Academician E. Kruglyakov, who is a nuclear
physicist, wrote a book (in 2001) which I am now
reading. Kruglyakov is the deputy director of a
large Russian Academy of Science institute in
Novosibirsk. Let me translate a story described
on page 199.
"Do you remember destruction of genetics and cybernetics?
. . . That destruction was organized in the Propaganda
Department of the Central Committee of Communist Party.
. . . Let me tell you that only a miracle saved physics
from a similar act of destruction. I had a conversation with
I. Golovin, the deputy director of Kurchatov’s Institute. He
said that one day Beria [the secret police chief] suggested
to I. V. Kurchatov that idealistic physics, such as quantum
mechanics and theory of relativity, should be purged.
Igor Vasilevich immediately replied that the atomic bomb
design is based on these two theories. The purging is
not desirable because the country needs the bomb.
Beria informed Stalin about this conversation. This
resulted in the cancellation of a session whose
purpose was to discuss an attack on physics.”
I did not know about this story; perhaps others might
also be interested. That is why I am posting this
description. Kurchatov was the scientific director of
the first Soviet atomic bomb project.
Ludwik Kowalski