LAST EDITED ON Jun-12-24 AT 08:33 PM (EDT)
 
I'm relistening the Audible edition of Adam Higginbotham's Midnight in Chernobyl at the moment. At one point in the narrative, a few days after the reactor explosion, it contains a description of an actual international conversation that happened, and which could possibly be paraphrased thus:

WEST GERMANY
Uh hey, USSR? We're getting a Scheißetonne of weird radionuclides in the wind coming from your neighborhood. WTF is going on?

SWEDEN
Yeah, we've noticed that too. What gives?

THE SOVIET UNION
Nothing! Everything is fine. Listen, never mind about that--what do you know about fighting graphite fires? Like really big graphite fires? That are radioactive? Asking for a friend.

Ah, those wily Soviet diplomats. The West will never make the connection.

--G.
NARRATOR: The West made the connection.
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Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
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