Editing Nikolay Basov (section)

==Politics==
He entered politics in 1951{{clarify|date=December 2012}} and became a member of parliament (the [[Soviet of the Union]] of the [[Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union|Supreme Soviet]]) in 1974.<ref name=AC>[https://books.google.com/books?id=3-G3vi5av28C "A century of Nobel Prizes recipients: chemistry, physics, and medicine"], Francis Leroy. CRC Press, 2003. {{ISBN|0-8247-0876-8}}, {{ISBN|978-0-8247-0876-4}}. p. 174-175</ref> Following [[U.S. President]] [[Ronald Reagan]]'s speech on [[Strategic Defense Initiative|SDI]] in 1983, Basov signed a letter along with other Soviet scientists condemning the initiative, which was published in the New York Times.<ref name=TS>[https://books.google.com/books?id=J6cx2ZOixcYC "The strategic defence initiative: US policy and the Soviet Union"], Mira Duric. Ashgate Publishing, Ltd., 2003. {{ISBN|0-7546-3733-6}}, {{ISBN|978-0-7546-3733-2}}. p. 43-45</ref> In 1985 he declared the Soviet Union was capable of matching SDI proposals made by the U.S.<ref name=TS />
{{clarify|date=December 2012}}