In 1962, Switzerland adopted a unique law that is still in force. He guaranteed each resident of the country a place in the underground asylum – and ordered to build such shelters in all new houses. After the USSR lost the Cold War to the West, this demand seemed to Atavism. But when Russia invaded Ukraine, the Swiss remembered their shelters. Today, each of them has the right and the ability to get a place – one square meter – in an underground bunker. As Switzerland became the world leader in the number of such bunkers and how other European countries are trying to catch up with it, he told it. “Medusa” retells this material. Switzerland, which has observed neutrality for more than 200 years, is a world leader in the number of protective bunkers per capita. In a country where less than nine million people live, more than 370 thousand shelters of different sizes have been built, from single -family to giant, capable of accommodating thousands of people. They should protect the civilian population, including in a nuclear war, giving shelter for up to two weeks. S. Switzerland, it is valid in Switzerland to build bunkers with all new residential buildings. If a separate shelter in the house cannot be equipped, it is necessary to make a fee for the maintenance of a nearby public bunker. The price for a place for humans is from about 1,500 to 3,000 francs, depending on the size of the hopper. These expenses fall on the shoulders of developers and real estate owners. The partner of the head of the civil defense service of Canton Geneva Guillaume Vergen calls the bunkers “an integral part of the Swiss identity.” In the military history of the country, mountains and dungeons have always been considered as a safe space, confirms the historian Sylvia Berger. Even the 19th century, the Swiss generals decided to build fortifications in the Alps so that the army could retreat there in case of invasion. These fortifications were updated during World War II. But the destructive bombing of European cities forced the Switzerland authorities to think about defense not only for the military, but also for civilian ones. The Cold War, which began after the Second World War, made this task even more important. So the law on civilian bunkers appeared in Switzerland. The largest of them is Sonnenberg in Lucerne. This is a car tunnel that can be re -equipped with a refuge relatively quickly. It was built in the 1970s and was designed to receive 20 thousand people. There were concrete doors in the tunnel with a thickness of one and a half meters, which were supposed to be closed with a nuclear attack or technogenic disaster, and the command center, where two -tiered beds, dry toilets, water, canned food and tons of other supplies for survival were stored. In the team center there was a kitchen and a medical compartment equipped with a single shower in the entire bunker. It was predicted that in the event of a threat of Sonnenberg, it would be possible to convert from the tunnel to the bunker in two weeks. But the only exercises conducted in 1987 showed that these calculations are not entirely true. The emergency rescue units managed to deploy only part of the necessary infrastructure and could not fully close one of the four concrete doors, which reduced the protective function of Sonnenberg to nothing. In Switzerland, discussions began about whether it was worth spending resources on maintaining the readiness of such a huge bunker. After about 15 years, its capacity was reduced from 20 to 2 thousand people, and a museum was opened in the command center. In the 1960s, when the requirement to build bunkers in new houses only appeared, the Swiss understood its appropriateness. But in the 1970s and 1980s, more and more power began to gain movements for peace, and people doubted the need and practicality of bunkers. Will they really protect from the consequences of the nuclear war? Why do you need such protection at all if the world is destroyed outside? Do bunkers bring the nuclear war closer, undermining the belief that it is impossible to survive? Do they distract from the efforts to prevent conflicts? These debates were intensified or weakened depending on how society perceived the threats. In 2011, the Swiss parliament discussed the refusal to build civil shelters, but then left everything as it is. A similar influence on public opinion was also had a full -scale invasion of Russia in Ukraine in 2022. The worried Swiss mistakenly began to write and call the Sonnenberg Museum, asking which bunker they go to. The head and guide of the museum Zora Shelberg, who answered their calls and messages, realized that they confused the museum with the civil protection service. Louis-Henri, the head of the civil protection service of the canton in the border with France, told Reuters that even the French called them and asked for a place in the shelter. “Suddenly we became extremely in demand. People wanted to know where the bunkers, whether they were prepared, in what places there are places, ”said the business, adding that the requests from France’s citizens had to be rejected. For 63 years, the Swiss spent more than 13 billion dollars on the construction of bunkers. Against the backdrop of a conflict in Ukraine, they are more likely to treat them not as a burden, nonsense or a good room under a wine cellar, and as a privilege, Zora Shelberg believes. She has already noticed a change in moods for visitors to the Museum of Sonnenberg. “Until 2022, most of the population and even some politicians considered the shelters unnecessary. And this has definitely changed, ”Daniel Zordi, one of the leaders of the Federal Civil Protection Department of Switzerland, agrees. The attitude towards refuge in other European countries that are preparing to repel Russian aggression in the weakening of the US military and diplomatic support. Finland reported that her bomb shelters would be enough for 85% of the country’s population. Sweden is ready to place 67% of residents in them. Norway plans to resume the construction of bunkers in each new house, stopped in 1998. Germany, where less than a thousand public shelters, discusses the possibility of encouraging people to build them on their own. In Spain, the volume of construction of private bunkers since 2022 increased by 200%. (Tagstotranslate) News
