How did the all-out offensive on virgin lands turn out for the country and what are the consequences of the corn epic and the ill-conceived chemicalization of agriculture? What is the cost of the Chernobyl disaster and was there any point in testing the latest nuclear weapons at the Semipalatinsk test site? The author of the book talks about the major environmental miscalculations that happened in the USSR during the development of natural resources and the taming of the peaceful atom.