Chip War

Chapter 7 examines the Soviet Union’s efforts to develop a semiconductor industry in the Cold War era. Inspired by American advancements in microelectronics, Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev sought to “catch up and overtake” the US in semiconductor technology. The chapter highlights Anatoly Trutko’s year-long study at Stanford University and the espionage activities of Joel Barr and Alfred Sarant, who fled to the USSR after their involvement in Julius Rosenberg’s spy ring. Barr and Sarant proposed building a Soviet version of Silicon Valley, which became the city of Zelenograd, dedicated to semiconductor research and production. Though the Soviet Union lagged behind the US in technological innovation, Zelenograd symbolized the USSR’s ambition to compete with the West in the semiconductor race. Despite initial enthusiasm and resources, the Soviet semiconductor industry struggled to match Silicon Valley’s rapid advancements due to bureaucratic inefficiencies and limited access to cutting-edge technology.

Chapter 8 recounts the Soviet Union’s attempts to replicate US semiconductor technology during the Cold War. Soviet leaders, desperate to catch up with the United States in technological advancements, adopted a strategy of copying American innovations, such as Texas Instruments’ integrated circuits. While the USSR excelled in theoretical physics and had some notable achievements, their “copy it” approach, led by Alexander Shokin, was fundamentally flawed.