Gorbachev once said that the Chernobyl nuclear accident could be the real cause of the collapse of the Soviet Union five years later, even more important than the cause of reforms he started. The picture shows the Chernobyl nuclear power plant. (Photo credit: Internet)
Nikolai Antoshkin, a former Soviet hero and member of the Russian State Duma who was personally responsible for and participated in the destruction of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, died Sunday (17) in a hospital after contracting the “Chinese Communist virus” (Wuhan New Crown Pneumonia, COVID-19). Nikolai Antoshkin died in hospital on Sunday (17) at the age of 79. The Chernobyl nuclear meltdown in 1986 killed hundreds of thousands of people, damaged millions more and sparked the collapse of the communist camps in Eastern Europe, including the former Soviet Union.
“Chernobyl heroes died from the “Chinese Communist virus”
State Duma Chairman Vyacheslav Volodin announced Monday (18) that MP Antoshkin had died in hospital of an “incurable disease”. Previously, the United Russia party had revealed that Antoshkin had been hospitalized after contracting Wuhan pneumonia.
According to Russian media reports, Antoshkin was born in 1942 and, after graduating from the Air Force School, was involved in the Sino-Soviet border conflict in 1969 and the war in Afghanistan in 1979; in 1986, Antoshkin was then chief of staff of the Kiev Military District Air Force; from 1989 to 1993, Antoshkin was in command of the Moscow Military District Air Force and then in command of the frontline air force.
Reports say that he was involved in directing the rescue efforts of the nuclear reactor rupture that erupted at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant that year, when helicopters flew over the plant and finally stopped the nuclear fission reaction inside the reactor after dumping nearly 2,000 tons of boron carbide and sand from the air into the exposed reactor wreckage.
Antoshkin also personally flew a radiation reconnaissance mission over the reactor, for which he was awarded the title “Hero of the Soviet Union,” the highest honor in the Soviet Union’s merit system.
Volodin said that Nikolai Antoshkin selflessly served his country, risked his life to save people’s lives, and was a responsible person who helped all those in need.
According to RIA Novosti, in the past 24 hours, 22,857 new confirmed cases of the CCP virus were reported in 85 constituent entities of Russia, of which 2,504 (11.0%) were found to be without clinical symptoms; the cumulative number of CCP virus infections was 3,591,066, with a growth rate of 0.6%; 471 new deaths were reported, and the cumulative number of deaths in Russia was 66,037.
“Review of Chernobyl’s past
The story behind the Chernobyl nuclear meltdown seems to have disappeared from sight with the collapse of the Soviet Union, but those who were tortured by nuclear radiation told the world how horrible the disaster of the century was.
In the early hours of April 26, 1986, Unit 4 of the nuclear power plant in the city of Pripyat in the Chernobyl district of the former Soviet Union’s Ukraine exploded, spewing huge amounts of radioactive material and fuel straight to the zenith, and the fire burned for eight days. The Soviet Union used human lives to dispose of 35 percent of the radioactive material and prevented a secondary explosion at the nuclear power plant. But after the explosion at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, more than 8 tons of powerful radioactive material leaked, and the winter westerly winds blew the contaminants around the world.
Two days after the accident, nuclear radioactive material was detected in the air in Stockholm, Sweden. Two days after the accident, on April 28, the Soviet Union, under strong diplomatic pressure, was forced to broadcast 20 seconds of news about the accident at Chernobyl on the national evening news, without ever mentioning the radiation damage. By this time, a full 60 hours had passed since the accident. This announcement appeared in the Soviet press on April 30.
As a show of great power, a big May Day parade was held as usual on May 1 in Kiev, more than a hundred kilometers from the site of the nuclear accident, when the radiation dose outdoors in Kiev was already eight times the normal value. But the Ukrainian party dignitaries who attended the event had quietly sent their children abroad long before the event. And countries such as Britain and France also evacuated their citizens from Kiev.
On May 4, people 30 kilometers around the nuclear accident were ordered to evacuate, but they had been full of nuclear radiation for more than a week without any knowledge of it.
On May 9, Moscow held its usual celebrations of victory in the Patriotic War, deliberately scaling up the event to show that everything was under control. At the same time, the Soviet propaganda system launched an attack on the West.
Moscow News published an article on May 11 entitled “The poisonous cloud of anti-Sovietism”, which comprehensively discredited the United States and Western society, covered up and refused to acknowledge the truth about the accident, and continued to brainwash the domestic population. It makes people wonder what they have really experienced in these past ten days or so.
To prevent another leak of radioactive materials, the former Soviet authorities used about 367,000 cubic meters of concrete and 7,300 tons of steel to build a huge bunker to seal off the Chernobyl 4 reactor.
When more information was revealed and the former Soviet population learned how serious the disaster really was, people could not forgive the authorities for their lies about radiation levels, confusing medical health advice and their political indifference. This event caused the entire Soviet population to lose trust in the government and confidence in the country began to crumble.
Finally, on December 25, 1991, a heavy snowfall fell in many northern countries that day. Gorbachev announced the dissolution of the Soviet Union in front of the media cameras in the Kremlin, and the sickle and hammer flag slowly descended from above the Kremlin, bringing the first Soviet regime on earth to an end.
According to the United Nations Atomic Energy Agency, the explosion that occurred at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in 1986 released a radioactive cloud that covered most of the Soviet Union, including the territories within what is now Belarus, Ukraine and the Russian Federation, resulting in the radiation exposure of nearly 8.4 million people in the three aforementioned countries.
Statistics show that of the 840,000 people who participated in the rescue at that time, 70,000 were permanently disabled and more than 300,000 died as a result of radiation injuries. Experts reveal that the explosion was equivalent to 400-500 times of the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima, Japan in 1945. And everyone at the site at the time was exposed to four times the lethal amount of radiation.
“Chernobyl” sounded the death knell of communist totalitarianism
Gorbachev later said: “The Chernobyl accident may have been the real cause of the collapse of the Soviet Union five years later, even more important than the cause of reform that I started.
Russian scholar R. G. Pikhoia noted: “The Soviet political leadership must be held accountable for the danger to the health and lives of hundreds of thousands of people caused by the failure to disclose or inform them in a timely manner. After Chernobyl, an ecological campaign with clear political overtones was launched throughout the country. Social movements emerged in Ukraine and Belarus, which were particularly affected, accusing the central regime of committing ‘crimes against the race’ against the inhabitants of these regions.”
Serhii Plokhy, an expert on Ukrainian history at Harvard University and author of “Chernobyl: A Tragic History,” notes that the Chernobyl nuclear accident occurred in a profound context. “The Soviet government controlled everything at the time, including information. In previous similar disasters, the Soviet government had withheld information from engineers, operators and others. …… This atmosphere of extreme secrecy, caused by the Cold War, was also an important factor in the Chernobyl nuclear accident.”
Shashly Pulocki believes that in the eyes of those in power in the Soviet Union, human life was not important; it was the completion of a particular mission that was important.
“The regime at the time was an instrument of authoritarian rule, and the people could neither change policy nor challenge authority. The government was not accountable to the people, so it would neglect the health of the people and sacrifice people’s lives. The authoritarian regime had the advantage of being good at dealing with emergencies and being able to mobilize people quickly, which resulted in more casualties.”
The accident brought home to the Ukrainian public that the deceptive tactics and blame shifting nature of the Communist Party would never change, and that the Communist Party had no mechanism or function to correct itself from the beginning.
“Chernobyl” sounded the death knell of communist totalitarianism. After the accident, the truth about the Chernobyl nuclear accident was revealed in Ukraine, Lithuania and Armenia. In March 1990, Lithuania declared independence; in December 1991, Ukraine held a referendum to declare independence; and on December 25, the Soviet Union was dissolved.
Today, “Chernobyl” has become a synonym for historical witness, and the history of “Chernobyl” leading to the disintegration of the communist totalitarian regime will always be remembered. The hero of Chernobyl is mentioned again because of his death, but he died of the pandemic “Chinese Communist virus” caused by another communist totalitarian regime.
Recent Comments