Ministry of Medium Machinebuilding
Ministierstvo Sriednego Mashinostroeniya - Minsredmash

In 1939-1946, the USSR People's Commissariat for Medium Engineering was in charge of another industry and transformed into the People's Commissariat (Ministry) of the USSR automobile industry.

Ministers
Soviet Atomic Project
1943	Kurchatov Igor Vasilievich
First Main Directorate
1945	Vannikov Boris Lvovich
1953	Zavenyagin Avraamy Pavlovic
Ministry of Medium Machinebuilding
1953	Malyshev, Vyacheslav Aleksandrovich
1955	Zavenyagin, Avraamy Pavlovich
1956	Vannikov Boris Lvovich
1957	Pervukhin Mikhail Georgievich
1957	Slavsky Efim Pavlovich
1986	Ryabev Lev Dmitrievich
Ministry of Atomic Energy and Industry
1989	Konovalov Vitaly Fedorovich
1991	Nikipelov Boris Vasilievich
Ministry of Atomic Energy
1992	Mikhailov Viktor Nikitovich
1998	Adamov Evgeny Olegovich
2001	Rumyantsev Alexander Yuryevich
Federal Atomic Energy Agency
2004	Rumyantsev Alexander Yuryevich

Formed by a decree of the Presidium of the USSR Armed Forces on 06/26/1953 on the basis of the 1st and 3rd Main Directorates of the Special Committee under the USSR Council of Ministers, in 1963-1965 it was called the State Production Committee on Medium Machinebuilding under the USSR Supreme Economic Council. The department was tasked with ensuring the advanced position of Soviet science and technology in the field of atomic energy, guided missiles and long-range missiles. Initially, it combined the management of the nuclear and missile industries.

The history of the nuclear industry has several starting points. The main ones are: September 1942, February 1943 and August 1945. In September 1942, the State Defense Committee (GKO), by its decree (No. 2352ss of September 28, 422) on the organization of work on uranium, ordered the Academy of Sciences "... to resume work on the feasibility of using atomic energy by splitting the uranium nucleus and submit by April 1, 1943 year report on the possibility of creating a uranium bomb or uranium fuel. " By this order, a special laboratory of the atomic nucleus was organized at the Leningrad Physical-Technical Institute, which was at that time in evacuation in Kazan. Later it was named Laboratory of Measuring Instruments No. 2 of the USSR Academy of Sciences (LIPAN No. 2).

In February 1943, GKO, by order No. 2872ss of 02.11.43, transferred this laboratory to Moscow, and appointed Professor I.V. Kurchatov was the scientific director of uranium works and assigned the duties of the day-to-day management of these works to the deputy chairman of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR M.G. Pervukhin and GKO Commissioner for Science S.V. Kaftanova. From the top management, the uranium problem was supervised by the First Deputy Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars, Deputy Chairman of GKO V.M. Molotov.

In 1942-45 about a hundred people were directly involved in this problem in the USSR. In the USA at that time fifty thousand people worked on the development of the atomic bomb!

During these years, the USSR conducted an analysis of intelligence, studied the physics of uranium fission, isotope separation, radiochemistry and uranium metallurgy. The ongoing hostilities on the battlefields of World War II demanded the highest tension of the forces of the people and all sectors of industry and agriculture for its victorious completion, so the attention to the uranium problem was then minimal. And only shortly after the first test of the US atomic bomb (July 1945) did the country's top leadership take decisive measures to organize work on a national scale on the atomic problem as a whole and on the development of the atomic bomb in particular.

GKO Decree No. 9887ss of 08.20.45 created a Special Committee of the highest statesmen and scientific physicists. General administrative management of the problem passes from V.M. Molotov to L.P. Beria. For the direct management of organizations and enterprises for the investigation of the atomic energy of uranium and the production of atomic bombs, the 1st Main Directorate was formed under the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR, headed by Boris Lvovich Vannikov.

And since September 1945, the future giant nuclear industry began to emerge and boom, practically in all its directions. Hundreds of thousands of people began to work in it.

Outstanding Constructors
Alexandrov	Anatoly Petrovich
Dollezhal	Nikolay Antonovich
Kapitsa	Peter Leonidovich
Keldysh	Mstislav Vsevolodovich
Khariton	Yury Borisovich
Kurchatov	Igor Vasilyevich
Landau	Lev Davidovich
Leipunsky	Alexander Ilyich
Sakharov	Andrey Dmitrievich
Shchelkin	Kirill Ivanovich
Stekelnikov	Vasily Vasilievich
Tamm	Igor Evgenievich
Velikhov	Evgeny Pavlovich
Zeldovich	Yakov Borisovich

Under the leadership of the Ministry of Medium Engineering, enterprises and research organizations of the nuclear industry were formed - the Siberian Chemical Combine in Tomsk-7 (now the city of Seversk; 1955), the Krasnoyarsk Mining and Chemical Combine in Zheleznogorsk (1958), and the instrument-making plant in the city of Zlatoust-36 (now the city of Trekhgorny; 1955), as well as the science city of Chelyabinsk-70 (now the city of Snezhinsk; 1957), etc .; the first strategic ballistic missile with a nuclear charge R-5 was built (adopted for service in 1956); work began on the creation of the R-7 rocket carrying a hydrogen bomb (1953, on this basis, the Soviet space project was developed in 1957); significantly increased the production of atomic bombs, mass production of hydrogen bombs.

The development of nuclear energy in the USSR took place against the backdrop of growing nuclear defense power: on August 12, 1953, the RDS-6 thermonuclear (hydrogen) bomb was first tested (creators - A.D. Sakharov, Yu.B. Khariton, Ya.B. Zel'dovichidr.) ; conducted military exercises with the use of nuclear weapons RDS-2 in the region of the Totsky camps (September 1954). In 1954, the leadership of the Ministry of Environment reported to the USSR government on the creation of serial (5 types) production of RDS products and their transportation means (aircraft, cruise missiles and long-range missiles, sea torpedoes).

The period in which the Minsredmash led the nuclear industry was the time of the most significant achievements of the USSR in both the defense and peaceful use of atomic energy. This was also due to the participation in the work in the industry of such scientists as I.V. Kurchatov, Yu.B. Hariton, A.P. Alexandrov, A.I. Leipunsky, A.D. Sakharov et al. At the same time, difficulties and problems met in the development of nuclear technology for the production of electricity as an industrial industry. This was manifested in the Chelyabinsk (1957) and Chernobyl (1986) accidents. There were some accidents and human casualties during the creation of the nuclear submarine fleet.

The world's first nuclear power plant was built (Obninsk, 1954); the first dual-purpose (capable of producing electricity and weapons-grade plutonium) industrial reactor was commissioned (1955, Siberian Chemical Plant); the first Soviet nuclear submarine K-3 of project 627 was built (in the test operation of the Navy since 1959) and the first nuclear icebreaker "Lenin" (launched in 1957, entered into service in 1959).

In 1954, it was decided to create a training ground on Novaya Zemlya, then the first underwater nuclear explosion in the USSR (1955), a nuclear torpedo test (1957) and a thermonuclear bomb (2.9 MT; 1957) were carried out. In 1955, the first Soviet nuclear submarine (N-submarine) K-3 (Project 627) was laid in Severodvinsk and a decision was made to begin construction of the NPS series (three K-3 submarines were commissioned in 1959).

In 1955, enterprises and design organizations involved in rocket science were separated from the Ministry of Medium Engineering (merged into the Specialized Committee on Armament of the Army and the Navy). In the same year, the 6th Main Directorate (mass production of nuclear munitions) was created as part of the Ministry of Medium Engineering. In 1955, the launch of industrial nuclear reactors took place: I-1 (300 MW, the scientific and design manual of NII-8, now the N. A. Dollezhal Scientific Research and Design Institute of Energy Engineering) and the OK-190 heavy-water reactor (PO "Lighthouse", Chelyabinsk region).

Since 1956, the Ministry of Medium Machinebuilding was engaged in the implementation of the first program for the development of atomic energy in the USSR; the Main Directorate for the Use of Atomic Energy was formed in its composition. In 1960-1965, part of the enterprises, research institutes and design bureaus of the department were subordinate to the State Committee for the Use of Atomic Energy.GDR ).

In 1958, it was decided to switch to the wide industrial use of the centrifuge isotope separation method. Its successful implementation brought the USSR (Russia) to a leading role in the world, providing up to 40% of the market for uranium enrichment services. Adopted in 1959, the world's first nuclear-powered icebreaker "Lenin" opened a new direction, most important for the development of the northern regions of the USSR, on the creation of an icebreaker fleet (the icebreakers "Arctic" and "Siberia"). This allowed later to switch to year-round navigation along the Murmansk – Dudinka route. At the same time, the industrial infrastructure of powerful nuclear engineering and the nuclear fuel cycle (NFC) was developing: the Atommash complex (Volgodonsk, Rostov Region) was put into operation, where it was planned to produce annually up to 8 VVER reactor vessels (1976), and the RT-1 plant (PO Mayak, Ozersk, Chelyabinsk Region, Nuclear submarine ) and fast neutron reactors (BN) and for the production of regenerated uranium and energy plutonium.

In the 1970s, thanks in large part to the activities of the Ministry of Medium Machinebuilding of the USSR, the level of nuclear munitions reached a level comparable to those in the United States, and in the early 1980s exceeded it. At the same time, the Ministry of Medium Machinebuilding supervised the accelerated construction of VVER-1000 and RBMK-1000 nuclear reactors, bringing annual commissioned capacities to 4 million kW (large-scale construction was completed as a result of the Chernobyl accident in 1986).

In 1989, the Ministry of Medium Machinebuilding was merged with the Ministry of Atomic Energy and transformed into the Ministry of Atomic Energy and Industry of the USSR (liquidated on December 26, 1991 due to the termination of the USSR). The industry enterprises located on the territory of the Russian Federation were placed at the disposal of the Ministry of Atomic Energy of the Russian Federation (established on January 29, 1992, since 2004 the Federal Atomic Energy Agency, and since 2007 the State Atomic Energy Corporation Rosatom).