Kalashnikov inventor haunted by unbearable pain of dead millions
Kalashnikov inventor haunted by unbearable pain of dead millions
Russian who designed Kalashnikov rifle confessed in final letter of spiritual pain caused by his invention
Luke Harding and agencies Moscow
theguardian.com, Monday 13 January 2014 12.14 EST
During his long lifetime Mikhail Kalashnikov expressed few regrets about his deadly eponymous invention. "I sleep soundly," he once said.
But in a letter to the head of Russia's Orthodox church written shortly before his death, the creator of the AK-47 revealed he was lately afflicted with spiritual torment. Kalashnikov, who died last month aged 94, told Patriarch Kirill he felt responsible for the millions of deaths caused by his revolutionary sub-machine gun.
"My spiritual pain is unbearable. I keep asking the same insoluble question. If my rifle deprived people of life then can it be that I … a Christian and an orthodox believer, was to blame for their deaths?" he wondered.
The letter, written last April and published on Monday by the newspaper Izvestia, is filled with similar musings about the nature of good and evil and the meaning of life.
"The longer I live," he wrote, "the more this question drills itself into my brain and the more I wonder why the Lord allowed man the devilish desires of envy, greed and aggression."
More:
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jan/13/kalashnikov-weapon-inventor-spiritual-pain-dead-millions
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