More than one source has already answered this question by saying that there is no real substance called red mercury, and it is a myth that began in the Soviet Union in the past, as the official spokesman for the Atomic Energy Agency answered in his interview with the British newspaper The Guardian in 2004, describing the matter as all “nonsense.” Real in atomic science and nuclear energy; How did the legend start?

The beginning of the legend... just before the collapse of the Soviet Union

The legend of red mercury began in 1991 with intelligence information obtained by the intelligence service of Czechoslovakia (one of the countries affected by the control of the Soviet Union) that there was a secret operation to transfer 60 kilograms of a mysterious substance, which the information said was called “red mercury” to unknown destinations outside the Soviet Union, and it was preserved in A cement container lined with nuclear radiation insulating material.

The news was soon picked up by a newspaper of limited circulation at the time and published a fabricated investigation based on the information, in which it mentioned in passing that the Soviet government was determined to fulfill requests for red mercury from foreign countries wishing to acquire nuclear weapons. The newspaper reported in its investigation that the Chemical Industries and Research Company “Alkor” She is the one behind this compound that will “tip the energy balance.”

It is interesting, according to the Radio Free Europe website, that one of the close collaborators with this company, whose name was associated with red mercury, was the former Soviet intelligence officer and the current president of Russia: Vladimir Putin himself.

The Russian newspaper also reported in its investigation that the price of one kilogram of red mercury ranges from 200 to 400 thousand dollars.

As a result of this incident, news of red mercury spread throughout the republics of the collapsed Soviet Union, and extensive investigations began to spread around it, especially since many Soviet Union generals began to profit from secret deals to sell the Soviet nuclear arsenal, with the precious and strategic materials of gold, platinum, and uranium, which is What inspired everyone in the world that red mercury is among these materials that Union generals trade in.

The mystery around red mercury reached its peak in the mid-nineties, until news of red mercury crossed the ocean to the Soviets' arch enemy: America.

Indeed, American intelligence investigated the controversial material, and they began to warn their agents that the Soviets were trying to defraud those dreaming of nuclear power and its secrets in the world.

In the early 2000s, in the villages of Upper Egypt, somehow the legend of red mercury grew out of nowhere, and no one knows to this day how it began and who started it. All that was spread at the time was that there was a substance called red mercury that the ancient Egyptians used in mummification, and that it had supernatural powers, such as harnessing the jinn, and that it could “direct” on its own, like a magnet or a compass, to the locations of golden treasures.

The rumor developed that this substance was found inside certain royal mummies in the form of a small compressed container the size of a medicine ampoule and was popularly called “balha” among antiquities researchers. Due to its similarity to fresh red dates, and the price of one gram of it reaches thousands, and sometimes millions of dollars.

This rumor quickly ignited the ambitions of those looking for money and quick profits, and illegal archaeological excavations began to escalate very quickly in order to access this material.

In addition to this, many began to exploit the ignorance and greed of others, and to defraud those wishing to obtain red mercury by counterfeiting glass ampoules filled with magnetized stone chips and red dye, and selling them as the desired material, trying to exploit some people’s ignorance of the magnetic properties of the metal.

In late 2015, the New York Times published a long story, citing sources inside Syria, that a representative of ISIS leaders met in the town of Tal Abyad, near the border with Turkey, with a supplier of goods, and told him - according to the investigation’s description - that ISIS wanted to buy “ “Red mercury.” Other sources described that the organization wanted to obtain red mercury to conduct tests on it in order to manufacture a bomb with nuclear capacity.

Some other news outlets confirmed that the organization had indeed obtained some of the red substance, and one of the eyewitnesses said that the experiment with red mercury with chlorine had a devastating effect in the laboratory where the experiment took place, but of course all sources treated this story as pure and common. Imagination of some.

News of red mercury continues to infiltrate the public scene and social media conversations to this day, but the difference is that many today have begun to become convinced that the substance is basically a myth and legend and does not exist.