To the Russian scientific community President of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine Academician A.G. Zagorodniy suggested to me to address representatives of Russian science asking them to turn their attention to the events taking place in my native country, the request which I initially refused.
It seemed to me that if there are still people who believe that this does not exist and nothing is happening or support such actions which is generally criminal then no calls will lead to anything. And I’m not going to waste my time trying to convince those who I first wanted to address as colleagues, but instead am addressing here as seemingly educated people who, nevertheless, are the same dummies in history as their “leader” who has gone out of his mind. So instead I’m just going to ask whether you understand what is actually going on in Ukraine today.
Oh, I’m sorry, you were told that “A special military operation with the purpose of denazification and demilitarization of the country, as well as the protection of people who are subjected to harassment and genocide by the Kiev regime.” I find these words hard to comprehend. I being a Russian-speaking citizen of Ukraine who graduated from a Russian school here, a university and received the State Prize and several State awards, simply do not understand what it is about. And if I follow the logic of the maniac who invented this crazy idea I have to admit that for many decades what you celebrated on May 8 or 9 (as you prefer) was not the Victory of the Soviet people in the Great Patriotic War but rather the day when the Wehrmacht Special Operation to demilitarize the USSR and protect people who were in concentration camps created by the Moscow regime for their views has ended. I suppose you will be horrified how something like this could even come to my mind but do not worry – of course, it was a war in which by the way Ukraine according to official data was the most affected among the Soviet republics in relative losses.
And there is no doubt that the war is going on now, however Russia unleashed it not on February 24, 2022, as they say for some reason, but in 2014 when treacherously and behind the back, scheming, Russia took from Ukraine the territories for which it has no rights. Those who know the history at the level of the completely unknown “historian” V. Putin think the opposite but this is their problem. And setting the things straight it’s not just a war but a full-scale Patriotic War between Ukraine and Russia that started on February 24, 2022. On this day a new countdown in our history and a new historical reality appeared. I will not repeat the words about the Russian ship, which have become an international meme and very accurately reflect our general attitude towards you and your country, but I will repeat: we are waging a war of liberation in which everyone, I repeat everyone in my country participates.
And although I do not know the precise name under which this war will go down in our history books, perhaps the Ukrainian Patriotic War, I have no doubts that every Ukrainian student, every Ukrainian will know its twists and turns. As I said to convince you, the aggressively silent majority as described by Yuri Afanasiev, is a hopeless cause. And to make sure that I am right take a few minutes and watch no, not the false Russian TV but any foreign channel and you will quickly loose your mind with the number of methods by which your frenzied army is fighting civilians. Look at the incredible missile destruction of the pearl in the crown of scientific Ukraine, the Russian-speaking city of Kharkov and wild raids on Sumy, Kherson, Mariupol, Chernihiv, even Donetsk and Odessa – the entire Russian-speaking belt of Ukraine. These insane war crimes are incomprehensible, but I am sure they will all receive their assessment of the world community and will be condemned.
My suggestion is to allow yourself to do at least a minimally noble deed and tell your families, children, employees about what you have taken away. But apparently your choice, or the choice of the scientific community that considers itself as the top of the Russian intelligentsia, whose democracy and humanity unfortunately, as the history shows, ends with the word Ukraine to which you “skillfully” added the words Crimea and LDNR, or other. This in my understanding is a position of silent contemplation of what is happening and is absolutely unacceptable for any normal person. And what I am watching and hearing right now, on the morning of March 3 at 11:00, when I am writing these lines is the following: in Kyiv, where I am now, sirens are howling warning of air strikes after a night with 4 explosions in the center; in Kharkiv, Sumy, Volnovakha, Chuguev and other cities and towns there are battles with the use of multiple rocket launchers by your troops; with great difficulty people are fleeing from Ukraine to avoid the “liberators”, the number has reached 800,000. And at the same time the scientific community of Russia, its majority, chews snot and is silent! So what kind of relationship can we talk about in the future?
I don’t know about others, but I won’t take any part in it, because you have lost all my respect. Briefly about myself: I am Vadim M. Loktev, theoretical physicist, student of the outstanding Soviet physicist A.S. Davydov who in turn was a student of I.E. Tamm. It so happened that in my life I personally knew and communicated with such world-famous towering figures of science as A.M. Prokhorov, A.A. Abrikosov, L.V. Keldysh, A.S. Borovik-Romanov, S.V. Vonovsky, L.V. Kirensky, V.L. Ginzburg, I.E. Dzyaloshinskiy and others. I would like to believe that these in all respects independent personalities would not be idle mummies.
I know of course that scientists and research organizations around the world condemned Russia’s attack on Ukraine. Some of them have severed all ties with Russia cutting funding as much as possible or ceasing cooperation with Russian scientists. Moreover, numerous academies, universities and research groups have issued strongly critical statements about the conflict and expressed support for their Ukrainian counterparts. Even in Russia there were more than 5,000 people including about 85 scientists who are members or professors of the Russian Academy of Sciences who signed a letter condemning the hostilities and saying that the Russian leadership unleashed an ugly war. But what is 5,000 scientists against the background of 2-3 hundred thousand remaining scientists, the number which appears in various Russian records?
Therefore, despite the presence of a few brave heads among you, I join the proposals of my colleagues and want to frankly say that I am far from the only one who makes proposals for a complete boycott of the Russian academic community. There cannot be any cooperation with people as representatives of a country that has set out to wipe out the state of Ukraine from the face of the earth.
The potential sanctions could for example include: a ban on publishing results obtained in Russia or written by Russian authors in Western journals; a ban on the participation of Russian researchers in international research groups or conferences; rejection of proposals of any international conferences in Russia and so on. I might be called biased or unfair but in my deep conviction the Russian scientific community which did not show a proper understanding of the nature of the conflict and did not show any empathy for us, as a collective imbecile continues to believe the frankly delusional statements of its own (including academic) leadership and must pay a price for supporting Putin and his schizophrenic policies.
Academy-secretary of the Physics and Astronomy Division of the National Academy of Science of Ukraine, member of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine March 03 2022, V.M. Loktev