Our Soviet Tesla! The extraordinary life of Lev Theremin - inventor, millionaire, spy, convict and genius. Theremin's "bug": how the Soviet Union spied on the US embassy for seven years

Theremin is the world's first (and most unusual) electronic musical instrument. It is played without touching it with hands. In addition to the theremin, Theremin created a non-contact alarm system, the Buran eavesdropping device, far-sightedness, and many more interesting things. In the last years of his life, Lev Theremin was looking for means to achieve immortality.

Geniuses rotted in prisons, burned at the stake, thrown out to die in the trash, forced to die young (as if, for example, in a duel). At best, they simply didn't notice. It has always been so.

“A gift to the American continent,” one of his colleagues in the field of electronics described Vladimir Kozmich Zworykin. Having every reason for this: it is Zworykin who owns the invention of the twentieth century - electronic television; his innovative ideas were also used in the creation of electron microscopes, photomultipliers and electron-optical converters, in the creation of new models of military equipment, engineering and medical equipment.

Among the geniuses came across those who resented such an attitude. But there were also those who did not pay any attention to the stupidity of society (and the stupidity of the authorities). Theremin was just one of those. Naive and light, and not at all grumbling about either fate, or the general secretary, or the country in which "the devil guessed him to be born with soul and talent." Even when it was already possible to grumble, on the contrary, at the age of 95 (in 1991, two years before his death), he finally joined the Communist Party.

Theremin wanted to become a party member all his life. And now, after all the repressions and bullying with which the system indulged him, after numerous refusals and bureaucratic delays, he finally achieved his goal, received a party card.

From the party card, a wrinkled, decrepit old man, the same age as the century, looks firmly. Lev Sergeevich Termen, born in 1896. Membership fees have been paid.

Theremin always knew how to surprise. He materialized such things, at the sight of which, in action, contemporaries could only shrug and, patting this modest, thin intellectual on the shoulder, slightly cautiously remark: “Well, you, my friend ... give!” Somehow, probably, Vladimir Ilyich Lenin reacted when Lev Theremin demonstrated his theremin in the Kremlin. It was 1922, the time of electrification, the time of great communist changes.

Briefly about the theremin: it is the world's first electronic musical instrument. It was created by the Russian inventor Lev Sergeevich Termen in 1920. The theremin has one main characteristic feature: it is played without touching it at all. Only in a special way they move their hands around him. It looks like magic. (For more on the instrument and how it works and how it is played, see Wikipedia.)

Each - even imperceptible to the eye - movement of a person next to the theremin turns into a characteristic gliding sound. Therefore, no one other than the performer should approach the instrument during the concert. Even the slightest trembling of the player's body is reflected in the sound, that is, the result coming from the speakers is directly affected by both the musician's breathing and his heartbeat, in short, any vibrations of his body. This feature allows us to speak of the theremin not only as the first electronic musical instrument, but also as the most “lively” and expressive of all electronic musical instruments.

Lenin was impressed. Theremin himself was no less impressed. He later recalled the meeting with Ilyich all his long life, extremely, it must be said, full of events and meetings with remarkable people. But although Theremin knew many great men on both sides of the ocean, it was his acquaintance with Lenin that he considered the most important and decisive for himself. “One and a half to two hours, which I was happy to spend near Vladimir Ilyich, seemed to rediscover his great charm, warmth, goodwill, everything that you especially realize when you meet in person,” he said. Since then, he has been devoted to the revolution and the party always and in spite of everything.

Indeed, Termen's life changed dramatically after meeting with Lenin.

The young inventor was given a paper, according to which he received the right to free and unimpeded travel on all Russian railways - to show the theremin to the people, give concerts of "radio music" and lecture on the prospects for the development of electricity in art and life. His invention fit perfectly into the electrification program of the whole country. (“I have always said that electricity can work miracles. It’s good that even music is electrified in our country!” - so, according to Termen, Lenin himself told him.)

Theremin gave more than 150 performances in the cities and villages of Soviet Russia and was a constant success among both music lovers and radio enthusiasts.

And then, in 1926, he invented television ...

In fact, it is believed that television was invented by completely different people. And so, in fact, it is - officially TV appeared in the USSR in the 30s, and Termen's name still does not appear in the history of television. But in vain. The first developments of "far-sightedness" were carried out by Theremin during Lenin's lifetime, and an absolutely ready-made device, with which it was possible to observe a moving image on a 150x150 cm screen, was presented in 1926. This device was absolutely innovative at that time, it made it possible to transmit not from a dark room, as in earlier developments, but directly from the street, in natural light ...

The device was immediately classified, suggesting that it be used to protect state borders. And happily forgot about it. So in our country they did with great inventions quite often. Either they did not pay attention to them at all (as a result, we lost a lot of brilliant scientists and a lot of inventions), or kept them secret. And even now, many wonderful, albeit difficult to implement, ideas are still being buried in the ground. Perhaps the Skolkovo project will contribute to the cessation of this long-term practice? Who knows…

Theremin was awarded another State Prize for "far-sightedness" and sent on a long-term business trip abroad. First to Europe and then to the USA. Where Theremin, thanks to his theremin, immediately became a celebrity and a millionaire. Quite a lot has been written about this business trip, so we will not dwell on it now. Let's just say that in parallel with a beautiful life in New York, filled with luxury and parties with Dupont, Ford, Rockefeller, Charlie Chaplin, Einstein, Gershwin and other VIPs, Theremin worked as a Soviet spy.

“My conversations with the military and with the people of the American military business were by no means limited to talking about music. Believe me, I was well informed about the plans of the American political Olympus, and from what I knew, I understood: not the United States, but the countries of the fascist axis are our future military adversary, ”he will tell Moscow News in 1988. And then, in the late 20s, every week, between the next concert, meeting at the club of millionaires and work in the laboratory, he went to an inconspicuous cafe, where two people in gray (workers of the Soviet embassy) forced him to drink two glasses of vodka, and then in detail were asked about everything. Regarding vodka, Lev Sergeevich, who sincerely served his homeland, would later say with surprise: “Did they not trust me, or what?” However, he immediately came up with an antidote - he ate a pack of butter before meetings.

Many years later, he would half-jokingly mention in a conversation with Bulat Galeev (the late pioneer of Russian media art, author of the book about Theremin “Soviet Faust”) how important the work done by Theremin was for our country: “You know, but I’m in America was like Richard Sorge in Japan." However, in 1938, for some reason, the Center ceased to need Termen's services. And then the millionaire Lev Theremin suddenly disappeared.

He himself always claimed that he returned to his homeland of his own free will (the war began, and he felt that he was needed). In fact, he was simply forced to return.

A young wife remained in America (a beautiful Negro dancer), whom he later remembered with love and regret all his life ...

And in the USSR, repressions awaited him ...

Stories like the one that happened to Theremin at that time hint at something like a collective neurosis. After all, if you look closely, it turns out that many of the most talented Soviet people of that time, as it were, sacrificed themselves: they seemed to deliberately commit certain acts that provoked a corresponding reaction from the NKVD. Especially when the repressions were already in full swing and the tense expectation of something bad was constantly hanging in the air. Many victims of repression were somehow unconsciously framed. As if feeling it someone for some reason need. No, they didn't do anything illegal, but... they just drew special attention to themselves.

Theremin also, of course, did not commit any crimes (just as almost none of the innocently tortured and killed people at that time committed them). Returning to the USSR, he lived quite quietly in Leningrad for another six months, and no one touched him or called him. But in March 1939 he suddenly for some reason I decided to go to Moscow and report for a business trip.

He made his way to Voroshilov, reminded himself of himself - and was arrested.

He was sentenced to eight years of corrective labor for participating in the murder of Kirov (moreover, at the time of Kirov's murder, the accused was simply not in the country). But not only the ridiculous accusation is surprising, but also Termen's completely childish, naive and simple reaction to what began to happen to him after that. It seemed that not only was he not indignant, but he was somehow even grateful to the authorities. Probably, for the fact that as a result he was nevertheless given the opportunity to work and even provided with the necessary equipment.

Correctional labor camp in Kolyma. There, the genius was forced to load and carry stones. As a result, he designed a monorail for his car, began to fulfill several norms a day.

Less than a year later, he was returned to Moscow. I ended up in the famous sharashka on the Yauza, where many famous scientists-prisoners worked for the good of their homeland... Theremin also began to work...

It cannot be said that the motherland did not appreciate these works at all. For example, in 1947, Beria presented Theremin to the Stalin Prize of the 2nd degree for the unique Buran eavesdropping system he developed for the special services. According to Academician Landau, Stalin, who personally approved the lists of laureates, crossed out the number "2" in front of Termen's name and wrote "1". The Stalin Prize of the 1st degree was a rather serious financial incentive. And besides, it meant liberation. In fact, it's almost over...

But it was impossible for the inventor to live in the wild - no working conditions! There was simply no place to get the necessary parts and devices. Therefore, immediately after the release, Theremin asked to return. And he continued to create for the benefit of the domestic military-industrial complex.

All this time Termen's relatives did not know anything about his fate. They thought he had disappeared somewhere else in America. Only in the second half of the 60s Termen "legalized himself in the world", retired from the organs, got a place at the Moscow Conservatory, and began to engage in his favorite developments in the field of music. True, at that time everything was too conservative at the conservatory (now there is a center for electro-acoustic music, named after Theremin by the Theremin Center). Therefore, Termen was not allowed to work normally, and he had to leave. He was sheltered at the university, at the department of acoustics. There he continued his research in the field of recording the electrical radiation of the human body and bioacoustics, created a polyphonic version of the theremin, and worked with students. But in general, his talents were not very much in demand. Although he could have invented a lot of other things if he had received a grant, or something, or something like that.

Officials did not want to hear anything about his innovative ideas. Moreover, he was not allowed to come to work on weekends. And this led Termen to a forced film mania: since there were no conditions for working at home, and indeed it was crowded, Lev Sergeevich spent Saturdays and Sundays all day in the cinema - just to pass the time until Monday. According to Bulat Galeev, the genius kept a notebook in which he wrote down the names of films he had already watched (“I don’t like to watch the same thing twice.”) This notebook eventually accumulated more than four thousand titles ...

When confronted with something new that runs counter to the dead knowledge of yesteryear, people instinctively feel threatened by the foundations that make them feel important, smart, and in demand. They rush then to use the word "visionary" in a pejorative sense. And this is so humanly understandable ... After all, the visionary is a danger to them. He sees visions and tries to comprehend them and present them in the form of scientific (or any other) discoveries, but they do not see visions, and they have nothing to comprehend ...

Such an attitude towards people who in the West are honored (or could be honored) as great scientists has become some kind of unkind tradition in Russia. Theremin was known to everyone in the USA and Europe as the legendary creator of the first electronic musical instrument. And they would gladly accept and give him everything, if only he wanted to come to them. But he was a patriot and a consistent adherent of the communist idea, and he did not care much for the West ...

Only in the last years of his life did he sometimes begin to respond to invitations and go abroad, to various festivals of contemporary art, where he was received as a guru. In the USSR, he was revered only in narrow circles of electronics and media art lovers. They saw great potential in the theremin, especially in the area of its connection with the latest computer technology. And even now, the theremin continues to excite, bringing to life unexpected ideas and projects (for example, here is the project of an interactive club-theater using the theremin) ...

But the main thing that occupied the mind of Theremin in the last 10 years of his life was not the theremin. He was seriously fascinated by the problem of immortality. And he was on the verge of solving this problem.

Theremin seriously thought about immortality back in 1924 - when Lenin died. Lev Sergeevich then repeatedly turned to the Soviet leadership with a request to freeze the deceased Ilyich. To bring him back to life after a while. And in the 80s, Termen, explaining in an interview to Bulat Galeev his idea of “time microscopy”, which was supposed to lead him to solve the problem of immortality, said this: “Red blood cells are such “creatures” (they are visible only under a microscope) , which come in different breeds, and they change due to the age of the person. Several terms and periods of their shifts were found. And in these moments, new "beings" are at war with the old ones, hence aging arises. You need to be able to select these "creatures" from donor blood in time. And it needs a lot! Therefore, how to catch them, at what age - and you can’t tell anyone! .. "

His ideas about immortality were, of course, completely visionary. And the less likely they were to be understood. Another quote: “We have already carried out experiments at the Medical Academy, with Lebedinsky. On animals. Something has already worked. But in order to study the behavior of blood cells, to learn how to select and multiply them, we needed a 10,000 frames per second ultra-fast movie camera. And a very highly sensitive film is also needed, because these “creatures” cannot be strongly illuminated, they die from heating ... After all, when we look through a microscope, we see everything in magnification many times over. And the speed of movement of these "creatures" in the blood remains the same. It is necessary to slow it down by the same amount, and then we will perceive them in their natural form, as if we ourselves penetrated into their world. To do this, you will need to watch the film shot by a super-high-speed camera on a conventional projector. I have already tried something and even figured out how to hear their voices, which we do not notice with the ordinary ear. I not only checked blood cells, but, in addition, spermatozoa. All these "creatures", you know, dance and sing under a microscope. And in their trajectories of movement - a certain pattern. This is very important…”

These and other similar words of Theremin caused bewilderment and skepticism even among his friends from the world of science. Not to mention the people who distributed the funds ... But Termen never in his life suffered a single defeat in the implementation of his ideas, if it came to this implementation. And this is really very important.

Secret. Urgently.

Operation "Moscow Heat" has begun - a fire broke out in the stairwell of the US Embassy building at 13 Mokhovaya Street and began to spread along the second floor of the building. Strong smoke forced the evacuation of members of the American diplomatic mission, security, technical workers of the Embassy and their families. At present, our "fire brigades" have arrived at the scene of the emergency. We act according to plan "B".

...Several fiery red cars with sirens flew into the courtyard of the US Embassy; fire brigades cheerfully rushed inside the building, straightening the sleeves of the hoses along the way. And then they stopped in confusion - the way up was blocked by American marines. To a furious shout: “Get out of the way! Everything will burn there, mother #%$#!!!” followed by a harsh response in broken Russian: “Let everything burn. In the name of the President of the United States, access by outsiders is prohibited."

An attempt to force a breakthrough into the American embassy failed. The most "delicious" rooms - the offices of military intelligence officers, cryptographers, analysts, employees of the State Department, as well as the most important room - the ambassador's office, were still inaccessible to Soviet intelligence.

Former building of the US Embassy on Mokhovaya street

There are no fortresses that the Bolsheviks could not take (I. Stalin)

This fantastic story began at the end of 1943, when Stalin was informed about the creation in the USSR of a unique listening device - a microwave resonator designed by Lev Theremin.

The "perpetual motion machine" did not need batteries and operated in a completely passive mode - no magnetic fields, no own power sources - nothing that could unmask the device. Placed inside an object, the "tadpole" was powered by microwave radiation from a distant source - the microwave wave generator itself could be located anywhere within a radius of hundreds of meters. Under the influence of a human voice, the nature of the oscillations of the resonating antenna changed - it only remained to receive the signal reflected by the "bug", record it on a magnetic tape and decrypt it, restoring the original speech.

The spy system, which received the code name "Chrysostom", consisted of three elements: a pulse generator, a resonator ("bug") and a receiver of reflected signals, placed in the form of an isosceles triangle. The generator and receiver could be located outside the listening object, but the main problem was the installation of a "bug" in the office of the American ambassador.

The focus with the fire failed. As practice has shown, the Americans had everything OK with security. Access to the secret premises of the Embassy was strictly limited. None of the Soviet citizens and members of official delegations were allowed close to the upper floors of the building.

It was then that the idea with the "Trojan horse" was born.

A rich collection of souvenirs made of wood, leather and ivory was urgently delivered to the reception room of the People's Commissar of Internal Affairs of Beria: a shield of a Scythian warrior made of black alder, two-meter mammoth tusks, an Ericsson telephone set inlaid with ivory - a gift from the Swedish king to Nicholas II, a luxurious basket for papers, made entirely from the fore-knee of an elephant leg ...

Alas, none of the rare exhibits impressed the technical specialists of the NKVD - the installation of Zlatoust required a very special souvenir, made taking into account the technical characteristics of the listening device itself. A souvenir that could not leave indifferent the American Ambassador to the USSR Averell Harriman. An exceptional rarity that would be impossible to re-gift or “forget” to anyone in the back room of the Embassy.

How Harriman was outmaneuvered

... The orchestra thundered and the choir of pioneers sang:

O say, can you see, by the dawn's early light,

What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming?

Whose broad stripes and bright stars, through the perilous fight,

O'er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming?

What, in the middle of the battle, did we read at the evening lightning?

In blue with a scattering of stars, our striped flag

Red-white fire from the barricades will again appear ...

A solemn line in the Artek camp, tied red ties and a line of young sonorous voices singing the anthem of the United States in English - the American ambassador burst into tears. Touched by the warm welcome, Harriman gave the Pioneers a check for $10,000. The British ambassador, who was present at the line, also handed over to the pioneers a check for 5,000 pounds. At the same moment, to the solemn sounds of music, four pioneers brought in a lacquered wooden shield with the US coat of arms carved on it.

To thunderous applause, the director of Artek handed over to “our American friends” a certificate for a rare coat of arms signed by the All-Union headman Kalinin: sandalwood, boxwood, sequoia, elephant palm, Persian parrotia, mahogany and ebony, black alder - the most rare wood species and the skillful hands of Soviet craftsmen . The gift turned out well.

I can't take my eyes off this miracle! Where should I hang it? - a rare case when Harriman said aloud what he really thought.

Hang it over your head, Comrade Berezhkov, Stalin's personal interpreter, unobtrusively hinted to Harriman, the British ambassador will burn with envy.

Trojan passions or operation "Confession"

The successful operation to introduce "Zlatoust" into the American Embassy was preceded by a long serious preparation: a specially organized event - the celebration of the 20th anniversary of the Artek camp, where the American and British diplomatic missions were invited to "express gratitude from Soviet children for their help in the fight against fascism" - a ceremony , from which it was impossible to refuse to visit. Careful preparation - a pioneer choir, a ruler, an orchestra, perfect cleanliness and order, special security measures, two battalions of NKVD soldiers disguised as pioneer leaders. And, finally, the gift itself with a "surprise" - a unique work of art in the form of the US coat of arms (Great Seal) with a "Theremin resonator" mounted inside.

Operation Confession has begun!

As the analysis of the "bug" signals showed, the coat of arms with "Zlatoust" took its rightful place - on the wall, right in the office of the head of the American diplomatic mission. It was here that the most frank conversations were held and emergency meetings were held - the Soviet leadership learned about the decisions taken by the ambassador before the President of the United States himself.

On the upper floors of the houses on the opposite side of the street, in front of the American Embassy, two secret apartments of the NKVD appeared - a generator and a receiver of reflected signals were installed there. The espionage system worked like clockwork: the Yankees spoke, the Soviet intelligence officers recorded. In the mornings, wet linen was hung on the balconies of apartments, "housewives" from the NKVD diligently shook out rugs, literally throwing dust in the eyes of American counterintelligence.

For seven years, the Russian bug "undermined" worked in the interests of Russian intelligence. During this time, "Chrysostom" survived four ambassadors - each time the new inhabitants of the office sought to change all the furniture and interiors, only the wonderful coat of arms remained in the same place.

The Yankees learned about the existence of a "bug" in the Embassy building only in 1952 - according to the official version, radio technicians accidentally discovered the frequency on which Zlatoust was working on the air. An urgent inspection of the premises of the Embassy was carried out, the entire office of the head of the diplomatic mission was “shaken upside down” - and found ...

At first, the Americans did not understand what kind of device was hidden inside the shield with the coat of arms. 9" metal wire, hollow resonator chamber, elastic membrane...no batteries, no radio components, no "nanotechnology" whatsoever. Mistake? Was the real bug hidden somewhere else?!

The British scientist Peter Wright helped the Americans to understand the principles of the "Chrysostom" operation - acquaintance with Termen's microwave resonator shocked the Western intelligence services, the experts themselves admitted that if it were not for the case, the "eternal bug" could still "undermine" the symbol of American statehood in the Embassy USA Moscow.

The Americans did not dare to reveal to the media the shocking fact about the discovery of a bug that he had worked in the office of the Head of the US diplomatic mission for more than seven years. Unflattering information became public only in 1960 - the Yankees used the Zlatoust as a counterargument in the course of an international scandal involving the downed American intelligence officer U-2.

After extensive research of the coat of arms with the "secret", our Western friends tried to copy the "Chrysostom" - the CIA initiated the "Comfortable chair" program, but could not achieve an acceptable quality of the reflected signal. The British were more fortunate - created as part of the secret government program "Satyr", the resonator bug was able to transmit a signal at a distance of up to 30 yards. Pathetic semblance of the Soviet system. The secret of the Russian "Chrysostom" turned out to be too tough for the West.

The old building of the US Embassy on Novinsky Boulevard

The new building of the Embassy in Bolshoi Devyatinsky Lane

One of the most successful Soviet intelligence operations during the Cold War seriously alarmed the Americans. "Zlatoust" was only the beginning of the campaign to listen to the "enemy camp" - much later, during the reconstruction of the US Embassy building on Novinsky Boulevard in 1987, the Americans found that their apartments were literally teeming with all kinds of "bugs" and listening devices. But an even more shocking incident occurred on December 5, 1991 - on that day, the chairman of the Inter-Republican Security Service (MSB, the successor to the KGB), Vadim Bakatin, at an official meeting, handed over 70 sheets to the American Ambassador Robert Strauss with schemes for laying "bugs" in the buildings of the US embassy complex in Moscow. Eyewitnesses claim that at that moment the American was simply speechless - the first person of the state security service handed over his weapon to the enemy! Finally, I was surprised by the volume of all kinds of "bookmarks" - Soviet intelligence officers for years bugged the entire building up and down.

Bakatin and Kalugin

As for the Chrysostom bug, today the coat of arms with the super-bug built into it occupy a worthy place in the exposition of the CIA Museum in Langley, Virginia.

The forgotten genius of electronic music. A few words about the creator of "Chrysostom".

The unique resonator bug is the merit of the Soviet scientist and inventor Lev Sergeevich Termen (1896-1993). A musician by training, he began his career creating never-before-seen electronic musical instruments. Deep knowledge in music and electrical engineering allowed the young inventor to patent in 1928 the "theremin" - an unusual musical instrument, the game of which consists in changing the position of the musician's hands relative to the antennas of the instrument. Hand movements change the capacitance of the "theremin" oscillatory circuit and affect the frequency. The vertical antenna is responsible for the tone of the sound. The horseshoe antenna controls the volume.

Laureate of the Stalin Prize in 1947 for the creation of listening devices - L. Termen received his award not only for his work on the brilliant Chrysostom. In addition to a passive resonator bug for the American embassy, he created another technical masterpiece - the Buran remote infrared eavesdropping system, which reads the vibration of glasses in the windows of the listening room using a reflected IR signal.

Lev Sergeevich Termen (1896-1993)invented

1. A group of electric musical instruments:

- theremin

- rhythmicon

– terpsiton

2. Burglar alarm

3. Unique eavesdropping system "Buran"

4. The world's first television installation - long-range vision

September 17th, 2013

Secret. Urgently.
Operation "Moscow Heat" has begun - a fire broke out in the stairwell in the building of the US Embassy at 13 Mokhovaya Street and began to spread along the second floor of the building. Strong smoke forced the evacuation of members of the American diplomatic mission, security, technical workers of the Embassy and their families. At present, our "fire brigades" have arrived at the scene of the emergency. We act according to plan "B".

Former building of the US Embassy on Mokhovaya street

There are no fortresses that the Bolsheviks could not take (I. Stalin)

This fantastic story began at the end of 1943, when Stalin was informed about the creation in the USSR of a unique listening device - a microwave resonator designed by Lev Theremin.

The Perpetuum Mobile did not need batteries and operated in a completely passive mode - no magnetic fields, no own power sources - nothing that could unmask the device. Placed inside an object, the "tadpole" was powered by microwave radiation from a distant source - the microwave wave generator itself could be located anywhere within a radius of hundreds of meters. Under the influence of a human voice, the nature of the oscillations of the resonating antenna changed - it only remained to receive the signal reflected by the "bug", record it on a magnetic tape and decrypt it, restoring the original speech.

It was then that the idea with the "Trojan horse" was born.

How Harriman was outmaneuvered

... The orchestra thundered and the choir of pioneers sang:

O say, can you see, by the dawn's early light,
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming?
Whose broad stripes and bright stars, through the perilous fight,
O'er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming?
What, in the middle of the battle, did we read at the evening lightning?
In blue with a scattering of stars, our striped flag
Red-white fire from the barricades will again appear ...

I can't take my eyes off this miracle! Where should I hang it? - a rare case when Harriman said aloud what he really thought.

Hang it over your head, Comrade Berezhkov, Stalin's personal translator, unobtrusively hinted to Harriman, the British ambassador will burn with envy.

Trojan passions or operation "Confession"

Operation Confession has begun!

As the analysis of the "bug" signals showed, the emblem with "Zlatoust" took its rightful place - on the wall, right in the office of the head of the American diplomatic mission. It was here that the most frank conversations were held and emergency meetings were held - the Soviet leadership learned about the decisions taken by the ambassador before the President of the United States himself.

The Yankees learned about the existence of a "bug" in the Embassy building only in 1952 - according to the official version, radio technicians accidentally discovered on the air the frequency on which Zlatoust worked. An urgent inspection of the premises of the Embassy was carried out, the entire office of the head of the diplomatic mission was “shaken upside down” - and found ...

The British scientist Peter Wright helped the Americans understand the principles of the Zlatoust operation - acquaintance with Termen's microwave resonator shocked the Western intelligence services, the experts themselves admitted that if it were not for the case, the "eternal bug" could still "undermine" the symbol of American statehood in the Embassy USA Moscow.

The Americans did not dare to reveal to the media the shocking fact about the discovery of a bug that he had worked in the office of the Head of the US diplomatic mission for more than seven years. Unflattering information became public only in 1960 - the Yankees used the "Zlatoust" as a counterargument in the course of an international scandal involving the downed American intelligence officer U-2.

The old building of the US Embassy on Novinsky Boulevard

The new building of the Embassy in Bolshoi Devyatinsky Lane

One of the most successful Soviet intelligence operations during the Cold War seriously alarmed the Americans. "Zlatoust" was only the beginning of a campaign to listen to the "enemy camp" - much later, during the reconstruction of the US Embassy building on Novinsky Boulevard in 1987, the Americans found that their apartments were literally teeming with all kinds of "bugs" and listening devices. But an even more shocking incident occurred on December 5, 1991 - on that day, the chairman of the Inter-Republican Security Service (MSB, the successor to the KGB), Vadim Bakatin, at an official meeting, handed over 70 sheets with diagrams of laying "bugs" in the buildings of the US embassy complex in Moscow to the American ambassador Robert Strauss. Eyewitnesses claim that at that moment the American was simply speechless - the first person of the state security service handed over his weapons to the enemy! Finally, I was surprised by the volume of all kinds of "bookmarks" - Soviet intelligence officers for years bugged the entire building up and down.

Bakatin and Kalugin
As for the Chrysostom bug, today the coat of arms with the super-bug built into it occupy a worthy place in the exposition of the CIA Museum in Langley, Virginia.

The forgotten genius of electronic music. A few words about the creator of "Chrysostom".

The unique resonator bug is a merit (1896-1993). A musician by training, he began his career creating never-before-seen electronic musical instruments. Deep knowledge in music and electrical engineering allowed the young inventor to patent in 1928 the "theremin" - an unusual musical instrument, the game of which consists in changing the position of the musician's hands relative to the antennas of the instrument. Hand movements change the capacitance of the "theremin" oscillatory circuit and affect the frequency. The vertical antenna is responsible for the tone of the sound. The horseshoe antenna controls the volume.

Lev Sergeevich Termen (1896-1993)invented

1. A group of electric musical instruments:

- theremin

- rhythmicon

– terpsiton

2. Burglar alarm

3. Unique eavesdropping system "Buran"

4. The world's first television installation - long-range vision

worked on:

- speech recognition system

- human freezing technology

- military sonar

According to materials:
http://www.specnaz.ru/
http://www.softmixer.com/
http://wikipedia.org/
http://www.spybusters.com/
http://www.thesound.ru/

Perhaps I will remind you of another spy story - The original article is on the website InfoGlaz.rf Link to the article from which this copy is made -

Without such a popular espionage tool as a microphone, the profession of a secret agent is impossible to imagine. But using this device is not as easy as it seems. It must be installed in the right place, and it must also be successfully disguised. Sometimes intelligence officers have to not only show miracles of ingenuity, but also use the peculiarities of human psychology.

Drilling holes - without noise and dust

For intelligence agencies, installing eavesdropping electronics was (and still is) just as trivial as for ordinary people, say, changing a gasket in a faucet or installing an air conditioner. But this operation cannot be called simple. It's only in films that everything is done in the blink of an eye: drilled a hole, put a microphone in it, pressed a button. In practice, the secret services had to deal with a lot of problems - to avoid unnecessary noise when drilling walls, carefully remove traces, mask the installation site of the listening device.

For technicians whose duties include such work, special tool kits are produced that cannot be bought just like that in the nearest store. This brace called Belly Buster is a specially “pumped” hand drill, a pneumatic hammer, which is used to make holes in masonry walls.

Here you have a monometer, and a number of nozzles, and tubes to gently start the “bug”. This particular model was used in the late 50s - early 60s of the last century.

Beetle carrying a beetle

Sometimes one gets the impression that the arsenal of means of foreign intelligence agencies, especially British and American ones, is so huge that these guys sometimes do not even know what technical know-how is hidden in top-secret warehouses. For example, a few years ago, engineers at the Georgia Institute of Technology spent a whole million dollars from the US Air Force to make the TechJet Dragonfly dragonfly robot. The tiny aircraft weighs 25 grams and is 15 centimeters long. This robo dragonfly can work up to half an hour, making video and photography.

TechJet Dragonfly is guided by GPS and generally resembles an ordinary compact quadcopter, which few people can surprise today. But here's what's interesting. Did the US Air Force know when they gave a million dollars to create a robotic flying device that their colleagues from the CIA had a similar gadget sitting and gathering dust for forty years?

The technical department of the Intelligence Agency created a flying dragonfly back in the seventies! Of course, it was simpler and was called differently - "Insectotopter" (Insectotopter), but the idea was similar.

In the seventies, the CIA developed a subminiature radio microphone (or simply a "bug"), and the question immediately arose: "how to quietly deliver such a radio microphone to the place of wiretapping?" We decided to make a miniature aircraft.

At first, no one thought about a dragonfly, everyone seriously believed that they were creating a mechanical bumblebee. Created by a watchmaker, the flying robot had a built-in fluid oscillator that powered the robotic insect's wings for lift. The device used a small amount of rocket fuel from which gas was produced. This gas set the oscillator in motion, and the exhausts gave additional thrust. When the device was ready, it turned out that it had little in common with the bumblebee. And then they decided to "make up" the insectopter like a dragonfly. This toy was controlled by a laser beam, with the help of the same beam useful information was taken from the listening radio microphone. The tests were successful, but there was one “but”. Unfortunately for the inventors of the flying "bug", it had one drawback, due to which this device was never used anywhere - it was very unstable in flight if the wind was blowing. And in espionage work, one must be prepared for any drafts, so the dragonfly bumblebee was left in reserve.

Trojan from the USSR: the most mysterious gift

The state security organs of the USSR not only did not lag behind their Western counterparts, but often outstripped them in terms of the technical equipment of their agents. When spy equipment made in the USSR fell into the hands of Western intelligence officers, their leading engineers were amazed at the ingenuity of Soviet scientists. Moreover, to understand how the discovered spy devices worked, scientists around the world had to spend a lot of time.

An example of such a "triumph of science" by Soviet intelligence was the invented wiretapping device, which caused the loudest diplomatic scandal in the history of relations between the USSR and the USA. And it was like that.

In the autumn of 1933, the Soviet Union established diplomatic relations with the United States, and in 1934, American diplomats were given a newly built house on Mokhovaya Street, the Zholtovsky House.

Interestingly, two years before this event, the Church of St. George on Krasnaya Gorka, built in the 17th century, was located on the site of the new building. However, the communists were not particularly concerned about religious and cultural values - the temple was demolished, and a new house was erected in its place. Initially, it was built as a residential building, but it also fit perfectly under the embassy, where it was located until 1953.

Ever since the American diplomats had taken over the Mokhovaya building, Soviet intelligence had been doing their best to place microphones in the building to listen in on conversations. But alas, the embassy security worked flawlessly, and all attempts to get inside the building over and over again ended in failure. The most famous failure of intelligence is the thwarted operation "Moscow heat", when they tried to set a fire in the embassy building. But even then, the guards did not let the fire brigades inside, saying that it would be better if everything burned down than outsiders would be in the embassy.

Talented scientists were attracted to solve such a difficult task. One of them is Lev Sergeevich Termen.

The Theremin family has French roots, all of its representatives are amazingly talented, this name has been known since the 14th century. Among the ancestors of Lev Theremin were musketeers, priests, musicians, artists. In the very same scientist and inventor, two talents united at once - a physicist and a musician.

In world science, this is truly a legendary person. He invented the first electronic musical instrument theremin (which is still used by musicians) and developed a lot of interesting devices - from burglar alarms for the Hermitage and Alcatraz prison to the terpsiton device, which combined a musical instrument that reacts to the dancer's body position with a light and music installation.

Theremin was such a bright personality that he aroused the interest even of Lenin. Back in the mid-twenties, Lev Sergeevich was ready to create a prototype of the far-sighted television broadcasting system, and for this he appears in the Encyclopædia Britannica as the inventor of television.

In 1928, Lev Termen left the country, continuing to remain a citizen of the USSR. He was closely associated with the secret services, although he did not engage in actual intelligence. In Europe, and later in the USA, Theremin promoted his ideas. He gave tours and played in front of the public on his eteraton (as he himself called his musical instrument, which the press dubbed the theremin in the press). He improved his equipment and invented more and more new devices. And I must say, he succeeded in all this brilliantly - there was always a full house at concerts, and celebrities themselves were looking for communication with him. His social circle included a large number of famous personalities - from Albert Einstein to Charlie Chaplin.

This man was on the path to success and could have become an influential person, but the Soviet system stood in his way. The scientist was recalled to the USSR, where he was subjected to repression by the NKVD and was sent to serve his term in a camp in Kolyma, in Magadan. But the scientist's talent made itself felt even in such harsh conditions. He managed to make inventions even in the camp, making rational proposals for work, which attracted the attention of the operational and technical department of the NKVD.

The prisoner was sent to the Tupolev design bureau TsKB-29, also known as "sharashka". There he worked for the next eight years. Another person who suffered from the Soviet regime worked in this design bureau - Sergei Pavlovich Korolev, the future creator of Soviet cosmonautics. In TsKB-29, Korolev was an assistant to Lev Theremin. The security authorities showed particular interest in the inventor when the scientist presented the unique Buran wiretapping system. This device directed a beam at the window in the room where surveillance was carried out, after which it read the vibrations in the infrared range and decoded the signal, translating it into sound. Fantastic device for that time.

It took the CIA almost 60 years to make a similar device (albeit more complex and using a laser - it was patented in the USA under number No. 7580533 of August 25, 2009). Lavrenty Beria personally instructed to use this system in spying on the US, British and French embassies in Moscow. For the Buran system, the prisoner Termen was awarded a closed Stalin Prize of the first degree. Academician Landau later recalled that when the lists were submitted to Stalin for approval, Termen was nominated for a second-class prize. But Stalin personally corrected the number "two" opposite Termen to "one". A large amount of money was attached to the award - one hundred thousand rubles. But Termen was never given money, replacing the cash reward with an apartment on Leninsky Prospekt.

Lev Theremin did not stop in his experiments and soon created another amazing thing - an endovibrator designed for remote wiretapping. The invention of the Soviet scientist was unique, if only because this listening device was almost impossible to detect. It did not require a power source and contained no active electronic components. The endovibrator worked like a conventional detector receiver - due to the energy of radio waves. The project was named "Zlatoust". Such a bug theoretically has an unlimited service life, is light and compact.

But the main problem remained - how to install a spy bug if outsiders cannot enter the embassy building? And then the intelligence leadership went to the trick: it was decided to hide the "Chrysostom" in a souvenir and hand it over as a gift to the ambassador.

But what souvenir could be given to the ambassador so that he would not refuse to take it? This task was solved brilliantly. With the help of the greatest masters of the country, a real work of art was created.

The lacquered wooden panel in the form of the most recognizable emblem of the United States - the Great Seal of the United States, could not but arouse the admiration of the American Ambassador Averell Harriman. The certificate attached to the gift listed a number of precious woods that were used to create the masterpiece: sandalwood, boxwood, sequoia, elephant palm, Persian parrotia, mahogany and ebony, black alder. The gift was presented by the children when the ambassador was on a visit to the pioneer camp Artek. And a reason was found to invite distinguished guests - the All-Union children's health resort, which in 1945 hosted 1,200 children, just turned 20 years old. And since the well-known Yalta conference was taking place at the same time, a visit to the restored Artek from the ruins fit into the “mass cultural program” for high officials. On that day, the meeting of distinguished guests turned into a holiday.

To “put pressure on a tear,” the pioneers sang the American anthem at a gala concert. The touched ambassador, looking at the gift handed to him, only managed to mutter: “Where can I keep it?”. Immediately behind him, Valentin Mikhailovich Berezhkov, Stalin's personal translator, grew up and casually dropped: “Yes, hang it in your office. The English will burst with envy.” He said and nodded towards the British Ambassador to the USSR, Sir Archibald Kerr, who was also present at the ceremony, but did not receive SUCH a gift.

Before hanging a wooden eagle in the embassy, American technicians, of course, “probed” it for bugs. But they were not found, because Lev Theremin's device was passive and did not emit anything by itself. And then the souvenir was indeed hung in the ambassador's office. Operation "Confession", the purpose of which was to bring a bug into the US Embassy building, ended in success.

And for seven whole years, unsuspecting members of the diplomatic mission were subjected to wiretapping. During this time, four ambassadors have been replaced. The most secret meetings did not take place in the ambassador's office, but even the information that the USSR special services received with the help of Zlatoust made it possible to keep abreast of the main internal problems of the strategic enemy.

With the help of powerful emitters installed in the houses adjacent to the US Embassy, pulses with a frequency of 330 MHz were transmitted to Zlatoust. The resonator in the device generated a signal that was transmitted through the antenna and changed depending on the sound in the ambassador's office. Specialists from the authorities caught this signal and decoded it using a receiving device, which was also unusual. It included a receiver, a decoder and a tape recorder, which were located on the same line as the generator. To avoid superposition of radiating and received waves, the entire geometric figure had to have the shape of an isosceles triangle.

In order not to cause any doubts among the Americans, the NKVD officers imitated the daily routine of ordinary Soviet people in the windows of neighboring houses: they shook rugs on the balconies, hung clothes to dry, watered flowers, portrayed family quarrels in open windows, etc.

The bug was discovered quite by accident, and there is still no exact information about how this happened. British intelligence specialist MI5 Peter Wright writes in his book that he was found in 1951, discovered by a regular technical check before the visit of the American Secretary of State to Moscow. According to him, at a frequency of 1800 MHz, technicians discovered the effect of an acoustic string.

But the words of Peter Wright diverge from what other sources and, in particular, the American intelligence services themselves claimed. According to an alternative version, the bug was found in 1952, when a British radio operator heard a transmission on the open air from the office of the American embassy just at the moment when the special services were wiretapping, irradiating Zlatoust. The embassy conducted an urgent check, and the device was found.

In any case, it is obvious that the American intelligence services were in no hurry to fan the scandal and kept this fact as a trump card up their sleeve. Firstly, it was inconvenient to admit that they had been led by the nose for so many years, and secondly, they wanted to present this fact with benefit. The silence was broken only in 1960. On May 1, during a flight over Sverdlovsk, a U2 spy plane was shot down. A month after this incident, in contrast to the world criticism that fell upon the United States, the Americans put forward a counterargument and demonstrated the Soviet “Chrysostom” at a UN meeting. The subtext of their speech was obvious: there is nothing wrong with espionage - you are following us, and we are also watching you.

But even after the discovery of the creation of a closed design bureau, the American intelligence services could not understand how this contraption works (that's what they began to call it - The thing).

I had to turn to my British colleagues for help. Only Peter Wright, already mentioned above, could understand the principle of the scheme, and it took him ten weeks. Perhaps he could have done it faster, but the American specialists managed to damage the finely tuned device: one of the technicians simply pierced the “Zlatoust” membrane with his finger.

Peter Wright - spy tech catcher

The British intelligence services made a replica of this device and called their clone of the passive listening device "Satyr". Despite the fact that Chrysostom was a very simple device, it took Western engineers a year and a half to repeat it.

So the device that Lev Termen made ceased to be secret and was successfully adopted by the special services of Britain, the USA, Canada, and France.

Lev Sergeevich lived to be 97 years old and outlived all his enemies, envious people and rotters. Until his death, he remained a very cheerful and optimistic person. He considered himself lucky, and often joked about his age and said that he would live to be a hundred years old. "What do you want? Our surname, if you read it the other way around, it will turn out - DOES NOT DIE. In his declining years, at the age of 95, Lev Theremin even joined the Communist Party. The scientist explained his action very simply: "I promised Lenin when we talked with him." That's what he was - a genius of music and espionage.

Sergey and Marina Bondarenko

TERMEN Lev Sergeevich (1896-1993) - inventor, physicist, musician.

Quote: Creator of the world's first electronic musical instrument theremin (1919-20); one of the first long-range television systems (1925-26); the world's first rhythm machine rhythmicon (1932); security alarm systems, automatic doors and lighting; the first and most advanced listening devices, and so on.

Born in 1896 in St. Petersburg. He graduated from the St. Petersburg Conservatory in the cello class, studied at the Faculty of Physics and Mathematics of St. Petersburg University.

Since 1919 - head of the laboratory of the Physical-Technical Institute in Petrograd, at the same time since 1923. - collaborated with HYMN" (State Institute of Musical Science, Moscow).

In 1927 he was sent by the People's Commissariat for Education of the RSFSR on a business trip abroad. He traveled all over Europe, was one of the most popular people in New York, was a member of the club of millionaires. In 1931-38. - director of the joint-stock company Teletouch Inc. (USA). Such outstanding people of their time as the emigrant Albert Einstein, the conductor Leopold Stokowski, the actor Charlie Chaplin, the artist Marie Helene Bute, and so on, visited and worked in his New York studio. etc. His inventions, made in the 20-40s, have firmly entered our everyday life.

At the end of 1938 he returned to the USSR. Arrested in 1939 and sentenced to 8 years in the camps. He spends a year in Kolyma, but most of his time in the legendary "Tupolevskaya" sharashka. After his release, he works at the KGB research center, developing various electronic systems.

Since 1963 - member of the acoustic laboratory of the Moscow Conservatory. In the late 60s, due to disagreements with the administration after the publication of an article about Theremin in the American newspaper The New York Times, Lev Sergeevich was expelled from the conservatory with a scandal, he was forced to go to work at Moscow State University.

Since 1966 - member of the Acoustics Department of the Faculty of Physics, Moscow State University.

For the last twenty-five years Termen has been working in the Acoustics Laboratory of Moscow State University. 6th class mechanic. He slowly worked on his theremins - he restored some, improved some, even invented one in which sound through a system of photocells arose from the mere glance of a musician.

Lev Theremin died in 1993 in poverty and obscurity, hunted down by neighbors in a communal apartment. Legendary Theremin…

His most widely known invention is the theremin, which Lenin liked. Playing the theremin consists in the musician changing the distance from his hands to the antennas of the instrument, due to which the capacitance of the oscillatory circuit changes and, as a result, the frequency of the sound.

The vertical straight antenna is responsible for the tone of the sound, the horizontal horseshoe - for its volume.

To play the theremin, you need to have perfect hearing, since the musician does not touch the instrument while playing.

But not only theremin...

He invented:

1. A group of electric musical instruments:

Theremin

Rhythmicon

terpsiton

2. Burglar alarm

3. Unique eavesdropping system "Buran"

4. The world's first television installation - distant vision

worked on:

Speech recognition system

human freezing technology

Military sonar.

Already at 26, he demonstrated television in the Kremlin.

At that time, televisions with screens the size of a matchbox were being created, and his TV had a huge screen (1.5 x 1.5 m) and a resolution of 100 lines.

In 1927, the scientist demonstrated his installation to the Soviet military leaders K.E. Voroshilov, I.V. Tukhachevsky and SM. Budyonny:state minds watched with horror on the screen Stalin walking through the Kremlin courtyard.

This picture scared them so much that the invention was immediately classified ... and safely buried in the archives, and television was soon invented by the Americans.

Theremin struck the world scientific community with his theremin, on which he himself (and he, in addition to physics, also graduated from the conservatory) gave classical music concerts.

The USSR received orders from several firms for the manufacture of 2,000 theremins on the condition that Theremin would come to America to supervise the work.

But instead of one task, Lev Sergeevich received two: one from the Commissar of Education Lunacharsky and the second from the military department.

Quote:

Even upon arrival in America, he rented a six-story mansion on 54th Avenue for 99 years. In addition to private apartments, it housed a workshop and a studio. Here Lev Sergeevich often played music with Albert Einstein: the physicist played the violin, the inventor played the theremin. Einstein was fascinated by the idea of combining music and spatial images. And Termen figured out how to do it: he invented the light-musical instrument rhythmicon. Huge transparent wheels with a geometric pattern applied to them rotated in front of a strobe lamp. As soon as the musician changed the pitch, the frequency of the strobe flashes and the patterns changed - the spectacle was impressive. Well, fantasy began when the walls of the studio went up and down. Of course, not really, but with the help of the play of light. The bewitched visitors gasped in surprise!

Rumors of these experiments attracted many famous people to the studio. Theremin's guests included the millionaires DuPont, Ford and Rockefeller. However, Termen himself was included in the list of twenty-five celebrities of the world by the mid-30s. And even was a member of the club of millionaires.

Was he really a millionaire? It is not known for sure. Some say that Teletouch Corporation brought a lot of money to Termen personally and to Soviet Russia. And others claim that Termen was financed by military intelligence. Because the true purpose of his business trip to America was espionage.

Every two weeks, Lev Sergeevich came to a small country cafe, where two young people were waiting for him. They listened to his reports and gave new tasks. However, these tasks were not burdensome and did not particularly distract Theremin from work. And he was already carried away with might and main by the most fantastic of his ideas - an instrument that gave birth to music from dance. In fact, this is a kind of theremin: the sound is created not only by the hands, but also by the movements of the whole body, and the corresponding name was given to it - terpsiton - after the name of the goddess of dance Terpsichore. At the same time, each sound corresponded to a lamp of a certain color. Imagine what an extraordinary sight it was, because any movement of the dancer responded with sounds and flickering of multi-colored lights!

To create a concert program, Theremin invited a group of dancers from the African American Ballet Company. Alas, it was not possible to achieve harmony and accuracy from them, the project had to be postponed. But the beautiful mulatto Lavinia Williams danced in this troupe, who conquered Lev Sergeevich not only as a ballerina, but also as a woman. Theremin decided to marry.

It never occurred to him that marriage to a black woman would radically change his life. But, as soon as the lovers registered their marriage, the doors of many houses in New York closed before Theremin: America did not yet know political correctness. He lost informants, which caused serious dissatisfaction with the Soviet intelligence. And in 1938 Termen was ordered to leave immediately for Russia. Lavinia was told that she would come to her husband on the next boat.

The spouses never saw each other again. And Termen until the end of his days kept a marriage certificate issued by the Russian embassy in America.

The Great Depression that broke out at the turn of the 1930s ruined many people.

But not Theremin: the resourceful scientist had another trump card - a burglar alarm.

Theremin's sensors were torn off with hands. They were installed even in Sing Sing prison and in Fort Knox, where the American gold reserves were stored.

Thousands of Americans enthusiastically began to learn to play the theremin, and the General Electric Corporation and RCA (Radio Corporation of America) bought licenses for the right to manufacture it.

Theremin by the mid-30s was included in the list of twenty-five celebrities in the world and was a member of the club of millionaires.

During the concert, he became interested in Lavinia Williams and married her. Alas, she was dark-skinned, and at that time such a marriage was considered indecent.

The racists of America closed the doors of their salons in front of him ...Political correctness had not yet been invented.

Perhaps the love of the beautiful Lavinia was dearer to Theremin than communication with the Rockefellers. But…

In addition to concerts and contracts for the theremin, he also performed the same second task: he was engaged in espionage in favor of the USSR.

Marriage to a mulatto deprived him of informants. And this caused the wrath of Soviet intelligence.

He was urgently summoned to the USSR, and Lavinia was supposed to come after him.

When they came for him, she got the impression that he was taken away by force, but who would listen to her.

They didn't see each other again.

Never.

In Moscow, he was arrested as a "defector", and after a month of skillful processing of socialist legality in the Lubyanka, Lev Termen confessed to everything.

For example, in the fact that, together with a group of astronomers, he planned the assassination of Kirov.

The version was:

Kirov (who by that time had long been dead!) was going to visit the Pulkovo observatory.

Astronomers have planted a land mine in a Foucault pendulum.

And Termen, with a radio signal from the USA (!!!), was supposed to blow it up as soon as Kirov approached the pendulum (!).

The investigator was not even embarrassed by the fact that the Foucault pendulum is located not in Pulkovo, but in the Kazan Cathedral.

Lev Sergeevich was given eight years and sent to Kolyma.

In the camp, he immediately invented a self-propelled car on a monorail, and he was soon taken to the so-called "sharashka" Tupolev, where Sergei Pavlovich Korolev was his assistant.

The war broke out and he developed equipment for radio control of unmanned aircraft and beacons for naval operations.

But not only. Theremin also developed the famous Buran eavesdropping system in this sharashka.

They say it is still in use today.

The crown of this creation was a wooden panel, which was presented to the American ambassador by the Soviet pioneers.

The panel was hung in the ambassador's office, and ... soon they began to look for where the colossal information leak was coming from.

Only seven (!) years later, a cylinder with a membrane was found in this panel.

For another year and a half, American intelligence engineers struggled with the riddle - what is it? ..

But it turned out that a beam was directed from the house opposite to the study window, and the membrane, which vibrated in time with the speech, reflected it back.

Along with a speech that was recorded.

In the future, Theremin improved the invention even more: it was possible to do without a membrane, its role was played by window glass.

The Soviet authorities were so delighted with this useful invention that Termen was awarded the Stalin Prize of the 1st degree right in prison.

And then they were even released, which was simply an outstanding act of humanism and the triumph of socialist legality, so dear to some.

And they even made him happy with two rooms of that very “free living space”.

Well, who would not agree that two rooms were given to Lev Theremin for free? Of course, he was literally gifted. Has he earned two rooms for this country?

In the 60s, L. Theremin wanted to do electronic music again, but some party-gobish mug just spat in his eyes, pointing out that "electricity exists to execute traitors, and not to create music."

These are the thinkers who decided the fate of science in the country in general and the brilliant inventor Theremin in particular.

Of course, he remained highly classified and continued to work for intelligence, because he was not hired anywhere else.

At first he was engaged in military hydroacoustics, and then he was instructed to develop a "device for searching for flying saucers."

Such idiocy did not inspire him at all, and in 64 he finally left the organs and began to work quietly and peacefully in the acoustic laboratory of the Moscow Conservatory.

Yes, it would have worked if the New York Times correspondent had not been impatient to make a report about the conservatory.

And there the correspondent came across Lev Theremin. The whole world was sure that he died in 1938, crushed by a meat grinder of millions of repressions.

When the US found out that the great Theremin was alive, it was a bomb. Sensation. Achtung. Paragraph.

The scientific community of America and Europe literally roared.

An avalanche of letters from scientists and colleagues poured in to Termen, reporters and television companies rushed to him in a crowd ...

He was invited to Stanford, to Paris, to Holland, to Sweden…

The leadership of the conservatory was so scared of all this that ...

Theremin was simply fired, and his equipment and developments were thrown into the trash.

And he developed a synthesizer, which was soon successfully developed by the Japanese Yamaha, earning millions and millions on it ...

And for the next 25 years, the great scientist, who was probably not inferior in talent to Leonardo himself, the legendary inventor, whom Lenin praised and respected by Einstein, worked as a mechanic of the 6th category in some provincial laboratory.

He lived with his family in a two-room apartment, probably watched TV - which he was not allowed to invent -, and on TV there were concerts of rock stars on Yamaha synthesizers.

The daughters grew up, started their own families, and five lived in a small two-room apartment on Leninsky Prospekt - L. S. Termen, daughter Natalya with her husband and two children.

With great difficulty, he managed to get another room in the buggy communal apartment, where the neighbors hunted him down.

Lev Sergeevich taught his niece Lida Kavina to play the theremin. By the age of twenty, she had become a virtuoso performer and traveled all over Europe with concerts. In 1989 Termen was also invited to the Experimental Music Festival in France. And he, 93-year-old, went!

When in 1991 in a Hamburg theater they decided to use the theremin, it turned out that almost the only performer in Europe was Lydia Kavina. Over the past years, the situation has changed a lot: playing the theremin is taught at universities, and festivals are held in different countries of the world.

October 10, 2004. Jean-Michel Jarre arranges another phantasmagoria in the "Forbidden City" in Beijing.

But most of all, at the end of his life, Termen surprised those around him with his entry into the CPSU: "I promised Lenin." Lev Sergeevich tried before, but he was not accepted into the party for "terrible crimes". So Termen became a communist only in 1991, simultaneously with the fall of the USSR.