So I bring to your attention a simple, but very long recipe for cooking ...
Mercury is a familiar substance in a thermometer since childhood. A terribly poisonous and dangerous to life and health metal of a silvery-white color, liquid at the same time. Even the alchemists of the Middle Ages tried to turn this unusual substance into gold.
At school, from chemistry lessons, we learn about periodic where Hg is an element with atomic number 80. Now this fluid metal, known since ancient times, has been well studied. Whatever property of mercury is of interest to the layman, it will not be difficult to learn more about it. For example, its colorlessness in vapor, boiling point, compressibility, etc.
Already in the early 90s of the XX century, rumors spread everywhere about the creation of a completely new variety of this metal. The subject of gossip was red mercury, or rather the substance RM 20/20, allegedly produced in the secret scientific laboratories of the USSR. People's faith in the reality of the existence of this substance was supported by all the new stories and scandals associated with its sales. Mythical mercury red cost fabulous money. Sellers asked for 1 kg from 300 to 400 thousand dollars.
And there were those willing to pay such sums, especially in the West, which at that time was still little acquainted with Russian ingenuity. Red mercury, as they said, had simply fantastic properties - from super-density (over 20 g / cm 3) and super-radioactivity to cosmic origin or the ability to cure any ailments. Under her guise, the buyer was slipped anything - from mercury amalgam to ordinary mercury, painted with dyes or brick powder.
Many Soviet nuclear physicists have repeatedly refuted the possibility of creating such a substance, explaining that this not only contradicts the laws of nature, but is also impossible at the modern technological level. The addition of mercury compounds to uranium or plutonium used in nuclear reactions only reduces their radioactivity and functionality.
Having no real basis, rumors about the substance RM 20/20 after a few years practically subsided by themselves. Current observers believe that the hype that red mercury then caused was artificially created. The money interests of many high-ranking people have become a source of active promotion of rumors in the media. As well as the desire of the West to discredit the nuclear energy of the former Soviet Union, conveying to the world community the idea of an atomic terrorist threat from Russia.
And now again in the means mass media you can find articles about the reality of scientific developments to create red mercury, as a fundamental substance for the development of nanotechnology or "living machines". Sign on behalf of professors and academicians unique opportunities revealed to mankind by this technological discovery. Red mercury is called a universal catalyst and inhibitor chemical reactions, fabulous prices for the "philosopher's stone of the 21st century" are also mentioned. This proves that people who are ready to cash in on someone's belief in miracles have not disappeared anywhere.
“Whose fingers are in red mercury?”, “Red mercury will flow to the West in exchange for large sums of dollars”, “Mysteries of red mercury: a billion dollars is unknown for what”, “Radioactive trail from Irkutsk to Milan” - such headlines filled in 1991 strips of both domestic newspapers and reputable Western publications.
Czech special services at the airport in Ostrava on August 29, 1991 unsuccessfully tried to detect 60 kilograms of "liquid red mercury from the USSR." Around the same time, Swiss and Italian police arrested four smugglers who allegedly found two kilograms of red mercury in their luggage. Not only journalists, but also special services rushed along this trail.
True or scam?
The main version of the use of red mercury was its participation as a component in the production of miniature atomic bomb. Naturally, such a danger could not pass by the attention of the special services, including the KGB of the USSR and the GRU of the Ministry of Defense.
At the Leningrad Institute of Imitation Technologies, mercury pyroantimonate was synthesized - a red substance that was similar in everything to that very red mercury. It remained to find out - can red mercury really be considered a strategic material suitable for the production of nuclear charges? And in general - does it exist?
In the case of pyroantimonate, only once was it possible to reach a real consumer. And then his interests were represented by intermediaries. Apparently, the buyer really did not want to "shine" in front of Interpol and the IAEA, which also showed interest in red mercury.
According to one version, foreign intelligence services deliberately started a fuss in order to identify possible smuggling channels, intermediaries and buyers of components to create nuclear weapons. Or, with the help of a mythical product, they tried to pump out cash from the budgets of countries dreaming of creating their own nuclear potential.
Vice-President Alexander Rutskoi sternly promised to deal with swindlers selling red mercury. According to him, under her guise, some criminal structures tried to take uranium or plutonium out of the CIS. There was also a version that, under the patronage of some high-ranking Soviet officials, gold dissolved in mercury was exported to the West.
But the British newspaper Independent wrote directly that red mercury is a brilliant scam, the meaning of which is to get money out of thin air. Over time, however, the truth came to light.
genius trap
The assistant to the government of the Republic of Ichkeria, self-proclaimed by Dzhokhar Dudayev (a former laboratory assistant at one of the Grozny research institutes), told the following in a narrow circle. According to him, having met in Moscow with the same swindler, who has extensive connections in research institutes, they began to think: what can be sold to foreigners? At first, the crazy decision was made to design ... a miniature plutonium bomb. True, at the same time the inventors became known to the KGB officers of the USSR, but so far they have not been arrested.
Then the scammers came up with the idea of selling red mercury salts made in the laboratory of one of the Moscow research institutes as "an important component in the production of nuclear weapons." And the secret services organized a "leak" for them, which made it possible to establish contacts with customers. This helped to trace the real routes of smuggling of hazardous materials.
Western intelligence agencies were alarmed after the threat of the Spanish branch of Al-Qaeda to carry out a terrorist attack using a miniature atomic bomb made on the basis of red mercury. But in Russia, after a similar statement made by the terrorist Shamil Basayev, they only laughed.
After all, red mercury, or "component RM-20/20", was a bluff born within the walls of the GRU and the KGB! In my time Soviet Union"bought" the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), or, as it was called, " star Wars". Enormous human reserves and funds were involved in creating countermeasure systems until it became clear that SDI was a bluff!
And then, as a retaliatory strike, the YaM-20/20 was born, with a crazy certificate like “a substance obtained using an accelerator with a high content of neutrons in the nucleus, capable of reducing the critical mass of uranium-235 due to neutron radiation, which makes it possible making a miniature atomic bomb. The goal was twofold: firstly, to force the Western intelligence services to develop the mythical red mercury. And secondly, to try to trace the actions of possible terrorists who pecked at this bait. Here, swindlers came in very handy, offering at fabulous prices publicly available red mercury oxides and even ... crushed bricks.
When the Soviet Union collapsed, Russian criminal organizations began to rapidly develop and grow in strength. They tried to contact other global crime syndicates.
Drug trafficking and the sale of radioactive materials were created. At the end of 1993, some disturbing news appeared in the world ... The Russian mafia offered to sell a mysterious substance called "Red Mercury", unknown until now on the Western market. On December 23, 1993, a group of Moldovan nationalists were arrested trying to bring certain amounts of pure uranium and what they believed to be red mercury to Romania.
Western nuclear physicists were subject to misgivings. They tried to determine if this mysterious substance really exists, and if so, what it really is and what it can be used for. In 1994, the US Department of Energy and the International Atomic Energy Agency declared that red mercury did not exist. According to them, it was just another scam by the Russian crime syndicate...
This official position of the West did not convince all nuclear physicists. Some argue that the fraud allegations are intended to cover up an inconvenient truth. In June 1994, the International Defense Review published a report on atomic physics, Dr. Frank Barnaby with an anonymous Russian physicist who claimed that red mercury is important component most modern Russian nuclear weapons. It was supposed to be a very effective catalyst, thanks to which it became possible to build bombs many times cheaper and faster than their Western counterparts.
Hence, concerns arose about the resale of this technology to terrorist groups. An atomic bomb built using red mercury can weigh only 2-3 kilograms, so it could be easily transported and detonated in the city center. This Russian physicist also said that several Middle Eastern countries illegally seized a certain amount of this substance for the production of weapons.
To this day, it is not known whether a substance called red mercury even exists. Everyone can have an opinion on this topic... Perhaps one day it will be clarified. In the meantime, the truth is somewhere nearby ... and most likely red mercury never existed. However, in nature there is mercury sulfide (vermilion) HgS, which can be figuratively called red mercury, due to its scarlet color, but it does not have any mythical properties.
Drug trafficking and the sale of radioactive materials were created. At the end of 1993, some disturbing news appeared in the world... The Russian mafia offered to sell a mysterious substance called "Red Mercury", unknown until now on the Western market. On December 23, 1993, a group of Moldovan nationalists were arrested trying to bring certain amounts of pure uranium and what they believed to be red mercury to Romania.
Western nuclear physicists were subject to misgivings. They tried to determine if this mysterious substance really exists, and if so, what it really is and what it can be used for. In 1994, the US Department of Energy and the International Atomic Energy Agency declared that red mercury did not exist. According to them, it was just another scam by a Russian crime syndicate...
This official position of the West did not convince all nuclear physicists. Some argue that the fraud allegations are intended to cover up an inconvenient truth. In June 1994, the International Defense Review published a report on atomic physics, Dr. Frank Barnaby with an anonymous Russian physicist, who claimed that red mercury is an important component of most modern Russian nuclear weapons. It was supposed to be a very effective catalyst, thanks to which it became possible to build bombs many times cheaper and faster than their Western counterparts.
Hence, concerns arose about the resale of this technology to terrorist groups. An atomic bomb built using red mercury can weigh only 2-3 kilograms, so it could be easily transported and detonated in the city center. This Russian physicist also said that several Middle Eastern countries illegally seized a certain amount of this substance for the production of weapons.
To this day, it is not known whether a substance called red mercury even exists. Everyone can have an opinion on this topic... Maybe one day it will be cleared up. In the meantime, the truth is somewhere nearby ... and most likely, red mercury never existed. However, in nature there is mercury sulfide (vermilion) HgS, which can be figuratively called red mercury, due to its scarlet color, but it does not have any mythical properties.
PS:In 1992, at the suggestion of BURBULIS, by order of the President of the Russian Federation, the PROMEKOLOGIA concern was granted the monopoly right to manufacture and trade in red mercury?
"In order to complete solution problems environmental safety in Russia to allow the Promekologiya concern to manufacture, purchase, store, transport, supply and sell red mercury for rubles and hard currency within an annual export quota of 10 tons"?
There were also operations with "non-existent osmium-187", with which the St. Petersburg mayor's office tried to "feed" hungry St. Petersburg in 1993.
but -
AT special program dedicated to the secrets of red mercury, which
aired the other day on Channel 4 of British Public TV
A number of British and Russian scientists expressed confidence that
such a substance exists, that it is produced in the Urals, and passes
verification in Dubna that it enhances the action of neutrons in nuclear
charges and thanks to this makes it possible, for example, to create an atomic
teacup-sized bombs capable of destroying an entire city. AT
In the course of the discussions, some of the participants referred to a top secret
a report on red mercury allegedly presented to President Yeltsin.
Quoted a letter from the Minister of Foreign Economic Relations of the Russian Federation
Prime Minister with a request to allow the sale of 5 tons of this substance for
frontier. On the other hand, the statement of the vice-president of the Russian Academy of Sciences
