spoke about Beria in Karaulov's TV program "The Moment of Truth" very respectfully ("good man!"). Journalist Valentina Gatash in the article Top-secret physicist Lavrentiev writes:

“Oleg Lavrentiev was born in 1926 in Pskov. Having read the book "Introduction to Nuclear Physics" in the 7th grade, he had a burning dream to work in the field of nuclear energy. But the war began, the occupation, and when the Germans were driven out, Oleg volunteered for the front. The young man met the victory in the Baltic states, but again his studies had to be postponed - he had to continue military service on Sakhalin, in the small town of Poronaysk.

Here he returned to nuclear physics. In the unit there was a library with technical literature and university textbooks, and Oleg, on his sergeant's allowance, subscribed to the journal "Advances in Physical Sciences". The idea of ​​a hydrogen bomb and controlled thermonuclear fusion first came to him in 1948, when the command of the unit, which distinguished a capable sergeant, instructed him to prepare a lecture on the atomic problem.

Having a few free days for preparation, I rethought all the accumulated material and found a solution to the issues that I had been struggling with for more than one year, - says Oleg Alexandrovich. To whom and how to report it? There are no specialists in Sakhalin, which has just been liberated from the Japanese. The soldier writes a letter to the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, and soon the command of the unit receives an order from Moscow to create working conditions for Lavrentiev. He is given a secure room where he writes his first articles. In July 1950, he sends them by secret mail to the heavy engineering department of the Central Committee.

Sakhalin work consisted of two parts - military and peaceful.

In the first part, Lavrentiev described the principle of operation of a hydrogen bomb, where solid lithium deuteride was used as a fuel. In the second part, he proposed using controlled thermonuclear fusion to generate electricity. The chain reaction of the synthesis of light elements should not proceed in an explosive manner, as in a bomb, but slowly and in a controlled manner. Outstripping both domestic and foreign nuclear scientists, Oleg Lavrentiev solved the main question - how to isolate the plasma heated to hundreds of millions of degrees from the reactor walls. He proposed at that time a revolutionary solution - to use a force field as a shell for the plasma, in the first version - an electric one.

Oleg did not know that his message was immediately sent for review then to the candidate of sciences, and later to the academician and three times Hero of Socialist Labor A.D. Sakharov, who commented on the idea of ​​controlled thermonuclear fusion: "... I consider it necessary to discuss Comrade Lavrentiev's project in detail. Regardless of the results of the discussion, it is necessary to note the author's creative initiative right now."

In the same 1950, Lavrentiev was demobilized. He comes to Moscow, successfully passes the entrance exams and enters the Faculty of Physics of Moscow State University. A few months later, he was summoned by the Minister of Instrumentation V.A. Makhnev - that was the name of the Ministry of Atomic Industry in the realm of secrecy. Accordingly, the Institute of Atomic Energy was called the Laboratory of Measuring Instruments of the USSR Academy of Sciences, that is, LIPAN. At the minister's, Lavrentiev met Sakharov for the first time and found out that Andrei Dmitrievich had read his Sakhalin work, but they only managed to talk a few days later, again at night. It was in the Kremlin, in the office of Lavrenty Beria, who was then a member of the Politburo, chairman of a special committee in charge of the development of atomic and hydrogen weapons in the USSR.

Then I heard a lot of kind words from Andrei Dmitrievich, - Oleg Alexandrovich recalls. - He assured me that now everything will be fine, and offered to work together. Of course, I agreed to the proposal of a man I liked very much.

Lavrentiev did not even suspect that A.D. liked his idea of ​​controlled thermonuclear fusion (CNF) so much. Sakharov that he decided to use it and, together with I.E. Tamm also began to work on the problem of CTS. True, in their version of the reactor, the plasma was held not by an electric, but by a magnetic field. Subsequently, this direction resulted in reactors called "tokamak".

After meetings in "high offices" Lavrentiev's life changed like in a fairy tale. He was given a room in a new house, given an increased scholarship, and the necessary scientific literature was delivered on demand. He took permission to attend classes freely. A teacher of mathematics, then a candidate of sciences, and later an academician, Hero of Socialist Labor A.A. was attached to him. Samara.

In May 1951, Stalin signed a decree of the Council of Ministers that marked the beginning of State program thermonuclear research. Oleg received admission to LIPAN, where he gained experience in the field of emerging high-temperature plasma physics and at the same time learned the rules of working under the heading "Soviet secret". In LIPAN, Lavrentiev first learned about the ideas of Sakharov and Tamm on a thermonuclear reactor.

It was a big surprise for me, - Oleg Alexandrovich recalls. - When meeting with me, Andrei Dmitrievich did not say a single word about his work on the magnetic thermal insulation of plasma. Then I decided that we, Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov and I, came to the idea of ​​plasma isolation by a field independently of each other, only I chose an electrostatic thermonuclear reactor as the first option, and he chose a magnetic one.

On August 12, 1953, a thermonuclear charge using lithium deuteride was successfully tested in the USSR. Participants in the creation of new weapons receive state awards, titles and prizes, but Lavrentyev, for a reason completely incomprehensible to him, loses a lot overnight. / MY COMMENT: Everyone knew that L.P., who had been arrested by that time, patronized him. Beria /. In LIPAN, his permit was withdrawn, and he lost his permanent pass to the laboratory. A fifth-year student had to write a graduation project without an internship and without a supervisor on the basis of the theoretical work he had already done on the CTS. Despite this, he successfully defended himself, receiving a diploma with honors. However, the pioneer of this idea was not hired to work at LIPAN, the only place in the USSR where they were then engaged in controlled thermonuclear fusion.

In the spring of 1956, a young specialist with an unusual fate came to our city /Kharkov/ with a report on the theory of electromagnetic traps, which he wanted to show to the director of the institute K.D. Sinelnikov. But Kharkov is not Moscow. The inventor of the TCB was again settled in a hostel, in a room where eleven people lived. Gradually, Oleg made friends and like-minded people, and in 1958 the first electromagnetic trap was built at the KIPT.

At the end of 1973, I sent an application to the State Committee for Inventions and Discoveries for the discovery of "Thermal-insulating effect of the force field," says Lavrentiev. - This was preceded long search my first Sakhalin work on thermonuclear fusion, which was required by the State Committee. When asked, I was told that secret archives destroyed in the 1950s, and advised to seek confirmation of the existence of this work from its first reviewer. Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov sent a certificate confirming the existence of my work and its contents. But the State Committee needed that same handwritten Sakhalin letter, which had sunk into oblivion.

But finally, in 2001, in the August issue of the journal "Uspekhi fizicheskikh nauk" a series of articles "On the history of research on controlled thermonuclear fusion" appears. Here, for the first time, the Lavrentiev case is described in detail, a photograph of him from a personal file of half a century ago is placed, and, most importantly, for the first time, documents found in the Archive of the President of the Russian Federation, which were stored in a special folder under the heading "Soviet secret", are presented for the first time. Including Lavrentiev's proposal, sent from Sakhalin on July 29, 1950, and Sakharov's August review of this work, and instructions from L.P. Beria... Nobody destroyed these manuscripts. Scientific priority is restored, the name of Lavrentiev has taken its present place in the history of physics.

In Pyatikhatki, the settlement of employees of the Kharkov Institute of Physics and Technology, Ph.D., leading researcher Oleg Lavrentiev has been living and working for more than half a century. But even here, not everyone knows that Oleg Alexandrovich is a living legend of physics of the twentieth century. It was he who for the first time in the world in 1950 formulated the problem of using controlled thermonuclear fusion for peaceful energy and developed the design of the first reactor. Then the 24-year-old Lavrentiev proposed the original design of the hydrogen bomb.

Oleg Lavrentiev was born in 1926 in Pskov. Having read the book "Introduction to Nuclear Physics" in the 7th grade, he had a burning dream to work in the field of nuclear energy. But the war began, the occupation, and when the Germans were driven out, Oleg volunteered for the front. The young man met the victory in the Baltic states, but again his studies had to be postponed - he had to continue military service on Sakhalin, in the small town of Poronaysk.

Here he returned to nuclear physics. In the unit there was a library with technical literature and university textbooks, and Oleg, on his sergeant's allowance, subscribed to the journal "Advances in Physical Sciences". The idea of ​​a hydrogen bomb and controlled thermonuclear fusion first came to him in 1948, when the command of the unit, which distinguished a capable sergeant, instructed him to prepare a lecture on the atomic problem.

Having a few free days for preparation, I rethought all the accumulated material and found a solution to the issues that I had been struggling with for more than one year, - says Oleg Alexandrovich. To whom and how to report it? There are no specialists in Sakhalin, which has just been liberated from the Japanese. The soldier writes a letter to the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, and soon the command of the unit receives an order from Moscow to create working conditions for Lavrentiev. He is given a secure room where he writes his first articles. In July 1950, he sends them by secret mail to the heavy engineering department of the Central Committee.

Sakhalin work consisted of two parts - military and peaceful.

In the first part, Lavrentiev described the principle of operation of a hydrogen bomb, where solid lithium deuteride was used as a fuel. In the second part, he proposed using controlled thermonuclear fusion to generate electricity. The chain reaction of the synthesis of light elements should not proceed in an explosive manner, as in a bomb, but slowly and in a controlled manner. Outstripping both domestic and foreign nuclear scientists, Oleg Lavrentiev solved the main question - how to isolate the plasma heated to hundreds of millions of degrees from the reactor walls. He proposed at that time a revolutionary solution - to use a force field as a shell for the plasma, in the first version - an electric one.

Oleg did not know that his message was immediately sent for review then to the candidate of sciences, and later to the academician and three times Hero of Socialist Labor A.D. Sakharov, who commented on the idea of ​​controlled thermonuclear fusion: "... I consider it necessary to discuss Comrade Lavrentiev's project in detail. Regardless of the results of the discussion, it is necessary to note the author's creative initiative right now."

In the same 1950, Lavrentiev was demobilized. He comes to Moscow, successfully passes the entrance exams and enters the Faculty of Physics of Moscow State University. A few months later, he was summoned by the Minister of Instrumentation V.A. Makhnev - that was the name of the Ministry of Atomic Industry in the realm of secrecy, respectively, the Institute of Atomic Energy was called the Laboratory of Measuring Instruments of the USSR Academy of Sciences, that is, LIPAN. At the minister's, Lavrentiev met Sakharov for the first time and found out that Andrei Dmitrievich had read his Sakhalin work, but they only managed to talk a few days later, again at night. It was in the Kremlin, in the office of Lavrenty Beria, who was then a member of the Politburo, chairman of a special committee in charge of the development of atomic and hydrogen weapons in the USSR.

Then I heard a lot of kind words from Andrei Dmitrievich, - Oleg Alexandrovich recalls. - He assured me that now everything will be fine, and offered to work together. Of course, I agreed to the proposal of a man I liked very much.

Lavrentiev did not even suspect that A.D. liked his idea of ​​controlled thermonuclear fusion (CNF) so much. Sakharov that he decided to use it and, together with I.E. Tamm also began to work on the problem of CTS. True, in their version of the reactor, the plasma was held not by an electric, but by a magnetic field. Subsequently, this direction resulted in reactors called "tokamak".

After meetings in "high offices" Lavrentiev's life changed like in a fairy tale. He was given a room in a new house, given an increased scholarship, and the necessary scientific literature was delivered on demand. He took permission to attend classes freely. A teacher of mathematics, then a candidate of sciences, and later an academician, Hero of Socialist Labor A.A. was attached to him. Samara.

In May 1951, Stalin signed a decree of the Council of Ministers that laid the foundation for the State Program for Thermonuclear Research. Oleg received admission to LIPAN, where he gained experience in the field of emerging high-temperature plasma physics and at the same time learned the rules of working under the heading "Soviet secret". In LIPAN, Lavrentiev first learned about the ideas of Sakharov and Tamm on a thermonuclear reactor.

It was a big surprise for me, - Oleg Alexandrovich recalls. - When meeting with me, Andrei Dmitrievich did not say a single word about his work on the magnetic thermal insulation of plasma. Then I decided that we, Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov and I, came to the idea of ​​plasma isolation by a field independently of each other, only I chose an electrostatic thermonuclear reactor as the first option, and he chose a magnetic one.

On August 12, 1953, a thermonuclear charge using lithium deuteride was successfully tested in the USSR. Participants in the creation of new weapons receive state awards, titles and prizes, but Lavrentyev, for a reason completely incomprehensible to him, loses a lot overnight. In LIPAN, his permit was withdrawn, and he lost his permanent pass to the laboratory. A fifth-year student had to write a graduation project without an internship and without a supervisor on the basis of the theoretical work he had already done on the CTS. Despite this, he successfully defended himself, receiving a diploma with honors. However, the pioneer of this idea was not hired to work at LIPAN, the only place in the USSR where they were then engaged in controlled thermonuclear fusion.

In the spring of 1956, a young specialist with an unusual fate came to our city with a report on the theory of electromagnetic traps, which he wanted to show to the director of the institute, K.D. Sinelnikov. But Kharkov is not Moscow. The inventor of the TCB was again settled in a hostel, in a room where eleven people lived. Gradually, Oleg made friends and like-minded people, and in 1958 the first electromagnetic trap was built at the KIPT.

At the end of 1973, I sent an application to the State Committee for Inventions and Discoveries for the discovery of "Thermal-insulating effect of the force field," says Lavrentiev. - This was preceded by a long search for my first Sakhalin work on thermonuclear fusion, which was required by the State Committee. When asked, I was then told that the secret archives of the fifties had been destroyed, and I was advised to apply for confirmation of the existence of this work to its first reviewer. Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov sent a certificate confirming the existence of my work and its contents. But the State Committee needed that same handwritten Sakhalin letter, which had sunk into oblivion.

But finally, in 2001, in the August issue of the journal "Uspekhi fizicheskikh nauk" a series of articles "On the history of research on controlled thermonuclear fusion" appears. Here, for the first time, the Lavrentiev case is described in detail, a photograph of him from a personal file of half a century ago is placed, and, most importantly, for the first time, documents found in the Archive of the President of the Russian Federation, which were stored in a special folder under the heading "Soviet secret", are presented for the first time. Including Lavrentiev's proposal, sent from Sakhalin on July 29, 1950, and Sakharov's August review of this work, and instructions from L.P. Beria... Nobody destroyed these manuscripts. Scientific priority is restored, the name of Lavrentiev has taken its present place in the history of physics.

After the publication in the journal "Uspekhi fizicheskikh nauk", the Academic Council of the KIPT unanimously decided to petition the Higher Attestation Commission of Ukraine to award Lavrentiev a doctoral degree based on the totality of published scientific papers - he has over a hundred of them. The Ukrainian VAK refused.