"We remain strong almost everywhere where we were, nothing has changed here. It's just that some developments have remained unclaimed for many years and need some renovation. But the fact that the potential is enormous is shown, for example, by the fact that in a short time, on the initiative of the president, we have made hypersound, which no one else in the world has, and the West cannot catch up with us in this yet," Kovalchuk said in an interview with Sputnik.
"In fact, we became a technological superpower only after its implementation. Yes, we were catching up with America when creating the atomic bomb. But then we were always the first. The first hydrogen bomb in 1953, the first nuclear power plant in 1954, the first nuclear icebreaker in 1959. And also nuclear medicine, research nuclear reactors — we were among the best in the world," he added.