Thank you for sharing the biblical references—interesting! one also needs to wonder if part of this meme was salted into the West as communist propaganda to discourage the use of nuclear weapons to counter a communist advance into NATO countries. One would need to look at Hollywood taking this to overkill with On the Beach or Threads (UK). Same could be said about the spread of the Nuclear Free Zone protests that spread throughout Europe and some of the West—was this initiated as a lever by the Communists and fellow travelers in order to make the US and NATO mothball its overwhelming nuclear superiority?
Ecclesiastes 4 seems a close match to your John Mitchell quote:
So I returned, and considered all the oppressions that are done under the sun: and behold the tears of such as were oppressed, and they had no comforter; and on the side of their oppressors there was power; but they had no comforter.
Wherefore I praised the dead which are already dead more than the living which are yet alive.
Interesting nonetheless, though from the title I was hoping this was going to be you diving in to answer the question yourself.
I think it’s a very erroneous belief in modern pop culture that nuclear war is a total doomsday scenario and attempts at survival are pointless in the face of an assured dismal outcome. The reality seems to much less guaranteed and the outcome more influenceable by decisions made now, but few are aware of the actual post-attack outlook and instead get most of their information from The Road and Mad Max.
"I have seen it speculated that the Russian version of the phrase is more directly traced to a particular translation of Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island, but tracing Russian origins of a phrase go beyond my ken. I think that Kahn is probably important in the Anglophone world for this association, and is why the Khrushchev quote would have been picked up on in particular. But who can say?"
Translation in 1935 is certainly not the oldest source, but it is likely what transformed more obscure reference with apocalyptic tone to a common saying (and for post-soviet period Dzhigarkhanyan from 1988 cartoon is universally known and unforgettable https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CZ42AEu0v60), it is highly likely that Khrushchev either had read it directly or picked up the saying from someone who did.
For what it's worth, Fred Kaplan writes in "Wizards of Armageddon" that Kahn didn't just publish "On Thermonuclear War" but also gave many public talks on the subject. Those and the accompanying news coverage may have helped drive popularity of the phrase.
Thank you for sharing the biblical references—interesting! one also needs to wonder if part of this meme was salted into the West as communist propaganda to discourage the use of nuclear weapons to counter a communist advance into NATO countries. One would need to look at Hollywood taking this to overkill with On the Beach or Threads (UK). Same could be said about the spread of the Nuclear Free Zone protests that spread throughout Europe and some of the West—was this initiated as a lever by the Communists and fellow travelers in order to make the US and NATO mothball its overwhelming nuclear superiority?
Ecclesiastes 4 seems a close match to your John Mitchell quote:
So I returned, and considered all the oppressions that are done under the sun: and behold the tears of such as were oppressed, and they had no comforter; and on the side of their oppressors there was power; but they had no comforter.
Wherefore I praised the dead which are already dead more than the living which are yet alive.
Interesting nonetheless, though from the title I was hoping this was going to be you diving in to answer the question yourself.
I think it’s a very erroneous belief in modern pop culture that nuclear war is a total doomsday scenario and attempts at survival are pointless in the face of an assured dismal outcome. The reality seems to much less guaranteed and the outcome more influenceable by decisions made now, but few are aware of the actual post-attack outlook and instead get most of their information from The Road and Mad Max.
"I have seen it speculated that the Russian version of the phrase is more directly traced to a particular translation of Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island, but tracing Russian origins of a phrase go beyond my ken. I think that Kahn is probably important in the Anglophone world for this association, and is why the Khrushchev quote would have been picked up on in particular. But who can say?"
This seems to be a good source reference: https://ru.wiktionary.org/wiki/%D0%B6%D0%B8%D0%B2%D1%8B%D0%B5_%D0%BF%D0%BE%D0%B7%D0%B0%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D1%83%D1%8E%D1%82_%D0%BC%D1%91%D1%80%D1%82%D0%B2%D1%8B%D0%BC
Translation in 1935 is certainly not the oldest source, but it is likely what transformed more obscure reference with apocalyptic tone to a common saying (and for post-soviet period Dzhigarkhanyan from 1988 cartoon is universally known and unforgettable https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CZ42AEu0v60), it is highly likely that Khrushchev either had read it directly or picked up the saying from someone who did.
For what it's worth, Fred Kaplan writes in "Wizards of Armageddon" that Kahn didn't just publish "On Thermonuclear War" but also gave many public talks on the subject. Those and the accompanying news coverage may have helped drive popularity of the phrase.
Is there an incorrect word or a word missing from this clause? I'm tripping on "he was probably the most to immediately credit."
I think he was probably the most to immediately credit for the phrase gaining a broader association with a post-nuclear existence.