By Ilya Rogachev
Back in 1957, the Soviet Union accomplished the impossible.
That year, on October 4, a country that had been devastated by World War II just 12 years before, launched the worldwide famous Sputnik-1, Earth’s first artificial satellite.
Thus, a new era of humankind’s history - the Space Age - had begun.
In light of that, it is hardly believable that such a remarkable event could be accompanied by something that was described as “crisis”.
Yet that is what happened. The “Sputnik Crisis” was a period of public fear and anxiety in Western nations about the perceived technological gap between the US and the Soviet Union caused by the launch of Sputnik-1.
Here are a couple of examples:
* An extract from an article titled “Race to Land on Moon is Result of Success Achieved by Sputnik” and published in a US newspaper “Ocala StarBanner” on November 2, 1957: “US civilian and military scientists are being urged to get an American rocket there (to the Moon) first to soothe somewhat the national pride hurt by Russian success in putting the first satellite aloft”.
The launch of Sputnik hurt US national pride and fuelled plain and simple jealousy. Jealousy and hurting pride entailed fear.
* How do you like this extract from another article titled “Latest Red Rumor: They’ll Bomb the Moon” published in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette” on November 1, 1957?
“The latest rumour doing the rounds is that the Russians plan to explode an H-bomb on the moon If that’s true - look out! The rocket and its cargo of violence are more likely than not to boomerang (to Earth)”.
Here we have a well-known image of “evil Russia planning something evil again”.
* Even back in 1957 the West, the US in particular, denied the possibility that USSR could do anything for the sake of humankind, trying to paint its every success as part of a certain “evil plan” which existed only in its imagination.
And what do we have today, when it comes to the Russian “Sputnik V” vaccine?
The same thing, with the exception that the most discussed “Sputnik” today is not a satellite anymore.
We even see the name of the vaccine described as an “homage to Cold War era”.
Well, the same reaction to both Sputniks, apparently, is the Western “homage to Cold War era”.
The mainstream Western media are describing “Sputnik V” as something “dangerous” and “impossible”.
Here’s what Anthony Fauci, the top infectious-diseases expert in the US, told CNN: “We (the US) are going very quickly. I do not believe that there will be vaccines so far ahead of us that we will have to depend on other countries to get us vaccines.
“I believe the programme that is being sponsored by us right now, and being directed and implemented by us, is going at a very rapid speed.”
Take a moment and appreciate the logic: The US is moving fast (without “cutting corners”, right?) And this is why Russia just can’t legitimately develop a safe vaccine faster.
How does this make any sense? Apparently, the Western media are attacking Russia’s vaccine because the US “programme” wasn’t fast enough.
By the way, remember the US, the UK and Canada’s recent accusations of “Russian hackers” trying to steal their vaccine researchers’ hard work? They are based on the same grounds.
The Western mainstream media, however, “missed” the intervention of Alexander Gintsburg, the head of Russian Gamaleya National Research Centre for Epidemiology and Microbiology.
He said the West was seeking to lure Russian vaccine researchers away.
Apparently, there’s nothing wrong with attempting to bribe Russian scientists if it’s done by the West.
There’s an interesting detail: on the basis of what they have written about Russia - a “shattered economy”, “backward science and medicine” (with all the Russian scientists having fled to North Korea, have you not been told so many times?) - Western media agencies are implying that our country, which was turned into a wasteland by communism and then Vladimir Putin’s rule, can’t possibly produce anything new or good.
Meanwhile, hardly anyone stressed the fact that Sputnik V was developed by Gamaleya Centre - the same scientific institution that had created a vaccine against Ebola.
Sputnik V did not appear out of the blue - Russia had relevant expertise in vaccine development.
Another curious example of this anti-Russian-vaccine campaign is the reaction to President Putin’s daughter’s inoculation.
An opinion from a columnist of The Washington Post: “As a point of pride, Putin pointed out that one of his own daughters has taken the vaccine and suffered only a slight, short-lived temperature increase. That sounds convincing, doesn’t it? My daughter didn’t die, so it’s all good.”
We can hardly understand the sarcasm here. Becoming a volunteer for vaccination against a dangerous virus is an act of bravery, regardless of one’s family or any other background.
But okay, let’s say the president’s daughter wasn’t involved. Instead, Sputnik V was injected in Russians who were not members of president’s family. That would’ve been used as an argument against Sputnik V, as if the president is reluctant to give the vaccine to his own family and it proves its inefficiency better than anything.
It seems, for the Western and pro-Western media outlets, no matter what, when and how Russia does - it does it wrong.
Why? Just because it’s Russia.
Finally, the production of a pilot batch of Sputnik V sparked an outburst of anger of Russia’s ill-wishers - the same people who earlier said the vaccine wasn’t safe because it didn’t pass the third, the most wide-scale stage of testing. Little did they know that the batch was produced primarily for purposes of stage 3.
Of course, developing a thing as delicate and complex as a vaccine takes time and effort. Yet what is astonishing is that Western media’s constant denial of the said time and effort when it comes to Russia.
They preferred to hurry up and label “Sputnik V” as “dangerous”.
The world is well aware that many countries across the globe are developing their own vaccines, which is brilliant. Vaccine research is not a race or a competition.
However, we fear that the worst thing that Sputnik V would’ve caused is speeding up the research in other countries (at the cost of vaccines safety and efficiency), just like Sputnik-1 entailed swift creation of Nasa and, eventually, the Space Race.
We really hope, for the better future of mankind, that it’s not the case.
Otherwise, Karl Marx’s saying will be proved right once again: “Hegel remarks somewhere that all great, world-historical facts and personages occur, as it were, twice. He has forgotten to add: the first time as tragedy, the second as farce”.
* Rogachev is ambassador of the Russian Federation to the Republic of South Africa and the Kingdom of Lesotho.
** The views expressed here are not necessarily those of IOL.