The Bear Trap by Maor Kohn

Author:Maor Kohn [Kohn, Maor]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: eBookPro
Published: 2024-10-13T00:00:00+00:00

“They sent an official to my classroom at the university. He accompanied me to the Rector’s office and handed me a recruitment order. I was supposed to report to the State Security Department soon after. When I got there, I was one of 33 scientists from varying fields, chemists, physicists, and mathematicians who’d been invited from all over Soviet Union in order to be tested and sorted for various security projects, at the top of which was the Nuclear Project. We were tested for three days, after which they assigned us with a psychological personality profile as well as a grade for the level of risk, reliability and loyalty, and level of professionalism – all this to decide which of us was to be recruited and to what level of secrecy we could be exposed. There was a long list of parameters, like family status, distance from home, academic achievement, the number of research studies published, etc. As I’ve already pointed out, I did everything to show them how unsuitable I was for the project, without raising suspicion or hurting my chances of returning to academia. But I was only partially successful.”

“What do you mean?” asked Michael.

“When I got back to the Mathematics Department, it turned out that I’d been replaced by another mathematician, a younger man who resumed my research at the point at which I’d stopped. Although I wasn’t fired from the university, I was assigned the role of placing and training freshmen, and I was denied any chances of getting my own laboratory. I realized that someone at the top wasn’t pleased with my test results.”

“And that’s the reason you decided to emigrate to Israel at this time?”

“I’m a Jew and, from my perspective, studying and performing research at the Technion in liberated Israel sounds like a dream come true, certainly compared to what was left for me to do in Moscow.”

“Where is your family? Are you married?”

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