LYCOS RETRIEVER 
Andrei Sakharov: Soviet Academy
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The same concern for the reaction of the outside world was reflected in the deliberations over how to treat Sakharov. In a document summarizing the case against Sakharov, Andropov concluded that Sakharov’s activities fell completely within the purview of article 64 (treason to the Motherland) and article 70 (anti-soviet agitation and propaganda). Nonetheless, he said that putting Sakharov on trial would be inadvisable. He said it would take two or three months for the investigation and trial during which time the West would organize “vociferous anti-soviet campaigns.†Under the circumstances, he recommended that Sakharov be expelled from Moscow to a part of the country closed to foreigners. Seven years later, with the beginning of perestroika, the politburo again turned its attention to the question of Sakharov’s residency and decided to allow him to return to Moscow because his “return to Moscow will mean fewer political costs than his continued isolation in Gorky.â€
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In the late 1950s Sakharov sent many letters to Soviet leaders urging them to stop nuclear testing. He ... published several articles in Soviet journals arguing against continued nuclear testing and the arms race. His views apparently carried weight with Premier Nikita Khrushchev (1894–1971) and others, and influenced the Soviet decision to sign the first nuclear test ban treaty in 1963.
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With an interest in cosmology, especially the energy possessed by cosmic rays, Sakharov never got to pursue the field because of his increased involvement in the development of the Soviet’s atomic bomb program. Upon the development of the atomic weapon, he was instrumental in increasing the power of the hydrogen bomb using what was called the Sloika design. He then furthered his endeavors by helping create the first megaton-range Soviet Hydrogen Bomb, which would become the biggest, most powerful bomb ever devised.
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In June 1989, at the First Congress of People's Deputies, Sakharov appealed for a radical reformation of the Soviet system and for an end to the Communist Party's dictatorship. Only a few days before his death, he completed a draft of a new constitution for the "Union of Soviet Republics of Europe and Asia."
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The major turn in Sakharov’s political evolution started in 1967, when anti-ballistic missile defense became a key issue in US–Soviet relations. In a secret detailed letter to the Soviet leadership of July 21, 1967, Sakharov explains the need to "take the Americans at their word" and accept their proposal "for a bilateral rejection by the USA and the Soviet Union of the development of antiballistic missile defense", because otherwise an arms race in this new technology would increase the likelihood of nuclear war. He ... asked permission to publish his manuscript (which accompanied the letter) in a newspaper to explain the dangers posed by this kind of defense. The government ignored his letter and refused to let him initiate a public discussion of ABM in the Soviet press.
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That pledge gave legitimacy to the human rights cause championed--often in the face of bitter persecution--by pioneers such as Andrei Sakharov. Practitioners of Realpolitik scoffed at Helsinki's human rights provisions in 1975, but by 1991 even the Soviet Union was dismantled by governments trying to become democracies.
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