Summary: The modernization process in the development of the Bulgarian economy and the necessary acceleration of scientific and technological progress were objectively hampered by the Cold War escalation. Since the announcement of the Western restrictive and discriminative policy on trade with Eastern Europe (the so called COCOM barriers), one of the permanent tasks of the governments in the region was to find ways for overcoming those artificial obstacles. The paper aims to discuss in short the historical development of the Bulgarian Scientific-Technical Intelligence branch and the reflection of its activities and results on the establishment of the national electronic industry as a core part of the modernization of the country. The author examines also as specific case studies the Bulgarian scientific intelligence presence in Japan and India, which was of great importance for the development of Bulgarian electronic industry and its increasing export to the Third World countries.
Keywords: COCOM, scientific intelligence, electronics, Bulgaria, USA, Japan, India
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