Andrey Tupolev 1941-72 - Later Career
After the end of the Great Patriotic War Tupolev remained one of the leading Soviet aircraft designers. The scope of Tupolev’s activities while working at SUAI (State University of Aerospace Instrumentation) in 1936-1937 before his arrest, his active role in the domestic aviation development prompted Stalin the idea of entrusting to A.N. Tupolev an important nation-wide task: technical management of restructuring of the USSR industry to recreate American B-29 bomber. Stalin gives extraordinary powers to Tupolev. Andrey N. ensured the task performance in an incredibly short period of a year and a half; in May 1947 the first production Tu-4 took off.
He was the founder of Soviet jet engine powered civil aviation, coming up with the idea of Tu-104 in the 1950s.
At each stage of the work Tupolev put forward and was the first in the country to solve the most important (often not obvious) problems which determined the progress of aircraft industry, particularly heavy one. He was capable of catching the main point of the problem, was sensible of the nascent progressive scientific and technical tendencies in aviation and allied industries. Everything that was digested and logically defined by him that he considered to be mature enough for using in manufacture due to his talent and unrestrained activity he turned to real aircraft designs. He could construct advanced aircraft sometimes superior to foreign analogues despite the fact that Russian aircraft industry fell behind the world one.
A natural leader and head of one of the most cutting-edge innovative research centers (TsAGI), Andrey Tupolev was able to attract young talented engineers to work with him. Pavel Sukhoi, a founder of OKB Sukhoi and the developer of Su fighter Jets was among them. Tupolev could make people enthusiastic about solving technical challenges. Though he was a leading constructor he never made significant decisions without debating them first with his colleagues. “An airplane is a collective product of different people,” he used to say. He was highly praised by his colleagues and followers.
Nobody else in the design bureau studied so carefully articles, reports and photos of the aircraft and its components as Tupolev. He had never taken a decision without discussing the matter with the experts of his design bureau and different scientific research institutes of the country: TsAGI, CIAM, VIAM, LII and many others.
He had an ability to save the information in memory like a computer, to listen and to understand paying no attention to emotions and advertisement. If he did not understand he would say: “Repeat, repeat what you said?” and continued listening. Most of all he was interested in the test data as the basis for decision making. But he did not forget about checking the method and performance of the experiment using his rich experience in this field.
The manner of his leadership was notable for high demands, dislike of slovenliness even in form of behavior. However he trusted his assistants, after a long time of joint work he relied on their erudition and honesty. If it was necessary he could take the responsibility for all their actions. They returned devotion and selfless labor to him. Tupolev did not forgive lie and meanness; he lost credit to a guilty person. Sometimes he could forgive pretending that he did not notice white lie because he knew that the error would be corrected.
Andrey N. Tupolev could arouse enthusiasm in people just by his speech. “Aircraft design is a team work”, it was his credo. The peculiarity of his work was engaging in the process all creative people of the bureau, the potential of the whole aviation industry and related sectors. He used the method of “horizontal communication” to establish fruitful relations between different participants of the aircraft constructing. Most decisions concerning new aircraft design were usually a palliative between two contrary demands. The responsibility for compromise settlement at the “horizontal communication” level (designing engineer, aerodynamicist - raised the initiative and responsibility for the decisions of each participant. Andrey N. was supervising this “level”, stimulated the creativity and responsibility of the workers but did not allow them to ask him for advice and then in case of failure to accuse him.
Working at TsAGI and OKB Tupolev, Andrey Nikolaevich was able to raise a new generation of aircraft designers. One of them was his son – Aleksey Tupolev, who took over from his father as the head of OKB Tupolev.
A.N.Tupolev was a member of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR, honorary member of the Royal Aeronautical Society of Great Britain and the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics; he was awarded the prize and gold medal of N. E. Zhukovskiy, six State Prizes, the highest prize of International Aviation and Sports Federation (FAI). He was awarded a Title of Hero of Socialist Labor, the highest orders of the Soviet Union.
A.N. Tupolev knew his worth but never worried about maintenance of the authority. Test pilot M.L. Gallay told the following about this personality trait: “I have seldom met a person who does not care about the impression he makes on people. May be it was one of the reasons of the strong impression he made”. Unfortunately, Andrey N. Tupolev did not leave a book of recollections. When somebody asked him why he did not write about his eventful life he turned everything into a joke. And once he answered: “I don’t write I create”. Till the end of his life he had a desire to create something new and not to recollect what was already done.
Andrey Tupolev died on 23 December 1972, leaving a rich legacy behind him. This was the man who changed aviation and influenced it like no other.
His son, Alexey Andreevich Tupolev (1925–2001), also became an aircraft designer. He created a big jet plane, the first Soviet long-range supersonic strategic bomber.
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