Boris Shcherbina Quotes

You’ll do it because it must be done. You’ll do it because nobody else can. And if you don’t, millions will die. If you tell me that’s not enough, I won’t believe you. This is what has always set our people apart. A thousand years of sacrifice in our veins. And every generation must know its own suffering. I spit on the people who did this, and I curse the price I have to pay. But I’m making my peace with it, and now you make yours. And go into that water. Because it must be done.

When it’s your life and the lives of everyone you love, your moral conviction doesn’t mean anything.

The science is strong, but a test is only as good as the men carrying it out.

That went surprisingly well. You came off like a naive idiot. And naive idiots are not a threat.[to Valery Legasov]

We couldn’t put a man on the moon. At least we can keep a man off a roof.

At the levels some of them were exposed? Ionizing radiation tears the cellular structure apart. The skin blisters, turns red, then black. This is followed by a latency period. The immediate effects subside. The patient appears to be recovering. Healthy, even. But they aren’t. This usually only lasts for a day or two. Then the cellular damage begins to manifest. The bone marrow dies, the immune system fails, the organs and soft tissue begin to decompose. The arteries and veins spill open like sieves, to the point where you can’t even administer morphine for the pain, which is unimaginable. And then three days to three weeks, you are dead.[Boris Shcherbina: What does the radiation do to them precisely?]