![]() ![]() In a letter to Pravda that was forwarded to the Politburo, a group of “liquidators” describes the lack of medical care and the attitude of neglect from local party and government organs. Truly heroic work by the Soviet military-22,500 conscripts by the end of 1986-is presented in the report by Marshal Sergey Akhromeyev, chief of the Soviet General Staff and the person in charge of the military “liquidation” effort ( Document 5). According to the continually growing documentary record, the same system that was initially unprepared for a disaster of this scale, was able to respond quickly and to concentrate all its resources on containment and cleanup of the accident.Īt the same time, the shock of Chernobyl in the atmosphere of glasnost promoted by Gorbachev led to widespread grass-roots expressions of discontent and criticism of the government response. The Ukrainian Ministry of Health reported to the Union Ministry of Health on extensive programs of medical oversight, testing and treatment of evacuees, nutrition programs, and monitoring of children, who absorbed more of the damaging radiation than other groups. The State Hydrometeorological Committee and the Ministry of Health produced reports on the effects of radiation on citizens and levels of contamination of water and agricultural resources, closely monitoring the changing situation on the ground. This was a public health emergency of a kind the USSR was utterly unprepared for and once its scope was fully appreciated it prompted a huge government effort to come to grips with the consequences. The Soviet documents published here in translation for the first time show the monumental efforts by the military and civilian services to contain the reactor fire, evacuate citizens, and decontaminate the area. Other important documents in today’s posting, which is the second installment in the Archive’s series focusing on Chernobyl evidence ( Volume 1), include the initial analysis of radioactive contamination in Sweden, which was the first signal internationally of the Chernobyl accident, Soviet internal discussions of the causes of the accident, and the first signs of domestic opposition in the Soviet Union to the culture of secrecy surrounding all information about the accident. Although the subsequent Politburo discussion featured attempts to avoid responsibility and to find scapegoats, this document also shows the impact of Mikhail Gorbachev’s policy of glasnost-one hears an unusual amount of disagreements and questioning of the party leadership itself. ![]() The Shcherbina report gives a deeply critical analysis of the situation throughout the Soviet nuclear power industry and shows that shortcuts had been made that led to serious safety issues and numerous smaller accidents. Shcherbina called for halting further construction of such reactors ( Document 1). The documents include the extremely important Politburo discussion of Chernobyl on July 3, 1986, when the head of the investigative commission, Boris Shcherbina, clearly stated that it was not just the violations of rules committed by the staff that led to the explosion, but that “RBMK reactors are potentially dangerous” in their very design. Washington, D.C., – The Soviet Politburo knew as soon as July 1986 that the design of the Chernobyl reactor was at fault in the deadly explosion there the previous April, not just the errors made by reactor staff, according to documents published today for the first time in English by the National Security Archive. The Nuclear Disaster through the Eyes of the Soviet Politburo, KGB, and U.S. ![]()
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