The birth of the Soviet missile defense system. Kartsev and Chelomey are building "Star Wars"
History Kartseva, like Yuditsky, is closely connected with the defense industry. All of his best works have been devoted to this topic, and as a result, his amazing talent and incredible genius were ineptly squandered by the party bureaucrats. In addition, Kartsev (like Lebedev) stood at the very origins of domestic computer engineering - he also found M-1 Brook!
With this we will begin our story.
Note that many of the machines mentioned here have already been described earlier, so we'll just refer the reader to the relevant articles.
The path to computer science for Kartsev began, as for a true veteran, back in 1951. The family, fortunately, did not reward him with relatives - enemies of the people, so he had no problems with the origin and training.
Kartsev was born in Kiev in 1923, his father was lucky to die a year after his birth and thus deftly avoid becoming a potential pest in the thirties. After the death of the breadwinner, the family moved to Odessa, then to Kharkov, then returned to Kiev, where Kartsev successfully finished school in 1941 and was immediately drafted to the front.
He fought desperately, as part of the Southwestern, Southern, North Caucasian and 2nd Ukrainian fronts, was a tanker, went through the entire war and was demobilized only in 1947. Took part in the liberation of Romania, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Austria. As a result of the war, the twenty-year-old foreman received the Order of the Red Star, medals "For Courage" and "For the capture of Budapest," so he showed himself worthy.
After the demobilization, Kartsev did not go along the party line, like our locksmiths-ministers, but moved to Moscow and entered the Moscow Power Engineering Institute at the radio engineering faculty, studied even too well - in the third year he passed exams as an external student and for the fourth, and as one of the best students In 1950, MEI was among the chosen ones, whom Brook took directly from the fifth year to the laboratory of electrical systems of the Energy Institute of the USSR Academy of Sciences (ENIN) for the construction of the first / second (depending on how you count, see article about M-1) computer in the USSR - M-1.
Kartsev worked diligently and showed such abilities that in 1952, after graduation, he did not have to worry about work - the talented graduate immediately got a job at the ENIN of the USSR Academy of Sciences for a permanent job, designing the M-2 machine. For her, he had already become the main developer, the productivity of the car was about 2 KIPS - at that time a decent figure, as we remember, the monstrous "Arrow" had the same. Compare, however, the parameters.
Still assembled almost from scrap metal (ENIN employees were actively dismantling German trophies for spare parts, as we already mentioned), the miniature and easy-to-use M-2 made the NIEM development monster in all respects. Knowing the USSR, it's easy to guess what went into the series. As we remember, Strela was the worst of the three designs of machines from 1952-1954 - the BESM was 1,5 times smaller and three times faster, and the M-2 was 6 times smaller and simpler at the same speed. In fact, the tradition of looking not at the characteristics, but at the proximity to the party was built into the domestic computer industry right at the time of its creation.
The most interesting thing is that the M-2 did not even have a chance to get into the series. The car was made in a completely blasphemous way for the USSR - it was not in the State Planning Committee and TZ was not lowered onto it. It was not ordered or approved by officials, in fact, Brook, as in the case of the M-1, was engaged in the development of a computer almost clandestinely.
As a result, absolutely everything that needed to be made and assembled was made handicraft, on the knee and in parts. M-2 was several times larger than M-1, it was impossible to build it by the laboratory. Naturally, no plant could take up its production without a party decree, as a result, it was necessary to carry out production in parts, negotiating here and there throughout Moscow through Brook's personal contacts.
For example, the pedestal of the machine was made at the pilot plant of the Institute of Fossil Fuels of the USSR Academy of Sciences, RAM - at the plant of medical equipment, logic blocks were mounted in the experimental workshops of the Moscow Power Engineering Institute. The manufactured parts were sent to the laboratory for assembly and adjustment, and a new batch of documentation was sent to production, etc. Working in this way, after 19 months it was possible to assemble an arithmetic device and a control device, another month was spent on a power supply unit and a magnetic drum. Finally, by December 1953, the RAM cabinet was plugged in and the car started up.
Surprisingly, this story repeated itself, in general, in all the developments of Brook himself, his cars were created all the time in a pirate way, without government support. His only patron was the director of the ENIN of the USSR Academy of Sciences Academician Gleb Maximilianovich Krzhizhanovsky, the creator of GOELRO, an exemplary old Bolshevik and a friend of Lenin, who, by some incredible miracle, was not cleaned up by Stalin in the 1930s (despite his personal dislike for him). As Alexander Zalkind recalled,
As we have already said, in the early 1950s, machine time in the USSR was so valuable that applications for the use of a computer were submitted through ministers, M-2 had an advantage in this regard. Finding itself in a kind of legal vacuum, not formally attached to anyone, it was used outside the standard hierarchy to solve problems personally approved by Brook.
Naturally, the use of such a thing, unique for the Union of those years, as a computer, could in any case generate politics around the machine. Brook set aside time for those tasks that seemed interesting to him (well, for those people who could contribute to his election to full academicians, as we remember, he was already a member of correspondent by that time). For the convenience of the visiting scientists, he even organized a group of programmers, gradually developing a library of useful subroutines.
Experts from the Institute of Atomic Energy, ITEP, FIAN USSR, Central Institute of Forecasts, State Astronomical Institute named after V.I. Sternberg, Moscow Aviation Institute, Institute of Oil, Gas and Chemistry. Gubkin, Faculty of Physics and Mechanics and Mathematics of Moscow State University and others. It should be noted that this machine really brought a lot of benefits - from calculating the supports of the Bratsk hydroelectric power station and wells in the Stavropol gas field to purely theoretical studies in the field of elementary particles.
Then, as we said, politics began. Brook was closely acquainted with the fathers of Russian cybernetics - Sobolev, Lyapunov, Kantorovich and Kitov. By cybernetics, we mean its classical meaning - the science of optimal methods of systems control. Kantorovich and Lyapunov were world-class mathematicians and were engaged in economic models, Sobolev, as the head of the Department of Computational Mathematics of the Faculty of Mechanics and Mathematics of Moscow State University, supported them in every possible way, and Kitov came up with a brilliant idea at that time - to create an extensive computer network for the State Planning Commission, in fact the Soviet Internet, connecting a variety of control computers into a single system.
We will come back to this idea later, because it cost dearly to everyone who supported it, we note for now that Brook also became infected with the concept of a computer network and began to promote it (as it turned out later, in vain).
So, Brook would not have been himself if he had not tried to derive some personal benefit from the M-2, he hoped that in the next elections to the Academy of Sciences of the USSR, Sobolev, seeing what benefit the machine brings him, would vote for him. For unknown reasons, Sobolev chose Lebedev - he suddenly ascended into the pantheon of Soviet scientific superheroes, and Brook was left with nothing. As a result, Brook took offense and later flatly refused to cooperate with Moscow State University, and stopped giving them his car.
This is how N.P. Brusentsov, the designer of the world's only serial ternary computer "Setun", recalls this:
In general, it is not entirely clear what Nikolai Petrovich had in mind, the M-2 existed in a single copy and no one was going to replicate it. Probably, Sobolev discussed with Brook the possibility of making another copy for Moscow State University, or moving the M-2 to the country's main university? In any case, the cooperation between ENIN and Moscow State University ended on this sad note, and Brusentsov began a project of a ternary computer, with which there were also monstrous political and bureaucratic torments, nevertheless, in 1958 "Setun" successfully started working.
The maximum benefit that Brook got from the M-2 was the reorganization of ENIN in 1956 into an independent Laboratory of Control Machines and Systems of the USSR Academy of Sciences (LUMS of the USSR Academy of Sciences) under his leadership.
Interestingly, Brook also conducted the country's first experiments with computer networks. In 1957, at the first industrial exhibition in the pavilion of the Academy of Sciences at VDNKh, the remote control of the M-2 computer was connected by a telephone line with a machine located on Leninsky Prospekt. The machine solved the tasks set from the remote control and issued printouts to the teletype, the whole exhibition gathered to look at such a miracle.
A little later, these experiments helped Kartsev in the development of the M-4 complex for remote work with radars. The machine itself worked for 15 years, of course, being hopelessly outdated, which once again shows the level of computerization of the Union - even old computers were worth their weight in gold. After that, alas, a typical fate awaited her - scrap metal.
It is surprising that long before Google, with its practice of allocating paid working hours to employees for the implementation of their personal ideas and projects, Brooke introduced a similar undertaking. Taking advantage of the fact that the M-2 machine was in fact his personal computer, he (at the time when academics literally fought during machine time) by a strong-willed decision allocated Sunday for the entertainment of programmers. As a result, the employees programmed game tasks, system diagnostics tasks, and others. From these entertainments, the first in the USSR original algorithms for enumeration, construction of reference systems with logarithmic notation and search, etc., grew up.
The M-3 machine, the successor of the first two, passed by Kartsev, it was developed by N. Ya.Matyukhin's group since 1954 (Matyukhin was a strong engineer, although not such a genius as Kartsev, he specialized in small computers, and the intelligent leader Brook, not wanting to squander his subordinates in vain, he gave him his own task, so Kartsev went to make M-4, and Matyukhin - M-3).
Brooke was just an inveterate anarchist, so the work was done again without a special decree, again on an initiative basis! In fact, nothing would have happened the third time if three academicians were not interested in Series M at once - V.A. Ambartsumyan (Academy of Sciences of Armenia), A.G. Iosifyan (VNIIEM) and S.P.
As we remember, in the mid-1950s, the number of computers in the entire USSR numbered a dozen and not a single one of them (with the exception of the Ukrainian MESM) was in the Union republics, naturally, the prospect of getting at least one piece greatly inspired them. In 1956, three copies of the M-3 were made at the pilot production of VNIIEM, they were divided by the project participants: VNIIEM itself, Korolev and the Yerevan Mathematical Institute of the Academy of Sciences of Armenia.
Naturally, not a single plant undertook to make it in series, since it was not in the plans, but a lucky chance helped.
At the same time, the Belarusians were completing the construction of the Minsk Computer Engineering Plant, they offered to make the car at home, and the State Planning Committee suddenly gave the go-ahead (as we can see, in the days before the Ministry of Radio Industry and the Ministry of Economic Development and Trade, issues of production were solved somehow easier).
Remembers B.M.Kagan, who informally led the joint development group:
M-3 continued the command system of previous machines, was miniature (3 cabinets + power supply, total area of about 3 sq. M, power consumption 10 kW, only 774 lamps and 3000 diodes) and had a slightly lower performance - about 1 KIPS (in the version with memory of a healthy person, on ferrites, in the version with a magnetic drum - no more than 0,03 KIPS).
In general, the desire for miniaturization (which resulted in extremely successful models of small computers) was born in Brook not from a good life.
As we remember from the M-1 (which had to be assembled on trophy cuproxes), ENIN had a huge strain with lamps, and getting even 200-300 pieces was just the highest aerobatics of Soviet blat and penetration (at the same time, a total of more 50 thousand, not greedy).
A.B. Zalkind, one of the participants in the creation of the M series, recalls that the quote characterizes that time so amazingly that it deserves to be quoted in its entirety:
A story worthy of "Seventeen Moments of Spring" to gain a couple of hundred pentodes.
As a result, Brook learned to masterfully save on everything he could, and thus an extremely successful project of small cars was born. The M-3 series was produced in Minsk from 1958 to 1960 in a simplified version (with memory on a primitive magnetic drum), 16 machines were manufactured, and in 1960 they managed to make 10 more with ferrite memory. In the same year, the plant switched to "Minsk" - their own version of the M-3 (the developer was G.P. Lopato, a total of 10 versions of this architecture were created, and Lopato himself then wound around the Union and even abroad, helping to debug their machines M -series).
In Yerevan, the car served as the basis for "Aragats", "Hrazdan" and "Nairi". Most notably, in the mid-1950s, international and intra-union cooperation was surprisingly more effective than in the 1960s. Copies of the documentation on the M-3 were received not only by Armenians and Belarusians, but also by Academician V.A. and even the Chinese! However, the history of early Chinese military computers is beyond the scope of this story and, if there is interest from the readers, deserves a separate article, especially since there is no information about this in Russian at all.
And what was Kartsev doing at this time?
Of course, he built the M-4! The director of the Radio Engineering Institute of the USSR Academy of Sciences, Academician A.L. Mints, already known to us on the topic of missile defense, in 1957 turned to Brook with a proposal to develop a computer for radar, designed to work in conjunction with the radar of Yu.V. Polyak. Brook, of course, agreed, and in the best traditions of the Soviet classics, he became the general designer, and, of course, Kartsev became the developer.
The machine was already semiconductor and architecturally adapted for specific signal processing algorithms, for example, the processor supported hardware square root extraction, double comparisons, etc. Kartsev in M-4 was the first to propose solutions that later became classical - firmware with algorithms, channel I / O coprocessors and other architectural features of 1960-1970 air defense / missile defense computers.
For the M-4 computer, two versions of the ALU were designed: the U-1 parallel type on static triggers using a pulse-potential system of elements (P-16B transistors) and the U-2 series U-2 type using a purely pulse system on dynamic triggers with diffusion transistors P403 and delay lines. Both were made, but a parallel one went into series.
Kartsev, in addition to the general architecture, was personally responsible for the development of the control device. The machine turned out, again, rather compact, all the equipment was placed in 4 cabinets and 2 racks. A year later, the work was completed, and the documentation arrived at the Zagorsk Electromechanical Plant (ZEMZ), by 1960, two prototypes were manufactured and installed at the Radio Engineering Institute of the USSR Academy of Sciences for tuning and docking with the radar. For the convenience of work, the team headed by Kartsev was assigned to the Special Laboratory No. 2. These people later entered the Kartsev Research Institute.
At this time in Kazakhstan, at the Balkhash test site, the first tests of the prototype of System "A" - the Kisunko anti-missile defense system were already in full swing. For control and interfacing, an ersatz was used, quickly converted by Burtsev from BESM-2 - the M-40 machine, manufactured by ITMiVT.
In general, Burtsev, as we have already said, was incredibly lucky - without expecting it, Lebedev's student managed, without participating in any battles, to automatically become the only developer of actually working missile defense computers in the USSR, mass-produced, taken on combat duty and working in such quality. As a result, 99 percent of people who are minimally involved in the topic of domestic missile defense development will confidently name Burtsev when asked who was the protagonist in the development of missile defense computers.
Judge for yourself - when in 1955 Kisunko was looking for a computer for his system, there were only Strela at hand (it makes no sense to even think about this), M-2 (similarly, the power is not nearly the same), Kartsev's machines are not yet in the project it was, BESM-2, the work of the master Lebedev himself, was also not suitable, fortunately, he found an intelligent student - Vsevolod Burtsev, who already had experience with computers for radars (project "Diana", 1953).
As a result, Kisunko was forced in 1959 to be content with his bundle of M-40 and M-50, and it was they who participated in the epoch-making successful experiment of intercepting a ballistic missile.
Further in 1961, he develops an improved version of the M-50 - 5E92b, which, again, is put on the prototype of the A-35 system in anticipation of Yuditsky's machine, which, as we already know, is canceled in 1971. And voila - Burtsev again, by the will of fate, becomes the author of the first missile defense computer in the USSR, put on alert. Further, the Kisunko project is closed along with all the work of Kartsev and Yuditsky, and the new A-135 missile defense system receives the Elbrus computer to work ... yes, Burtsev again.
Elbrus-2, moreover, functioned as part of the complex back in 1995, which as a result led to a persistent myth: ITMiVT is the only greatest developer of world-class supercomputers in the USSR from the moment of its foundation until the collapse of the Union, Lebedev (in the most old-school version of the myth) / Burtsev (in the version close to reality) are the greatest fathers of Soviet supercomputer technologies, so cool that their machines defended our skies from enemy missiles for 50 years. However, we still have a long and interesting conversation about ITMiVT and their machines.
Now let's return to Kartsev again.
The most interesting thing is, what was the M-4 system intended for?
The reader might think that the Sary-Shagan training ground on Lake Balkhash in Kazakhstan in 1961-1962 means the "A" system and anti-missile defense. Nothing of the kind, as we remember - Mints ordered the car to Kartsev, who did not want to have anything to do with the anti-missile heresy. The test site was used for a bunch of various tests, and in the early 1960s, research was carried out there on Chelomey's absolutely schizo-technical project - the "Satellite Fighter" system.
As a result, the life and work of Kartsev turned out to be, to the very end, connected in one way or another with this project.
In general, Chelomey was an epochal and great person, he definitely deserves a separate article, which, and not just one, has already been written about him. Therefore, here we will only touch on the project itself, for which the M-4 was created and its background.
As you know, Chelomey's whole life was spent in a continuous confrontation with Sergei Korolev. Korolev's talent as a designer can be discussed for a long time, but as a manager and even a top manager, as they would say now, he was absolutely brilliant (and he was excellent at working with the Soviet bureaucracy, being able to lubricate a critically important gear at any moment). Chelomei was indeed a brilliant scientist, mechanic and mathematician, but at the same time transverse, almost like Kisunko, and the party battles were given to him with difficulty.
What was more important in the conditions of the USSR can be judged by 1945.
By this time, Chelomey, being a simple student, was giving a course of lectures on the dynamics of structures to the engineers of the Zaporozhye Motor-Building Plant, a year before the flow he graduated with honors from Kiev aviation Institute, in parallel at the Academy of Sciences of the Ukrainian SSR, attended a course of lectures on mechanics and mathematics by the great Italian scientist Tullio Levi-Civita, the father of the mathematical part of general relativity, who worked with Einstein, communicated and studied with such outstanding mathematicians and mechanics as academician Grave and famous Krylov. At the age of 22 he wrote his first university textbook (published!) On vector analysis, by the age of 25 he published 14 articles and became a candidate of sciences, having defended himself at the Institute of Mathematics of the Academy of Sciences of the Ukrainian SSR, in 1940, among the 50 best young scientists of the Union, he was admitted to a special doctoral program at Academy of Sciences of the USSR (26-year-old Chelomey is the youngest in this fifty elite).
At the age of 26, he becomes a doctor of sciences and receives a Stalin scholarship in the amount of 1500 rubles, a huge amount for those times, more than the salary of a professor. In 1942, the Central Institute of Aviation Motors. P. Baranova Chelomey invents and builds the world's first pulsating jet engine, and by 1945 his cruise missile 10X, the first in the USSR and the second in the world, was adopted.
By this time, Sergei Korolev graduated from a technical school in Moscow, builds gliders and flies on them, in 1933 somehow manages to get into the Jet Research Institute of the NK of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs and by 1935 become the head of the rocket aircraft department. And then his career was tragically interrupted - the leadership of the Jet Institute fell under the purge, including himself. In the famous sharashka, TsKB-29 helps another inmate, Tupolev, to design the Pe-2 and Tu-2, in the second sharashka, OKB-16 attaches a jet accelerator to the Pe-2, and was released ahead of schedule in 1944. And then the career flooded.
As a result, by 1950, Korolev became the chief and chief designer of the OKB-1 NII-88 MV USSR, created for him, and Chelomey was summoned to the carpet to Stalin on a denunciation of the futility of all his work. Chelomey is kicked out from everywhere, his design bureau is taken away, his plant is transferred to A.I. In February 1953, he personally went to Stalin.
According to Chelomey,
As a result, a miracle happened, and from the leader's office Chelomey went not to the Gulag, but back home, somehow convincing Stalin that he was not a pest. A month later, Stalin dies, and Chelomey, still in shock from what happened, meets Khrushchev.
Having experienced such a turning point, people usually learn valuable life lessons, and Chelomey also learned. He forever realized that more important than all real developments are the real patrons in the party. In February 1958, a graduate of the Bauman Moscow State Technical University Sergei Nikitich Khrushchev was assigned to one of the most promising organizations of the military-industrial complex - OKB-30 to our friend Kisunko. However, at that moment he was on the rise, had a whole bunch of applications and, even without looking at the list, announced the search and refused to hire another group of graduates.
His deputy Elizarenkov noticed the name of Khrushchev, but, knowing the character of the chief, did not object. So the priceless list landed on the table of the chief designer of the then little-known OKB-52 of the State Committee for Aviation Engineering of Chelomey, and he instantly realized that such a treasure should not be missed. The son of the secretary general was immediately adopted, and in the same year Chelomey was elected a corresponding member of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR, in 1959 he was appointed general designer of aviation equipment of the USSR, without delay and hesitation, his first missile system P-5 was adopted by submarines. Immediately after the death of the aircraft designer Polikarpov, Chelomey occupied his well-equipped experimental plant on Khodynka.
As we already remember, he is trying to declare his missile defense project, a bit manic and providing for massive thermonuclear air explosions of anti-missiles in the North Pole, from where the main wave of attacking ICBMs was supposed to go, but, realizing the absurdity of the idea, he rejects it. His eternal rival Korolev at this time launches the first satellite, and Chelomey is struck by an interesting idea - in opposition to his opponent, to submit the idea of an anti-satellite weapons... Well, at the same time, it was necessary to load its design bureau with a government order - the niches of the air and missile defense were occupied by Raspletin and Kisunko, the anti-satellite topic remained free. Moreover, on February 28, 1959, the United States launched the first military-experimental reconnaissance satellite, Discoverer 1, into orbit. Khrushchev immediately declared that no foreign reconnaissance satellites dare to desecrate the space of the USSR, someone threw in the crazy idea that there could be a nuclear bomb on board the satellite , in the end, it is easy to guess that Chelomey received carte blanche for any of his experiments.
Then a typical corps de ballet began, similar to the one with anti-missile defense, only with anti-satellite. The satellite had to be shot down with a satellite, it was necessary to launch the aforementioned anti-satellite into orbit with a heavy rocket (for the combat satellite of those years, according to the project, had a mass of under two tons), which means it was necessary to build a heavy rocket. Here KB Korolev and Yangel have already boiled - Chelomey climbed into their domain.
Yangel even had an R-16 rocket ready with a launch weight of about 140 tons (about as much as needed). Hearing about the project, Mikoyan pulled himself up, and even Kisunko offered his help, but Khrushchev rejected them all in favor of OKB-52. At the same time, in order to overwhelm the Queen, it took additional efforts of Marshal Ustinov himself, who could tolerate him and promoted him as a competitor to Yangel. Note that the marshal did not forgive him for the victories of Chelomey and until the end of his career he put a spoke in the wheels, especially after the death of Khrushchev.
When Khrushchev was flooded in 1964, Chelomey almost fell under the skating rink of repression for the second time, fortunately, the times were already herbivorous, so everything was limited to the typical undercover struggle "who will have time to cover whose projects before." As a result, this resulted in the fact that the commission headed by Keldysh and with the support of Ustinov hacked to death the Chelomeev Proton project in favor of the insane design of Korolev, the technoschizophrenic H-1 rocket, all 4 launches of which ended in phenomenal failure, including the most powerful explosion in the history of astronautics in five (!) kilotons, which completely destroyed not only the rocket and the launch pad, but everything within a radius of half a kilometer from the launch point (surprisingly, history later restored justice - "Proton" became one of the best missiles in the world, the pride of the USSR and Russia, used a lot years and performed an uncountable number of flights).
In 1979, Ustinov gave Chelomey, he was restricted in his activities, the manned flight programs developed by him were closed, the already completely finished and debugged first automatic station "ALMAZ-T" for all-weather sensing and radar of the Earth was removed from launch.
In 1981 Ustinov will say about Chelomei:
After that, a decree of the Central Committee of the CPSU and the USSR Council of Ministers is issued, which actually prohibits all the work of Chelomeev's NPO Mashinostroenie related to space exploration. Three years later, Chelomey dies, he is forgotten for many years, the only legendary creator of the Soviet space program in all textbooks is Sergei Korolev, ranked among the pantheon of official geniuses of the USSR. And only in the early 2000s, this version begins to gradually burst at the seams.
Returning to the M-4 project, we note that, naturally, the PSO complex also required the entire ground harness - command-measuring complexes and radars. Chelomei did not quarrel with Raspletin and Mintz, unlike Kisunko, and therefore received their full support in one and the other. Naturally, this was only the beginning. The memoirs of the scientific director of the Central Research Institute "Kometa", academician A. I. Savin will help to feel the atmosphere of those years and those meetings.
By the way, Kisunko also did not forgive Chelomey for this decision and later (in parallel fighting off his persecution by the Ministry of Radio Industry) took part in the persecution of Chelomey, perpetrated by Kisunko's patron Marshal Ustinov. Scorpions in a bank can serve as a good model of the life path of many Soviet general designers, regardless of their genius. Unfortunately, the reality of their existence was such that practically no one managed to get dirty in one way or another. And, looking at those times and those actions, now only the immortal lines of Nikolai Gogol from Dead Souls come to mind:
Since in the development of the IS system, the main and most difficult were two tasks, completely analogous to the problems of missile defense: to select an enemy satellite and point its own anti-satellite at it with high accuracy, then no less powerful computers were required to solve this problem.
So Kartsev received his order, and an M-4 appeared at the Sary-Shagan training ground with a good performance of about 50 KIPS.
During the implementation of the machine, valuable experience was gained, and literally in the process of implementation, it was decided to build an improved version of the machine - M-4M, by adding specific nodes for the primary processing of radar data to it: a sector switch, a code converter, a drive, a threshold device, a buffer memory, transcoding devices, coordinate determination device, buffer registers, etc. The set was named the primary processing device (UPD) and was supposed to occupy one more typical cabinet from M-4. In the process, I had to try pretty hard, get new high-frequency diffusion transistors, but in the end, the modernization turned out as planned.
The UPO cabinet was ready by October 1962 and by 1963 the M-4M (some sources use the M4-2M index originally proposed by Kartsev) was installed at the Balkhash test site. Both machines were in operation at the facility until 1966.
Everywhere they write that the M-4M was produced in series, in practice it turned out a little differently.
Precisely, 8 copies of the kit were made (according to the number of Dnestr radars, 2 stations of 4 units, one near Irkutsk, Mishelevka, OS-1 node and at Cape Gulshat of Lake Balkhash in the Kazakh SSR, Sary-Shagan, OS-2 node). The kits were in operation for only 4 years until 1966, when the Dniester system became obsolete and was replaced by Dniester-M, and later - Dnipro.
One more important fact should be noted.
Acquaintance with the radar operators later turned out to be very bad for Kartsev. The fact is that the development of radar equipment was raked up by the same great and terrible Ministry of Radio Industry, formed in 1965, and Kartsev with his research institute, since he had already worked on the relevant topics, was automatically assigned to the subordination of Kalmykov. Knowing all the parts of the previous history, it is easy to guess that such submission could not end with anything good for the unfortunate Kartsev, it never ended.
Summing up the turbulent fifties, we can say the following, of course, on the basis of discussion.
The very idea of a Satellite Destroyer from the point of view of the concept was much more insane and useless than missile defense. As already mentioned, it was precisely the fact that the Soviet anti-missile missile was the first in the world to be able to stop an ICBM attack that very qualitatively cooled many hotheads of the Pentagon, who were struggling with their desire to poke red buttons throughout the second half of the 1950s.
The importance of the air defense system is even more stupid to deny, so the investment of manpower and resources in their development was fully justified.
As for the PSO system, it is almost impossible to come up with an adequate case for its use.
The idea that a satellite could carry a nuclear bomb was absurd by the standards of 1950s technology - many times more reliable, cheaper and safer for themselves to use conventional rockets. Shooting down other people's satellites (even potential spies) in peacetime is difficult to imagine a greater absurdity, both from the point of view of the international situation and simple logic - exactly the same our own satellites fly over the territory of foreign countries in the same way.
In the event that the conflict reaches a stage of such a level that it will be necessary to destroy everything on which it is written Made in USA, then satellites will certainly not become a primary target, because at the same time a hail of nuclear missiles will fall on us. As a result, the usefulness of the satellite extermination system (as well as the general control system of outer space for the passage of these satellites) is an extremely controversial thing.
It is all the more annoying that the ingenious works of Kartsev were used only exclusively for this project, which absorbed an unimaginable amount of money.
In the next part, we will conclude our conversation about the M-series cars and find out how this epic ended.
To be continued ...
With this we will begin our story.
Note that many of the machines mentioned here have already been described earlier, so we'll just refer the reader to the relevant articles.
The path to computer science for Kartsev began, as for a true veteran, back in 1951. The family, fortunately, did not reward him with relatives - enemies of the people, so he had no problems with the origin and training.
Kartsev was born in Kiev in 1923, his father was lucky to die a year after his birth and thus deftly avoid becoming a potential pest in the thirties. After the death of the breadwinner, the family moved to Odessa, then to Kharkov, then returned to Kiev, where Kartsev successfully finished school in 1941 and was immediately drafted to the front.
He fought desperately, as part of the Southwestern, Southern, North Caucasian and 2nd Ukrainian fronts, was a tanker, went through the entire war and was demobilized only in 1947. Took part in the liberation of Romania, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Austria. As a result of the war, the twenty-year-old foreman received the Order of the Red Star, medals "For Courage" and "For the capture of Budapest," so he showed himself worthy.
After the demobilization, Kartsev did not go along the party line, like our locksmiths-ministers, but moved to Moscow and entered the Moscow Power Engineering Institute at the radio engineering faculty, studied even too well - in the third year he passed exams as an external student and for the fourth, and as one of the best students In 1950, MEI was among the chosen ones, whom Brook took directly from the fifth year to the laboratory of electrical systems of the Energy Institute of the USSR Academy of Sciences (ENIN) for the construction of the first / second (depending on how you count, see article about M-1) computer in the USSR - M-1.
M-2
Kartsev worked diligently and showed such abilities that in 1952, after graduation, he did not have to worry about work - the talented graduate immediately got a job at the ENIN of the USSR Academy of Sciences for a permanent job, designing the M-2 machine. For her, he had already become the main developer, the productivity of the car was about 2 KIPS - at that time a decent figure, as we remember, the monstrous "Arrow" had the same. Compare, however, the parameters.
Still assembled almost from scrap metal (ENIN employees were actively dismantling German trophies for spare parts, as we already mentioned), the miniature and easy-to-use M-2 made the NIEM development monster in all respects. Knowing the USSR, it's easy to guess what went into the series. As we remember, Strela was the worst of the three designs of machines from 1952-1954 - the BESM was 1,5 times smaller and three times faster, and the M-2 was 6 times smaller and simpler at the same speed. In fact, the tradition of looking not at the characteristics, but at the proximity to the party was built into the domestic computer industry right at the time of its creation.
The most interesting thing is that the M-2 did not even have a chance to get into the series. The car was made in a completely blasphemous way for the USSR - it was not in the State Planning Committee and TZ was not lowered onto it. It was not ordered or approved by officials, in fact, Brook, as in the case of the M-1, was engaged in the development of a computer almost clandestinely.
As a result, absolutely everything that needed to be made and assembled was made handicraft, on the knee and in parts. M-2 was several times larger than M-1, it was impossible to build it by the laboratory. Naturally, no plant could take up its production without a party decree, as a result, it was necessary to carry out production in parts, negotiating here and there throughout Moscow through Brook's personal contacts.
For example, the pedestal of the machine was made at the pilot plant of the Institute of Fossil Fuels of the USSR Academy of Sciences, RAM - at the plant of medical equipment, logic blocks were mounted in the experimental workshops of the Moscow Power Engineering Institute. The manufactured parts were sent to the laboratory for assembly and adjustment, and a new batch of documentation was sent to production, etc. Working in this way, after 19 months it was possible to assemble an arithmetic device and a control device, another month was spent on a power supply unit and a magnetic drum. Finally, by December 1953, the RAM cabinet was plugged in and the car started up.
Surprisingly, this story repeated itself, in general, in all the developments of Brook himself, his cars were created all the time in a pirate way, without government support. His only patron was the director of the ENIN of the USSR Academy of Sciences Academician Gleb Maximilianovich Krzhizhanovsky, the creator of GOELRO, an exemplary old Bolshevik and a friend of Lenin, who, by some incredible miracle, was not cleaned up by Stalin in the 1930s (despite his personal dislike for him). As Alexander Zalkind recalled,
work on the computer ... was carried out semi-legally, today they would say that this is the work manager's hobby and nothing more.
As we have already said, in the early 1950s, machine time in the USSR was so valuable that applications for the use of a computer were submitted through ministers, M-2 had an advantage in this regard. Finding itself in a kind of legal vacuum, not formally attached to anyone, it was used outside the standard hierarchy to solve problems personally approved by Brook.
Naturally, the use of such a thing, unique for the Union of those years, as a computer, could in any case generate politics around the machine. Brook set aside time for those tasks that seemed interesting to him (well, for those people who could contribute to his election to full academicians, as we remember, he was already a member of correspondent by that time). For the convenience of the visiting scientists, he even organized a group of programmers, gradually developing a library of useful subroutines.
Experts from the Institute of Atomic Energy, ITEP, FIAN USSR, Central Institute of Forecasts, State Astronomical Institute named after V.I. Sternberg, Moscow Aviation Institute, Institute of Oil, Gas and Chemistry. Gubkin, Faculty of Physics and Mechanics and Mathematics of Moscow State University and others. It should be noted that this machine really brought a lot of benefits - from calculating the supports of the Bratsk hydroelectric power station and wells in the Stavropol gas field to purely theoretical studies in the field of elementary particles.
Then, as we said, politics began. Brook was closely acquainted with the fathers of Russian cybernetics - Sobolev, Lyapunov, Kantorovich and Kitov. By cybernetics, we mean its classical meaning - the science of optimal methods of systems control. Kantorovich and Lyapunov were world-class mathematicians and were engaged in economic models, Sobolev, as the head of the Department of Computational Mathematics of the Faculty of Mechanics and Mathematics of Moscow State University, supported them in every possible way, and Kitov came up with a brilliant idea at that time - to create an extensive computer network for the State Planning Commission, in fact the Soviet Internet, connecting a variety of control computers into a single system.
We will come back to this idea later, because it cost dearly to everyone who supported it, we note for now that Brook also became infected with the concept of a computer network and began to promote it (as it turned out later, in vain).
So, Brook would not have been himself if he had not tried to derive some personal benefit from the M-2, he hoped that in the next elections to the Academy of Sciences of the USSR, Sobolev, seeing what benefit the machine brings him, would vote for him. For unknown reasons, Sobolev chose Lebedev - he suddenly ascended into the pantheon of Soviet scientific superheroes, and Brook was left with nothing. As a result, Brook took offense and later flatly refused to cooperate with Moscow State University, and stopped giving them his car.
This is how N.P. Brusentsov, the designer of the world's only serial ternary computer "Setun", recalls this:
Then the task was very simple: we had to get our own M-2 machine for Moscow State University, which was made in Brook's laboratory. But it turned out to be a problem. At the elections of academicians, Sergei Lvovich Sobolev, our leader, voted not for Brook, but for Lebedev. Brooke was offended and did not give the car. I came to Sobolev and asked: what am I going to do now? He answers me: let's make our own car.
In general, it is not entirely clear what Nikolai Petrovich had in mind, the M-2 existed in a single copy and no one was going to replicate it. Probably, Sobolev discussed with Brook the possibility of making another copy for Moscow State University, or moving the M-2 to the country's main university? In any case, the cooperation between ENIN and Moscow State University ended on this sad note, and Brusentsov began a project of a ternary computer, with which there were also monstrous political and bureaucratic torments, nevertheless, in 1958 "Setun" successfully started working.
The maximum benefit that Brook got from the M-2 was the reorganization of ENIN in 1956 into an independent Laboratory of Control Machines and Systems of the USSR Academy of Sciences (LUMS of the USSR Academy of Sciences) under his leadership.
Interestingly, Brook also conducted the country's first experiments with computer networks. In 1957, at the first industrial exhibition in the pavilion of the Academy of Sciences at VDNKh, the remote control of the M-2 computer was connected by a telephone line with a machine located on Leninsky Prospekt. The machine solved the tasks set from the remote control and issued printouts to the teletype, the whole exhibition gathered to look at such a miracle.
A little later, these experiments helped Kartsev in the development of the M-4 complex for remote work with radars. The machine itself worked for 15 years, of course, being hopelessly outdated, which once again shows the level of computerization of the Union - even old computers were worth their weight in gold. After that, alas, a typical fate awaited her - scrap metal.
It is surprising that long before Google, with its practice of allocating paid working hours to employees for the implementation of their personal ideas and projects, Brooke introduced a similar undertaking. Taking advantage of the fact that the M-2 machine was in fact his personal computer, he (at the time when academics literally fought during machine time) by a strong-willed decision allocated Sunday for the entertainment of programmers. As a result, the employees programmed game tasks, system diagnostics tasks, and others. From these entertainments, the first in the USSR original algorithms for enumeration, construction of reference systems with logarithmic notation and search, etc., grew up.
M-3
The M-3 machine, the successor of the first two, passed by Kartsev, it was developed by N. Ya.Matyukhin's group since 1954 (Matyukhin was a strong engineer, although not such a genius as Kartsev, he specialized in small computers, and the intelligent leader Brook, not wanting to squander his subordinates in vain, he gave him his own task, so Kartsev went to make M-4, and Matyukhin - M-3).
Above - most likely, the only surviving photos of the M-2 and M-3 vehicles from the INEUM archives (http://www.ineum.ru). Below is a mock-up of the M-3 machine in the museum of the Minsk Computing Machinery Production Association (photo https://museum.dataart.com).
Brooke was just an inveterate anarchist, so the work was done again without a special decree, again on an initiative basis! In fact, nothing would have happened the third time if three academicians were not interested in Series M at once - V.A. Ambartsumyan (Academy of Sciences of Armenia), A.G. Iosifyan (VNIIEM) and S.P.
As we remember, in the mid-1950s, the number of computers in the entire USSR numbered a dozen and not a single one of them (with the exception of the Ukrainian MESM) was in the Union republics, naturally, the prospect of getting at least one piece greatly inspired them. In 1956, three copies of the M-3 were made at the pilot production of VNIIEM, they were divided by the project participants: VNIIEM itself, Korolev and the Yerevan Mathematical Institute of the Academy of Sciences of Armenia.
Naturally, not a single plant undertook to make it in series, since it was not in the plans, but a lucky chance helped.
At the same time, the Belarusians were completing the construction of the Minsk Computer Engineering Plant, they offered to make the car at home, and the State Planning Committee suddenly gave the go-ahead (as we can see, in the days before the Ministry of Radio Industry and the Ministry of Economic Development and Trade, issues of production were solved somehow easier).
Remembers B.M.Kagan, who informally led the joint development group:
... Since the work on the creation of the M-3 computer was proactive and was not included in any plans, the State Commission headed by Academician N. G. Bruevich with the participation of M. R. Shura-Bura showed character and did not want to accept the machine: they say , was born illegally. But they accepted it anyway. And for two years it was not possible to solve the issue in a state-like manner - to launch it into serial production. At this time, the Yerevan Institute of Mathematical Machines was organized, and according to our documentation on the M-3 computer, this institute built its first computers. In those same years, a plant was built in Minsk, but it turned out that he had nothing to do. Minsk residents learned that Iosifyan has a car, which no one agrees to put on the series. And only then it was decided to transfer the documentation for the M-3 from VNIIEM to this plant. So the work on the creation of the M-3 computer became the basis for the development of mathematical mechanical engineering in Yerevan and Minsk.
M-3 continued the command system of previous machines, was miniature (3 cabinets + power supply, total area of about 3 sq. M, power consumption 10 kW, only 774 lamps and 3000 diodes) and had a slightly lower performance - about 1 KIPS (in the version with memory of a healthy person, on ferrites, in the version with a magnetic drum - no more than 0,03 KIPS).
In general, the desire for miniaturization (which resulted in extremely successful models of small computers) was born in Brook not from a good life.
As we remember from the M-1 (which had to be assembled on trophy cuproxes), ENIN had a huge strain with lamps, and getting even 200-300 pieces was just the highest aerobatics of Soviet blat and penetration (at the same time, a total of more 50 thousand, not greedy).
A.B. Zalkind, one of the participants in the creation of the M series, recalls that the quote characterizes that time so amazingly that it deserves to be quoted in its entirety:
Machine time on the first computers was extremely important for the department, where Boroda [Kurchatov] was at the head. The famous scientist S.L.Sobolev was the right hand of Boroda, responsible for mathematics. He often visited the M-1 computer, strongly supporting our work. For his team, it was required to carry out inversion of high-dimensional matrices ... At this time, we began to receive the first domestic 6X4 pentodes. An attempt to replace German pentodes with domestic ones failed, since the spread of the cutoff voltage of our pentodes was very large ... The operation of the M-1 computer, even during tests, stopped. This was very unpleasant for Sobolev. And for our development team, it was a disaster. I was sent to Leningrad to the Svetlana plant with the task of bringing a batch of several hundred 6X4 lamps that had passed special control.
For this, a simple stand was made with a mains plug and with one lamp panel, a power circuit for a pentode and a TT tester for measuring current.
We prepared a regular letter: “In order to provide technical assistance, please allow the representative to reject your 6X4 lamps. We guarantee payment ... "
Before our departure, S. L. Sobolev visited us. He told me: “If there are difficulties, you should call by phone ... At the beginning of the conversation, say a word (Sergei Lvovich gave the name of a flower known to all). After such preparation, with trepidation I stepped onto the carpet of the office of the chief engineer of the Svetlana plant Gavrilov. I was still stomping at the entrance when Gavrilov, without getting up from his chair, asked: "Pick up the lamps?" I replied, "Yes." In response I heard: "Get out of here! .."
Sadly I trudged off to the hotel, and then I remembered Sergei Lvovich's parting words. I called. After answering, the subscriber named the flower. A voice in the receiver said the number of an apartment in a residential building on Nevsky Prospekt, opposite the knitwear studio. Came to this address. Outwardly, an ordinary apartment. They let me in, listened carefully and said: “We act only at the level of the third secretary of the regional committee. You will have to wait two days and call us in the same way. " Two days later my call was answered: “Everything is all right with Gavrilov. You can visit him. " On the Svetlana, Gavrilov smiled, held out his hand and gave instructions to do everything I needed. I took three hundred 6X4 lamps to Moscow.
For this, a simple stand was made with a mains plug and with one lamp panel, a power circuit for a pentode and a TT tester for measuring current.
We prepared a regular letter: “In order to provide technical assistance, please allow the representative to reject your 6X4 lamps. We guarantee payment ... "
Before our departure, S. L. Sobolev visited us. He told me: “If there are difficulties, you should call by phone ... At the beginning of the conversation, say a word (Sergei Lvovich gave the name of a flower known to all). After such preparation, with trepidation I stepped onto the carpet of the office of the chief engineer of the Svetlana plant Gavrilov. I was still stomping at the entrance when Gavrilov, without getting up from his chair, asked: "Pick up the lamps?" I replied, "Yes." In response I heard: "Get out of here! .."
Sadly I trudged off to the hotel, and then I remembered Sergei Lvovich's parting words. I called. After answering, the subscriber named the flower. A voice in the receiver said the number of an apartment in a residential building on Nevsky Prospekt, opposite the knitwear studio. Came to this address. Outwardly, an ordinary apartment. They let me in, listened carefully and said: “We act only at the level of the third secretary of the regional committee. You will have to wait two days and call us in the same way. " Two days later my call was answered: “Everything is all right with Gavrilov. You can visit him. " On the Svetlana, Gavrilov smiled, held out his hand and gave instructions to do everything I needed. I took three hundred 6X4 lamps to Moscow.
A story worthy of "Seventeen Moments of Spring" to gain a couple of hundred pentodes.
As a result, Brook learned to masterfully save on everything he could, and thus an extremely successful project of small cars was born. The M-3 series was produced in Minsk from 1958 to 1960 in a simplified version (with memory on a primitive magnetic drum), 16 machines were manufactured, and in 1960 they managed to make 10 more with ferrite memory. In the same year, the plant switched to "Minsk" - their own version of the M-3 (the developer was G.P. Lopato, a total of 10 versions of this architecture were created, and Lopato himself then wound around the Union and even abroad, helping to debug their machines M -series).
In Yerevan, the car served as the basis for "Aragats", "Hrazdan" and "Nairi". Most notably, in the mid-1950s, international and intra-union cooperation was surprisingly more effective than in the 1960s. Copies of the documentation on the M-3 were received not only by Armenians and Belarusians, but also by Academician V.A. and even the Chinese! However, the history of early Chinese military computers is beyond the scope of this story and, if there is interest from the readers, deserves a separate article, especially since there is no information about this in Russian at all.
Engineers debug the program on the "Minsk-1" computer in LITMO. Computer "Aragats" in the computing center of Perm State University. "Hrazdan-2" is the factory version of the M-3, modified by the Yerevan Research Institute of Mat. machines. Early 1960s (photo https://museum.dataart.com).
M-4
And what was Kartsev doing at this time?
Of course, he built the M-4! The director of the Radio Engineering Institute of the USSR Academy of Sciences, Academician A.L. Mints, already known to us on the topic of missile defense, in 1957 turned to Brook with a proposal to develop a computer for radar, designed to work in conjunction with the radar of Yu.V. Polyak. Brook, of course, agreed, and in the best traditions of the Soviet classics, he became the general designer, and, of course, Kartsev became the developer.
The machine was already semiconductor and architecturally adapted for specific signal processing algorithms, for example, the processor supported hardware square root extraction, double comparisons, etc. Kartsev in M-4 was the first to propose solutions that later became classical - firmware with algorithms, channel I / O coprocessors and other architectural features of 1960-1970 air defense / missile defense computers.
For the M-4 computer, two versions of the ALU were designed: the U-1 parallel type on static triggers using a pulse-potential system of elements (P-16B transistors) and the U-2 series U-2 type using a purely pulse system on dynamic triggers with diffusion transistors P403 and delay lines. Both were made, but a parallel one went into series.
Kartsev, in addition to the general architecture, was personally responsible for the development of the control device. The machine turned out, again, rather compact, all the equipment was placed in 4 cabinets and 2 racks. A year later, the work was completed, and the documentation arrived at the Zagorsk Electromechanical Plant (ZEMZ), by 1960, two prototypes were manufactured and installed at the Radio Engineering Institute of the USSR Academy of Sciences for tuning and docking with the radar. For the convenience of work, the team headed by Kartsev was assigned to the Special Laboratory No. 2. These people later entered the Kartsev Research Institute.
At this time in Kazakhstan, at the Balkhash test site, the first tests of the prototype of System "A" - the Kisunko anti-missile defense system were already in full swing. For control and interfacing, an ersatz was used, quickly converted by Burtsev from BESM-2 - the M-40 machine, manufactured by ITMiVT.
In general, Burtsev, as we have already said, was incredibly lucky - without expecting it, Lebedev's student managed, without participating in any battles, to automatically become the only developer of actually working missile defense computers in the USSR, mass-produced, taken on combat duty and working in such quality. As a result, 99 percent of people who are minimally involved in the topic of domestic missile defense development will confidently name Burtsev when asked who was the protagonist in the development of missile defense computers.
Judge for yourself - when in 1955 Kisunko was looking for a computer for his system, there were only Strela at hand (it makes no sense to even think about this), M-2 (similarly, the power is not nearly the same), Kartsev's machines are not yet in the project it was, BESM-2, the work of the master Lebedev himself, was also not suitable, fortunately, he found an intelligent student - Vsevolod Burtsev, who already had experience with computers for radars (project "Diana", 1953).
As a result, Kisunko was forced in 1959 to be content with his bundle of M-40 and M-50, and it was they who participated in the epoch-making successful experiment of intercepting a ballistic missile.
Further in 1961, he develops an improved version of the M-50 - 5E92b, which, again, is put on the prototype of the A-35 system in anticipation of Yuditsky's machine, which, as we already know, is canceled in 1971. And voila - Burtsev again, by the will of fate, becomes the author of the first missile defense computer in the USSR, put on alert. Further, the Kisunko project is closed along with all the work of Kartsev and Yuditsky, and the new A-135 missile defense system receives the Elbrus computer to work ... yes, Burtsev again.
Elbrus-2, moreover, functioned as part of the complex back in 1995, which as a result led to a persistent myth: ITMiVT is the only greatest developer of world-class supercomputers in the USSR from the moment of its foundation until the collapse of the Union, Lebedev (in the most old-school version of the myth) / Burtsev (in the version close to reality) are the greatest fathers of Soviet supercomputer technologies, so cool that their machines defended our skies from enemy missiles for 50 years. However, we still have a long and interesting conversation about ITMiVT and their machines.
Now let's return to Kartsev again.
The most interesting thing is, what was the M-4 system intended for?
The reader might think that the Sary-Shagan training ground on Lake Balkhash in Kazakhstan in 1961-1962 means the "A" system and anti-missile defense. Nothing of the kind, as we remember - Mints ordered the car to Kartsev, who did not want to have anything to do with the anti-missile heresy. The test site was used for a bunch of various tests, and in the early 1960s, research was carried out there on Chelomey's absolutely schizo-technical project - the "Satellite Fighter" system.
As a result, the life and work of Kartsev turned out to be, to the very end, connected in one way or another with this project.
In general, Chelomey was an epochal and great person, he definitely deserves a separate article, which, and not just one, has already been written about him. Therefore, here we will only touch on the project itself, for which the M-4 was created and its background.
As you know, Chelomey's whole life was spent in a continuous confrontation with Sergei Korolev. Korolev's talent as a designer can be discussed for a long time, but as a manager and even a top manager, as they would say now, he was absolutely brilliant (and he was excellent at working with the Soviet bureaucracy, being able to lubricate a critically important gear at any moment). Chelomei was indeed a brilliant scientist, mechanic and mathematician, but at the same time transverse, almost like Kisunko, and the party battles were given to him with difficulty.
What was more important in the conditions of the USSR can be judged by 1945.
By this time, Chelomey, being a simple student, was giving a course of lectures on the dynamics of structures to the engineers of the Zaporozhye Motor-Building Plant, a year before the flow he graduated with honors from Kiev aviation Institute, in parallel at the Academy of Sciences of the Ukrainian SSR, attended a course of lectures on mechanics and mathematics by the great Italian scientist Tullio Levi-Civita, the father of the mathematical part of general relativity, who worked with Einstein, communicated and studied with such outstanding mathematicians and mechanics as academician Grave and famous Krylov. At the age of 22 he wrote his first university textbook (published!) On vector analysis, by the age of 25 he published 14 articles and became a candidate of sciences, having defended himself at the Institute of Mathematics of the Academy of Sciences of the Ukrainian SSR, in 1940, among the 50 best young scientists of the Union, he was admitted to a special doctoral program at Academy of Sciences of the USSR (26-year-old Chelomey is the youngest in this fifty elite).
At the age of 26, he becomes a doctor of sciences and receives a Stalin scholarship in the amount of 1500 rubles, a huge amount for those times, more than the salary of a professor. In 1942, the Central Institute of Aviation Motors. P. Baranova Chelomey invents and builds the world's first pulsating jet engine, and by 1945 his cruise missile 10X, the first in the USSR and the second in the world, was adopted.
By this time, Sergei Korolev graduated from a technical school in Moscow, builds gliders and flies on them, in 1933 somehow manages to get into the Jet Research Institute of the NK of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs and by 1935 become the head of the rocket aircraft department. And then his career was tragically interrupted - the leadership of the Jet Institute fell under the purge, including himself. In the famous sharashka, TsKB-29 helps another inmate, Tupolev, to design the Pe-2 and Tu-2, in the second sharashka, OKB-16 attaches a jet accelerator to the Pe-2, and was released ahead of schedule in 1944. And then the career flooded.
As a result, by 1950, Korolev became the chief and chief designer of the OKB-1 NII-88 MV USSR, created for him, and Chelomey was summoned to the carpet to Stalin on a denunciation of the futility of all his work. Chelomey is kicked out from everywhere, his design bureau is taken away, his plant is transferred to A.I. In February 1953, he personally went to Stalin.
According to Chelomey,
everything was at stake. The tension is extreme. But I had one advantage: I was young.
As a result, a miracle happened, and from the leader's office Chelomey went not to the Gulag, but back home, somehow convincing Stalin that he was not a pest. A month later, Stalin dies, and Chelomey, still in shock from what happened, meets Khrushchev.
Having experienced such a turning point, people usually learn valuable life lessons, and Chelomey also learned. He forever realized that more important than all real developments are the real patrons in the party. In February 1958, a graduate of the Bauman Moscow State Technical University Sergei Nikitich Khrushchev was assigned to one of the most promising organizations of the military-industrial complex - OKB-30 to our friend Kisunko. However, at that moment he was on the rise, had a whole bunch of applications and, even without looking at the list, announced the search and refused to hire another group of graduates.
His deputy Elizarenkov noticed the name of Khrushchev, but, knowing the character of the chief, did not object. So the priceless list landed on the table of the chief designer of the then little-known OKB-52 of the State Committee for Aviation Engineering of Chelomey, and he instantly realized that such a treasure should not be missed. The son of the secretary general was immediately adopted, and in the same year Chelomey was elected a corresponding member of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR, in 1959 he was appointed general designer of aviation equipment of the USSR, without delay and hesitation, his first missile system P-5 was adopted by submarines. Immediately after the death of the aircraft designer Polikarpov, Chelomey occupied his well-equipped experimental plant on Khodynka.
As we already remember, he is trying to declare his missile defense project, a bit manic and providing for massive thermonuclear air explosions of anti-missiles in the North Pole, from where the main wave of attacking ICBMs was supposed to go, but, realizing the absurdity of the idea, he rejects it. His eternal rival Korolev at this time launches the first satellite, and Chelomey is struck by an interesting idea - in opposition to his opponent, to submit the idea of an anti-satellite weapons... Well, at the same time, it was necessary to load its design bureau with a government order - the niches of the air and missile defense were occupied by Raspletin and Kisunko, the anti-satellite topic remained free. Moreover, on February 28, 1959, the United States launched the first military-experimental reconnaissance satellite, Discoverer 1, into orbit. Khrushchev immediately declared that no foreign reconnaissance satellites dare to desecrate the space of the USSR, someone threw in the crazy idea that there could be a nuclear bomb on board the satellite , in the end, it is easy to guess that Chelomey received carte blanche for any of his experiments.
Then a typical corps de ballet began, similar to the one with anti-missile defense, only with anti-satellite. The satellite had to be shot down with a satellite, it was necessary to launch the aforementioned anti-satellite into orbit with a heavy rocket (for the combat satellite of those years, according to the project, had a mass of under two tons), which means it was necessary to build a heavy rocket. Here KB Korolev and Yangel have already boiled - Chelomey climbed into their domain.
Yangel even had an R-16 rocket ready with a launch weight of about 140 tons (about as much as needed). Hearing about the project, Mikoyan pulled himself up, and even Kisunko offered his help, but Khrushchev rejected them all in favor of OKB-52. At the same time, in order to overwhelm the Queen, it took additional efforts of Marshal Ustinov himself, who could tolerate him and promoted him as a competitor to Yangel. Note that the marshal did not forgive him for the victories of Chelomey and until the end of his career he put a spoke in the wheels, especially after the death of Khrushchev.
When Khrushchev was flooded in 1964, Chelomey almost fell under the skating rink of repression for the second time, fortunately, the times were already herbivorous, so everything was limited to the typical undercover struggle "who will have time to cover whose projects before." As a result, this resulted in the fact that the commission headed by Keldysh and with the support of Ustinov hacked to death the Chelomeev Proton project in favor of the insane design of Korolev, the technoschizophrenic H-1 rocket, all 4 launches of which ended in phenomenal failure, including the most powerful explosion in the history of astronautics in five (!) kilotons, which completely destroyed not only the rocket and the launch pad, but everything within a radius of half a kilometer from the launch point (surprisingly, history later restored justice - "Proton" became one of the best missiles in the world, the pride of the USSR and Russia, used a lot years and performed an uncountable number of flights).
In 1979, Ustinov gave Chelomey, he was restricted in his activities, the manned flight programs developed by him were closed, the already completely finished and debugged first automatic station "ALMAZ-T" for all-weather sensing and radar of the Earth was removed from launch.
In 1981 Ustinov will say about Chelomei:
He became very independent.
After that, a decree of the Central Committee of the CPSU and the USSR Council of Ministers is issued, which actually prohibits all the work of Chelomeev's NPO Mashinostroenie related to space exploration. Three years later, Chelomey dies, he is forgotten for many years, the only legendary creator of the Soviet space program in all textbooks is Sergei Korolev, ranked among the pantheon of official geniuses of the USSR. And only in the early 2000s, this version begins to gradually burst at the seams.
Returning to the M-4 project, we note that, naturally, the PSO complex also required the entire ground harness - command-measuring complexes and radars. Chelomei did not quarrel with Raspletin and Mintz, unlike Kisunko, and therefore received their full support in one and the other. Naturally, this was only the beginning. The memoirs of the scientific director of the Central Research Institute "Kometa", academician A. I. Savin will help to feel the atmosphere of those years and those meetings.
By the beginning of my work in KB-1, the main responsibilities were distributed as follows. S. L. Beria, A. A. Kolosov and D. L. Tomashevich led the systems "Comet" and ShB-32, PN Kuksenko and A. A. Raspletin - the system "Berkut". Soon I was appointed deputy chief designer of S. L. Beria for the enterprise. After the resignation of S. L. Beria and P. N. Kuksenko, Deputy Chief Designer for Science A. A. Raspletin was appointed chief designer for anti-aircraft missile topics, and I was his deputy ...
Quite difficult times soon came for our design team.
On the one hand, after NS Khrushchev's statement about the futility of strategic aviation, work began to curtail on aircraft systems of jet weapons - our main topic.
On the other hand, the head of state's excessive enthusiasm for rocketry led to the rapid growth of missile design bureaus. Kisunko was engaged in an experimental missile defense system, and an influx of personnel from Raspletin and Kolosov began to him. Seeing the growing authority of Grigory Vasilyevich literally by leaps and bounds, specialists went to work for him. He accepted them willingly, especially since the staffing of his SKB-30 was constantly increasing. Alexander Andreevich was engaged in the modernization of the air defense system of Moscow, and the country's leadership treated his activities favorably.
We found ourselves under the threat of closure. It was necessary to save the team. While developing aviation, anti-aircraft and anti-tank systems, I drew attention to a completely new and, as it seemed to me, space theme very close to us. Our weapons were designed to combat moving targets - aircraft carriers, airplanes, tanks... Defeating a maneuvering target is a difficult task, so we focused on the creation of missile control and guidance systems. A unique team of high-class specialists was gradually formed. There were no such specialists among the developers of ballistic missiles, since ballistic missiles are designed to deal with stationary targets.
Reflecting on the prospects of our design bureau, I realized: either we will switch to the space theme, or we will cease to exist as a collective. Having called VN Chelomey, I asked to receive me. Vladimir Nikolaevich immediately set the time, and soon we met at his design bureau. I prepared thoroughly for the meeting, drew diagrams with which I illustrated my story. Chelomey listened attentively, but did not give a final answer. The meeting ended. I was waiting.
Rumors began to be heard that several leading designers had approached Chelomey with space ideas. Will my proposals be accepted?
Finally, I was informed that V.N. Chelomey had appointed a meeting. When I arrived, Raspletin, Kisunko and Kalmykov were already sitting in his office. Chelomey began the meeting, not paying any attention to me. Listening to him, I felt that the soil was leaving from under my feet. At the end of his speech, he announced that the anti-satellite system was entrusted to Kisunko, and the naval space reconnaissance to Raspletin. I got up and started to defend myself. I don't remember what exactly I was talking about then. I was very worried. Having finished, he sat down and prepared for the verdict.
I can't say how I took Chelomey, but his final speech had the effect of a bomb. Changing his decision to the opposite, he said that he was entrusting our SKB-41 with both space reconnaissance and anti-satellite defense.
No one objected to him. Kolosov left his post, and I was appointed acting chief designer of SKB-41. In the fall of 1960, we started developing a preliminary design for the Satellite Fighter system. We were entrusted with the ground complex, the onboard complex, part of the satellite's automation and the control program.
Quite difficult times soon came for our design team.
On the one hand, after NS Khrushchev's statement about the futility of strategic aviation, work began to curtail on aircraft systems of jet weapons - our main topic.
On the other hand, the head of state's excessive enthusiasm for rocketry led to the rapid growth of missile design bureaus. Kisunko was engaged in an experimental missile defense system, and an influx of personnel from Raspletin and Kolosov began to him. Seeing the growing authority of Grigory Vasilyevich literally by leaps and bounds, specialists went to work for him. He accepted them willingly, especially since the staffing of his SKB-30 was constantly increasing. Alexander Andreevich was engaged in the modernization of the air defense system of Moscow, and the country's leadership treated his activities favorably.
We found ourselves under the threat of closure. It was necessary to save the team. While developing aviation, anti-aircraft and anti-tank systems, I drew attention to a completely new and, as it seemed to me, space theme very close to us. Our weapons were designed to combat moving targets - aircraft carriers, airplanes, tanks... Defeating a maneuvering target is a difficult task, so we focused on the creation of missile control and guidance systems. A unique team of high-class specialists was gradually formed. There were no such specialists among the developers of ballistic missiles, since ballistic missiles are designed to deal with stationary targets.
Reflecting on the prospects of our design bureau, I realized: either we will switch to the space theme, or we will cease to exist as a collective. Having called VN Chelomey, I asked to receive me. Vladimir Nikolaevich immediately set the time, and soon we met at his design bureau. I prepared thoroughly for the meeting, drew diagrams with which I illustrated my story. Chelomey listened attentively, but did not give a final answer. The meeting ended. I was waiting.
Rumors began to be heard that several leading designers had approached Chelomey with space ideas. Will my proposals be accepted?
Finally, I was informed that V.N. Chelomey had appointed a meeting. When I arrived, Raspletin, Kisunko and Kalmykov were already sitting in his office. Chelomey began the meeting, not paying any attention to me. Listening to him, I felt that the soil was leaving from under my feet. At the end of his speech, he announced that the anti-satellite system was entrusted to Kisunko, and the naval space reconnaissance to Raspletin. I got up and started to defend myself. I don't remember what exactly I was talking about then. I was very worried. Having finished, he sat down and prepared for the verdict.
I can't say how I took Chelomey, but his final speech had the effect of a bomb. Changing his decision to the opposite, he said that he was entrusting our SKB-41 with both space reconnaissance and anti-satellite defense.
No one objected to him. Kolosov left his post, and I was appointed acting chief designer of SKB-41. In the fall of 1960, we started developing a preliminary design for the Satellite Fighter system. We were entrusted with the ground complex, the onboard complex, part of the satellite's automation and the control program.
By the way, Kisunko also did not forgive Chelomey for this decision and later (in parallel fighting off his persecution by the Ministry of Radio Industry) took part in the persecution of Chelomey, perpetrated by Kisunko's patron Marshal Ustinov. Scorpions in a bank can serve as a good model of the life path of many Soviet general designers, regardless of their genius. Unfortunately, the reality of their existence was such that practically no one managed to get dirty in one way or another. And, looking at those times and those actions, now only the immortal lines of Nikolai Gogol from Dead Souls come to mind:
All Christ sellers. There is only one decent person there: the prosecutor; and that, if you tell the truth, a pig.
Above - the irreconcilable opponents, Chelomey and Korolev, were even outwardly a bit alike, usually smiling Chelomey could also be serious and tough, and the gloomy and strict Korolev could be charming and smiling. Below are children with a difficult fate, Sergei Khrushchev and Sergo Beria. Both worked with rockets, both were designers, both, after the fall of their fathers, were accused of taking their place solely thanks to the patronage of their parents and without it they would be nothing (photo http://www.npomash.ru, http: // deduhova .ru, https://comp-pro.ru, https://ru.wikipedia.org/)
Since in the development of the IS system, the main and most difficult were two tasks, completely analogous to the problems of missile defense: to select an enemy satellite and point its own anti-satellite at it with high accuracy, then no less powerful computers were required to solve this problem.
So Kartsev received his order, and an M-4 appeared at the Sary-Shagan training ground with a good performance of about 50 KIPS.
During the implementation of the machine, valuable experience was gained, and literally in the process of implementation, it was decided to build an improved version of the machine - M-4M, by adding specific nodes for the primary processing of radar data to it: a sector switch, a code converter, a drive, a threshold device, a buffer memory, transcoding devices, coordinate determination device, buffer registers, etc. The set was named the primary processing device (UPD) and was supposed to occupy one more typical cabinet from M-4. In the process, I had to try pretty hard, get new high-frequency diffusion transistors, but in the end, the modernization turned out as planned.
The UPO cabinet was ready by October 1962 and by 1963 the M-4M (some sources use the M4-2M index originally proposed by Kartsev) was installed at the Balkhash test site. Both machines were in operation at the facility until 1966.
Everywhere they write that the M-4M was produced in series, in practice it turned out a little differently.
Precisely, 8 copies of the kit were made (according to the number of Dnestr radars, 2 stations of 4 units, one near Irkutsk, Mishelevka, OS-1 node and at Cape Gulshat of Lake Balkhash in the Kazakh SSR, Sary-Shagan, OS-2 node). The kits were in operation for only 4 years until 1966, when the Dniester system became obsolete and was replaced by Dniester-M, and later - Dnipro.
The only canonical photo M-4M, a complete set of cabinets, 4 - for the main machine, 5th - UPO cabinet, 6th - interface equipment. Drawing of the project of the radar "Dniester" (photo http://www.icfcst.kiev.ua/, https://ru.wikipedia.org/)
One more important fact should be noted.
Acquaintance with the radar operators later turned out to be very bad for Kartsev. The fact is that the development of radar equipment was raked up by the same great and terrible Ministry of Radio Industry, formed in 1965, and Kartsev with his research institute, since he had already worked on the relevant topics, was automatically assigned to the subordination of Kalmykov. Knowing all the parts of the previous history, it is easy to guess that such submission could not end with anything good for the unfortunate Kartsev, it never ended.
Hack and predictor Aviator
Summing up the turbulent fifties, we can say the following, of course, on the basis of discussion.
The very idea of a Satellite Destroyer from the point of view of the concept was much more insane and useless than missile defense. As already mentioned, it was precisely the fact that the Soviet anti-missile missile was the first in the world to be able to stop an ICBM attack that very qualitatively cooled many hotheads of the Pentagon, who were struggling with their desire to poke red buttons throughout the second half of the 1950s.
The importance of the air defense system is even more stupid to deny, so the investment of manpower and resources in their development was fully justified.
As for the PSO system, it is almost impossible to come up with an adequate case for its use.
The idea that a satellite could carry a nuclear bomb was absurd by the standards of 1950s technology - many times more reliable, cheaper and safer for themselves to use conventional rockets. Shooting down other people's satellites (even potential spies) in peacetime is difficult to imagine a greater absurdity, both from the point of view of the international situation and simple logic - exactly the same our own satellites fly over the territory of foreign countries in the same way.
In the event that the conflict reaches a stage of such a level that it will be necessary to destroy everything on which it is written Made in USA, then satellites will certainly not become a primary target, because at the same time a hail of nuclear missiles will fall on us. As a result, the usefulness of the satellite extermination system (as well as the general control system of outer space for the passage of these satellites) is an extremely controversial thing.
It is all the more annoying that the ingenious works of Kartsev were used only exclusively for this project, which absorbed an unimaginable amount of money.
In the next part, we will conclude our conversation about the M-series cars and find out how this epic ended.
To be continued ...
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