"Damon Knight - Short Stories Vol 1" - читать интересную книгу автора (Knight Damon)

тАЬTomorrow the doctor and his instruments will be back in Paris. Plenty of things can happen before
tomorrow. In the name of sanity, man, how can anybody trust a thing that looks as if it ate the baby?тАЭ

I was a little annoyed. I said, тАЬAre you sure you're not more worried about their politics than their
appearance?тАЭ

He said, тАЬBah,тАЭ and went away.

The next day reports began to come in from government laboratories all over the world where the
Kanamit's power source was being tested. They were wildly enthusiastic. I don't understand such things
myself, but it seemed that those little metal boxes would give more electrical power than an atomic pile,
for next to nothing and nearly forever. And it was said that they were so cheap to manufacture that
everybody in the world could have one of his own. In the early afternoon there were reports that
seventeen countries had already begun to set up factories to turn them out.
The next day the Kanamit turned up with plans and specimens of a gadget that would increase the fertility
of any arable land by 60 to 100 per cent. It speeded the formation of nitrates in the soil, or something.
There was nothing in the newscasts any more but stories about the Kanamit. The day after that, they
dropped their bombshell.

тАЬYou now have potentially unlimited power and increased food supply,тАЭ said one of them. He pointed
with his three-fingered hand to an instrument that stood on the table before him. It was a box on a tripod,
with a parabolic reflector on the front of it. тАЬWe offer you today a third gift which is at least as important
as the first two.тАЭ

He beckoned to the TV men to roll their cameras into closeup position. Then he picked up a large sheet
of cardboard covered with drawings and English lettering. We saw it on the large screen above the
podium; it was all clearly legible.

тАЬWe are informed that this broadcast is being relayed throughout your world,тАЭ said the Kanama. тАЬI wish
that everyone who has equipment for taking photographs from television screens would use it now.тАЭ

The Secretary-General leaned forward and asked a question sharply, but the Kanama ignored him.

тАЬThis device,тАЭ he said, тАЬgenerates a field in which no explosive, of whatever nature, can detonate.тАЭ

There was an uncomprehending silence.

The Kanama said, тАЬIt cannot now be suppressed. If one nation has it, all must have it.тАЭ When nobody
seemed to understand, he explained bluntly, тАЬThere will be no more war.тАЭ

That was the biggest news of the millennium, and it was perfectly true. It turned out that the explosions
the Kanama was talking about included gasoline and Diesel explosions. They had simply made it
impossible for anybody to mount or equip a modern army.

We could have gone back to bows and arrows, of course, but that wouldn't have satisfied the military.
Besides, there wouldn't be any reason to make war. Every nation would soon have everything.

Nobody ever gave another thought to those lie-detector experiments, or asked the Kanamit what their
politics were. Grigori was put out; he had nothing to prove his suspicions.