Einstein and Bolsheviks

From the new book “The Revolution in Physics and the Fate of its Heroes. Albert Einstein in the focus of the history of the twentieth century. " M.: URSS, 2018)

"I have more professorships than reasonable thoughts"

When Hitler came to power, Einstein was in America as an invited professor at the California Technological Institute in Pasadena, near Los Angeles. The appointment of the new Reich Chancellor of Germany was not a big surprise for Einstein. It was felt that he was ready for such a turn of history. Two days after Hitler entered the new position, the scientist turned to the leadership of the Prussian Academy of Sciences with a request to pay him a six -month salary at once, and not by the beginning of April, as previously planned. Life very soon showed that such a prudence of the scientist was not superfluous. Having returned to Europe in March 1938, Einstein first wrote a statement to the Prussian An on the exit from its members and the termination of his activity as an academic professor. The great physics needed to look for a new place of work.

Einstein received a lot of proposals to occupy the Professor Department. It is rare that the world university would not want to have a recognized leader among physicists-theoreticals, the Nobel laureate and the author of the fundamental works of new physics. Soon there were so many suggestions that he complained in April 1933 to a friend of Yelovin: “I have more professor places than reasonable thoughts in my head” [Fölsing, 1995 p. 752].

"I have never approved communism"

One exotic invitation of Einstein to the work that received in the summer of 1933 was told by Boris Shain, an American mathematician who worked until 1979 at the Saratov State University [Berkovich, and others, 2009]. We are talking about a proposal to the great physicist to become a professor of this educational institution. The invitation came from Gabriel Konstantinovich Hvorostin, an influential person in the city and who, as they say, had a high -ranking patron in Moscow. In the 30s, Hvorostin became the rector of the University of Saratov and dreamed, according to him, to make Gettingen on the Volga from the SSU [Gordon, 2011]. I must say that Saratov was not Einstein with a completely unfamiliar city - Professor Milos Marich lived and worked here, since 1930, the head of the university department of histology, the brother of Mileva, the first wife of Einstein.

According to Shain, Einstein replied that he would never learn Russian. Then Hvorostin came up with a tricky plan: to create the Academy of Sciences of the Autonomous Republic of the Germans of the Volga region, to make Einstein its president with a good salary, and the physicist will live and work in Saratov. Hvorostin, of course, was known that the Academy of Sciences of the Autonomous Republics was not laid, they existed only in the Union republics, but he hoped to settle this issue with the help of his patron in the Central Committee of the CPSU (B.).

Nothing came out of this plan, but the very idea of ​​invitation to the USSR of Jews from Germany, looking for salvation from the persecution of the Nazis, was not new. Only in the Tomsk State University to them. Kuibyshev worked mathematicians from Germany Fritz Nyoter, Stefan Bergman and others. In two years, they managed to implement the publication of the Izvestia of Mathematics and Mechanics in Siberia in Siberia in German, in which Albert Einstein was also printed [Klimushin, and others, 1992].

Difficulties with the Russian language were not the only reason why Einstein refused to move to the USSR. Due to his left views, pacifist sentiments, rejection of Nazism, many considered him a convinced communist, a supporter of the Comintern. During a trip to America, he repeatedly encountered protests against his supposedly Stalinist preferences. In fact, any dictatorship, whether Stalin or Hitler, was equally unacceptable for the scientist, although he did not put an equal sign between them. Gathering in September 1933 to America, Einstein gave an interview to The New-York World Telegram, in which he emphasized:

“I am a convinced democrat and that is why I am not going to Russia, although I have received a very welcoming invitation ... Now I am the same opponent of Bolshevism as fascism. I am opposed to any dictatorship ”[Einstein, 2004 S. 234].

"Bolsheviks to me more to taste"

However, Einstein's attitude to the Bolshevik dictatorship was not at all as consistent and uncompromising as to Hitler’s dictatorship. Einstein never hid his sympathies to the ideas of equality and the lack of operation. He was a member of the pacifist organization Union of the New Fatherland, which after the First World War set himself the task of improving German-Russian relations. In January 1920, Albert writes to Max Born:

“I must actually admit that the Bolsheviks are more to me than their funny theories. It would be damn interesting to look at these things once near ”[Einstein-Born, 1969 pp. 43-44].

Guided by his social temperament, Einstein did not refuse to enter a committee, lead a society or sign a petition against something or in defense of someone. It was important for him to help weak, persecuted and oppressed, to support the fight against violence, a violation of human rights, and inciting a new war. So he turned out to be a member, and even the honorary chairman of several dozen societies, committees, Soviets ...

Without hesitation, the great physicist joined the International Committee of Working Assistance (Interrabp) starving in Russia, created according to Lenin's draft of August 1921 [Lenin, 1960 p. 250]. The activity of the inter - -rabboral was coordinated by the Comintern. The secretary of the working assistance committee was the communist Willy Münzenberg, a famous publisher, the head of the propaganda department of the Comintern. Many historians call Müncentberg the most effective propagandist of the first half of the twentieth century, the genius of disinformation. Willy was familiar with Lenin even in Switzerland and enjoyed his boundless confidence. Despite the hunger in Russia, Münzenberg allocated huge funds to create a favorable political climate for the Soviets in Europe. To interest the liberals of the ideas of Bolshevism, he created numerous organizations that were most often disguised as charitable foundations. Many European intellectuals, whom Lenin called “useful idiots” [GROSS, 1991] got into the “network” of Münzenberg.

The great physicist did not escape such a fate. In June 1923, Einstein became part of the Central Committee of the Society of Friends of the New Russia, recently founded by Willy Münzenberg instead of the Friends of Soviet Russia, who fell on the fraud. The newly created society was published by Das Neue Russland , published in Berlin in German. His fresh issues were regularly sent to the house [Goenner, 2005 p. 303].

In the fall of 1923, there were reports in the Berlin publications that the creator of the theory of relativity spent several days in Moscow and Petrograd. In fact, Einstein neither then nor later in the USSR came for a day. For a communist experiment, he preferred to observe and express his sympathies, being from the borders of the Soviet Union at a safe distance. Max Bourne emphasizes:

“The theme of the Russian revolution arises in its subsequent letters quite often. However, when Einstein had to leave Germany, he went to America, not to Russia. As far as I know, he never visited Russia ”[Einstein-Born, 1969 p. 47].

"... we are talking about a conspiracy"

In 1930, several indicative processes were held in the USSR against the "pests" and other "enemies of the people." The most is known for the “business” of the so -called industrial party. But there was another trial - against the "organizers of hunger." After all, it was necessary to find the guilty that as a result of the Stalinist collectivization, millions of Soviet people were starving, many were dying of hunger.

As always, the company in the press of the beginning of the newspaper Pravda - September 22, it went out with a catchy heading: “The OGPU was disclosed a counter -revolutionary, spy and wrecking organization in the supply of the population with the most important foods (meat, fish, canned food, vegetables), which aimed to create hunger in the country and cause discontent among broad working masses and this promote the overthrow of the dictatorship of the proletariat” [Chernavin, 1999 p. 64].

The famous economist and public figure Boris Davydovich Brutz-Uk, sent from Soviet Russia in 1922, tried to raise the voices of the protest of Western intellectuals. A letter against Red Terror was signed by Arnold Zweig and Albert Einstein. In the absurd accusation of the forty -eight specialists of the national economy of organizing hunger, the creator of the theory of relativity saw “either the despair of the regime driven into the corner of the regime, or the mass psychosis, or the mixture of both ... It is very sad that the development of the USSR, which we looked at with hope, leads to such terrible things” [Fölsing, 1995 p. 727].

However, Einstein’s signature under the letter of protest did not last long. In his circle of communication there were many Soviet people and German communists, who, on their own initiative or on the instructions of the relevant authorities, justified Stalin’s actions. And a scientist, independent of someone else's opinion and confident in himself in matters of physics, easily believed their arguments in the field of politics. Einstein authorized his friend Professor of the Higher Mathematics of Leningrad University Herman Muinz to publish in the New Russia journal a refutation of his original opinion. Einstein’s words were given in the note: “Today I regret deeply that I put my signature then, since I no longer believe in the correctness of my old views. Then it did not occur to me that with a special position of the Soviet Union there could be something that does not fit into the usual order of things for me ”[Grundmann, 2004 p. 411]. Further followed the remark of Professor Muinz that Einstein, as a member of the Society of Friends of the New Russia, was closely monitoring the successful progress of socialist construction in the Soviet Union. “Western Europe,” Einstein said “will soon envy you soon” [Grundmann, 2004 p. 411].

It is hard to say who exactly convinced Einstein and forced Einstein and forced him to believe in Stalin's propaganda. Perhaps it was Dmitry Maryanov, a Russian journalist attributed to the Soviet embassy in Berlin, who in 1930 became the husband of Einstein Margo's younger reception. It is possible that the influence on the great physicist was exerted by Willy Müncentberg, with whom Albert maintained close relations.

Einstein did not change his new opinion about Stalinist purges in subsequent years. When a large terror in 1937 gained giant turns, he wrote to Max Born from Princeton:

“The signs are multiplying that Russian processes are not fraud, in fact, we are talking about a conspiracy, in the eyes of which Stalin is a dull reactionary who betrayed the idea of ​​a revolution. True, it is difficult for us to believe it, but the best experts in Russia are of the same opinion ”[Einstein-Born, 1969 p. 179].

This is how far the Grand Physicist “Best Experts in Russia” has started - before the justification of the Stalinist large terror! In the same letter, Max Born Einstein tells about his life in Princeton and as if in passing mentions the death of his wife: “He got well -settled, I live like a bear in a den and feel more at home than in my entire change in life. This feeling of bear loneliness only increased after the death of a friend who associated me with many people ”[Einstein-Born, 1969 pp. 177-178].

Max Bourne, as if trying to justify his friend, notes:

“It is quite amazing how Einstein in a short description of his bear life, in which he feels at home, casually informs of the death of his wife. For all the kindness, responsiveness and love for people, he was independent of his environment and close people ”[Einstein-Born, 1969 p. 180].

The creator of the theory of relativity was well versed in the most difficult physical processes, but sometimes he was brutally mistaken in the assessment of human relations and social phenomena.

Evgeny Berkovich,
The editor -in -chief of the magazine "Seven Arts",
cand. physical. sciences, doctor of natural science (Germany)

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