The main economic miracle of the twentieth century - industrialization in the USSR
The tasks outlined in the May 2018 presidential decree ("On national goals and strategic objectives for the development of the Russian Federation until 2024") boil down to ensuring an economic breakthrough and overcoming Russia's lagging behind many other countries of the world, reducing its role in the world economy. And in this, Russia should rely on world experience in solving similar problems. In the history of the twentieth century, there are many things that have been called economic miracles. There was a Japanese miracle, a German one, a South Korean miracle. The accelerated development of the manufacturing industry was at the heart of the economic miracle everywhere.
However, we sometimes forget that the main economic miracle of the 20th century is industrialization in the USSR. We have a lot to learn from ourselves. The most valuable experience lies underfoot.
2019 marks 90 years since the start of industrialization. Most historians consider the decision of the XVI Conference of the CPSU (b) in April 1929 to be the point of its beginning.
Let me remind you of the main milestones in Soviet socioeconomic history. War communism became its first stage. Since 1921, the New Economic Policy (NEP) began, and industrialization came to replace it. There is no single point of view on the question of the time of completion of industrialization. Some believe that this happened on June 22, 1941, when Hitler attacked our country. Others believe that it continued into the first post-war decade. With the coming to power of N. S. Khrushchev and especially after the XX Congress of the CPSU (1956), industrialization ended.
In this article I want to outline what can be called preparatory events that preceded the decisions of the 16th Party Conference in 1929. The NEP of the 1920s was a time of respite for the country. The position of the state in the economy was weakened, commodity-money relations gained wide scope, the private capitalist structure began to revive, which posed a threat to the political power of the Bolsheviks.
Added to this were external threats from Russia's former allies in the Entente. Firstly, the Soviet Union was in a trade and economic blockade by Western European countries and the United States. Secondly, there was a threat of military intervention. Several times the country was in the balance of a military invasion.
The West issued a series of impossible ultimatums to the Soviet Union. Among them - to recognize the debts of the tsarist and provisional governments. The amount of debts was about 18.5 billion gold. rubles. In January 1918, the Bolsheviks issued a decree announcing the refusal of the new government from these debts. Other requirements are to return the nationalized property to foreign owners or to pay compensation for it. Another demand for the USSR was the abandonment of the monopoly of foreign trade.
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For all these positions, the West received a categorical refusal from the Soviet state, which was announced at the Genoa Economic Conference in 1922. However, the West continued to put pressure on the Soviet Union with the help of sanctions, as it is doing now with respect to the Russian Federation. All this prompted the Soviet leadership to think about the need to create a self-sufficient economy. An economy that would not depend on either imports or exports, depriving the West of the opportunity to use trade and economic sanctions against our country.
The threat of war made people think about strengthening their defenses. The country's military industry was weak. In addition, party and state leaders remembered the lesson taught by the First World War. Russia turned out to be ill-prepared for it, many types of weapons, ammunition, military equipment had to be purchased from the allies. There were long delays in deliveries, often the conclusion of contracts was hedged with conditions of a political and military nature. In the 1920s, the situation got worse, the former allies turned into enemies.
And in the mid-1920s, the word "industrialization" appeared in the lexicon of Soviet leaders. At first, an analogy was drawn with what the European states experienced in the 18th-19th centuries, turning from agrarian to industrial countries. The Industrial Revolution in England was most often recalled, but the Bolsheviks could not literally borrow the English experience.
First, the English industrial revolution was carried out at the expense of gigantic capital received from the plunder of the colonies. This was ruled out for the USSR. Secondly, the Soviet Union did not have those nearly a hundred years during which Britain carried out its industrialization. “We are 50-100 years behind the advanced countries. We must make good this distance in ten years. Either we do it, or they will crush us … - Stalin said in his speech at the First All-Union Conference of Socialist Industry Workers on February 4, 1931.
To many in the Kremlin, industrialization seemed like a pipe dream. One of the main ideologues of the party, Nikolai Bukharin, protested against industrialization, in particular, advocating the continuation of the NEP. He relied on the magical power of commodity-money relations and the market, which would first create a light industry, and when sufficient capital accumulates in it, proceed to the creation of a heavy industry. According to Bukharin's version, industrialization could take a century, and the intervention could begin at any moment.
There were also radicals in the Kremlin. Trotsky advocated an ultra-high rate of industrialization. His idea of a superfast industrialization was combined with the idea of a permanent revolution, which can only be global. Trotsky relied on quotations from Marx and Lenin, while Stalin dared to put forward the thesis about the possibility of the victory of socialism in one separate country. This thesis contradicted the postulates of Marxism-Leninism about the world revolution, but it prepared the ideological ground for industrialization.
Omitting the details of heated discussions about industrialization (its feasibility, sources, rates, algorithms, external conditions), which were conducted in the Central Committee of the CPSU (b), the Council of People's Commissars, the Council of Labor and Defense (STO), the State Planning Commission under the STO and other organizations, I will say that by the beginning of 1928 all discussions were over. No, the discussion of technical issues continued - the discussions on fundamental political and ideological issues ended. In order to move from discussions to business, Stalin had to liquidate - not in the physical, but in the organizational sense - the internal party groups that held extreme positions on industrialization: the "Left Opposition" (Trotsky, Zinoviev, Kamenev, Rakovsky, Radek, Preobrazhensky, etc..), "Workers' opposition" (Shlyapnikov, Kollontai, etc.), "new opposition" (Bukharin, Tomsky,Rykov, etc.). Without ideological and political consolidation in the highest party and state leadership, it was unthinkable to launch industrialization.
The most active opponent in the person of Trotsky had to first be removed from all posts (1927), then expelled from the USSR (1929). After that, by the way, Stalin took a more "leftist" position on the issue of industrialization (higher rates in a short time).
Now about some of the official events that were directly related to industrialization.
December 1925 - XIV Congress of the CPSU (b). It was the first time the word "industrialization" was heard from a high rostrum. A general decision was made on the need to transform the USSR from an agrarian country into an industrial one.
December 1927 - XV Congress of the CPSU (b). On it they finally put an end to all types of opposition. It was announced that preparations for industrialization were beginning on the basis of five-year plans for the development of the national economy of the USSR. Directives were adopted for drawing up the first five-year plan for the development of the national economy of the USSR. It was pointed out that industrialization should be carried out on the basis of "intense plans", but not at an ultra-high rate, as called for by Trotsky.
April 1929 - XVI Conference of the CPSU (b). It approved the draft of the first five-year plan, developed on the basis of the Directives of the XV Congress of the CPSU (b). The plan was calculated for the period from October 1, 1928 to October 1, 1933 (then the financial year began on October 1). However, the procedure for approving the five-year plan did not end there, it still required its approval by the All-Union Congress of Soviets.
May 1929 - V All-Union Congress of Soviets. The congress heard and discussed the report on the work of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR and fully approved the government's policy. The congress adopted the first five-year plan for the development of the national economy, at the congress the whole country sounded: "the first five-year plan of industrialization."
So, the start of industrialization can be counted either from October 1, 1928, when the first five-year plan actually started, or from April-May 1929, when the five-year plan went through the procedure for its approval by the highest party and state authorities. Both at the XVI Conference of the CPSU (B) and at the V All-Union Congress of Soviets, two main goals of industrialization were clearly formulated:
- achieving full economic independence of the state by creating a self-sufficient economy (not dependent on exports / imports);
- creation of the material and technical base of a powerful defense industry, ensuring the military security of the state.
And the main means of achieving the set goals was called the mobilization of all types of resources - material, financial, human, scientific and technical. That is, economic mobilization. About the methods and forms of Soviet industrialization, about its mistakes and achievements, about its concrete results - in our next articles.
Continuation: "On the sources of financing for Soviet industrialization."
VALENTIN KATASONOV