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In Baksan, we were joined by an old friend of mine, the chairman of the village council, Azret Shokovich Bifov, with his sons Zhamal and Hassan. I contacted them late in the evening and invited to take part in the event. Somewhere a year before this episode, we rested in Elbrus region with families, and for my part it would be an unforgivable mistake not to invite these noble people to a decent men company, knowing how much honour and respect among the countrymen Azret Shokovich enjoys.

We got there two hours later. I don’t remember exactly what that place was, it seems, a recreation center for management, as there was security and staff. Representatives of the regional party committee of Kabardino-Balkaria, who met us, suggested a walk to the mountains. My legs ached then, and I had to give up climbing. Together with the chef of the sanatorium and the Baksan friends I took up cooking dinner. Kabardians brought with them a fat-tailed ram, dressed it and everything turned out at the highest level. Skewers of lamb and pork, shulum, skilfully cooked lamb entrails, greenery, vegetables, fruits, various slices of sturgeon and salmon fish and meat and sausage products. Guests came back from the walk about three hours later, pleased and full of enthusiastic impressions. We had already prepared a sumptuous dinner by that time, all the more so that everyone was pretty hungry. Sergey Pavlovich, impressed by the beauty of the nature of the Caucasus, was pleased and even made a toast and despite the sanatorium regime, took two or three shots of brandy.

We came back home late at night.

The second meeting with Korolev occurred in 1961. On a call from the USSR Ministry of Medium Machine Building, I once again had to visit the capital. By the way, I don’t know how it was in other ministries, but in those years our employees were summoned to Moscow and not sent on business trips by their enterprises. On arriving, I directly went to the reception office of Efim Pavlovich Slavsky, our long-term minister (from 1957 to 1986), who had served at his post until the age of 88. The receptionist knew me and both his secretaries usually tried to help get to the boss without delay, but this time they asked to wait. Just in case I asked, “Who is there with him?” It turned out that it was Korolev, and then, having rejoiced, I said that I had known him well for a long time. My arrival was reported. And I immediately entered into the minister’s cabinet, which I had known for a long time, and embraced him and Sergey Pavlovich. Slavsky says to me, “It is very good that you have arrived today. By four o'clock in the evening be with me. In the meantime, take a break from the road, or do something.”

There was always enough work in the ministry. I went around the offices I had planned, settled in a hotel, and at the appointed time appeared before Slavsky. Together, in the Minister’s “Chaika”, we went to the restaurant of the Moscow Hotel. We were met at the service entrance and taken to the luxurious banquet hall, where about twelve people had already gathered, all close to Korolev. It turned out that the event was dedicated to giving Sergey Pavlovich the second Golden Star of the Hero of Socialist Labor. I was introduced to the guests as a colleague of Efim Pavlovich for work in Chelyabinsk-40 and who had worked for many years alongside Igor Vasilyevich Kurchatov. I don’t remember who those people were, but there were the Stars of Heroes on the jackets of many of them, and Slavsky at that moment had two. The evening was solemn, everyone wished the general designer further space victories. Surprisingly, they drank little, basically brandy. Probably because many were already at a respectable age. When the word was given to me, I wished success to the hero of the occasion and expressed hope for future meetings, but this time at the resorts of the Caucasian Mineral Waters, where almost everyone went to restore health. Sergey Pavlovich could not resist talking about our first meeting, about the huge “chief” who made him put on a sheepskin coat, felt boots, drink a glass of brandy in the cold and safely delivered to his destination. We parted somewhere by midnight.

Then there was another, third, meeting with Korolev in Sochi. In autumn of 1963 the velvet season settled on the Black Sea coast. The new triumph of the Soviet cosmonautics! The flight was carried out by the first woman cosmonaut in the world – Valentina Tereshkova. That year I received a personal voucher to the Sochi sanatorium “Zvezdochka”. Holders of such vouchers were settled in luxury rooms or in separate cottages. I got a cottage for two rooms. In the other half Nikolay Konstantinovich Baibakov, who for nearly thirty years headed the USSR State Planning Committee, was having resting with his family. In terms of age, he is older than me by a year, and, as far as I know, he is the only living Commissar of today (the Minister) of the Stalin call. Seems that he had headed the People's Commissariat of the oil industry since 1943. We talked much and learned about each other a lot of interesting things in twenty-four days of rest. Having came back from the beach one day, I found a note on my desk saying the chief medical officer of the sanatorium invited me to his place. It turned out that a meeting with cosmonauts was scheduled for this time. The neighbor also received an invitation, and together we went. Indeed, cosmonauts Andriyan Nikolaev and Pavel Popovich arrived, and about thirty minutes later Sergey Pavlovich Korolev arrived with a retinue of five people. He was having rest at the government dacha. We had interesting time: all the attention in those years was riveted on the heroes of space, they were celestials.”

“Well, did you manage to talk to Korolev in presence of so many people?”

“Of course. We embraced, shook hands friendly and during the toast he again recalled the episode of our first acquaintance, thanked for the considerate attitude and even jokingly said that I was his bodyguard during the visits to the Urals.”

“And what were the drinks?”

“There was everything on the table: Armenian brandy, Georgian wine, Russian vodka, champagne. This time I drank wine, Sergey Pavlovich only brandy and as always drank a little, my neighbor Baibakov – vodka. Korolev's friendly attitude, his story about the “exploits” on “Mayak” immediately won Nikolay Konstantinovich’s favour. After this meeting and before the end of the holiday, we began to communicate more and almost made friends, exchanged phone numbers, although we never saw each other again.”

“You know, Ivan Nikiforovich, what is the most amazing thing about your story? Of the listed characters ofthat memorable meeting, only Baibakov and Medyanik are still alive. On March 5, 2006, in the Column Hall of the House of the Unions, ninety-fifth anniversary of Nilolay Konstantinovich was solemnly celebrated. Speakers noted the outstanding achievements of our countryman. There were many honored guests from among the former secretaries of the Central Committee, union and republican ministers, representatives of CIS. Among those present and speaking there were congratulations from N. I. Ryzhkov, G. A. Zyuganov, Y. M. Luzhkov, Y. P. Ryabov, N. I. Maslennikov, Y. P. Batalin, E. S. Korshunov. Each guest was presented with souvenirs and a book “Baibakov from Stalin to Yeltsin”.

And on June 2, 2007, Medyanik turned 95 years old. Hometown congratulated him adequately on this day.”

“There has something gone absurdly wrong with the academics,” recalls Ivan Nikiforovich.” Most of them worked on a permanent basis in Dubna, Arzamas-16, KB-2, KB-3. They came to “Mayak” mainly to test their own inventions. Sometimes it happened that, where he had invented or discovered something had to be put into production, and then there were problems that affected the time of creation of the bomb. Time was running out, no failures were allowed. And then, according to Stalin’s personal instructions, all key scientists, project participants, were transported to our place for the completion of the installation and the commissioning of the main production facilities. So those three special two-story cottages were filled with renowned residents. Complete secrecy was observed. Only a few people knew who came or was leaving: the director of the plant, his deputy on security, representative from the Council of Ministers, I and maybe one or two people more. It was damn nice when at a solemn banquet in honor of the twentieth anniversary of the first testing, one of the academicians stood up and offered a toast, “To the “chief” who met and saw us off and wrapped in warm sheepskin coats!”

They made me stand up, and the whole hall, two or three hundred, men applauded.

There is one more thing to add. Most of the academicians – physicists, chemists, mathematicians – at the time of their work in the project to create the atomic bomb were classified. It was only after a successful test, on August 29, 1949, the party and the government appreciated their achievements and showered orders, medals, the Stars of Heroes, Stalin, Lenin, State and even Nobel prizes. If my memory doesn’t fail me, three times Heroes among those who were related to the bomb, were eleven people.”

“Ivan Nikiforovich, maybe I will surprise you now. We talked a lot about the great Kurchatov, but did you know that once he saved me from major troubles?”

“And when was it?”

“In the early eighties.”

“Well, you, brother, and exaggerate! Igor Vasilyevich passed away in 1960, toy were only eight then.”

“And, nevertheless, it is.”

I will cite for readers an excerpt from my first book, “The Casket of Colourful Contemporaries.”

"The table of the presidium"

In MOSCOW, I used to rent a room at the Orlyonok Hotel – a favorite, democratic, always hospitable and accessible. In the winter of eighty-three I and Volodya Avetisov stayed in Orlyonok for three days. On the eve of departure, we went to the center of Moscow, booked a table in the elite and closed to the non-artistic people restaurant of the WTO. Everything pleased there – excellent cuisine and excellent service, tremendous attention to the person and the opportunity to witness the capital celebrities – the people of the theater and cinema – meeting whom everybody dreamt in youth. I repeat, I do not belong to the artistic circle; in theatrical language I was introduced in this circle by Valery Shein, a great friend of Boris Rosenfeld, the manager of concert programs in Moscow. The restaurant began to live life to the fullest at midnight – from the hour when the theaters finished spectacles, and the artists went to have dinner, chat with each other, relax over a glass of brandy or vodka, move away from unrest, after the performance. During the day few people looked here. I really liked not to surprise Volodya Avetisov, but to show him that my frequent trips to the capital had paid of: I met interesting people, plunged into the world of art, gained connections, without which even the restaurant like the WTO was not possible.

Having wandered around the city, at half past seven in the evening, we went to Pushkin Square to that very restaurant. Boris Nikolaevich, the waiter with whom we agreed in advance, met us. He took us to the table I ordered, and I was surprised to read the sign, “The chairman's table.” Such a sign made it possible not to disturb us, because by half past ten the hall was full, there were not enough seats. And the sign was a kind of security certificate, that’s the way Boris Nikolaevich tried. “The chairman's table” was stunningly served. I think that the restaurant business designers were worth it for a reason: everything was decorated with taste, elegantly, richly. A lot of snacks, alcohol, although Boris Nikolaevich knew that I did not have an addiction to drinking. But he could not know my friend’s taste, and, naturally, as the serving protocol required, put a bottle of Armenian brandy. The situation itself was disposed to drink off, and we took two or three shots.

Looking around, we noticed that there were no vacant seats in the hall, except for our two. And then Boris Nikolaevich asked us if we would be so kind as to let two ladies sit down at our table. We didn’t object to ladies, but, frankly, we were not disposed to start new acquaintances. He explained the situation, “Our regular customers, both actresses.”

I will be frank, both ladies were nice, beautiful and, as it turned out later, really worked in the theater – either in the Theater for Young People, or in the theater at the House of Culture of the Likhachev Automobile Plant. I can not be accurate today, for many years have passed. When young women appeared, we proposed not to order snacks as we had enough of them and everything is untouched – appetizing, beautifully decorated greenery, decorated various cooking fixings in the form of twisted in a spiral rings of carrots, onions. Outlets of vegetables, cold beef melting in the mouth, ham, olivesd – just an exhibition of the achievements of the national economy, no less no more! But alcohol was asked to add.

And it all started! Volodya, who always controled himself, did not drink, and I, with my passion to making toasts, took control of the table. Our neighbors liked toasts, and it added enthusiasm. Things were gaining momentum and were worthy of attention by Eldar Ryazanov for his next masterpiece, when the master brings comedy to such an extent that tragedy could happen after it…

Somewhere by midnight I’ve had my doze and even exceeded it. When we were about to leave, I began to insist that our companions should be taken home. Volodya tried to stop me, persuade me, reminding that we had a plane early in the morning, that there was no time to sleep. But it was impossible to stop me. And Volodya, of course, could not leave his friend to the mercy of fate, to leave alone in Moscow at night with the drunk ladies, knowing my ability to throw money with or without reason.

We traveled by taxi for a long time, not knowing how far our lovely ladies had gotten. I was dozing, then came to my senses, and for this reason I did not remember the route. Volodya saw the road clearly, but he knew Moscow badly. The only thing that crashed into the memory was the monument to Kurchatov. I remember getting out of the car, how the ladies invited us to have a cup of coffee for vigour. And we went! What for? But having previously arranged with the taxi driver that he would wait for us for about fifteen minutes. Volodya was very unhappy with the night journey. Two o'clock at night, and we were far from the center drinking coffee on the outskirts… There was the reason to become indignant. Fifteen minutes or even more passed, finally, we said goodbye, to our luck found the taxi on the spot, got in and came back to the hotel.

At last! The concert was over, you could relax and even take a little nap… The clock hands showed three in the morning. The driver was in a hurry to the taxi park, as he had to be back and then like a bolt from the blue.

“Where is the jacket?” I howled like a wolf. “Volodya, tell me, where could I leave the jacket?”

Horror is drawn on his face too. In the leather jacket I took off in the hallway, there was everything: plane tickets, money, passports, other documents…

I sobered up instantly and remembered how we arrived, how I took off the jacket and stayed in a woolen pullover, and how I was leaving the ladies cosy home in the far outskirts, how threw on a sheepskin coat, forgetting about the jacket. Here it is, the very edge beyond which lies the tragedy! What to do? We did not know the names of random friends, their addresses, or phone numbers and was it at all? The only thing that I remember was a monument to Kurchatov! “Thank you, Igor Vasilyevich, thank you for that mark! Of course, you are a great scientist, physicist, we give you glory! But now it is you, Igor Vasilyevich, who must help, save me from being ruined!” In such a half-crazy delusion we ran out into the street. Fortunately, the hotel has taxi cars on duty.

“Where are we going?” one of the drivers cheered up.

“If you can find a monument to Kurchatov, we are going with you!”

The driver’s eyes popped out of his head. Just after three o'clock in the morning, two mad people rushed into the car and are crazily interested in the sights of the capital. How to react to it? Most likely, seeing us, he understood that it was a serious matter and got involved in the work. The monument was found. So what is next? We drove two or three blocks, but all in vain. There was not a single light in all the windows. At last we found the house. Seeing obscene inscriptions in the elevator we realized that we were on the right track. We rang the bell. The door of the apartment opened. Yes, it was them, our saviours! And the jacket was in the hallway, alive and good! We checked, valuables were in place – passports, money, tickets… All-in-all, the show was over! The public could go home. The women spoke in vying, “Your forgotten in a hurry jacket was immediately noticed, but it was late – you have already left the house. It became clear from the hotel business card where to look for, so we decided to inform the administrator in the morning.”

I don’t know if they would call the hotel or not, but I think that’s what would have happened. It’s good that the actresses turned out to be decent women, they didn’t touch either the money or the documents, otherwise we couldn’t get out of the trap we had made for ourselves. I instructed myself, children and grandchildren: taking alcohol, be circumspect and vigilant. Of course, first of all, I take it on my account, weigh this commandment up on myself, putting it in my own moral tablets.

“Yes, I agree, an interesting adventure. Good thing that it ended well for you.”

From molecular level to atomic!

Here is, for example, another case: when another star academician, Nikolay Antonovich Dollezhal, came to the Laboratory No. 2 (later it became Kurchatov Atomic Center) at the invitation of Igor Vasilyevich and the academician said right off the bat, “You are an expert in chemical engineering, so let's work together! We need a reactor to produce plutonium.” Ivan Nikiforovich smiled slyly, “I will not lie, I did not hear the conversation, and could not hear it. But read in the interview. Truely, many-many years later. Looks very much like Kurchatov. Well, and that Dollezhal was also a man of incredible mind and immediately understood what it was for and noticed that his scientific interests “do not coincide with atomic science…”

Kurchatov said, “You used to work at the molecular level – now work at the nuclear!” Igor Vasilyevich was witty, everyone knew that. And that he loved jokes, they also knew, but all the same, they swallowed the bait.

And now I remembered the galoshes. So here he gave people a lot to laugh at. All took galoshes at the entrance to the laboratory. And all the galoshes were with the same flannel crimson lining, they so shined, so shined! Well, so, as not to confuse this “mellow shine”, the initials of the host were attached to galoshes. So our Beard changed the initials of the chiefs of quite high rank. Laughter lasted for an hour when they tried to shove their shoes in their own… I almost said “sleigh”. Although it was really that way.

Here one more… All of us there, at “Mayak”, knew about the top secrecy in the “Kurchatov establishment” at Lubyanka: you couldn’t take out even a piece of paper – everything was accountable. If you have taken a sheet, wrote it up – hand it over on receipt. It was impossible to break the security. And Igor Vasilyevich took it, yes he acted outrageously: he burnt the paper in an ashtray and then laughed, “And it smelled of broken security in the room for a long time…”

Let's stop for a while. Let us give Ivan Nikiforovich the opportunity to get over the excitement of unwittingly reviving memories.

Author's retreat

The documents I have studied, and they are publications in the press, recollections of eyewitnesses, the books by V. Novoselov and V. Tolstikov – “Mysteries of Sorokovka 40th)", P. Zhuravlev – "My Atomic Age", the documentary book of V. Brokhovich "The "Mayak" Chemical Plant", a collective jubilee collection, "The Creators of the Atomic Shield", dedicated to the 50th anniversary of the city of Ozersk (the former Chelyabinsk-40 with the famous "Mayak") created a picture of a difficult and heroic time. The picture, frankly speaking, of not the bright tone…

After the Americans dropped atomic bombs on Hirosima and Nagasaki in August 1945, and the world first learned about the consequences of this terrible monster, Stalin immediately responded to this alarming event: Americans need what we are made of.

This meant that the Soviet development of a nuclear project, begun in 1943 and interrupted by urgent military concerns, should be promptly restored. And naturally, it was necessary to mobilize the Soviet scientists involved in this problem: physicists, chemists, workers of small and medium special engineering to implement the task.

We needed a sensible scientific project manager.

In the Kremlin, the Politburo considered two candidates – Igor Vasilyevich KURCHATOV and Abram Isaakovich ALIKHANOV, a highly educated person who was a student of the famous physicist Ioffe. It was Alikhanov who in 1943 during the elections to the Academy of Sciences became academician, beating Kurchatov. Now it is Kurchatov's turn to go around Alikhanov by half a length.

Lavrentiy Beria, ingratiating and deliberating, turned to Stalin, "Maybe after all Kurchatov?"

"Kurchatov, let it be Kurchatov," Stalin agreed meekly, obviously pleased.

Igor Vasilyevich was assigned officer in both the Kremlin and the Lubyanka under the watchful eye of the KGB! There he studied the drawings, diagrams, documents, delivered to Moscow from abroad.

What kind of documents were they? Where from and who had got them? How many more undeciphered stirlitz are waiting for a date with our curiosity and ignorance? At what a cost and ingenuity, what savvy, how many lives of our intelligence officers had lost obtaining these secret documents, we, obviously, will never know. The truth can be learnt by our grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Probably…

But the "feat of our intelligence officers” is the subject of a special conversation, true heroes of the invisible front, and, of course, the dream of cinematographists and writers.

Igor Vasilyevich appreciated the significance of these documents: these were well-known guidelines for scientific research on the uranium problem, enabling our scientists to avoid many mistakes and reduce the time to create their own nuclear bomb.

Do I have to say that all this was kept as top secret?!

Alikhanov was not just famous in the country at that time, but all over the world. But the preference given by the highest party leadership to Igor Vasilyevich Kurchatov had no effect on their friendly relations. There were never any disagreements, envy and offenses between academicians, they remained friends and likeminded people.

In those years, secret laboratory № 3, which was headed by Alikhanov, was later transformed into the Institute of Theoretical and Experimental Physics (ITEP), dealt with the same uranium problems as Laboratory No. 2, which became Kurchatov atomic center.

The difference is that the first atomic bomb told the world about the Soviet Union's nuclear viability in 1949, and the first test of the hydrogen bomb – the even more terrifying creation of the human mind (or – madness?) – happened in 1955.

It was then that academicians Alikhanov, Kurchatov, Alexandrov and Vinogradov appealed to the country's party leadership with a letter in which they warned the Central Committee against using this super-weapon, which threatens the world with complete destruction:

“We need to resolve all the differences between world powers only by political methods. We need new international policy. The new war is simply impossible.”

Our politicians accepted and understood the meaning of this document in their own way. Malenkov supported the pacifist concern of scientists. Khrushchev held the letter and at the right moment used it “political myopia” against Georgiy Maksimilianovich Malenkov and overthrew the party comrade without pity.

Let us mentally return to the meeting of the Politburo, where the candidacy of the scientific director of the atomic project was approved. I imagine that “sacred” horror on the faces and in the eyes of the members of the Stalinist Politburo when Alikhanov's name and patronymic were spoken aloud: Abram Isaakovich. Readers of the new democratic society cannot understand that horror: what of it that Alikhanov has the face of “Caucasian nationality”?

What of the fact that his name and patronymic, on the contrary, are clearly of not “Caucasian origin”? But in those distant years everything had the meaning – down to the shape of the nose and ears. And during the interview Alikhanov behaved too independently, he was non-partisan, which was generally considered unacceptable for a Soviet scientist of such a rank.

There was no subordination at the institute, which was headed by Alikhanov: it was possible to communicate with colleagues at any time. Such a “rampant democracy” in the Soviet institution was almost a challenge to the existing order and the state system itself.

And another significant, almost criminal touch – Yuriy Orlov, one of the most seditious Soviet dissidents, Doctor of Physics and Mathematics, worked at the institute of Alikhanov. Endless “cleansing” didn't help, Alikhanov knew how to take a punch.

He was “forgiven” everything – his name and patronymic, and his Caucasian appearance, and independence, and non-partisanship, and Yuriy Orlov (for the time being, of course). The main thing that Alikhanov was a brilliant scientist. And the development of more distant prospects for the creation of the hydrogen bomb was entrusted to him. More precisely, – to his institute – ITEP, named after him. But it would happen much later.

And in that post-war period he had enough recognition and secret glory. He had enough of his work absorbing and responsible. He was valued and respected by colleagues and friends, among whom were “physicists” and world-famous “lyricists”.

It is said that when a dispute broke out among the intelligentsia who is more important – supporters of the rational world (physics) or its sentimental perception – through art (lyrics), the first one to discredit in the press the stupidity of such a division was Academician Alikhanov.

He himself was a man with a stunningly beautiful and significant face, thoughtful eyes and all the bright signs of “artistic appearance” – was more like an artist. This drove the women crazy who were lucky enough to be in his company and even more so to talk with him, which sometimes they failed to do.

The power of his intellect, knowledge, impeccable and subtle taste of the true connoisseur of art attracted to him people equal in value of the spiritual potential.

“There are two “Slavas” in our company,” Alikhanov joked. “Slava Otechestva and my wife, Slava Roshal… Well, if Rostropovich drops by, there will be three “Slavas”!”

“And where do we belong?!” Aram Khachaturian and Martiros Saryan playfully “boiled up”, cooled, however, by complacent Dmitriy Borisovich Kabalevsky.

Music was played in the Alikhanov's house in Cheryomushki. Perhaps, under the portrait of Alikhanov, written by Saryan's talented hand, Slava Roshal, laureate of the International Violin Contest, and Aram Khachaturian, a man of hot temper and an author of incendiary music, gave a concert. The music was most likely sublime, sophisticated, classical, from Mozart, Vivaldi, Tchaikovsky, Prokofiev to Shostakovich, who was sitting right there and dying from fear while waiting for a sound musical typo in his own opuses.

This state was in any hall where his music was played (which is confirmed by many documentarists who wrote about Shostakovich, and his acquaintances, his friends, his wife Irina Antonovna): he, the genius of the musical Olympus, was as a schoolboy afraid of others' mistakes in own compositions.

As a rule were no typos. But there was a bewilderment from something else… Shostakovich was telling Alikhanov, “Abram Isaakovich, you have a beautiful house. But how can you live so far away from the conservatory?” The phrase, which later became popular, was replicated in a musical society in the famous datchas (summer cottages) of Leningrad and Moscow elite beau monde – in Repino and Komarovo, Peredelkino, Zhukovka and Barvikha. Childishly naive in life, Dmitri Dmitriyevitch thought that the Cheryomushki village near Moscow was in the “far away kingdom” almost at the edge of the world.

Exactly with the following “A true physicist should live closer to the conservatory”, the newspaper Izvestia, on April 17, 2004, published an article by Sergey Leskov, timed to the centenary of academician Abram Alikhanov.

Golden Stars of Heroes of Socialist Labor, the title of laureate of Lenin, Stalin, State Awards, orders of various iconic virtues rained down on nuclear scientists after a successful trial test near Semipalatinsk.

Ivan Nikiforovich Medyanik was also awarded the Order of the Red Banner of Labor.

“All the people mentioned in the list are famous in their own way,” Ivan Nikiforovich returns to the conversation. “You can write books about each. Well, they have, in fact, already been written. Some of them and they are in majority have fame with a “positive” sign, others with a “minus” sign. But then we did not know anything negative. We were children of our time: Communists, Komsomol members, all brought up in one ideology, committed to the high idea of building communism. It turned out we were hostages of a false idea.

“Would anyone even try to give a hint about it!” The Great October Revolution was a reality, Lenin's covenants were a reality, the party congresses with kilometer long newspaper resolutions and reports were a reality, and everything seemed to be for the good of the common people.