Balkan Cyberia: Cold War Computing, Bulgarian Modernization, and the Information Age behind the Iron Curtain by Victor Petrov (review)

Reviewed by: Balkan Cyberia: Cold War Computing, Bulgarian Modernization, and the Information Age behind the Iron Curtain by Victor Petrov Evgeniy Kandilarov (bio) Balkan Cyberia: Cold War Computing, Bulgarian Modernization, and the Information Age behind the Iron Curtain By Victor Petrov. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2023. Pp. 424. Probably for many people, it sounds like a myth or even a joke that during the Cold War, Bulgaria, mostly known for its agriculture production, developed a strong electronic industry and in the 1980s was already manufacturing over 40 percent of the personal computers of the Soviet Bloc. This made Bulgaria third in the world in the production of computers per capita. In this book, Petrov explains how this could happen under a Communist regime, when international technology transfer was severely restricted due to the Cold War. He demonstrates the logic and dynamics of high-tech development in the Eastern Bloc countries, their internal competition within COMECON, and their efforts to keep up with the West in digital electronic computing. On the basis of an extremely rich and diverse set of primary and secondary sources, Petrov traces the difficult path of the Bulgarian electronic industry in the second half of twentieth century, from three perspectives: First, he discusses the government's decision-making and policymaking processes, showing the specific advantages and shortcomings of the socialist political and economic system. Second, he reviews the purely technological development, including the role of scientists, engineers, and inventors in the research and development process. He emphasizes the scientific and technical potential of well-educated specialists in various fields related to electronics, many of whom had studied in Western Europe, the United States, and Japan. The third perspective is the social impact of digital electronic computing in the Soviet Bloc countries. How did electronic technologies change people's lives and minds? And how was the idea of technological progress applied in socialist ideology and propaganda? Crucial for Bulgarian electronics was the establishment of various high-tech industries in Bulgaria related to electronic technology, such as machine building, robotics, and equipment for spaceships, each with their own R&D activities. One of the most interesting parts of Petrov's book discusses the technological transfer from the West to the Communist Bloc. Here, he pays special attention to the acquisition of "know-how" through training and specialization programs of Bulgarian engineers and scientists in various countries in Western Europe or Japan. The purchase of licenses was also important, as well as the role of scientific and technical intelligence. The book builds on some classic works on socialist economies done by Janos Kornai, Andre Steiner, Adam Zwass, Manuel Castells, and others. For the analysis of the development of science and computer technology in the Soviet Union, the book builds on solid works of scholars such as Slava End Page 739 Gerovitch, Benjamin Peters, Boris Malinovsky, Loren R. Graham, David Mitchell, Paul N. Edwards, Marc Adams, Jerome Segal, and others. Petrov also draws parallels and comparisons between Bulgaria and some of the other Socialist countries within COMECON, referring to work by authors like James W. Cortada, Petri Paju, Helena Durnova, Zsuzsa Szentgyorgi, and Andrew Targowski. As for the Bulgarian historiography on the subject, although it is extremely limited, Petrov refers to previous contributions of Ivan Tchalakov and Evgeniy Kandilarov. However, Petrov's main goal is to elaborate on and further contribute to the topic, and for this purpose the research was done almost entirely on the basis of primary sources from Bulgarian, Russian, and Indian archives, memoirs and articles by engineers, and unpublished documents from personal archives, as well as various interviews done by the author. In the Bulgarian historiography after 1989, the topic of the technological development during the Cold War has been greatly neglected, mainly due to the notion that the development of technologies in the Socialist countries behind the Iron Curtain was completely ineffective, which suggests that such a research topic does not deserve any attention. Victor Petrov has convincingly refuted this thesis. Evgeniy Kandilarov Evgeniy Kandilarov holds a Ph.D. in modern and contemporary history and is associate professor at Sofia University "St. Kliment Ohridski," as well as at the Institute for Historical Studies of the Bulgarian...