THE YEARS OF PROGRESS

By R. W. Davies

THE INDUSTRIALISATION OF SOVIET RUSSIA 1:

THE SOCIALIST OFFENSIVE: THE COLLECTIVISATION
OF SOVIET AGRICULTURE, 1929–1930
THE INDUSTRIALISATION OF SOVIET RUSSIA 2:
THE SOVIET COLLECTIVE FARM, 1929–1930
THE INDUSTRIALISATION OF SOVIET RUSSIA 3:
THE SOVIET ECONOMY IN TURMOIL, 1929–1930
THE INDUSTRIALISATION OF SOVIET RUSSIA 4: CRISIS
AND PROGRESS IN THE SOVIET ECONOMY, 1931–1933
THE INDUSTRIALISATION OF SOVIET RUSSIA 5:
THE YEARS OF HUNGER: SOVIET AGRICULTURE,
1931–1933 (with Stephen G. Wheatcroft )
THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE SOVIET BUDGETARY
SYSTEM
FOUNDATIONS OF A PLANNED ECONOMY, 1926–1929,
VOL. 1 (with E. H. Carr)
SOVIET HISTORY IN THE GORBACHEV REVOLUTION
SOVIET HISTORY IN THE YELTSIN ERA
SOVIET ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT FROM LENIN TO
KHRUSHCHEV

By Stephen G. Wheatcroft
CHALLENGING TRADITIONAL VIEWS OF RUSSIAN
HISTORY (editor)
THE ECONOMIC TRANSFORMATION OF THE SOVIET
UNION, 1913–1945 (editor with R. W. Davies and Mark Harrison)

By Oleg Khlevnyuk
THE STALIN–KAGANOVICH CORRESPONDENCE,
1931–1936 (with R.W. Davies, E. A. Rees and others)
THE HISTORY OF THE GULAG FROM
COLLECTIVIZATION TO THE GREAT TERROR
MASTER OF THE HOUSE: STALIN AND HIS INNER
CIRCLE
THE INDUSTRIALISATION OF SOVIET RUSSIA 6

THE YEARS OF
PROGRESS:
THE SOVIET ECONOMY,
1934–1936

R. W. DAVIES
Emeritus Professor of Soviet Economic Studies, University of Birmingham
with the participation of
OLEG V. KHLEVNYUK
Senior Research Fellow at State Archive of the Russian Federation
and
STEPHEN G. WHEATCROFT
Professor, Nazarbayev University,
Professorial Fellow, Melbourne University
© R. W. Davies, Oleg Khlevnyuk and Stephen G. Wheatcroft 2014

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 In fond memory of

FRANCES REBECCA DAVIES

(1931–2011)
This page intentionally left blank
 CONTENTS

List of Tables xi
Preface xiv

1 THE XVII PARTY CONGRESS AND THE SECOND

FIVE-YEAR PLAN 1
(A) The Background 1
(B) The Congress Proceedings and the Five-year Plan 4

2 1934: A YEAR OF RELAXATION:

THE POLITICAL BACKGROUND 15

3 THE ECONOMY IN 1934 38

(A) The 1934 Plan 38
(B) The First Six Months 45
(i) Industry and investment 45
(ii) Internal trade 51
(iii) Finance 53
(iv) Agriculture 56
(C) The Second Six Months 58
(i) Financial and trade crisis 58
(ii) Preliminary moves towards the abolition
of rationing 63
(iii) Agriculture 66
(D) The Outcome 68
(i) The conference on heavy industry.
September 1934 and its aftermath 68
(ii) Industrial production 73
(iii) Investment 76
(iv) The defence sector 76
(v) The Gulag economy 78
(vi) The railways 81
(vii) Agriculture 82

vii
viii Contents
4 1935: THE GROWING THREAT OF WAR 90

5 THE 1935 PLAN AND THE ABOLITION OF BREAD

RATIONING 114
(A) The Initial Stage of Preparing the 1935 Plan,
July–August 1934 114
(B) The Decision to End Bread Rationing 121
(C) The Adoption of the 1935 Plan 130

6 ‘CONTINUOUS ADVANCE’: JANUARY–SEPTEMBER 1935 136

(A) Industrial Production 136
(B) Investment 139
(C) Internal Trade Following the Abolition of Bread
Rationing 142
(D) Finance and Credit 150
(E) Agriculture 153
(F ) The Push to Further Expansion 156

7 ‘ADVANCING TO ABUNDANCE’, SEPTEMBER–

DECEMBER 1935 160
(A) The Launching of the Stakhanov Movement 160
(i) The background 160
(ii) The Stakhanov ‘leap forward’ 164
(iii) Stakhanovism and the campaign
against ‘sabotage’ 169
(B) The End of Food Rationing, October 1, 1935 173
(C) The October–December Economic Plan and
its Outcome 176
(i) The quarterly plan 176
(ii) Industrial production and costs in practice 178
(iii) Capital investment 182
(iv) Internal trade after the abolition of all food
rationing 185
(v) Finance and credit 188

8 1935 IN RETROSPECT 193

(A) Capital Investment 193
(B) Industrial Production 196
(C) Armaments Production 203
 Contents ix
(D) The Role of the Gulag 211
(E) The Triumph of the Railways 214
(F ) Internal Trade 219
(i) Retail trade and the rise of the market 219
(ii) Reform of the trade network 227
(G) Foreign Trade and the Balance of Payments 232
(i) Foreign trade 232
(ii) The balance of payments 235
(H) Labour and Labour Productivity 237
( I ) Costs and Prices 240
( J ) The State Budget 245
(K) The Attempts at Financial Reform 248
(L) The Advance of Agriculture 252
(i) The continued spread of collectivisation 252
(ii) The rapid growth of agriculture 253

9 THE AMBITIOUS 1936 PLAN 264

(A) Stalin Overrules Molotov: The July 1935
Directives 264
(B) The Adoption of the Plan, December 1935–
January 1936 268

10 THE POLITICAL CONTEXT OF ECONOMIC

CHANGE, 1936 275

11 1936: ‘THE STAKHANOVITE YEAR’ 296

(A) The Advance Accelerates, January–June 1936 296
(B) Stakhanovism and the Economy, January–August
1936: The Campaign against Sabotage
Temporarily Withdrawn 303
(C) The Council of Narkomtyazhprom,
June 25–29, 1936 305
(D) Mild Deceleration, July–December 1936 310
(E) The Failure of the 1936 Harvest 316

12 THE SUCCESSFUL OUTCOME OF 1936 321

(A) Industrial Production 321
(B) The Crisis in the Coal Industry 324
(C) The Armaments Industry 326
(D) The Capital Investment Campaign 331
x Contents
(E) Expansion of the Gulag 341
(F ) Internal Trade and Consumption 346
(G) Foreign Trade 351
(H) Labour and Labour Productivity 353
(I) Costs and Finance 355
( J) The Agricultural Crisis and its Solution 359

Appendix A 370
Appendix B 375

CONCLUSIONS 384

Tables 397
Glossary of Terms and Abbreviations used in Text 437

Bibliography 449
Name Index 461
Subject Index 467
 LIST OF TABLES

1 Number of workers and gross production by

industry, 1933 and 1937 397
2 Industrial production and employment, 1928, 1932–40 399
3 Production of capital goods in physical terms 400
4 Production of aircraft, 1933–41 401
5 Production of tanks, 1933–41 402
6 Light industry 403
(a) Production of industrial consumer goods in
physical terms, 1928, 1932–40 403
(b) Number of manual workers employed in
light industry, 1933 and 1937 404
7 Production of major food items in physical terms,
1928, 1932–40 405
8A Capital investment, 1933–37 406
8B Capital investment, 1933–37 407
9 Capital investment in selected branches of
heavy industry, 1933–37 408
10 Capital investment and increase in capital stock,
1933–37 409
11 Housing: Capital investment and area brought into
operation, 1933–37 409
12 Investment and construction costs, 1933–37 410
(a) Index of investment costs at current prices 410
(b) Index of costs of ‘pure building’ by type
of expenditure 410
13 The Powell index of Soviet construction, 1928–40 411
14 Increase in investment as compared with
previous year, 1934–36 411
15 Main changes in the distribution of investment,
1935–36 412
(a) The economy as a whole 412
(b) Narkomtyazhprom (excluding defence
industries) 413
16 The capital investment plan for 1936: the
rival estimates 414

xi
xii List of Tables
17 Machine building 415
(a) Number of products of the machine-building
industry, 1913, 1932, 1937 and 1947 415
(b) Capital investment in machine building by
industry served, 1933–39 416
(c) Capital investment in machine building during
first and second five-year plan (October 1,
1928 – December 31, 1932 and 1933–37) 417
(d) Moorsteen on civilian machine-building
production 417
(e) Production of metal-cutting machine tools
in physical terms by type of machine tool 418
18 Employed population, 1928, 1932–36 419
(a) Number of employed persons (manual and
office workers) 419
(b) Average annual wage in current prices 419
19 Internal trade 420
(a) Number of urban and rural trading units,
1934–39 420
(b) Number of trading units by type of
organisation, 1934–39 420
(c) Retail trade turnover, 1932–38 421
20 Foreign trade 422
(a) Exports, 1933–40 422
(b) Imports, 1933–40 424
(c) Production and import of certain commodities,
1932 and 1937 425
(d) Imports by type of commodity,1932–38 426
(e) Exports and imports, 1913–40 427
21 Currency in circulation, 1929–37 428
22 State budget: plan and fulfilment, 1933–40 428
23 Prices 429
(a) Retail price index, 1932–37 429
(b) Change in transfer prices in Narkomtyazhprom,
April 1, 1936 430
(c) Increase in prices paid by industry, 1932–37 431
24 The Gulag economy 432
(a) Number of prisoners in camps and colonies,
1934–40 432
(b) Number of special settlers, 1934–40 432
 List of Tables xiii
25 Agricultural operations 432
(a) Winter sowings, 1933–35 432
(b) Spring sowings, 1933–36 433
(c) Harvested area threshed, 1931–36 433
26 Grain collections, 1933/34–1936/37 433
27 State grain stocks, 1930–41 434
28 Number and percentage of collectivised
households, 1933–39 435
29 Machine-tractor stations and kolkhoz agriculture,
1933–39 435
30 Agricultural crops apart from grain, 1933–37 436
31 Number of cattle by social sector, 1928, 1934–38 436
 PREFACE

The final two volumes in this series, volumes 6 and 7, deal with eco-
nomic developments between 1934 and 1939. This was the period in
which the high level of investment during the first five-year plan was
brought to fruition. The Soviet Union was transformed into a major
industrial power. The foundations were laid for Soviet victory in the
second world war and its emergence as one of the two major world
powers after the war. In the years covered by these volumes basic
industries – coal, oil and iron and steel – expanded at a particularly rapid
rate, and the production of high-quality steel more than quadrupled.
Non-ferrous metal industries were established, including rare metals
previously not produced in the USSR. Simultaneously the production of
a great variety of engineering products greatly expanded. The machine-
tool industry hardly existed before the first world war, but by 1932 it
produced some 20,000 machine tools, and by the eve of the second
world war some 58,000, including over 2,000 automatics and semi-
automatics which had not been produced at all in 1932 (see Table 17(e)).
This was still not yet a fully-industrialised economy. On the eve of
the second world war it still depended on the import of a high pro-
portion of non-ferrous metals (see Table 20 (c)) and sophisticated
machine tools. But Soviet industry provided the basis for the extraor-
dinarily rapid development of the defence industry. Investment in
armaments expanded at a moderate pace in 1934 and 1935, but
from 1936 onwards it increased far more rapidly than investment as
a whole: (measured in current prices)

1934 1935 1936 1937A 1937B 1938 1939

All investment (annual 30.4 –15.4 30.0 –9.3 –13.0 8.6 4.8
percentage increase)
Investment in armaments 26.4 18.9 62.1 50.0 68.6 50.0 20.3
industries (annual
percentage increase)
Investment in armaments 3.2 3.2 4.2 6.9 8.9 12.6 14.8
industries as per cent of
all investment
Source: see Table 8 in vol. 6 and equivalent table in vol. 7. The different methods of
calculation in 1934–1937A and in 1937B–1939 will be discussed in vol. 7.

xiv
 Preface xv
The production of armaments increased at a similar rate. It
amounted to 3.5 per cent of all gross industrial production in 1932,
and 4.5 per cent in 1936; and by 1939 had increased to 12.9
per cent. Particularly full data for 1940, including arms production
by civilian industry and deducting civilian production by the arma-
ments industry, show that in that year armaments constituted 17.4
per cent of all gross industrial production.1 The data of the state
budget for all kinds of defence expenditure, including the mainte-
nance of the army and navy, showed a similar progression, Defence
outlays increased from 9.7 per cent of state budgetary expenditure
in 1934 to 16.1 per cent in 1936, 25.6 per cent in 1939 and 32.6
per cent in 1940.2
Although there is thus an important continuity between 1934–36
and 1937–39 – the extraordinarily rapid increase in defence expend-
iture in face of the fascist threat – the two periods covered by vols. 6
and 7 were substantially different. The years covered by the present
volume were a time of relative moderation. Stalin had established his
unchallengeable authority in the Politburo, but the political regime
was relatively relaxed and considerable experimentation took place in
the economy. As a result of the increasing availability of newly-
constructed plant, and the partial maturation of the work force, these
were years of intensive industrial development, in which the rapid
industrial growth depended on increasing productivity of labour
rather than the growth of the number employed. Although the threat
of war looming over the economy led to an expansion of military
expenditure, it proved possible to increase greatly the production of
consumer goods and to expand the social services, resulting in a con-
siderable improvement of the standard of living. This was greatly
assisted by the circumstance that all branches of agriculture began to
recover from the disasters of the previous four years. A threatening
famine, due to the very poor harvest of 1936, was prevented owing to
the availability of large grain stocks. The emigré Russian economist
Naum Jasny correctly designated 1934–36 as ‘the three “good” years’.
Politically, a sharp turn towards increased repression was marked
by the Zinoviev–Kamenev trial of August 1936 and the replacement
in September of Yagoda by Yezhov as People’s Commissar of
Internal Affairs. This was the prelude to the new situation which will
be dealt with in volume 7. In 1937 and 1938 the vast majority of the
1
RGAE, 4372/94/1461, 114, cited in Simonov (1996), 154.
2
See Harrison and Davies (1997), 372.
xvi Preface
existing generations of economic managers were dismissed and most
of them were executed, and mass repression was carried out on an
unprecedented scale. The years 1937 to 1939, to be dealt with in
volume 7, were a time of tragic conformity.
Throughout these two volumes industrial production is cited in
the official figures at 1926/27 prices. These are by far the most con-
venient data in which to discuss the changes in industrial develop-
ment. But the reader should bear in mind that they give an especially
favourable view of Soviet growth.3 Alternative estimates by Western
economists4 are as follows for the growth between 1932 and 1937
(1932=100, all in 1928 or 1926/27 prices, which give a higher figure
than measurement in 1937 prices):

Official Soviet index 221

Seton 210
Hodgman 216
Nutter 186

I am exceedingly grateful to Oleg Khlevnyuk, who provided material

and analysis on the Gulag and related matters, and to Stephen
Wheatcroft, who performed the same role in relation to agriculture;
and to both of them for providing information and comments on
many aspects of Soviet development.
Special thanks also goes to Michael Berry, whose great knowledge
of the subject enabled him to collect a vast amount of newspaper
and other material when my disability made it impossible for me to
work in libraries, and who undertook the difficult task of preparing
the indexes.
I am also most grateful to other colleagues who assisted me with
information and advice, including Julian Cooper, Paul Gregory,
Mark Harrison (whose assistance in preparing the manuscript for
publication was particularly valuable), Melanie Ilić, Christopher
Joyce and Andrei Markevich (who both collected material for me in
the Russian archives), Viktor Kondrashin, Judith Pallot, Lewis
Siegelbaum, Arfon Rees, Mark Tauger and the late Derek Watson.
Valuable assistance was provided by Russian archivists, including
Elena Tyurina, the director of RGAE, Lyudmilla Kosheleva and
Larissa Rogovaya; and by Philip Hillyer.
3
The reasons are explained in Davies, Harrison and Wheatcroft, eds. (1994),
30–2 and 138–41.
4
See ibid. 292–3.
 CHAPTER ONE

THE XVII PARTY CONGRESS AND

THE SECOND FIVE-YEAR PLAN

(A) THE BACKGROUND

The XVII party congress met in Moscow from January 26 to

February 10, 1934. This was the end, or almost the end, of three
years of severe economic and political crisis and disastrous famine,
associated with rapid industrialisation; this crisis is discussed in
volumes 4 and 5 of the present work. Though famine conditions
continued in certain areas in the first six months of 1934 (see vol. 5,
pp. 266–7, 411–12), the reasonable harvest of 1933, and the more
moderate economic policies pursued in industry and elsewhere since
the summer of 1932, brought to an end the worst of the famine. The
currency was stabilised, and from the spring of 1933 industry began
to develop more rapidly.
The second five-year plan began to be drawn up in a more or less
realistic form at the beginning of 1933.The crucial problem was of
course to determine a feasible rate of growth of industrial produc-
tion and capital investment. Following the abandonment of the
impossibly high targets of 1930–31, the central committee plenum
of January 1933 had agreed that in 1933–37 the average annual rate
of growth of industrial production should be planned at 13–14 per
cent as compared with 21–22 per cent in the first five-year plan (see
vol. 4, p. 332). No figure was included for capital investment. In fur-
ther discussions in the first months of 1933, contradictory proposals
about investment were put forward. The various commissariats
sought as usual to increase the amount of investment they received,
but on February 20, 1933, Mezhlauk on behalf of Gosplan sent a
warning report to Stalin and Molotov pointing out that extra invest-
ment would require the allocation of additional food and other
resources. The Politburo concurred with his objections, and on
March 2, 1933, resolved in relation to the 1934 plan:

In view of the attempts of certain People’s Commissariats to fix the

volume of capital investment at a higher level than that which

1
2 The XVII Party Congress and the Second Five-year Plan
corresponds to the total sum of 18,000 million rubles available for
capital investment [in 1933], as was fixed by the January plenum of
the central committee and the central control commission, the
Politburo states that such attempts are unconditionally inadmissible.1

Encouraged by this prudent decision, the Mezhlauk commission

resolved that the annual increase in production in 1933–37 should
be limited to 13 per cent and that the plan for pig-iron production in
1937 should be reduced from 18 to 15 million tons.2 On May 28,
1933, Kuibyshev and Mezhlauk sent a letter to Stalin defending the
figure of 15 million tons, and the associated figures for crude and
rolled steel. Kuibyshev argued that a higher figure would involve
increased investment in Narkomtyazhprom and would increase its
annual growth of production to 16 per cent a year, and continued:

As the smelting of 15.2 million tons of pig iron and 11.6 million tons
of rolled steel will satisfy other branches at the agreed rate of growth,
and is sufficiently tense from the point of view of the new equipment
required, especially for crude and rolled steel, Gosplan requests per-
mission to carry out further work on the five-year plan on the basis
of this limit.3

No reply to this letter has been traced, and the discussions in June
and July 1933 in Gosplan continued to be based on the higher figure
of 18 million tons of pig iron in 1937.4 It was this figure which was
included in the directives to the XVII congress six months later.
Gosplan continued, however, to argue for a lower rate of invest-
ment. At the end of June 1933 it proposed that investment in 1933–37
should amount to a mere 97,000 million rubles as compared with the
135,000 requested by the commissariats.5 This was the lowest figure
to emerge in the discussion, and assumed that annual investment dur-
ing the five years would be only slightly higher than in 1933. But after
further discussion within Gosplan, the proposed figure was increased
to 120,000 million rubles.6 At a Gosplan meeting chaired by Kuibyshev

1
RGASPI, 17/3/917, 7.
2
RGAE, 4372/92/14, 62–63.
3
RGAE, 4372/92/13, 98–103.
4
RGAE, 4372/92/18, 1–2.
5
RGAE, 4372/92/17, 366.
6
RGAE, 4372/92/17, 366.
 The Background 3
on July 19, 1933, G. Smirnov, responsible for capital investment
within Gosplan, sought to reduce it to 110,000 million, on the grounds
that sufficient resources were not available to back up the higher
figure.7 On July 26 a further Gosplan meeting adopted a ‘final’
compromise figure of 112,750 million rubles.8
It eventually emerged that this was by no means a final figure. On
November 15, the Politburo decided to convene the XVII congress
on January 15, 1934 (it eventually met on January 26). This meant
that a decision about production and investment in the five-year plan
could no longer be postponed. The Politburo discussion on Molotov’s
and Kuibyshev’s reports to the congress was held on December 20,
and considered a plan which was greatly increased as compared with
the previous proposals. It included an annual growth of industrial
production by over 18 per cent as compared with the previous
13–14 per cent, and a volume of capital investment in 1933–37
amounting to 133,000 million rubles as compared with 112,750.9
This decision was evidently taken by senior political leaders with-
out consultation with the key departments within Gosplan. On
December 20, the day on which the Politburo met, Lauer, the
respected long-established head of the metals department of
Gosplan, sent an angry letter to Kuibyshev, Mezhlauk and
Petropavlovskii (the secretary of the Gosplan party cell):

I feel it necessary to draw your attention to the fact that work in

Gosplan on finalising the second five-year plan has been organised in
a completely unsatisfactory way, and will not enable the plans to be
of good quality. We received an order to check the five-year plan
tables and to return them with corrections in the course of one day.
Some people received additional information from comrade Gaister
about the changes you have made in the initial plan. But these
changes are so serious that they affect all branches of the economy,
and it is impossible simply to correct the tables, it is necessary to
undertake a new interconnection of every sector (every branch) with
the economy as a whole. As far as I know, the rates of growth of
industrial production have been sharply changed (18 instead of
14 %), the relation of Group A and Group B has been changed,
and capital investment in the final year has been sharply increased

7
RGAE, 4372/92/17, 367, 443–442.
8
RGAE, 4372/92/18, 76–78, 85.
9
RGASPI, 558/1/3103.
4 The XVII Party Congress and the Second Five-year Plan
(34,000 million instead of 26,000 million). The output of machine-
building has been sharply increased. This requires a new balance of
building materials, a new metal balance, and different requirements
of fuel and power.

After this diatribe, Lauer rather tamely requested five or six days
rather than one day to do the job.10 Not surprisingly, the work took
much longer. As late as December 31, Gaister reported additional
changes to Stalin and the central committee, further complicating
the work of the Gosplan staff. These included increases proposed by
Stalin himself in the production of consumer goods by heavy indus-
try and investment in the light and food industries (from 7,700 to
14,500 million rubles), and he also proposed an increase in the supply
of locomotives and wagons to the railways.11
It was the more ambitious version of the plan which was submit-
ted to the congress a month later. Industrial production would
increase by 19 per cent a year, and investment in the five years would
amount to 133.4 thousand million rubles.

(B) THE CONGRESS PROCEEDINGS AND

THE FIVE-YEAR PLAN

The Politburo decided to present the congress to the public as a

demonstration of the triumph of the Soviet system and of the eco-
nomic policies of the past few years. On the first day of the congress,
January 26, the main article on the front page of Pravda was headed
‘The Congress of Victors’, and the congress was known by this name
throughout the Stalin period.
According to the party Statute, congresses were supposed to meet
annually. But there had already been a two-year gap between the
XIV congress (December 1925) and the XV congress (December
1927), and a two-and-a-half-year gap between the XV congress and
the XVI congress, which convened in June–July 1930. Then the
XVII congress was convened three-and-a-half years after the XVI
congress. These delays were never explained.
The XVII congress was attended by 1,227 voting and 739 consul-
tative delegates. The fate of most of the delegates was anything but
10
GARF, 5446/22/24, 114, 114ob.
11
GARF, 5446/22/27, 230–234.
 The Congress Proceedings and the Five-year Plan 5
victorious. A special commission reported at the beginning of 1956
that 1,103 of the total of 1,966 delegates had been arrested, mainly
in 1937–38, and 848 of these had been executed. And of the 139 full
and candidate members of the central committee elected at the
congress, 101 were executed and five committed suicide.12
The publication of this tragic information in 1956 was used to
suggest that the party and its leading members were the main victims
of the repressions; the full story (to be discussed in vol. 7) was revealed
only after the fall of the Soviet Union. These revelations also gave
rise to the widespread notion that an attempt was made at the con-
gress to replace Stalin as general secretary of the party.13 Many ver-
sions of this notion appeared at the time and later, based on rumour
rather than hard evidence. The least implausible account was that
during the congress some party leaders discussed the possibility of
replacing Stalin by S. M. Kirov, but Kirov refused. According to this
account, during the election of the central committee at the congress
some 270–300 votes were cast against Stalin, who ordered the
destruction of these voting slips. This account was used to claim that
Kirov’s murder in December 1934 and the consequent execution of
many of the congress delegates were carried out on Stalin’s direct
orders.14 Many years after the event the papers of the election com-
mission of the congress were examined and there was no evidence
that more than three delegates voted against Stalin. However, 166
slips of the voting delegates at the congress were absent. They may
have been destroyed, or the delegates may actually have abstained
from voting.15 The other anomaly in the voting at the time of the con-
gress was that no mention was made of Stalin’s election to the post of
general secretary. After the XVI congress in 1930, the relevant central
committee resolution included as a separate item ‘the plenum con-
firmed cde. Stalin as general secretary of the party’. The new central
committee at the XVII congress was merely reported to have elected
a secretariat of four persons, listed in the following order: Stalin, L. M.
Kaganovich, Kirov (who remained secretary of the Leningrad
12
Reabilitatsiya, i (2000), 317, 411.
13
Reabilitatsiya, ii (2003), 372–4.
14
This version appeared in Mikoyan’s memoirs (Mikoyan (1999), 592–3) at a time
when it had already been disproved.
15
Izvestiya TsK, 7, 1989, 114–21. Lenoe (2010), 610, points out that 134 voting
delegates did not return ballots at the XVI and 43 at the XV Congresses, and sug-
gests that the particularly high failure to return ballots in 1934 may have been due
to a flu epidemic.
6 The XVII Party Congress and the Second Five-year Plan
regional party committee) and A. A. Zhdanov (who relinquished his
post as secretary of the Gor’kii regional party committee).16
In spite of these anomalies, there is little doubt that the more
extreme suggestions of a plot against Stalin were a legend, and that
the effect of the congress as a whole was to strengthen Stalin’s posi-
tion in the party, to remove elements of democracy and collective
leadership within the party, and to increase the centralisation of
political power. Kaganovich’s report ‘Organisational Questions’,
delivered on February 6, announced important changes in the party
Statute. The congress was now to meet only once in three years
(though in practice its mext meeting was not held for another five
years!). The central control commission, a joint agency with Rabkrin,
which had the same nominal status as the central committee, was
now replaced by a commission of party control, attached to the cen-
tral committee and headed by a central committee secretary, and
Rabkrin was abolished.17 Stalin, whose report on the work of the
central committee was the first item on the agenda, declared at the
end of the session that the discussion had shown ‘the complete unity of
views of the party leaders’ and that there had been ‘no disagreements at all
with the report’, and brazenly concluded to immense applause:

The question arises whether after this there is any need for a reply to the discus-
sion? I think there is no such need. Allow me then not to reply to the discussion.18

However, in spite of this enthusiastic presentation of Soviet suc-

cess, some speeches at the congress implicitly criticised aspects of
previous policy by attributing them to excesses of the local authori-
ties, though throughout the congress no direct or indirect reference
was made to the famine. P. P. Postyshev, then second secretary of the
Ukrainian party, for example, condemned the mass repressions in
the countryside in the following terms:

It must be stated firmly and specifically that, in these years of sudden

change, repressions were the main method of ‘leadership’ of many
Ukrainian party organisations ... And the enemy certainly used this
method of ‘leadership’, and on a very considerable scale, to stir up

16
P, July 14, 1930, February 11, 1934.
17
XVII s”ezd (1934), 525–66.
18
XVII s”ezd (1934), 269.
 The Congress Proceedings and the Five-year Plan 7
some groups of collective farmers and individual peasants against
collectivisation, and against the party and Soviet power.19

These remarks indicate one of the major reasons for the adoption of
a more moderate policy. In previous years the party had been at odds
with a considerable section of the population, and it now sought to
reduce social tension and limit the repressive policy.
External factors were also a reason for displaying moderation
and presenting the USSR as democratic. The seizure of power by
Hitler, and the threat from Japan, led the USSR to seek to draw
closer to France and its allies. A few weeks before the party congress
the Politburo decided to join the League of Nations and seek a
regional agreement to mutual defence against aggression (see vol. 4,
pp. 358–61). At the congress Stalin referred to the substantial
improvement in relations between the USSR, France and Poland,
and the establishment of normal relations with the USA, while
insisting that the USSR ‘was oriented in the past and is oriented at
present on the USSR and the USSR alone’.20
The restoration of peace in the party was an important element
in party policy. Since the previous spring a number of members of
former oppositions had been restored to some degree of favour at
the price of fully capitulating to Stalin (see vol. 4, pp. 363–4). Shortly
before the congress, on December 12, 1933, the Politburo agreed
that Zinoviev and Kamenev should be offered the opportunity to
join the party through a Moscow district, and on December 20 it
agreed that Preobrazhensky should be readmitted to the party.21
At the congress a number of prominent former members of oppo-
sitions repudiated their earlier views and declared their loyalty to
Stalin and his policies. A distinguishing feature of most of these
speeches was that they did not simply declare their support for party
policy but offered quite rational explanations of their change of
mind. This is very different from the political trials of 1936–38,
where some of the same people presented themselves as traitors to
the party and hirelings of capitalism. On the third day of the con-
gress Lominadze and Bukharin spoke from the left and the right
respectively. Lominadze explained that the ‘leftist’ views that he had
advocated for over two-and-a-half years on China, on the

19
XVII s”ezd (1934), 67.
20
XVII s”ezd (1934), 13–14.
21
RGASPI, 17/3/936, 5, 15.
8 The XVII Party Congress and the Second Five-year Plan
inner-party regime and on peasant policy had overestimated the
strength and the danger of NEP and provided the basis for the right-
‘left’ bloc of Syrtsov and Lominadze.22 Bukharin, in a lengthy
address, described the great successes of Soviet technology, with
which his recent work in charge of research and development in
heavy industry had been concerned, and praised party policy towards
agriculture:

The great service of our party leadership and of Stalin personally is

that they precisely determined the historical moment at which the
storm attack should begin, its stages and its operational management.

He condemned forthrightly the policy and tactics of the Right oppo-

sition, of which of course he had been the most prominent member:

One of the sharpest Parthian arrows launched by the opposition,

which bordered on a crime, was accusing the party regime of the
military-feudal exploitation of the peasantry. This was one of those
poisonous slogans which could have disorganised to the maximum
those who were storming the capitalist heights, and which was
particularly dangerous in connection with the danger of war.23

The final section of his speech warned presciently and in very strong
terms of the danger presented by Germany under Hitler, ‘who is
openly calling for the destruction of our country’, and by Japan.
‘Hitler wants to drive us into Siberia, and the Japanese imperialists state
that they want to drive us out of Siberia, so that probably the entire
160 million population of our country would have to be located on
one of the blast furnaces of Magnitogorsk.’24
The most remarkable speech from a former oppositionist came
from Preobrazhensky, who had been a leading figure in the Left
opposition since 1923 and its main economic adviser. He explained
that he had not been at the congress for six or seven years and that
then he had spoken against party policy. He now condemned
Trotsky’s rejection of Socialism in One Country (on which he had

22
XVII s”ezd (1934), 118–19. For the Lominadze–Syrtsov affair see vol. 3,
pp. 411–15 and The Lost Politburo Transcripts (2008), 78–96 (Khlevniuk).
23
The Parthian Empire fought against the Romans and others; the Parthian arch-
ers fired their shots while retreating by turning back towards the advancing enemy.
24
XVII s”ezd (1934), 124–9.
 The Congress Proceedings and the Five-year Plan 9
always been ambiguous) and his own former policy of ‘primary
socialist accumulation’, which he now admitted would have broken
the alliance with the peasantry:

Collectivisation – that is the heart of the matter! Did I predict col-

lectivisation? I did not. In the form of collectivisation the party car-
ried out the very great task of transforming millions of peasant
households, and of assisting the peasant economy by flinging huge
amounts into the countryside in the form of the output of our indus-
try, of huge financial resources, and of organisational assistance from
soviet agencies and the party.25

The congress was also addressed with apologies and expressions

of loyalty by Rykov, Tomsky, Radek, Zinoviev and Kamenev. These
speeches were a demonstration both of Stalin’s unchallenged author-
ity and of the new policy of reconciliation within the party: Stalin
referred to the ‘exceptional ideological, political and organisational
cohesion of our party ranks’.26 The party saw the rehabilitation of
many leading figures who had been Stalin’s opponents as a first step
towards the gradual rehabilitation of rank-and-file former opposi-
tionists and the end of repressions and party cleansings. Kirov,
towards the end of his speech at the congress, uttered the encourag-
ing words ‘The basic difficulties are behind us.’ This statement must
have been welcomed by many delegates as presaging a time of
stability and reconciliation.27
This shift in policy was associated at the congress with the con-
solidation of the changes already undertaken in economic policy.
Two issues were strongly emphasised. First, the wider use of eco-
nomic methods of administration, and of economic incentives.
Stalin, in the section of his report dealing with trade, insisted that
‘goods are produced in the last resort not for production but for con-
sumption’, and praised the improvements in trade which had taken
place as a result of rivalry (sorevnovanie) between different trading
agencies, and the introduction of commercial trade. (‘Commercial
trade’ was the term used for state and cooperative trade at prices
higher than the prices of rationed goods or than the lower so-called
‘normal’ prices of industrial consumer goods which were informally
25
XVII s”ezd (1934), 236–9.
26
XVII s”ezd (1934), 259.
27
XVII s”ezd (1934), 259.
10 The XVII Party Congress and the Second Five-year Plan
rather than formally rationed.) He strongly criticised ‘leftist chatter’
about the introduction of direct product exchange and the abolition
of money. He argued that ‘money is an instrument of bourgeois
economics which Soviet power has taken into its own hands and
adapted to the interests of socialism’. Direct product exchange was
a matter for the distant future, and would be a result of ‘an ideally-
organised Soviet trade, which we do not have now and which we
shall not achieve quickly’.28
This general idea was developed in more specific terms by Mikoyan,
People’s Commissar for Supply. He stated that to use the police to
struggle against high prices at bazaars was ‘useless’, and that the best
way for the state to put pressure on market prices was to develop state
trade. He told the delegates that Stalin had proposed to ‘reduce prices
on the kolkhoz market by exerting pressure from state economic inter-
vention’. The growth of the ‘free sale’ of products by the state was an
important precondition for the abolition of consumer rationing:

The most fundamental improvement in supply would be to open up

the closed shops and begin to sell without ration cards ... We would
not waste so much paper, and ration cards would not be misused.

Mikoyan nevertheless admitted that closed rationed sales would con-

tinue for a long time.29 The XVII party congress made no specific
commitment about the abolition of rationing. The second five-year
plan merely cautiously stated that the great expansion of retail trade
and the trade network during the plan ‘will create in its turn all pos-
sibilities for the preparation of the abolition of the rationed issue of
goods’.30 This clearly implied that rationing would be abolished only
after the end of the plan – i.e. in 1938 or later. But although the
abolition of rationing was not proposed at the congress, such state-
ments posed the idea that it was politically necessary. These argu-
ments in favour of the abolition of rationing were repeated when the
decision was taken to abolish bread rationing as soon as ten months
after the congress.
The second issue emphasised at the congress was the rejection of
‘petty-bourgeois equalisation’, already a firm plank of party policy
since Stalin’s ‘six conditions’ speech of June 1931 (see vol. 4, pp. 71–2).
28
XVII s”ezd (1934), 26–7.
29
XVII s”ezd (1934), 180–1, 184.
30
Vtoroi (1934), i, 383; this volume was sent to press on September 1, 1934.
 The Congress Proceedings and the Five-year Plan 11
This policy was vigorously endorsed at the congress not only for indus-
try but also in relation to the kolkhozy. Stalin sharply criticised the
imposition of agricultural communes, in which all production was
socialised, explaining that ‘the present-day commune emerged on the
basis of a low level of technology and a poor supply of goods’, and
that as a result it ‘practised equalisation and paid little attention to the
everyday needs of its members’. In Stalin’s opinion, communes, ‘the
higher form of the kolkhoz movement’,‘will grow out of the devel-
oped and profitable artel’’. The artel’ put together ‘the personal day-
to-day interests of collective farmers with their social interests’, and
therefore ‘in present conditions it is the only correct form for the kolk-
hoz movement’.31 This approach provided the basis for encouraging
the development of the personal household plots (the usad’by). It
would lead in the next five years to a substantial growth of production
and was a major factor in the gradual emergence of the countryside
from the severe crisis.
Molotov in his report to the congress announced that agricultural
output would double in the second five-year plan. This decision was
based on an unjustified optimism about the prospects for rural devel-
opment. In particular, it assumed that the grain yield would increase
to 10.6 tsentners a hectare in 1937 as compared with an average
yield of 7.5 tsentners in 1928–32.32 Another major agricultural
theme at the congress was the livestock crisis. Stalin in his opening
report already produced figures frankly showing the great decline of
livestock, though he attributed the decline to kulak influence. He
assumed that the decline would be quickly overcome. One of the
draft versions of the congress resolution stated that the meat prob-
lem would be solved by the end of the five-year plan, and Stalin
wrote in the margin ‘that’s a long time’.33 In consequence this prop-
osition did not appear in the congress decision on the five-year plan,
which stated that livestock output must increase by 225 per cent in
1933–37.34
The recognition of the need to increase the standard of living
after its considerable decline in previous years, together with the
need to provide incentives for increased production, led to the

31
XVII s”ezd (1934), 29.
32
XVII s”ezd (1934), 360. The yield for 1928–32 was in fact less than 7.5 tsentners
a hectare.
33
RGASPI, 81/3/94, 14.
34
XVII s”ezd (1934), 663.
12 The XVII Party Congress and the Second Five-year Plan
decision that during the second five-year plan the production of con-
sumer goods (Group B) must increase more rapidly than the produc-
tion of means of production (Group A). This, together with the
proposed increase in agricultural production, led to optimistic plans
to increase trade turnover by two-and-a-half times and double real
wages.35 Other measures were also included which would improve
living standards – an increase in expenditure on culture and welfare,
and on housing, and the introduction of compulsory universal seven-
year education. In these ways the authorities hoped to provide incen-
tives for improving labour efficiency and increasing the level of skill
of the working population.
As we have seen, in the optimistic version of the plan presented to
the congress industrial production would grow by 19 per cent a year
in 1933–37, and investment in the five years would amount to 133,
400 million rubles. These figures were the result of a compromise.
The industrial commissariats received more investment, but also
agreed to achieve a higher rate of industrial growth. But this decision
did not suit the People’s Commissars in charge of industry; and of
course it also ran contrary to the January 1933 directives of the cen-
tral committee. The discussion continued at the congress itself. On
February 4, Ordzhonikidze made his famous intervention objecting
to delegates’ proposals to increase the plan still further, instead pro-
posing that the plans for major industries should be cut. Industrial
production as a whole should increase not by 19 but by 16.5 per cent
a year. Following this intervention, Mikoyan on behalf of the food
industry and Lyubimov on behalf of light industry also proposed
that their production plans should be reduced.36
The archives do not reveal how this decision was taken. But some
indication of what happened is given by the preliminary transcript
of the congress, which shows that the decision was taken at the last
moment. The original transcript of Lyubimov’s speech shows that it
consisted of a survey of the development of light industry during the
first five-year plan. But at the end of his speech, after his time had
elapsed and he was given an extra five minutes to speak, he hastily
and vaguely listed the changes being made to increase the light
industry plan for 1933–37.37 Similarly Pyatakov, soon to be appointed

35
XVII s”ezd (1934), 668.
36
XVII s”ezd (1934), 435–6, 439–41, 443–55.
37
RGASPI, 59/2/33, 164–192. The published official record includes many
changes.
 The Congress Proceedings and the Five-year Plan 13
first deputy commissar of Narkomtyazhprom, included a belated
reference to Ordzhonikidze’s proposal to reduce the plan for the
production of railway wagons.38 It should also be noted that in their
speeches Ordzhonikidze and Mikoyan stated that the new proposals
had been approved by the Politburo.39 As there had been no Politburo
sessions or meetings in Stalin’s office at the beginning of February, it
is likely that the decision was taken informally, probably between the
conclusion of Kuibyshev’s speech on the evening of February 3 and
Ordzhonikidze’s speech on the evening of February 4. Here an
anonymous letter from Moscow published in the émigré Menshevik
journal may well be relevant. If this is a true account, the commission
referred to must have met quite hastily:

On the eve of the congress the draft of the five-year plan … was dis-
tributed to all the delegates. But some of the directors who were pro-
moted former workers (vydvizhentsy) expressed doubts to Stalin whether
the rates could be achieved, and Stalin decided to take initiative in his
hands and convene a meeting of factory directors, at which they were
asked to state quite openly whether the proposed plan could be ful-
filled. As a result of the discussion Stalin concluded that the plan
should be reduced, particularly in view of the fact that the Soviet
government would very probably have to carry out a ‘war’ plan paral-
lel to the ‘peace’ plan. On Stalin’s proposal a commission was set up
consisting of Ordzhonikidze, Kuibyshev, Voroshilov, Pyatakov and
60 representatives of the corporations, and this re-examined all the
norms of the second five-year plan and reduced them.40

As a result of the changes made at the congress, the industrial

production target for 1937 proposed by Molotov and Kuibyshev was
reduced from 103,000 to 92,700 million rubles, and the planned
output of crude steel in 1937 from 19 to 17 million tons. The average
annual rate of growth of industry as whole was reduced from 19 to
16.5 per cent. Group B was reduced from 21.9 to 18.4 per cent, and
Group A from 15.9 to 14.5 per cent.41 But the figure for investment
was not changed.

38
RGASPI, 59/2/16, 234.
39
XVII s”ezd (1934), 435, 440.
40
SV, 4, 1934, 14.
41
RGASPI, 59/2/43, 126, 129.
14 The XVII Party Congress and the Second Five-year Plan
On the whole then, these last-minute changes were a victory for
the industrial commissariats, which were given reduced production
targets without a reduction in investment. This decision was obvi-
ously influenced both by the previous experience of the first five-year
plan, when impossibly high targets were set, and by fear of the polit-
ical damage which would result from a repetition of the failure to
reach key targets. At the session Molotov no doubt reflected the view
of Sovnarkom and Gosplan in praising the cuts as a manifestation of
‘Bolshevik caution’ – a Bolshevik virtue which had not been promi-
nent during the first five-year plan. But at the same time he warned
that the planned growth of industrial production by 16.5 per cent
a year was a lower limit which ‘must not be reduced by a single
per cent, or by one tenth of a per cent’; in particular, the 1934
plan – 19 per cent – must be achieved in full.42 Molotov’s warnings
indicated that the party leadership continued to hope and intend
that plan should be increased as soon as circumstances seemed
favourable.
Following the congress, the draft five-year plan was systematically
revised in order to include the changes made at the congress, which
naturally influenced many aspects of the plan; but the changes were
quite minor.43 The final plan was sent to the press in several volumes
in September and approved by a decree of TsIK and Sovnarkom on
November 17, 1934.44
It soon emerged that the figure for capital investment should have
been increased rather than reduced: it was not large enough to cover
all the new capacity required by the production plans (see pp. 338–40
below). It should be emphasized, however, that the five-year plan as
it emerged at the congress was nevertheless set within a relatively
more realistic – or less unrealistic – framework. The flights of fancy
which relentlessly raised to the skies the targets of the first five-year
plan were now held down. The annual rate of growth of industry
was discussed within the limits of 13 and 19 per cent; no one could
now propose a growth rate of 50 per cent. This was one of the main
achievements of the congress in economic policy.

42
XVII s”ezd (1934), 523.
43
For a comparison of the plan presented to the congress with the final version,
see Zaleski (1980), 132.
44
SZ, 1934, art. 437.
 CHAPTER TWO

1934: A YEAR OF RELAXATION:

THE POLITICAL BACKGROUND

Until the murder of Kirov on December 1, the year 1934 – with

qualifications – continued the relative moderation and relaxation
which was a prominent feature of the party congress.
With the triumph of fascism in Germany and Japan, a grave dan-
ger confronted the Soviet Union and the rest of the world. But in
1934 the immediate threat to the Soviet Union somewhat receded.
In the Far East, the belligerent Japanese war minister Araki was
replaced on January 22.1 In May, Karakhan, the Soviet deputy
People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs responsible for the Far East,
was removed from his post and despatched to Ankara. He was tradi-
tionally hostile to Japan and an ardent supporter of Chinese com-
munism.2 This marked a further increase in the authority of Litvinov
and his policy of collective security in Europe and caution in the Far
East.3 During the summer the Chinese nationalist leader Chiang-
Kai-shek sent his future ambassador on an exploratory trip to
Moscow. The positive reaction of the Soviet side paved the way for
the eventual collaboration of Chinese nationalists and communists
against Japan.4
In Europe the signing of the Polish–German non-aggression
pact in January aroused much alarm in Moscow. But Franco-Soviet
relations greatly improved. Then in June Czecho-Slovakia and
Romania recognised the USSR. In September the Soviet Union
was accepted into the League of Nations.5 A moral victory over
Nazi Germany had already been achieved with the collapse at the
beginning of the year of the prosecution of the Bulgarian com-
munist leader Dimitrov in the Reichstag Fire Trial. In July Germany,
struggling to emerge from the depression, offered a substantial

1
See Haslam (1992), 88–9.
2
See Pons and Romano, eds (2000), 123 (S. Dullin).
3
Litvinov had been made a full member of the party central committee at the
XVII congress.
4
See Slavinskii (1999), 42–3.
5
See Haslam (1984), 37–42.

15
16 1934: The Political Background
credit to the USSR for the purchase of German machinery and
other manufactures.6
Dimitrov’s triumphant return to Moscow in February soon had a
significant effect in Comintern. Dimitrov pressed the case against the
sectarianism which had characterised international communist
activities since 1928 in favour of a move towards a united front of
socialists against imperialism and fascism. In July both the French
and the Italian communists and socialists reached agreement for
common action. By the end of the year, with Stalin’s support, the
united front policy had come to predominate in Comintern.7 And
before the end of the year the French communists, previously notori-
ous for sectarianism, had moved towards the advocacy of a ‘Popular
Front’. The Popular Front, unlike the United Front, included middle
classes as well as workers and defended democratic freedoms against
fascism.8 The success of Litvinov and Dimitrov had done much to
break down Soviet isolation.
Within the Soviet Union, agriculture began to emerge from fam-
ine and industry developed rapidly. Against this background there
were many manifestations of greater relaxation. Reversing previous
austerity, the prohibition on jazz and dance music was lifted and they
soon became popular in the major cities.9 The film Veselye rebyata
( Jolly Fellows), the first of a series of popular musical comedies, was
widely shown and publicised. This was also a time of relative toler-
ance in high culture. In March Shostakovich’s grim new opera Lady
Macbeth of Mtsensk, later to be savagely condemned (see p. 289 below),
was favourably received. In April the British conductor Albert Coates
visited Moscow and performed works by Vaughan Williams as well
as classical Russian composers.10
The more relaxed atmosphere in cultural affairs was reflected in
two significant gestures towards dissident writers. In May Pilnyak,

6
This was reported to the Politburo on July 5 (RGASPI, 17/162/15, 113–14 (art.
89/72)). The credit offered was for 200 million marks. Following strenuous negotia-
tions, agreement in principle was reached in December 1934, subject to Germany
improving the list of goods it would supply (RGASPI, 17/162/17, 42, 49, dated
September 17; ibid. 88–89, dated December 5). The agreement was eventually
signed by Schacht, German Minister of Economics, and Kandelaki, Soviet trade
representative in Germany, on April 9, 1935 (DVP, xviii (1973), 280–4).
7
For these events see Carr (1980), 124–46.
8
Ibid. 195–201.
9
See, for example, Komsomol’skaya pravda, May 30, October 27, 1934.
10
Bullard (2000), 243–4.
 1934: The Political Background 17
author of the notorious short story about the death of Frunze,
implicating Stalin for his lack of judgment or malevolence, was
granted permission, together with his wife, to travel abroad for two
months.11 In July, the poet Mandel’shtam who had been arrested in
May in connection with his bitter poem about Stalin, was released
after Bukharin had appealed to Stalin. Following the release, Stalin
made his famous phone call to Pasternak reporting the news, which
was taken by Moscow intellectual circles as an indication of his
moderation.12
The climax of the cultural activities of 1934 was the First All-
Union Congress of Soviet Writers, which met in Moscow from
August 17 to September 1, and was reported in considerable detail
in Pravda, Izvestiya and other national newspapers. It was addressed
by a wide range of writers and party luminaries, from Gorky to
Babel and from party secretary Zhdanov to the former Trotskyist
Radek and the former Rightist Bukharin. It combined political con-
formity with a less sectarian assessment of the prospects for literature
than had previously prevailed. Behind the scenes, following an appeal
by Ilya Ehrenburg to Stalin, the authorities prepared to disband
the International Association of Revolutionary Writers (MORP)
in favour of a broad-based organisation. This gained the support
of famous writers such as Malraux, Thomas and Heinrich Mann,
Dos Passos and Sherwood Anderson.13
The harsh treatment in 1933 of the national pretensions of the
Ukrainians and others was also modified. In December 1932 the
Moscow Politburo had strongly condemned ‘Ukrainisation’ in both
Ukraine itself and in the North Caucasus.14 But a Politburo decision
of January 19, 1934, resolved to transfer the Ukrainian capital from
Russian-oriented Khar’kov to the old Ukrainian cultural centre of
Kiev, over 400 km closer to the frontier. This move was both an
implicit declaration that the Soviet Union did not believe that an

11
Schast’e (1997), 172.
12
See Tucker (1990), 282–6, on this event and on the atmosphere in 1934
generally.
13
See Ehrenburg’s letter to Stalin, September 13, 1934 (SKP, 718–19). Stalin told
Kaganovich on September 23 ‘He is right’, and set out the tasks of the international
association as ‘a) the struggle against fascism, b) the active defence of the USSR’
(SKP, 493). MORP was eventually disbanded in December 1935, by which time the
new association was already extremely active. Not to be confused with MOPR, the
International Union for Assistance to Revolutionary Fighters.
14
See vol. 5 of this series, pp. 190–1.
18 1934: The Political Background
enemy could seize its territory and a concession to the Ukrainians.
The Politburo decision authorising the transfer claimed that it would
facilitate ‘the further most rapid development of national culture
and Bolshevik Ukrainisation on the basis of industrialisation and col-
lectivisation’. This was a remarkable reversal of the decision of
December 1932.15 Then in April 1934 Lyubchenko, a Ukrainian
and a former borotbist, was appointed chair of the Ukrainian
Sovnarkom.16 In the following month a draft resolution of the
Ukrainian party central committee insisted that all persons employed
by state and cooperative establishments in Ukraine should learn
Ukrainian, and that all party members should speak in Ukrainian at
meetings.17 In Belorussia, Stalin in a personal intervention com-
plained that the ‘national moment’ had been underestimated in
party and government work.18 In Kazakhstan, the teaching of the
Kazakh language was made compulsory in Russian-speaking
schools.19 To celebrate the 15th anniversary of the founding of the
Kazakh republic (October 4, 1935), elaborate preparations were
launched in October 1934 to prepare publications and an exhibition,
and to issue a Kazakh encyclopaedia in both Kazakh and Russian.20
The contrast between anti-Semitism in Nazi Germany and racial
equality in the Soviet Union was emphasised by the well-publicised
elevation of the small Jewish national district of Birobidzhan to the
Jewish autonomous region.21 In the autumn a Sovnarkom decree
listed ‘Measures for the Economic and Cultural Development’ of
this region, including a significant increase in its allocation from the
state budget.22
Many, perhaps most, Soviet citizens in town and country saw some
improvement in their living conditions following the great decline in
15
RGASPI, 17/3/937, 44 (art. 204/185, dated January 19, 1934).
16
RGASPI, 17/3/944, 81 (art. 133/116, dated April 28). Chubar’, the previous
incumbent, was transferred to Moscow as deputy chair of the USSR Sovnarkom
with enthusiastic encomiums on his work in Ukraine. The borotbisty were a Ukrainian
peasant party with an outlook similar to the Socialist Revolutionaries, and were
admitted into the communist party in 1920 (see Carr (1958), 306).
17
See Martin (2001), 365.
18
See ibid. 364.
19
Levon Mirzoyan (2001), 69 (decree of Kazakh TsIK and Sovnarkom, dated
April 14).
20
Ibid. 77–8 (decisions of Kazakh party bureau, dated October 13 and 28). The
encyclopaedia was not in fact published until the 1970s (ibid. 299, note 42).
21
SZ, 1934, art. 208 (decree of TsIK, dated May 7).
22
SZ, 1934, art. 400 (dated October 1).
 1934: The Political Background 19
the previous five years. Peasant incomes and the real wages of the
employed population increased. Goods’ shortages were somewhat
mitigated.23 A senior British diplomat, who had recorded the pre-
cipitate decline in consumption in his diary since his arrival in
Moscow in 1930, concluded ‘I think that Russia has turned the cor-
ner now … I don’t see why the Soviet government should not now
become steadily more prosperous.’24 In the autumn, Sidney and
Beatrice Webb visited the USSR in connection with the preparation
of their book Soviet Communism – a New Civilisation? Sidney Webb was
‘extremely impressed’ by the improvements since his first visit in
1932, and particularly commented on the new cooperative depart-
ment store in Leningrad, which he compared with the Army and
Navy Stores in London, and claimed was better than ‘the most
privileged cooperative shops in Britain’.25
The recovery of 1934 was not confined to the economy. The num-
ber of pupils in schools increased from 22.0 million in the 1933/34
school year to 23.6 million in 1934/35.26After the substantial decline
in the number of students and scientists during the 1933 crisis, by
January 1, 1935, the number of students in higher education had
increased to 1,156,000 as compared with 1,019,000 on January 1,
1934, and in the same period the number studying in technicums
increased from 602,000 to 683,000.27 On October 1, a Sovnarkom
decree on school building complained that construction was lagging
considerably behind the plan, and instructed Gosplan to issue addi-
tional building materials in October–December 1934.28 Sovnarkom
also adopted a three-year programme for an increase in the intake of
doctors in training from 15,600 in 1934 to 33,600 in 1937.29
These improvements particularly favoured the intelligentsia and
the elite generally. Following the easing of restrictions on the social
origins of those attending higher education, the number of students

23
In Moscow clothes, boots and pots and pans, previously very difficult to obtain
except in closed shops, were available in normal shops (Bullard (2000), 253, 258,
276 – diary entries for April 7 and 21 and June 18).
24
Bullard (2000), 264 (diary entry for May 6).
25
DVP, xvii (1971), 695 (despatch of Maisky, Soviet Ambassador to Britain,
November 23, 1934).
26
Osnovnye pokazateli, 1934, 264.
27
Osnovnye pokazateli, 1934, 252; these numbers had not yet reached the level of
January 1, 1933.
28
SZ, 1934, art. 399.
29
SZ, 1934, art. 348 (dated September 3).
20 1934: The Political Background
who were manual workers or peasants by social origin declined.30
Moscow restaurant life revived. Those who could afford it listened to
jazz in the Metropol’ or Natsional hotels, or watched gipsy singers
and dancers in the Praga.31 Ear-marked funds were established to
provide financial support for members of the Writers’ and the
Architects’ Unions.32
The character of 1934 cannot, however, be fully embraced by the
terms ‘flexibility’ or ‘moderation’. This was also a year of patriotic
celebration of newly-acquired Soviet strength. A potential tragedy
was turned into triumph when the ice-breaker Chelyuskin, purchased
by the USSR from Denmark, was wrecked on an ice floe while
endeavouring to traverse the Great Northern Sea Route. After win-
tering on the ice, the 73 stranded men were all rescued by Soviet
aircraft. The success was celebrated by full-page accounts in the
newspapers, and even by devoting a complete number of Pravda to
the event. Stalin and four other members of the Politburo sent con-
gratulatory telegrams to both Professor Shmidt and his colleagues
from the Chelyuskin, and to the Soviet airmen.33 In July, an elabo-
rate decree expanded the functions of the Chief Administration of
the Northern Sea Route to include a network of polar stations, the
exploration of the prospects for industrial development of the Arctic

30
Social origin of students (as percentage of total number):

Manual Collective farmers Office

workers and individual workers
peasants and Others
Higher education: 1933 50.3 16.9 32.8
1934 47.9 14.6 37.5
Technicums: 1933 41.5 39.8 18.7
1934 36.9 38.8 24;3
Source: Osnovnye pokazateli, 1934, 265.
31
See Fitzpatrick (1999), 93.
32
The Litfond was established on July 28 (SZ, 1934, art. 311), and the Architects’
Fund on October 5 (SZ, 1934, art. 413).
33
See, for example, ZI, April 12, April 14, 1934. In 1996 the archives released a
document written after the accident by the captain of the ship, Voronin; it claimed
that the Chelyuskin was unsuitable for ice-breaking in those conditions, and called for
greater independence for ships’ captains (Istochnik, 1, 1996, 18–38; the document
was dated October 1, 1934).
 1934: The Political Background 21
region, and the education of the minority northern peoples.34 In the
same month, so far without publicity, Sovnarkom took practical steps
to construct in Moscow the grandiose Palace of the Soviets, to be
completed by 1942 at a maximum cost of 700 million rubles.35 Then
in September the single-engined aircraft RD/ANT-25, designed by
Tupolev and manufactured by TsAGI, and equipped with the Soviet
M-34 aeroengine, acquired the first of the many Soviet world avia-
tion records of the 1930s. It flew 12,411 km in a triangle around
Khar’kov.36
This was also a year in which what has been variously termed the
‘conservative shift’ or ‘Great Retreat’ to stability and traditional val-
ues was taken further. In January, two Sovnarkom decrees set out the
arrangements for higher degrees and academic posts which have
prevailed until the present day.37 Then on May 15, following a meet-
ing between Stalin and the principal education officials, three major
decrees issued jointly by Sovnarkom and the party central committee
consolidated the move away from experimentation in schools.38 The
first decree provided that the division of the schools into primary
(classes I–IV), incomplete secondary (classes I–VII) and complete
secondary (classes I–X) should be universal throughout the USSR.
Pupils finishing class X were to be afforded priority in admission to
higher education, and pupils finishing class VII were to be afforded
priority in admission to technicums.39 The second and third decrees
thoroughly revised the teaching of history and geography in schools.40
The decree on history condemned the existing practices as domi-
nated by ‘abstract sociological models’, and called for ‘the presenta-
tion of the most important events and facts in chronological sequence,
with a description of historical personalities’. The decree stated that
this factual basis was an essential prerequisite to lead pupils to a

34
RGASPI, 17/3/949, 72–81 (decree of Sovnarkom and party central committee,
dated July 20).
35
GARF, 5446/1/476, 149 (art. 1577/274ss, dated July 4). The decision to build
the Palace was first adopted in 1931.
36
Chkalova (2004), 135–7; the work on the plane began at the end of 1931.
37
SZ, 1934, arts. 29, 30 (dated January 13).
38
Stalin, together with Kuibyshev, Kaganovich and Zhdanov, met Bubnov and
Epshtein (People’s Commissar of Education of the RSFSR and his deputy), and
Stetsky (head of the department of culture and propaganda of the central
committee) for 1³ hours on May 15. For earlier developments, see vol. 4, p. 78.
39
SZ, 1934, art. 205.
40
SZ, 1934, arts. 206 and 207.
22 1934: The Political Background
marxist conception of history. Five commissions were established,
with the task of preparing five new textbooks within a year; the com-
missions consisted of prominent historians who were very varied in
their views and approaches. Faculties of history were to be estab-
lished in Moscow and Leningrad Universities from the beginning of
the academic year. All this was an implicit condemnation of the
Pokrovsky school. Henceforth history taught in schools and universi-
ties was an amalgam of conventional political, cultural and economic
history, placed in a dogmatic Stalinist framework. The teaching of
geography was similarly criticised for ‘abstract and dry presentation,
lack of material on physical geography, weak training in map reading,
and overloading with economic statistics and general models’.
A major dispute between Stalin and the editors of the party jour-
nal Bol’shevik soon made it clear that the new approach to history
would involve a more positive treatment of Russian national history
and traditions. The journal proposed to publish Engels’ article ‘The
Foreign Policy of Russian Tsarism’, written in 1890. In a letter to the
Politburo, written on July 15, Stalin objected to the publication on
the grounds that Engels exaggerated the role of Russian expansion-
ism as leading to world war, and underestimated both the imperialist
contradictions between Britain and Germany and German expan-
sionism.41 The Politburo of course concurred.42 In its issue of July 31
the journal then published a letter written by Engels in 1888, and an
editorial note to it.43 The editorial note was angrily criticised by
Stalin in a further letter to the Politburo on August 5. He claimed
that by failing to recognise that Engels had made mistakes, and that
Lenin had developed marxist doctrine on war further than Engels,
the editors of Bol’shevik had acted with a ‘Trotskyite-Menshevik ori-
entation’. Stalin blamed Zinoviev for writing the editorial note, and,
on Stalin’s proposal, the Politburo replaced the editor of the journal
and dismissed Zinoviev from the editorial board.44 This incident not
only incorporated a Russian orientation into the approved historical

41
SKP, 712–15. His memorandum about Engels was published as an article in B,
9, May 1941; for an English translation see Labour Monthly, August 1952 (by Brian
Pearce).
42
RGASPI, 17/3/949, 18 (dated July 22).
43
B, 13–14, 1934, 84–90.
44
For Stalin’s letter to the Politburo, and his accompanying letter to Kaganovich,
both dated August 5, see SKP, 419, 716–17; for the Politburo decision, see RGASPI,
17/3/950, 31–32, 82–89 (dated August 16).
 1934: The Political Background 23
framework, but also demonstrated Stalin’s right to criticise his
illustrious predecessor Engels.45
During the first six months of 1934 several significant decisions
restricted the powers of the OGPU, continuing the more moderate
policies associated with Akulov, who was appointed as the first
Procurator of the USSR in June 1933, a position which he continued
to occupy until March 1935.46 The Politburo instructed local OGPU
agencies that in future they should check exiles most carefully, ‘secur-
ing satisfactory sanitary and food conditions’.47 In a separate deci-
sion, it warned the OGPU not to question army officers and men
without the knowledge and agreement of the appropriate army com-
missar.48 After considering a case in which the OGPU had sentenced
five alleged spies, it rescinded their sentences and ordered ‘all the top
personnel of the OGPU to devote attention to faults in the conduct
of OGPU investigations’.49
In these months the Politburo launched a major reform of the
security services. On February 20, it decided to establish a People’s
Commissariat of Internal Affairs of the USSR (NKVD), which
would incorporate a reorganised OGPU.50 Two days later, in a mem-
orandum to Stalin and Kaganovich, Akulov advocated the abolition
of the local OGPU troiki which had the right both to try cases on any
criminal matter, and to impose sentences; in a number of regions the
troiki could impose the death penalty.51 Instead, the OGPU should
45
The famous ‘Remarks’ of Stalin, Kirov and Zhdanov on the preliminary out-
lines of the textbooks on modern history and the history of the USSR were written
a few days later, on August 8 and 9. Unlike the decree on history of May 15 and
Stalin’s memoranda about Bol’shevik, they emphasised the need to contrast the
‘bourgeois French revolution’ with the ‘socialist soviet October revolution’ in the mod-
ern history textbook, and that the history of the non-Russian nationalities should be
a major feature of the textbook on USSR history, and stressed the reactionary
nature of Tsarism and its dependence on the West. The Remarks were approved by
the Politburo on August 14 (RGASPI, 17/3/950, art. 99–100), and published in
Pravda on January 27, 1936).
46
For Akulov’s previous activities, including his role as first deputy chair of the
OGPU between July 1931 and September 1932, see vol. 4 of this series, p. 77.
47
RGASPI, 17/162/16, 12–16 (dated March 10).
48
RGASPI, 17/162/16, 66 (dated May 25).
49
RGASPI, 17/162/16, 88–89 (dated June 5).
50
RGASPI, 17/3/939, 2.
51
See, for example, RGASPI, 17/162/15, 27 (dated August 15, 1933), granting
the right to the OGPU troiki in Ukraine, Belorussia, the Urals, North Caucasus, the
Lower Volga region, Kazakhstan and West Siberia to impose the death penalty on
‘active bandits’.
24 1934: The Political Background
merely retain the right to impose sentences of exile of 3–5 years.
Akulov also proposed that all places of detention should be managed
by the new NKVD, including the labour colonies of the republican
People’s Commissariats of Justice in which sentences of up to three
years were served.52 Krylenko, People’s Commissar of Justice for the
RSFSR, advocated an even more far-reaching reform. He argued
that the transfer of all places of detention to the NKVD should lead
to the abolition of his own commissariat and the placing of the
whole court system in the hands of the Procuracy and the Supreme
Court, each acting autonomously.53 His proposal to abolish the
People’s Commissariats of Justice was rejected.54
The NKVD of the USSR was eventually established on July 10,
1934. The decree was approved by the Politburo, promulgated by
TsIK and published in the national press on the same day.55 Yagoda
was appointed the first People’s Commissar of Internal Affairs of the
USSR.56
The decree establishing the NKVD provided that all places of
detention were to be placed under a chief administration of the
NKVD for corrective labour camps and labour settlements. The
other main function of the OGPU, investigating counter-revolutionary
and anti-soviet activity, was managed by a chief administration for
state security. The legal collegium and regional troiki of the OGPU
were abolished and cases of treason, sabotage and counter-revolution
were henceforth to be tried by military collegia of the normal courts.
A ‘Special Conference’ of the NKVD was given the right to deport
foreign citizens, and to exile Soviet citizens for a period up to five
years. These were more limited powers than those possessed by the
equivalent agency in the OGPU.57 Krylenko unsuccessfully argued
that the Procuracy should have the right to protest about the decisions
of the Special Conference.58

52
Lubyanka (1922–1936) (2003), 487–9.
53
Ibid. 492–3 (memorandum to Stalin, Kaganovich and Molotov, dated February 27).
54
RGASPI, 17/3/942, 2–3 (item 8 at the Politburo session of March 29).
55
RGASPI, 17/3/948, 33, 92–93; SZ, 1934, art. 283.
56
Menzhinsky died on May 10, 1934.
57
The other main divisions of the NKVD managed the militia (civil police); fron-
tier and internal security; the fire service; and the registration of citizens. The
Statute of the Special Conference was approved on November 5 (SZ, 1935, art. 84).
58
Lubyanka (1922–1936) (2003), 548–9 (memorandum to Kaganovich, dated
August 3).
 1934: The Political Background 25
On the same day on which it established the NKVD, the Politburo
adopted a series of measures which simultaneously instituted the
arrangements for trying cases of treason, sabotage and counter-
revolution by special (military) collegia of the normal courts, and
provided for improved training and remuneration for court officials.59
These measures were generally welcomed as a major improve-
ment. Izvestiya, now edited by Bukharin, boldly declared that the
establishment of the NKVD ‘means that the enemies within the
country have in the main been defeated and smashed …; it means
that the role of revolutionary legality and of precise rules fixed by
the courts will increase to a tremendous extent’.60 Kaganovich
authoritatively stated that ‘as we are in more normal times we can
punish [class enemies] through the courts and not resort to
extra-judicial repression’.61
In practice, a policy of greater leniency had already began to pre-
vail in 1933. The attempt of Yagoda to establish new special settle-
ments containing as many as two million people had failed miserably,
with considerable suffering.62 The gross number of new special set-
tlers in 1933 amounted to only 268,000, and as a result of deaths,
escapes and transfer of some settlers to camps the total net number
of special settlers declined by 70,000, falling from 1,142,084 to
1,072,546.63 In 1934, the net number of special settlers declined still
further. With the end of the famine the deaths in the settlements had
declined from 152,601 in 1933 to 40,012 in 1934: but by January 1,
1935, the net number of settlers had fallen by about 100,000 to
973,693; it was less than one million for the first time since 1930.64
The number of people arrested by the security services (OGPU/
NKVD) amounted to 505,256 in 1933 and the equivalent number
of arrests by the NKVD in 1934 was considerably smaller – 205,173.
The number of persons sentenced as a result of cases handled by the
NKVD/OGPU also declined substantially in 1934, from 264,994 in
1933 to 113,629 in 1934. The number of death sentences fell slightly,
from 2,154 to 2,056.65 The total number of people sentenced to
59
Resolution ‘On the Court and the Procuracy’, RGASPI, 17/3/948, 94–98; for
details, see Solomon (1996), 166–7.
60
I, July 10, 1934.
61
Cited in Solomon (1996), 166.
62
See vol. 5 of this series, p. 224, and for more detail ch. 2 of Khlevniuk (2004).
63
See Khlevniuk (2004), 68.
64
See Table 24, and SI, 11, 1990 (Zemskov).
65
OA, 2, 1992, 28 (V. P. Popov).
26 1934: The Political Background
deprivation of freedom by the civil courts declined from 414,862 in
1933 to 284,880 in 1934 (RSFSR only).
There was also a sharp improvement in conditions in camps and
colonies as well as in the special settlements. In camps the number of
deaths declined from 67,300 in the famine year 1933 (15.7 per cent
of the annual average number of prisoners) to 26,300 in 1934 (4.2
per cent of all prisoners).66
The status of some former kulaks was significantly improved. In
March 1934, in response to a request from a region, the Politburo
resolved that there was no objection to accepting former kulaks into
the kolkhozy if they had returned from exile with a positive recom-
mendation.67 Then on May 27 TsIK ruled that, provided that they
worked conscientiously and were ‘loyal to the measures of Soviet
power’, former kulaks, on the proposal of OGPU plenipotentiaries,
could be restored to civil rights after five years, or after three years if
they were working in the gold and platinum industry. Moreover,
shock workers, particularly young workers, could acquire civil rights
ahead of time.68
The reduction in the number of sentences for counter-revolution-
ary offences did not, however, lead to a decline in the total number
of prisoners in the forced labour system. While the number of pris-
oners in camps who had been sentenced for counter-revolutionary
offences declined in 1934 by 16.9 per cent, the total camp popula-
tion increased by 215,500, from 510,000 on January 1, 1934, to
725,500 on January 1, 1935. Moreover, this net increase did not
represent the total number of persons newly sent to camps in 1934,
which amounted to some 428,000.69 This was the largest increase in
the camp population in any year in the 1930s except 1938.70 Of the
66
SI, 6, 1991, 14 (Zemskov); nevertheless, the percentage of deaths was still higher
than in 1931 (3.6 per cent).
67
RGASPI, 17/162/16, 6 (dated March 3).
68
SZ, 1934, art. 257. For a later modification of this decision, see p. 283 below.
69
SI, 6, 1991, 11, 14 (Zemskov). During 1934, 147,300 persons were released from
camps, 36,700 escaped and were not recaptured, and 26,300 died, a total of 213,300
(see SI, 6, 1991, 14 (Zemskov)), which added to 215,500 gives 428,800.
70
Apparently the increase in the other sectors of the penal system was not substan-
tial, if it occurred at all in 1934. As we have seen, the number of special settlers
declined. The number of prisoners in the colonies of the People’s Commissariats of
Justice amounted to ‘up to 400,000’ in March 1934 (memorandum by Krylenko,
dated March 17 (Lubyanka (1922–1936)(2003), 508–9). According to the TsIK and
Sovnarkom decree of October 27, and the NKVD order of October 29, 1934, all
prisoners in these colonies were to be transferred to the NKVD by December 1.
 1934: The Political Background 27
net increase of 215,500, 75.6 per cent of the total were sentenced
during 1934 in four main categories: crimes relating to property;
crimes of office and economic crimes; theft of socialist property;
and belonging to the ‘socially harmful or socially dangerous
element’.71 These large increases resulted from the determination of
the authorities to impose social order on the substantial section of
the population whose lives had been disrupted by dekulakisation
and famine, and by the introduction of the passport system in most
towns. In the Russian republic alone, 385,000 people had been
refused passports by August 1934.72
At the XVII party congress prominent former oppositionists had
declared their loyalty to Stalin’s policies (see pp. 7–9 above). Following
the congress, a number of them were brought back into public life.
On February 20, Bukharin was appointed editor of the government
newspaper Izvestiya. Shortly afterwards its size was increased, and it
was authorised to appoint foreign correspondents in Washington,
Tokyo and Warsaw.73 Bukharin immediately embarked on the publi-
cation of a large number of lively and wide-ranging articles which,
while enthusiastically supporting the regime, also sought to widen its
flexibility, and the limits of discussion. Bukharin’s former right-wing
associate Uglanov was readmitted into the party.74 The Politburo
also recommended the party control commission to consider the
readmission to the party of the prominent former Trotskyist
Rakovsky, following the publication of his renunciation of his past
views in Pravda.75 Zinoviev and Kamenev were appointed to official
posts (though, as we have seen, Zinoviev soon fell into disfavour). In
July P. G. Petrovsky, son of the Ukrainian president, who had been
arrested in connection with the Ryutin affair, was freed from
imprisonment following his public avowal of error.76

(SZ, 1934, art. 421; ISG, ii (2004), 113–14). In fact, however, the number of prison-
ers in NKVD colonies amounted to only 240,000 on January 1, 1935 (SI, 6, 1991,
11 (Zemskov)).
71
OI, 4, 1997, 65 (Zemskov).
72
Cahiers, lxii (2001), 520 (Shearer).
73
RGASPI, 17/3/939, 2; 17/3/940, 24 (dated March 2).
74
RGASPI, 17/3/941, 20 (dated March 13).
75
For the negotiations with Rakovsky, see RGASPI, 17/3/941, 20 (dated
March 13), 40 (dated March 18), P, April 14, 1934, and RGASPI, 17/3/944, 17
(dated April 22). He was eventually readmitted eighteen months later on
November 13, 1935.
76
RGASPI, 17/3/449, 18 (dated July 22).
28 1934: The Political Background
In June the former Trotskyist Pyatakov, who had returned to the
official fold in 1929, was appointed to the key post of first deputy
commissar for heavy industry.77 This consolidated the dominance in
Narkomtyazhprom of the talented and thrusting officials who had
been advanced and encouraged by Ordzhonikidze in the previous
four years. In the economy more widely, reorganisation of the com-
missariats and the reshuffling of leading officials brought forward
several talented leaders in planning, finance and trade. On April 4,
Mar’yasin was appointed head of the State Bank (Gosbank); he soon
proved to be independently-minded and bursting with ideas for the
improvement of the financial system.78 On May 25, following the
resignation of Kuibyshev, Mezhlauk, an experienced, competent and
broadminded administrator, was appointed head of Gosplan in his
place.79 Then on July 29, 1934, Veitser was appointed People’s
Commissar of Internal Trade, following the division of Narkomsnab
into Narkomvnutorg, responsible for internal trade, and Narkom-
pishcheprom, responsible for the food industry. As head of
Narkomvnutorg he combined energetic visits to local organisations
with enthusiasm for consumer-oriented trade and for market arrange-
ments within the state system.80 The equally energetic and more

77
SZ, 1934, ii, art. 132 (dated June 10).
78
SZ, 1934, ii, art. 54. He replaced Kalmanovich, who was appointed People’s
Commissar for Grain and Livestock State Farms. L. E. Mar’yasin (1894–1938) was
born in Mogilev, attended a gymnasium before the revolution, and joined the party
in 1915. He served in party posts during the civil war; in 1923–24 he was head of
the department of trade and financial policy of Vesenkha, and in 1925–27 worked
in the party apparatus, first in the Ukrainian raspredotdel and then, with Yezhov as
deputy head of the USSR orgraspredotdel. In 1930 he graduated from the party
Institute of Red Professors, and joined the board of Gosbank, becoming a deputy
head on February 4, 1932.
79
SZ, 1934, ii, art. 83. V. I. Mezhlauk (1892–1938) was born in Khar’kov; his
father was a teacher from a gentry family. Mezhlauk graduated in history, philology
and law at Khar’kov university before the revolution. A Menshevik before 1917, he
joined the Bolsheviks in July 1917, served in the Red Army, and briefly became
People’s Commissar for War in Ukraine in 1919. In the 1920s he worked in
Narkomput’, and then occupied various positions, including head of Glavmetall, in
Vesenkha until he was appointed first deputy chair of Gosplan in 1931. He was
famous in party circles for his unpublished cartoons of party leaders, often drawn at
Politburo meetings.
80
SZ, 1934, ii, art. 145. I. Ya. Veitser (1889–1938), born in Vilna, a member of
the Jewish Bund before the revolution, attended the Juridical Faculty of Kazan’
University, and worked as a tutor and accountant. He joined the Bolsheviks in 1914,
and after the revolution served in various local economic posts in Chernigov, Vyatka,
 1934: The Political Background 29
politically influential Mikoyan took over Narkompishcheprom. On
April 10, I. M. Kleiner (1893–1937), who had been a very influential
second in command in Komzag, was appointed its head when
Chernov took over Narkomzem.81 In his memoirs Mikoyan, the only
member of this group to survive the purges, compensating for his
failure to save any of them from execution, described Veitser as ‘an
extremely creative (initsiativnyi) and efficient leader’, and Kleiner and
Chernov as ‘entirely worthy and well-trained people’.82 He also char-
acterised Grin’ko, People’s Commissar for Finance, as ‘an intelligent
and well-trained person, who had a good mastery of the issues
relating to his commissariat’.83
One leading Bolshevik administrator was less fortunate at this
time than Bukharin and the others. A. M. Markevich, pioneer of the
Machine-Tractor Stations and first head of Traktorotsentr, had been
sentenced to imprisonment in a labour camp in March 1933, when
a large number of prominent agricultural officials were sentenced to
death for ‘counter-revolutionary wrecking’.84 His case was reconsid-
ered by a commission of the Politburo established on September 15,
1934.85 Stalin strongly supported this move. A draft resolution from
the commission criticised ‘the illegal methods of investigation’, and
called for a re-examination of the case. These proceedings had not
been completed by the time of Kirov’s murder, and Markevich was
not released.86

Penza and Tula. In 1924 he was appointed a member of the collegium of

Narkomtorg, and served there until 1929, when he was appointed Ukrainian
People’s Commissar of Internal Trade. In 1930 he was transferred to the newly-
established Narkomvneshtorg, and was appointed Soviet trade representative in
Germany in 1931. An ascetic man, he was married to Natalya Sats, niece of
Lunacharsky’s actress wife, and director of the Moscow children’s theatre. For
Veitser’s activities in Narkomtorg see also Hessler (2004), ch. 5.
81
SZ, 1934, ii, art. 99. For Kleiner’s previous activities see the index to vol. 5.
Kleiner, a former anarchist, was exiled to Siberia in 1910 and then served in the
army and worked in a tobacco factory. He joined the Bolsheviks in 1920, and occu-
pied various posts concerned with trade until his appointment to Komzag in 1932.
82
Mikoyan (1999), 295.
83
Ibid. 520.
84
See vol. 4, p. 337 and vol. 5, pp. 355–6. For Markevich see the numerous refer-
ences in the index to vol. 2.
85
RGASPI, 17/162/17, 42; the commission consisted of Kuibyshev (chair),
Kaganovich and Akulov; Zhdanov was later added (ibid. 67, dated October 4).
86
For further details see Khlevnyuk (1996), 130–3. Stalin brusquely wrote on a
further appeal from Markevich ‘Return to the camp’.
30 1934: The Political Background
Ordzhonikidze, in a speech at Uralmashzavod on August 24,
1934, emphasised the need for a more positive attitude to the ‘bour-
geois specialists’. He referred dismissively to a recent case of arson in
the factory, conceding somewhat ambiguously that ‘we must believe’
the confessions of the engineers concerned, but also declaring ‘I
think, comrades, that this trial and this group of people will be the
last group in our factory’:

There must be no talk that our engineers, with whom we built our
factories, have begun to vacillate, that some of them have doubts.87

The drive for social order began to include the imposition of con-
ventional sexual morality. At this time stories about homosexual
practices were widespread in Moscow.88 On March 7, 1934, a
Sovnarkom decree imposed a sentence of 3–5 years on those found
guilty of ‘homosexual relations’; the sentence was increased to 5–8
years if the person accused used force or took advantage of the posi-
tion of dependence of his partner.89 In August Florinsky, head of the
protocol department of Narkomindel, was accused by the OGPU of
being both an active homosexual and a spy, neatly combining a polit-
ical and a moral offence, and he was arrested on the order of the
Politburo, with Stalin’s explicit support.90
Several significant measures adopted in the course of 1934 – well
before the murder of Kirov – ran counter to the apparent modera-
tion of the reform of the OGPU. These could partly be explained by
the generally threatening international situation. On March 29, on
Stalin’s proposal, the Politburo established a commission chaired by
Zhdanov with the task of preparing ‘practical measures fully protect-
ing our armaments factories from penetration by undesirable ele-
ments’.91 On May 4, it approved a list of 68 factories where special
‘hiring departments (otdely naima)’ were to be headed by selected

87
RGAE, 7297/38/113, 2–3.
88
See Bullard (2000), 225, 234.
89
SZ, 1934, art. 110.
90
See Maksimenkov (1997), 205–6. The Politburo resolution called for the removal
of Florinsky and checking all the staff of the commissariat (RGASPI, 17/3/949,
24). This was followed by a letter from Stalin to Kaganovich of August 4 complain-
ing about the delay in the arrest, and by ciphers and a letter of reply from Kaganovich
of August 4 and 5 (SKP, 416, 417, 421).
91
RGASPI, 17/162/16, 25 (item 6).
 1934: The Political Background 31
OGPU officials.92 A few weeks later the Politburo reprimanded the
aviation industry for the ‘irresponsible’ issue of passes to enter air-
craft factories.93 This was an important stage in the establishment of
a tight security cordon around the armaments’ industries, which
maintained a high degree of secrecy throughout the Soviet period.
The Politburo also set up a high-level commission to sanction
business journeys abroad. Requests were to be checked for both
the ‘political trustworthiness’ of the applicants and for ‘business
expediency’.94 Then, on a proposal from Voroshilov, new clauses
were included in the Statute on State Crimes imposing severe pun-
ishments on servicemen who fled abroad, and on their families. If
members of the family assisted the betrayal or knew about it they
were to be sentenced to 5–10 years deprivation of liberty, and
their property was to be confiscated. Moreover, all adult members
of the family who had been living with the serviceman or main-
tained by him were to be deprived of electoral rights and exiled to
‘distant areas of Siberia’ for five years. The same new clauses
imposed the death penalty (or ten years’ imprisonment in mitigat-
ing circumstances) for revealing state secrets as well as for espio-
nage.95 The decree, with its sinister threat to punish innocent
family members, was drawn to general attention by publishing it
in the press.
In practice, during 1934 the Politburo authorised the death sen-
tence for alleged spying on several occasions, and the Supreme
Court was provided with finance to construct a building in which
death sentences could be carried out.96 The boundary between
spying and dissidence, always flexible, moved appreciably during
the year. The death penalty was imposed not only on alleged

92
RGASPI, 17/162/16, 45, 51–54 (item 2). Elaborate details of these arrange-
ments were approved on May 26 (RGASPI, 17/3/945, 3, 61–72).
93
RGASPI, 17/3/948, 28 (dated July 8).
94
RGASPI, 17/3//945, 10 (dated May 7).
95
RGASPI, 17/3/946, 29; SZ, 1934, art. 255 (decree of TsIK, dated June 6). For
preceding Politburo decisions on this question, see RGASPI, 17/3/941, 1 (dated
March 20; item 1); 17/3/944, 3–4 (dated May 4, item 11); 17/3/945, 5 (dated May
26, item 14).
96
See, for example, RGASPI, 17/162/16, 86 (dated May 31), the case of mem-
bers of the Polish Liberation Army, and 17/162/17, 32 (dated September 2), the
case of Japanese spies in the Stalinsk iron and steel works in West Siberia. For the
allocation of 80,000 rubles to the Supreme Court, see RGASPI, 17/162/16, 45
(dated April 17).
32 1934: The Political Background
members of the Polish Liberation Army but also on alleged provo-
cateurs in the Polish Communist Party. In August, Stalin personally
indicated that dissidence involved treachery. Nakhaev, chief of
staff of the artillery division of Osoaviakhim (the Society for Air
and Chemical Defence) attempted – entirely unsuccessfully – to
organise an uprising in Moscow. Nakhaev was a sick isolated
30-year old who was preparing to commit suicide, and Voroshilov,
no doubt correctly, concluded that ‘he was a psychopath’. But
Stalin announced to Kaganovich that Nakhaev was a ‘Polish-
German or Japanese spy’, working for an organisation, and insisted
on the concoction of a case along these lines against Nakhaev and
his alleged co-conspirators.97
The application of the death penalty was not confined to cases of
alleged treachery. In April the Politburo approved the execution of
three members of railway staff following a train crash.98 In the
autumn, Kuibyshev visited Central Asia to support the campaign to
collect raw cotton, and special local commissions were authorised to
impose the death penalty for sabotage of the campaign.99
Moreover, the more flexible national policy generally characteris-
tic of 1934 was not consistently applied. In August 1934 Stalin wrote
to Kaganovich:

it seems to me that the time has come to eliminate the Central Asian
Bureau, thus connecting Turkmenia, Uzbekistan and Tadzhikia
directly with Moscow … It will be better without the barrier.100

On November 16 a Sovnarkom decree accordingly abolished the

Central Asian Economic Council, and the plenipotentiaries from
the USSR People’s Commissariats attached to it, and also abolished

97
For details see SKP, 411–12, and Rees, ed. (2004), 127–8 (Davies, Ilić and
Khlevnyuk). Nothing was known about this case until the opening of the archives in
the mid-1990s.
98
RGASPI, 17/162/16, 36 (dated April 8).
99
RGASPI, 17/162/17, 80 (dated November 9); 17/162/17, 86, 87 (dated
November 26). Outside the cotton area, in West Siberia, where disturbances were
frequent, a commission including the party secretary Eikhe was also authorised to
impose the death penalty (RGASPI, 17/162/17, 43 (dated September 19);
17/162/17, 74 (dated November 4)).
100
SKP, 460–1. Stalin justified this move on the grounds that the Central Asian
republics, unlike the Transcaucasian republics, were not combined into a federation.
But two years later the Transcaucasian Federation was also abolished.
 1934: The Political Background 33
the various industrial and administrative agencies responsible for
Central Asia as a whole.101 This was a major step towards the
centralisation of control over these national republics.
The year was not free of efforts to constrain the more indepen-
dently-minded. In March and April Pravda published articles and
correspondents’ reports criticising TsUNKhU. TsUNKhU was
headed by the independently-minded V. V. Osinsky. According to
Pravda, TsUNKhU had underestimated the number of livestock. An
editorial article on March 29 claimed that the ‘lower apparatus for
national records … to the extent of its power and ability is engaged
in wrecking’. It added that TsUNKhU itself was rubber stamping
this ‘wrecking collection of figures’. Mekhlis, the editor of Pravda,
later stated that he had personally written this editorial and two
further articles. In preparation he had consulted relevant staff in the
Moscow and Russian republic sections of TsUNKhU, Narkomzem
officials, and Voznesensky, who had been investigating the livestock
records and population statistics on behalf of the party and soviet
control commissions.102 On April 15 the Politburo established a
commission, headed by Kuibyshev, and including both Mekhlis and
Osinsky, to examine the matter, and also agreed that Osinsky should
publish a rebuttal in Pravda, to be followed the next day by an edito-
rial reply. These appeared on April 22 and 23, followed by a further
rebuttal and editorial reply on April 26 and 27. The editorial of
April 27, entitled ‘Comrade Osinsky Exposes Himself ’, condemned
him as a ‘conceited grandee’, who had a ‘non-party attitude to local
organisations’ and blamed him for the ‘bourgeois tendencies in the
TsUNKhU apparatus’. The criticisms by Pravda and its correspond-
ents were specific and detailed, but seem to have had little sub-
stance. On April 27, the day on which the editorial appeared,
Osinsky indignantly telephoned Stalin, and wrote letters to both
Stalin and Kuibyshev. He pointed out that the failure to publish a
further refutation in Pravda would mean that ‘the general public will
be convinced that Mekhlis is writing on the instructions of the cen-
tral committee’.103 The furore had no immediate sequel. On May 4

101
SZ, 1934, art. 241.
102
GARF, 5446/27/50, 65–66 (letter from Mekhlis to the Politburo, dated April
27), published in Sovetskoe rukovodstvo (1999), 274–5. In 1939 Voznesensky was
appointed head of Gosplan.
103
GARF, 5446/27/60, 33 (to Stalin), 31–32 (to Kuibyshev), published in Sovetskoe
rukovodtsvo (1999), 272–4.
34 1934: The Political Background
the Politburo postponed its discussion of the report of the Kuibyshev
commission, and on the following day granted Osinsky two months’
leave on medical grounds.104
In the following month a clash between Stalin and Bukharin con-
firmed that even in this time of relative moderation there were strict
limits on what could be published. On May 12, Bukharin published
an article in Izvestiya in which he presented an account of Soviet
industrialisation which combined enthusiasm with much greater
frankness than had so far been permitted. The key passage read:

The conscious force in [the proletarian revolution], the party, relying

on the heroic enthusiasm and self-assertiveness (samoutverzhdennost’ ) of
the proletariat, concentrated all economic resources on the heavy
industry sector. By intensifying and organising labour, by extreme
economy, by direct and indirect taxes, by voluntary payments, by
loans, by the corresponding price policy, and so on, a very firm direc-
tion was taken towards the self-assertive construction of heavy indus-
try. The percentage of accumulation in the national income was
extremely high (leading to very great ‘tension’), the redistribution of
the forces of production took place partly at the expense of the other
sectors of the economy (including agriculture) and the relationship
between production and consumption moved towards the decisive
predominance of the former.

In another passage Bukharin also asserted that ‘the individual peas-

ant sector and the personal economy of the collective farmer must
not in any circumstances be neglected’.
On May 13, the day after Bukharin’s article was published, A. I.
Stetsky, head of the propaganda and agitation department of the
central committee, sent a very critical memorandum about it to
Stalin, Kaganovich and Zhdanov. This was followed by further
exchanges between Bukharin and Stetsky, and eventually on July 14
Stalin sent all this material to the Politburo, commenting ‘Cde. Stetsky
is right, not Bukharin.’ In his accompanying memorandum Stalin
criticised Bukharin for several infelicities in his expression of marxist
doctrine. But the main thrust of his criticism was that ‘it is wrong to
give even a distant hint that our heavy industry developed by a defi-
nite or partial devouring of light industry and agriculture’ – ‘there is
104
RGASPI, 17/3/945, 7, 28. The livestock census in June–July 1935 was mainly
handled by Narkomfin (SZ, 1935, art. 231, dated May 17, 1935).
 1934: The Political Background 35
undoubtedly such a hint, though a distant one, in Bukharin’s article’.105
This was a relative mild presentation of Bukharin’s rather forthright
statement. No administrative measures against Bukharin followed,
and Bukharin continued to write prolifically in Izvestiya. For the
moment, moderation prevailed.
A few months later, Stalin himself acknowledged that Soviet
industrialisation had involved ‘costs and extra expenditure, the
breaking of machines and other losses’, but claimed that ‘we have
been able in 3 or 4 years, roughly and in the main, to achieve what
was accomplished in Europe in the course of decades’.106 In a similar
spirit, Ordzhonikidze, in a speech at Uralmash on August 29,
acknowledged the past sacrifices made to achieve the present rapid
growth in the production of iron:

we are obtaining this with imported equipment … no-one gave it for

nothing, we had little gold, and we had to take from ourselves a piece
of bread, a piece of meat, and export to pay the capitalists.107

On July 29, Stalin met the famous British writer and publicist
H. G. Wells, and the interview between them lasted three hours.
The text was approved by both Wells and Stalin, and published by
the British journal New Statesman and Nation and in Bol’shevik. Wells
argued that the United States under Roosevelt, whom he had also
recently interviewed, was creating a ‘planned, that is socialist econ-
omy’, and thus fundamentally was coming to resemble the Soviet
Union. According to Wells, it was essential if socialism was to be
established that the organisers of the economy and the skilled tech-
nical intelligentsia should be converted to socialist principles of
organisation. Stalin disagreed. He praised Roosevelt for his

105
RGASPI, 558/11/1118, 37–39. Stalin’s memorandum is published in TSD, iv
(2002), 200–1, and in Sovetskoe rukovodstvo (1999), 293–5. The latter source also pub-
lished memoranda from Bukharin, Stetsky and Mekhlis to Stalin and others (pp.
277–9, 282–92). Stalin also argued rather pedantically that Bukharin was wrong to
state that industrialisation required the development of fixed capital in general; the
essence of the matter was the capital of heavy industry. Bukharin was also wrong to
treat collectivisation as a mere ‘agrarian revolution’, because collectivisation was
superior to any other agrarian policies. And it was an error to distinguish a separate
‘classical’ phase in NEP, ‘based on the market’.
106
P, December 29, 1934 (address of December 26); for other aspects of this
speech, see p. 75 below.
107
RGAE, 7297/38/93, 2.
36 1934: The Political Background
‘initiative, courage and determination’, but argued forcefully and
with some sophistication that ‘Roosevelt will not attain the goal you
mention, if indeed that is his goal’. This was because the banks and
the industries were all owned by private owners, and skilled workers
and engineers were working for them. In a conciliatory passage, he
conceded that ‘perhaps, in the course of several generations, it will
be possible to approach this goal somewhat; but I personally think
that even this is not very probable’. Reforms were ‘concessions in
order to preserve class rule’. Instead, only the working class and
political power could overcome the resistance of the ruling class and
establish a new revolutionary order. Communists ‘would be very
pleased to drop violent methods if the ruling class agreed to give
way to the working class. But the experience of history speaks
against such an assumption.’ Communists must therefore ‘call upon
the working class to be vigilant, to prepare for battle’.108
The image of Stalin presented in the interview was that of a
thoughtful statesman, concerned to persuade Wells by rational
argument that his world view was mistaken.

The murder of Kirov on December 1 by Nikolaev launched a tragic

chapter in the history of Soviet repression. Some Soviet investigators
and historians insist that the murder was instigated by Stalin. Others
claim that the murder was the act of Nikolaev, a disillusioned indi-
vidual, or perhaps a jealous husband, and that it led the vicious and
paranoic side of Stalin’s character to predominate.109 A careful
Western historian writes in his monograph on the assassination and
its consequences that ‘My conclusion is that Nikolaev very probably
acted on his own.’110
Immediately following the murder, a decree of TsIK announced
savage ‘procedural changes’ in the investigation of terrorist organisa-
tions and of acts against Soviet officials. An investigation was to be
completed in ten days. The accused was to be given the indictment
within one day of the court sitting. The case was to be heard without

108
For the Russian text see Soch., xiv (1997), 24–39. For the English text, see
H. G. Wells’ Interview with Stalin (1950).
109
For the former view, see A. N. Yakovlev’s memorandum of March 27, 1990; for
the latter view, see the memorandum from officials of the USSR Procuracy and the
investigation department of the KGB, dated June 14, 1990 (Reabilitatsiya, iii (2004),
325–33, 459–507).
110
Lenoe (2010), 689.
 1934: The Political Background 37
the participation of the adversary side. No appeals or petitions on
sentences should be heard. The death sentence was to be carried out
immediately after the sentence was pronounced.111 Stalin insisted
to the investigators that the Zinovievites were responsible for the
murder.112 Before the end of the year 14 members of an ‘underground
Zinovievite organisation’, including Nikolaev, had been executed.
Many more were to follow.

111
SZ, 1934, 459.The decree was dated December 1, but it was not placed before
the Politburo (by poll) until December 3 (RGASPI, 17/162/17, 87). It was published
in Pravda and other national newspapers on December 5. An earlier version appeared
in Pravda on December 4.
112
Reabilitatsiya, iii (2004), 481.
 CHAPTER THREE

THE ECONOMY IN 1934

(A) THE 1934 PLAN

In Chapter 1 we saw that after much discussion in the course of

1933 the second five-year plan, approved at the XVII party con-
gress, included an investment figure which assumed that the average
annual investment during the last four years of the plan would be
over 50 per cent greater than actual investment in 1933.1 This
implied a very substantial increase of investment in 1934, but it
would nevertheless have been too small to contain the ambitions of
key sectors of the economy. The discussions of the plan for 1934
which took place in 1933 simultaneously with the discussions about
the five-year plan were strongly influenced by pressure from key sec-
tors of the economy, particularly the army and the armaments
industries. Their expenditure had been severely restricted in 1933,
a year of economic crisis – it had even been reduced as compared
with 1932. In June 1933, a commission headed by Ordzhonikidze,
cutting across the discussions about the five-year plan, concluded
that it was essential to expand the capacity of the armaments indus-
tries very considerably. Investment in these industries in 1933
amounted to 604 million rubles. The commission proposed that it
should amount to as much as 3,650 million rubles in the two years
1934–35. This enormous figure excluded investment for defence
purposes in the civilian sectors of the economy. According to the
commission, the bulk of this total must be concentrated in the single
year 1934. The defence sector of Gosplan reduced the 1934–35
claim to 2,250 million, of which 1,400 million would be invested in
1934, and itself proposed a much lower figure than this.2 Curiously,
all these drafts revived the ‘attenuating curve’ of investment,

1
The amount approved was 133,000 million rubles; with an investment of 18,000
million in 1933; this left 115,000 million for the remaining four years, or 28,800
million a year.
2
For the Gosplan record of these developments, see RGAE, 4372/91/1455,
43–41 (dated August 14, 1933), and 19–16ob (dated August 16); both these
documents are handwritten. For the figures, see n. 14 below.

38
 The 1934 Plan 39
notorious in the discussions about the first five-year plan in the
1920s.3 Meanwhile, the organisations responsible for different types
of armament had prepared their own draft investment plans for
1934. Even after these claims were reduced by the chief military-
mobilisation administration of Narkomtyazhprom, they still
amounted to 2,034 million rubles, plus 461 million in civilian indus-
try. 4 This temporarily revived the over-optimistic planning
characteristic of 1929–31.
Other government departments presented their own less ambi-
tious but still substantial claims for 1934 at this time. However, in
September 1933 Gosplan proposed that total investment in 1934
should amount to a moderate 21,000 million rubles, 17 per cent
greater than the investment actually achieved in 1933, and that
industrial production should increase by a relatively modest 15 per
cent. Kuibyshev, as head of Gosplan, forwarded the proposal to
Molotov, who agreed with it and forwarded it to Stalin, on leave in
Sochi.5 Stalin approved these figures on the same day, writing to
Molotov ‘I agree.’6 Gosplan now proceeded to cut back the depart-
mental claims. However, as a result of further pressure from the
commissariats, the investment plan was increased for both the five-
year plan and the 1934 plan. The plan for 1934, approved by
Sovnarkom on December 31, was increased to 25,111 million
rubles, nearly 40 per cent greater than investment in 1933. The
attenuating curve for the second five-year plan as a whole was still
retained: the 1934 figure was the largest annual increase.7 A pub-
lished Gosplan report drew attention to the fact that, following the
concentration on heavy industry during the first five-year plan, in
1934 for the first time investment was planned to grow more rapidly

3
For example, in an estimate for the aircraft industry, investment was to decline
from 340 million in 1934 to 118 million in 1937 as compared with 216 million in
1933 (RGAE, 4372/91/1455, 17ob). For the attenuating curve, see Carr and Davies
(1969), 847–8.
4
RGAE, 7297/41/183, 20–19 (dated August 4, 1933); in the artillery and small
arms industries, for example, the claim was reduced from 975 to 760 million (ibid. 2–1).
5
RGASPI, 79/1/798, 4 (Molotov letter to Kuibyshev, dated September 12).
6
Pis’ma (1996), 248–9.
7
SZ, 1934, art. 13. The other main planning document for 1934, the unified state
budget, was approved on January 4, 1934, by a session of TsIK (SZ, 1934, art. 14).
For the annual figures for 1934–37, see Vtoroi (1934), i, 717. The only other year for
which a substantial rate of growth was planned was 1937, the last year of the plan.
40 The Economy in 1934
in the Group B industries, and in agriculture and transport, than in
heavy industry.8
It was clear to those responsible for implementing the 1934 plan
that many of the specific projects included in the five-year plan could
not be fitted in to the investment allocations. The investment plan
was extremely tight in every industry. The head of Glavmetall, A. I.
Gurevich, wrote to Ordzhonikidze on November 30, 1933:

I am in great difficulty about how to allocate the capital investment

plan – because money is insufficient for everything which is abso-
lutely necessary … When I proposed more than 2,300 [million
rubles] you swore at me.9

The final allocation to the metals industry was only 1,627 million
rubles.10 Similarly, Kaminsky, People’s Commissar for Health, com-
mented when he submitted the health plan for the following year
that the 1934 investment allocation had been ‘completely
insufficient’.11 The chair of the soviet executive committee of the
Ivanovo region complained that the crucial rubber and asbestos
plant in Yaroslavl’ was working at only 6 per cent of its capacity, and
urgently needed a larger investment grant if it was to produce motor
tyres as scheduled.12 Gosplan of the Belorussian republic complained
not only about the size of its grant but also about the procedures fol-
lowed by Gosplan of the USSR. It claimed that these had forced the
allocation into fixed limits, removing factories essential to its plan.13
Two civilian sectors were particularly favoured. As compared with
the average increase of 39.5 per cent, investment was planned to
increase by 176 per cent in light industry, greatly neglected in previ-
ous years, and by 71 per cent for the railways, a persistent bottleneck.
Defence investment and expenditure was the most contentious
issue. Investment in Narkomtyazhprom, of which the armaments

8
PKh, 5, 1934, 29 (G. Smirnov), 25.
9
Sovetskoe rukovodstvo (1999), 264–5.
10
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1935 (1935), 468.
11
RGVA, 33987/3/633, 248 (undated memorandum to Stalin, Molotov and
Voroshilov, evidently written at the end of 1934).
12
RGAE, 4372/32/25, 153–152 (memorandum to Kuibyshev, dated December
16, 1933).
13
RGAE, 4372/32/25, 282–280 (memorandum from Golendo to Mezhlauk, evi-
dently written at the end of 1933). For other examples, see the series of documents
in RGAE, 4372/32/35.
 The 1934 Plan 41
industries formed a part, was planned to increase relatively slowly
(+22 per cent). Within Narkomtyazhprom the grant for investment
in the armaments industries amounted to 874 million rubles, as com-
pared with 604 million in 1933, an above-average increase (+45 per
cent), but a far cry from the proposals of the Ordzhonikidze commis-
sion.14 At the same time the army, supported by Narkomtyazhprom,
proposed to increase its order for weapons and other military equip-
ment very substantially. On November 19, 1933, the Politburo
instructed Voroshilov and Ordzhonikidze to prepare two variants of
the plan for military orders; one for 2,000 million rubles, the other
‘larger than’ 2,000 million rubles.15 Eventually military orders were
fixed at 2,494 million rubles, and the total defence appropriation
from the budget at 5,800 million rubles, an increase of 35 per cent
on actual expenditure in 1933.16 Thus expenditure on the armed
forces, like investment in the armaments industries, was planned to
increase substantially, but much less rapidly than the defence
commissariat had proposed.

14
Investment in the armaments industries, 1934–35 (million rubles):

1934–35 1934 1935

Ordzhonikidze commission claim, 3650
June 19331
Gosplan defence sector revision, 2250 1400 850
August 14, 19331
Gosplan defence sector: feasible 1250 650 600
amount, August 14, 19331
Military-mobilisation administration 2034
of Narkomtyazhprom2
Rudzutak commission, December 1051
14, 19333
Final plan, February 16, 19344 874
Actual investment4 (1666) 761 905
Sources:
1
RGAE, 4372/91/1455, 110.
2
RGAE, 7297/41/183, 19.
3
GARF, 8418/10/200, 32–35.
4
See Harrison and Davies (1997), 384.
15
RGASPI, 17/162/15, 146.
16
See Harrison and Davies (1997), 380; the amount actually achieved was 1,948
million rubles for equipment orders, and 5,393 million for the total defence
appropriation. All these figures are in current prices.
42 The Economy in 1934
The 1934 plan provided that industrial production in 1934 would
increase by 19 per cent, which was greater than the annual average
rate planned for 1933–37, 16.5 per cent. At the party congress
Molotov insisted that this figure must not be reduced by even the
slightest amount (see p. 14 above), Defending this high figure in the
planning journal, Mezhlauk, now head of Gosplan, explained that
1933 had been ‘a breakthrough year’, in which the ‘mastering of new
enterprises’ had made possible the more rapid development of indus-
try in 1934, together with an increase in output per person employed
and a decline in the cost of production.17 Lauer, the chief Gosplan
specialist on the iron and steel industry, pointed out that the increase
of its production would partly be made possible by the more efficient
use of blast-furnace and open-hearth equipment, the productivity of
which had declined in previous years.18
To achieve this rapid growth of industry, the 1934 plan envisaged
an increase in output per worker by 13.5 per cent, together with a
substantial expansion in employment. Non-agricultural employment
as a whole would increase by 5.9 per cent (2,100,000 persons), in
contrast to the decline of 4 per cent in 1933 (on the latter, see vol. 4,
p. 539). A large part of the increase in employment was to be pro-
vided by orgnabor, organised recruitment from the collective farms.
Most of the peasant recruits were to join the building industry. The
net increase in urban population was expected to amount to 800,000
persons, including family members.19
Gosplan struggled to reconcile the targets for investment and pro-
duction in 1934 with financial equilibrium. The stringent financial
controls of the second half of 1932 and the whole of 1933 had suc-
ceeded in reducing the amount of currency in circulation for the first
time since the currency reform of 1924. But the rate of growth of
investment and production planned for 1934 confronted the author-
ities with serious difficulties. They concluded that the increases in the
wage bill and other earnings which would result from the plans could
be met by a substantial growth of the supply of food and consumer
17
PKh, 5–6, 1934, 3–4.
18
PKh, 5–6, 1934, 70 (G. Lauer).
19
The main increase (thousands) in non-agricultural employment were to come
from orgnabor 848; higher education and factory schools 513; women already in
urban families 325. Only 180,000 would be school leavers, and a mere 84,000
demobilised soldiers and former artisans. (PKh, 5–6, 1934, 154–5 – B. Markus.)
A preliminary labour plan had shown an increase of only 1.25 million (RGAE,
4372/32/25, 183).
 The 1934 Plan 43
goods, following the better harvest of 1933, and by improving indus-
trial performance in the second half of the year. In November 1933,
in memoranda addressed to Mezhlauk (then deputy head of
Gosplan), the Gosplan trade department noted that in real terms sup-
plies to retail trade were planned to increase by 18.5 per cent in 1934.
The department proposed that commercial trade in food products
should be greatly expanded as a proportion of total trade (commer-
cial trade was the sale of otherwise rationed goods at higher prices –
see pp. 9–10 above). This would mop up the additional money incomes,
and also enable the present level of commercial prices to be reduced by
4,000 million rubles. The retail prices for rationed and other low-price
goods (so-called ‘normal prices’) could remain unchanged. Against this
background, prices on the kolkhoz market, which had been falling since
June 1933, would continue to decline in 1934.20
On November 28, 1933, the Politburo incorporated a revised ver-
sion of these proposals in its decision on the 1934 plan. The expan-
sion proposed in the plan was to be achieved by a combination of a
rapid increase in productivity of labour with strict financial control.
The plan envisaged that wages in 1934 would be restricted ‘in all
branches of the economy without exception’ to the level reached in
October–December 1933. The slow increase in money incomes
would form the basis of the plans for retail trade. The Politburo

20
RGAE, 4372/32/25, 257–254, 252–251 – V. V. Belenko, head of administration
for planning fondy and trade, Gosplan, to Mezhlauk, dated November 25, 23, 1933.
The following figures for retail trade (including public catering, but excluding the
kolkhoz market) (in thousand million rubles) were presented in the memoranda:

1933 1934 (plan without 1934 (plan with

(expected) price reduction) price reduction)
Socialised trade at 42.8 49.6 (44.6)
normal prices
Commercial trade 7.2 17.4 (13.4)
(including free sale
of bread products)
Total socialised trade 50.0 67.0 58.0
The 1934 plan for socialised trade eventually approved was 60,000 million rubles
(SZ, 1934, art. 13). In fact socialised trade amounted to 49,800 million rubles in
1933 and 61,800 million in 1934; within this total, commercial trade amounted to
6,300 million rubles in 1933 and 13,100 million rubles in 1934 (Sovetskaya torgovlya
(1935? [1936]), 74). Kolkhoz market prices fell by 39 per cent in 1934 (Malafeev
(1964), 402), the most substantial fall in any one year.
44 The Economy in 1934
insisted that the increase in trade must be brought about through
commercial sales, and the number of people receiving rations must
not increase in spite of the increase in the labour force. It also pro-
posed, more modestly than the Gosplan memoranda submitted a
few days previously, that the reduction in commercial prices would
amount to 2,000 rather than 4,000 million rubles. The net effect of
these arrangements was of course that average retail prices would
increase, though both the published and the confidential decisions
about the plan coyly failed to state this explicitly. The Politburo also
instructed Narkomfin that the plans for the state budget and the
banks should be drawn up so that there was no net issue of currency
in 1934.21
In spite of the decision to restrict currency issue in 1934, the rev-
enue and expenditure of the state budget were both scheduled to
increase by over 20 per cent.22 The main source of increased revenue
was to be the turnover tax and the related tax on commercial trade,
to be achieved partly by the increase in trade turnover and partly by
the increase in average retail prices.
In foreign trade, a positive balance had been achieved in the sec-
ond half of 1933, primarily as a result of a drastic cut in imports;
this was sufficient to cover the interest and current repayment on
foreign debt (see vol. 4, pp. 434–7 and 534–7). In 1934 export pros-
pects were limited, even though large repayments of the foreign debt
were still required. In November 1933, the foreign currency commis-
sion set up six sub-commissions to consider the 1934 plan.23 In the
course of the following month, draft plans for 1934 as a whole and
for January–March were adopted by the main commission, and
approved by the Politburo after some modification. Grain exports
were not expected to exceed two million tons, slightly more than in
1933.24 The foreign trade commission estimated that gold exports
would amount to 60 million rubles, less than in 1933, but the
Politburo increased this figure to 91 million rubles (70.5 tons), about
4 per cent more than in the previous year. Only a small proportion
21
RGASPI, 17/3/935, 58–62 (decision by correspondence no. 93/74, dated
November 28); see also GARF, 5446/1/472, 117–25 (Sovnarkom decree art.
2589/598s, dated November 29).
22
SZ, 1934, art. 14 (dated January 4).
23
Sub-commissions for exports; imports; the East; Torgsin; and foreign currency
were set up on November 22, and a sub-commission on foreign trade contracts with
Soviet enterprises on the following day (GARF, 6422/3/6, 108–109).
24
GARF, 8422/3/6, 169 (dated December 31).
 The First Six Months 45
of the total – 6 million rubles, 4.65 tons – was expected to come from
the newly-developed Kolyma gold field in the Far East.25 The
authorities searched for assets which would provide foreign currency,
even if on a small scale. On January 23, 1934, the Politburo approved
the sale of Giorgione’s ‘Judith’.26 Most export earnings were to come
from oil, timber and other agricultural products apart from grain,
and total exports would be less than in 1933. In consequence,
planned imports were very drastically cut to less than half the very
low 1933 level, a mere one-seventh of the imports in 1931.27 Even
key departments of state had to struggle for every item they imported.
Quite small imports required the approval of the foreign currency
commission or even of the Politburo.28 For the January–March quar-
ter the foreign trade balance was even tighter. The quarterly plan
showed a deficit of 37.6 million rubles, to be met from the small
amount of foreign currency accumulated in July–December 1933.29

(B) THE FIRST SIX MONTHS

(i) Industry and investment

Industry got off to a good start. In January–March 1934 production,

though less than the quarterly plan, was 18.3 per cent greater than
in the same period of 1933. In contrast to the previous year, it was
higher than in October–December 1933 for a number of major
products, including power, coal, and iron and steel.30 Gosplan pre-
pared the plan for April–June in an optimistic spirit. On March 8,
the Politburo resolved that industrial production in the second
25
GARF, 8422/3/6, 168 (December 3); RGASPI, 17/162/15, 145 (Politburo
proposal to consider an increase); 17/162/16, 254 (final decision of Politburo, not
taken until March 15, 1934).
26
RGASPI, 17/162/15, 184.
27
Exports were planned at 443 million rubles, and imports at 157 million rubles,
as compared with 496 and 348 in 1933 (RGASPI, 17/162/15, 155–156).
28
For example, on February 14, 1934, the Politburo approved the allocation of 2.5
million rubles for the purchase of French technical assistance and equipment for the
manufacture of destroyers, and on February 25 it authorised the expenditure of
5,000 dollars to assist Indian earthquake victims (RGASPI, 17/162/16, 5 (art.
20/4), 6 (art. 61/45)).
29
RGASPI, 17/162/15, 169, 175–176 (Politburo decision of January 19), GARF,
5446/1/464, 52–88 (Sovnarkom decree, art. 178/31s, dated January 25).
30
Osnovnye pokazateli, March 1934, x–xxiii.
46 The Economy in 1934
quarter should exceed the January–March level by 26 per cent,
reaching nearly a quarter of the annual plan. Capital investment
would amount to 6,999 million rubles, 27.9 per cent of the annual
plan, a very high figure for a period of the year when the building
industry would not normally reach its peak.31 Gosplan, in a memo-
randum to Sovnarkom on March 15, pointed out that the plan for
industrial production would ‘secure the fulfilment in the first six months of
49.4 per cent of the annual plan, and thus create all the conditions for its
fulfilment in the second half of the year’. Investment in the first six
months would reach 48.7 per cent of the annual plan:

[This] indicates a very important special feature of the plan, distinguish-

ing it from the plan of the second quarter of the previous year. Capital
investment in the second quarter of 1934 must develop with full force.32

This was ‘an extremely immense task’ in view of the ‘unsatisfactory

preparation for the building season’. Many capital projects lacked
technical plans and estimates, and were inadequately supplied with
building materials.33 A TsUNKhU report showed that investment was
considerably less than planned in the first two months of the year.34
In the January–March quarter as a whole investment remained
less than planned, but nevertheless the period was one of financial
strain. This was mainly because supplies to the consumer were sub-
stantially less than planned.35 As a result, turnover tax was also less
than planned. The shortfall in budgetary revenue amounted to 1,500
million rubles.36 January–March is normally a period in which a
considerable amount of currency is withdrawn from circulation.
Even in the inflationary year 1932 currency was reduced by 220
million rubles in this quarter. But in January–March 1934 the
reduction was only 161 million rubles (see Table 21).

31
RGASPI, 17/3/941, 11–12. On January 16, the Politburo had increased the
investment plan for January–March from 5,020 to 5,214 million rubles; the increase
was mainly allocated to the transport sector (RGASPI, 17/3/937, 38 – art. 180/161).
32
GARF, 5446/15/3, 106–108 (signed by Mezhlauk and Borilin).
33
Ibid. 93.
34
Osnovnye pokazateli, March 1934, 100.
35
The realised market fund of both food products and industrial goods was far less
than planned (see Itogi ... po tovarooborotu, March 1934, 14–17; food products are
given in kind, and non-food products in 1934 wholesale prices of industry). Retail
trade in current prices was reported as slightly less than planned (see ibid. 24).
36
See GARF, 5446/15a/473, 1–2.
 The First Six Months 47
Evidently as a result of these developments, on March 25 the
Politburo and Sovnarkom abruptly cancelled the decision of March 8
to increase the investment plan for April–June, blaming the ‘com-
pletely unsatisfactory preparation of building organisations’. The new
decision stated that the quarterly plan was to be reduced from 6,999
to 6,000 million rubles, and the annual plan by ‘at least’ 3,500 million
rubles (i.e. from 25,100 to at most 21,600 million rubles). Kuibyshev
was instructed to re-examine the question within three days.37
In attempting to reduce the allocations to the different branches
of the economy, Kuibyshev found it extremely difficult to reach
agreement with the commissariats. On March 28, the Politburo
resolved to postpone the question for a further ten days.38 In fact,
nearly four weeks elapsed before Kuibyshev reported on April 22
that he had been able to make a cut of only 2,100 million rubles in the
annual plan (reducing it to 23,000 million rubles). He added that even
this cut ‘affected a whole number of projects of very great national-
economic significance’. On the following day the Politburo accepted
this proposal for the year as a whole, but more drastically reduced the
April–June plan by 1,015 million rubles (i.e. to 5,983 million rubles,
slightly below the figure they had proposed on March 25).39
This reduction was not specifically mentioned in the press. An
authoritative article in the Gosplan journal, in an issue not sent to press
until September, even continued to give the original figure.40 A later
article on the results of the first six months of 1934 revealed the reduc-
tion indirectly, stating that investment in 1934 would be 4,500 million
rubles greater than in 1933 (which implied that it would be 22,500
million rubles rather than the 25,000 million in the annual plan).41
The military were particularly reluctant to accept a cut. In
February, before the proposed cuts, Tukhachevsky and Uborevich, in
a trenchant memorandum to Voroshilov, argued that in 1933 the
imperialist powers, including Britain, Germany and Japan, had

37
RGASPI, 17/3/942, art. 58/34; 5446/1/475, 14 (art. 624/109s).
38
RGASPI, 17/3/942, 24.
39
RGASPI, 17/3/944, 20, 61–62. This was not quite the end of the story. On
April 26 the final plan for the quarter adopted by Sovnarkom was increased slightly
to 6,050 million rubles (GARF, 5446/1/84, 380–381 (art. 970)). The revised annual
investment plan was approved by Sovnarkom on April 28 (GARF, 5446/1/86,
39–42 (art. 993)).
40
PKh, 5–6, 1934, 29 (G. Smirnov), and the appendix tables on p. 185 and
elsewhere.
41
PKh, 7, 1934, 11 (editorial).
48 The Economy in 1934
decided to devote much more attention to the air force, and that sud-
den attack would now replace the old methods of waging war. In a
prophetic passage, they declared:

The side which is not ready to destroy the aircraft bases of the enemy
[etc. etc.] … by rapid methods … will itself be defeated in the same
style, will not be able to carry out the necessary strategic concentration
and will lose its frontier bases for military action.

By 1935 8,300 aircraft could be directed against the USSR, and to

deal with these a stock of at least two or three times as many aircraft
was required, so development must be concentrated in 1934 and 1935:

The side which goes through 1934 without a radical strengthening of

its aviation will suddenly find itself, unexpectedly for itself, in a
threatening position.

The authors claimed that Ordzhonikidze supported their position.42

Soon after this pressure from within the armed forces, Kuibyshev
nevertheless proposed to reduce the annual plan for capital construc-
tion in the armed forces from 800 to 720 million rubles. On April 8,
Voroshilov protested in an indignant memorandum to Stalin that this
cut would reduce the allocations to the Far East for barracks and
stores, and would prevent the completion of hangars, garages and
other facilities required for aviation and for naval construction, even
though most building sites were already active, and 45,000 additional
workers had already been recruited for the Far Eastern programme.43
In spite of these protests, Sovnarkom reduced the plan for April–June
from 280 to 245 million rubles, and the annual plan from 812 to 745
million.44 Then on April 24, in a memorandum to Molotov, the Chief
Military and Mobilisation Administration of Narkomtyazhprom listed
factory by factory the changes required by the reduction of the invest-
ment plan for the armaments industry, particularly emphasising that

42
RGVA, 33987/3/400, 123–127.
43
RGVA, 33987/8/663, 147, 147ob. a
44
The annual plan was not specifically listed in the Sovnarkom decree, but is
recorded in a later Gosplan report (see Harrison and Davies (1997), 380). The mili-
tary files include a note dated April 25, stating that Kuibyshev and Voroshilov had
agreed the size of the reduction (RGVA, 33987/3/633, 149).
 The First Six Months 49
they would be unable to fulfil the mobplan (the mobilisation plan) in
the event of war. For example, tank industry factory No. 37 was sup-
posed to increase its mobilisation capacity six-fold in 1935, but now
this would be impossible, and tanks would have to be tested in the
open air, which would make delivery in winter ‘extremely difficult’.45
Against this background Stalin, Voroshilov and other members of
the Politburo indicated their support for the armed forces by partici-
pating in a concert and lunch on May 2 for 2,000 military partici-
pants in the May Day Parade. Voroshilov praised Stalin as ‘leader of
the Red Army, who knows it in detail’.46 Stalin, in an unpublished
speech, displayed his close attention to armaments by calling for
improvements in tanks, artillery and aircraft, specifying for example
the required velocity, ceiling and range of fighters, reconnaissance
planes and long- and short-range bombers.47
The plan for investment in armaments was, however, not increased.
But a few weeks later Stalin made a significant concession to the
military by increasing the allocation to road construction. Voroshilov,
in a memorandum to Stalin dated May 27, 1934, reported that the
Politburo commission on the subject had recommended a substantial
increase in spite of the opposition of Grin’ko, the People’s Commissar
for Finance, and complained that Sovnarkom had opposed the rec-
ommendation of the commission. Without an increase in the alloca-
tion, only enough was available in the main to build poor-quality
roads of ‘narrow strategic significance’.48 On June 9, the Politburo
increased the allocation by 70 million rubles.49
During April–June 1934, the economy continued to expand
extremely rapidly. In 1934, TsUNKhU sent regular monthly reports
about industrial production to Stalin and Molotov. These showed
that the rate of growth consistently amounted to 17 per cent or more
as compared with the same month in the previous year. Group A
industry (producer goods, mainly produced in Narkomtyazhprom)

45
RGAE, 7297/41/184, 155–152.
46
P and Krasnaya zvezda, May 4, 1934.
47
Nevezhin (2003), 53–4.
48
Sovetskoe rukovodstvo (1999), 280.
49
RGASPI, 17/3/946, 3, 48. According to later data, the allocation was increased
from 543 to 591 million rubles (Zaleski (1980), 650). The Soviet volume on the 1935
plan reported that 550 million rubles was actually spent; a 1937 document gave the
final figure as 609 million rubles (Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1935 (1935), 460;
RGAE, 1562/10/468, 5). Both these figures were higher than the average fulfilment
of the investment plan.
50 The Economy in 1934
expanded by more than 25 per cent, and the armaments industries
by over 30 per cent.50 These comparisons with January–June 1933
were biased, because in the first half of 1933 industry was in crisis.
But the output of Narkomtyazhprom industry was 10.2 per cent
greater than in the second half of 1933, when heavy industry had
begun to expand rapidly.51
These successes enabled the Gosplan journal to claim that in the
first six months of 1934 industrial production already amounted to
47.8 per cent of the annual 1934 plan, a considerably greater per-
centage than in previous years.52 In Narkomtyazhprom, an increase
in production of 29 per cent was obtained both by an increase in
output per worker, estimated at 16.8 per cent as compared with
January–June 1933, and by an increase in the number of workers by
10.3 per cent.53 Narkomtyazhprom also reported that the cost of
production had fallen by 6.4 per cent as compared with average costs
in 1933. For the first time for many years, costs declined in the coal
and iron and steel industries as well as in machine building.54
Surveying the economy as a whole, a confidential Gosplan report
on the first six months of 1934 applauded the ‘serious quantitative
and qualitative development in the economy’. The rapid growth of
industry was ‘a result of the consolidation of the breakthrough
achieved in the second half of 1933’.55
The Gosplan report recognised, however, that some important sec-
tors were still in difficulties. Within heavy industry, non-ferrous metals
lagged: the production of copper increased by only 8.3 per cent. The
performance of the previously sluggish oil industry improved, but the
output of petrol (benzin), critical for the aircraft and motor industries,
increased by only 4.4 per cent.56 And the performance of the
50
GARF, 5446/27/81, 7, 9, 11, 13; these one-page reports, signed by Kraval’,
deputy head of TsUNKhU, were sent to Stalin, Molotov and Kuibyshev. From
March they were also sent to Mezhlauk, who replaced Kuibyshev as head of
Gosplan.
51
For the 1934 figures, see Osnovnye pokazateli-NKTP. June and January–June 1934,
41; for 1933, see vol. 4, p. In the previous year, Narkomtyazhprom output in
January–June did not increase as compared with July–December 1932, and even in
1932 it was only 5.3 per cent greater in January–June than in July–December 1931.
52
PKh, 7, 1934, 5 (editorial; sent to press August 5, 1934).
53
Osnovnye pokazateli-NKTP, June and January–June 1934, 41.
54
Osnovnye pokazateli-NKTP, July 1934, 114–15. Costs continued to rise in the oil
extraction and non-ferrous metals industries.
55
RGAE, 4372/333/122, 284–283 (report dated July 18, 1934).
56
Osnovnye pokazateli-NKTP, June and January–June 1934, 55–78.
 The First Six Months 51
consumer goods industries in general was unsatisfactory. In value
terms, production in January–July 1934 was only 10.8 per cent greater
than in the same period of 1933. Within this total, the output of the
food industry was 21.1 per cent greater in January–June 1934 than in
the same months of 1933, but in 1933 these had been famine
months.57 The production of light industry increased by only 4.5 per
cent,58 dragged down by the low output of cotton textiles (–3.9 per
cent), woollens (–11.1 per cent) and leather footwear (–5.5 per cent).59
This poor performance was, of course, a result of the continuing
poor supplies from agriculture: the amount of raw wool and hides
continued to decline throughout 1933, and the raw cotton available
from the 1933 harvest was only slightly greater than in the previous
year (see vol. 5, pp. 456–7, 474). The annual Gosplan report for 1934
stated that in light industry as a whole ‘from January to May, growth
as compared with the previous year declined from 7.6 to 0 per cent’;
a gradual increase had begun only in June.60

(ii) Internal trade

The relatively poor performance of the consumer goods industries

resulted in failure to achieve the plans for internal trade in the first
six months of the year. As early as March 10, Mar’yasin, still at this
time only a deputy chair of Gosbank, sent a memorandum to Stalin
which warned that ‘the sharp underfulfilment of the trade plan as
early as the first quarter ... demonstrates the unsatisfactory position
of the trade network ... and the real threat which has emerged to the
annual plan for trade turnover and to our plan not to issue currency’.
Mar’yasin proposed far-reaching changes in the planning and organ-
isation of trade. Trade plans were far too inflexible, he argued, and
failed to coordinate the stocks available with consumer demand. In
future, a series of measures should make trade more flexible:

quarterly plans should be replaced by six-monthly plans; central trad-

ing agencies should be permitted to hold stocks to a specified amount;
the regions should be permitted to move goods between the

57
Osnovnye pokazateli, July 1934, 3; figures for January–June have not been available.
58
Osnovnye pokazateli, July 1934, 3; these figures are for January–July.
59
Itogi ... po tovarooborotu, June–July 1934, 17; these figures are for January–June.
60
Industrializatsiya 1933–1937 (1971), 276 (report dated January 28, 1935).
52 The Economy in 1934
allocations for rationed and for commercial supplies, and between
the state and cooperative sectors; guaranteed (bronirovannye) allocations
should be restricted to gold and fur.

Furthermore, a People’s Commissariat for Trade (Narkomtorg)

should be established. The present Narkomsnab was mainly an
industrial commissariat (responsible for the food industry), while the
Committee for Commodity Funds had no staff, even though it was
responsible for trade plans and for fixing prices. The new Narkomtorg
should take over all wholesale bases and take responsibility for both
state and cooperative trade. Stalin, evidently impressed by this mem-
orandum, circulated it to members of the Politburo.61 Some of these
reforms had to await the abolition of rationing; others were never
carried out. But on July 29 Narkomsnab was abolished and replaced
by Narkompishcheprom (the People’s Commissriat for the Food
Industry) and Narkomvnutorg (the People’s Commissariat for
Internal Trade) – often known as Narkomtorg.62
Before this administrative reform, the authorities sought to pro-
vide additional consumer goods to close the gap between supply and
demand which had led Mar’yasin to launch his memorandum. On
March 20, a Sovnarkom decree increased the investment in local
industry in 1934 by 72 million rubles and planned that its production
of consumer goods should be 226 million rubles greater than in the
1934 plan. To encourage this additional production, any profits
received would remain fully at the disposal of the soviet to which the
local enterprise was subordinate, and the goods were to be available
for sale in the region or district in which they were produced.63 Then
on April 1 Sovnarkom established a commission under Akulov to
prepare a draft decree on private trade. The term used was chastnaya
torgovlya, referring to non-state trade other the ‘kolkhoz trade’ of col-
lective farmers. The draft decree banned private trade in agricultural
raw materials purchased from others, but would have permitted
trade in ‘small drapery, small wooden goods and goods from chip-
pings, toys, fruit, berries, vegetables, mineral waters, etc.’ provided

61
APRF, 3/43/6, 43–58; the document was circulated on March 26. Stalin added
the heading ‘On the Planning of Trade Turnover and the Organisation of Soviet
Trade’.
62
SZ, 1934, art. 313. For the appointment of Mikoyan and Veitser as the respective
commissars, see p. 28 above.
63
GARF, 5446/1/34, 285–287 (art. 583); SZ, 1934, art. 122.
 The First Six Months 53
that it was carried out ‘on the ground, from the hands, and from
trays, stalls and kiosks’.64 But private trade was a sensitive subject;
and this decree was evidently not enacted.

(iii) Finance

Sovnarkom sought to stabilise the financial situation by reducing

budget expenditure. As usual, it tried to economise by cutting down
on bureaucracy. A decree dated April 11 ordered People’s
Commissariats and other central establishments, and their local
agencies, to reduce their staff by 14.1 per cent from 105,671 in 1933
to 90,854. This measure was to be carried out in full within ten
days(!), and no new institutions were to be established without the
permission of Sovnarkom.65 On the same day a parallel decree
stated that the staff of economic and cooperative agencies was to be
reduced by 10–15 per cent.66 Such proposed staff cuts were not
usually achieved in practice.
In spite of these measures, budget expenditure and short-term
credits crept up. A Sovnarkom decree dated June 22 stated that the
failure of the railways to carry out the freight plan in January–
June had led to ‘serious financial difficulties’. The freight plan for
July–December had to be reduced, and in consequence the sub-
sidy allocated to the railways by the 1934 state budget would have
to increase. Additionally, 150 million rubles would have to be paid
out in June and 48 million rubles in July to cover the excess losses
in 1933.67
In their effort to increase revenue, the financial authorities submit-
ted a series of memoranda to the Politburo urging that more supplies
should be made available, and that retail prices in normal trade
should be increased. They insistently argued that commercial trade
at higher prices should be increased. In March, the Politburo agreed

64
The commission was instructed (in Molotov’s handwriting) to ‘take account of
the exchange of opinions at Sovnarkom’ (GARF, 5446/3/8, 118).
65
SZ, 1934, art. 157. An unpublished appendix set out the reduction to be made
in considerable detail (GARF, 5446/1/85, 207–213).
66
SZ, 1934, art. 159.
67
GARF, 5446/1/476, 100–101 (art. 1494/259ss); this decree was approved by
the Politburo on the same day (RGASPI, 17/3/947, art. 114/104).
54 The Economy in 1934
to increase the amount of grain made available for the commercial
sale of bread in 1934 from 1,638,000 to 1,802,000 tons.68
Two months later, on May 20, 1934, the Politburo examined the
balance of food and fodder grains for the remainder of the agricul-
tural year (to June 30), and concluded that grain must be economised
still further in view of the drought. The seriousness of the situation
was indicated by a top-secret decision to import a small amount of
grain for the Far-Eastern region. Against this background, the
Politburo decided to double the ration price for bread from June 1 – a
major change in the prices paid by the consumer.69 This decision also
increased the prices of meals in canteens, which until then had been
a major source of nourishment at low prices.70 In compensation the
wages of lower-paid workers were to be raised by 10–15 per cent.
The published decree announcing the wage increase described the
existing price of bread as ‘extremely low’.71 This was a significant
move towards the abandonment of the view that the ‘normal’
rationed price was the real price, and that the commercial price was
exceptional. The price increase was naturally unpopular. Party offi-
cials reported rumours that Stalin was going to annul the decree, and
a few months later some mandates sent by voters to candidates in the
local elections called for a return to the pre-June bread prices.72 A
secret central committee directive advised local officials to explain to

68
RGASPI, 17/162/16, 18, no. 148/128, dated March 17. The amount eventu-
ally sold commercially in 1934 was 1,771,000 tons (Itogi ... po torgovle, July 1935,
16–17).
69
RGASPI, 17/3/945, 40 (no. 187/171); for the Sovnarkom decree on the same
day see GARF, 5446/57/30, 230–231 (art. 1207/206s), and for the clause on the
Far East see GARF, 5446/57/34, 8.
70
RGASPI, 17/3/946, 21 (no. 91/79, decision by correspondence, dated June 4).
An exception was made for Moscow, Leningrad and the textile areas (a major strike
had occurred in the textile areas in 1932, after cuts in the bread ration, and this no
doubt explains why they were exempted from the increase); but even here, while the
price of ordinary bread was not increased, the increase applied to sandwiches
(buterbrody – open sandwiches) and white rolls.
71
SZe, May 28, 1934 (decree of central committee and Sovnarkom, dated May
27); RGASPI, 17/3/946, 5, 49–58 (Politburo decision no. 13/1 by correspondence,
dated May 27). For the relevant decree of the Committee of Commodity Funds,
dated May 29, see BFKhZ, no. 31/33, 1934. The wage increase was provided for
nearly 9 million of the 23 million persons employed by the state (estimated from
data in decree of May 28 and in Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1935 (1935), 645–57).
72
S. Davies (1997), 28.
 The First Six Months 55
better-paid workers that the state was unable to afford a general
increase in wages.73
The increase in bread prices resulted in a much-needed increase
in budgetary revenue. The sum needed for the wage increase for
lower-paid workers in the seven months June–December 1934 was
estimated at 750 million rubles.74 But the addition to budgetary rev-
enue resulting from the higher bread prices was over 1,500 million
rubles.75
Nevertheless, budgetary revenue from turnover tax and commer-
cial trade in April–June was 345 million rubles less than planned, so
that the shortfall from these two sources in the first six months of
1934 amounted to as much as 994 million rubles (see Khlevnyuk and
Davies (1999), Table 5). The underexpenditure on capital investment
and other items of the budget as compared with the plan did not
compensate for this failure; and the pressure on the currency contin-
ued to increase. Two Politburo decisions in April authorised the issue
of ‘up to’ an additional 300 million rubles, but required that this
issue was to be reimbursed by May 20.76 A Sovnarkom decree of
May 14 insisted that currency in circulation on July 1 should not
exceed the level of January 1.77 In fact the net issue in these six
months amounted to 178 million rubles.

73
RGASPI, 17/3/946, 49.
74
This was the figure in the published decree of May 27; the Politburo estimate
was 665 million.
75
In 1934 the turnover tax paid by Komzag to the unified budget amounted to
4,574 million rubles (Otchet ... 1934 (1935), 174–5); this excludes the payments from
commercial trade. Let us assume that the sales of grain per month were approxi-
mately the same before and after the price increase (in fact they were a little higher – it
may be calculated from the data in Itogi ... po torgovle, January 1935, 22, 25, that the
market fund for non-commercial sales of flour amounted to 3,609,000 tons in
January–June and 4,123,000 tons in July–December). With a doubling of prices
from June 1, it may be estimated that receipts per month were 481 million rubles in
June–December as against 241 million in January–May, an additional 240 million
rubles; over seven months, so the additional revenue amounted to 240 ⫻ 7 = 1,680
million rubles. This needs to be reduced by the decline in commercial revenue due
to the slight fall in commercial sales of grain in the second half of the year, and the
halving of the commercial price of bread from December 1, 1934. The revenue
from turnover paid by Komzag in 1934 (excluding commercial sales), 4,574 million
rubles, was 2,300 million rubles in excess of the original 1934 budget (Otchet ... 1934,
174–5).
76
RGASPI, 17/162/16, 49 (decisions by poll of April 19 and 25 – arts. 43/26 and
103/86); each decision authorised the issue of 150 million rubles.
77
GARF, 5446/1/475, 198 (art. 1124/196ss).
56 The Economy in 1934
(iv) Agriculture

Before the harvest of 1934, the grim consequences of the 1932–33

famine continued to haunt the Soviet economy in spite of the
improved 1933 harvest. Cases of acute hunger – on a much smaller
scale than in 1933 – were reported from a very wide area until July
and later (see vol. 5, pp. 266–7, 411–12). There were also signs of
improvement. On July 1, 1934, the total stock of grain in the hands
of the state had increased to 2,838,000 tons, 841,000 tons more than
on July 1, 1933 (see Table 21), and considerably greater than the
frighteningly low stocks of July 1, 1932 – 1,362,000 tons, which had
fallen to a mere 792,000 tons on August 1 (see vol. 5, p. 104). But the
grain stocks at the end of the 1933/34 agricultural year were still
insufficient to protect the towns and the army, as well as the peasants
themselves, from a major agricultural crisis.
For the USSR as a whole, the first stages of the 1934 grain harvest
were reasonably satisfactory. The land area ploughed in the spring of
1933 for the grain sown in the autumn for the 1934 harvest was
substantially greater than in the previous year (see Table 25). The
area sown in the autumn equalled the amount in the previous year,
and was sown considerably earlier (see Table 25). The autumn
ploughing in 1933 for the spring sowing of 1934 was as much as 25
per cent greater than in the previous year, and the subsequent area
sown in the spring reached the same total as in 1933. The earlier the
crop is sown the more likely it is to withstand later poor weather, and
in 1934 sowing took place considerably earlier than in previous years,
including 1930, the record crop year. These developments led
Gosplan to conclude in its report on January–June that the successful
spring sowing meant that the harvest would be ‘close to the 1933
harvest, in spite of the worse meteorological conditions’.78
This prediction eventually proved to be correct. But by the time
of the Gosplan report a major obstacle to success had already
become abundantly obvious: the severe drought in a large part of
Ukraine and adjacent areas. In contrast to the 1933 Ukrainian har-
vest, which had been very successful, Ukraine was now repeating
the experience of 1932. On May 14 there was a sudden attempt to
sow an additional 15 million hectares, with a reduction in tax by

78
RGAE, 4372/333/122, 284–283 (report dated July 18, 1934).
 The First Six Months 57
50 per cent for those sowing above the initial norm.79 Molotov on
May 22, 1934, wrote to Kuibyshev about ‘the threat of drought’ (see
p. 58 below). A few days later, the published central committee and
Sovnarkom decree of May 27, announcing a wage increase for
lower-paid workers in connection with the increased ration price for
bread, attributed the increase in the market price of grain in May to
‘the partial destruction of the sowings in the southern areas of the
USSR in connection with the dry weather’.80
In this context of nervousness about the forthcoming harvest, on
June 29 a Politburo decision implicitly abandoned the earlier plan to
export some two million tons of grain in 1934. It stated that until the
question of the grain export from the forthcoming campaign was
settled, only up to 100,000 tons of barley, 25,000 tons of rye and
50,000 tons of wheat could be exported in the third and fourth
quarters of 1934.81
When the central committee plenum assembled on the same day,
June 29, the drought and poor harvest in Ukraine was a major sub-
ject of attention. In his opening report, Kuibyshev claimed rather
complacently that ‘in spite of the dry spring, the great work under-
taken by the party during the spring sowing has secured a good har-
vest’. Kosior, party secretary in Ukraine, admitted more frankly that
the grain collections would be carried out ‘in conditions of much
greater difficulties’ than in 1933. Even if the sowing of the late grains
such as maize was successful, the Ukrainian harvest would be ‘con-
siderably lower than last year’. Khataevich, party secretary in the
Dnepropetrovsk region of Ukraine, reported that much of the grain
was on such short stalks that it would have to be ‘shaved’ rather than
harvested. He asserted that in view of the poor harvest his region
would provide 10–12 million puds (164,000–200,000 tons) less than
planned in the control figures. Bryukhanov, deputy head of TsGK,
the USSR commission responsible for measuring the grain yield,
reported that the yield of the five main grains in the southern grain
regions would be about 3 tsentners per hectare less than in 1933.82

79
RGASPI, 17/3/945, 26. Six days later it was decided to exclude individual
peasants from this arrangement (17/3/945, 39).
80
P, May 28, 1934.
81
RGASPI, 17/162/16, 111. No further decision about grain export in 1934 has
been traced.
82
RGASPI, 17/2/525, 3–19ob, published in TSD, iv (2002), 157, 161, 167–9,
170.
58 The Economy in 1934
Three weeks after the plenum, on July 17, 1934, a top-secret deci-
sion of Sovnarkom drew the necessary conclusion. It reduced the
compulsory grain deliveries and other grain collections imposed on
the peasant and kolkhoz sector in Ukraine by one-third, from 362 to
241 million puds (5.93 to 3.95 million tons).83 The authorities now
had to cope with this reduction.

(C) THE SECOND SIX MONTHS

(i) Financial and trade crisis

The failure to keep currency issues in check led the authorities to

introduce further financial restrictions in the second half of the year.
On May 22, two days after the decision to increase the prices for
rationed bread, Molotov, who was on leave in the Crimea, wrote to
Kuibyshev, his deputy in Sovnarkom in Moscow, about the investment
plan for the July–September quarter:

I’ve been thinking about the third quarter. I consider that it would be
wrong to adopt a plan for the third quarter larger than the plan for
the second quarter. It would be more correct if we adopt an even lower
construction plan, particularly in view of the threat of drought.84

This was a drastic proposal. The July–September quarter is the peak

of the building season. The Politburo decision did not accept
Molotov’s pessimistic recommendations on the quarterly economic
plan. On June 4, it planned investment at 6,890 million rubles as
compared with 6,090 in the previous quarter, although it insisted
that no supplementary capital grants would be made available.85

83
GARF, 5446/1/477, 20–22. The final plan was as follows in million puds
(thousand tons in brackets): compulsory deliveries 181 (2960); payments to MTS
in kind 55 (900); return of 1933 grain loan 2.9 (48); return of 1933 debt to MTS
2.3 (38).
84
RGASPI, 79/1/798, 10–11, published in Stalinskoe Politbyuro (1995), 140.
Kuibyshev, who had previously been in direct charge of agricultural collections and
of Gosplan, was still generally responsible for both these functions in the Politburo
and Sovnarkom.
85
RGASPI, 17/3/946, 19–20, 67–70 (no. 88/76, adopted by correspondence); the
planned supply of goods to the countryside was to be reduced by the same amount.
 The Second Six Months 59
Then on June 22, noting ‘serious financial difficulties’ on the railways,
it decided that the railways’ budget subsidy for 1934 would have to
be increased by as much as 643 million rubles.86
On July 1, the mounting financial difficulties were vividly demon-
strated by the July–September directives for the all-Union budget
and the credit plan of Gosbank. Strenuous efforts were made to
increase budgetary revenue by increasing the revenue from commer-
cial trade, which was to amount to 2,150 million rubles, 20 per cent
of the all-Union budget. The annual plan had set the revenue from
commercial trade for the whole of 1934 at only 6,030 million rubles
(1,500 million rubles per quarter).87 Nevertheless, the increase in
expenditure resulted in a substantial deficit, amounting to 745 million
rubles. The credit plan reflected this decision in its own deficit of 686
million rubles; and Sovnarkom authorised the issue of 600 million
rubles in additional currency.
Even this revised plan proved extremely difficult to achieve. On
July 10 Mar’yasin, now head of Gosbank, reported to Molotov that
the supply of sugar and bread products for commercial trade was
far less than planned.88 Ten days later Grin’ko, also anxious about
the shortfall in revenue from commercial trade, proposed to Stalin
and Molotov that building materials should be made available at
commercial prices in special shops in 13 towns in the second half
of 1934. He pointed out that housing trusts and individual citizens
were unable to obtain wood, materials for windows, roofing iron or
glass, and this led to extensive speculation in materials intended for
state-planned projects, and to theft from the building sites. The
proposed increase in commercial trade would increase state reve-
nue. The proposal was not taken further. A sceptical note written
on the memorandum by Chubar’ asked ‘Will market supplies
[ fondy] be allocated and by what channels will they reach the
consumer?’.89
As Grin’ko and Mar’yasin feared, in July receipts from commer-
cial trade were less than planned.90 The month saw a general
86
RGASPI, 17/3/847, 28 (art. 114/104).
87
Otchet ... 1934 (1935), 174–5.
88
GARF, 5446/15a/451, 2. Mar’yasin was appointed vice-chair of Gosbank on
February 11, 1932, and chair on April 4, 1934.
89
RGAE, 6759/3/139, 79.
90
See GARF, 5446/15a/451, 1 (memorandum to Molotov from R. Levin, deputy
People’s Commissar for Finance, dated August 9); revenue amounted to 685 million
rubles as compared with the 753 million planned.
60 The Economy in 1934
deterioration in the financial situation. On July 25, Grin’ko and
Mar’yasin addressed a joint memorandum to Stalin and Molotov in
which they pointed out that as much as 320 million of the quarterly
currency plan of 600 million rubles had already been issued. They
attributed the excess issue primarily to the failure to supply goods for
commercial trade; and proposed a series of measures to accelerate
these supplies. Two days later, on July 27, most of these proposals
were accepted by the Politburo.91 In the next few weeks, further
measures were adopted in order to increase revenue.
By September 30, partly as a result of these measures, the finan-
cial situation had somewhat improved. Revenue from the three main
sources of budgetary income exceeded the quarterly plan (see
Khlevnyuk and Davies (1999), Table 8). But state budgetary and
credit expenditure evidently also increased even more than planned,
and the increase in currency circulation during the quarter amounted
to 725 million rubles as compared with the planned 600 million
rubles.
The experience of these months convincingly demonstrated that
the way out of the financial difficulties was to increase the prices of
rationed goods, and the amount of commercial trade at higher
prices. It also showed, however, that commercial prices could not
continue at the high level which obtained when commercial supplies
were small. On July 27 the Politburo was compelled through lack of
sales to reduce the commercial price of sugar by about 20 per cent
in the main sugar-producing regions, and in the Moscow and
Leningrad regions.92 Then on August 13 Mar’yasin in a memoran-
dum to Molotov complained both that some goods were in short
supply and that ‘the high level of commercial prices hinders the sale
of a number of food goods, especially confectionery, vegetable oil,
and also sugar in those regions in which the latest reduction of
prices was not carried out (such as the Volga regions)’. He insisted

91
RGASPI, 17/163/1033, 496, 136–137. This was not the sole explanation of the
additional currency issue. In July issue amounted to 334 million rubles (see GARF,
5446/26/6, 14), exceeding the plan by more than 130 million rubles (600 million
rubles in the quarter amounts to 200 million rubles per month). But the shortfall in
the tax on commercial sales was only 68 million (see previous note).
92
RGASPI, 17/3/949, 28 (no. 147/128, approved by correspondence). In the
same decision the Politburo also agreed to the commercial sale of eggs in Moscow
and Leningrad.
 The Second Six Months 61
that the commercial prices of goods in surplus should be reduced.93
Financial necessity increased the proportion of commercial trade
and drove the commercial price and the normal rationed price
closer together.
The growth of commercial trade brought further problems. The
availability of goods on commercial sale had provided temptations
and opportunities, ever since the inception of the system, for trading
organisations, enterprises and individual officials to transfer goods
from the closed network, where prices were low, to the commercial
network for sale at higher prices. The great expansion of commercial
trade in the first half of 1934 led to a burgeoning of these speculative
activities. In July the authoritative KTF (Committee on Commodity
Funds and Control of Trade), attached to the Council of Labour and
Defence (STO) and headed by Molotov, despatched Mikoyan,
Lyubimov, head of light industry, Grin’ko, Mar’yasin and other senior
economic leaders to the provinces. Their remit included: ‘check what
is being done to deal with speculation and intensify the struggle with
purchase of goods for resale, especially in view of the difference in
prices between commercial and non-commercial goods’. The OGPU
and the civil police (militsiya) should be involved in the struggle.94
The memorandum from Grin’ko on building materials prepared
at this time drew attention to ‘widely developed blat’ and to the theft
of materials from building sites.95 G. P. Tseitlin in another memoran-
dum claimed that the widespread resale of goods by regional and
district trading organisations involved ‘the complete disruption ( pol-
noe razrushenie) of prices’; a double and sometimes a treble mark-up

93
GARF, 5446/26/6, 4–6 (memorandum to Molotov). Molotov reluctantly
supported the memorandum with a waspish comment:

CDES. RUDZUTAK AND CHUBAR’. Although our financial agencies are

one-sidedly oriented on commercial trade and are taking little action in their
own department [po svoei linii], it is necessary to help them in this matter.

This memorandum is a copy, and the comment by Molotov (dated August 19) is
typed, but bears Molotov’s signature. Ya. E. Rudzutak, like Chubar’, was a vice-
chair of Sovnarkom.
94
GARF, 6759/1/11, 74; 6759/1/621, 194–195. STO was the main sub-
committee of Sovnarkom. For the functions of the KTF see V. Barnett in Rees, ed.
(1997), 181. KTF was absorbed by the People’s Commissariat of Internal Trade in
August 1934 (ibid. 182).
95
GARF, 6759/3/139, 79 (memorandum to Stalin and Molotov, dated July 20).
62 The Economy in 1934
on the official price was charged to consumers, who also had to pay
high freight charges.96 In Gor’kii (Nizhnii-Novgorod) and other
regions the closed shops in factories (Departments of Workers’
Supply – otdely rabochego snabzheniya – ORSy and Closed Workers’
Cooperatives – zakrytye rabochie kooperativy – ZRKy), which received
substantial supplies of food and consumer goods at low ‘normal’
prices, were said ‘in many cases to have turned into an open trade
network, carrying on illegal sale of goods at commercial prices’.97
For the most part these abuses were tackled by the traditional
devices, punitive sanctions and administrative control. In the first six
months of 1934 58,314 people were arrested and a further 53,000
exiled for speculation.98 But it was now increasingly recognised that
these were palliative measures; and that such illegal activities would
be eliminated only if Soviet trade took place without rationing; and
prices and incomes were set so that supply and demand on the retail
market were in balance.
In the last few months of 1934 the course of public finance thor-
oughly undermined the remaining hopes of achieving a favourable
financial situation before the abolition of rationing. On September
11, the Politburo approved the ceilings (limity) for October–December
1934, and a month later, on October 8, it approved the credit plan.
The plan assumed that industrial production would continue to grow
rapidly. But the amount allocated to capital investment, 5,110 mil-
lion rubles, was distinctly modest. The state budget was scheduled to
provide a considerable surplus, and as a result, according to the
credit plan, ‘at least 850 million rubles will be removed from
circulation in the fourth quarter’.99
During the quarter it became increasingly obvious that the finan-
cial plan could not be achieved. In a memorandum to Stalin and
Molotov dated November 20, 1934, Mar’yasin bluntly stated that
‘the course of the fulfilment of the currency plan for the fourth

96
GARF, 5446/82/30, 60ob.
97
RGAE, 7971/2/8, 134; this is a draft decree of Sovnarkom, September 1934.
For other examples of the sale of goods at illegally high prices see Malafeev (1964),
197–9.
98
Report from NKVD and militsiya to Sovnarkom, July 21 and August 20, 1934
(RGAE, 8040/8/45, 276–271). See also GARF, 6759/3/139, 69, 69a (memoran-
dum from Prokof ’ev, NKVD, to Molotov, dated July 14) on Moscow and region and
GARF, 6759/3/139, 64–62 (dated August 8) on Western region. The NKVD of the
USSR incorporated the former OGPU from July 1934 (see pp. 23–4 above).
99
RGASPI, 17/3/951, 49–50, 100–102 (art. 253); GARF, 5446/1/92, 252–253
(art. 2346).
 The Second Six Months 63
quarter will not secure the quarterly target of Sovnarkom of the
USSR to withdraw 850 million rubles from circulation’.100 The most
significant measure actually adopted was the sharp reduction in the
commercial price of sugar on December 12, which immediately
resulted in huge increases in sales.101 In the outcome, revenue from
commercial sales in October–December 1934 was less than planned,
and less than in the previous quarter.102 In a report to Molotov on
December 15, Gosplan estimated that the net currency issue in 1934
would be 400–500 million rubles (i.e. only about 350–450 million
rubles would have been withdrawn from circulation in October–
December).103 This estimate was far too low. Only 31 million rubles
were withdrawn from circulation in October–December (see Table 21).
Moreover, wage arrears by the end of the year amounted to
600 million rubles, greater than on December 1.104

(ii) Preliminary moves towards the abolition of rationing105

While the abolition of rationing was not yet on the immediate agenda,
developments in trade and price policy during the summer of 1934
were a major shift in this direction. Normal and commercial prices
had been brought closer together, and the continuing fall in prices on
the kolkhoz market meant that the gap between free-market and
commercial prices was also closing.106 The émigré economic bulletin
published in Prague commented in its August–September issue:

the Soviet government is seeking some kind of correction and some

kind of way out from the complicated confused position created in
recent years on the internal market.
100
GARF, 5446/27/81, 277–275; a copy of the memorandum was sent to
Kuibyshev.
101
See Khlevnyuk and Davies (1999), Table 3, and Izvestiya, December 28, 1934.
102
See Khlevnyuk and Davies (1999), Table 5.
103
RGAE, 4372/92/53, 18–22.
104
RGAE, 4372/92/53, 6–7 (memorandum from Mar’yasin, dated January 13).
According to the Gosplan memorandum of December 15 (see previous footnote),
the wage debt on December 1 was 590 million rubles.
105
The decision to abolish bread rationing, initiated by Stalin on October 22,
1934, is discussed in chapter 5, section (B) below.
106
See Khlevnyuk and Davies (1999), Table 3. In Moscow the price of a kilogram
of rye bread on the kolkhoz market in the first six months of the year varied between
1r85 and 2r, as compared with the commercial price of 1r50 (see the data for
Moscow and other towns in Tovarooborot SSSR za mai 1934, 36–7).
64 The Economy in 1934
This was ‘an experimental learning from mistakes’; ‘the experiment
of rationing the market for agricultural products gave negative
results, and a transition to the liberation of the food market from this
artificial rationing framework is intended’. The bulletin concluded
that legalising high commercial and kolkhoz market prices for food
had led to the abandonment of the artificial system of prices; ‘more
and more positions are being given up to true trade, taking into
account the real relationship between the availability of goods and
the money on the internal market’.107
From August onwards several significant developments reflected
the change in the attitude to trade. Mar’yasin, who went to the Azov-
Black Sea region on behalf of the Committee on Commodity Funds,
frankly argued in his report that the solution to the problem was to
move towards the abolition of rationing, at least as far as industrial
goods were concerned:

The continuation of the system (rezhim) of two prices for industrial

goods has turned into a brake on the further development of Soviet
trade, has made it more difficult to handle stocks of goods flexibly ...
and has provided possibilities for repurchase and speculation ...
I consider it necessary to take decisive steps even in the course of
1934 towards the unification of the prices of industrial goods.108

The new attitude to trade was strongly advocated within

Narkomvnutorg and the trading organisations. A memorandum on
trade in Moscow advocated a shift ‘from the rails of mechanical
distribution to the rails of Soviet trade’. The memorandum pointed
out that in the October–December quarter commercial trade in
Moscow would equal 43 per cent of the trade in rationed bread, 25
per cent of the trade in rationed sugar and 30 per cent of the
‘normal’ trade in confectionery; and praised the success of the huge
grocery Univermag (universal store) which had recently been opened
for sales at commercial prices in the premises of the famous pre-
revolutionary Eliseev grocery store in Gorky Street (Tverskaya), and
was visited by 60,000–70,000 customers a day. According to the
memorandum, pressure from customers, including peasants, and

107
BP, cxv (August–September 1934), 15, 19.
108
GARF, 6759/1/621, 159–160.
 The Second Six Months 65
from the Univermag, had already improved the quality of certain
kinds of industrial goods.109
Gosbank and the trading organisations were evidently convinced
that it was now possible to take practical steps towards the abolition of
food rationing. On September 14 a far-reaching proposal was made by
Mar’yasin about the sale of sugar, after bread the most important of
the rationed commodities. In a memorandum to the Politburo and
Sovnarkom he argued that in view of the large increase in the sugar-
beet harvest ‘it is evident that the commercial sale of sugar cannot be
carried out at the high level of prices of the current year’:

In the conditions which are appearing with the production of new

sugar I consider it necessary to give up the existing practice of three prices
for sugar (urban normal, rural normal and commercial), establish a single
price and abolish the rationing system for sugar.

Mar’yasin proposed that by December 1 a single price of 5 rubles

should be introduced. As this was double the rationed price, wages
of the lower-paid should be increased in compensation. Budgetary
revenue from sugar would amount to 4,000 million rubles in the
agricultural year 1934/35 as compared with 1,450 million in
1933/34; compensation paid out to the lower-paid over the year
would be 900 million rubles; so there would be a net gain to the
budget.110
This proposal was not approved, but its significance should not be
underestimated. The official scheme for the abolition of rationing
was that commercial trade should be increased and its prices gradu-
ally reduced to the level of the rationed prices. Mar’yasin’s proposals
implicitly rejected this scheme in favour of the more realistic arrange-
ments towards which the authorities had been moving in practice.
The new retail price should be fixed at a level between the existing
commercial and rationed prices, so that demand and supply would
be equal. The population would be partly compensated for the
increase, but at a level which would bring about a definite increase

109
RGAE, 7971/2/8, 122–125; this memorandum, which refers to the town of
Moscow, is not dated, but another version in the same file (ll. 128–33) is dated
October 26, 1934, and is signed by Z. Bolotin.
110
GARF, 5446/15a/427, 27–28 (memorandum addressed to Kaganovich and
Kuibyshev as Stalin and Molotov were on leave).
66 The Economy in 1934
in tax revenue.111 This general scheme was adopted by the government
when bread rationing was abolished three months later.

(iii) Agriculture

In 1934 Stalin was on leave for three months, from July 30 to October
31, and throughout most of this time he closely followed the progress
of the grain campaign, and bombarded Kaganovich, his deputy in
Moscow, with telegrams and letters. On August 12, after receiving a
memorandum about the slow progress of the grain deliveries from
D. A. Dvinsky, deputy head of the central committee secret
department, he wrote sternly to Kaganovich:

If you permit the least complacency in the grain collections, we may

end up on the rocks this year. Don’t forget that the plan for this year
is 70 million p[ud]s less than the actual collections last year.

He called for very strict control over individual peasant households,

reporting the outcome to the central committee every five days;
strong criticism of the negligence and wastefulness in Kazakhstan
and Saratov; a campaign against grain mites, strictly condemning
those at fault; and ‘fierce pressure’ for the return of grain loans. For
good measure he added a postscript that in areas where the collec-
tions were going badly ‘the party secretaries should be ordered to
return from leave and compelled to put things right’.112 On August
21 he instructed that Chernov, Yakovlev and Kleiner should be sent
to the Saratov, Stalingrad and Chelyabinsk regions and ‘compelled
to collect grain conscientiously’.113
By this time it had become clear to the authorities in Moscow that
the poor harvest in Ukraine would be compensated by a good harvest
in the Urals, Siberia and the Volga regions. Stalin’s son, visiting his
111
Mar’yasin reported that the ‘market fund’ of sugar would increase from
520,000 tons in 1933/34 to 1,000,000 tons in 1934/35. As budget revenue in
1933/34 amounted to 1,450 million rubles, we can calculate that without any price
change (and with the same proportion of commercial, rural and urban normal sales)
the revenue in 1934/35 would have amounted to 2,780 million rubles
((1,000,000÷520,000) ⫻ 1,450). The additional revenue was therefore (4,000 –
2,780) = 1,220 million less 900 million compensation = 320 million rubles.
112
SKP, 432–3.
113
SKP, 446.
 The Second Six Months 67
father in the Crimea, took with him a letter from Kaganovich about
these developments. However, on August 25 Stalin responded angrily
that ‘you are all counting on a good harvest in Siberia, the Urals and
the Volga and ... are comforting yourselves that as there is a good
harvest the collections will also be good’. He denounced this as
‘incorrect, illusory and dangerous’ and called for ‘maximum pressure’
in the regions with a good harvest. He also declared that in addition
to the compulsory delivery of grain, ‘purchases’ by the state (zakupki )
must amount to 200 million puds [3.3 million tons], and taxation
pressure must be increased; ‘I would not object even to some
“voluntary-compulsory” measures in regions with a good harvest to
stimulate purchases of grain’.114 On the same day a directive signed
by Stalin and Molotov obliged kolkhozy to form stocks ( fondy) to meet
the plan for zakupki before the grain was distributed to collective farm-
ers to remunerate their labour-days.115 Then on September 6 Stalin
even insisted in a further letter to Kaganovich that ‘you do not realise
what a catastrophe awaits us if we do not purchase all 200 million
puds of grain; ... our position is worse than you think’.116 On
September 11 the Politburo approved a detailed decree on the zakupki,
issued in the name of the central committee and Sovnarkom. It pro-
posed a number of incentives for the organisations responsible for the
zakupki, including the right of local soviets and consumer cooperatives
to retain part of the grain, and above all the provision of goods to the
value of 500 million rubles for kolkhozy, collective farmers and indi-
vidual peasants in return for supplying the grain. A wide variety of
goods was on offer, including sugar, felt boots, bicycles, gramophones
and watches, and building materials of all kinds.117
In the previous agricultural year, 1933/34, only 0.4 million tons
was collected in the form of zakupki, and the original plan for grain
deliveries approved by the June 1934 plenum of the central commit-
tee did not set a specific plan for zakupki. The zakupki insisted upon
by Stalin were certainly necessary if the state was to have grain in
hand to cope with the complexities of derationing. The 1934/35

114
SKP, 455.
115
Cited from the archives in Istoricheskie zapiski, no. 76 (1965), 58.
116
SKP, 477.
117
RGASPI, 17/3/951, 103–113. The zakupki campaign was widely publicised in
the press from September 21 onwards (see P, September 21, 22, et seq.) without
stating the amounts involved.
68 The Economy in 1934
grain deliveries plan, excluding zakupki, was no larger than the actual
amount of grain collected by the state in the previous year.118
From September to the end of the year, the campaign for normal
grain deliveries and zakupki continued side by side. On October 4
Kaganovich travelled to Chelyabinsk and Novosibirsk in order to
accelerate the grain collections.119 On October 11, Dvinsky sent a
message to Stalin reporting that by October 5 the grain collections
exceeded the amount collected on the same day in the previous
year.120 In the letter Stalin sent to Kaganovich on October 22
announcing his intention to abolish bread rationing (see p. 122 below),
his first sentence, implicitly revising his previous pessimism, stated
‘The plan for the grain collections will evidently be fulfilled for the
USSR.’ He continued by calling for the completion of the zakupki in
order to collect sufficient grain in the hands of the state. By the end
of the year what Stalin considered the essential prerequisite for the
abolition of rationing was achieved. Even more grain was collected as
zakupki than Stalin thought essential – 3.6 million tons as against the
3.3 million tons planned. Total collections amounted to 26.2 million
tons in 1934/35 as compared with 23.1 million in 1933/34.121

(D) THE OUTCOME

(i) The conference on heavy industry, September 1934, and its aftermath

Apart from the financial difficulties, developments in the second half

of 1934 continued to be outstandingly successful. A major ‘USSR
Conference of Managers and Engineering and Technical Personnel
of Heavy Industry’ met September 20–22 in an atmosphere of great
confidence and enthusiasm. In his opening address, Ordzhonikidze
reported that the production of Narkomtyazhprom in January–August

118
The amount in both 1933/34 (actual) and 1934/35 (plan) was 20.8 million tons
(these figures include deliveries by kolkhozy, sovkhozy and individual peasants, and
the payment in kind to MTS, but evidently exclude the milling levy and the repay-
ment in kind of grain loans) (see Kleiner’s report to the June 1934 central committee
plenum – RGASPI, 17/2/518, 72, 64–65).
119
SKP, 510–11, 514.
120
See TSD, iv (2002), 283.
121
1933/34: 22.7 collections (zagotovki) +0.4 zakupki; 1934/35: 22.6 +3.6. For data
see I. L. Strilever et al. (1935), pp. 17, 167. An alternative figure for 1934/35
collections, 23.3 million tons, is given in RGAE, 4372/35/548.
 The Outcome 69
1934 was as much as 28.4 per cent greater than in the same months
of 1933. In striking contrast to the tension with which industry had
approached the end of the year on previous occasions, Ordzhonikidze
calmly noted that ‘in the fourth quarter a particularly large increase
is not necessary in order to carry out the quarterly programme and
the whole annual plan’.122
The industrial experience of 1934 convincingly demonstrated
that the capacity introduced in previous years had made possible a
considerable expansion of production in 1934 – and that there were
good grounds for believing that this could continue in the future. At
the conference, Ordzhonikidze concentrated his attention on ‘the
reserves which we possess, which are still not utilised, and how to
mobilise them’. He pointed out that striking increases in production
had already been achieved by using capital more intensively. In sev-
eral major iron and steel works output per unit of plant had increased
considerably during 1934:

We will not listen any longer to those who assert that good indicators
cannot be achieved in our furnaces, using our ore and our coke.
If all our enterprises worked like those I have listed here, we would
have far more pig iron, we would probably have 4–5,000 tons more
a day.

Ordzhonikidze pointed out the further possibilities for the increased

use of existing capital. The engineering industry was working at only
80 per cent of its capacity, and the armaments industry had even
more spare capacity. Moreover, factories were often working for only
one seven-hour shift a day.123
This theme was taken up at the conference by many delegates.
M. M. Kaganovich pointed out that additional production could be
obtained not only by using equipment more fully and by using vacant
floor space, but also by overcoming ‘technological conservatism’.
Machine tools should be modernised, and components and product
types should be standardised.124 The head of the Maikop oil trust
acknowledged that its equipment was idle for 26 per cent of the time,
and also called for the implementation of Ordzhonikidze’s order
that American drilling speed should be reached in at least one oil
122
ZI, September 22, 1934.
123
ZI, September 22, 1934.
124
ZI, September 24, 1934.
70 The Economy in 1934
field.125 Gurevich, head of the iron and steel industry, proposed that
crude steel output per unit of open-hearth furnace should be
increased from the present 3.3–3.4 tons per square metre of furnace
floor to the output of the best furnaces, 4.5 tons and more, In addi-
tion, better repair of the furnaces would enable them to be used
250–300 times between repairs rather than the present 80–100
times.126 Rataichak, head of Glavkhimprom, the chief administra-
tion of the chemical industry, admitted that ‘capacity is considerably
greater than the plans received by the industry’; the main trouble
was the frequent breakdowns due to poor maintenance of equip-
ment.127 The deputy director of the Yaroslavl’ rubber and asbestos
combine reported that the previous management had been removed
by Ordzhonikidze because it insisted that the plan could not be
achieved without large expenditures on equipment, while the new
management had trebled output of tyres per day in the course of the
first nine months of 1934.128 The head of production at ZiS, the
Stalin vehicle works in Moscow, admitted that there were ‘still very
many reserves’ in the industry: the factories had been furnished with
first-class equipment which now needed proper exploitation.129
Mitkevich, the female director of the Gorbunov aircraft factory,
while noting the large increase in output per worker at the factory,
pointed out that it was working far below capacity, and needed orders
from outside the armaments industry to fill the gap.130 Pyatakov, with
characteristic bluntness, summed up the message conveyed by the
conference by shouting out at the director of the Khar’kov turbine
and generator factory ‘Your whole factory is a out-and-out reserve!’131
The particularly rapid development of iron and steel production
in 1934 led to an initiative which was to have far-reaching

125
ZI, September 23, 1934 (Borshchevskii, who pointed out that idle time in 1933
had been as much as 35 per cent).
126
ZI, September 23, 1934 (he was head of GUMP, Glavnoe upravlenie metal-
lurgicheskoi promyshlennosti).
127
ZI, September 24, 1934.
128
ZI, September 23, 1934.
129
ZI, September 24, 1934 (Vittenberg).
130
ZI, September 23, 1934. On the following day a female delegate from light
industry, complaining that heavy industry should employ more women in leading
positions, declared to applause that ‘I believe that women should rule our country
together with men’; in reply Ordzhonikidze drew attention to the speech by
Mitkevich, the only woman working in heavy industry to speak at the conference!
131
ZI, September 23, 1934; the director was Shubakin.
 The Outcome 71
consequences. Manaenkov, director of the Dzerzhinsky works,
announced at the conference that his factory would complete fully,
and ahead of time, its plan for ‘quantity, the orders placed with us,
quality, and variety of output’, and that this would be irrespective of
the number of furnaces actually brought into operation.132 Following
up this declaration, the representative of Stal’, the steel combine,
declared that the ‘uniquely large reserves’ in the industry would
enable it to follow Manaenkov’s example:

we take on the obligation to cover the underproduction which has occurred owing
to the delay in the introduction of new plant.133

In the next few years many gaps in the five-year plan were met by
operating equipment more efficiently – or more intensively – than
was originally planned.
The conference also paid considerable attention to the efficient
use of labour, an integral element in the drive to increase output
from available resources. This was very much a managers’ confer-
ence. The trade union representatives were reproved for demanding
more money for housing and other aspects of welfare rather than
working to improve the use of the available resources.134 A frequent
theme was the need for improved labour discipline and a reduction
in labour turnover. The speech of the director of the Putilov works
was published under the headline ‘Put an End to the Compromising
Attitude to Absenteeism’. He complained that other factories had
disrupted labour discipline by taking on workers who had been dis-
missed, and paying them more.135 Other speakers, however, sug-
gested that the main problem was the poor organisation of
production. Berezin, the director of the Kolomna engineering works.
admitted that the actual time worked per worker was only 5 hours 54
minutes in a seven-hour day, and Mitkevich gave the figure for her
factory as only five hours.136 Several senior managers admitted that
their industry could manage with far less workers. Ginzburg, the
head of the building industry in Narkomtyazhprom, posed ‘a militant

132
ZI, September 22, 1934.
133
ZI, September 23, 1934 (Shleifer).
134
See the exchange between Kosarev, on behalf of the Komsomol, and the trade
union secretary Veinberg (ZI, September 23, 1934).
135
ZI, September 23, 1934 (Ots).
136
ZI, September 23, 1934.
72 The Economy in 1934
task: in the shortest possible period of time, reduce the number of workers on
building sites by 40–50%’. Rataichik extravagantly claimed that the
chemical industry had ‘three times as large a labour force as it needs’.137
The chief engineer of a Leningrad power station, Kotonin, was
the only speaker at the conference to draw attention to the dangers
which could lurk in the more intensive use of equipment:

The fact that our power station plant works 6,000 hours a year is
presented as a major achievement as compared with abroad, where
the annual load is fixed at 3–4,000 hours. I must state, however, with
full responsibility, that such an extreme loading is not an achieve-
ment, but a ruination (ugroblenie) of our power plant. Equipment needs to
be halted on time, examined and repaired.

Foreign experience had shown that breakdowns were more costly

than keeping plant in reserve.138 Kotonin’s view was strongly chal-
lenged by the head of Lenenergo, the Leningrad power complex,
who insisted that the present reserve capacity was adequate, and
claimed that Kotonin, while an experienced engineer, had not been
involved in the operation of power stations in recent years.139 The
head of Mosenergo, the Moscow power complex, acknowledged
that Moscow power stations had to operate at a maximum capacity
of 650,000–670,000 kW, although the capacity available was only
600,000 kW:

This is a very substantial gap, and it obliges all the staff of the power
stations to force through working at full capacity.

But he also rejected Kotonin’s view that power plants should work
for only 3,000 hours a year as ‘profoundly mistaken’.140 A few months
later the Gosplan report on the 1935 plan noted that in 1934 power
capacity had increased far less than planned. ‘Increased power out-
put was obtained mainly by more intensive utilisation of existing
plant’, and the average number of hours worked had increased from
3,704 a year in 1933 to 4,000 in 1934. Gosplan’s conclusions were
compatible with Kotonin’s. It emphasised that the more intensive use

137
ZI, September 24, 1934; Ginzburg was head of Glavstroiprom.
138
ZI, September 24, 1934 (he worked at the Moscow-Narva power station).
139
ZI, September 23, 1934 (Antyukhin).
140
ZI, September 23, 1934 (Mitlin).
 The Outcome 73
of plant had led to delays in repairs, and insisted that the establish-
ment of reserve capacity in all the major power systems must be a
‘central task’ for 1935 and for the second five-year plan as a whole.
But developments in heavy industry in the next two years on the
whole confirmed Ordzhonikidze’s conclusion that production could
be substantially increased on the basis of existing capacity.

(ii) Industrial production

In its major publication The National-Economic Plan for 1935, issued in

June 1935, Gosplan reviewed the results of the 1934 plan, and was
able to claim that ‘in 1934 the USSR achieved considerable new
successes in carrying out the decisive economic task of the second
five-year plan – improving the technical rebuilding of the economy’.141
‘In socialist industry 1934 was a year of steep advance’, in which
both the heavy and food industries had exceeded their plan. The
production of industry as a whole had increased by 17.4 per cent,
and of heavy industry by as much as 26.7 per cent.142 Heavy industry
was particularly successful in two lagging branches. In coal mining ‘a
breakthrough had begun in the second half of 1933’, and in 1934
production increased by 23.2 per cent.143 And ‘1934 will enter the
history of Soviet iron and steel as a year of steep breakthrough, a
year of decisive victories in the struggle to master new technical
processes and new equipment’. Production of the industry had
increased by a record 39 per cent, and the production of pig iron
exceeded 10 million tons for the first time.144
The Gosplan report pointed out that industry achieved these results
largely by a substantial increase in output per worker rather than by
taking on new workers. Later data showed that in industry as a whole
the number of manual workers increased by 7.2 per cent in 1934, and
the number of white-collar workers and apprentices declined sub-
stantially, so the total increase in industrial employment was only 4.2
per cent – 335,000 (see Table 18). The large increases in production
were mainly obtained by increased productivity (output per worker).
In coal mining, following a decline in labour productivity in 1930–32,

141
For this volume see p. 130, n. 51 below.
142
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1935 (1935), 10, 13–14.
143
Ibid. 101.
144
Ibid. 118.
74 The Economy in 1934
the increase in 1934 was 14.4 per cent.145 Moreover, according to
Gosplan, ‘heavy industry as a whole exceeded the plan to reduce
production costs as a result of internal factors for the first time for
many years’.146 These improvements were in large part due to the
coming on stream of new capital: ‘1934 was the first year of the mass
assimilation of new machinery in labour-intensive industries’.147
The increases in labour productivity were accompanied by a sub-
stantial increase in wages. In industry as a whole, daily wages
increased by 14.9 per cent, nearly as rapidly as production, and in
coal mining wages increased more rapidly than output.148 But some
improvement took place in labour discipline. The recorded number
of days of both unjustified and justified absenteeism declined, and
labour turnover also declined.149
Against this background of rapid advance after a serious crisis,
Gosplan presented in its volume on the 1935 plan a quite frank
assessment of deficiencies in the economy in 1934. The timber and
light industries had been particularly unsuccessful. The timber indus-
try had failed to attract labour and had not used machinery efficient-
ly.150 Light industry ‘has not yet achieved the breakthrough required’,
particularly as a result of ‘completely insufficient work on expanding
the raw material base’.151 Local industry also lagged behind the plan,
and the artisan cooperatives had continued to lose labour in 1934.152
Gosplan also pointed out that within heavy industry itself several
sub-branches had performed badly. While the production of oil had
increased after the stagnation of the previous two years, it was still con-
siderably less than planned, largely as a result of several years in which
drilling and especially exploratory drilling of new oil fields had been
neglected. Oil refining lagged even more. In 1934 the production of
light oils was only 10 per cent greater than in 1931, although the need
for light oils had greatly increased: the production of automobiles was

145
Ibid, 318–19.
146
Ibid. 347–8.
147
Ibid. 349.
148
Osnovnye pokazateli, January 1935, 85.
149
Osnovnye pokazateli, January 1935, 98, 93.
150
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1935 (1935), 18.
151
Ibid. 177.
152
Ibid. 14, 218.
 The Outcome 75
18 times as great, and the production of tractors 2³ times as
great.153
Even in the most successful industries development was uneven.
The production of rolled steel lagged considerably behind pig iron
and crude steel. Stalin, addressing a reception for iron and steel
workers at the end of 1934, while praising the ‘great successes of the
iron and steel industry, which is the foundation of the economy’,
also called for the rapid development of crude and rolled steel, to
catch up with the progress of pig iron.154 The 1935 plan presented
a striking table which showed that as a result of low production
within the USSR and of import restrictions it was not until 1934
that the total availability of rolled steel had begun to emerge from
stagnation:

Supply of rolled steel (thousand tons)155

1930 1931 1932 1933 1934

Production 4671 4159 4288 4882 6723
Import 584 1275 802 427 265
Total 5262 5436 5090 5309 6968
The Gosplan report glossed over the financial difficulties of
1934. As usual, it boasted that the state budget was in surplus, but
it did not mention that the surplus was more than absorbed by the
increase in short-term credit outside the budget. In the course of
1934, currency in circulation in fact increased by 872 million
rubles, or 12.7 per cent, although the plan had stipulated that there
should be no net increase in currency during the year.156 By a
sleight of hand, the report claimed that ‘the average annual increase
in currency circulation in 1934 was maintained at the level of the
preceding year’. This claim depended on the very high level of cur-
rency in circulation at the beginning of 1933, the peak of the
economic crisis.157

153
Ibid. 107. The production of petrol amounted to only 2.74 million tons in 1934
as compared with 2.66 million in 1933 (ibid. 114).
154
P, December 29, 1934 (speech of December 26). Apart from his speech to the
Red Army on May 2 (see p. 49 above), this was his only reported address in 1934.
155
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1935 (1935), 126.
156
See Khlevnyuk and Davies (1999), 563.
157
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1935 (1935), 407.
76 The Economy in 1934
(iii) Investment

Gosplan reported that capital investment in 1934, at 21,500 million

rubles in current prices, while lower than the revised plan of 23,500
million, was 17 per cent greater than in 1933.158 Investment had
been allocated broadly along the lines stipulated in the plan.
Investment in transport, light industry, trade, education, health and
housing increased particularly rapidly, while investment in heavy
industry increased only slightly, and declined as a proportion of total
invesment (for the final figures see Table 8). The report on the 1935
plan failed to mention that the planned reduction of construction
costs in 1934 by 15 per cent had not been achieved, but an appendix
table quietly revealed that construction costs had remained stable in
1934, so that investment in real terms was very considerably less than
in the 1934 plan.159 Even so, the increase in investment put consider-
able pressure on the economy: the stocks of 11 of the 15 listed
building materials declined in 1934.160
To an even greater extent than in industrial production, the
increase in construction was achieved by an increase in output per
person rather than in the number of persons employed. Total
employment in the building industry increased from 2,349,000 to
2,455,000, or by only 4.2 per cent. As in industry, the absenteeism
and labour turnover declined, though, partly as a result of the sea-
sonal variation in employment in building, turnover was much higher
than in industry: it declined from 291.5 per cent of the average
labour force in 1933 to 238.1 per cent in 1934. Wages per worker
increased by 22.5 per cent, much more rapidly than in industry.161

(iv) The defence sector

The published Gosplan report on the results of the 1934 plan did not
deal with the defence sector. In 1934 its expansion was quite modest.
In practice, the Politburo had paid little attention to the strong pressure
from the military and the advice of the Ordzhonikidze commission.

158
However, the final figure for 1934 was 23,540 million rubles, equal to the plan
(see Table 8).
159
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1935 (1935), 658.
160
Osnovnye pokazateli, January 1935, 78; the stock of cement declined by one-third.
161
Osnovnye pokazateli, January 1935, 94–6.
 The Outcome 77
For the moment, the development of industry as a whole was treated
as more important than direct expenditure on defence. Expenditure
on Narkomvoendel, which was renamed Narkomoborony (the People’s
Commissariat of Defence) in June, was considerably less than planned.
In terms of current prices, it increased by 25.4 per cent. This was
partly because the number of servicemen, after declining in 1933,
increased from 885,000 to 975,000 in 1934.162 But a large part of this
increase was due to the higher cost of maintenance of the armed
forces, due to the increased prices of food and other commodities.163
The main increase in defence expenditure in real terms was in the
supply of armaments. The gross production of the armaments indus-
tries, measured in 1926/27 prices, increased by nearly 32 per cent.164
However, civilian production by these industries increased much more
rapidly than military production. Armaments production as such
increased by 20 per cent, which was a smaller increase than for
Narkomtyazhprom as a whole.165 The most rapid increase was in ship-
building, from a previously low level. The production of aircraft and
chemicals also increased rapidly. But the production of weapons and
ammunition increased only slightly, and remained lower than in 1932.166
At the beginning of 1935, Voroshilov, in a memorandum to
Ordzhonikidze about the results of 1934, acknowledged that mili-
tary orders had been met to a greater extent than in 1933, supported
by the improvement of industrial performance generally. But he

162
RGVA, 33987/3/1046, 146. For the renaming of the commissariat, see SZ,
1934, art. 256 (dated June 20). Gamarnik was appointed first and Tukhachevsky
second deputy people’s commissar. For defence expenditure, see Harrison and
Davies (1997), 380.
163
We estimate that the defence burden in terms of labour incomes slightly
declined from 5.1 to 5.0 per cent of all earnings (ibid. 395).
164
See Harrison and Davies (1997), 383, and RGAE, 4372/91/2101, 5, 3 (report
to defence sector of Gosplan, dated January 25, 1935).
165
Harrison and Davies (1997), 389. Typically, the ‘Molotov’ arms factory in Perm
fulfilled its plan as a whole ‘at the expense of basic (military) production)’; the local
representative of the party control commission expressed his ‘personal opinion’ that
the factory should not be allowed to claim that its plan was fulfilled (RGAE,
7297/38/184, 17–16 (n.d. [December 1934]). A similar report from the Sverdlovsk
NKVD was forwarded to Ordzhonikidze by Mironov on March 26, 1935 (ibid. 27–18).
166
Shipbuilding increased by 53 per cent (389), aircraft by 15.4 per cent, chemicals
by 54.9 per cent and GVMU by only 6.5 per cent. The military production of
GVMU, which managed the traditional armaments industries, and did not include
aircraft, shipbuilding, chemicals and tanks, had not recovered to the 1932 level
(RGAE, 4372/91/2189, 32–31 (dated January 20, 1935)).
78 The Economy in 1934
complained that production had lagged behind the plan for every
item except machine guns, and lagged behind heavy industry as
whole. In particular, inadequate attention had been given to the
production of new weapons.167
Capital investment in the defence sector increased at roughly the
same rate as in the economy as a whole. Investment in Narkomoborony
increased by 32 per cent, and in the armaments industries by 26 per
cent.168 Complaints from the armaments industries about the slow
increase in investment continued throughout the year. In September,
for example, GVMU complained that it had been allocated only 103
million rubles for October–December instead of the 155 million
rubles which were due.169 Eventually, the amount invested in GVMU
was increased substantially.170 But investment in the sector was far
lower than the plan approved at the beginning of the year.

(v) The Gulag economy

By the beginning of 1934 the total Gulag population had increased

to 510,000 persons (see Table 24). Data for the beginning of April
show the main employment of the camp population may be divided
into three categories (by this time the total number had somewhat
increased) (thousands):

1 Major industrial and building sites 310

2 Work under contract 130
3 Auxiliary work 118
TOTAL 558
Sources: TsAFSB, 3/1/316, 23–7, except for North-Eastern
camp, which includes the Dal’stroi trust, the population
of which amounted to 29,659 on January 1, 1934. and
has been added to the total (from Sistema (1998), 383).

167
RGVA, 33989/2/220, 24–22 (dated February 4, 1935).
168
Harrison and Davies (1997), 380, 384, 389. For Narkomoborony, we have taken
the credits actually utilised. This figure excludes the large investments for defence
purposes in the civilian sector, for which figures have not been available.
169
RGAE, 7297/41/184, 133–131 (memorandum to Pyatakov from Erman,
dated September 14).
170
See RGAE, 7297/41/110 (report of GVMU, dated May 9, 1935).
 The Outcome 79
The first category, covering 56 per cent of employment, includes
the major sites established in 1930–33. The most important of these
were

(1) The White-Sea Baltic Combine (BBK), the system of enterprises

and transport established round (the White-Sea Baltic Canal),
completed in 1933 (see vol. 4, pp. 32, 35–6, 37, 441);
(2) Dal’stroi, the trust responsible for mining gold in Kolyma (see
vol. 4, pp. 163, 172, 274, 273n, 441);
(3) the Moscow–Volga canal construction (see vol. 4, p. 441);
(4) railway construction in the Far East (including BAM – the
Baikal–Amur railway –, and also secondary lines to existing
railways) (see vol. 4. p. 441 n);
(5) the Ukhto-Pechora trust, comprising enterprises for the extraction
of coal, oil, and other substances in the Far North.

The second category, 23 per cent, includes such camps as Temnikov

and Svir’, which provided timber for Moscow and Leningrad.
The third category includes camps serving the Gulag itself,
engaged in agriculture and producing consumer goods. During the
harsh years of hunger agricultural sections were established in 16
camps, in order not to depend on sparse central supplies; the largest
of these were for Karaganda and Siberia.171
During 1934 the tendency to concentrate on major projects
became even more marked. By January 1935 the Moscow–Volga
canal employed 190,000 prisoners, BAM 154,000, BBK 66,000 (plus
22,000 special settlers), and Dal’stroi 60,000. In all, the major pro-
jects employed 64 per cent of the total camp population, which had
now risen to 725,000 (see Table 24). Dal’stroi was particularly suc-
cessful. Although the number employed increased only slowly, there
was a marked increase in gold production (see p. 342 below). This
was a result of the discovery of new sites and the construction of
approach roads in previous years. On February 22, 1935, E. P.
Berzin, the head of the trust, reported this progress to the Politburo,
which decided to give awards to him and other leaders of the trust.172

171
GARF, 9414/1/1913, 12–13.
172
RGASPI, 17/162/17, 127 (item XI) (February22); RGASPI, 17/3/961, 44–46
(art. 182) (March 22).
80 The Economy in 1934
The future progress of these projects depended of course on the
supply of capital and labour. In 1934, as we have seen, the level of
investment was hotly debated. On April 8, as part of his effort to
reduce investment as a whole, Kuibyshev decided to reduce investment
in the secondary railway lines in the Far East from 334 to 234 million
rubles,173 and the allocation to the Moscow–Volga canal from 400
to 300 million rubles. Five days later Yagoda, in a memorandum to
Molotov, Kuibyshev and Stalin, argued that these reductions were too
great, and proposed to reduce the allocations to the two projects by
only 30 and 50 million rubles respectively.174 The Sovnarkom decree
of April 28 (see p. 47 n. 39 above) agreed to Yagoda’s proposal for the
Moscow–Volga canal, reducing the allocation to 349 million rubles,
but eventually only 333 million rubles was invested in 1934.175
In the course of 1934 and 1935, the new NKVD, established in July
(see p. 24 above), took over the management of the places of confine-
ment previously managed by the republican commissariats of justice.
The RSFSR commissariat had controlled 548 places of confinement,
including 259 solitary-confinement prisons, 90 factory and 89 agricul-
tural colonies, 23 institutions for under-age offenders and 79 ‘colonies
for mass work’ (these provided prisoners by contract to various eco-
nomic organisations). On December 1, 1934, there were 212,382 pris-
oners in all these establishments. Of these, 144,207 were at work,
about half of them at industrial and agricultural enterprises within the
colonies, and the other half contracted out to various organisations.
There were 781 industrial enterprises within the colonies taken over
by the NKVD , mainly small artisan shops producing wooden goods,
building materials, clothing, footwear and other goods, mainly using
local materials. The agricultural enterprises included 90 sovkhozy and
258 small farms and allotments, which supplied part of the food needs
of the prisons and colonies.176 These transfers did not fundamentally
change the operation of the Gulag system, which looked on these
enterprises as mainly a source of labour for its major projects.

173
The decision to construct these lines in 1934 at a cost of 334 million rubles was
taken by Sovnarkom very recently, on March 27; OGPU was authorised to remove
labour for this purpose from any sites to which labour had not been specifically
allocated by the government (GARF, 5446/1b/474, 20–22).
174
GARF, 5446/27/82, 31–32.
175
TsAFSB, 3/2/454, 92.
176
GARF, 5446/16a/1359, 155, 164, 165, 203–215.
 The Outcome 81
(vi) The railways

In the previous year, 1933, the railways suffered more than the rest
of the economy from the severe strain on resources. While total
investment declined by 1.9 per cent, investment on the railways
declined by as much as 18 per cent. The daily number of wagons
loaded did not increase, and by the end of the year the amount of
freight awaiting transport had increased to 24–25 million tons.177
During 1934 the resources invested in the railways substantially
increased. In contrast to the previous year, investment on the rail-
ways increased more rapidly than total investment in the economy,
by 39.0 per cent as against 30.8 per cent. This growth was reflected
in a substantial increase in the supply of locomotives and goods wag-
ons to the railways, and an increase in the percentage of goods wag-
ons with automatic coupling from 17 to 26 per cent.178 With the
growth in the production of iron and steel, the supply of rails
increased from 289,000 to 528,000 tons.179 The amount spent on
repair and maintenance of the railways also increased, from 200 mil-
lion rubles in 1933 to 278 million in 1934.180 Some improvement
also took place in the efficiency with which resources were used: the
fuel used declined from 0.285 to 0.265 tons per thousand ton-kM.181
These developments resulted in a substantial increase in the freight
carried by the railways, from 51,200 to 55,700 wagon loads per
day.182 The amount of freight awaiting transport declined from
24–25 million tons at the beginning of 1934 to 15 million tons at the
end of the year.183 This growth in railway activity was accompanied
by a substantial increase in the number of manual and white-collar
workers employed on the railways, from 1,182,000 to 1,295,000, or
by 9.5 per cent. The monthly wage also increased substantially, by
15.9 per cent.184

177
See Rees (1995), 103, 229, 231.
178
Zheleznodorozhnyi transport (1970), 414–15.
179
Zheleznodorozhnyi transport (1970), 258.
180
Osnovnye pokazateli, 1934, 89.
181
Osnovnye pokazateli, 1934, 84.
182
Rees (1995), 231.
183
Ibid. 103. However, the Gosplan report on the 1935 plan stated that in 1934 the
inadequate availability of rolling stock had led to the ‘increased accumulation of
stocks of coal at the point of production’.
184
Osnovnye pokazateli, January 1935, 94–5. The number employed in workshops
attached to the railways increased much more slowly, from 165,000 to 170,000.
82 The Economy in 1934
In spite of this improved performance, the railways were only begin-
ning to emerge from crisis. They continued to suffer from serious acci-
dents, and these were dealt with by savage persecution of the railwaymen
held responsible; between March and July 1934, in a series of trials,
death penalties were imposed on engine drivers and minor officials.185
The commissariats who were the clients of the railways consid-
ered their performance to be wholly inadequate. At the seventh con-
gress of soviets on January 30, 1935, Ordzhonikidze complained in
strong terms:

A huge quantity of metal, fuel, building materials and finished goods

is awaiting transport. For Narkomtyazhprom it amounts to over
450,000 wagon loads ... These goods are extremely necessary.
Without these materials, the economy cannot develop normally.186

At the beginning of 1935 Narkomput’, the commissariat for transport,

submitted a report to Sovnarkom calling for a radical change in policy.
It complained that the failure to supply sufficient rails was ‘one of the
most difficult and dangerous troubles of railway transport’. It pointed
out that in 1913 the railways had received 590,000 tons of rails, more
than the 528,000 they received in 1934, but in 1913 the railways
carried only 66,000 million ton-km, as compared with the 205,000
million ton-km carried in 1934.187 By the end of 1934 the Politburo
began to afford the railways the priority which was long overdue.

(vii) Agriculture

The size of the harvest was, as usual, the subject of considerable con-
troversy. On May 10, 1935, Mezhlauk in a report to Molotov estimated
the 1934 harvest at 89.4 million tons, as compared with 89.8 million
tons in 1933, on the basis of a yield estimated at 8.5 tsentners a hec-
tare.188 But on December 15, 1935, Bryukhanov, reporting to Stalin and
Molotov on behalf of the state harvest evaluation commission TsGK,
claimed that these estimates on the basis of the so-called ‘normal eco-
nomic harvest’ made inadequate allowance for losses. This was because
the committee had available only data on the harvest on the root for
185
Rees (1995), 97–8.
186
See Zheleznodorozhnyi transport (1970), 259–60.
187
Zheleznodorozhnyi transport (1970), 257–9.
188
TSD, iv (2002), 487.
 The Outcome 83
some grains and on the threshings in a limited number of kolkhozy.
However, Bryukhanov explained, much fuller data were now available
and it was possible to estimate ‘the only real magnitudes which it is pos-
sible to measure and check: 1) the harvest on the root and 2) the actual
gross grain harvest’. Re-examining the data for 1934, Bryukhanov’s
own calculations showed that the yield was only 7.3 tsentners a hectare
and the actual harvest ( fakticheskii sbor) was 76.5 million tons.189
This was the closest an official estimate came to a realistic view of
the harvest. But it was unacceptable to the authorities. In 1933 the
Politburo had officially decided that the 1932 harvest amounted to
69.87 million tons, and this very high figure was treated as an absolute
truth, and was still used by Russian historians as late as 1995 (see vol.
5, p. 444). The much better harvests from 1933 onwards had to be
compatible with this figure for 1932; and the TsGK figure of 76.5
million tons for 1934 was rejected in favour of 89.4, as compared with
89.8 million tons in 1933 (for the fate of the TsGK, see pp. 360–1
below). The grain–fodder balances compiled at this time were brought
into balance by including an item nevyazka (disjuncture), amounting to
14.6 million tons in 1933 and 17.1 million in 1934, so that the harvest
net of the nevyazka amounted to 75.2 and 72.3 million tons.
Although the harvest in 1934 was somewhat lower than in the
previous year, Soviet industry had supplied massive new amounts of
mechanical power to agriculture which would eventually compensate
for the enormous decline in horse power in 1930–33.
Total tractor horse-power supplied (thousands)

January 1, 1934 January 1, 1935 (prelim)

To sovkhozy 1395 1714
To MTS 1762 2707

Totala 3266 4410

Source: Osnovnye pokazateli, 1934, 49.
Note: a These totals given in the original source do not equal the total of the separate
items.

In the course of 1934 the total horse power used in agriculture

increased by 35 per cent. The horse power available increased more
189
TSD, iv (2002), 641; see also p. 234 below.
84 The Economy in 1934
rapidly in MTS than in sovkhozy, by 53.6 per cent as against 22.0
per cent. The percentage of the kolkhoz sown area served by MTS
increased from 58.6 to 63.9 per cent.190 In 1934 the supply of spare
parts, often a bottleneck, increased by 55 per cent.191
The production of cotton declined in 1934. In November
Kuibyshev went to Central Asia in order to invigorate the collection
of the cotton crop. On November 7 he wrote to Stalin and Molotov
from Uzbekistan blaming the former landowners (the bai ) for much
of the difficulty, and he was given the right to form a troika, consisting
of himself, the Uzbek party secretary and the chair of the soviet
executive committee, with the power to impose the death penalty.192
Similar troiki were established on Kuibyshev’s initiative in the other
Central Asian republics (this power had already been given to Eikhe
in West Siberia – normally the death penalty required the sanction
of a special commission in Moscow). But the total raw cotton crop
collected amounted to only 1.18 million tons as compared with 1.32
million tons in the previous year (see Table 30).
In 1934 the harvests of vegetables and flax also declined slightly,
and the number of horses continued a slow decline. But the harvest
of potatoes and sugar beet increased, as did the number of livestock.
On January 1, 1935, TsUNKhU carried out a comprehensive live-
stock census, involving 25 million agricultural households, and
Osinsky reported to Sovnarkom that ‘1934 was a year of almost
universal break-through’ in livestock. ‘In 1934 the number of cattle
increased by 15.8 %, sheep and goats by 11.8% and pigs by 47.8%.’
The number of working horses declined, but only from 13.3 to 12.8
million, a far slower decline than in previous years193 (see also Table
31). The decline in the number of horses was far less than the
increase in mechanical horse-power. The official estimate of an
increase in gross agricultural production in 1934 by 6.7 per cent was
quite realistic.194
With the expansion of agricultural activity in 1934, the number of
labour days worked by collective farmers, particularly by women,
increased. This was shown by a TsUNKhU report comparing the

190
Osnovnye pokazateli, 1934, 48.
191
Osnovnye pokazateli, 1934, 51.
192
GARF 5446/27/73, 3; delo 27 contains much further information about
Kuibyshev’s activities in Central Asia at this time.
193
TSD, iv, 443–57 (prepared after April 1, 1935).
194
Osnovnye pokazateli, 1934, 44.
 The Outcome 85
family budgets of collective farmers in January–September 1933 and
1934.

Number of labour days worked by an average collective farmer aged

16 to 59

January–September 1933 January–September 1934

Men 186 190
Women 89 110
Both sexes 136 149
Source: published in TSD, iv (2002), 278.

The average number of labour days spent in non-agricultural

occupations increased from 19 to 29.
A further TsUNKhU survey of 83,000 collective farms showed that
the amount received in kind and in money by collective farm households
from the kolkhozy for their labour days increased substantially:

Received per January– January– January–

household December 1932 December 1933 December 1934
Grain (tons) 5.5 9.83 10.92
Potatoes (tons) 2.1 5.74 7.83
Vegetables and 0.5 1.41 2.25
cucurbits (tons)
Money (rubles) 88 103 129
Source: published in TSD, iv (2002), 362–3.
Note: the survey did not include monetary receipts from livestock or from special
crops.
Receipts in grain in Ukraine were sharply different, owing to the fate of the
Ukrainian harvest in the three years: 1932 2.52 tons; 1933 9.66; 1934 4.69, but the
potatoes, vegetables and money received per kolkhoz household in Ukraine
increased in 1934.

Collective farmers also increased substantially their production on

their household plots in 1934.195 In consequence there was a

195
See TSD, iv (2002), 279.
86 The Economy in 1934
substantial increase in trade on the kolkhoz market from 11,500 to
14,000 million rubles, even though prices on the market declined.196
In 1934 the party central committee decided to undertake a thor-
ough review of the state of collectivisation and to that end collected
material from the regional parties and on July 2, 1934, convened a
conference ‘On Questions of Collectivisation’. Only about 69 per
cent of peasant households were collectivised at the beginning of
1934, and the discussion turned on the relative position of collective
farmers and individual peasants, and what should be done about it.
The data collected, and the proceedings of the conference, devoted
most attention to the economy of the remaining individual peasants
and to the role of the household plots of the collective farmers. In
his memorandum preceding the conference, Postyshev, Ukrainian
party secretary, reported that there were three main types of
individual peasant:

(1) those who possessed agricultural land on which grain could be

grown as well as a household plot; agriculture was their main
source of income;
(2) those who possessed only a household plot – they cultivated veg-
etables and potatoes on their household plot, and the sale of
these on the market, plus their work in sovkhozy and industry,
and also for the local kolkhoz and collective farmer, was their
main source of income; the substantial number who owned a
horse also engaged extensively in cartage;
(3) peasants without a substantial economy of their own, who
worked in industry and building, and often also engaged in
speculation and theft.197

Other reports noted that many individual peasants lived near dis-
trict towns, where it was possible to work in the towns and sell produce
to the inhabitants; other groups or even whole villages of individual
peasants lived in remoter parts of a region. Reports from the Central
Black-Earth region, the North Caucasus and Siberia also emphasised
the strong position of individual peasants who owned a horse, and the

196
See RGAE, 1562/12/2122, 29, and 1562/12/2322, 77, and Table 19). It is not
known what proportion of this trade was by individual non-collectivised peasants.
197
TSD, iv (2002), 129–32.
 The Outcome 87
high earnings which could result.198 The reports also noted that indi-
vidual peasants were less restricted than collective farmers in deciding
what work to engage in outside agriculture, and placed great empha-
sis on their ability to conceal their earnings from the tax collectors.
But regional leaders also admitted that they lacked sufficient knowl-
edge of the economy of the individual peasants. Kosior, party secre-
tary in the Dnepropetrovsk region, noted at the collectivisation
conference ‘it must be honestly admitted that you rarely see the indi-
vidual peasant – when you go into a village, you only see and talk with
collective farmers, you rarely meet an individual peasant in the field
or go into his cottage – we don’t seek them out’.199
At the conference on July 2, Stalin played an active part, frequently
questioning the speakers. He concluded the proceedings by a speech
outlining future policy.200 He insisted that ‘what we have created in
2–3 years is a major achievement’, and that there was no need to
force the pace of collectivisation – it would be sufficient if it grew by
2, 3 or 4 per cent a year. Within the kolkhoz, the size of the household
plot should vary according to circumstances, and ‘it would be inexpe-
dient to restrict or reduce the household plot – this is not the time’.
But at present the household plot of the individual peasant was often
larger than that of the collective farmer, and this was wrong:

In all our work and activity, both legislative and administrative, one
idea must prevail – that the collective farmer should have more rights
and privileges than the individual peasant.

It would be wrong, however, to ‘arrest, punish or shoot’ the individ-

ual peasants – economic and financial measures must be used to
persuade them that it would be better to join the kolkhoz or leave for
the town than continue as an individual peasant.
Responding to this approach, on September 15 Molotov in a tel-
egram from Omsk, where he was pressing forward the grain collec-
tions, proposed that, as in 1932, a ‘one-time tax’ on the individual
peasants should be introduced, yielding 300 million rubles. He
argued that this was required because of ‘the growth of money
incomes, especially in connection with the large harvest of vegetables
and increased income from cartage’, and urged that it should be
198
TSD, iv (2002), 139–40, 233–4.
199
TSD, iv (2002), 177.
200
TSD, iv (2002), 186–92.
88 The Economy in 1934
higher on peasants living near towns.201 The tax was duly introduced
on September 26, and yielded 331 million rubles; it was sharply dif-
ferentiated in accordance with the estimated earnings of types of
peasants.202
The regional parties undertook considerable efforts to accelerate
the pace of collectivisation and impose greater restrictions on the
individual peasants in the months which followed the conference.
Thus I. M. Vareikis and E. M. Ryabinin, reporting from the Voronezh
region (formerly part of the Black-Earth region) on November 17,
described the measures they were taking to push the individual peas-
ants into the kolkhozy, and the party secretary of the Kiev region
reported on November 19:

In the past six months the regional committee has taken a number of ...
measures aimed at getting individual peasants to understand that they
will be allowed no privileged conditions. These include severe require-
ments that every individual peasant should fulfil all his obligations to
the state.203

In consequence, the percentage of households collectivised in the

region had increased from 74.2 per cent on April 1 to 81.0 per cent
on October 1. This was part of a general trend. In the USSR as a
whole, the percentage of households collectivised increased from 68.9
per cent to 77.2 per cent between January 1934 and January 1935.204
In 1934 the authorities also undertook an important step to con-
solidate the organisation of the kolkhozy. In January 1933, in the
midst of the agricultural crisis, politotdely ( political departments)
had been established in both the MTS and the sovkhozy, staffed by
party members brought in mainly from Moscow, Leningrad and the
army. These were men with long party membership and relatively
good education, who had been thoroughly checked for political reli-
ability. Their function was both to clear out unreliable officials from
agriculture and to seek to introduce agricultural improvements (see
vol. 5, pp. 358–62). On the whole, their activities had a positive
effect from the point of view of the authorities, and many of them

201
TSD, iv (2002), 219; he tactfully added the proviso ‘only if approved by com-
rade Stalin’.
202
SZ, 1934, art, 380 (decree of TsIK and Sovnarkom; Otchet ... 1934, 195).
203
TSD, iv (2002), 260–5.
204
Osnovnye pokazateli, 1934, 46.
 The Outcome 89
quickly gained a realistic attitude to agriculture and were able to
persuade higher authorities to take a more realistic attitude to rural
problems. But the functions of the politotdely and the district party
and soviet organisations greatly overlapped and as early as January
1934 Kaganovich hinted that the politotdely could not remain a
permanent feature of the countryside.205 During 1934 the friction
between the politotdely and the district soviets increased. At the
same time there were increasing complaints from the central author-
ities that the politotdely were guilty of ‘localism’ (mestnichestvo), which
evidently meant in practice that they tended to represent the inter-
ests of their MTS and kolkhozy to the higher authorities rather
than merely imposing the wishes of the authorities on the peas-
ants.206 In September Kaganovich, in a report discussing leading
party agencies, clearly intimated that the politotdely would in future
be abolished.207 But the future of the politotdely was not finally set-
tled. On November 26 Kosior strongly praised the positive role
played by the politotdely at the central committee plenum which
discussed the abolition of bread rationing, and declared that ‘there
cannot be any talk about and the party does not pose the question
of the abolition of the politotdely, as some are inclined to think’.
Stalin interrupted ‘If they have fulfilled their function, then they
must be abolished.’ But Kosior continued to argue that there were
so many problems in the districts that the politotdely should be
strengthened.208 But the plenum resolved to abolish the politotdely
by fusing them with the district party committees, though in every
MTS an official would serve as the secretary of the party organisa-
tion and the head of the political sector of the MTS and could not
be removed without central committee permission.209 The party
members who had been sent to man the politotdely were encour-
aged to continue to work in the rural party and many of them
remained in leading positions.

205
XVII s”ezd (1934), 560.
206
See Miller (1970), 243–4; IZ, no. 76 (1965), 56–7 (Zelenin); Shevlyakov (2000),
206–7.
207
The report was delivered on September 2, but not published until P, November
24, 1934. See also Miller (1970), 245.
208
TSD, iv (2000), 326–7.
209
The politodely were abolished during the first few months of 1935.
 CHAPTER FOUR

1935: THE GROWING THREAT OF WAR

In 1935 the threat of fascism to world peace greatly increased. The

Axis – Germany, Italy and Japan – began to be established, and Nazi
rule in Germany was consolidated. The looming menace of Nazism
became increasingly obvious. On January 13, in accordance with the
Versailles treaty, a plebiscite was held in the Saar, and the population
voted to rejoin Germany. The overwhelming vote demonstrated that
Germans could be rallied by the Nazi patriotic appeal. Two months
later, on March 13, in defiance of the Versailles treaty, Germany
declared itself free from the obligation not to build military aircraft.1
Three days later, again ignoring the treaty, Hitler announced the
introduction of compulsory military service.2
The Soviet reaction was sharp. In March, a British government
delegation visited Berlin and Moscow. On March 28, Litvinov told
Anthony Eden, Lord Privy Seal and a member of Baldwin’s Cabinet,
that ‘we do not have the slightest doubt of German aggression;
German foreign policy is inspired by two main ideas – revanche and
domination in Europe’.3 On the following day, Stalin was even more
pessimistic in conversation with Eden:

I think the position now is worse than in 1913 … because in 1913

there was only one centre of military danger – Germany – and now
there are two – Germany and Japan.

In contrast to Litvinov, who had told Eden that ‘in Japan, even in
military circles, a tendency to maintain peaceful relations with the
USSR is growing rapidly’, Stalin declared that ‘the situation in the
Far East is extremely alarming’; the improvement was ‘merely
temporary’.4
For the moment Litvinov’s view of the situation in Japan had
acquired some credibility as a result of the completion of the

1
See DVP, xviii (1973), 616.
2
This announcement was immediately reported in the Soviet press (see P, March
17 and 18, 1935).
3
Record of conversation printed in DVP, xviii (1973), 235–6.
4
Record of conversation printed in ibid. 247–8.

90
 1935: The Growing Threat of War 91
long-negotiated sale of the Chinese Eastern Railway to Japan on
March 23, 1935.5 But Litvinov’s efforts to conciliate Japan proved
increasingly unsuccessful. Border incidents were frequent and from
June Japanese pressure on Outer Mongolia increased.6
Immediately after Eden’s visit to Moscow, Soviet disquiet at
German rearmament was publicly expressed in a sensational article
by Tukhachevsky, ‘The Military Plans of Present-Day Germany’,
which appeared in Pravda on March 31. The article attacked the
German ‘revanchist aggressive policies’, and emphasised that they
were directed against France, Belgium, Austria and Czecho-Slovakia
as well as the USSR. Tukhachevsky claimed that Germany would
soon have up to 3,700 military aircraft; by the summer of 1935 her
armed forces would include at least 800,000 men, more than in the
French army and nearly as many as in the Soviet Union. The article
was approved by Stalin after some heavy editing which did not
change the substance of Tukhachevsky’s message.7
A few weeks later, on May 2, a Mutual Assistance Pact was signed
in Paris by the French Foreign Minister, Laval, and the Soviet ambas-
sador in Paris, followed on May 16 by a similar pact with Czecho-
Slovakia.8 Following the signature of the Pact, Laval visited Moscow
and on May 16 Stalin, thrusting aside the long-established Comintern
hostility to the militarisation of the bourgeois powers, publicly
‘expressed full understanding and approval of the policy of defence
carried out by France to maintain its armed forces at a level conso-
nant with its security needs’.9 This was an important encouragement
for Litvinov’s policy of establishing collective security in Europe.
The Franco-Soviet accord was soon followed by consolidating the
turn in Comintern policy, launched in the previous year (see p. 16
above), from the United Front of the masses against the bourgeoisie

5
See Slavinskii (1988), 53. On the same day the Politburo ruled that the first
Japanese payment was to be used solely for the purchase in the United States,
Britain and Germany of equipment for the ZIS vehicle factory in Moscow (RGASPI,
17/162/17, 157–158 – art. 189).
6
See Haslam (1992), 43–60; Safronov (2001), 145.
7
For the draft text and Stalin’s corrections see Izvestiya TsK, 1, 1990, 160–171. The
German ambassador and military attaché protested indignantly about the article to
Litvinov and to the foreign department of Narkomoborony.
8
DVP, xviii (1973), 309–12, 333–6. For the English text of the Franco-Soviet pact,
see Keith, ed., ii (1938), 29–33.
9
DVP, xviii (1963), 337, reported in I, May 16, 1935.
92 1935: The Growing Threat of War
to the Popular Front of democratic forces against fascism.10 In mid-
July a huge Rassemblement Populaire was held in Paris, attended by
such politicians as Daladier from the Radicals as well as the
Communist leader Thorez. Then from July 25 to August 21 the VII
Comintern Congress, the first congress since 1928, convened in
Moscow amid a blaze of publicity in the Soviet and Western com-
munist press. In his keynote speech Dimitrov, who was elected
General Secretary of Comintern, called for ‘the erection of a broad
anti-fascist popular front on the basis of the proletarian united front’. Thorez,
for his part, acknowledged that it was now possible to support an
‘anti-fascist bourgeois government’.11
The bitter Nazi hostility to communism, against which these
moves were directed, was certainly the dominant trend in German
foreign policy in 1935. But behind the scenes Schacht, minister of
economics and head of the Reichsbank, headed an effort to improve
economic relations with the USSR in a desperate search for raw
materials and for economic equilibrium in a Germany just emerging
from the world economic crisis. In separate conversations with the
Soviet ambassador in Berlin, Surits, and the trade attaché Kandelaki,
Shacht emphasised the importance of German–Soviet economic
relations and improved relations generally.12 On April 9, the agree-
ment that the Soviet Union should receive a 200 million Mark five-
year credit for the purchase of investment goods (see pp. 15–16
above) was finally signed.13 Then in June Schacht offered the USSR
a huge 1,000 million mark ten-year credit, the imports from Germany
to be paid for in oil and metals. For the moment fear of Germany
predominated in Moscow, and the offer was rejected by the Soviet
government on ostensibly technical grounds; Litvinov privately
dismissed it as a ‘German manoeuvre’.14
However, French adherence to the Franco-Soviet Pact soon proved
not to be dependable. And Britain displayed no disposition to join

10
For earlier developments see p. 16 above.
11
See Carr (1980), 406–7. On August 10 the Soviet Politburo approved the
administrative restructuring of Comintern, including the establishment of a secre-
tariat consisting of seven full and three candidate members (RGASPI, 17/162/18,
110 – art. 129).
12
Surits to Litvinov, January 16, 1935 (reported from the archives in VI, 5, 1991,
144); Bessonov to Litvinov, February 16 and April 12, 1935, reporting Kandelaki’s
conversations with Schacht (DVP, xviii (1973), 53–5; VI, 5, 1991, 147).
13
DVP, xviii (1973), 270–4; the goods were to be purchased within twelve months.
14
DVP, xviii (1973), 646–7.
 1935: The Growing Threat of War 93
France and the USSR in an anti-fascist alliance. British contempt
and mistrust for the Soviet Union was symbolised by the failure of
Sir John Simon, the Foreign Secretary, to visit Moscow with Eden
after their meeting with Hitler in March. And in June the wish to
appease Germany which prevailed in British policy was confirmed
by the Anglo-German naval agreement, which violated the Versailles
treaty.15
In view of the shaky foundations of collective security, the Soviet
Union did not close the door to a positive response to Schacht’s
advances. On November 2, the Politburo established a commission
headed by Ordzhonikidze ‘to discuss the orders we may place with
Germany if an 800-million mark credit becomes available’.16
Litvinov strongly resisted the widening of economic relations with
Germany. On December 3, in a secret memorandum to Stalin, he
assured him that he had confirmed the TASS reports that Schacht
had told the head of the Banque de France that Germany intended
to divide up Soviet Ukraine with Poland. Litvinov added contemptu-
ously that although ‘Schacht supports Hitler’s aims of conquest in
the East’, ‘cde. Kandelaki recently proposed we should support him
against Hitler’. Litvinov’s memorandum also criticised the Soviet
press for its ‘Tolstoyan position of non-resistance to evil’. He agreed
that economic relations with Germany should continue, but opposed
the placing of large orders for imports from Germany: ‘this would
give substantial support to German fascism, which is in very great
economic difficulties at present’:

whatever the conclusions reached by the Narkomtyazhprom commis-

sion, the issue of orders to Germany should be limited to 100, or a
maximum of 200 million marks.17

15
The agreement provided for Germany to construct up to 35 per cent of the
naval tonnage of the British Commonwealth, a figure which had been publicly
proposed by Hitler in March (for these events see Keith, ed., ii (1938), 36, 51–4).
16
RGASPI, 17/162/18, 48 (art. 265). According to the Soviet archives, German
anxiety to reach agreement on additional credits to Moscow was reflected in an
agreement on December 12 between Herbert Goering and Blomberg, Minister for
War, to be ‘prepared to meet Soviet orders for military hardware, including the most
complicated’ (VI, 5, 1991, 148). Herbert Goering was Hermann Goering’s cousin
and a senior adviser to Schacht.
17
Published from the archives in Izvestiya TsK, 2, 1990, 211–12. These figures were
evidently additional to the 200 million mark credit agreed in April.
94 1935: The Growing Threat of War
Meanwhile, on October 2–3, Italy had invaded Abyssinia (now
Ethiopia). This was the most flagrant act of aggression since the
Japanese invasion of Manchuria in September 1931, and it brought
Italy closer to Germany and Japan. In spite of its fascist government,
Italy had so far been on consistently good terms with the Soviet
Union. When the invasion of Abyssinia was imminent Stalin at first
displayed a wholly inadequate understanding of the fascist threat.
He wrote to Kaganovich and Molotov on September 2 that ‘the
conflict is not so much between Italy and Abyssinia as between Italy
and France on the one hand, and Britain on the other hand’. Two
ententes were emerging, Italy and France versus Germany and
Britain, and the Soviet Union should ‘encourage them to fight with
each other’.18 Ten days later, however, in a further message to
Kaganovich and Molotov, he indicated his opposition to Italy and
‘the supporters of aggression and war’ – but still insisted that ‘Litvinov
wants to follow the British line, but we have our own line’.19 However,
by the time the invasion took place he had came round to Litvinov’s
position. On October 4, he agreed to sanctions against Italy provid-
ing they were supported by other members of the League of
Nations.20
Soviet scepticism about the reliability of the alliance with France
was soon confirmed. Sanctions against Italy were introduced by the
League of Nations, but they were placed in jeopardy in December
by the abortive effort of Laval and Sir Samuel Hoare, the new British
foreign minister (known in left-wing circles in Britain as ‘Slippery
Sam’) to secure the League’s support for a compromise at the expense
of Abyssinia.21 At the end of the year, the future of collective security
remained uncertain, and on January 11, 1936, at a session of TsIK,
Molotov, while strongly criticising the militarisation of Germany,
noted the success of the credit agreement of 1935 and called on the
government of Germany to draw ‘practical conclusions’ from the
Soviet policy of ‘developing commercial and economic relations
with other states’. But his main message was that ‘we toilers of the

18
SKP, 545 (ciphered telegram).
19
SKP, 563–4 (ciphered telegram, dated September 12).
20
SKP, 602 (ciphered telegram); this proposal was endorsed by the Politburo on
the same day (RGASPI, 17/162/18, 172–173).
21
See DVP, xviii (1973), 591–2 (telegrams of December 15 and 16). Public indig-
nation in Britain led to Hoare’s resignation, but he still remained in the Cabinet.
He was replaced by Eden.
 1935: The Growing Threat of War 95
Soviet Union must rely on our own efforts to defend our affairs and
above all, on our Red Army’.22
As in 1934, the Soviet defence budget, when it was adopted at the
beginning of 1935, was fairly modest. Expenditure on Narkomoborony
was planned to increase by 20 per cent, more rapidly than the state
budget as a whole, but most of the increase did not represent a
growth in real terms – it was due to the rise in prices and other pay-
ments following the abolition of rationing.23 Expenditure on arma-
ments within the defence budget was also planned to increase rapidly
(see pp. 203–4 below), but capital investment, like capital investment
as a whole, was planned to decline in 1935, from 717 to 628 million
rubles.24 Total expenditure on all aspects of defence, including the
NKVD armies, was planned to increase by 30.7 per cent, from 9,134
to 11,938 million rubles.25
In the course of 1935, defence policy changed radically. On March
22, the Politburo approved a plan from Narkomoborony to strengthen
the Western and Eastern frontiers, requiring an additional allocation
to the commissariat in 1935 of 315 million rubles. This meant that
capital construction by Narkomoborony, instead of declining by 12
per cent, was now planned to increase by 32 per cent.26
The second major revision in defence plans was the decision of
the Politburo on May 5 to increase the size of the armed forces.
Three years previously Stalin had rejected the plan of the Red Army
Staff to increase the number of servicemen to 1,100,000, on the
grounds that ‘the mechanisation of the army in every country leads
to a reduction in its manpower’.27 But the new decision planned an

22
See Watson (2005), 150.
23
The state budget increased from 55,455 to 65,500 million rubles (12 per cent),
and the defence budget from 5,393 to 7,492 million. Of the increase of 2,099 mil-
lion rubles, 1,527 million was allocated to maintenance (see Harrison and Davies
(1997), 380).
24
See Harrison and Davies (1997), 380.
25
APRF 3/39/45, 3–9 (memorandum from Grin’ko to Stalin, January 3, 1935).
These figures define defence very widely: they include the NKVD armies, the mili-
tia and the Committee of Reserves, and defence investment in the armaments
industries and in civilian industry. Investment in Narkomoborony as such was
planned to increase from 5.355 to 7,092 million rubles, or by 39.9 per cent.
26
RGASPI, 17/162/17, 156–157 (art. 183); 195 million rubles was allocated from
the Sovnarkom reserve, and 120 million rubles by reducing the allocations to other
commissariats.
27
SKP, 224 (Stalin to Kaganovich and Molotov, July 15 or earlier, 1932, written
following his meeting with Voroshilov).
96 1935: The Growing Threat of War
increase from 975,000 at the beginning of 1935 to 1,513,000 on
January 1, 1938.28 Three months later, the Politburo decided that the
number conscripted in 1935 should be increased from the 813,000
available from the 1913 contingent to 990,000, by recruiting 177,000
from those born in 1914.29 In future years, the age for call up would
be gradually lowered from 21 to 19; in each year half of the
contingent from the following year was to be recruited.30
In 1935 serious efforts were made to enhance the prestige of the
Red Army, especially its officers, and to strengthen army discipline.
In 1934, following the renaming of Narkomvoendel (see p. 77 above),
a new Statute for the renamed Narkomoborony was intensively dis-
cussed behind the scenes. The Statute stressed the unified manage-
ment of the army, navy and air force, and replaced the long-established
Revolutionary Military Council by an appointed Military Council
attached to the commissariat.31 Nine months later, in August 1935,
officers’ pay was substantially increased.32 In the following months
further Statutes established standard military ranks, with provisions
on the military education and length of service required for each
rank.33 The hierarchy included the new supreme rank of Marshal of
the Soviet Union. It replaced the former revolutionary command
structure, and had many points of resemblance with the Tsarist
army. Simultaneously, what was previously known as the ‘Staff ’
(Shtab) of the Red Army acquired the pre-revolutionary name
‘General Staff ’.34 A decree of TsIK and Sovnarkom dated November
20 appointed five Marshals, naming their functions: Voroshilov,
Tukhachevsky (his deputy), Egorov (head of the General Staff ),
Budennyi (inspector of cavalry) and Blyukher ( commander of the
Far Eastern Army).35
28
RGASPI, 17/162/18, 20, 35–37 (art. 102).
29
RGASPI, 17/162/18, 107 (art. 91).
30
RGASI, 17/162/18, 123 (art. 356, dated August 28).
31
SZ, 1934, arts. 430 a–c, 431 (decrees of TsIK and Sovnarkom, dated November
22, 1934); for the correspondence on the Statute in August 1934 between Stalin and
Kaganovich, see SKP, 445, 446, 449, and 450, note 5.
32
RGASPI, 17/162/18, 102–4 (art. 32, dated August 2). The pay of the lowest
rank was increased from 270 to 350 rubles a month (30 per cent), and of the highest
rank from 670 to 1,000 rubles (49 per cent). Bonuses were to be paid for service of
two years and above, rising from 5 per cent of basic pay to 25 per cent for 20 years’
service.
33
SZ, 1935, arts. 468, 469 (decrees of TsIK and Sovnarkom, dated September 22).
34
SZ, 1935, art. 426 (dated September 22).
35
I, November 21, 1935.
 1935: The Growing Threat of War 97
These measures to strengthen and expand Soviet defence were
accompanied by repressive actions designed to secure a reliable pop-
ulation in the frontier zones in the event of war, affecting the whole
of the Western frontier. On December 27, 1934, a full session of the
Politburo resolved that ‘7 – 8,000 households from the unreliable
element’ should be resettled from the Western frontier districts of
Ukraine to its Eastern borders; in addition the NKVD should exile
2,000 anti-Soviet families from the frontier districts.36 By March
1935, some 42,000 people had been moved.37 Then on March 15 the
Politburo approved ‘Measures to Strengthen the Frontiers of
Leningrad Region and Karelia’. All the ‘unreliable element’ were to
be exiled from the frontier districts to Kazakhstan and West Siberia,
and a ‘forbidden zone’ was to be established, 100 km deep on the
Western frontier and 60 km deep in Murmansk and Siberia. Those
who entered the zone without permission were to be sentenced to
1–3 years’ compulsory labour.38 On June 12 the Politburo adopted
similar ‘Measures to Strengthen the Belorussian Frontier’, including
the establishment of a forbidden zone and special frontier districts.
In Belorussia 2,000 families from the ‘unreliable element’ were to be
exiled beyond the boundaries of the republic and 2,000 ‘reliable’
families were to replace them.39 The final decision in this group of
measures was a published decree of TsIK and Sovnarkom dated July
17, requiring that permission should be obtained from the NKVD to
enter the frontier areas.40
Milder measures to control the movement of the population cov-
ered the whole USSR. On September 21 a joint decree of Sovnarkom
and the party central committee complained that the population had
been poorly registered until the civil register offices (ZAGsy) had been
taken over by the NKVD in the previous year. The authors of the
decree were evidently alarmed that the registered population was far
lower than in previous plans and estimates; this would be confirmed
by the ill-fated population census of 1937. The decree claimed that
the inefficiency of the ZAGsy had been utilised by the ‘class enemy’
36
RGASPI, 17/162/17 (item XIV on the agenda). A later decision gave special
privileges to 4,000 families from Chernigov and Kiev which were being resettled in
the frontier districts (RGASPI, 17/162/17, 125–126 – art. 159, dated January 2).
37
See Khlevniuk (2004), 89.
38
RGASPI, 17/162/17, 149–151 (art. 103). These later decisions were approved
by poll.
39
RGASPI, 17/162/18, 57 (art. 61).
40
SZ 1935, art. 377.
98 1935: The Growing Threat of War
to conceal the growth of the population by under-registering births
and ‘exaggerating the death rate by registering the death of the same
person several times’. From January 1, 1936, formal birth certificates
were to be introduced, and these must be presented when entering
educational establishments, or when called up for military service.
The body of the decree was published, but a secret clause required
regional party committees to check all officials concerned with popu-
lation statistics and remove class-alien and poorly-trained personnel.41
Further decrees ruled that foreigners should be required to register in
every town they visited within 24 hours, and transferred the foreign
departments of soviet executive committees to the NKVD.42 The
requirement that foreigners should register in each town they visited
still operates at the present day.
The first repressions after the murder of Kirov were followed in
1935 by a much more extensive campaign against former members
of oppositions within the party and former members of other par-
ties, and against so-called ‘former people’, who had been better-off
or held office under the old regime. In mid-January, in secret trials
of the ‘Leningrad counter-revolutionary Zinovievite group’ and the
‘Moscow centre’, leading former members of the ‘New Opposition’
of 1925 were sentenced to imprisonment or exile, including Zinoviev
and Kamenev.43 On January 18 the old Bolshevik Lominadze, threat-
ened by these events, committed suicide.44 On the same day the
party central committee circulated a secret letter to local party
organisations. This claimed under the heading ‘Facts’ ( fakty) that the
Zinoviev group must be crushed, because they used their party mem-
bership to facilitate a ‘counter-revolutionary terrorism’ which was
essentially the same as that practised by ‘White Guard saboteurs’.
The letter also insisted that the revolutionary vigilance of party
members must be improved and intensified, especially by studying
every anti-party group and their behaviour.45 During the next few
months hundreds of ex-oppositionists, and many thousands of
41
SZ, 1935, art. 432. For the secret clause, see GARF, 5446/1/483, 67.
42
GARF, 5446/1/483 (art. 2076/345s, dated September 15); 5446/1/ 89 (art.
2236/366s, dated October 4). Registration in villages should take place within
48 hours of arrival.
43
See Khlevnyuk (1996), 142.
44
See ibid. 48–55. For Lominadze’s role in the ‘Syrtsov–Lominadze affair’ see vol. 3,
pp. 375–7. At the time of his suicide he was party secretary in the Magnitogorsk
factory.
45
Izvestiya TsK, 8, 1989, 85–115.
 1935: The Growing Threat of War 99
‘former people’, were expelled from the larger towns. During March,
11,702 former people, including 1,434 members of the nobility, were
removed from Leningrad.46 In the same month Shlyapnikov and
other members of the ‘Workers’ Opposition’ of 1921 were sen-
tenced.47 A long list was issued of publications by former opposition-
ists to be removed from general libraries.48 The rights and the
influence of former oppositionists and former members of other
revolutionary parties were greatly restricted by the abolition of the
Society of Old Bolsheviks and the Society of Former Political
Prisoners and Exiles.49
The ‘Kremlin affair’ neatly combined the campaigns against ex-
oppositionists and former people. The librarians, cleaners and other
members of staff of TsIK included both former people and relatives
of Kamenev, including his brother. They had evidently gossiped
about Stalin and his policies, and relentless questioning built this up
into a case that they intended to murder Stalin. Yenukidze, secretary
of TsIK, was responsible for its staff. In March he was removed from
his post.50 In May, in a secret trial, 108 persons were sentenced to
various terms of imprisonment and exile; two were sentenced to
death.51 In June, Yenukidze was expelled from the party and publicly
condemned for ‘moral and political degeneracy’.52

46
Communication from Zakovskii to Yagoda, March 31, 1935, published in
Lubyanka, i (2003), 654–7. Later in the year it was even proposed to exile 20,000
people from the resort town of Kislovodsk, where party leaders often took their
holidays (Petrovskii to Kalinin, July 22, 1935, published in Sovetskoe rukovodstvo (1999),
308–9).
47
Khlevnyuk (1996), 144.
48
RGASPI, 17/3/965, 63–64 (dated June 16). A parallel decision on the same day
condemned the ‘wholesale “purge” of libraries’ which had been taking place indis-
criminately (RGASPI, 17/3/965, 30).
49
The former decision, approved by the Politburo on May 25 (RGASPI, 17/3/924)
was published by the party central committee in Pravda on the same date; for the
latter see SZ, 1935, art. 299 (decree of TsIK, dated June 25).
50
SZ, 1935, ii, art. 30, dated March 3.
51
Extensive documents, including records of the questioning of the accused, are
published in Lubyanka, i (2003), 699–612, 618–19, 626–50, 658–60, 663–70. Stalin’s
numerous pencil notes on these documents show that he followed and influenced
these events in some detail. See also Izvestiya TsK, 7, 1989, 65–93 and Getty and
Naumov (1999), 161–79, for the discussion at the June 1935 central committee
plenum and its decision of June 7.
52
P, June 8, 1935.
100 1935: The Growing Threat of War
Yenukidze was replaced in March by Akulov, who relinquished his
post as Procurator of the USSR to his deputy Vyshinsky.53 (See also
p. 112 below.) In May, while these events were proceeding, a wide-
ranging party purge was launched, innocuously described as a
‘check-up ( proverka) of party documents’. It was conducted by the
party control commission headed by Yezhov. In December Yezhov
reported to the party central committee plenum that 15,218 ‘ene-
mies’ had been arrested, and over a hundred ‘enemy organisations
and groups’ had been exposed; 177,000 party members had been
expelled.54 The purge involved much closer collaboration with the
NKVD than in previous purges.55 Further steps to strengthen the
NKVD in 1935 included the adoption of ranks parallel to those in
the Red Army for the State Security Service of the NKVD.56 The
functions of the NKVD were also expanded by the transfer to it of
the Central Administration of Main and Hard Roads and Automobile
Transport; its functions included the management of the compulsory
road work carried out by peasants for some days in each year.57
The attempt to impose discipline extended to social as well as
political order. In March Voroshilov wrote to Stalin, Molotov and
Kalinin drawing attention to the growth of hooliganism and ban-
ditry in Moscow, and calling for the ‘cleansing of Moscow from
homeless and criminal children’; he proposed that this should be
organised by the NKVD, which under Dzerzhinsky had gained a
positive reputation for its handling of the waifs and strays of the
1920s.58 In the following month a decree of TsIK and Sovnarkom
ruled that adolescents aged 12 and over committing criminal acts
from theft to murder should be subject to all the punishments pro-
vided by criminal law.59 A secret Politburo circular explained that
53
SZ, 1935, ii, arts. 31–2, also dated March 3.
54
See Khlevnyuk (1996), 147–8; Getty and Naumov (1999), 197–211. In June
1936 Yezhov reported to the party plenum that ‘over 200 thousand’ members had
been expelled during the check-up (Getty and Naumov (1999), 236). Yezhov had
been appointed chair of the party control commission and a secretary of the party
central committee following Kaganovich’s appointment as People’s Commissar for
Transport on February 28 (see p. 215 below).
55
See Khlevnyuk (1996), 147.
56
SZ, 1935, art. 420, dated September 20; for the army ranks, see p. 96 above.
57
SZ, 1935, art. 452 (decree of TsIK and Sovnarkom, dated October 28); for
peasant labour obligations, see vol. 5, pp. 396–7.
58
Stalinskoe Politbyuro (1995), 144–5.
59
SZ, 1935, art. 155 (dated April 7). A further decree provided that homeless
children (as distinct from criminals) should be sent to children’s homes or back to
 1935: The Growing Threat of War 101
‘measures … include the highest measure of criminal punishment
(shooting)’.60 The death penalty had previously been restricted to
those aged 18 and over. During 1935 some 160,000 homeless and
neglected children were apprehended: 82,000 were sent to NKVD
reception centres and 10,000 were arrested.61
In spite of these developments, the more moderate policy associ-
ated with Akulov continued to operate in important respects. The
number of arrests by the security agencies remained about the same
as in the previous year. Arrests by the NKVD fell from 205,173 in
1934 to 193,083 in 1935. The sentences carried out by the security
agencies themselves continued to decline in accordance with the
policy of transferring sentences to the normal courts, falling from
87,569 to 43,665. However, the number of sentences imposed by
other agencies on cases initiated by the security agencies increased
substantially, from 113,629 to 267,064, and the total number of sen-
tences to deprivation of freedom by confinement in camps and colo-
nies increased from 284,880 in 1934 to 356,725 in 1935 (figures for
the RSFSR only), as part of the effort to impose social discipline.
However, this was still well below the 1933 level. The total number
of executions fell from over 2,000 to 1,229.62
The total number of special settlers on January 1, 1936, amounted
to 1,017,133, an increase of 43,000 in the course of the year. This
increase was partly due to the decline in the number of deaths by
18,000 and an increase in the number of births by 12,000, both due
to the improved conditions in the settlements; the number of escapes
also declined.63 During the year the civil rights of a substantial num-
ber of special settlers were restored, including the right to hold an
internal passport, but they were firmly forbidden to leave their settle-
ment on the grounds that their return to their original place of resi-
dence would violate the policy of developing poorly-inhabited areas
and would be ‘politically undesirable’.64

their parents (SZ, 1935, art. 252, dated May 31).

60
RGASPI, 17/2/162, 32, dated April 20. It is not known whether any youths
aged 12–17 were actually sentenced to death.
61
See Khlevniuk (2004), 127.
62
See sources cited in Chapter 10, p. 286.
63
See Table 24 and also SI, 11, 1990, 6 (Zemskov).
64
See Yagoda’s circular of January 5 and letter to Stalin of January 17, 1935
(Istoriya Stalinskogo Gulaga, v (2004), 209–10), and the TsIK decree of January 25
(ibid. 734).
102 1935: The Growing Threat of War
During the year the NKVD attempted to normalise the position
of the special settlements. It proposed to Sovnarkom that they should
be transferred from the NKVD to the union republics, and in July
Sovnarkom of the RSFSR agreed that those settlements established
by the end of 1932 should be transferred, but argued that the later
settlements established in 1933–35 should not be transferred because
the investment required would be too burdensome for the republican
budgets.65 A commission was established under the Sovnarkom of
the USSR, headed by D. Z. Lebed’, vice-chair of the RSFSR
Sovnarkom. It issued a report on August 15, 1935, agreeing that
1,797 settlements with a population of 459,675 should be trans-
ferred to the republics and regions, over 40 per cent of the total
population of the special settlements. It also agreed on arrangements
for the transfer to the republics and regions of finance, equipment
and staff (including the couple of thousand commanders of the set-
tlements, and nearly 10,000 medical and teaching personnel). In
November these proposals were confirmed by a further commission
of Sovnarkom USSR headed by Rudzutak,66 but like the economic
reforms proposed in 1935 (see pp. 248–54 below), these measures
were not put into effect.
The more moderate and flexible policies characteristic of 1934
continued in other respects. The VII Congress of Soviets, the first
since March 1931, assembled in Moscow from January 28 to
February 6, and resolved to make important changes in the
Constitution of the USSR. The existing Constitution had undergone
many modifications since its adoption in 1918. But it retained
unequal franchise for citizens of town and countryside, and the elec-
tion of each higher level of soviets not directly by the voters but by
the lower level of the soviets. In contrast, elections were henceforth
to be conducted on the principles of equal franchise, direct election
of all levels of the soviet hierarchy, and a secret not open ballot. This
was claimed to be a more democratic Constitution, corresponding to
the preponderance of socialist society in the USSR. Immediately
following the congress, TsIK appointed a Constitutional commission.
Of course, all elections continued to be controlled in detail by the
Communist party; the Soviet Union was in no sense a parliamentary

65
Politbyuro i krest’yanstvo, ii (2006), 329.
66
For these proceedings see ibid. 329–34.
 1935: The Growing Threat of War 103
democracy.67 But there is no doubt that this move was intended as a
gesture of reconciliation to the peasants; a peasant vote previously
carried only one-fifth of the weight of an urban vote. It was also
intended to appeal to the Western democracies. In an unpublished
note to the Politburo Stalin wrote that ‘the situation and the balance
of social forces in our country is such that we can only gain politi-
cally from this’; moreover, ‘such a reform is bound to act as a most
powerful weapon against international fascism’.68
Following the Congress of soviets, the Second All-Union Congress
of Collective Farmers met in Moscow from February 11 to 19, and
adopted a Model Statute of the Agricultural Artel.69 The Statute
provided a measure of stability for the structure of the kolkhoz and
especially for the household plot of the collective farmer; and in
practice the household plots were by and large left to thrive for the
next four years.
These gestures to the peasants were reinforced on July 29 by a
decree authorising an amnesty for collective farmers who had been
sentenced to five years’ deprivation of liberty or less, and had com-
pleted their sentence or been released early, providing that they were
now working ‘conscientiously and honestly’ for the kolkhoz.70 By
March 1, 1936, 557,000 collective farmers had been amnestied.71 In
addition, following a decree of August 10, 54,000 officials previously
sentenced for ‘sabotage’ of the grain collections or for circulating
substitutes for money were freed.72
A more generally applicable decree of Sovnarkom and the party
central committee, dated June 17, marked – albeit temporarily – a
significant step towards ‘socialist legality’. It insisted that the NKVD
could arrest a person only if the appropriate procurator agreed;
moreover, arrests of leading officials and specialists must be sanctioned

67
The decisions to revise the Constitution and to establish a Constitutional com-
mission were first adopted by the Politburo on January 30 on a proposal by Stalin.
68
Cited from the archives in Khlevnyuk (1996), 157.
69
The Statute was approved by a decree of Sovnarkom and the party central
committee (SZ, 1935, art. 82, dated February 17). It is discussed further below,
pp. 154–5.
70
SZ, 1935, art. 327 (decree of TsIK and Sovnarkom).
71
See Khlevnyuk (1996), 149–50. The effect of the decree was weakened by a
prior decision of TsIK that ‘restitution of exiled kulaks to civil rights does not give
them the right to leave their settlements’ (SZ, 1935, art. 57).
72
See Khlevnyuk (1996), 150; RGASPI, 17/3/970, 144–145; the figure is for the
period up to the beginning of December 1935.
104 1935: The Growing Threat of War
by the People’s Commissariat where they were employed and by the
appropriate party secretary.73
Stalin’s intention that this decision was to be taken seriously is
demonstrated by his handling of the Luk’yanov affair. In August S.
S. Luk’yanov, the non-party editor of the French-language Journal
de Moscou, published by Narkomindel, was arrested by the NKVD
on the authority of Agranov, on the grounds that he had allowed
doubtful anti-Soviet elements, possibly including spies, to associate
with the journal. The arrest was supported by Kaganovich and
Yezhov, but opposed by Narkomindel with the backing of Voroshilov.
Stalin immediately wrote to Kaganovich: ‘NKVD did not have the
right to arrest [Luk’yanov] without the authority of the C[entral]
C[ommittee]’, and the Politburo reproved Agranov accordingly.
But Stalin did not resist the dismissal of Luk’yanov, so the incident
may merely demonstrate his wish to affirm his personal control
over the NKVD.74
Meanwhile, in July Zhdanov was sent to Saratov to report on the
activities of the Saratov party committee, and issued a sharp criti-
cism of the committee for using repression and administrative meth-
ods against rank-and-file party members rather than education and
persuasion, and for imposing a military discipline which meant that
members were afraid to speak up.75
Further measures improved the rights of specialists and their fam-
ilies. On December 23, Sovnarkom approved a circular prepared by
Vyshinsky on behalf of the Procuracy and Yagoda on behalf of the
NKVD authorising the employment in their field of expertise of
specialists and skilled workers who had been exiled, and their chil-
dren were henceforth permitted to enter higher education establish-
ments.76 A few days later, a further decree adopted new rules for
entrance into higher education establishments and technical colleges
(tekhnikumy). Henceforth all limitations on entry (i.e. quotas) which

73
Khlevnyuk (1996), 148–9.
74
See SKP, 530–1, 537–9, 542–3. Kaganovich approved the reproof to Agranov,
but on the ‘substance of the issue’ wrote to Stalin: ‘permit me to defend the position
I have taken in this matter’ – the closest he came to a disagreement with Stalin.
Stalin in turn blamed Narkomindel for inadequate guidance of the journal, and
suggested that Bukharin and Radek should be made responsible for it.
75
See Priestland (2007), 316–17.
76
GARF, 5446/502/38, 190.
 1935: The Growing Threat of War 105
were due to the social origin of the student or to other restrictions
placed on them were abolished.77
On December 15, a lengthy decree from TsIK strongly criticised
the handling of complaints from the population, using evidence from
a survey of four regions. It demanded that complaints should be
taken much more seriously, placing personal responsibility for the
proper handling of complaints on the heads of soviet executive
committees at various levels.78
These developments were part of a general effort by the regime to
persuade wider sections of the population to identify themselves with
the Soviet system. On the occasion of Red Army day, Stalin, as part
of the drive to secure support from the traditionally anti-Soviet
Cossacks, sent a message of greetings to the First Cavalry Army.79
On May 2, Stalin, at a reception for participants in the May Day
parade, raised his glass to ‘non-party Bolsheviks’; ‘such people, com-
rades, such militants, are often more worthy than many party mem-
bers’.80 Three days later, at a reception for Red Army graduates,
claiming that ‘we have already outlived the period of a famine in
technology’, he declared that henceforth ‘cadres decide everything’.
Leading personnel must take care of their staff, ‘both “small” and
“big”’, and abandon a ‘soulless bureaucratic attitude’ to them.81
Later in the year, at the conference of Stakhanovites – described in
the press as ‘a congress of party and non-party Bolsheviks’ – he
proclaimed:

Life has become better, comrades. Life has become more joyful. And
when life is more joyful, the work goes faster.82

The background to such appeals was the continued improvement

in the standard of living. A secret TsUNKhU report concluded that

77
SZ, 1936, art. 2, dated December 29, 1935. In 1934 (see pp. 19–20 above) such
students were permitted to enter higher education establishments, but were subject
to a quota.
78
SZ, 1936, art. 174, published belatedly in the issue of June 16, 1936. A provision
which was almost completely ignored in practice was that complaints must not be
sent back to the person complained about.
79
Stalin, Soch., xiv (Stanford, 1967), 55, P, February 4, 1935. he also sent greetings to
the First Cavalry Division on June 18 (Soch., xiv (Stanford, 1967), 70, P, June 8, 1935).
80
I, May 4, 1935.
81
P, May 6, 1935.
82
Stalin, Soch., xiv (Stanford, 1967), 322.
106 1935: The Growing Threat of War
in January–June 1935 ‘the abolition of bread rationing enabled a
general improvement in the position of workers’ families’. Prices
paid by them for food increased by 28.2 per cent, but the increase in
income per head enabled food consumption to increase by 5.2 per
cent, and by 11.1 per cent if the increased production of their per-
sonal allotments were taken into account. The report noted that
prices increased much more rapidly in regions where bread rations
had been more substantial and available to a higher proportion of
the population. As a result – and contrary to the general trend of
previous years – food consumption declined by 2–3 per cent in
Moscow but increased by as much as 50 per cent in the Ivanovo
region. 83 In 1935 as a whole, as in the previous year, food consump-
tion by manual workers and engineering and technical staff increased
substantially.84 Food consumption by collective farmers also increased:
the confidential report on family budgets of collective farmers for
January 1936 claimed that in July–December 1935 their food con-
sumption per head was 7 per cent higher than in the same period of
the previous year.85 The availability of woollen textiles and footwear
also increased, owing to the improvement in the livestock situation.
But as a result of the poor cotton harvest in 1934, the consumption
of cotton textiles and clothing declined for both manual workers and
engineering and technical staff. The production of consumer dura-
bles increased rapidly. These included bicycles, radios, gramophones,
sewing machines, clocks and watches, and electric light bulbs. Except
for light bulbs and watches, these were produced in hundreds of
thousands rather than millions, and they were therefore available to
only a small minority of the population. (See Tables 6 and 7.)
In 1935 investment in social and cultural services (i.e. education,
health, housing and municipal economy) also increased rapidly, by
28.2 per cent as compared with the increase in total investment by
15.9 per cent (see Table 8). Investment in education rose by as much
as 65.2 per cent, following the school building programme announced
in 1934 (see p. 19 above). Some 533 urban schools were completed

83
RGAE, 1562/329/62, 89–94, dated September 29, 1935.
84
Consumption of vegetables declined, owing to the poor harvest. Workers’ con-
sumption of sugar and confectionery also declined. Annual figures for white-collar
workers have not been traced.
85
RGAE, 1562/80/1, Byudzhety kolkhoznikov, January 1936, Table 1, reported
an increase in protein by 6.7 per cent, in both fats and carbohydrates by 7.5 per cent
and in calories by 7.4 per cent.
 1935: The Growing Threat of War 107
as compared with 160 in 1934, and the number of small rural schools
also substantially increased.86 Sovnarkom ambitiously announced
that these developments should enable the abolition of the third shift
in schools in 1935/36 and of the second shift in 1937/38.87 More
prosaically, a further decree instructed district soviets to eliminate the
arrears in teachers’ pay.88 Further decrees provided for increased
production and improved quality of school textbooks and pencils,
pens, exercise books and other school equipment. In future, text-
books and school equipment should be available on free sale in state
shops rather than sold through the schools.89 In 1935/36 the number
of students in higher education and technical colleges and the num-
ber of pupils in the top three forms of secondary schools increased
rapidly.
Investment in the health services expanded at a much slower rate,
but substantial sums were allocated in the state budget for increased
pay for medical staff, and the number of doctors, nurses and other
medical staff increased more rapidly than the number of manual
and office workers as a whole.90 The 1936 plan claimed with some
justification that these changes provided a sound basis for future
development.91
In contrast, Gosplan bluntly stated that the results of the housing
programme in 1935 were ‘completely unsatisfactory’; only 60 per
cent of the plan for new accommodation had been completed.92
While investment in urban housing increased by as much as 33 per
cent in 1935, the amount of new housing completed was 25 per cent
less than in 1934 (see Table 11). This seems to have been primarily

86
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1936 (1936), 348–9.
87
SZ, 1935, art. 162, dated February 22.
88
SZ, 1935, art. 201, dated May 4.
89
SZ, 1935, art. 360, dated August 9, art. 411, dated September 14. See also
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1936 (1936), 348.
90
SZ 1935, art. 92, dated March 4; Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1936 (1936), 457,
459, 461.
91
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1936 (1936), 299.
92
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1936 (1936), 504–5. A distinguished group of British
local government experts who visited Moscow in 1936 concluded that the lag in the
growth of housing behind the growth of the urban population was a major failure
of the regime. One of them ( Jewkes) calculated that for the cost of the Moscow
Metro 470,000 people could have been provided with eight square metres of hous-
ing per head, but another (Sir Ernest Simon) commented about the Metro that ‘the
whole of Russia feels proud of it’ (Simon et al. (1937), 90–1, 204–5). The present
area of urban housing per head was 4.5 square metres.
108 1935: The Growing Threat of War
the result of the continuing rise in the cost of house building, which
reached 324 rubles per square metre in 1935 as compared with the
185 rubles anticipated when the five-year plan was compiled in
1932–33.93
Major projects were started or continued which appealed to Soviet
patriotism and enhanced Soviet international prestige; they centred
on Moscow as the capital of the Soviet Union and of world com-
munism. On May Day Chkalov flew the I-16 fighter over Red
Square, and on May 5 both the designer and the pilot were awarded
the Order of Lenin. At the reception Stalin was reported to have said
to Chkalov ‘Your life is more valuable than any machine.’94 Then on
May 15 the first line of the Moscow Metro was opened amid trium-
phant publicity.95 Following the visit of the architectural and techni-
cal commission of the Palace of Soviets to Europe and the United
States, elaborate decrees provided that construction should begin in
1935. United States’ expertise would be extensively involved in plan-
ning the steel frame, building materials, lifts and escalators, acoustics,
air conditioning and even food preparation. A rotating team of two
Soviet architects or engineers would be located in New York for the
duration of the project.96 The main hall of the palace would seat
20,000 people, and the buffet would be capable of serving 3,000
people simultaneously.97
The climax of these plans for Moscow came with the public
announcement on July 10, shortly before the Comintern congress, of
the ten-year ‘General Plan for the Construction of Moscow’. After
much dispute, the plan retained the main features of Moscow’s his-
toric centre, but with a major re-routing of the roads.98 In September,
a further decree praised the substantial work which had already been
undertaken on the Moscow–Volga canal, and authorised its exten-
sion and deepening. The canal, which was being built by the NKVD
with the extensive use of forced labour, was to be completed by April
1937. The total cost of construction would amount to the huge sum
93
RGAE, 1562/1/1039, 79 (n.d.[1939?]).
94
P, May 4, 6, 1935; Chkalova (2004), 116–18.
95
P, May 15, 16, 1935.
96
GARF, 5446/1/481, 7–14, dated April 26. $7 million were allocated for US
technical assistance (RGASPI, 17/162/18, 114, dated July 17).
97
GARF, 5446/1/482, 47–50 (art. 1475/230s, dated June 29).
98
SZ, 1935, art. 306, decree of Sovnarkom and the party central committee. An
English translation of this long decree was published in Moscow: General Plan for the
Reconstruction of the City (1935), and in Simon et al. (1937).
 1935: The Growing Threat of War 109
of 1,400 million rubles; and a supplementary allocation of funds was
made available in 1935.99 The finishing touch for the Moscow enter-
prise was the decision to remove the Imperial eagles from the Kremlin
towers and replace them with five-pointed Soviet stars; 68 kilograms
of gold were allocated for this purpose.100
The prestige projects were not confined to Moscow. In July, the
competence of the State Administration for the Northern Sea route
was extended by adding to its functions the provision of economic
and cultural services to the peoples of the Far North; the existing
Committee to Assist the Far North was abolished.101 Its grant from
the state budget was considerably increased, but expenditure on the
Northern Sea Route was far less than on the Moscow–Volga canal.102
In the Union republics, most publicity was afforded, following the
disasters of 1931–33 (see vol. 5, pp. 321–5, 408–9), to the future
plans of the Kazakh ASSR, announced on the occasion of the fif-
teenth anniversary of the foundation of the republic; the plans
placed special emphasis on education and rural health.103
Soviet achievements were celebrated in a variety of well-publi-
cised ways. Stalin, together with other members of the Politburo,
travelled in the new Moscow Metro and visited the first stages of the
Moscow–Volga canal.104 A team of young soldiers attached to
Narkomput’ rode Soviet-manufactured bicycles on a 9,000 kilometre
route from Khabarovsk in Siberia to Moscow in the record time of
57 days.105 More traditionally, cavalrymen completed a ride through

99
SZ, 1935, art. 395 (decree of Sovnarkom and the party central committee, dated
September 8); Stalin authorised the publication of the decree (SKP 557, n. 1, dated
September 8), which appeared in Pravda on September 9.
100
GARF, 5446/1/483, 19, dated September 17, and 74, art. 2149/359ss, dated
September 23.
101
SZ, 1935, art. 338, dated July 21.
102
See Table 8. In 1935–37 investment in the Northern Sea Route amounted
to 364 million rubles, but investment in the Moscow–Volga canal amounted to
425 million rubles in 1937 alone (see Table 8 and, for the 1937 expenditure,
RGAE, 1562/10/502a, 27 (n.d. [1938?]).
103
SZ, 1935, art. 458, dated October 25. The celebration of the occasion was
delayed from September to October 24 on the proposal of Mirzoyan, the party sec-
retary (SKP, 540, Kaganovich to Stalin, dated August 29, and Stalin’s reply in n. 3).
104
P, April 29, June 5, 1935.
105
See RGASPI, 17/3/971, 4, dated August 31, 1936, and SKP, 542, where
Kaganovich claimed to Stalin that the journey was made ‘without breakdowns and
accidents’.
110 1935: The Growing Threat of War
Central Asia and the North Caucasus from Askhabad to Moscow.106
A disaster was turned to patriotic advantage following the precedent
of the rescue of the stranded crew of the Chelyuskin (see p. 20 above).
The prestigious 77-seater metal civil aircraft Maksim Gorky, at that
time the largest in the world, crashed on May 18, 1935, after collid-
ing with an accompanying fighter plane. In July Sovnarkom
announced the collection of voluntary contributions to enable the
construction of sixteen new Maksim Gorky airliners; the planes were
to be named after the present members of the Politburo plus Frunze,
Lenin, Kuibyshev, Dzerzhinsky and Kirov.107 But only one passenger
aircraft of this type was ever completed; the factory was transferred
to the production of heavy bombers.108
Official encouragement of a more relaxed attitude to everyday life
continued in 1935. In April the government authorised the sale of the
ingredients for the traditional Easter cake.109 Following Gorky’s sup-
port for folk culture at the Writers’ Congress, folk songs and folk dances
were popularised, and ballroom dancing also became fashionable.110
At the end of the year, the traditional Christmas tree was revived as a
New Year tree, and on December 31, 1935, and January 1, 1936, new
year festivities were firmly installed as a feature of the Soviet calendar.
For many of those living in the major towns who identified them-
selves with the regime this was a time of great hope. A mining student
in Sverdlovsk, who became deputy minister for geology after the war,
described in his diary how he went to performances of Beethoven
and Gounod, saw Boris Godunov, The Demon and Faust, and enthusiasti-
cally studied Greek thought, the history of the arts, philosophy, dia-
lectical materialism – and ballroom dancing. His last diary entry for
1935 read ‘Life! I have triumphed!’111 The 21-year old son of a deku-
lakised peasant, previously tormented by his dual position as a Soviet
citizen and a ‘class alien’, concluded in the spring of 1935 that the
new attitude to class meant that ‘I’ve been made a citizen of the com-
mon family of the USSR’, and when he was admitted to the Moscow

106
RGASPI, 17/3/970, 68, dated August 26, 1935. For Stalin’s greetings to this
exploit, see Soch. xiv, 71.
107
SZ, 1935, art. 308, dated July 5; EZh, July 8, 1935.
108
Samoletostroenie, i (1992), 322–3, 375.
109
See Tucker (1990), 325–6.
110
Ibid. 326–7; and see p. 290 below.
111
Garros et al., eds (1995), 257–82 (L. A. Potemkin’s diary).
 1935: The Growing Threat of War 111
Medical Institute in the autumn, believed that he had entered ‘a new
stage … of my being and consciousness’.112
But this was a year of trial and turmoil for many ‘former people’
and former party oppositionists. Even the 58-year-old founder of the
Leningrad puppet theatre complained of her ‘awful, degrading life’:
she and her 19-year-old son were frequently interrogated by the
NKVD, and many of her friends and associates were peremptorily
exiled to remote regions.113 Mandel’shtam, who had been exiled to
Voronezh but for the moment spared by Stalin from a worse fate (see
p. 17 above), was deprived of his personal pension.114

The experienced and talented group of senior officials responsible for

managing the government departments concerned with the economy
remained unchanged in 1935 – with two important exceptions.
Kaganovich, while retaining some of his party functions, including
acting as deputy to Stalin when Stalin was on vacation, joined them
in direct management of the economy with his appointment on
February 28 as People’s Commissar for Transport.115 Osinsky was
removed from his post of director of TsUNKhU. Since his appoint-
ment in January 1932 as its first director (see vol. 3, pp. 201–2), he had
done a great deal to restore the collection and publication of more
reliable statistics about the economy. But he and his associates in
TsUNKhU had been frequently criticised and badgered, most notably
in the winter of 1932–33 (see vol. 5, pp. 134–5, and vol. 4, pp. 262–3,
338–40). In 1934 he was viciously attacked by Pravda, on extremely
slender grounds (see pp. 33–4 above). In March 1935 his son was
arrested by the NKVD, accused of membership of a Trotskyist group;
Osinsky immediately appealed to Stalin, who ordered his son’s release
on the same day.116 In the following month, however, Osinsky met
Stalin, and informed him that ‘I am absolutely unable to work in
TsUNKhU any longer.’ Stalin referred the matter to Molotov, to
whom Osinsky wrote that ‘I feel a constantly increasing insurmount-
able and profound repulsion’ for work in TsUNKhU.117 On August 8
112
Fitzpatrick, ed. (2000), 77–116, esp. pp. 87–90 ( J. Hellbeck, citing the diary of
S. Podlubnyi; for Podlubnyi’s later disillusionment, see vol. 7).
113
See her diary in Garros et al., eds (1995), 334–41.
114
GARF, 5446/1/481, 52 (art. 873/129s, dated May 11, 1935).
115
SZ, 1935, ii, art. 29; for transport see pp. 214–19 below.
116
Lubyanka, i (2003), 650–1.
117
Sovetskoe rukovodstvo (1999), 206–7 (letter to Molotov, dated May 15, 1935).
According to Stalin’s appointments diary, Osinsky met Stalin for 35 minutes on
112 1935: The Growing Threat of War
he was replaced by Kraval’, a tough Stalin operator, who had been put
in to TsUNKhU as Osinsky’s deputy after the 1932–33 crisis.118
In the Politburo itself, Kuibyshev, who died on January 25, and Kirov
were replaced by Mikoyan and Chubar’; these were normal promotions
from their position as candidate members of the Politburo. Chubar’, a
competent administrator, and already a deputy chair of Sovnarkom,
replaced Kuibyshev as head of the Committee of Reserves.119 By acci-
dent and design, other changes in the positions of leading personnel
were more significant portends of the future. Following Kaganovich’s
transfer to Narkomput’, he was replaced as head of the influential
party control commission by his deputy Yezhov. Yezhov was also
appointed as a secretary of the party central committee and head of its
department of leading party agencies. Moreover, Yezhov became in
effect the supervisor of the NKVD on behalf of the party.120 Under
Stalin’s supervision, he organised the trials of the Zinovievites after the
murder of Kirov; and in May he sent to Stalin the first chapter of his
never-completed From Factionalism to Counter-Revolution, which, following
the line taken by the central committee circular of January 18 (see
p. 98 above) provided the ideological justification of treating the former
oppositionists in the party as class enemies.121 In 1935 Yezhov met
Stalin in his office 32 times as compared with 17 in 1934, while Stalin’s
meetings with Yagoda declined from 51 to 36.122
The other significant change resulted from Akulov’s appoint-
ment as secretary of TsIK following the downfall of Yenukidze.
Akulov, who had a reputation for moderation, was replaced as
Procurator of the USSR by his deputy Vyshinsky.123 For the
moment, Vyshinsky continued Akulov’s efforts to achieve a meas-
ure of control by the Procuracy over the activities of the NKVD.124

April 10; no-one else was present.

118
For Kraval’ see vol. 2, pp. 342–3, and vol. 3, pp. 339–40. Osinsky remained
head of the State Committee for Measuring the Harvest until it was merged into
TsUNKhU in March 1937.
119
SZ, 1935, ii, art. 65, dated April 28. Kuibyshev was replaced as head of the
commission of state control by the colourless Antipov (SZ, 1935, ii, art. 61, dated
April 27).
120
See Khlevnyuk (1996), 161.
121
See Jansen and Petrov (2002), 29–30.
122
Khlevnyuk (1996), 290–1. Andreev, also reliably obedient to Stalin, took over
the party Orgburo from Kaganovich.
123
SZ, 1935, ii, arts. 31–2, dated March 3.
124
See Khlevnyuk (2004), 293–4, 299–310 (memoranda of February 1936).
 1935: The Growing Threat of War 113
But his opportunistic malleability was well known, and from the sum-
mer of 1936 he was the principal scourge of the accused in the three
major public trials.
The general effect of the changes in the party leadership was to
somewhat dilute the influence of Stalin’s closest associates and to
strengthen the ease with which Stalin could take decisions on his
own. The diminished influence of the Politburo was reflected in the
decline in the number of its sittings from 46 in 1934 to 20 in 1935.125
Simultaneously, the Stalin cult was greatly enhanced. In July and
August 1935 Pravda published in eight instalments Beria’s notorious
falsified panegyric about Stalin’s pre-revolutionary role, On the History
of Bolshevik Organisations in the Transcaucasus; an editorial praised the
work as an example to follow.126 At this time the French communist
writer Henri Barbusse completed an enthusiastic biography of
Stalin, which was published in French and English.127 Previous his-
tories of the Soviet party were downgraded. On December 4, 1935,
Yaroslavsky, who had completed a revised version of his very widely
circulated party history, complained to Ordzhonikidze that this
work, on which he had been engaged for ten years, ‘is being buried ’.128
Behind the scenes a new sycophantic attitude to Stalin appeared in
a private letter from Kaganovich to Ordzhonikidze, praising the suc-
cess of the grain collections as ‘our completely unusual stunning
victory – the victory of Stalinism’.129
The growing threat of war during 1935 led to a sharp increase in
some of the resources devoted to defence. Instead of the planned
increase of 32 per cent, capital construction by Narkomoborony
increased by as much as 65 per cent.130 Expenditure on maintenance of
the armed forces amounted to 4,762 million rubles instead of the 4,202
million originally planned.131 The main failure of the defence plan in
1935 was that expenditure on the purchase of armaments increased by
only 14 per cent, far less than planned; the armaments industries had
not achieved their ambitious plan (see pp. 203–11 below).
125
See Khlevnyuk (1996); decisions not taken at the sessions were made by poll of
the members, usually by telephone.
126
P, July 29–August 5. August 10 (editorial). For these events, see Tucker (1990),
333–5.
127
Ibid. 335.
128
Sovetskoe rukovodstvo (1999), 320–1.
129
Stalinskoe Politbyuro (1995), 146–7, dated September 4, 1935.
130
See Harrison and Davies (1997), 380.
131
See Harrison and Davies (1997), 380.
 CHAPTER FIVE

THE 1935 PLAN AND THE ABOLITION OF

BREAD RATIONING

(A) THE INITIAL STAGE OF PREPARING THE 1935 PLAN,

JULY–AUGUST 1934

‘The Targets (limity) for the National-Economic Plan of 1935’ were

adopted five months before the beginning of the year, on July 29,
1934, as a decree of Sovnarkom.1 This was far earlier than with
previous annual plans, and the targets were set out in greater detail.
This minor revolution in planning procedures was designed to ena-
ble government departments, republics, regions and enterprises to
prepare their own annual plans, and submit their claims for materials
and equipment, before the beginning of the new year.
In the now remote world of NEP, Sovnarkom decided on June 8,
1927, that in future it would approve the ‘numerical ceilings and
main directives’ of the annual ‘control figures’ in sufficient time to
enable Gosplan to disaggregate them to the commissariats and the
republics by July 1.2 This was three months before the economic
year, which then began on October 1. It proved impossible to carry
out even this more modest timetable in the later 1920s, years of
profound disputes and rapid shifts in policy, or during the planning
chaos of 1929–30. From the 1931 plan onwards, however, the
Politburo and/or Sovnarkom adopted at least a handful of planning
indicators a few weeks before the beginning of the year. The politics
of planning was of course utterly different in the 1930s from the
second half of the 1920s, when the preparation of the annual plans
was conducted largely in public, and the main stages of the plan-
ning process, and the main disputes, were described in some detail
in the press.3 In the 1930s, the draft plan continued to be discussed
within Gosplan and between the key commissariats, but these dis-
cussions took place almost entirely in secret. For the 1934 plan, for
example, the key investment and production figures were agreed

1
GARF, 5446/1/89, 157–9 (art. 1803).
2
See Carr and Davies (1969), 811.
3
See, for example, Carr and Davies (1969), chs 12 and 34.

114
 Preparing the Plan, July–August 1934 115
privately in September 1933 between Kuibyshev (then head of
Gosplan), Molotov and Stalin; and two months later the plan was
not considered by a full meeting of the Politburo but adopted as a
decision of a restricted Politburo session, which the full Politburo
later approved by poll.4 Similarly the Sovnarkom decree on the
1935 plan was approved by a restricted Politburo meeting on the
previous day, July 28; it was not formally endorsed by the full
Politburo until August 5.5 All Politburo decisions were of course
secret, and the July 29 Sovnarkom decree was classified ‘not for
publication’.6
The decree of July 29 included production, investment and finan-
cial targets. The increase in production by the industrial commis-
sariats was planned at 15 per cent and by the industrial cooperatives
at 14 per cent. The railways would carry an average of 63,000
wagon-loads a day and receive an allocation of 650,000 tons of
Grade 1 rails. The progress made in the first half of 1934 indicated
that these were realistic targets. In the first six months of 1934 indus-
trial production was over 17 per cent greater than in the same period
of the previous year and by June 1934 57,000 railway wagons were
loaded daily. The July 29 targets were supplemented on August 5 by
a further Sovnarkom decree setting out plans for increases in labour
productivity (output per worker) and for the production targets in
physical terms for 24 major items of industrial output.7 These targets
were also on the whole realistic.
The crucial figure in the decree of July 29, and the most contro-
versial, was for capital investment. Its importance was emphasised by
setting out, in an appendix table, 38 sub-allocations to commissariats
and other government departments. Only 18,000 million rubles (in
1935 prices) were allocated, even though at this time the annual plan
for investment in 1934 was 23,000 million rubles, and the second
five-year plan, published only a couple of months previously, allo-
cated 27,704 million rubles to investment in 1935 (also in 1935
prices).

4
RGASPI, 17/3/935, arts. 93/74 and 93/75, dated November 28, and article
104/85, dated November 29, 1933.
5
RGASPI, 17/3/949 (art. 17/139).
6
No record has been available of the prior informal top-level exchanges which
undoubtedly took place about the basic ceilings in the July 29 decree.
7
GARF, 5446/1/89, 310–311 (art. 1836).
116 The 1935 Plan and the Abolition of Bread Rationing
The very modest investment plan was closely associated with the
attempt to achieve – or rather move in the direction of – the five-year
plan decision to reduce average retail prices in the course of the five
years by as much as 35 per cent. The effect of this large reduction
would be that retail trade in 1937 would amount to 53,000 million
rubles in current prices as compared with 81,575 million rubles when
valued in 1933 prices – a reduction of over 28,000 million rubles.8
This would in turn require a quite unusual degree of financial
restraint, including a reduction in industrial costs over the five years
by 26 per cent, and of building costs by as much as 40 cent.9
During the first eighteen months of the five-year plan, however,
costs had been reduced only slightly, and retail prices had increased.
Against this background the decree of July 29 called for great
financial stringency:

The budget and credit plans for 1935 shall be based on a plan not to
issue additional currency (bezemissionyi plan), and to form a reserve
amounting to 2 thousand million rubles in the unified state budget.

In this spirit the decrees of July 29 and August 5 called for substantial
cost reductions, beginning a belated move towards achieving the
five-year plan requirement.10 The decree of July 29 also announced
a severe restriction on the average wage per head in 1935 – it would
remain at the level of the last three months of 1934.
The decree of July 29 also declared that in retail trade all addi-
tional supplies would be directed into commercial and rural trade (as
distinct from trade in rationed goods), and that retail prices in com-
mercial and rural trade would be reduced by 2,000–3,000 million
rubles (for the term ‘commercial trade’, see pp. 9–10 above). This
reduction would have been only a small step towards the reduction
of prices by over 28,000 million rubles by 1937; the decree had
silently abandoned the five-year plan for costs and prices. Before this
decision was taken, the trade sector of Gosplan, in a memorandum

8
Vtoroi (1934), i, 530–1.
9
VKP v rez., ii (1954) 762; Vtoroi (1934), i, 321. In consequence the cost of indus-
trial production in 1937, measured in current 1937 prices, would be 13,000 million
rubles less than the cost of the same output measured in 1932 prices.
10
The cost reduction in 1935 would be as follows (per cent): Narkomtyazhprom 6;
Narkomlegprom 1; Narkompishcheprom 3; Narkomles 3.5 (excluding the timber
collections); cost of pure building 15; cost of equipment used in investment 4.
 Preparing the Plan, July–August 1934 117
of July 18, 1934, acknowledged that average retail prices, including
the prices of rationed goods, would actually rise in 1934. Prices in
commercial and rural trade would decline by only 1,300 million
rubles, as compared with the 1934 plan of 2,000 million, and the
increased price of rationed bread, introduced in the previous month
(see pp. 54–5 above), would raise retail prices in the period June–
December 1934 by 2,500 million rubles, resulting in a net price
increase of 1,200 million. In the hope of making progress towards
the five-year plan objective, the memorandum of July 18 optimisti-
cally proposed that retail prices should be reduced by as much as
7,000 million rubles in 1935, declining by 17 per cent in commercial
and rural trade.11 The decree of July 29 implicitly rejected this
proposal as unrealistic.
The low capital investment figure came as a great shock to the
various Gosplan departments and to the People’s Commissariats.
When the initial claims of the Gosplan departments were aggre-
gated, they reached the extravagant total of 33,768 million rubles.
Gosplan reduced this figure first to 26,537 million and then to 23,500
million rubles.12 This was already quite a low figure, approximately
the same as the current 1934 plan, and 15 per cent below the plan
for 1935 in the five-year plan. Immediately after receiving the notifi-
cation of their share of the lower planned investment of 18,000
million rubles, a mere 65 per cent of the five-year plan figure, the
major Gosplan departments protested vigorously.
By far the largest item in the investment plan was of course the
allocation to Narkomtyazhprom, amounting to 39 per cent of the
total. The Narkomtyazhprom plan for 1935 set out in the decree
of July 29 was 6,950 million rubles, 77 per cent of the five-year
plan figure, and over 1,000 million rubles less than the 8,040
million rubles proposed by Gosplan. The extremely competent
metallurgy department of Gosplan was very perturbed by the allo-
cation to the iron and steel industry. When the five-year plan was
compiled, it was already clear to the specialists that it would be
extremely difficult to fit the ambitious iron and steel construction
programme into the allocation. The investment in iron and steel
planned by the central authorities in Gosplan for 1935 was 2,000
million rubles, approximately the same as the amount in the
11
RGAE, 4372/33/122, 135–132.
12
RGAE, 4372/33/122, 161–160 (n.d., but from internal content evidently
prepared in June or early July 1934).
118 The 1935 Plan and the Abolition of Bread Rationing
five-year plan for 1935. On July 18, a memorandum from the
Gosplan metallurgy department assessed this allocation in unusu-
ally favourable terms. It estimated that over half the total would be
available for the construction of new factories; this would make it
possible to begin the construction of the Bakal works and the sec-
ond phase of the Kuznetsk works.13 But two days later, on July 20,
the news was received that the allocation would be only 1,500
million, and might be as low as 1,375 million, considerably less
than the investment expected in 1934. A very sharp memorandum
from the metallurgy department stated that the 1,500 million
would mean that no start could be made on the Bakal works or on
the second phase of Kuznetsk, and that far fewer furnaces and
rolling mills would be completed in 1935 than had been planned.
The department conceded that this failure would not have a great
effect on production in 1935 itself, but insisted that it would
‘threaten the fulfilment of the targets set out in the five-year plan
for 1936 and 1937’. And the lower figure, 1,375 million, would
mean that the completion of major facilities at such works as
Tomsky and Dzerzhinsky would be delayed, and part of
Zaporozhstal’, the only supplier of sheet steel now under construc-
tion, would have to be mothballed.14 These dire predictions proved
to be amply justified, both for 1935, and for later years.15
The allocation to the non-ferrous metals industries was similarly
reduced, from 1,000 million rubles in the five-year plan to 700 million
rubles. The Gosplan department bluntly commented that this would
‘presuppose that a number of basic building projects will be moth-
balled so that they will produce only after 1937’; as a result, the

13
RGAE, 4372/33/122, 259–255.
14
RGAE, 4372/33/122, 250–248.
15
Later development will be discussed in vol. 7. In 1935, the number of completions
was as follows:

Planned Predicted by metallurgy Actual

sector, July 20, 1934
Blast furnaces 6 3 3
Open-hearth furnaces 40 30 26
Rolling mills 21 15 18

Actual figures are from Clark (1956), 322.

 Preparing the Plan, July–August 1934 119
five-year plan would not be carried out.16 This pessimistic assessment
in fact proved, except in the case of zinc, to be far too optimistic, as
the following figures show (thousand tons):

1937 plan 1937: predicted in 1937

in five- July 20, 1934 Gosplan Actual
year plan memorandum
Copper 135 112 98
Zinc 90 70 77
Lead 115 101 62
Aluminium 80 53 38
The fuel sector of Gosplan similarly concluded that the allocation
to the oil industry ‘fails to solve a number of especially important
tasks and gives rise to alarm for the following years’. It also pointed
out that the allocation to the coal industry would mean a delay in
the work on new mines, and as these took five years to complete, it
would threaten the prospects for supplying additional coal not only
in 1937 but also in later years. The coal industry was also faced with
the particularly acute problem of supplying accommodation for
new workers, which could not be covered by the low allocation: at
present even in the most favourable areas housing per head
amounted to only 3.5 m2, and at new mines the figure fell to only
2.2–3m2.17
The second largest allocation in the investment plan was to
Narkomput’: the allocations to Narkomtyazhprom and Narkomput’
together amounted to over 55 per cent of total investment. The allo-
cation to Narkomput’, 3,000 million rubles, was relatively generous,
amounting to 81 per cent of the amount allocated for 1935 in the
five-year plan. For several years the inability of the railways to cope
with the increased volume of freight had been a serious constraint
on the economy, and the authorities were at last beginning to recog-
nise that the main reason for this was insufficient investment. In the
preliminary negotiations both Narkomput’ and the transport sector
of Gosplan demanded substantially greater investment than was

16
RGAE, 4372/33/122, 247–246, dated July 20, 1934.
17
RGAE, 4372/33/63, 117–121 (oil industry, dated November 13, 1934); ibid.
60–88 (coal industry, dated November 12, 1934). These November memoranda
were calling for an increase in the allocation announced in the previous July.
120 The 1935 Plan and the Abolition of Bread Rationing
provided for in the five-year plan.18 The allocation of 3,000 million
rubles met with strong objections. On July 20 the transport depart-
ment of Gosplan pointed out that while 3,800 million rubles ‘in gen-
eral corresponds to the proposals of the five-year plan’, a reduction
to 3,400 million rubles would mean that investment in new lines and
in factories serving the railways would be drastically cut; moreover,
they would be able to afford only 450 of the 650 million rubles of
new rolling stock planned for 1935. As for the allocation of 3,000
million rubles:

[This amount] would additionally require sharp cuts in the alloca-

tions to the main services supporting the locomotives, wagons, and
track, and would bring about a further reduction in the allocations to
new construction – not merely the almost complete cancellation of
work on new projects, but also the mothballing of part of the projects
already under way.19

Light industry suffered the most savage cut. The five-year plan
proposed a major expansion in both the light and the food industry,
‘creating large-scale machine industries’. The food industry had
made substantial progress in this direction during the first five-year
plan, but investment in light industry had been very small. Its most
important products, cotton textiles, were already manufactured in
large factory units, and the shortage of cotton and other raw materi-
als meant that the industry would be able to manage using the exist-
ing machinery. The preliminary proposal made by Gosplan already
reduced the allocation for 1935 from 2,600 million rubles in the
five-year plan to 1,600 million rubles. The Gosplan department

18
Investment plans for Narkomput’, 1935 (million rubles in 1935 prices)

In five-year plan 3710

Proposed by Narkomput’ 5500
Proposed by Gosplan transport department 4470
Initial proposal by Gosplan 4100
Revised proposal of transport department 3800
Revised proposal by Gosplan 3400
Allocated by Sovnarkom, July 29, 1934 3000
(RGAE, 4372/33/122, 161–160 (n.d.), and Tables 14 and 15 below).
19
RGAE, 4372/33/122, 149.
 The Decision to End Bread Rationing 121
concerned with light industry complained that this would mean that
it would be ‘extremely difficult’ for enterprises already under con-
struction to be brought into operation in 1936 as planned, particu-
larly as the estimates of the cost of constructing them, prepared
several years ago, were far too low. Moreover, the construction of
over 100 further new factories was due to begin in 1935, and the
proposed investment would mean that only preliminary work could
be undertaken. Construction would be delayed for a year or eighteen
months, and the production plans for 1937 would not be met.20
After it had submitted this memorandum the department was
informed that the allocation had been reduced to a mere 750 million
rubles. A further memorandum from the department insisted that
this would mean that the planned start on 100 new factories would
be completely abandoned in 1935. Only 18 of the 100 factories
already under construction could be completed, and most of the
remainder would be mothballed. The production plans for 1937
would have to be drastically cut.21 Nevertheless, the allocation in the
July 29 decree remained at 750 million rubles.
The ceilings announced for 1935 in July and August 1934 remained
unchanged until the end of 1934, in spite of frequent complaints
behind the scenes about the low level of investment.22

(B) THE DECISION TO END BREAD RATIONING

The obvious prerequisite for the abolition of bread rationing was the
availability of sufficient bread to avoid shortages. When Stalin per-
sonally decided that it was time to abolish bread rationing is not
known. He communicated his decision to his immediate colleagues
on October 22, 1934. But, as we have seen (see p. 66 above), in the
course of the summer and autumn of 1934 he displayed great anxi-
ety about the course of the grain deliveries to the state in a series of
letters written from vacation to Kaganovich. The 1934 grain harvest

20
RGAE, 4372/33/122, 187–185 (memorandum to Kviring and Smirnov, n.d. –
from internal evidence written mid-July 1934 or earlier).
21
The file contains two memoranda sent to Kviring at this time: the first, dated
July 20, cites alternative figures of 750 and 900 million rubles; the second, evidently
written shortly afterwards, mentioned only the lower figure. RGAE, 4372/33/122,
192–188, 184.
22
For the plan for defence expenditure, see Chapter 4, pp. 45–6.
122 The 1935 Plan and the Abolition of Bread Rationing
was a reasonable one, though somewhat lower than the 1933 har-
vest, and the grain deliveries had progressed well. Somewhat more
grain was available for internal consumption owing to the reduction
of grain exports.23 The extent of Stalin’s anxiety – if he did not
already have the abolition of bread rationing in mind – would be
surprising.
The measures proposed by Stalin, including the zakupki, were to
provide considerably more grain than in the previous year. Stalin at
first said nothing to his colleagues about his intention of abolishing
bread rationing. But on October 22 he wrote to Kaganovich, propos-
ing what he described as ‘a most serious reform’: the complete aboli-
tion of bread rationing from January 1935.24 According to Stalin,
bread rationing was ‘recently still necessary and useful, but [is] now
a fetter on the economy’. This letter supports the hypothesis that his
earlier insistence on the need for grain was closely linked with his
hopes for the abolition of rationing: in order to abolish bread ration-
ing, he wrote, it is ‘necessary to have in the hands of the state 1,400–
1,500 thousand million puds [22.9–24.6 million tons] of grain’.
Stalin summarised the main provisions of the future reform in a
concise statement:

By lowering comm[ercial] prices and increasing the ration price we

will fix an average price for bread and flour, stabilise on it and vary it
by areas. This will make it necessary to increase wages, and the prices
paid for cotton, wool, flax, leather, tobacco, etc.

Stalin asked Kaganovich to consult the other members of the Politburo

about the proposal to end rationing, ‘and – if you agree – begin to
prepare the matter’.
On October 28, the day on which he received this letter,
Kaganovich requested the Politburo to assemble in emergency
session.25 The Politburo, as always, agreed to Stalin’s proposal.26
23
Grain exports amounted to 769,000 tons in 1934 (primarily from the 1934
harvest) as compared with 1,684,000 in the previous year (Vneshnyaya torgovlya
(1960), 144).
24
SKP, 513.
25
Ibid.; this is a note on Stalin’s letter, which is endorsed as having been read by
Molotov, Zhdanov, Kuibyshev, Kalinin and Andreev.
26
APRF, 3/43/51, 47. The decision set out the responsibilities of Veitser, Zelensky,
Kleiner, Shvernik (with Veinberg as his replacement), Mezhlauk and Grin’ko for
preparing different aspects of the reform, the work to be undertaken ‘in strict
 The Decision to End Bread Rationing 123
The decision was not included in the minutes (bez protokola), presum-
ably in order to maintain particularly strict secrecy. On the same day
Kaganovich wrote in reply to Stalin:

today we have given a number of tasks to Veitser, Kleiner and others,

on the preparation of the question of the transition from the ration-
ing system, and on new prices and wages. It will be a major and
excellent business.27

Stalin returned to Moscow at the end of October, and was closely

involved in the preparation of the reform.28
The abolition of rationing was presented in the press as a major
triumph for the Soviet system; it was offered to the population as a new
stage in economic development in which sacrifices and tribulations
were past. It was the main topic of the central committee plenum
which met November 25–28. At the plenum Molotov, in delivering the
main report, praised the reform as enabling ‘a rapid development of
trade in conformity with the requirements of the consumers in town
and countryside’; the abolition of bread rationing marked ‘the begin-
ning of the abolition of rationing for all food products and commodi-
ties’.29 He explained that bread prices would vary by geographical
area, for which purpose the USSR would be divided into eight Zones
(poyasy). He also strongly insisted on the need to move over from the
supply of flour to the supply of baked bread. He pointed out that in
some industrial areas, such as the Ivanovo and Urals regions, bread
was largely supplied in the form of flour owing to ‘impermissible back-
wardness in the baking of bread’. Prices should be arranged so as to
stimulate the purchase of bread rather than flour.30
In compensation for the price increases, wages in 1935 would
rise by 4,100 million rubles, or approximately 10 per cent.

secrecy’. Kleiner, previously deputy head of Komzag, was appointed its head on
April 10, 1934, replacing Chernov. Shvernik was head of the All-Union Central
Council of Trade Unions.
27
SKP, 519.
28
For details see Khlevnyuk and Davies (1999), 572–3.
29
The report, delivered on November 25, was published in I, November 30, 1934;
the archives contain both a typed stenogram of the report (RGASPI, 17/2/528),
and the authorised text in the printed but secret verbatim report (RGASPI,
17/2/536, 1–9).
30
The passages about the importance of baked bread did not appear in the typed
version of Molotov’s report.
124 The 1935 Plan and the Abolition of Bread Rationing
The expenditure on higher wages and the higher prices of indus-
trial crops must be balanced by the revenue from increased bread
prices:

It must be planned so that the state should not suffer a loss.

Stalin interrupted with the remark ‘It evidently comes out fifty-fifty
(tak na tak), it is equal.’ Molotov replied ‘so far it is still with a surplus
(s gakom)’; revenue was ‘so far planned at 2–2³ milliard [thousand
million] rubles higher’ than expenditure, but precise financial
estimates could not yet be made.31
Speakers who followed Molotov expressed some unease about the
possible effects of the abolition of bread rationing. Zelensky placed
great stress on the need to involve small-scale local and artisan indus-
try so as to ensure that enough bread was available. It was not merely
that bakeries were insufficient; in some areas bread had to be issued
as grain because the grain mills were incapable of producing enough
flour. But there was a more general problem:

People have grown accustomed in the past five years to ration cards,
and reckon that it is calmer with cards, and many people fear that
they will be in difficulties.32

Nikolaeva from Ivanovo region pointed out that in her region 54 per
cent of textile workers received flour rather than bread, and took
flour even when bread was available.33 Postyshev complained that
many workers were compelled to buy flour at high prices; they would
need somewhat higher wages to meet the extra cost.34 Razumov,

31
The exchange with Stalin does not appear in the published report. Both the
published report and the printed verbatim report in the archives include the follow-
ing sentence which is not in Molotov’s original typed version of the report: ‘We must
not set the aim that the state should gain any supplementary revenue from carrying
out the present measure’ – obviously inserted after Stalin’s speech at the plenum –
see p. 126 below. These two versions of Molotov’s report omit any mention of the
2,000–2,500 million rubles.
32
RGASPI, 17/2/536, 10–11. In the typed stenogram of this speech, Zelensky
referred to a ‘huge’ rather than a supplementary growth of local and artisan indus-
try (RGASPI, 17/2/529, 3). The passage about the lack of mills appears in the
typed stenogram but not in the printed report in the archives (ibid. 5).
33
RGASPI, 17/2/536, 11.
34
RGASPI, 17/2/536, 13.
 The Decision to End Bread Rationing 125
from West Siberia, insisted that workers in West Siberia received
sufficient rationed bread, and would object when they had to buy
unrationed bread at three times the rationed price. He was twice
interrupted by Stalin, who commented ‘The market does not take
rationed bread into account’ and ‘You want to prove too much. You
want to base yourself on the old rationed price.’35
In his speech Veitser strongly stressed, with some support from
Stalin, that the end of rationing meant that old habits must be given
up and production must correspond to the needs of the consumer:

This does not mean that we are renouncing planning – on the con-
trary, it must be strengthened; but it must be real economically-
oriented trade planning, based on good knowledge of demand.
Stalin. And not office-based.36

At the end of the session Stalin addressed the delegates in an

unpublished speech which placed great emphasis on the enhanced
importance of the consumer and on the use of prices and wage
incentives; and said little about administrative control.37 ‘We must
stand strongly with both feet on the foundation of keeping account
of the requirements of real people, on the basis of getting near to the
consumer’. Stalin outlined five major advantages of the reform.
First, it would strengthen the money economy and develop trade
to the full. With rationing (‘in my opinion stupid’) the consumer ‘was
entirely not taken into account’.38 It was a system of ‘mechanical,
blind, bureaucratic distribution’. But with its abolition:

The tastes, requirements and wishes of particular areas and individ-

ual consumers will have to be taken into account by our trading
organisations.
35
RGASPI, 17/2/536, 18. In the typed version of Razumov’s speech Stalin was
recorded as saying ‘the market does not take the rationed price into account’. Stalin
also interrupted Razumov’s comparison of the high price of flour with that of
baked bread: ‘Stop talking about flour. Talk about baked bread’ (RGASPI,
17/3/529, 67, 66).
36
RGASPI, 17/2/536, 14–16.
37
RGASPI, 17/2/530, 78–98; a slightly revised version was prepared for the
unpublished Sochineniya, xiv, 48–59.
38
In the version prepared for publication in the Sochineniya, the phrase ‘in my opin-
ion stupid’ and the word ‘entirely’ were omitted.
126 The 1935 Plan and the Abolition of Bread Rationing
‘Bread will bring all the rest behind it’; ‘evidently we shall do the
same for potatoes, sugar and manufactured goods’.
Secondly, the abolition of rationing would end the ‘bacchanalia of
price’. Stalin resumed his insistence in his exchange with Razumov
that the rationed price should not be considered a real price, so that
the new prices already represented a price reduction ... ‘Market
prices do not take ration prices into account because these are not a
price but a gift to the working class.’
Thirdly, the reform would prevent speculation, which was ‘abso-
lutely inevitable when there were in practice 2 or 3 prices for bread’;
at present in large towns workers sold rations at higher prices which
they had purchased for 50 kopeks a kilogram, and competed with the
state, so that the state could not sell bread at the commercial price of
1 ruble 50 kopeks.
Fourthly, the ruble would be more stable, and the stability of the
ruble would strengthen both planning and economic accounting
(khozraschet).
Fifthly, the reform would compel trading organisations to ‘respect
the consumer and recognise him as a human being’.
Towards the end of his speech Stalin strongly criticised Gosbank
for claiming that the state would gain monetarily by two or three
thousand million rubles. Narkomfin was wrong to assume that work-
ers would buy as much bread on the market as they received in
rations: skilled workers in industrial towns would buy less, and work-
ers with low rations in the provinces would buy more, and the new
prices would be lower for them, so they would gain:

What will we gain, and how much will we lose? In general it is not
possible to estimate anything here in advance; to guess that the
reform will give us a monetary gain is, in my opinion, like trying to
write with forks on water.
We have also discussed this question with Molotov. They sup-
plied him with all kinds of materials to the effect that we will gain,
but when we examined the materials this turned out to be non-
sense ... Perhaps the state will have a monetary gain from the
reform, but it is more likely that there will be no gain. It is wrong
to guess.

The published resolution of the plenum reiterated the general

features of the reform, and called for the establishment of at least
 The Decision to End Bread Rationing 127
10,000 additional bread kiosks (lavki) by April 1, 1935.39 In the press
the assassination of Kirov on December 1 overshadowed for a few
days the preparations for the end of rationing. But after the publica-
tion of the Sovnarkom decree about the reform,40 it returned to the
centre of attention.
In an article published on December 22, Bukharin strongly sup-
ported the reform, and argued that one of the aims of the assassina-
tion of Kirov was to sabotage it. The enemy, Bukharin insisted,
sought to disrupt the ‘new and higher stage in our economic devel-
opment’; the abolition of rationing would enable the introduction of
true economic accounting, and would ‘change daily habits, from the
book-keeper to the storekeeper, from the engineer to the director’.41
The Sovnarkom decree of December 7 established the new retail
prices for rye and wheaten bread, and the considerably higher prices
for flour. The prices varied considerably by Zone: thus the retail
price of standard wheaten bread ranged between Zones from 80
kopeks to 1.50 rubles per kilogram. The typical price was 1 ruble per
kilogram; this was double the old ration price and two-thirds of the
old commercial price (see Khlevnyuk and Davies (1999), Table 3).
The decree also increased the delivery price paid by the state for cot-
ton, tobacco and other raw materials; this was because the abolition
of rationing meant that grain was no longer supplied to these spe-
cialised sectors of agriculture at the privileged ration prices, but at
the new higher retail price.
The decree also announced that the wage supplement, which
became known as the ‘bread supplement (khlebnaya nadbavka)’ (or
sometimes as the ‘bread and fodder supplement’) would amount to
4,200 million rubles.42 The authorities were anxious that this should
not provide a pretext for other wage increases. A further decision of

39
KPSS v rez., iii (1954), 256–60; the resolution first appeared in P, November 29,
1934. In the discussion of the resolution, Stalin, in spite of his earlier criticism of
Razumov, endorsed his proposal to vary bread prices, commenting that it would
‘make the transition more flexible’ (RGASPI, 17/2/529, 78).
40
SZ, 1934, art. 445, dated December 7; the decree was published in the daily
newspapers on the following day.
41
I, December 22, 1934.
42
The breakdown between government departments was set out in an unpub-
lished decree of December 5 (GARF, 5446/1/94, 143–145, art. 2672); the total
was 4,148.5 million rubles, but excluded the gold and platinum industry (as well
as the army and the OGPU, which do not seem to have been included in the total
4,200 million).
128 The 1935 Plan and the Abolition of Bread Rationing
the plenum, published as a decree of Sovnarkom and the party cen-
tral committee in the issue of Izvestiya which contained Molotov’s
report to the plenum, prohibited ‘any direct or indirect increase of
the established wage (transfer from grade to grade, renaming of
posts, etc.)’; the appropriate agencies should ‘immediately cancel any
unauthorised increase in wages and bring those guilty strictly to
justice’.43
In contrast to the wage supplements of June 1934, which had
been allocated only to lower-paid workers, the new supplements
were directed towards workers who had previously received high
rations. In his report Molotov explicitly stated that the wage sup-
plement would be differentiated so that ‘a larger increase in wages
will obtain where bread was supplied solely on the ration’ and ‘a
somewhat smaller increase will obtain for those groups supplied on
Lists 2 and 3’. The plenum resolution ruled that the wage increases
should ‘take into account the maintenance of the advantages
established for particular groups and categories of workers in the
ration system’. The specific supplements authorised in the detailed
regulations varied sharply from List to List and Zone to Zone,
approximately depending on the size of the bread ration previ-
ously received, and on the new price of bread in the particular
Zone. Thus in the case of persons employed by establishments
financed from the state budget, workers on the Special List received
9 rubles in Zone 1, and as much as 33 rubles in Zone 8. The vari-
ation between Lists may be illustrated by taking Zone 4 as an
example. Workers on the Special List (the top category) received an
extra 20 rubles per month, while those on List 3 (the fourth and
bottom category) received only 8 rubles.44 Within the Special List
and List 1, workers in heavy industry working underground, and in
hot and harmful work, received a slightly larger increase than other
workers.45 But this was not a differentiation according to wages
earned. A highly-paid skilled worker in a factory whose employees
were on the Special List received the same increase as a poorly-paid
unskilled worker.

43
I, November 30, 1934.
44
GARF, 5446/1/95, 74–77 (art. 39, dated January 9, 1935).
45
See order no. 1574 of Narkomtyazhprom dated December 25, 1934, in BFKhZ,
no. 1, 1935, 36–9; and see Bergson (1944), 211. Similar regulations for other com-
missariats are also published in BFKhZ.
 The Decision to End Bread Rationing 129
The amount paid was more than sufficient to cover the additional
cost of previously rationed bread for one person.46 But families with
dependants were disadvantaged by the reform. Under the rationing
arrangements dependants had received a bread ration in their own
right. In October–December 1934 50.54 million people were in
receipt of rations, and 23.97 million of these (47.4 per cent) of these
were dependent family members.47 In his speech to the plenum
Stalin complained that under rationing ‘manual and office workers
gathered their relatives together, subscribed to ration cards for them
and sold half the bread’. The new regulations went to the other
extreme. No additional payment was made for the dependent rela-
tives, including children as well as spouses who were not working,
and aged dependants. This meant that only employees without
dependants were adequately compensated: in his speech to the ple-
num Stalin conceded that the compensation was ‘not in full – we are
compensating by at least ¼’.48 Inadequate or no compensation for
dependants was a prominent general feature of the new arrange-
ments for food supply. The new sugar ration introduced from January
1, 1935, provided a standard 50 per cent increase in the ration for
employees with families, irrespective of the size of the family.49

46
Thus in the Special List the bread ration was normally 1 kilogram a day, the
increase over the rationed price was 50 kopeks per kilogram, and the wage supple-
ment was 16r per month.
47
RGASPI, 82/2/45, 80. Those receiving rations because of their occupations
included 22.87 million manual and office workers, 1.08 million students, 1 million
pensioners, 0.13 million policemen (militsionery), 0.5 million special settlers and
1 million artisans (kustari). These figures evidently exclude the armed forces, the
OGPU, and people confined in prisons and camps. According to Molotov’s report
to the party plenum, 40 million persons were on the four ration Lists which received
central supplies, and 10 million received rations from local resources (I, November
30, 1934); in his report Kaganovich noted that in addition to the 50 million,
24 million peasants received supplies of grain in return for their supply of industrial
crops to the state (EZh, December 27, 1934).
48
RGASPI, 17/2/530, 78–98.
49
GARF, 5446/1/94, 340–341 (Sovnarkom decree dated December 26, 1934).
Manual workers on the Special List received 1 kilogram per month if they did not
have families, 1.5 kilograms if they did; manual workers on List 1 received 0.8 and
1.2 kilograms; white-collar workers on the Special List or working in Moscow,
Leningrad, the Donbass or Baku received 0.5 and 0.75; the ration for all other blue-
collar workers depended on resources (white-collar workers on Lists 2 and 3 were
not mentioned at all).
130 The 1935 Plan and the Abolition of Bread Rationing
(C) THE ADOPTION OF THE 1935 PLAN

The annual national-economic plan was not eventually adopted

until February 8, 1935, at the time of the first session of TsIK imme-
diately following the VII Congress of soviets. When the decrees of
July 29 and August 5, 1934, setting out the main plan indicators,
were approved, it was taken for granted that rationing would con-
tinue in 1935, and the decision to abolish bread rationing meant that
all financial plans had to be revised. The work was not complete
when the VII Congress assembled, and at the time of the congress
only the main indicators of the plan were issued in a small-circulation
booklet. The plan was approved by a decree of Sovnarkom.50 This
was a huge document containing 441 folios, partly printed and partly
rough typewritten tables. Although the decree was not published, its
figures were frequently cited in the speeches of the political leaders.
The plan was finally sent to press by Gosplan in May 1935. The
National-Economic Plan for 1935 was an impressive and informative
book of 942 pages, and widely available in an edition of 28,000
copies.51 This resumed – but only for two years! – the tradition which
had been dropped after 1931.
The plan strongly emphasised that for the majority of items the
amounts proposed corresponded to the figures for 1935 in the five-
year plan.52 The plans for output per worker remained the same as
in the decrees of July and August 1934. The planned growth in the
gross production of Narkomtyazhprom was increased from 16 to
19 per cent as a result of the continued progress in the last months
of 1934. The main production targets in physical terms, however,
were largely unchanged as compared with the summer of 1934.53

50
GARF, 5446/1/37, art. 226, dated February 8.
51
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1935 (1935). This was the second edition of the 1935
plan, published on June 2, 1935. This edition stated that the first edition, published
at the beginning of 1935, ‘included only the main indicators of the plan and was
printed in a limited edition’. The second edition volume was an outcome of the
combined efforts of Mezhlauk, appointed head of Gosplan in April 1934 (see p. 28
above), and Osinsky as head of TsUNKhU. This was a volume unprecedented in its
elaboration. It included nearly 450 pages of text and over 500 pages of tables, and
was printed in 28,000 copies, thus continuing the major improvement in public
access to economic information following the dearth of the crisis years.
52
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1935 (1935), 16.
53
These figures are cited from the decree of February 8; changes in the published
book were only minor.
 The Adoption of the Plan 131
As in previous years, the plan proposed that most of the increase
would be obtained by a growth in output per worker. In 1935 this
was to amount to 14.1 per cent, and would achieve 69 per cent of
the increase.54 In consequence, the total hired labour force would
need to rise by only one million persons, from 23.3 to 24.3 million;
departures from the labour force meant that nearly two million new
entrants would be required.55
The most important change was in the capital investment plan,
which was raised from 18,000 to 21,190 million rubles, as a result of
a series of decrees adopted in December 1934 and January 1935.
The allocation to Narkomput’ was increased from 3,000 to 3,937
million roubles, the most important element in the major drive to
end the transport bottleneck (see pp. 214–19 below).56 The alloca-
tion to Narkomtyazhprom was increased by some 700 million
rubles.57 A large part of this was earmarked for investment in the
railway engineering and electric-power equipment industries.58 The
metallurgy and fuel industries, about which the greatest alarm had
been expressed (see pp. 117–19 above), did not, however, receive any
additional allocation. The remaining increase (1,569 million) was

54
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1935 (1935), 319–20.
55
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1935 (1935), 331–4. The 1,970,000 new entrants
would come from the following sources (thousands):

Graduates of higher education 560

establishments, technicums, etc.
Women previously engaged in 270
housework
Orgnabor (excluding seasonal) 820
(Other 320)

The total number from orgnabor, including seasonal workers, would reach a max-
imum of five million persons, declining to 2.5 million in July and August during the
harvest. These figures evidently include seasonal workers recruited informally as
well as those signed up for orgnabor.
56
GARF, 5446/1/478, 236–237 (art. 146/19, dated January 13, 1935).
57
The Narkomtyazhprom allocation in the decree of July 29 was 6,950 million
rubles; the new allocation was 7,374 million. In his report to the VII Congress of
soviets, Ordzhonikidze stated that the allocation was 7,634 million rubles
(Ordzhonikidze, ii (1957), 655–6); this included the bread and fodder supplement of
260 million (Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1935 (1935), 468).
58
100 million rubles for railway engineering; 191 million for electric power
equipment.
132 The 1935 Plan and the Abolition of Bread Rationing
distributed between a large number of government departments.
The only major commissariat which did not benefit was
Narkomlegprom, whose allocation was even reduced from 750 to
658 million rubles.59
The plan stressed that although the finance provided for capital
investment would not increase as compared with 1934, investment
would increase in real terms owing to the planned reduction in
investment costs of 15 per cent (12 per cent allowing for price
increases).60 This was a familiar example of planning out of hope
rather than solid calculation: investment costs had increased in every
year since 1929. The amount of new capital made available to the
economy would also be increased by a higher completion rate: dur-
ing the course of 1935 new capital in use would be 6.4 per cent
greater in value than the amount of capital invested.61
A major factor in the proposed reduction in investment costs
would be the increase in output per person employed in construction
work by as much as 15 per cent (the increase in 1934 had been 8.9
per cent). As a result construction would require a smaller labour
force: the average number of persons working in the industry would
decline from 2,545,000 in 1934 to 2,321,000 in 1935. 62
The increases in the capital investment plan added to the finan-
cial problems facing 1935, but the main change in the financial situ-
ation was the substantial increase in the retail price of bread and
flour following the abolition of bread rationing, which fundamen-
tally changed the structure of internal trade and of the state budget.
The price increase was almost entirely collected into the revenue of
the budget as turnover tax; the payments to the peasants for the
compulsory delivery of grain increased by only 10 per cent.63 How
much additional revenue this would amount to was a controversial
matter. On January 4, 1935, a decree of Sovnarkom on the 1935
budget resolved to ‘consider the question exhausted’ by including
the sum of 24 thousand million rubles in the revenue of the state

59
The main decrees authorising these changes were GARF, 5446/1/94 (art. 2710,
dated December 13, 1934); GARF, 5446/1/478, 223–6 (art. 2721, dated December
16) and ibid. 236–7 (art. 2750, dated December 22).
60
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1935 (1935), 12–13.
61
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1935 (1935), 306.
62
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1935 (1935), 311–12.
63
See Malafeev (1964), 177.
 The Adoption of the Plan 133
budget.64 Further Sovnarkom decrees specified the rates of turnover
tax on flour and other grain products, listed the main sources of
planned revenue from the tax in some detail, and fixed the revenue
from commercial trade in 1935 at a minimum of 5,450 million
rubles.65 This was eventually increased to 6,450 million, 35 per cent
more than the revenue from commercial trade apart from bread etc.
in 1934.66
The abolition of bread rationing transformed the structure of the
budget. In the outcome of the unified state budget for 1934, revenue
from the sale of grain, bread and flour amounted to 16.0 per cent of
total revenue; in the 1935 budget estimates, the projected 24,000
million rubles from this source was nearly treble the amount in 1934,
and amounted to 36.4 per cent of all budgetary revenue (see
Khlevnyuk and Davies (1999), Table 9). In 1934, turnover tax plus
the revenue from commercial trade amounted to 74 per cent of
budgetary revenue; in the 1935 budget the proportion rose to 88.7
per cent. In consequence, socialised retail trade (including public
catering) was planned to increase from 61,700 to 80,000 million
rubles, by about 30 per cent.67 The large number of government
decisions adopted about turnover tax at this time reflected the
complexity and importance of the task.
While the derationing of bread resulted in a large increase in
budgetary revenue, expenditure increased simultaneously. Wages
were planned to increase by 10 per cent (4,300 million rubles) to
compensate for the increase in the price of bread.68 The 1935 plan
admitted that average wages in industry would increase by 19.6 per
cent as compared with increased output per worker of 11 per cent.69
The delivery prices for cotton, flax, hemp and tobacco, the produc-
ers of which had previously received grain products at low prices,
were trebled or quadrupled.70 In consequence, the prices paid by

64
RGASPI, 17/162/19, 119 (decision no. 2, by correspondence); GARF,
5446/1/480, 7–8 (art. 23/6ss, dated January 7).
65
GARF, 5446/1/480, 21 (art. 117/15s, dated January 17); GARF, 5446/1/95,
273–277 (art. 121, dated January 20).
66
Otchet ... 1935 (1937), 4–7. The state budget was formally approved in a pub-
lished decree of TsIK on February 8; however, following normal practice the
decision about currency issue was not included in the decree (SZ, 1935, art. 70).
67
See Table 19, and GARF, 5446/1/97 (art. 226, dated February 8, 1935).
68
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1935 (1935), 331.
69
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1935 (1935), 319–20, 634, 641.
70
See Malafeev (1964), 396–7.
134 The 1935 Plan and the Abolition of Bread Rationing
food and light industry for agricultural raw materials increased dra-
matically. The 1935 plan approved by Sovnarkom listed substantial
increases in the cost of production (per cent):

Increase Increase (+) or

(+) in cost decrease in cost of
of production production
deducting wage
and price increases
Narkomtyazhprom +3.0 –6.0
Narkomlegprom +51.6 +1.2
Narkompishcheprom +53.1 –3.1
Narkomles +13.0 –2.7
Narkomput’ +11.0 +5.8
The cost increase for all-Union industry as a whole would amount to
21.4 per cent.71
In spite of all these changes, the Politburo still insisted that
Narkomfin and Gosbank should prepare their budget and credit
plans for 1935 ‘so as to ensure that they are carried out without cur-
rency issue’.72 The attempt to bring this about caused great difficul-
ties. A memorandum from Grin’ko pointed out that the abolition of
bread rationing was ‘an extremely complex reform’. At present the
credit plan for 1935 was lacking as much as 4,000 million rubles.
Moreover, the present draft budget contained a reserve for reducing
retail prices amounting to only 2,000 million rubles, and budget
revenue exceeded expenditure by only 500 million rubles. These
were substantially lower figures than Narkomfin and Gosbank had
proposed, but ‘owing to the increase of budget expenditure it had
been necessary to retreat from this position … Nevertheless, I must
particularly stress that I consider the reserves are extremely
inadequate.’73
Mar’yasin, in a report to Sovnarkom dated January 13, was as
usual even more forthright. He insisted that when the credit plan had
71
GARF, 5446/1/97 (art. 226, dated February 8, 1935).
72
RGASPI, 17/162/17, 119 (dated January 4, 1935); Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan
1935 (1935), 658; GARF, 5446/1/480 (art. 23/6ss, dated January 7).
73
RGAE, 7733/13/185, 63–62 (n.d.; from internal evidence written late December
1934 or early January 1935). Grin’ko also called for an increase in freight charges in
1935; and on January 4 the Politburo agreed to an increase of 150 million rubles
(RGASPI, 17/162/17, 119).
 The Adoption of the Plan 135
been prepared without a deficit this had been on the assumption that
it would receive 1,500 million rubles from the budget surplus provided
by Narkomfin. This had not been available:

In view of the omission from the Gosbank credit plan of this amount,
it has been prepared with a deficit of 1,500 million rubles. A deficit
in the credit plan means currency issue.

He proposed that the deficit should be dealt with ‘in operational

practice (v operativnom poryadke)’ when the quarterly credit plans were
approved. This would enable the year to end ‘without currency issue
or at least with minimum currency issue’ – a provocative phrase
which revealed his scepticism about the Politburo decision not to
issue net currency in 1935.74
The state budget was formally approved by a published decision
of TsIK on February 8, the day on which the unpublished economic
plan was approved by Sovnarkom. It nominally provided for a sur-
plus of 500 million rubles. The budget decision announced publicly
a substantial figure for defence expenditure – 6,500 million rubles –
a major step towards frankness, though disclosure was still
incomplete.75

74
RGAE, 4372/92/53, 6–7.
75
Otchet ... 1935 (1937), 4–7; SZ, 1935, art.70.
 CHAPTER SIX

‘CONTINUOUS ADVANCE’:
JANUARY–SEPTEMBER 1935

In 1935, in contrast to 1934, the authorities somewhat enlarged their

horizons in each quarter. In the first quarter, the production of
Union and republican industry was planned to be as much as 22.4
per cent greater than in the same period of 1934; in the third quarter
the equivalent figure was increased to 25.8 per cent. The quarterly
investment plan naturally increased in each of the first three quar-
ters: investment in the winter months January–March was always
low. But the total investment planned for the first three quarters
reached some 18.4 thousand million rubles, at least 78 per cent of
the annual plan (see pp. 139–40 below). The caution about invest-
ment in 1934 had yielded by the summer of 1935 to optimism,
reflected in the decisions in July about the 1936 plan (see p. 267 below).

(A) INDUSTRIAL PRODUCTION

Following a relatively slow start in January, industrial production

resumed the rapid expansion characteristic of 1934, and in January–
March amounted to 99.1 per cent of the quarterly plan. While
Narkomtyazhprom production fulfilled only 97.6 per cent of its
plan, this was an increase of 24.3 per cent as compared with
January–March 1934.1
Kviring, deputy head of Gosplan, in a report in the economic
newspaper entitled ‘On the Road of Continuous Advance’, particu-
larly praised the iron and steel industry, noting that while it had not
quite reached the plan for the quarter, it had exceeded the plan for
March. This had been achieved ‘not by introducing additional blast
furnaces, open-hearth furnaces and rolling mills, but by their better
utilisation’. In contrast, the fuel industry had lagged: if the shortfall in
oil continued, it ‘would threaten the supply to tractors and vehicles,
1
As compared with the same month of 1934, the gross production of the Union
industrial commissariats (together with Komzag and the film industry) increased by
16.1 per cent in January, 21.9 per cent in February and 21.1 per cent in March
(Osnovnye pokazateli, January 1935, 3, February 1935, 3, March 1935, 7).

136
 Industrial Production 137
which are increasing in numbers’. Kviring also praised the railways
for nearly reaching the plan to load 60,000 wagons per day.2
A parallel report in the industrial newspaper claimed that ‘the whole
system for the preparation of industry for winter and for the progress
of production in the complicated winter period was better than in
preceding years in most heavy industry enterprises’. The quarterly
plan had been fulfilled more successfully in 1935 than in the previous
year: production had almost reached the level of October–December
1934 (usually it took some months for Narkomtyazhprom industry to
regain the peak level of the previous year).3
The reports on industrial production in April–June also showed
steady progress. The lengthy unpublished memorandum from
Gosplan to the government on ‘The Work of Industry in the First
Half of 1935’ was particularly enthusiastic.4 It reported that the
production of Union and local industry had been 19.3 per cent
greater than in the same period of 1934; almost all the industrial
commissariats had fulfilled their plan, not just Narkomtyazhprom,
and costs (allowing for price increases) had declined. The copper
industry ‘for the first time for many years successfully carried out its
six months’ programme’. However, as in January–March, coal and
oil lagged. Output per worker had increased in the coal industry, but
the number of workers had declined throughout the six months, and
labour turnover had increased. Gosplan attributed the labour short-
age to the familiar problems of coal mining: bad housing and the
poor recruitment of labour from the countryside.5 In the oil industry,
according to Gosplan, the main trouble was the failure to introduce
new wells in both the Baku and Grozny fields.
The plan for the July–September quarter, influenced by the rapid
advance during the spring, specified that the production of Union
and local industry should be 25.8 per cent greater than in the same
quarter of 1934, and amount to just over a quarter of the annual
plan. This was a planned increase unprecedented since the rapid
2
EZh, April 14, 1935. In March the average daily loading reached 59,200 wagons.
3
ZI, April 6, 1935 (A. Gerzenshtein).
4
RGAE, 4372/33/399, 77–46, dated August 8, 1935.
5
A report from Rukhimovich, responsible for the fuel industries, dated July 13,
1935, called for the introduction of a six-day week, which would increase the num-
ber of working days a month from 24 to 25, and for the greater use of piece work
in the pay of engineering and technical workers, and of bonuses for outstanding
workers. Somewhat surprisingly, it also proposed that payment should be made to
brigades rather than to individual workers. GARF, 5446/16/4169, 54–59.
138 ‘Continous Advance’: January–September 1935
expansion of 1929–32. In the outcome, industrial output in July–
September nearly reached the plan, and exceeded the 1934 level by
as much as 23.4 per cent. Though somewhat less than planned,
Narkomtyazhprom production was as much as 25.2 per cent above
the 1934 level.6 The fuel industries continued to lag. But their per-
formance was markedly better than in the same quarter of 1934. In
the summer months holidays reached their peak and the harvest
lured former peasants back to the countryside. In July–September
1934 oil production had stagnated and coal production declined as
compared with the previous quarter. In the same months of 1935,
however, oil production slightly increased and coal production rose
by 4.7 per cent.7 The improvement in the coal industry was achieved
in spite of a decline in the labour force, a result attributed to both
more intensive work and the increase of mechanisation.8
The third quarter of 1935 was also marked by another novel success:
the output of consumer goods exceeded the plan by 2.1 per cent. Food
production increased particularly rapidly as compared with 1934: the
greater availability of livestock enabled increased production by the
meat and dairy industry. The increase in raw materials from livestock
also favourably affected light industry, providing more leather for
footwear and more wool for woollen textiles.9 With the arrival of the
good cotton harvest, the production of cotton textiles, the most impor-
tant products of light industry, began to revive after the decline of the
previous twelve months.10

6
Osnovnye pokazateli, September 1935, 3.
7
Tyazhelaya promyshlennost’ 1936 (1937), 17, 23.
8
Output per worker per month increased in the Donbass in 1935 as follows (tons):

Exploitation At the coal face

(zaboi)
January–March 18.7 49.9
April–June 19.8 53.5
July–September 21.9 57.5
In September output per worker in the coal industry as a whole was 16.9 per cent
greater than in September 1934 (Osnovnye pokazateli, October 1935, 27, 29).
9
Food production was 30.1 per cent and light industry production 14.9 per cent
greater than in the same quarter of 1934 (Osnovnye pokazateli, September 1935,
xxviii–xxix, 3).
10
Osnovnye pokazateli, September 1935, 4–6, 14–17. As usual, production measured
in 1926/27 prices increased more rapidly than production measured in physical
 Investment 139
(B) INVESTMENT

The report for the first quarter published in the industrial newspaper
(see p. 137, n. 3 above) acknowledged that capital investment had
been unsatisfactory: labour, money and building equipment had all
been used inefficiently. Later figures showed that investment in the
quarter had amounted to only 3,425 million rubles as compared with
the plan of 4,367 million.11 How far this represented an increase as
compared with the same months of 1934 is not clear. Production of
cement, glass and timber by Union industry was substantially greater
than in 1934, but 9.7 per cent less building materials were carried by
the railways.12 In the economic newspaper, a critical full-page report
entitled ‘Reduce the Cost of Construction!’ pointed out that in the
iron and steel combine ‘Stal’, building costs had actually increased by
4.5 per cent in January–March.13 However, the plan to increase out-
put per worker had partly succeeded: the number of building workers
on April 1, 1935, was one-third less than on the same date in 1934.14
For the second quarter, the authorities, influenced by the success-
ful progress of industry, were optimistic about the possibilities of
expanding investment. In the spring of 1934 strenuous efforts were

terms; improvements in quality played some part in this gap. With both measurements
the increase was substantial.

July–September 1935: percentage increase above July–September 1934

Measured in 1926/27 prices Measured in physical units

Cotton textiles 3.5 1.1
Woollen textiles 16.5 10.2
Knitwear 26.8 23.6–34.8
Leather footwear 30.5 34.5
Flour 31.0 27.5
Meat 36.5 21.5
Preserved foods 59.2 44.0
Dairy produce 29.3 6.9
Vodka 12.4 7.6
11
Soveshchanie (1936), 33 (Ginzburg).
12
Estimated from data for mineral building materials and timber for building in
Osnovnye pokazateli, 1935, 112–13.
13
EZh, May 12, 1935.
14
See Table 18 and RGAE, 1562/10/468, 12 (n.d. [1937]).
140 ‘Continous Advance’: January–September 1935
made to cut down the investment plan, but in 1935 the April–June
plan, 5,850 million rubles (5,980 including the bread and fodder
supplement), amounted to well over a quarter of the annual plan.15
In practice, during the April–June quarter, in contrast to the slow
start at the beginning of the year, investment greatly increased,
though it did not reach the plan. Building materials carried on the
railways exceeded the amount carried in the same quarter of the
previous year by 10.7 per cent, so that for the first six months of
1935 as a whole the lag behind 1934 had been overcome.16 Investment
increased by 60.4 per cent during the quarter, and amounted to 91.9
per cent of the quite ambitious quarterly plan.17 In heavy industry
investment in April–June was 40 per cent greater than in the previ-
ous quarter, and 4.3 per cent greater than in the same quarter of the
previous year.18 This was achieved almost entirely by an increase in
output per worker between January and June. The number of build-
ing workers increased by only 4.1 per cent in the same period, largely
because many workers had been retained during the winter months,
when much less building could be accomplished.19 A survey of major
sites showed that output per worker in physical terms increased by
50–65 per cent between January and June in each of the main
operations: earth work, bricklaying and concreting.20
The third quarter, July–September, was the peak of the building
season, and the national-economic plan for July–September adopted
at the full meeting of the Politburo on June 1 included an ambitious
investment plan. In spite of the shortfall in the second quarter, invest-
ment was set at the record figure of 8,005 million rubles, including the
bread and fodder supplement. The decree stipulating this sum also
decided to expand the Moscow ball-bearing plant and to establish a
similar factory in Saratov, and authorised the NKVD to undertake the
first stage of investment in the future nickel centre at Noril’sk.21

15
RGASPI, 17/162/17, 143 (art. 48, dated March 10); GARF, 5446/1/480, 147–
154 (art. 405/51s, dated March 11). A supplementary plan dealing with output per
worker and costs was approved on March 26 (GARF, 5446/1/99, 342–87 – art. 514).
16
Osnovnye pokazateli, 1935, 113.
17
Soveshchanie ... stroitel’stva (1936). It amounted to 5,494 million rubles as compared
with the plan of 5,980 million.
18
Tyazhelaya promyshlennost’ 1935 (1936), 295.
19
Tyazhelaya promyshlennost’ 1935 (1936), 297.
20
Tyazhelaya promyshlennost’ 1935 (1936), 298.
21
RGASPI, 17/3/964, 1, 57–59 (dated June 1, 1935); GARF, 5446/1/102 (art.
1072); 5446/1/481, 121–122 (both dated June 2). A supplementary decree was
 Investment 141
During the quarter investment increased rapidly. The partial data
available at the time showed that the proportion of the annual plan
fulfilled increased from 38.3 per cent by July 1 to 65.5 per cent by
October 1.22 Investment by Narkompros, largely a result of the imple-
mentation of the programme to build new schools (see p. 19 above),
reached 83.0 per cent of the annual plan by October 1. A survey in
August of a large sample of schools under construction claimed that
they were now 90.2 per cent completed as compared with only 13.2
per cent on January 1.23 In contrast, only 54.1 per cent of the annual
planned investment in housing had been carried out by October 1.24
Early in the third quarter, on July 11, an important but very
belated decree was promulgated and published ‘On the Plan for
Completion ( pusk) of New Enterprises in 1935’. This sought to max-
imise the new capacity made available in 1935 by developing propos-
als already set out in the annual economic plan on February 8. It
listed in some detail the main capital projects to be completed in
1935, ‘with the aim of timely and successful preparation for the mas-
tering of the new enterprises and production units’. Total new capac-
ity to be introduced during the year was valued at 22,375 million
rubles, almost equal (insofar as the prices were comparable) to the
investment to be made in 1935.25 Nearly all this programme remained
to be completed. A survey covering one-third of the total showed
that only 23.4 per cent of the annual completions plan had been

promulgated on June 22 (GARF, 5446/1/103 – art. 1267). A Politburo decision of

June 20 authorised Gulag to take over construction and administration of the
Noril’sk combine from the Northern Sea Route administration (RGASPI,
17/162/18, 62, 66–67 – art. 203).
22
Osnovnye pokazateli, August 1935, 95–7; October 1935, 115–17. According to later
data, investment in July–September amounted to 6,338 million rubles, 15.4 per cent
greater than in the previous quarter and only 81.1 per cent of the quarterly plan,
which had been increased to 8,815 million rubles. (Soveshchanie ... stroitel’stva (1936)).
By October 1, only some 62 per cent of the annual plan had been carried out
(Soveshchanie ... stroitel’stva (1936)). The results for Narkomtyazhprom were similar
(Tyazhelaya promyshlennost’ 1935 (1936), 295).
23
Osnovnye pokazateli, October 1935, 115–17; August 1935, 112–13.
24
Osnovnye pokazateli, October 1935, 115–17.
25
SZ, 1935, art. 325. The new capacity was presumably valued at ‘estimate prices’,
while current investment was given in current prices or ‘planning prices’, and
included a substantial sum for capital repair as well as new investment. We have
been unable to establish the extent to which these figures are comparable, but they
were very frequently compared in Soviet sources.
142 ‘Continous Advance’: January–September 1935
achieved by July 1.26 Some major industries lagged far behind the
annual plan:
New Capacity in 193527

Plan Actual: January–June

Electric power (th. kWh) 817 89
Coal (million tons) 22.3 0
Oil wells drilled 1292 366
Blast furnaces 6 2
Open-hearth furnaces 24 7
Rolling mills 22 6
In the July–September quarter further projects were completed,
but the results lagged far behind the plan. Reports covering about a
quarter by value of the projects to be completed by the end of the
year showed that only 34 per cent had been ‘transferred into exploi-
tation’ by October 1, and only 59 per cent of those due for completion
during the quarter.28

(C) INTERNAL TRADE FOLLOWING THE ABOLITION

OF BREAD RATIONING

In January–March, the crucial first months after the abolition of

bread rationing, the food industry overfulfilled its plan, and its pro-
duction was 15.7 per cent greater than in the same period of 1934.29
However, retail trade turnover reached only 90 per cent of the plan.
This was primarily due to the absolute decline of public catering.
Data published later by TsUNKhU showed that the number of
dishes sold in January–March was 30 per cent less than in the same
quarter of 1934, and that even in value terms sales had declined
slightly.30 The main reason for the decline was that after January 1,
1935, bread and flour were sold to public catering establishments at
the new retail prices; previously they had been sold at low rationed

26
Osnovnye pokazateli, July 1935, 117.
27
Derived from SZ, 1935, art. 325.
28
Osnovnye pokazateli, September 1935, 138.
29
Osnovnye pokazateli, March 1935, 6. This figure includes the industry of both
Narkompishcheprom and the People’s Commissariats of Local Industry.
30
Osnovnye pokazateli, 1935, 165.
 Internal Trade 143
prices. This led to a rapid rise in the cost of meals in canteens, buffets
and restaurants, and workers tended to eat there less frequently. The
decline proved to be permanent. Sales continued to decline through-
out the second five-year plan. Even in 1956, following a large tem-
porary increase in public catering during the second world war, the
number of dishes sold was lower than in 1934!31 This was a significant
change in the eating habits of the urban population.
Bread, and flour to make bread, were of course the most impor-
tant items in the food budget of both workers and peasants. The
higher prices from January 1 were widely unpopular, particularly
among poorly-paid workers, for whom bread was the major item in
their food budget, and among those with many dependants. Secret
party reports in Leningrad noted that the poorest-paid workers were
the most hostile. A worker in the Putilov factory commented that ‘for
those who make 500 to 600 rubles per month, [the price increases]
are nothing, but for those workers who make 100 to 150 rubles, it will
be difficult’.32 One worker commented that ‘only the rich will eat
white bread, as in the past’. 33 Workers with children were particu-
larly indignant. At one factory a female trade union organiser com-
plained that owing to the inadequacy of the additional pay ‘now our
children will have to live by begging’.34 A party member with a fam-
ily of seven complained when the reform was introduced ‘I don’t
have enough bread even now.’35 Some people even claimed that
Kirov’s murder, which took place two days after the end of bread
rationing was announced, was a protest36; and at a meeting on the
death of Kirov participants complained that the restriction of the
sale of groats and flour would mean that they would have to buy
them at higher prices on the market.37 A few weeks after the free sale
of bread was introduced, 70 women at the Lebedev factory in
Leningrad went to the director to demand increased wages, and
those who refused to leave his office were removed by factory secu-
rity; but concerted protests seem to have been rare.38 Better-paid
31
Narodnoe khozyaistvo SSSR v 1958 godu: statisticheskii ezhegodnik (1959), 743.
32
Slavic Review, 56 (1997), 494 (Rimmel); see also the housewife’s comment reported
on p. 496; and S. Davies (1997), 140.
33
S. Davies (1997), 29.
34
Slavic Review, 56 (1997), 493 (Rimmel).
35
S. Davies (1997), 29.
36
Slavic Review, 56 (1997), 483–4 (Rimmel).
37
Ibid. 491.
38
Ibid. 497.
144 ‘Continous Advance’: January–September 1935
workers, on the other hand, defended the end of rationing on the
grounds that it enabled the purchase of more bread at prices lower
than those on the market.39
In spite of the widely-expressed discontent about the failure to
provide compensation for the increased prices to dependants, the
problem received little attention in the press. Such compensation
could hardly have been provided as part of the normal wage. It
would have been possible to pay child allowances to working parents,
but the rare comments in the press on the position of dependants did
not consider this possibility. In his report to the Moscow party organ-
isation in December 1934 (see p. 129, n. 47 above), Kaganovich
brusquely commented that ‘we cannot of course fix wages on the
per-eater principle; wages are fixed according to the skill and pro-
ductivity of labour’.40 An article by a bank official in the economic
newspaper claimed that only 12–18 per cent of workers had more than
one dependant, and proposed that their cases should be dealt with by
bringing non-working members of the family into employment, and by
helping workers with dependants to improve their skills so as to earn
more.41 But this was a pious hope rather than a practical proposal.42
With this mixed popular reception of the end of bread rationing,
the authorities made great efforts to secure an adequate supply of
bread and flour. For those members of the urban population who had
received a low bread ration, or no ration at all, and for peasants who
were purchasers of grain products, the new prices were lower than
the old commercial and market prices. It was expected that in the first
weeks after the reform peasants in large numbers would seek to pur-
chase bread and particularly flour in the towns. For this reason the
decree of December 7 (see pp. 127–8 above) stipulated that temporar-
ily the maximum amount of bread to be purchased by one person was
two kilograms and the maximum of amount of flour only 1 kilogram.

39
Ibid. 485, 487–8. For hostile and favourable comments on the end of bread
rationing recorded in the NKVD files see also Osokina (1998), 180–1.
40
EZh, December 27, 1934.
41
EZh, December 30, 1934 (G. Kos’yachenko).
42
Trotsky, writing from exile, complained that ‘the abolition of consumer rationing
directly harms the workers, especially the lower extremely poorly-paid strata. i.e. the
vast majority’. He nevertheless commended the abolition of rationing in principle,
insisting that ‘the transfer of economic relations to the language of money is entirely
necessary at the present initial state of socialist development, in order to calculate
the real social use and economic effect of the outlays of labour energy by workers
and peasants’ (Byulleten’ Oppozitsii, 42, February 1935, 2).
 Internal Trade 145
The experience of the first few weeks of 1935 confirmed these fears.
The free sale of bread was relatively smooth in large towns which had
adequate supplies of flour and adequate bakeries. But in small towns
and in the countryside it proved impossible to meet demand; in the first
ten days of January two-thirds of the planned monthly supply of flour
to the countryside was already exhausted.43 Long bread queues
appeared in many towns. As early as January 8 Kleiner and Veitser sent
a memorandum to Stalin and Molotov describing this situation, urging
the allocation of extra grain to some regions, and calling for special
measures to ‘regularise trade in bread in the countryside’.44
Following this memorandum the Politburo approved a decree of
the central committee and Sovnarkom, dated January 11, which
instructed local authorities to reallocate grain so as to give priority to
industrial areas and areas producing industrial crops (Stalin added to
the text at this point ‘at the expense of rural locations’). The decree
provided that the sale of bread in each rural district must be restricted
on a daily basis to one-thirtieth of the monthly plan for the district.
In the countryside bread must primarily be sold in canteens and buf-
fets of institutions, with priority to their employees. In compensation,
additional fodder crops could be issued in the countryside.45 Thus
the decree in effect established a system in the countryside confining
bread issues to those employed by the state. This resulted in a sharp
switch of bread sales in favour of the towns in the month as a whole
(see Khlevnyuk and Davies (1999), Table 5 (c)).
Following the decree, even larger numbers of peasants made their
way to the towns in search of bread. The State Procurator reported that
the bread queues which formed in the towns resulted in a number of
deaths from suffocation, and led urban employees to abandon their work
in search of bread. As a result of the excess demand for bread, informal
rationing arrangements temporarily re-emerged in many towns.46
Outside the large towns, bread and flour shortages continued for
some months. The restrictions on sales in the countryside continued;
and in March a further decree specified that the sale of flour, groats
and macaroni should take place in all trade outlets only once every

43
GARF, 5446/16a/329, 17.
44
RGASPI, 17/163/1051, 77–83.
45
RGASPI, 17/163/1051, 77–78; GARF, 5446/1/95, 159–60 (art. 39).
46
GARF, 5446/16a/329, 47–49, 59. See also Osokina (1998), 182, citing NKVD
reports on the very widespread reintroduction of forms of local rationing in the first
few months of 1935.
146 ‘Continous Advance’: January–September 1935
two days.47 In a detailed report to Molotov on the sale of bread and
flour in the first ten days of April, Veitser noted that ‘demand in the
countryside is extremely high ... queues have formed in a number of
places’. He gave examples of queues of 100–150 people in rural
district towns. In larger towns ‘the flood of visitors from rural dis-
tricts seeking grain has continued’; and cases had been reported of
the speculative purchase of bread and flour for illegal resale in the
countryside at higher prices. Veitser listed a number of larger towns
in which there had been queues of 70 or more people, including
Novosibirsk, Chersonnesus and Ashkhabad.48
A different kind of difficulty confronted the trading agencies for
other food products; it proved difficult to sell them at the prevailing
commercial prices. This was primarily because, with the improvement
in agriculture, the supply of food to the kolkhoz market by both kolk-
hozy and peasants considerably increased; the kolkhoz market prices
for nearly all foods continuously declined. Thus a Narkomfin report
on the first quarter of 1935 noted that on the kolkhoz market in
February the prices of meat were 17 per cent lower than in February
1934, the prices of dairy products 27.4 per cent lower, of eggs 18.9
per cent lower and of vegetables 37.5 per cent lower. As a result ‘prices
for butter, dairy products and meat on the kolkhoz markets are consid-
erably lower than the prices of free sale [i.e. commercial prices] of the
socialised sector in those towns in which free sale of these products is
allowed’. The report commented wryly:

Until now we have not taken into account the structure of the turn-
over of kolkhoz trade in compiling both the trade plan and the rev-
enue of the budget. Now in compiling and approving the plans we
need to include the turnover of kolkhoz trade in the indicators.49

With the increase in supplies, it also proved difficult to sell at the

prevailing commercial prices some products, such as toilet soap, for
which there was no competition on the kolkhoz market.
In all these cases the obvious solution was to reduce commercial
prices. But in order to obtain the planned amount of budgetary

47
GARF, 5446/1/480, 147–148 (art. 405/51s, dated March 11).
48
GARF, 5446/82/36, 42–36 (dated April 15).
49
RGAE, 7733/13/184, 49–51 (unsigned memorandum entitled ‘Fulfilment of
the Balance of Money Incomes and Expenditures of the Population in the First
Quarter of 1935’).
 Internal Trade 147
revenue, it was also necessary to increase the low normal retail prices
in rationed and closed trade. During 1935 price policy moved inexo-
rably towards the closing of the gap between commercial and nor-
mal prices. But there were sharp differences between government
departments about how to implement this policy. Narkomvnutorg,
anxious to increase trade turnover, frequently proposed the reduction
of commercial prices. Gosplan and Narkomfin, concerned about the
reduction of revenue which this entailed, were more cautious. The
decisions of the Politburo and Sovnarkom were usually compromises.
As early as January 5 Veitser proposed to Stalin and Molotov that
a unified price should be introduced for confectionery, 40 per cent
lower than the commercial price. This in effect meant the abolition
of rationing of confectionery. Veitser explained that the rationed
sales were products of a very low grade, which were only able to be
sold because they were cheap. Gosplan and Narkomfin objected, and
the government approved a price reduction intermediate between
their proposal and that of Narkomvnutorg.50
In February, on the basis of a memorandum from Veitser, sup-
ported by Mikoyan as People’s Commissar for the Food Industry, and
endorsed by Molotov, the Politburo and Sovnarkom approved the
reduction of the commercial prices of milk and toilet soap. The
main argument in favour of the proposal was that these products
were difficult to sell at the prevailing commercial prices; substantial
stocks of soap had accumulated.51
Then on March 5, in a memorandum to Stalin and Molotov,
Veitser, again with the support of Mikoyan, reported that in January
and February macaroni sales had amounted to a mere 35 per cent of
the quarterly plan. He accordingly proposed that the limit on the
number of days on which macaroni could be sold should be removed,
and that its price should be reduced by 14 per cent.52 On behalf of
Narkomfin, Grin’ko approved the removal of the limitation on sales,
but objected to the proposed price reduction on the grounds that the
retail price would then be lower than the cost of production.53 A
commission chaired by Mikoyan proposed a compromise, and on
April 3 Sovnarkom approved a price reduction of 7 per cent.54

50
GARF, 5446/16a/377, 1–6.
51
GARF, 5446/17/279, 16.
52
GARF, 5446/16a/378, 15–16.
53
GARF, 5446/16a/378, 22–22ob.
54
GARF, 5446/16a/378, 3; GARF, 5446/17/279, 15–16.
148 ‘Continous Advance’: January–September 1935
During April–June Narkomfin, Gosbank and Narkomtorg, with
the support of Molotov as chair of Sovnarkom, continued their efforts
to increase trade turnover and to reduce the amount of normal trade
at low prices. A Sovnarkom decree dated March 20 fixed the amount
of meat to be made available for commercial (‘open’) sale at 60,000
tons in 1935, and increased the number of towns in which these open
sales were permitted.55 On April 23, on a proposal from Molotov, the
Politburo approved a Sovnarkom decree authorising unified prices for
makhorka (cheap tobacco), preserved foods and woollen fabrics, thus
ending the existence of parallel commercial and normal prices for
these goods. In the case of makhorka, the price in closed trade had
previously been 25 kopeks a packet, and in open trade 1 ruble; the
new unified price was fixed at 50 kopeks. As only 13 per cent of retail
trade had taken place at commercial prices, the new price meant that
budgetary revenue per kilogram of makhorka would increase. In the
case of woollen fabrics, as much as 95 per cent had been sold at com-
mercial prices, but they were nevertheless still in short supply; the new
‘unified’ price was therefore simply fixed at the level of the old com-
mercial price. Nearly all sales of preserved foods had also been at
commercial prices, but it was decided that their new unified price
must be lower than the commercial price; it was estimated that the
new price would mean a loss of 30 million rubles to the budget by the
end of 1935. But this loss could not be avoided, as adequate sales had
proved impossible at the old commercial price.56
In spite of all these measures, the sale of food products at com-
mercial prices continued to lag. Early in June a Narkomfin memoran-
dum noted that kolkhoz market prices continued to be lower than
commercial prices for ‘dairy and oil products, eggs, etc.’, and that this
had ‘a definite influence on the failure to fulfil the plan for the sale of
food products’.57 Nevertheless, the results of the state budget and the
credit plan for April–June were relatively satisfactory: net currency
issue amounted to 450 million rubles (see Table 21), and thus came
within the limits fixed by the Politburo. However, there was a snag.
The increase in currency issue was not sufficient to cope with the

55
GARF, 5446/1/99, 261–263 (art. 470).
56
GARF, 5446/17/39, 24–26. On May 15 a Sovnarkom decree announced vari-
ous deductions from price and wage incentives designed to encourage the sale of
vodka (GARF, 5446/1/101, 349–352 – art. 901).
57
RGAE, 7733/13/184, 28–29 (unsigned memorandum ‘The Balance of Incomes
and Expenditures of the Population in the 3rd Quarter of 1935’, transmitted June 7).
 Internal Trade 149
expansion of retail trade, and a cash shortage temporarily emerged.
On May 31, a decree of TsIK and Sovnarkom ruled that heads of
organisations and enterprises issuing various kinds of money substi-
tutes were to be sentenced to up to five years’ deprivation of liberty.58
In the summer, some shortages of bread and flour still occurred.
Even as late as October 1935 the monthly report on internal trade
noted that ‘numerous faults at every level (in supplies from Zagotzerno
[the state agency for the distribution of grain], and in the bakery and
trading network, continued to cause hold-ups in the grain trade, and
was bound to affect its development’.59 But the situation in the coun-
tryside gradually improved. On June 17 Sovnarkom was sufficiently
confident to issue a decree which resolved to ‘cancel the existing
arrangements for fixing daily limits on the sale of baked bread in
rural areas’.60 Evidently in order to ensure adequate rural supplies of
grain, the Politburo substantially increased the July allocation to the
countryside (see Khlevnyuk and Davies (1999), Table 5 (c)). But,
paradoxically, at this time the availability of grain from the substan-
tial 1935 harvest began to reduce the rural demand for bread and
flour. The monthly report on internal trade for August reported the
‘lower demand for bread as a result of the new harvest’.61 And
Gosbank reported to Molotov that the average daily receipts of the
bank from grain had fallen from 48 million rubles at the beginning
of July to 40.7 million at the end of August; it explained that ‘in the
main this is a result of the reduction of demand from the rural pop-
ulation for baked bread’.62 In the autumn the monthly flour allocation
to the countryside was not fully utilised (see Table 5 (c)).
In both the second and the third quarters retail trade increased as
compared with the previous quarter, but in both quarters it failed to
reach the plan. In July–September, measured in current prices, it
amounted to only 94.4 per cent of the quarterly plan.63 Sales of meat,
vegetable oil and sugar in physical terms lagged considerably behind
the plan.64 In January–September as a whole, retail trade amounted to

58
SZ, 1935, art. 234, replacing the decree of June 1, 1930 (SZ, 1930, art. 345). For
the 1930 cash shortage, see vol. 3, p. 152.
59
Tovarooborot SSSR za oktyabr’ 1935, 27.
60
GARF, 5446/1/103, 226 (art. 1224, dated June 17).
61
Tovarooborot SSSR za avgust 1935, 12.
62
GARF, 5446/82/39, 109–107 (dated September 7, signed by G. Arkus).
63
Estimated from data in Osnovnye pokazateli, September 1935, 173.
64
Osnovnye pokazateli, September 1935, 180.
150 ‘Continous Advance’: January–September 1935
only 72.2 per cent of the annual plan.65 These figures exclude public
catering, which continued to decline. In buffets, cafés and restaurants
the number of dishes sold per month declined in April–September,
following the sharp fall in January–March. Prices were further increased,
so that turnover rose in terms of current prices, but even so sales lagged
considerably behind the plan.66 By the end of September the lag of
state and cooperative trade confronted the authorities with the prospect
of excess purchasing power which would partly be taken up by kolkhoz
trade, and partly result in shortages in state and cooperative shops.

(D) FINANCE AND CREDIT

On January 19 Sovnarkom approved the Union state budget for

January–March, eight days after approving the quarterly economic
plan, but three weeks before the approval of the annual plan.67 To deal
with the imbalance in the credit plan (see pp. 134–5 above), it allocated
550 million rubles to Gosbank for the revaluation of seasonal stocks; this
was evidently on the assumption that income would be obtained by
Gosbank from these stocks at the new higher retail prices. Nevertheless,
a substantial deficit still remained in the quarterly credit plan. On
January 26, even before this plan was adopted, the Politburo authorised
an ‘intra-quarterly currency issue’ of 100 million rubles, to be liquidated
by the bank by March 1.68 The credit plan, eventually approved on
February 13, when the quarter was half over, stipulated that there should
be no net issue of currency in the quarter as a whole.69 This was already
an admission that the plan not to issue extra currency in 1935 was in
jeopardy – normally the currency in circulation declined during this
quarter.70 The difficulties with retail trade during the quarter imposed a

65
Osnovnye pokazateli, September 1935, 182–3, measured in current prices.
66
Osnovnye pokazateli, September 1935, 194–5. The underlying data refer to organ-
isation which included 60–65 per cent of all public catering. Turnover amounted to
85.5 per cent, but the number of dishes to only 68.1 per cent, of the quarterly plan
(ibid. 173).
67
GARF, 5446/1/85, 270–271 (art. 119).
68
RGASPI, 17/162/17, 123 (art. 126); GARF, 5446/1/484, 1 (art. 158/21ss of
Sovnarkom, dated January 27).
69
GARF, 5446/1/98, 42–44 (art. 236).
70
Even in 1932, an inflationary year, in the first quarter currency in circulation
declined by 120 million rubles, and in January–June 1934 it declined by 161 million
(see Table 21).
 Finance and Credit 151
further strain on the state budget and the credit plan. Budgetary revenue
received in January–March was less than planned.71 In the event cur-
rency issue amounted to 145 million rubles (see Table 21) – a clear indi-
cation that the effort to avoid net issue in 1935 was not viable.
The national-economic plan for the April–June quarter, approved
on March 10–11 (see pp. 137–8, 140 above), stated that revenue and
expenditure of the Union budget for the quarter would be equal, at
12,900 million rubles, and instructed Sovnarkom to prepare the credit
plan ‘on the basis of the present directives and the plan for trade turn-
over’. At this time, in spite of the nominal balance in the budget, it was
intended that the currency issue in the quarter would amount to 500
million rubles: Mar’yasin, in a memorandum to Molotov dated March
19, stressed the ‘tremendous tension in the credit plan of the second
quarter’, and insisted that in order to restrict currency issue to 500
million rubles the trading organisations would need to sell off excessive
stocks of flour, groats, macaroni and other commodities.72 But a com-
mission chaired by Molotov, which examined the draft budget in detail,
increased the proposed budget expenditure by 514 million rubles. On
March 26, following the meeting of the commission, a joint memoran-
dum from Grin’ko and Mar’yasin to Stalin and Molotov stressed that
a currency issue of 400–500 million rubles could be achieved only if
sales of flour and confectionery were substantially increased above the
initial plan.73 The Politburo decision on the budget and the credit
plan, eventually adopted on March 28, on the eve of the new quarter,
decided, in an ambiguous phrase, that ‘the utilisation (ispolzovanie) of
currency issue shall in no circumstances exceed 400–500 million
rubles, and may take place only with permission of the central com-
mittee in each individual case’.74 This decision fully confirmed the
sceptical attitude of Gosbank to the plan not to issue currency in 1935

71
Receipts from turnover tax and profits deductions amounted to 11,633 million
rubles as compared with the planned 11,837 million (estimated from Osnovnye
pokazateli, March 1935, 168).
72
RGAE, 4372/92/53, 32–36.
73
RGAE, 4372/92/53, 47–50.
74
RGASPI, 17/162/17, 160–161 (art. 220); GARF, 5446/1/484, 2–3 (art.
539/74s, dated March 29). A memorandum from Mezhlauk, dated March 26, set
out the detailed proposals and was approved by Molotov the same day (RGAE,
4372/33/84, 120–116); the currency figure was, however, added at the Politburo.
A further decree of Sovnarkom on the state budget for the quarter insisted on the
importance of achieving the planned revenue from commercial trade and from
the sale of spirits (GARF, 5446/1/100, 95–98, dated March 30).
152 ‘Continous Advance’: January–September 1935
as a whole, because it would be impossible to claw back this issue in
the second half of the year: substantial currency issues were always
required in the third quarter with the advent of the new harvest; and
in the fourth quarter, even in the deflationary year 1933 only 31 million
rubles had been withdrawn from circulation (see Table 21). In the
event, following the strenuous efforts during the April–June quarter to
increase budgetary revenue, currency issue amounted to 450 million
rubles, the mid-point of the range fixed by the Politburo.
In the July–September quarter Grin’ko and Mar’yasin, with the
support of Molotov, again struggled to balance the budget and limit
the amount of currency issue. The Sovnarkom decree on June 14 on
the Union budget and credit plan for the quarter authorised a net
issue of currency amounting to as much as 800 million rubles, and
emphasised that this meant that net issue over the whole period
January–September must not exceed 1,400 million rubles (600
million rubles had already been issued in January–June).75
To achieve this result the decree set out a number of exceptional
measures designed to increase budgetary revenue during the quarter,
especially previously unintended cuts in exports and increases in
imports. These included (in million rubles):

Measure approved Increase Increase

in sales in budget
revenue
Remove goods from export, selling most 200 95
internally (furs, tobacco, lights (kishki),
preserved foods, paraffin, linen)
Import extra goods (mainly tea, rubber, 285 185
tobacco, cocoa beans, hops)
Abolish dual prices for tea; fix new unified 60 45
price at level of commercial price
Increased ration price of meat by 1 ruble per 50 45
kilogram from July 20
Raise commercial price of cotton textiles by 100 95
50 kopeks per metre
Sell additional supplies of flour and oats 215
Total 910 465

75
RGASPI, 17/162/18, 58 (dated June 13); GARF, 5446/1/484, 24–27 (art.
1175/178s, dated June 14).
 Agriculture 153
The decree justified the changes in the foreign trade plan on the
grounds that they were needed to balance the quarterly budget and
enable the currency issue plan ‘to be restricted solely to the needs of
agricultural collections and trade turnover’.76 But the uncertainties
of the financial situation were reflected in the promulgation over a
month later of a further decree on the credit plan for the quarter
which recorded a deficit of 1,463 million rubles, and contained
last-minute handwritten alterations.77
During the quarter a series of additional measures sought to amelio-
rate the fiscal situation by increasing trade turnover (and hence budget-
ary revenue). On July 3, the Politburo, in a resolution written personally
by Stalin (an unusual event in the mid-1930s), established a commission
chaired by Mikoyan with the aim of improving the unsatisfactory work
of the consumer cooperatives in the countryside.78 A few days later the
Politburo agreed that consumer cooperatives and departments of work-
ers’ supply could sell food products at commercial prices through their
special network of shops; previously these sales had been carried out
only by state trade. The Politburo also increased the number of towns
in which meat could be sold at commercial prices from 37 to 95.79 As
we have seen, retail trade as a whole continued to be less than planned.
But the various measures to increase budgetary revenue by increas-
ing commercial trade were accompanied by a large increase in rev-
enue following the launching of a new mass loan.80 Currency issue,
at 701 million rubles, remained within the July–September limits.

(E) AGRICULTURE

A major event in the history of Soviet agriculture was the second

congress of collective-farm shock workers, held in February 1935.81
76
RGASPI, 17/3/965, 17–18; 17/162/18, 58, 64–65; GARF, 5446/1/484,
24–27. Owing to the huge gap between world prices and internal prices, the addi-
tional 485 million rubles of retail trade at commercial prices listed in the first two
items above would be obtained by cutting exports by 2.097 million gold rubles and
increasing imports by 1.298 million gold rubles.
77
GARF, 5446/1/482, 56–57 (dated July 19).
78
RGASPI, 17/163/1069, 2.
79
RGASPI, 17/163/1070, 101 (decisions of July 7 and 16).
80
Revenue from mass loans and self-taxation increased as follows (million rubles):
January–March 1942; April–June 1423; July–September 2701; October–December
2858 (Osnovnye pokazateli, 1935, 259).
81
For the first congress, held in February 1933, see volume 5, pp. 207–9.
154 ‘Continous Advance’: January–September 1935
Stalin and most members of the Politburo participated, and it was
attended by 1,436 delegates; 51 per cent of these were chairmen or
brigade leaders of kolkhozy, and a further 25 per cent were described
as ‘rank and file workers’. 30.8 per cent of the delegates were
women – a very large figure for that time, though most of the
women occupied junior posts.82 The congress was opened on
February 11 by Chernov as People’s Commissar for Agriculture, and
the first item on the agenda, and the main feature of the conference,
in addition to nation-wide publicity for the success of collectivisa-
tion, was a report by Yakovlev, as head of the agricultural depart-
ment of the central committee, on a new model Statute for the
agricultural artel, replacing the previous model statute of March 1,
1930.83 Speeches at the congress referred to the murder of Kirov and
the recent death of Kuibyshev, but the general atmosphere was one
of moderation and reconciliation. This was demonstrated by a
speech by Bukharin. He praised Stalin’s agricultural policies and
condemned the right deviation, but did not attack the Zinovievites;
the speech was applauded by the delegates and occupied a full page
in Pravda.84
At the congress commission discussing the Statute, Stalin in a
lengthy speech strongly argued that the provisions for the household
plot of the kolkhoz household should be extremely flexible. He
rejected the view of ‘comrades who have been very bold here and
say 1/10 or 1/12 [of a hectare]’:

We began to implant kolkhozy on a mass scale only about three years

ago. The old society was built up in the course of hundreds of years,
and if you think the new society can be built in three years you are
mistaken …Years are needed to strengthen the kolkhoz system properly,
and the opinion of the collective farmers must be taken into account if
they are not to turn away and to develop a completely unnecessary
superfluous dissatisfaction … So I propose that you should decide that
the size of the household land of the kolkhoz farm should vary

82
Vtoroi s”ezd (1935), 247–97. Only 8.1 per cent of kolkhoz chairmen were women,
as compared with 42.5 per cent of rank-and-file workers. On the other hand,
women, who were very prominent in dealing with livestock, made up 49.2 per cent
of the managers of livestock units (fermy).
83
For the previous Statute, see vol. 2 of this series, p. 106: this Statute in turn
replaced the Statute of February 6, 1930 (see vol. 2, pp. 90–1).
84
P, January 16, 1935.
 Agriculture 155
according to local conditions. It must not be less than a quarter of a
hectare, it can be up to 0.5 hectares, and in some cases up to 1 hectare.
I am afraid that that’s too bold, and perhaps the amount should be
larger.
Kalinin. Comrade Stalin, we haven’t got enough land.
Stalin. Anyway, what I propose will be enough to prevent most collective
farmers being dissatisfied, who have more than 0.5 hectares now.

He similarly called for flexibility in the amount of livestock held by

the kolkhoz household.85
Accordingly, the model Statute, adopted in its revised form by the
congress on February 17 and approved by Sovnarkom and the party
central committee, stated:

The size of the land of the household plot (priusadebnaya zemlya) in the
personal use of the kolkhoz household (excluding land occupied by
housing) may vary between ½ of a hectare to ³ hectare and in some
districts up to 1 hectare depending on the regional and district condi-
tions decided by the People’s Commissariats of Agriculture of the
Union Republics on the basis of the directives of the People’s
Commissariat of Agriculture of the USSR.

A separate section of the Statute provided that in most districts the

household could hold in its personal use 1 cow and up to 2 calves,
1 sow and its progeny, or, if the board of the kolkhoz found it neces-
sary, 2 sows and their progeny, up to 10 sheep and/or goats, an
unlimited number of poultry and rabbits and up to 20 beehives.
Larger numbers could be held as stipulated in areas with more
developed livestock farming, and households in nomad districts
such as Kazakhstan could hold 8–10 cows and their calves and 100–
150 sheep and/or goats, an unlimited number of poultry, up to 10
horses and 5–8 camels.86 These widely-publicised provisions pro-
vided the basis for the rapid expansion in future years of the personal
earnings of collective farmers.
The weather for the harvest of 1935 was more or less consistently
favourable. October 1934 was warmer than normal, and autumn
sowings in 1934 for the 1935 harvest extended into a longer period.
The temperatures in April 1935 were relatively high and assisted an
85
TSD, iv (2002), 390–402.
86
SZ, 1935, art. 82.
156 ‘Continous Advance’: January–September 1935
early start for the spring sowings. The growing season in the summer
of 1935 was relatively cool, a further advantage.
Following the normal pattern, the 1935 harvest was planned to
exceed that of 1934, presumed in the autumn of 1934 to be 90.4
million tons, and to amount to 95.2 million tons.87 It was assumed
that grain yields would rise from 8.8 tsentners per hectare in 1934 to
9.4 tsentners per hectare in 1935, while the area sown to grain would
increase only slightly.
In practice, the sowings in the autumn of 1934 took place signifi-
cantly earlier than in all previous years (see Table 25). By October 1,
31.9 million hectares had been sown, several million more than in all
earlier years in the 1930s. The total eventually sown was less than in
previous years, but there were grounds to expect that the average
yield would be higher.
The spring sowings in 1935 in April and the first half of May took
place much earlier than in previous years. By May 1, 50.1 million
hectares had been sown; the amount sown in 1934, the highest previ-
ous amount, was only 36.2 million hectares, and on May 15 sowing
had reached 78.3 million hectares, exceeding the 1934 record by
9 million hectares. The sowings in 1934 were already much more
firmly based than those of the previous five years. Although eventu-
ally the total was not as high as the figures claimed in previous years,
this was of little importance, because very late sowings usually had
very poor results. The earlier sowings in both autumn 1934 and
spring 1935 gave grounds to expect a higher than normal yield.
The harvesting campaign in 1935 progressed more rapidly than in
the early 1930s. Throughout August the amount harvested was
slightly less than in 1934, but in September the harvested area
threshed was considerably greater than in any of the previous four
years. There was every sign that the harvest would be very substantial.

(F) THE PUSH TO FURTHER EXPANSION

In the spring and summer of 1935 the political leaders manifested

an enthusiasm about the progress of the economy which bordered
on euphoria. The tricky operation of abolishing bread rationing had
proceeded without any great mishap. Industry had progressed rap-
idly, and the transport bottleneck was being rapidly eliminated.
87
RGAE, 4372/33/725, 2.
 The Push to Further Expansion 157
Although investment was not keeping up with the five-year plan,
several major industries, and the railways, had been strikingly suc-
cessful in using capital more efficiently. This new tendency, which
had emerged in the previous year, seemed to offer great prospects for
future development.
The optimism was dramatically expressed in Stalin’s speech to army
graduates on May 4. He declared in the published version of his speech:
We already have a powerful and first-class industry, a powerful and
mechanised agriculture, transport which is developing, and reaching
up to new heights, and a well-organised and excellently equipped
Red Army … This means we have in the main outlived the period of
famine in technology …
If our first-class works and factories, our state farms and collective
farms, and our Red Army, had enough cadres capable of absorbing
this technology, our country could obtain an effect three or four times
as great as it had now.88
The old slogan ‘technology (teknuka) decides everything’ ... must
now be replaced by a new slogan ‘cadres decide everything’. This is
the main thing now.89

In the same month Ordzhonikidze, addressing the Council of

Narkomtyazhprom, citing the familiar example of the improved effi-
ciency with which iron and steel plant was being used, strongly criti-
cised the existing so-called ‘technically based norms’. He castigated
them as conservative and out of date, providing ‘a pretext for
reinforcing our backwardness’.90

88
P, May 6, 1935. In the original version of his speech, Stalin stated:

If our industry had well-seasoned cadres who had mastered technology, we

would have trebled the output, even more, I assure you; if our agriculture with
its present machine base, possessing over 300,000 tractors, if this agriculture
included experienced, reasonably experienced, leaders of agriculture, we could
obtain a harvest three times as large, I assure you – this isn’t boasting.

Stalin was obviously uneasy about associating himself with a specific claim about
huge increases in output. In the version prepared for publication, ‘output’ was at
first replaced by ‘effect’. He then changed ‘effect’ to ‘results’ and then back again to
‘effect’. (See the texts in Nevezhin (2003), 81, 89.)
89
Sochineniya, i (xiv), 61–2.
90
P, May 18, 1935, Ordzhonikidze (1957), 162–86.
158 ‘Continous Advance’: January–September 1935
In the same spirit the Gosplan report on the results of the first six
months declared:

Industry not only strengthened the considerable rates of growth

already observed in 1934 but also achieved a further rate of growth;
this permits one to affirm the presence of the change in the rate of
growth of industrial production which was referred to in cde. Stalin’s
speech of January 1933 as in prospect for the second half of the
five-year plan.91

This is a reference to Stalin’s optimistic prediction about the future

at the plenum of the central committee in January 1933 in the midst
of the 1932–33 economic crisis:

In the second half of the second five-year plan, say, we will be able
to make a new powerful jump forward in construction and in the
growth of industrial output.92

Confidence in the economy born of success encouraged the polit-

ical authorities to seek to expand the economy by further intensifica-
tion of the use of existing labour and capital, and led to the emergence
of the Stakhanov movement (see pp. 160–9 below). At the same time
it pushed aside the financial caution which had played a major part
in economic decision making since the summer of 1932. As we have
seen (p. 131 above), the 1935 investment plan was increased by a
series of specific decisions. Between February 8, when the investment
plan was adopted as part of the annual economic plan, and July 29,
when it was consolidated in connection with the preparation of the
economic plan for 1936, planned investment increased from 21,684
to 24,842 million rubles, by 14.6 per cent. In this time of increasing
awareness of the Nazi threat, the main increases were for directly
defence purposes. On March 22, Narkomoborony was allocated an
addition 315 million rubles (see p. 95 above). On April 22, the
Politburo approved an elaborate report on the aircraft industry by a
commission headed by Molotov; this included an additional

91
RGAE, 4372/33/399, 77.
92
P, January 10, 1933; for other aspects of this speech, see vol. 4, pp. 318–22. In
his one intervention at the XVII party conference a year earlier, Stalin stated that
the second five-year plan was only a minimum, which could be expanded in the
control figures year by year (see vol. 4, p. 136).
 The Push to Further Expansion 159
allocation to Narkomtyazhprom for the industry amounting to 200
million rubles in 1935. The industry was also authorised to under-
take new construction for the remainder of 1935 without technical
projects or estimates – a decision in the opposite direction to the
efforts to impose more stringent controls on the building industry.93
On May 11, an comprehensive plan for the expansion of the gold
industry set out the investment to be made in 38 separate sites, and
increased the 1935 investment in the industry from 152 to 254
million rubles.94 The allocation to the railways was also substantially
increased, and substantial additional investment was also approved
for housing and education, though this did not entirely compensate
for the cuts made in July 1934.95
These changes all reflected a new era in which the needs of both
defence and welfare were given some priority over the needs of
heavy industry. Although the reduction in the allocation to
Narkomtyazhprom as compared with 1934 had now been more than
fully restored, this did not improve the position of the coal and iron
and steel industries; in both these industries the investment planned
for 1935 was still no higher than in 1934. The extra allocations to
Narkomtyazhprom had mainly been devoted to the special pro-
grammes for the aircraft and other defence industries, and for the
gold industry.
On July 29, the consolidation of the expanded investment plan for
1935 was the background to a much more significant change: the
approval of the preliminary much more ambitious plan for 1936, to
which we return below.

93
RGASPI, 17/162/18, 7–15 (art. 172).
94
GARF, 5446/1/481, 35–36 (art. 851–132s); for the February 8 and July 29
investment figurers, see Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1935 (1935), 4 74 and GARF,
5446/1/102, 295–312.
95
See sources listed in previous note.
 CHAPTER SEVEN

‘ADVANCING TO ABUNDANCE’,
SEPTEMBER–DECEMBER 1935

In September, simultaneously with the preparation of the plan for

the October–December quarter, the Soviet leaders undertook two
major modifications in economic policy. First, the Stakhanov move-
ment was launched. During their efforts to accelerate economic
development by the more intensive use of capital and labour, they
stumbled across the production feat of a Donbass coal miner, Aleksei
Stakhanov, and then transformed it into a major campaign. Secondly,
they extended the abolition of rationing to all other foods.

(A) THE LAUNCHING OF THE STAKHANOV MOVEMENT

(i) The background

The drive to increase production largely depended on output per

worker, which was planned to yield over 40 per cent of the increase
in industrial production in both the five-year plan as a whole and the
1935 plan (see pp. 42 and 131 above). The growth of output per
worker in turn depended both on improvements in the amount of
capital employed per worker (together with the ‘quality’ of capital
– the efficiency with which it was utilised), and on the efficiency and
intensity of the workers’ efforts. Ever since the mid-1920s, Soviet
politicians, planners, economists and engineers sought to measure
scientifically – or at least accurately – the optimum output both of
industrial plant and machinery, and of the workers themselves.
These endeavours resulted in the emergence of a complex system
of ‘norms’ (normy) for measuring capacity and output; the system
drew extensively on foreign experience.1 Capital projects specified
the optimum production capacity of the factory, and of the main
production units within the factory. These were known variously
as ‘technical norms’ (tekhnicheskie normy), ‘technical coefficients’
1
For a comprehensive survey, see L. Siegelbaum, ‘Soviet Norm Determination in
Theory and Practice, 1917–1941’, in SS, vol. 36 (1984), 45–68.

160
 The Launching of the Stakhanov Movement 161
(tekhnicheskie koeffitsienty) or ‘limits’ (limity or sometimes predely). Thus in
the iron and steel industry the main technical coefficient for a blast
furnace was the number of cubic metres of furnace volume required
to produce a ton of pig iron – the smaller the number of cubic
metres, the greater the productivity of the furnace. Similarly, the
technical coefficient for an open-hearth furnace specified the num-
ber of tons of crude steel which could be produced per square metre
of the floor area of the furnace – in this case, the larger the number
of tons, the greater the productivity. Similar norms were adopted for
specific pieces of machinery. In the coal industry the norm for a cut-
ting machine or a pneumatic pick was the number of tons of coal it
could hew in a given period. In the machine-building industries, with
their great variety of machines, each machine or type of machine
was supposed to have its own technical specifications (known as a
pasport).
These technical norms for equipment were usually prepared by
the engineers in the project or research institute of the industry, or in
laboratories or design bureaux attached to factories. With imported
equipment, or equipment based on foreign models, the foreign
specifications were used, modified for Soviet conditions.
These norms stated the optimum rather than the maximum produc-
tion which could be achieved – production might be achieved above
the optimum by working the equipment too hard so that its life was
shortened. Naturally practice fell short of the optimum; and when
the production plans for an industry or a factory were prepared, the
planners used ‘planning norms’ ( planovye normy) derived from, but
lower than, the technical norms; these showed what was believed to
be feasible to produce from the equipment in the period concerned.
A different type of norm, closely related to and often confused
with the technical norm of the equipment, was the ‘output norm’
(norma vyrabotki ) which specified the amount of production which a
worker would be expected to produce in a given time. The output
norm was used to calculate the amount of money the worker would
be paid for a particular job (the rastsenka, normally known in Britain
as ‘the rate for the job’). The calculation of output norms was a very
complex and tricky business, undertaken by the Technical Norming
Bureau (TNB) of the factory and carried out by a large army of
norm-setters (normirovshchiki ). The TNB worked in uneasy association
with the technical director of the factory, and the norm-setters in
turn worked with the foreman of the shop concerned, and with the
162 ‘Advancing to Abundance’, September–December 1935
workers themselves. The number of norms was very large. Some
210,000 norms were in use in the Gor’kii Automobile Works alone.2
The norm-setters were also numerous, and usually poorly qualified.
In the machine-building industry there were 12,000 norm-setters,
these included 400 engineers and 2,200 technicians; the remaining
9,400 had no technical qualifications.3
Ideally, the output norms were supposed to be obtained by scien-
tific measurement of the best practice – they should be ‘technical
norms’. But usually, though they were often called ‘technical norms’,
they were obtained by such empirical devices as making a percentage
deduction from the time actually taken in the factory to produce the
particular component, or by a guess at what it was reasonable to
expect from the worker. Hence they were often described as
‘experimental-statistical norms’ or as ‘norms by eye’ (na glazok).4
By 1935 norms were coming to the centre of the stage. It was
already evident that the ambitious multiple policy goals of the five-
year plan would be very difficult to achieve. Even the considerable
increases in the 1935 investment plan made in January–July 1935,
and in the July 1935 version of the 1936 plan, failed to reach the
five-year plan targets. But the efficiency with which equipment was
used in the iron and steel and other industries had considerably
improved since the beginning of 1934, and labour productivity had
increased. This gave rise to hopes that both technical and output
norms could be substantially increased. On March 10, 1935, the
party central committee and Sovnarkom issued a decree announcing
a partial revision of the norms (i.e. the output norms) in 1935.5 The
decree closely associated the revision of norms with new capital
equipment and the efficient use of existing capital:

New enterprises have been completed and new capital equipment

has been introduced, the skills of the workers and the mastering of
the use of new equipment have grown. In this connection the out-
put norms of some groups of workers at many enterprises are

2
See Filtzer (1986), 210.
3
ZI, December 29, 1935 (speech of Andreev to December 1935 plenum of party
central committee).
4
Filtzer (1986), ch. 8, gives a detailed account of the variety of devices by which
norms were accommodated to the political, social and economic circumstances of
the factories.
5
RGASPI, 17/3/961, 14–15 (art. 91).
 The Launching of the Stakhanov Movement 163
obviously out of date, and are a brake on the further improvement
of labour productivity.

This particularly applied to machine building, iron and steel and

coal, and to some branches of the food and light industries. In these
cases the norms must be increased, and must result in the full use of
the working day, The new norms must be adopted by May 1, and
must not change for the rest of the year. In future new norms must
be approved whenever new equipment is introduced. This was fol-
lowed three days later by an order of Narkomtyazhprom repeating
these decisions.6
On May 12, 1935, eight days after Stalin’s speech on ‘cadres’ (see
p. 105 above), one of the main issues discussed at the Council
attached to Narkomtyazhprom was the ‘technically-based norms’
(tekhnichesko-obosnovannye normy) for equipment. Ordzhonikidze insisted
that the existing norms ‘are not progress, but in the best case a reflec-
tion of how far we have at present mastered a particular process, and
in the worst case – it is yesterday’. He was challenged. Korolev, head
of the aircraft industry, defended the ‘passports’ ( pasporty) of machine
tools, prepared by the appropriate laboratory, as ‘the crucial factor in
the utilisation of equipment and labour’, but Ordzhonikidze sharply
replied:

You know the metallurgists’ passport of two years ago, what it was
yesterday and today. When we negotiated with cde. Birman in
February, we spoke of a passport of 1.15 [cubic metres of furnace
per ton of pig iron], and he is coming up to 0.98.7

The question of technically-based norms was posed even more

sharply on the railways. Kaganovich, newly-appointed People’s
Commissar, from April 1935 onwards strongly criticised the engi-
neers in the commissariat who purportedly insisted that a daily load-
ing of 55,000–58,000 freight wagons a day was a maximum limit,
given the existing state of track and rolling stock. These limits were
soon referred to as ‘the bourgeois theory of the “limit”’, and the

6
For the text of the order, see Industrializatsiya, 1933–1937 (1970), 264–5.
7
RGAE, 7297/138/77, 120–122. Birman was at this time director of the
Petrovskii iron and steel works. For the ‘negotiations’ at the Congress of Soviets on
January 31, at which Birman agreed to 1.15 in a public discussion with Ordzhonikidze,
see Ordzhonikidze (1957), 632–3.
164 ‘Advancing to Abundance’, September–December 1935
‘limiters’ ( predel’shchiki ) were summarily dismissed, An article attack-
ing the anti-state theory of the limit, published in Pravda on May 11,
and signed ‘Transportnik’, is believed to have been written by Stalin.8
Then in July Kaganovich launched a campaign frankly known as
‘forcing the boilers’, which aimed to increase the time locomotives
were in motion from 7.9 to 10 hours a day.9

(ii) The Stakhanov ‘leap forward’

It was in this context that the Stakhanov movement was launched.

Both Ordzhonikidze and Kaganovich closely linked their homilies
and imprecations about technical norms for equipment with the
achievement of higher output norms by the workers. Thus in January
1934 Ordzhonikidze insisted that to achieve improved coefficients
for blast furnaces ‘the issue here is solely a matter of people’, a matter of
how well people worked.10 A year later, at the VII Congress of
Soviets, eight months before Stakhanov’s famous feat, Ordzhonikidze,
after discussing the productivity of cutting machines, praised a
Donbass miner, Tel’nykh, who was a delegate at the congress, for
achieving a monthly output of 10,000 tons as compared with the
average 2,700 tons in the best coal district.11
Such feats were frequently undertaken during the next few months.
Z. E. Zorin, head of Artemugol’, a Donbass coal trust, later noted
that before Stakhanov’s record shift there were already ‘people who
in specific circumstances work better than others’:

I must say straight out that we slept through our own Stakhanov
movement. In our mines in June, Medvedev, a coal-face worker,
produced 112 tons [per shift], and we did not notice.12

Then on July 1, an engine driver on the Donetsk line, Krivonos,

increased the speed of his locomotive from 24 to 31.9 kilometres an

8
See Rees (1995), 114–18.
9
Ibid., 119–20.
10
Ordzhonikidze (1957), 545–6.
11
Ibid., 619–20.
12
RGAE, 7297/38/175, 273 (report to conference on the coal, oil, chemical and
metallurgical industries, attended by participants in central committee plenum,
December 26, 1935).
 The Launching of the Stakhanov Movement 165
hour; he was later treated as a Stakhanovite, or a ‘Stakhanovite-
Krivonosite’, jointly with Stakhanov himself.13
The circumstances of Stakhanov’s own record on the night of
August 30/31 have been much discussed. While we lack full documen-
tary evidence about the launching of Stakhanov’s record, and the
organisation of the subsequent campaign, we can reconstruct certain
important elements of the story. Stakhanov’s feat was inspired by the
general atmosphere, in which the intensification of labour was strongly
encouraged, and active preparations were made for the occasion by
the party organisation in the mine.14 But the evidence seems to show
that Stakhanov’s action was not directly organised by the Politburo, or
by Stalin himself. Stalin was on vacation, and there was nothing about
Stakhanov or his record shift in the numerous ciphered telegrams
exchanged between Kaganovich and Stalin. In the Stalin–Kaganovich
telegrams the sole mention of the movement (without any reference to
Stakhanov himself ) was a paragraph in Kaganovich’s telegram of
September 5, 1935, in which he took the opportunity to inform Stalin
about the success of locomotive drivers in speeding up the trains.15 But
Stalin apparently made no response. Probably Ordzhonikidze enthu-
siastically wrote to Stalin or telephoned him about the developments
in heavy industry; but no record of this has so far been traced.16 If
there was a prime mover in the campaign, it was certainly
Ordzhonikidze himself, strongly supported by his deputy Pyatakov.
At the beginning of August, after struggling for the interests of
Narkomtyazhprom in the discussions on the 1936 plan, Ordzhonikidze
departed on vacation to Kislovodsk. He travelled through the
Donetsk region by train, and received S. A. Sarkis (Sarkisov), secre-
tary of the Donetsk regional party committee, and Zorin, head of
Artemugol’, in his coach.17 After they had complained about the lack
of supplies, he promised to help, and at the same time asked them to
pay proper attention to the work of miners who were showing the
way forward (shakhtery-‘mayaki’, literally ‘beacons’), the ‘thousands’ of
leading miners in the Donbass.18
13
See Rees (1995), 123.
14
See Siegelbaum (1988), 67–9.
15
RGASPI, 558/11/743, 29–36.
16
Stalin was in Sochi, Ordzhonikidze on the northern side of the mountains in
Kislovodsk and Zheleznovodsk.
17
Owing to the large number of aircraft disasters, the top leaders were not
permitted to travel by air.
18
RGASPI, 85/29/119, 114.
166 ‘Advancing to Abundance’, September–December 1935
A few weeks later Ordzhonikidze, on vacation in Kislovodsk, read
a short item on the last page of the September 2 issue of Pravda:

…in a 6-hour shift Stakhanov gave 102 tons of coal, which is 10 per
cent of the daily output of the mine, and earned 200 rubles.

(In fact Stakhanov, contrary to the usual practice, did not do his own
propping but worked with two proppers, but even so the output per
man was 5.23 times the norm.19) Ordzhonikidze promptly phoned
Narkomtyazhprom in Moscow and the coal trust in Kadievka, and
within a few days a campaign about Stakhanov’s record was organ-
ised in the central newspapers. On September 6, Pravda published an
enthusaistic report about the records achieved by Stakhanov and
Dyukhanov, a local party organiser who visited the mine where
Stakhanov worked. On the same day Ordzhonikidze also wrote to
Sarkisov, not mentioning Stakhanov specifically, but setting out his
thoughts and plans:

Sarkis – the coal situation, and the fuel situation generally, is bad. It
is clear to me today that the management of both Glavugol’ and the
trusts is bad. This is mainly managers of the old type. They must
either be sharply reoriented and compelled to work in a new way, as
we did in iron and steel – or be replaced by young people … Tel’nykh
and others must be boldly promoted to leading posts.
… You can’t get away from the fact that there are hundreds and
thousands of real heroes among the rank and file, who demonstrate
brilliant models of how to work … The experience of iron and steel
has fully justified such boldness … We can’t manage without a big
shake-up in coal. We can’t organise wages along new lines, or the
workplace, without a shake-up.20

A few days later, on September 11, Pravda published an enthusiastic

editorial ‘An Important Initiative in the Donbass’, which launched
the national campaign.21

19
See Siegelbaum (1988), 70–1.
20
RGASPI, 85/29/460, 2–3, published in Sovetskoe rukovodtsvo: perepiska, 1928–1941
(1999), 310–11. Tel’nykh was the record-breaker in the Donbass praised by
Ordzhonikidze the previous January (see above).
21
For a careful account of the campaign, see Siegelbaum (1988), 75–88.
 The Launching of the Stakhanov Movement 167
The strong official backing for the Stakhanovite movement had
definite political as well as economic objectives. In 1935 numerous
initiatives by the leadership were directed towards consolidating
the unity of the country. On July 30, a month before Stakhanov’s
record, Stalin, addressing a major conference of railwaymen,
attended by several members of the Politburo, insisted that there
were no major and minor personnel on the railways, only major
and minor posts – everyone was equally important. 22 The
Stakhanovite movement became a major part of the campaign for
national unity. In October and November 1935 numerous confer-
ences and meetings attended by both Stakhanovites and political
and economic leaders were widely publicised, and all the regional
and district party secretaries and all the enterprise directors were
drawn into the campaign. Then the ‘First All-Union Conference of
Stakhanovite Working Men and Women’ was held November
14–17 in a blaze of publicity, attended by all the members of the
Politburo and 3,000 managers of the economy and rank-and-file
Stakhanovites. The reports of the proceedings became one of the
main propaganda documents of the second half of the 1930s.
Stalin, in his address to the conference, which was his first known
reference to Stakhanovism, described the Stakhanov movement as
‘fundamentally profoundly revolutionary’. According to Stalin, the
movement ‘began of itself, from below’ and ‘spread across our
Soviet Union not gradually, but with an unprecedented speed, like
a hurricane’.23
At the conference, the Soviet leaders openly manifested what
Benvenuti has characterised as ‘reverting to the ultra-ambitious
economic expectations of the early Thirties’.24 Ordzhonikidze,
reviving a major slogan of the first five-year plan, called for the
fulfilment of the second five-year plan in four years in the Donbass
coal industry.25 Gurevich, head of the iron and steel industry, drew
attention to the campaign for ‘the five-year plan in four’ in his
industry; and the director of the Kirov works in Leningrad stated

22
Cited by Kaganovich in Pervoe (1935), 189. For other aspects of this speech see
Rees (1995), 122.
23
P, November 22, 1935; Stalin, Soch., xiv (1967), 80, 87–8.
24
Benvenuti (1989), 24.
25
See his exchange with Artyukhov, head of the Gorlovka mine (Pervoe (1935), 47).
168 ‘Advancing to Abundance’, September–December 1935
that his factory would achieve ‘five in four’. 26 Molotov went much
further. After insisting that ‘every worker can become a Stakhanovite’, he
announced:

The productivity of our works and factories will secure us within a

short period a doubling and trebling of industrial output, as comrade
Stalin has pointed out so many times.27

Ordzhonikidze, not to be outdone, insisted that it was possible to

achieve ‘without any doubt the doubling, trebling and quadrupling of
the productivity of labour and production, as cde. Stalin said – this
matter is in our hands’.28
Stakhanovism was the main item on the agenda of the plenum of
the party central committee, which met December 21–25, 1935 (see
pp. 171, 182 below), and was widely publicised. At this time Stalin
was personally active to an unprecedented extent in ‘communicating
with the people’. He held a series of meetings with delegations of
workers and peasants, and representatives of various Soviet repub-
lics.29 A remarkable Pravda editorial on January 1, 1936, entitled
‘The Stakhanovite Year’, and accompanied by a large photograph of
a smiling pipe-smoking Stalin, boldly declared that ‘the Soviet land
is advancing to abundance at a rapid pace’:

The country has never lived so full-blooded a life as at present.

Vivacity, confidence and optimism are universally dominant. People
are as it were taking to wings. The country is in process of becoming
not only the richest but also the most cultured in the entire world.
The advance of the working class to the level of professional engineers
and technicians is on the agenda.

26
Pervoe (1935), 108, 133. See also Zhdanov on some Leningrad factories (Pervoe
299). However, the independent-minded Tochinskii insisted, contradicting
Ordzhonikidze, that the major iron and steel works at Enakievo was not ready to
fulfil the five-year plan in four years; Ordzhonikidze in reply asserted that the iron
and steel plan would be ‘considerably exceeded’ in four years (ibid. 150, 318).
27
Ibid. 281. The comment on Stalin evidently referred to his speech of May 4 (see
p. 157 above).
28
Ibid. 324.
29
For his similar meetings concerned with agriculture, see p. 263 below.
 The Launching of the Stakhanov Movement 169
The editorial closely linked this alluring prospect to the question of
labour productivity:

Every newly emerging social system triumphs over the old outdated
mode of production because it brings about a higher productivity of
labour.

(iii) Stakhanovism and the campaign against ‘sabotage’

The extent to which Stakhanovism was resisted and resented by

workers, managers and engineers has yet to be established. The hos-
tility of some ordinary workers was frequently described in NKVD
and party reports in the autumn of 1935.30 There is also a great deal
of evidence that many senior managers, factory directors and engi-
neers regarded Stakhanovite record-breaking as disrupting planning
and the progress of the economy. The scepticism of some leading
industrialists was clearly displayed at a meeting in Narkomtyazhprom
of heads of Chief Administrations and chief engineers on October
15, 1935.31 And in the factories foremen and engineers were har-
assed by managers to increase the number of Stakhanovites, and by
Stakhanovites for failing to supply the extra tools and materials to
enable higher production.32
In the autumn of 1935, resistance to Stakhanovism met an increas-
ingly repressive response from the authorities, who often linked even
mild resistance with counter-revolutionary activity and sabotage. As
early as September 14 Pravda published a telegram by Ordzhonikidze
in which he anticipated ‘philistine scepticism on the part of certain
backward leaders, which will in practice mean sabotage’, and called
for their immediate removal.33 Then on September 20 a Pravda edi-
torial was headed ‘Fire on the Saboteurs!’ On November 17 Stalin,
in his speech at the Stakhanovites’ conference, while he did not spe-
cifically mention ‘sabotage’, called for ‘the curbing of stubborn con-
servatives among the managerial, engineering and technical staff ’, at

30
See S. Davies (1997), 32–4.
31
See Benvenuti (1989), 31–2; RGAE, 4372/38/180, 93–283.
32
These issues are extensively discussed in Khlevniuk (1995); Filtzer (1986), ch. 7;
Getty and. Manning, eds (1993), 142–60 (R. Thurston), as well as in Benvenuti and
Siegelbaum.
33
The telegram was dated September 12.
170 ‘Advancing to Abundance’, September–December 1935
first by patiently persuading them, and then, ‘if persuasion does not
work, more decisive measures will have to be taken’.34
On November 26 Vyshinsky, the USSR Procurator, claimed that
on the railways a Stakhanovite had been attacked, and attempts had
been made to organise a ‘wrecking act’ to discredit Stakhanovism.
He proposed that the case should be heard in open court and the two
main persons accused should be sentenced to death by shooting.35
On November 29 the question was examined by the Politburo: Stalin
personally replaced the proposal to impose the death penalty by ten
years of imprisonment.36 On December 10 and 16 Vyshinsky
informed Stalin and Molotov, and Kaganovich (as commissar for
railways) that each of the accused had been sentenced to 6–10 years’
deprivation of liberty. According to Vyshinsky, the trials were
attended by a large number of railwaymen, who showed ‘strong
approval’ of the sentences; the trials were broadcast by radio and
reported in the local press.37 A copy of one of Vyshinsky’s letters to
Molotov is located in the files of Chubar’’s secretariat, and Molotov
has noted on it ‘Cde. Chubar’ for inf[ormation]’.38 This is evidence
that the political leadership of the USSR were informed about the
attacks on Stakhanovism and took them seriously.
At the beginning of December Vyshinsky issued a circular
requiring the following to be treated as acts of terrorism:

the use of forcible actions against Stakhanovites in connection with

their activity, actions which result in their death or other serious
consequences;
attempts or preparation for such actions.

Damage of machine tools and other mechanisms, undertaken to

disrupt the work of Stakhanovites, should be treated as wrecking or
as a ‘diversionary act’. ‘Deliberate hindrance of the activity of
Stakhanovites by official persons’ should be treated as counter-
revolutionary sabotage. Thus anti-Stakhanovite acts were brought

34
P, November 22, 1935.
35
GARF, 8131/37/58, 20–21.
36
RGASPI, 17/163/1086, 60, 61–63. The resolution was approved by poll, with
the signatures of Stalin, Molotov, Ordzhonikidze, Mikoyan and Kaganovich;
Voroshilov, Chubar’ and Andreev informed the secretary of their approval.
37
GARF, 8131/37/58, 89–90, 99.
38
GARF, 5446/26/49, 277.
 The Launching of the Stakhanov Movement 171
under the most severe clauses of the Criminal Code, carrying pun-
ishments including the death penalty. Further, ‘threats against, and
persecution and beating’ of Stakhanovites should also carry severe
penalties. All such cases should be widely publicised, and should be
tried in open court sittings in the presence of a wide public, and
reported in the local press.39
Andreev, a secretary of the party central committee and Politburo
member, in preparing for the central committee plenum of December
21–25, at which he gave the keynote speech, was supplied with a
considerable amount of NKVD material on the resistance of ‘con-
servative and counter-revolutionary elements’ to the Stakhanov
movement. The material indicates that by December hundreds of
cases of sabotage had already been discovered or concocted. The
NKVD used the following headings to describe resistance to
Stakhanovism: deliberate damage of the equipment of Stakhanovites;
creation of unfavourable conditions for their work (including supply-
ing them with poor-quality tools and materials, and allocating inap-
propriate personnel to Stakhanovite work-teams); illegal reduction
of rates for the job and increases of norms; ‘deception’ by economic
agencies (this obviously refers to inaccurate reports); ‘counter-
revolutionary agitation against Stakhanovite methods’; terror against
Stakhanovites.40
Such broad headings enabled accidents, damage of machinery
and poor quality materials – frequent occurrences in the Soviet
industry of the 1930s – to be treated as crimes. Thus a report to
Andreev dated October 11 claimed that the collapse of the mine
roof and the consequent death of nine of the 14 members of a
Stakhanovite brigade at Mine No. 204 in the Chelyabinsk Coal Trust
was ‘a result of the use of obviously wrecking methods of organising
mining’; six engineers were found guilty of wrecking.41 Cases were
reported in the legal journal, and in the industrial newspaper, of
workers receiving sentences of 2–5 years’ imprisonment merely for
strongly criticising Stakhanovism.42
Andreev’s address to the central committee plenum discussed the
question of sabotage in this spirit. He insisted that it was ‘impos-
sible to avoid the decisive opposition of class enemies’ and that

39
GARF, 8131/37/58, 32–34.
40
RGASPI, 73/1/141, 205.
41
RGASPI, 73/1/141, 241,
42
See Filtzer (1986), 204.
172 ‘Advancing to Abundance’, September–December 1935
‘numerous facts, known to everyone, inform us of the more deter-
mined struggle of class enemies’. He claimed that much sabotage
had taken place but had not been disclosed, because (a revealing
remark) ‘no-one now dares to speak openly against the Stakhanov
movement’.43 Some other speakers also claimed that Stakhanovism
was hindered by sabotage. Thus Ryndin, from the Urals, referred
to ‘many facts of open and secret sabotage’ on the railways, adding
that ‘Many people have already been exposed and driven out –
there were unfortunately quite a number of Communists among
them.’44 But on the whole the theme of sabotage was rather muted.
Ordzhonikidze criticised the conservatism of ‘many and very
many’ managers, engineers and technicians, but did not refer to
sabotage.45 The resolution of the plenum stressed the importance
of ‘breaking the remaining resistance to the Stakhanov movement
of the conservative section of managers, engineers and technicians
in all branches of industry and transport’, and called upon party
and trade union organisations to ‘expose class-alien elements which
attempt to do harm to ( pakostit’ ) Stakhanovites’.46 But it did not
explicitly mention sabotage. At a Narkomtyazhprom conference,
held on December 26, a day after the plenum, the participants,
including Ordzhonikidze, paid no attention to the question of
sabotage.47
These developments were characterised by Benvenuti as ‘the
December truce’, which showed ‘signs of reconciliation between
industry and the authorities’.48 While this is an accurate characteri-
sation of the change in attitude of Ordzhonikidze and probably
some of the other senior People’s Commissars, in practice accusa-
tions of sabotage and counter-revolutionary activity did not cease,
and in some sectors were even intensified.

43
P, December 29, 1935.
44
RGASPI, 17/2/561, 32.
45
P, December 27, 1935.
46
P, December 26, 1935.
47
For this conference see Rees, ed. (1997), 120 (Khlevnyuk); Benvenuti (1989),
75–6. This was a conference of participants in the plenum concerned with the coal,
oil, chemical and metallurgical industries. The report of its proceedings appears, in
somewhat different versions, in ZI, December 31, 1935; RGASPI, 85/29/114; and
RGAE, 7297/38/175, 46–275.
48
Benvenuti (1989), 35, 40.
 The End of Food Rationing 173
(B) THE END OF FOOD RATIONING, OCTOBER 1, 1935

The abolition of all food rationing was firmly on the agenda by August
1935. On August 2 Molotov, who was on leave, wrote to Stalin:

Are we intending to go to the abolition of ration cards for food and

industrial goods this year? It seems to me that this is what must be
done, It is necessary that wages should really become the main
regulator for the growth of labour productivity.49

Three days later Stalin replied: ‘You are of course right about the full
abolition this year of ration cards for industrial goods and food; this
matter must be carried to a conclusion.’50
Preparation for the more or less complete abolition of food ration-
ing began early in September. On August 31, Stalin, in a telegram to
Kaganovich and Molotov, stressed the urgency of reducing the price
of bread and flour, particularly in Central Asia: ‘this is in order to
make it unprofitable to grow grain and compel them to transfer
almost all their land to the production of cotton’.51 A few days later
Molotov and Kaganovich replied to Stalin outlining proposals about
reduced bread and flour prices, and adding the important qualifica-
tion that ‘we are thinking of tying in the whole question with the
abolition of ration cards for meat, sugar and fish’. They stated that
they would prepare the matter within ‘about five days’.52 However,
other work evidently got in the way, because nothing happened for
two weeks. On September 19 Stalin chided them in a brief telegram:

Where is your draft on the reduction of bread prices and the abolition
of rations for meat and sugar? You must hurry up.53

The telegram was despatched at 9.07 p.m. Kaganovich and Molotov

must have worked through the night. On September 20 at 6.05 a.m.
they sent him a very long telegram on both subjects.54

49
RGASPI, 558/11/769, 162–164.
50
Pis’ma (1996), 257. On the attempted derationing of industrial consumer goods,
see pp. 226, 349 below.
51
SKP, 543.
52
SKP, 552 (dated September 5).
53
SKP, 573.
54
SKP, 573–7.
174 ‘Advancing to Abundance’, September–December 1935
The section on the abolition of rationing proposed that unified
prices should replace commercial and ration prices for meat prod-
ucts, fish, herrings, potatoes and sugar. The prices were set out in
some detail. They were lower than the existing commercial prices.
The unified price for meat was about double the ration prices for
meat, and the sugar price was treble the ration price for sugar, but
the new price for potatoes was only slightly higher than the ration
prices for potatoes prevailing after the 1934 harvest. Prices of meat
dishes in canteens would also be increased, but the increase would be
limited (evidently they feared a further drop in canteen sales) by
reducing the meat content of the meals. For the time being fats
would continue to be rationed. The new prices would be differenti-
ated by zone, and would be lower in Moscow, Leningrad and the
Donbass than elsewhere. The sale of meat would be concentrated in
towns previously supplied with rationed meat.
Stalin sent Kaganovich and Molotov a further telegram at 3.40 p.m.
on the same day, September 20, objecting to the scrappy nature of
their telegram and castigating their proposal to fix meat prices lower
in Moscow, Leningrad and the Donbass as ‘fundamentally incor-
rect’: ‘this approach returns us to the old anti-marxist practice when
products were cheaper in Moscow and Leningrad than in the places
where they were produced’. He also insisted that rationing of butter
should be abolished – a ‘serious reduction’ should be made in its
price (obviously referring to the commercial price). However, he
raised no objection to the similar price differentiation proposed for
sugar and fish.55 His proposals were immediately accepted by
Molotov and Kaganovich, and incorporated in a decree of the cen-
tral committee and Sovnarkom, which was approved by the Politburo
on September 25 and published the following day.56
The decree, entitled ‘On the Reduction of Prices for Bread and
the Abolition of the Rationing System for Meat, Fish, Sugar, Fats
and Potatoes’, took effect from October 1.57 It declared:

The upsurge in livestock farming, the increased yield of sugar beet,

and the strengthening and development of the fish industry have now
created all the necessary conditions for the elimination of the ration-
ing system for meat, fats, fish, sugar and potatoes … [This] must

55
SKP, 577.
56
SKP, 580 (dated September 22); RGASPI, 17/3/971, 61, 140–149.
57
SZ, 1935, art. 422; for the reduction of bread prices see pp. 175–6 above.
 The End of Food Rationing 175
eliminate the existence of dual prices – high commercial prices and
ration prices which are too low – and secure the establishment of
unified state selling prices for each region or republic at a level
between the present commercial and ration prices.

Five Zones were approved for meat, fish and dairy products (though
with different areas covered for each product) and four Zones for
sugar, as compared with eight Zones for bread.58 As Stalin proposed,
prices were higher in the Zone containing Moscow, Leningrad and
the Donbass than in all other Zones except the Far East. No special
addition to wages was provided for; the authorities claimed that the
net effect of the reform was to reduce the prices paid by the
population (see pp. 233–4 below).
On September 5, in response to Stalin’s anxiety about the price of
bread and flour in the cotton areas (see p. 173 above), Molotov and
Kaganovich had proposed that bread and flour prices should be
reduced on September 25 by between 20 and 40 per cent, depending
on the area and the type of grain.59 In his reply on the following day,
Stalin insisted that all price reductions, including those for Central
Asia, should be introduced in all regions on October 1, at the same
time as the abolition of food rationing.60 In their long telegram of
September 20, Molotov and Kaganovich had already set out detailed
proposals for bread prices, including larger reductions in Central
Asia and the Far East.61 Stalin expressed doubts about reducing the
price of rye bread by as much as 20 kopeks, and objected to the
larger reduction proposed for the eighth (Far Eastern) Zone as
‘economically incorrect’.62
The decree of September 25 reduced the retail price of bread by
between 7 and 25 per cent, depending on the Zone, and of flour by
between 13 and 33 per cent.63 As a concession to Stalin, the reduc-
tion for rye bread varied between 15 and 20 kopeks according to the
region, and the reduction in the Far East was not greater than in
other regions.
58
For meat and meat products, the towns to which meat was supplied were divided
into zones; for other foods administrative regions were each placed in a zone.
59
SKP, 552 (dated September 5).
60
SKP, 556.
61
SKP, 574.
62
SKP, 577. About rye bread he wrote: ‘The reduction for rye bread by 20k is very
large, but since you have adopted such a large reduction I do not object.’
63
SZ, 1935, art. 422 (dated September 25).
176 ‘Advancing to Abundance’, September–December 1935
The reduction in bread prices may have been made out of neces-
sity. With the decline in prices on the kolkhoz market it may have
become more difficult to sell bread from state shops; according to
trade statistics sales declined by 17 per cent in July–September 1935
as compared with April–June; in the previous year the decline in the
same quarter was only 9 per cent.64
Kaganovich, reporting the publication of the decree to Stalin,
informed him that ‘today meetings and talks are taking place in every
factory’, and added complacently:

the attitude of manual and office workers is very good … many work-
ers made a calculation and themselves pointed out that, as they
bought meat and butter on the market, they are now gaining.65

(C) THE OCTOBER–DECEMBER ECONOMIC PLAN

AND ITS OUTCOME

(i) The quarterly plan

In September the quarterly national-economic plan was approved

before the decision to abolish all food rationing and before the
Stakhanov movement had substantially affected economic policy
and the economic atmosphere. But it was prepared against the back-
ground of the considerable successes of industry and the railways,
and in the context of the series of decisions to increase the investment
plans both for the remainder of 1935 and for 1936.66
The outline plan approved by the Politburo on September 7 was
unusually incomplete.67 While it included specific plans for a number
of producer and consumer goods, some important items were miss-
ing, and a dispute about the plan for cotton textiles was referred to a
special commission. A couple of weeks after the initial approval of
the plan, a further Politburo decision increased the plan for industrial

64
See quarterly data for 1934 in Itogi ... po tovarooborotu, July 1935, 16–17, and for
1935 in Osnovnye pokazateli, 1935, 225.
65
SKP, 589 (dated September 26).
66
For the 1936 plan, see p. 268 below.
67
RGASPI, 17/3/971, 18–19, 89–94.
 The October–December Plan 177
production by 1.9 per cent.68 A much more detailed plan was
approved by Sovnarkom on September 26.69 Other plans were
increased on the authority of the commissariat: the plan for Donbass
coal was increased from 18.5 to 20 million tons.70
The capital investment plan for the fourth quarter involved a fur-
ther increase in the annual plan for 1935, On September 6 Kaganovich
reported to Stalin by telegram that 4,507 million rubles remained for
the quarter from the annual plan, but an additional 732 million
rubles were required. Agriculture and transport needed to purchase
equipment produced in excess of the plan, and additional expendi-
ture needed to be undertaken on meat combines, food warehouses
and the textile industry. Additional investment was also required to
prepare for further school building in 1935, to mechanise the trans-
port of timber, and for the most important projects of heavy industry.
Investment for the quarter should therefore total 5,239 million rubles.
(This figure excluded the bread supplement, which brought the total
to 5,369 million rubles.) Reflecting the expansive mood of the time,
Stalin replied on the same day without querying any of the items
proposed, merely stating ‘I do not object to the additions to the ceil-
ings for the IV quarter which you propose’, and this figure was
included in the quarterly plan adopted on September 7.71

68
RGASPI, 17/3/971, 64, dated September 25 (art. 211). The quarterly plans for
the gross production of industry were changed as follows (million rubles at 1926/27
prices):

September 7 September 25
Narkomtyazhprom 6800 6870
Narkomlegprom 1600 1722
Narkompishcheprom 2000 2080
Narkomles 600 603*
Narkoms of local industry 1800 1881
(Other) (700) (601)+
Total 13500 13758
* Given in the Sovnarkom decree of September 26 (see next footnote).
+ Given in the Sovnarkom decree of September 26 as including Komzag 562,
cinema and photography 39.

69
GARF, 5446/1/171, 241–87 (art. 2170).
70
See Siegelbaum (1988), 74.
71
SKP, 555–6. For the wage addition, see RGASPI, 17/3/971, 93.
178 ‘Advancing to Abundance’, September–December 1935
However, this decision reflected the uncertainties of the informa-
tion about investment available to (or comprehended by) the Soviet
leaders. Although Kaganovich and Stalin were apparently unaware
of this, the increase proposed was purely nominal. In fact the invest-
ment plan had been consistently underspent in 1935 up to that time.
Three months after the quarterly plan was approved, Ginzburg, in
charge of investment in Narkomtyazhprom, reported to the builders’
conference that total investment in January–September 1935 had
amounted to 15,257 million rubles.72 As the annual plan was 24,482
million rubles (see p. 158 above), as much as 9,245 million rubles of
the annual plan had therefore not yet been spent! The monthly
reports for investment in a substantial number of sites had shown
underexpenditure throughout 1935. (See p. 142 above.)

(ii) Industrial production and costs in practice

The vociferous campaign extolling the first successes of Stakhanovism

was encouraged by the exceptionally rapid growth of production in
a number of key industries. In coal and iron and steel, and in favoured
branches of engineering such as the tractor and automobile indus-
tries, production increased much more rapidly between August (the
last month before Stakhanov’s feat) and December 1935 than in the
same period of 1934:
Increase in production, August–December (per cent)73

1934 1935
Coal (tons) 15.3 28.2
Pig iron (tons) 2.1 6.9
Crude steel (tons) 10.5 15.6
Rolled steel (tons) 10.4 32.4
Vehicles (numbers) 22.6 31.5
Tractors (numbers) 6.9 30.5
While such remarkable results were not achieved throughout indus-
try, this was certainly an outstanding period for industry as a whole.
In October–December 1935 production was 25.2 per cent greater
72
Soveshchanie (1936), 53.
73
Estimated from monthly data in Osnovnye pokazateli, 1935, xxi–xxvi.
 The October–December Plan 179
than in the same period of 1934 and 27.5 per cent greater than in
the previous quarter. The October–December quarter was responsi-
ble for as much as 32.1 per cent of annual output; the equivalent
figure for 1934 was 28.9 per cent.74
In value terms, total gross production amounted to 14,876 million
rubles, substantially exceeding the plan of 13,758 million. The four
main industrial commissariats all exceeded their plan.75 As always, these
figures in value terms present a more favourable picture than those in
physical terms. The annual report of TsUNKhU lists the results in
physical terms for 36 of the items for which plans were approved by the
Politburo on September 7. Of these, 17 exceeded the plan, 18 did not
reach the plan and one exactly equalled the plan. The main lag was in
the production of coal, oil and building materials, though all these items
increased substantially. In the fuel and power group production declined
in the quarter only in the case of petrol. In contrast to previous years,
most food products and industrial consumer goods exceeded the plan.76
The increase in production was associated with, and depended on,
a rapid increase in labour productivity. In Narkomtyazhprom as a
whole, output per worker was 13.4 per cent greater in the fourth than
in the third quarter, and 36 per cent higher than in 1934 as a whole,
thus exceeding the quarterly plan.77 This increase was to a substantial

74
Osnovnye pokazateli, 1934, 3; 1935, 4.
75
Osnovnye pokazateli, 1935, 4; for the plan, see n. 68 above. The commissariats for
local industry slightly underfulfilled their plans.
76

Exceeded plan Lower than plan Equalled plan

Fuel, power, industrial 2 8 0
raw materials
Building materials 0 3 0
Chemicals 2 0 1
Machine building and 5 4 0
metalworking
Industrial consumer goods 3 1 0
Food products 5 2 0
Total 17 18 1
Sources: Based on comparison of data in Osnovnye pokazateli, 1935, 18–25 and
RGASPI, 17/3/971, 89–91 (dated September 7).
77
The quarterly plan approved by Sovnarkom states that productivity in October–
December should exceed the average level for 1934 as a whole by 28 per cent
(GARF, 5446/1/171, 242, dated September 26).
180 ‘Advancing to Abundance’, September–December 1935
extent the result of the pressure exerted on managers, engineers and
workers by the Stakhanovite campaign. At first this mainly involved
the encouragement of individual records. The press extolled the suc-
cess and the virtues of Stakhanov and other coal miners, Busygin,
who produced crankshafts at the Gor’kii automobile works, Gudov, a
machine miller, Smetanin, who manufactured footwear in Leningrad,
the train driver Krivonos, and the sisters Vinogradova, who tended
cotton textile looms in Vychuga.78 For heavy industry alone, record
holders were celebrated by the publication of a two-volume work in
their honour; 647 names were listed for November alone.79 Before the
end of the year the movement was extended to embrace much larger
numbers of workers: in December Stakhanovite shifts and
Stakhanovite days were organised in the Donbass mines.80
The achievement of higher productivity was encouraged both by
the high prestige attached to the record holders and by the high
earnings involved in large increases in output. Many workers were
paid by progressive piece rates: once a worker had fulfilled 100 per
cent of the norm, the increment to wages increased more rapidly
than productivity. In the Donbass, 31.8 per cent of all mine workers
were paid by progressive piece rates in September and this increased
to 32.7 per cent by December.81 This carried with it serious problems
for financial stability. In a joint memorandum dated December 19,
Grin’ko and Mar’yasin pointed out that the wage bill in October–
November 1935 was 8.1 per cent higher than in August–September,
whereas in the same period of 1934 the increase had been only 5.1
per cent. The authors of the memorandum noted ‘the rapid devel-
opment of labour productivity, breaking down the old, outdated
output norms, and sharply increasing earnings’.82
Ever since the late 1920s the wage system had been constructed on
the premise that labour productivity would rise more rapidly than
wages. This was to be achieved by the annual upward revision of
norms of output (i.e. cutting the rate for the job), plus ad hoc upward
revisions when new equipment was introduced. It proved extremely
difficult to maintain this policy in practice. In 1934, according to offi-
cial figures, industrial labour productivity rose by 11.0 per cent, but the

78
See Siegelbaum (1988), 76.
79
See ibid. 76–8.
80
See ibid. 101.
81
Tyazhelaya promyshlennost’ 1935 (1936), 234.
82
GARF, 5446/17/341, 20–22; for this memorandum see pp. 190–1 below.
 The October–December Plan 181
average wage in industry rose by 16.3 per cent.83 In 1935 the average
wage sharply increased at the beginning of the year following the abo-
lition of bread rationing, but, following the norm revision of March–
April, wages grew less rapidly in the second and third quarters.84
The Stakhanov movement widened the gap between wages and
productivity. In the first months of the campaign the press was full of
reports of the huge wage increases received by Stakhanovites, and
attempts to increase output norms were slapped down.85 On October
11 the industrial newspaper Za industrializatsiyu reproduced the norms
decision of the previous March, printing in bold type the clause ‘The
revision of out-of-date norms shall be completed not later than 1 May
1935 and the revised norms shall be fixed for a period of 1 year.’ At
a Narkomtyazhprom conference on October 15, 1935, Pyatakov per-
emptorily told Rataichak, the head of the chemical industry: ‘if you
want to wreck the Stakhanov movement, revise the norms’.86 Between
August and December 1935 the average daily wage of industrial
workers increased by 16 per cent, while in the same months of 1934
it had increased by only 5.0 per cent.87 The monthly wage of indus-
trial workers in October–December as a whole exceeded the July–
September level by 21.4 per cent and was 28 per cent greater than in
the same months of the previous year.88
This situation could not last. At the conference of Stakhanovites
in November, many speakers criticised the old norms for both equip-
ment and workers’ output as out-of-date and superseded. But it fell
to Stalin to state that the norms of output must be increased. In the
final speech of the conference, he insisted that ‘a planned economy
is impossible without norms’; norms were needed as ‘a great control-
ling force’ to bring the mass of the workers up to the level of the

83
See Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1935 (1935), 442–3, 637, and Zaleski (1980),
550, 562.
84
As compared with the same period of the previous year, the average wage rose
by 28.3 per cent, and productivity by only 11 per cent over the whole period
January–September (Osnovnye pokazateli, September 1935, 21–3; Osnovnye pokazateli,
1935, 59–61). These figures are for the increase in the daily wage as compared with
daily productivity.
85
See Siegelbaum (1988), 88, and Industrializatsiya SSSR, 1933–1937 gg. (1971),
284–5.
86
See SS, vol. 36 (1984), 60 (Siegelbaum), Siegelbaum (1988), 87, Benvenuti
(1988), 191–2; and RGAE, 7297/38/180, 153–154.
87
See data in Osnovnye pokazateli, January 1936, 142.
88
Osnovnye pokazateli, January 1953, 142.
182 ‘Advancing to Abundance’, September–December 1935
most advanced. But norms must be increased. It would be unrealistic
to fix them at the level reached by Stakhanovites; because the mass
of workers would be unable to achieve them, but:

We need technical norms which would be placed somewhere between

the present technical norms and the norms achieved by the Stakhanovs
and the Busygins.89

One of the main purposes of the December plenum of the central

committee was to prepare the ground for the increase of both types
of norm. In its resolution Stalin inserted a substantial paragraph
calling for the replacement of existing technical norms and output
norms as out of date.90 Throughout the text of the resolution Stalin
replaced ambiguous expressions such as ‘check the norms critically’
and ‘re-examine the norms’ by the specific requirement ‘re-examine
the norms in the direction of an increase’.91

(iii) Capital investment

In the fourth quarter of every year capital investment was subject

to two conflicting trends. On the one hand, every Soviet organisa-
tion struggled to improve performance so as to fulfil the annual

89
P, November 22, 1935. Stalin used the phrase ‘technical norms’ (tekhnicheskie
normy) rather than ‘output norms’ (normy vyrabotki). The term was used to refer both
to norms for equipment and norms of output for workers. It was clear from the
context that Stalin was referring to output norms for workers, but evidently some
people assumed that norms of equipment should also be intermediate between the
old level and the Stakhanovite records. At the central committee plenum in
December, Mikoyan delicately corrected Stalin’s ambiguity:

I think that when norms of capacity of equipment and of production capacity

of factories are fixed, we must take the indicators of the Stakhanovites as a basis,
because technical norms of equipment and norms of output are different things.
We cannot revise the capacity norms of equipment and factories every year or
two. This is fixed for many years ahead.
(P, December 27, 1935)
90
RGASPI, 558/1/3191, 6, 9–10. Some of his insertions were in his own
handwriting, others a typewritten text probably prepared on Stalin’s instructions.
91
Ibid. 13–15.
 The October–December Plan 183
plan. This trend was particularly strong in 1935 when the invest-
ment plan was supplemented by a firm plan for the completion of
specific projects. On the other hand, the weather dictated that this
was a time of seasonal decline in the building industry. In 1935, as
in other years, the number of building workers began to decline in
November before reaching a low point in the first quarter of the
following year. But in 1935 the decline in the fourth quarter, 4.6 per
cent, was somewhat less than the decline of 5.7 per cent in the
fourth quarter of 1934.92 And in 1935 the building industry was
supported by an unprecedented increase in the supply of building
materials, partly due to the improved performance of the
railways.93
In consequence, the preliminary monthly reports showed that
investment increased rapidly in the fourth quarter, and more rapidly
than in the fourth quarter of 1934. About 6.4 per cent of the annual
plan was fulfilled per month in January–June; the percentage
improved to 9.1 in both the third and the fourth quarters.94 Accurate
information about total investment in the whole economy in
October–December has not been available, but the final figures for
Narkomtyazhprom show the same trend. The amount of investment
increased in the quarter and reached 29.2 per cent of annual

92
Osnovnye pokazateli, January 1936, 158.
93
Building materials carried on the railways, measured in wagon loads per day,
were as follows in October–December 1935:

Number Percentage of same

of wagons month in 1934
(a) Mineral building materials
October 5788 180.0
November 6995 199.7
December 6816 288.7
(b) Building timber
October 6104 137.1
November 6301 140.4
December 6480 152.5
Source: Osnovnye pokazateli, October 1935, 73; 1935, 110; Kratkie itogi, November 1935, 22.
94
Estimated from data in Osnovnye pokazateli, July 1935, 80–4; October 1935, 115–17;
January 1936, 112–15.
184 ‘Advancing to Abundance’, September–December 1935
investment; in the same period of 1934 investment declined and
amounted to 26.1 per cent of annual investment.95
This progress was not sufficient to overcome the lag in the first six
months of the year. Tumanov, director of the Industrial Bank,
reported to the builders’ conference in mid-December:

In a number of People’s Commissariats this year we can observe

considerable progress in increasing the rate of building (Narkomles,
Narkompishchprom, Narkomlegprom, Narkomput’). Nevertheless,
the whole programme of capital investment as a whole, to judge by
the data for 10 months, will not be fulfilled. Obviously in consequence
of this the programme for completions will not be fulfilled.96

In building, unlike most of the rest of industry, no major advance

in labour productivity was achieved in the fourth quarter: in
Narkomtyazhprom it increased by only 3.0 per cent as compared
with the previous quarter. Stakhanovism had made only minor
advances in the industry. At the builders’ conference, a bricklayer
from Zavodstroi reported that he was the only worker in the industry
who received an award out of 140 Stakhanovites.97 But the building
industry had carried out a Stakhanovite-like feat earlier in the year.
In Narkomtyazhprom labour productivity was already 44 per cent
higher in April–June 1935 than in 1934 as a whole; this increased to
58.7 per cent in July–September and 60.0 per cent in October–
December.98 The average wage in the fourth quarter increased by

95
Quarterly investment in Narkomtyazhprom, 1934–35 (million rubles in plan-
ning prices of the year concerned):

1934 1935
January–March 1522 1466
April–June 1971 2057
July–September 2131 2392
October–December 1986 2443
Whole year 7611 8358

Source: Tyazhelaya promyshlennost’ 1935 (1936), 295.

96
Soveshchanie (1936), 230.
97
Ibid. 223 (Samarin).
98
Tyazhelaya promyshlennost’ 1935 (1936), 297.
 The October–December Plan 185
4.4 per cent, slightly more rapidly than labour productivity, exceeding
the average level in 1934 by 43.4 per cent.99

(iv) Internal trade after the abolition of all food rationing

The situation for the foods taken off the ration in October 1935 was
at first very patchy. In a memorandum to Kaganovich and Molotov
about the food trade between October 1 and October 10, the first
ten days after the end of rationing, Veitser reported that even though
some kinds of fish were not available, ‘the sale of fish in most towns
is taking place normally’, and that in most regions the sale of sugar
was also taking place normally. But with other products the situation
was far less favourable. Veitser described ‘the huge demand for meat
in Central Asian towns’, which was explained by the fact that in this
area the unified state price was 7.60 rubles per kilogram, while the
price on the kolkhoz market was 14–15 rubles. Sales of meat prod-
ucts had considerably exceeded the plan in the majority of towns;
Veitser recommended that the number of towns in which state trade
in meat products took place should not be increased. The demand
for butter and vegetable oil was also high, partly because seasonal
supplies were not yet available on the kolkhoz market. In this case
Veitser recommended that the sale should be restricted only to the
eleven principal industrial towns: ‘in other towns butter and vegeta-
ble oil should either not be sold at all or for certain towns a firm daily
amount for sale should be approved’.100
On November 25 Veitser submitted a further memorandum to
Stalin and Molotov on the sale of food in the first 45 days since
October 1. He reported that retail sales by the state, and sales on the
kolkhoz market, had both substantially increased; kolkhoz market
prices, particularly for meat and butter, had fallen considerably in the
previous two months. In some large towns state sales of meat had
been slow because prices were higher than at the kolkhoz market.
Sugar was available without interruption in all regions. But sausages,
butter and vegetable oil were not available in sufficient quantities
outside the major towns; in all other towns a firm ceiling should
be placed on sales (Molotov wrote against these points on the
99
Tyazhelaya promyshlennost’ 1935 (1936), 297. Excluding the bread addition, the
average wage in October–December exceeded the 1934 level by 26.1 per cent.
100
GARF, 5446/82/40, 122–118 (dated October 14).
186 ‘Advancing to Abundance’, September–December 1935
memorandum ‘correct’).101 At the beginning of December Mar’yasin
also noted that ‘at present demand exceeds supply to a certain extent
for a number of commodities’.102 In contrast, a few days later
Mezhlauk noted that existing retail prices for flour were too high,
and that this restricted sales; and similarly ‘at present prices, potatoes
in a number of towns, including Moscow, are selling poorly’.103
There was an enormous variation in the extent to which the quar-
terly plan for the ‘market fund’ of planned and controlled foods was
fulfilled in different regions. The so-called ‘market fund’ was that
part of the supply which was made available to the individual con-
sumer rather than to organisations such as the army, or for process-
ing by industry. ‘Planned and controlled’ goods were those which
Narkomtorg distributed centrally; in the case of food the term cov-
ered grain products and eight other foods. Of the 28 or 29 regions
and republics, the number in which the market fund failed to reach
the plan was as follows: butter 18; vegetable oil 22; margarine 27;
meat 20; meat products 9; fish (i.e. fish apart from herrings) 18;
herrings 12.104
The uneven availability of food is strikingly illustrated by the data
for the sales of major food products in eleven large towns in October–
December 1935. Between 19 and 43 per cent of sales took place in
Moscow and Leningrad, and between 35 and 76 per cent in the
eleven towns.105 But Moscow and Leningrad between them included
only about 14 per cent of the urban population of the USSR and

101
RGASPI, 82/2/684, 96–102.
102
GARF, 5446/17/341, 113 (dated December 2); for this memorandum see
below.
103
RGAE, 4372/92/59, 1–7 (dated December 4).
104
Estimated from data in Osnovnye pokazateli, 1935, 231.
105
The percentages of total sales of the eight listed foods were as follows:

Moscow and Leningrad All eleven towns

Butter 39.9 61.2
Vegetable oil 29.5 47.7
Margarine 19.1 31.3
Sugar 23.6 43.1
Meat 48.0 75.7
Meat products 42.2 59.6
Fish 20.1 34.5
Herrings 25.0 47.4
Source: calculated from data in Osnovnye pokazateli, March 1936, 230–5.
 The October–December Plan 187
4 per cent of the total population; the equivalent figures for the
eleven towns were about 27 and 7.5 per cent.106 The concentration
of some 40 per cent of meat, meat products and butter in Moscow
and Leningrad is a particularly outrageous demonstration of the
priority afforded to these two cities.
In spite of these deficiencies, as a result of the successful fulfilment
of the deliveries’ plans for nearly all food products, the market fund
for all eight foods except fish was larger than in October–December
1934.107 For industrial consumer goods and other ‘non-food’ com-
modities the market fund was 23.1 per cent greater than in October–
December 1934, and slightly exceeded the plan.108 Total retail trade
by state and cooperative organisations in October–December 1935
exceeded the plan by 6.4 per cent.109
However, public catering, not included in this figure, continued to
perform badly. In October–December prices again increased slightly
as a result of the removal of food from sale at low rationed prices,
providing a further disincentive to take meals in canteens. In
October–December prices per dish increased by 1.9 per cent and
were 96 per cent higher than the price per dish in 1934.110 Moreover,
the food content of each dish was reduced in this quarter. According
to data on major public catering establishments, the number of
dishes sold amounted to only 76.8 per cent of the plan and was 17.5
per cent less than in the previous quarter; and public catering even
in terms of current retail prices amounted to only 89.9 per cent of
the plan.111 More complete data also showed that sales in terms of
current retail prices declined by 10 per cent as compared with the
previous quarter.112
Taken as a whole, this final stage in the abolition of food rationing
achieved a reasonable degree of stability on the consumer market.

106
For further details see chapter 8, n. 154.
107
See Osnovnye pokazateli, 1935, 225 (measured in physical terms).
108
Osnovnye pokazateli, 1935, 225 (measured in transfer-wholesale prices of 1935).
109
Osnovnye pokazateli, 1935, 226–8. We have not manage to establish whether the
quarterly plan took into account the small rise in retail prices consequent upon the
abolition of rationing on October 1.
110
Calculated from data on the retail sales in public catering, measured both in
current prices and in number of dishes sold (Osnovnye pokazateli, March 1936, 281–2).
These figures cover 92 per cent of all public catering (for the full figure for 1935, see
Table 20).
111
Osnovnye pokazateli, 1935, 237–8.
112
Osnovnye pokazateli, March 1936, 281–2.
188 ‘Advancing to Abundance’, September–December 1935
This was reflected in the continued decline of kolkhoz market prices
in the first months after October 1. On kolkhoz food markets in the
towns, average prices in September 1935 were 78.9 per cent of prices
in September 1934, and in November 1935 they fell to 71.0 per cent
of prices in November 1934.113

(v) Finance and credit

In the last quarter of 1935, the problem of inflation continued to

trouble and vex the authorities. On September 23, the Politburo and
Sovnarkom approved a credit plan for the quarter which showed a
deficit, compensated by a net currency issue of 200 million rubles
during the quarter.114 This meant that net currency issue during
1935, planned at the beginning of 1935 not to take place at all,
would amount to 1,496 million rubles.
But even this quarterly plan proved hopelessly inadequate. As
early as October 23, the Politburo authorised the issue of 450 million
rubles in addition to the approved 200 million. Of this, 150 million
was to cover the cost of the increased delivery to the state of cotton,
sugar beet, flax and potatoes, and 300 million was for wage advances
before the November holidays. These were supposed to be tempo-
rary issues, to be returned before the end of the quarter.115 But
Gosbank had evidently assumed from the beginning of the quarter
that the Politburo decision to issue only 200 million rubles should not
be taken seriously. In a memorandum to Stalin and Molotov dated
December 2, Mar’yasin announced that the total net issue expected
in 1935 was 1,700–1,800 million rubles (implying an issue of 400–
500 million in the fourth quarter). He explained that the growth of
credit issues by the state was due partly to the increase in prices
owing to the abolition of rationing and partly to the growth of pro-
duction, of state collections of agricultural products, and of trade,

113
Osnovnye pokazateli, 1935, 240–1. The decline occurred in all the major groups:
vegetables, meat and dairy products, eggs, livestock and fodder (the sale of grain
products in this period was illegal and therefore not included in the index).
114
RGASPI, 17/162/18, 152; the decree (art. 2150/360ss) appears in GARF,
5446/57/38, 75 and (for currency issue) in 5446/57/39, 37.
115
RGASPI, 17/162/18, 181; this decision was embodied in a decree of
Sovnarkom dated October 25 (GARF, 5446/57/38, 181 – art. 2389/394ss).
 The October–December Plan 189
which had led to an increase in stocks of agricultural raw materials
and food. He made it abundantly clear that he thought that this
increase in currency circulation was legitimate:

Currency issue in 1935 ... has increased the average annual amount
of currency in circulation by 19%, while trade turnover has increased
by 34%.
Currency issue has grown more slowly than trade turnover because, as in the
previous year, the rate of circulation of money has increased. Every ruble
issued by the bank circulated 6.63 times during 1933, 8.05 times in
1934, and 9.29 times in 1935 – i.e. the increase in 1935 as against
1934 is 15%.
The amount of currency issued during the year must be consid-
ered entirely legitimate, justified by the growth of agricultural collec-
tions and trade turnover. The reduction of market prices is one of
the best indicators of the further strengthening of the ruble.

Mar’yasin also advocated a net increase in currency in 1936

amounting to a further 1,000–1,300 million rubles.116
This was a most unusual and striking criticism of the currency and
credit policies of the Politburo. Throughout 1934 and 1935 Mar’yasin
had displayed objectivity and independence in his secret reports to
the Politburo, and as head of Gosbank had taken important financial
decisions firmly into his own hands. This assertion of the authority
of Gosbank had not endeared him to Grin’ko, another independent
spirit, and head of Narkomfin to which Gosbank was administra-
tively subordinate. On October 25, 1935, Grin’ko sent a memoran-
dum to Molotov, with a copy to Mezhlauk, ‘on the question of the
mutual relations between Narkomfin and Gosbank’. He declared
that these relations

are now completely intolerable in character – every kind of joint

work between Narkomfin and Gosbank has ceased, and, contrary to
the existing statute of Gosbank, all possibility of the carrying out of
any supervisory functions by Narkomfin is excluded.

116
GARF, 5446/17/341, 108–15.
190 ‘Advancing to Abundance’, September–December 1935
He complained that ‘until the beginning of 1935 we always prepared
and discussed all major financial questions jointly with Gosbank’, but
that now

cde. Mar’yasin not merely bases himself on the viewpoint that the
State Bank is completely independent, and defends this viewpoint to
the government; in fact on his own authority he puts this viewpoint
into practice.

Thus Gosbank did not discuss its quarterly credit plans with
Narkomfin, and Narkomfin was not sent documents about them;
they were sent to Sovnarkom and Gosplan before they were received
by Narkomfin. Grin’ko submitted a draft decree which restored the
old practices. Its most important point was that

the question of the issue of currency in excess of the plan or the

withdrawal of money from circulation in excess of the plan shall be
raised by Gosbank with the central committee and Sovnarkom, by
agreement with Narkomfin, only after a joint discussion of the ques-
tion of the amount, period and purpose of the issue or withdrawal
of currency.

Evidently the immediate inspiration for this sharp memorandum

was the Politburo decision to issue additional currency, which was
made four days later.117
The urgency of the currency problem was such that, two months
later, following Mar’yasin’s memorandum of December 2, a recon-
ciliation was effected between Grin’ko and Mar’yasin, and they
jointly signed a further memorandum to Stalin and Molotov, the first
sentence of which read ‘The course of the fulfilment of the eco-
nomic plan of the 4th quarter has created additional demands for
currency issue.’ The memorandum explained:

Gosbank was permitted to issue 600 million rubles in the 4th quarter
of 1935, providing, however, that 400 million rubles of this was
returned in December and the 4th quarter should end with a net
issue of 200 million.

117
GARF, 5446/29/11, 81–5; the document was marked ‘secret’ and (in Grin’ko’s
handwriting) ‘urgent’.
 The October–December Plan 191
However, by December 15 the bank was compelled not only to leave
the 600 million rubles in circulation but also to use fully its 3 per cent
right, so by December 15 the issue in the 4th quarter amounted to
781 million rubles ...

... We ask you to sanction a total issue of 750 million rubles in the 4th
quarter.
Even this level of currency issue would require urgent measures to
increase the sale of sugar, soap, confectionery, herrings, meat,
sausages, butter and vegetable oil in the remaining ten days of
December.

The ‘3 per cent right’ of Gosbank, previously mentioned by

Mar’yasin in a memorandum of February 23, is a reference to a
decree of the Council of Labour and Defence, adopted on October
28, 1927, which entitled Gosbank to issue without permission cur-
rency amounting to 3 per cent of the total circulation in any month.
We return to this matter below. Grin’ko and Mar’yasin attributed the
need for extra currency to two main factors: the need to pay for state
collections of cotton, sugar beet and other industrial crops in excess
of the plan; and the successful development of heavy industry, which
had resulted in an unusual increase in the wage bill (see p. 181
above). 118
Three days after the despatch of this memorandum, on December
22, the Politburo agreed that the net currency issue in the 4th quarter
could amount to 700 million rubles, stipulating that this amount
must not be exceeded. It also resolved ‘to reprove (ukazat’ ) Grin’ko
and Mar’yasin for insufficient and belated measures on the cash def-
icit in Gosbank and the over-issue of currency’.119 This revised plan
proved realistic: currency issue in the fourth quarter amounted to
680 million rubles (see Table 21).
The scandal of the unauthorised currency issue in October–
December 1935 continued to reverberate after the end of the year.
It was investigated by the party central control commission, and on
March 31, 1936, its chair, Antipov, submitted a report which found
that Mar’yasin had drawn up the credit plan of the fourth quarter
without any intention of keeping to the 200 million ruble currency
limit. He had planned on the assumption that the issue would amount
118
GARF, 5446/17/341, 20–22.
119
RGASPI, 17/162/19, 19.
192 ‘Advancing to Abundance’, September–December 1935
to 600 million rubles; this was ‘a most crude violation of state disci-
pline by the leadership of the bank, which disorganised the work on
controlling currency circulation’. Antipov rejected Mar’yasin’s refer-
ence to the ‘3 per cent right’ of the bank; Antipov correctly explained
that the 1927 decree required that all currency issued on this ground
must be withdrawn again before the end of the month in which it
was issued.120

120
GARF, 5446/26/73, 6–4; for the STO decree, see GARF, 5674/4/10, 71
(point 8). This incident is discussed further below.
 CHAPTER EIGHT

1935 IN RETROSPECT

The second of the three years of rapid economic development,

1935, was the most successful of all the pre-war years. Industry and
agriculture both expanded more rapidly than in 1934. The compli-
cated abolition of food rationing was successfully negotiated, the
living conditions of a substantial minority of the urban population
noticeably improved and many peasants were also living better. In
consequence, an accelerating euphoria about the future of the econ-
omy sounded forth with a loud voice; and in the last four months of
the year the campaigns for economic efficiency gave way to
Stakhanovism with its emphasis on heroic feats of labour productiv-
ity. Over-optimism about economic prospects, encouraged by Stalin
and enthusiastically supported by Ordzhonikidze, led to the deci-
sions in the second half of 1935 (discussed in Chapter 9) to increase
investment in the single year 1936 by over 50 per cent. The smoother
development characteristic of 1934 and most of 1935 began to be
undermined.

(A) CAPITAL INVESTMENT

The initial modest investment plan for 1935 would have resulted in a
decline in investment as compared with 1934, but it was augmented
by many ad hoc decisions (see ch. 5). The enlarged plan was not com-
pletely fulfilled. According to the preliminary monthly reports, 92.1
per cent of the annual investment plan for the economy as a whole
was fulfilled by the end of the year, and 94.3 per cent of the
Narkomtyazhprom plan.1 Investment measured in current prices
increased by 15.3 per cent – and this figure underestimates the real
increase, as costs probably declined during the year (see Tables 12(a)
and 12(b) below). The material inputs into investment increased even
more rapidly than investment measured in value terms. According to
Western estimates, the production of building materials increased by
1
Osnovnye pokazateli, January 1936, 112–15. The final results for 1935 state that
Narkomtyazhprom had completed 95.2 per cent of the plan (Tyazhelaya promyshlen-
nost’ 1935 (1936), 295).

193
194 1935 in Retrospect
24.8 per cent and of capital equipment by 28.8 per cent.2 The num-
ber of building workers declined by 15.6 per cent, from 2,250,000 to
1,900,000.3 According to Soviet estimates, this drastic decline was
compensated by a dramatic increase of labour productivity in the
industry by as much as 22 per cent, which began in the spring of
1935, preceding Stakhanovism by half a year.4
During the first five-year plan investment had been overwhelm-
ingly concentrated on heavy industry. It was strictly limited in other
sectors of the economy, including the consumer industries, the rail-
ways, housing and agriculture.5 Stalin had optimistically asserted in
1930 that the time had come to switch resources to light industry, but
it was not until 1934 that priorities began to change. The authorities
now set themselves five competing aims: to increase consumption; to
expand social and cultural services; to overcome the transport bottle-
neck; to cope with the insistent claims of Soviet defence – and at the
same time to support heavy industry.
This proved a very difficult task. As often happens when priorities
change, the shift largely took place not by drastically reducing invest-
ment in the sectors previously afforded priority, but by directing the
increase in investment to the newly-favoured activities. In 1935 this
change in direction was particularly pronounced. Four sectors,
responsible for less than half of total investment, absorbed 86.5 per
cent of the net increase in investment as compared with the previous
year. (See Tables 14 and 8)
Investment in the consumer industries expanded less rapidly than in
the other three sectors. At the builders’ conference in December 1935,
Lyubimov, People’s Commissar of Light Industry, explained that its
investment was mainly concerned with the reconstruction of existing
enterprises, except in Central Asia; and with enlarging housing and
canteens in the many factories transferred from local industry. Modern
machinery for light industry was not yet being made by the Soviet
machine-building industry – for many items of equipment not even
designs had yet been produced. The building technology available was

2
See Table 18; Moorsteen and Powell (1966), 878–9; and Moorsteen (1962), 454.
3
RGAE, 1562/10/468, 12.
4
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1936 (1936), 285.
5
The earlier disasters of agriculture made it necessary to direct a substantial part
of investment in machine building to the production of tractors and combine
harvesters – but this modernisation was insufficient to compensate for the reduction
in the number of horses.
 Capital Investment 195
very backward. Light industry possessed ‘only one excavator, and that
an old one’. The industry lacked quarries of its own, and the new fac-
tories under construction, such as the Tashkent cotton textile combine,
depended on the supply of bricks from quarries attached to the rail-
ways.6 A long time would elapse before the Tashkent combine would
be completed: announced with great ceremony in 1932, the work was
not started until two years later. Thus light industry still mainly used the
factories and the machinery established before the revolution and in the
1920s. The shortage of cotton, and of raw materials from animals,
meant that there had been little incentive to carry out the far-reaching
modernisation programme which had been fiercely debated during the
preparation of the first five-year plan and was optimistically included
in the second plan.7 In contrast, in the food industry some large mod-
ern factories had already been established (see vol. 4, p. 491). Market
supplies from individual peasants had given way to compulsory deliver-
ies from state farms, collective farms and collective farmers, and the
authorities believed that large modern bakeries, meat processing com-
bines and canning factories were essential if these centralised supplies
were to be directed to the favoured sections of the urban consumers.
In the second sector, social and cultural services, investment
expanded much more rapidly. Within this sector, investment in educa-
tion increased most rapidly. In real terms it had substantially declined
between 1930 and 1933 (see vol. 4, p. 506). It increased in 1934, but
in real terms was probably not much higher than in 1930, in spite of
the huge increase in the number of children attending school. In
1935, following the announcement of the school building programme
(see p. 19 above), investment in education more than doubled.
Investment in housing also increased rapidly, though as in previous
years much of the increase was absorbed by the rapid increase in the
cost of house building. The total stock of urban housing increased by
only 2 per cent in 1935.8 Investment in the health services increased
least rapidly, following an increase of 87 per cent in 1934.
In absolute terms the third sector, transport, particularly the rail-
ways, received the largest increase in investment. Investment in this
sector had been relatively neglected for many years. It increased sub-
stantially in 1934 and by a further 36 per cent in 1935. The increase

6
Soveshchanie (1936), 255–9. ‘My brick,’ interjected Kaganovich.
7
For these debates, see Carr and Davies (1969), 417–18.
8
It rose from 196.6 million m2 at the end of 1934 to 200.4 million m2 at the end
of 1935 (Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1936 (1936), 467).
196 1935 in Retrospect
in investment in the railways alone amounted to over one-third of
the total increase in investment. In most sectors of the economy
investment lagged behind the annual figure for 1935 set out in the
second five-year plan, but investment in the railways exceeded the
five-year plan figure by over 20 per cent.9
The most rapid increase took place in the fourth sector, defence.
Investment in Narkomoborony increased by as much as 65 per cent. At
the TsIK session in January 1936, Tukhachevsky explained in public
that the expansion of the army had required ‘the construction of addi-
tional barracks, the extension of training grounds and testing sites, and
the allocation of additional resources to the maintenance of personnel’.10
Investment in the NKVD increased by 44.2 per cent, from 1,284 to
1,852 million rubles.11 Defence thus already accounted for a larger
share of investment than the food and light industries combined.
The expansion of these four sectors meant that investment else-
where was greatly restricted. Investment in heavy industry increased
by only 10 per cent, and in important branches of heavy industry the
increase was even less. These included iron and steel and many
branches of engineering, which had received ample investments in
earlier years. Investment in the chemical industries was reduced. The
increases in heavy industry were concentrated in non-ferrous metals,
where large new facilities were still being established, and in the lag-
ging oil industry. Investment in the electricity industry also increased,
though it lagged behind the figure stipulated in the five-year plan.

(B) INDUSTRIAL PRODUCTION

On December 20, 1935, the usually undemonstrative Mezhlauk sent

a memorandum as head of Gosplan to Stalin and Molotov pointing
out that as a result of the ‘stormily developing Stakhanov movement’
heavy industry would exceed its plan for the year by 5.3 per cent. He
therefore proposed that the increase in the 1936 plan should not be
based on the previous estimate of production by Union and local

9
This figure is in terms of current prices; in terms of ‘1933 planning prices’
railway investment also lagged behind the five-year plan.
10
EZh, January 14, 1936.
11
RGAE, 1562/10/582a, 6. For investment in the armaments industries, see p. 203
below.
 Industrial Production 197
industry in 1935 as a whole (45,170 million rubles) but on the new
estimate (49,490 million rubles).12
In the event Mezhlauk proved to have been slightly too optimistic:
production in 1935 was reported to have been 49,235 million
rubles.13 But industrial growth in 1935 was more rapid than in 1934
and exceeded the expectations of the authorities. According to offi-
cial figures, it increased by 28.6 per cent as compared with the
planned 19.4 per cent. The overfulfilment of the plan of each of the
four main industrial commissariats, as well as of the commissariats
of local industry, was unprecedented.14 The émigré research group
in Prague, previously very sceptical about/ Soviet progress, con-
cluded that the plan was fulfilled ‘more calmly and more evenly, both
over time and between industries’.15
Most of the capital goods industries subordinate to Narkomtya
zhprom achieved major advances.
The outstanding achievement was the rapid progress of the metals
industries. Iron and steel production increased by 29.4 per cent,
exceeding the annual plan for the first time since the 1920s. Rolled
metal output increased by 33 per cent, more rapidly than pig iron
(27 per cent), thus closing the gap which Stalin had singled out the
previous December (see p. 75 above). The more complex products
– electrosteel, steel pipes and high-quality steels generally – increased
particularly rapidly. Some new plant was brought into operation in
1935 (see n. 16 below), but Gosplan correctly emphasised that, as in
1934, the production increases were achieved ‘not so much by the
growth of production capacity as by the further improvement of all
technical and production indicators’.16 The production of iron ore,
a bottleneck in previous years, increased by 25 per cent, and both ore

12
RGAE, 4372/92/39, 20–21.
13
Osnovnye pokazateli, 1935, 4; the report was completed on January 20, 1936.
14
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1936 (1936),Osnovnye pokazateli, 1935.
15
BP, cxxvi (January–February 1936), 2–4.
16
This is shown by the following data for 1935 (million tons):

Capacity increase1 Production increase2

Pig iron 0.8 2.1
Crude steel 2.0 2.9
Rolled steel 1.0 2.2
Sources: 1 Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1936 (1936), 112.
2
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1936 (1936), 39.
198 1935 in Retrospect
and coke were used more economically.17 Gosplan even-handedly
attributed the success of the iron and steel industry both to ‘the
achievements of the Stakhanov movement’ and to the profitability
campaign. According to Gosplan, this campaign had introduced
‘genuine khozraschet’, establishing a new payment system both for
engineering personnel and for workers, and had led to both techno-
logical and economic improvement – ‘economics began to push
technology forward’.18
The non-ferrous metals industries also increased rapidly. The
smelting of copper increased from 53,310 tons in 1934 to 75,423
tons in 1935, mainly at the three Urals factories. But demand
expanded more rapidly than production (see p. 234 below),
Production of aluminium at the new Dnepr works, the heart of the
Dnepr combine, increased from 14,400 tons in 1934, its first year of
operation, to 25,000 tons in 1935. Aluminium production now
exceeded total consumption in the previous peak year 1931, when it
amounted to 20,000 tons, entirely imported. Gosplan described
1935 as a ‘breakthrough year’ in the case of nickel and tin. Nickel,
like aluminium, was produced for the first time in 1934, and in 1935
production increased by 22 per cent. The USSR also embarked on
the production of the rare metals wolfram and molybdenum.
Gosplan acknowledged, however, ‘serious faults’ in the production of
nickel, tin and rare metals. Insufficient ore had been mined, so the
refining plant could not work at full capacity, and production failed
to meet the requirements of industry. The completion of the second
stage of the nickel plant at Ufalei was behind schedule.19 The grow-
ing demand for these metals, which were particularly needed for
armaments, led the authorities to accelerate their development (see
p. 212 below for nickel project).
The greater availability of iron and steel provided the basis for the
rapid expansion of the machine-building and metalworking indus-
tries, the production of which was nearly 10 per cent greater than
planned. During the year new capacity was established for manufac-
turing iron-and-steel making equipment in the Kramatorsk plant
and in Uralmashzavod. In the automobile industry, new capacity
was completed to enable an increase in the production of lorries by
50,000 a year. The capacity of the nine main machine-tool factories
17
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1936 (1936), 109–10.
18
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1936 (1936), 111.
19
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1936 (1936), 121–2.
 Industrial Production 199
was increased by one-third during the year, and the Khar’kov factory
for radial drills and polishing machines began operation. In trans-
port engineering, the annual capacity of the Lugansk locomotive
works was increased from 400 to 600, and the factory produced 521
‘FD’ locomotives as compared with only 182 in 1934.20 The total
production of goods locomotives amounted to 1,807 as compared
with the planned 1,707, an increase of 54.8 per cent above 1934
(measured in terms of series ‘E’ locomotives).21 But the production
of excavators for the neglected building industry lagged behind the
plan in the first six months of 1935. In October, the Commission for
Soviet Control reported unfavourably on the industry to Sovnarkom;
and subsequently total production increased from 290 in 1934 to 458
in 1935.
The increase in locomotive production was part of the successful
effort to greatly enlarge the supply of rolling stock to the railways.
The ability of the Soviet planning system to switch resources to a
priority sector was memorably demonstrated by the unprecedented
expansion in the production of goods wagons for Narkomput’ from
19,024 in 1934 to 61,658 in 1935.22 This remarkable increase was
achieved primarily by switching engineering factories which had pre-
viously produced other types of machinery. Over 50 per cent of all
goods wagons produced in 1935, and 71 per cent of the increase
over 1934, were manufactured at 12 factories at which no or few
wagons had previously been produced. These included such famous
works as ‘Serp i Molot’, Rostselmash, Krasnoe Sormovo and the
Kirov works in Leningrad. Most of the new wagons were technically
relatively simple 2-axle flat cars. The production of passenger wagons
was simultaneously reduced from 1,490 to 889.23
The production of lorries, tractors and combine harvesters all
greatly increased. Both ZiS and ZiM increased their production of
lorries by about 40 per cent, but the production of motor cars, pro-
duced solely at ZiM, increased by only 12 per cent.24 The production
of tractors reached its pre-war maximum. The main increase was in

20
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1936 (1936), 66–7, Tyazhelaya promyshlennost’ …
(natural’nye pokazateli), 1935, 50–1.
21
Tyazhelaya promyshlennost’ … (natural’nye pokazateli), 1935, 50–1.
22
Measured in 2-axle units, the increase was from 28,957 to 85,675 (see Rees
(1995), 232).
23
For details see Tyazhelaya promyshlennost’ … (natural’nye pokazateli), 1935, 51–2.
24
Tyazhelaya promyshlennost’ … (natural’nye pokazateli), 1935, 49.
200 1935 in Retrospect
the production of caterpillar tractors – the Chelyabinsk factory
reached almost full capacity. On May 21, Sovnarkom finally decided
that the Khar’kov and Stalingrad factories should go over to the
production of caterpillar tractors.25 During the year the complicated
transfer began, and production of wheeled tractors increased only
slightly. The May 21 decree also ordered an increase in the initial
plan for the production of the Chelyabinsk factory in 1935, and this
was almost achieved.26 The factory was due to replace petrol by die-
sel engines during 1935–37, at an investment cost of 100 million
rubles, three million in foreign currency. The production of intertill-
ing tractors, so far neglected, increased from 2,680 to 12,424; they
were all manufactured at the Kirov works in Leningrad.27 The three
factories responsible for producing combine harvesters more than
doubled their output, though the revised plan was not achieved.28
Two branches of machine building were notably less successful.
Machine-tool production increased by 24 per cent, but failed to
reach the plan. The new Khar’kov factory lagged particularly badly,
and production of the more advanced automatic and semi-automatics
amounted to a mere 258 as compared with the total machine-tool
production of 10,321.29 According to Gosplan, the planned produc-
tion of major items of equipment for the electricity industry was also
underfulfilled ‘on a considerable scale’.30
The fuel and power industries were far less successful than the
metallurgy and engineering industries. The Stakhanovite movement
achieved its greatest success – albeit temporarily – in coal mining.
Coal production rose fairly slowly in the first nine months, but
extremely rapidly in October–December.31 The industry nevertheless
failed to reach its plan.
25
GARF, 5446/1/481, 78–80 (art. 956/149s).
26
The plan for the Chelyabinsk works was increased from 15,000 to 21,000 trac-
tors; 20,450 were produced.
27
For the figures on tractor production in this paragraph, see Tyazhelaya promyshlen-
nost’ … (natural’nye pokazateli), 1935, 49–50. The 1935 report on GUTAP is located
in RGAE, 7622/1/785.
28
Tyazhelaya promyshlennost’ … (natural’nye pokazateli), 1935, 84. The original plan of
20,000 harvesters was increased to 25,000 on May 27; 20,170 were produced.
29
Tyazhelaya promyshlennost’ … (natural’nye pokazateli), 1935, 55; these figures are for
Glavstankoinstrument only, excluding production in the armaments and other
industries.
30
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1936 (1936), 65.
31
Output per month (thousand tons): January: 8,215; September: 8,587; December:
11,175 (Osnovnye pokazateli, 1935, p. xxi).
 Industrial Production 201
The oil industry, neglected in the early 1930s after its great success
during NEP, also failed to reach the plan. In spite of increased invest-
ment in 1935, and the increase in drilling by 18.5 per cent, Gosplan
reported ‘considerable tension’ due to oil shortages:

At the end of 1935 the oil industry was still in a clearly unsatisfactory
state, and it is still one of the backward industries.32

Following a visit to the USA, a Soviet oil specialist, in a memoran-

dum to Molotov, Chubar’ and Ordzhonikidze, concluded that ‘we
are a long way behind the technical development of the US indus-
try’. He listed indicators demonstrating this backwardness,
described processes which were not yet used at all in the Soviet
Union, and proposed that the USSR should seek substantial US
technical assistance.33
The electricity industry was the most successful of the fuel and
power group. Production increased by 23 per cent. As in many other
industries, the increase was achieved primarily by the more efficient
use of capacity – the average annual number of hours for which
power stations operated rose from 3,980 to 4,700. This was achieved
partly by increasing the steam productivity of the boilers and partly
by reducing hold-ups and speeding up repairs. Gosplan commented
that ‘contrary to the assertions of some engineering and technical
staff, whose attitudes are conservative’, the loss of power in the trans-
mission lines and the number of breakdowns also declined substan-
tially. In spite of the increase in production, however, power was still
in short supply in the Donbass, and power shortages led to delays in
industrial production in the Urals. The auguries were not favourable.
New capacity increased by only 967,000 kW as compared with the
planned 1,538,000. Gosplan warned that while some slack still
remained, ‘it will not cover growing needs in full’.34
The expansion of the timber industry was one of the most remark-
able developments in 1935. After increasing rapidly in the late 1920s,
the production of timber stagnated in the early 1930s, primarily

32
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1936 (1936), 101, 103.
33
GARF, 5446/26/58, 141–137 (dated January 19, 1936). In reply Rukhimovich,
in charge of the fuel industry, claimed that the author (Boev) had underestimated the
Soviet indicators, but also proposed the purchase of US equipment (ibid. 144–142ob,
dated January 29).
34
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1936 (1936), 78–81.
202 1935 in Retrospect
owing to the decline in the availability of men and horses. The
amount of commercial timber shipped was less in 1934 than in 1931.
A decree of TsIK and Sovnarkom, dated January 19, 1935, placed
first in its list of the defects of the industry ‘the completely unsatisfac-
tory organisation by Narkomles and its agencies of the recruitment
of the labour force and its consolidation in production, and a formal
attitude to the signing of contracts for timber haulage with kolkhozy
and industry’.35 In 1935 the labour available continued to decline.36
But the mechanised shipment of timber, though remaining a small
part of the total, greatly increased, and increased labour productivity
was encouraged by a substantial rise in wages. The total amount of
commercial timber shipped increased from 99.7 to 117.0 m3, as a
result of an increase in output per worker of 24 per cent.37 This was
hailed as a major breakthrough, and People’s Commissar Lobov was
awarded the Order of Lenin.38
The industrial successes of 1935 were not confined to the capital
goods’ industries. For the first time for many years, the output of the
consumer goods’ industries, 17.4 per cent greater than in 1934,
exceeded the plan.39 This progress was primarily due to the greater
supply of raw materials from agriculture. Food industry production
increased by as much as 22.3 per cent. The reasonable harvest of
1934 and the good harvest of 1935 enabled flour output to rise by
36.9 per cent, and, as a result of the substantial sugar-beet harvest,
sugar production increased at a similar rate. The greater availability
of livestock in the second half of the year provided the basis for a

35
GARF, 5446/1/95, 284–293 (art. 123).
36
According to a Narkomles report, the number of workers engaged in timber
procurement declined from 568,000 in 1934 to 554,000 in 1935. The number of
seasonal workers within this total declined from 469,000 to 449,000, so the number
of permanent workers slightly increased (RGAE, 7637/1/1890, 93–94).
37
RGAE, 7637/1/1889, 94, Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1936 (1936), 150–1.
Mechanised shipment increased from 5 to 11 million m3. Most timber was procured
by Narkomles, the remainder by various commissariats and the rural population.
According to preliminary figures, commerical timber shipped by Narkomles
amounted to 71.9 million m3, as compared with 60.3 million in 1934. The other
organisations involved were Narkomtyazhprom (10.0 million m3), Narkomput’
(10.1), the timber cooperatives (4.2), Narkomzem (4.0) and ‘self-procurement’ by the
rural population (13.7); production by Narkomvnudel was not listed in these
published figures (Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1936 (1936), 424–5).
38
See Rees, ed. (1997), 136 (Rees).
39
The data on these industries, except where otherwise stated, is obtained from
Osnovnye pokazateli, 1934, 14–17, and Osnovnye pokazateli, 1935, 4, 10–11, 24–5.
 Armaments Production 203
significant increase in meat and dairy production. The growth of the
food industry was also due to the development of food processing. In
1935 803 million cans and jars of preserved food were produced, as
compared with 683 million in the previous year. Mikoyan asserted
that canning factories were ‘all or almost all equipped with the last
word in United States’ technology’, and were capable of producing
‘up to 1,200 million cans or more’. The increase in fish production
by 12.1 per cent was relatively disappointing after the rapid expan-
sion in the previous year. Mikoyan pointed out that the fishing indus-
try was equipped with trawlers, ‘floating crab factories’ and whale
boats, and claimed that it was capable of producing much more.
Other branches of the food industry, however, were largely not mod-
ernised: in spite of the construction of a number of modern bakeries,
much bread baking relied on primitive equipment.40
So-called light industry, producing industrial consumer goods,
grew by only 11.4 per cent. This was largely because the output of
cotton textiles, by far the largest component, was inhibited by the
poor cotton harvest in the previous year, and increased by only 1.8
per cent. Leather and woollen goods performed better, as a result of
a moderate increase in raw materials from livestock.

(C) ARMAMENTS PRODUCTION

In contrast to the outstanding successes of civilian industry, the

armaments industries lagged far behind the plan. Investment in
armaments increased much more slowly (by 18.9 per cent) than
investment in the defence facilities controlled by Narkomoborony,
and was probably still somewhat lower in real terms than in the peak
year 1932. While investment costs generally somewhat declined in
1935, they increased in the armaments’ industries.41
In the course of 1935, the military, alarmed by the deteriorating
international situation, pressed for large increases in the plan for
armaments’ orders. Initially the agreed figure was 2,662 million
rubles, which was already 37 per cent higher than in 1934. As a
result of a series of ad hoc decisions, this increased to the enormous

40
P, December 27, 1935.
41
In Glavvoenprom investment costs were planned to decline by 14 per cent, but
in fact increased by over 7 per cent, as a result of the increase in building costs by
10 per cent (GARF, 7297/41/194, 216–215, dated June 1936).
204 1935 in Retrospect
figure of 3,450 million rubles, 77 per cent greater than in 1934.42 In the
upshot, however, the orders fulfilled amounted to only 2,226 million
rubles, less than the original plan. This figure, in current prices, is 14.3
per cent greater than the 1934 figure, but during 1935 prices of mili-
tary goods may have increased owing to the rise in nominal wages and
in the cost of inputs as a result of the abolition of food rationing. As in
the previous year, the increase in the total production of the armaments
industries was mainly due to the expansion of their civilian production.43
The slow development of the armaments industry sharply con-
trasted with the growth of Germany’s aggressive intentions, empha-
sised by Tukhachevsky in his March 31 article (see p. 91 above). As
the failure to fulfil the armaments plan became clear, the military,
and the defence sector of Gosplan, bombarded the senior figures in
the Politburo with anguished complaints. Tukhachevsky, the most
vociferous and persistent, sent a detailed memorandum to Molotov
in August complaining that the armaments plan was not being ful-
filled.44 In October a memorandum from the central administration
of Gosplan to Molotov and Mezhlauk reported that in January–
September only 47 per cent of the armaments plan had been ful-
filled as compared with 61 per cent in the same period of the
previous year; in contrast the industry had achieved 71 per cent of
its annual plan for peaceful production. The report commented that
this was ‘extremely abnormal’.45 On November 15, in a memoran-
dum to Stalin, Tukhachevsky declared that preparations for produc-
tion in the event of war were wholly inadequate: the situation was
‘extremely threatening’; ‘in the event of war the army will undoubtedly
suffer very severe shocks’.46
Public references to the armaments industry were subject to strict
censorship. Virtually nothing about these setbacks appeared in the
press, which presented the progress of defence in a rosy light. But the

42
RGVA, 2/14/1667, 20 (dated January 20, 1936).
43
See Harrison and Davies (1997), Table 8. In Glavvoenprom (excluding the air-
craft and tanks industries) total production measured in 1926/27 prices, increased
by 17.8 per cent. ‘Peaceful production’ rose by 28.4 per cent, but military production
by only 10 per cent (RGAE, 7297/41/194, 296 – n.d. [1936]).
44
RGVA, 33989/2/220, 64–61 (dated August 28).
45
RGVA, 33989/2/220, 290–288 (report dated October 22, signed by Kraval’; a
copy was sent to Tukhachevsky). These figures did not include either the military or
the civilian production of the aircraft industry.
46
RGVA, 33989/3/400, 258–261; for other aspects of this memorandum see
p. 210 below.
 Armaments Production 205
press was also careful to explain to the public that armaments in the
capitalist countries were advancing rapidly, so that great Soviet
efforts must be made if the potential enemies were to be surpassed.
Following his visit to the United States, Tupolev emphasised that in
the United States and Britain monoplanes were replacing biplanes,
and that ‘in America construction in wood is being used less and
less’.47 On the annual Aviation Day, celebrated for the third time on
August 18, the press pointed out that expenditure was rising rapidly
in capitalist countries, particularly in Germany, where (it was alleged)
there were already 10,000 aircraft (including civil aircraft), the num-
ber of which would double by the end of 1936.48 On the same occa-
sion Korolev, head of Glavaviaprom, told the Soviet public that
capitalist aviation was making ‘huge efforts’ to create new designs of
aircraft and engines, and warned that ‘the data we obtain from the
literature about the technical development of capitalist aviation is to
a considerable extent out of date’. To overtake the fascist countries
the aircraft designer must occupy centre stage and the industry must
undergo ‘systematic modernisation’.49
The priority and urgency of expanding and modernising the air-
craft industry were emphasised by the 1935–37 plan for the industry
proposed by a commission headed by Molotov and approved by the
Politburo in April.50 The initial 1935 plan for the aircraft industry
envisaged a fairly modest increase in output from 440 to 531 million
rubles, but during 1935 this figure was increased to 611 million
rubles.51 Major changes in the pattern of production and in technol-
ogy were envisaged for 1935. The total number of military aircraft
produced was planned to decline from 3,962 to 2,891. This was
because the production of reconnaissance planes and trainers was to
be drastically reduced, while the production of the much more expen-
sive bombers and fighters would increase by 57 and 67 per cent
respectively.52 This involved substantial changes in technology.

47
ZI, July 6, 1935; for other aspects of his visit, see p. 234 below.
48
ZI, August 18, 1935.
49
ZI, August 18, 1935.
50
RGASPI, 17/162/18, 7–13 (art. 172, dated April 22). This decree transferred
200 million rubles to capital investment in 1935 from the reserve (see p. 134 above).
51
For sources see previous n.
52
For 1934 output, see Samoletostroenie, i, 432–5; we have omitted ‘passenger and
other aircraft’. 1935 figures are calculated from the figures in GARF, 8418/10/31,
93–94 (this decree was dated November 10, 1935 and therefore included changes
introduced during 1935).
206 1935 in Retrospect
The main bomber would be the high-speed SB2, designed by Tupolev,
the main fighter the T-16, a pioneer monoplane with a retractable
undercarriage, only 50 of which had been produced in 1934. The
bombers were to be produced at f. 22 in Moscow (formerly the Russo-
Baltic factory), the fighters at the new f. 21 in Gor’kii. The 1935 order
for the SB2 was increased from 200 to 400 in April. In the hope of
achieving this very optimistic plan, f. 22, f. 26, which manufactured
its M-100 engine, and f. 95, which produced non-ferrous metals, were
all transferred to ‘mobilisation conditions’.53 A further complication
was that the I-15 needed longer runways, but the decision to enlarge
the runways was not taken until July 1935.54
The aircraft industry was in difficulties throughout the year.
Following a report from Narkomtyazhprom on the results of the first
six months of 1935, a STO decree ordered that ‘in view of the
extremely burdensome programme of output’, production not
related to the industry should gradually be transferred to other
branches of the economy.55 Then in the autumn a subcommission of
the Commission of Party Control reported very unfavourably
on the performance of the industry. The report was prepared by
Khakhan’yan, in charge of military supervision, and Berezin, head
of the naval group, and sent to Stalin and Molotov.56 It concluded
that, except in the case of fighters, ‘the rearmament plan for the cur-
rent year is clearly disrupted’. The production of bombers lagged
badly; contrary to the situation in the previous year, airframes now
lagged behind engines. The report claimed that recent air disasters
were caused by production defects not bad operation. The plan for
the new SB2 for 1935 was reduced to from 400 to75, but in fact none
were produced by the end of the year.
Soon the fighter programme also came in for strong criticism. In
a separate memorandum, Berezin concluded that the I-15 was ‘com-
pletely unsuitable for warfare’ and ‘dangerous to operate’, and even
the new I-16 had serious defects, including an unreliable chassis.
Polikarpov, the veteran designer, had created these planes ‘in an
atmosphere of excessive haste, and tries not to recognise their faults’,

53
GARF, 8418/28/6. 68–69, dated April 5; f. 95, a new factory, had been trans-
ferred to the aircraft industry from Glavtsvetmet in 1934 (Samoletostroenie, i, 427).
54
Samoletostroenie, i, 157–8.
55
GARF, 8418/10/38, 1–3 (decree no. 5-80ss, dated July 4).
56
There are two versions in the archives; the second is dated October 5 (RGVA,
33989/2/220, 241–230; GARF, 8418/10/91, 13–24).
 Armaments Production 207
and Chkalov, who had carried out the factory tests of the planes, had
concealed their defects.57
The Khakhan’yan–Berezin report was followed by a defensive
memorandum from Korolev, the head of the industry, who pointed
out that there had been a lag in fighter design brought about by the
general scepticism in the world aircraft industry about the military
value of the fighter plane. He insisted that the I-15 and I-16 were ‘a
huge step forward’, and had reached world levels. While acknowledg-
ing various faults in the industry, he claimed that in 1934 and 1935 it
had created 13 new types of aircraft in spite of ‘huge technical diffi-
culties and the lack of a firm line from the air force’.58 However, on
behalf of the armed forces, Voroshilov reported to Molotov and Stalin
on November 11 that none of the three new aircraft in the 1935 plan
had been produced at all.59 On the same day the Defence Commission
established a subcommission on ‘improvement of the quality of air-
craft and engines and measures to complete the fulfilment of the 1935
programme’; the subcommission was headed by Ordzhonikidze.60
On December 2, the subcommission recommended to the Defence
Commission, with the support of Stalin, that Korolev should be
replaced by M. M. Kaganovich (Lazar Kaganovich’s brother), that
Tupolev should be appointed chief engineer of the industry, and that
the director of f. 22 should be replaced.61 The subcommission also
secured additional subsidies amounting to 55 million rubles to cover
unforeseen losses.62
Summing up the performance of the aircraft industry in 1935, a
STO decree reported that only 2,448 aircraft had been produced as
compared with the 3,995 scheduled in the final plan. Engine produc-
tion, 7,574 as compared with the planned 9,165, had more nearly
achieved the plan, but only 120 of the more advanced M-100 engines
had been produced as compared with the planned 1,000.63 Figures
issued by Narkomoborony showed that in value terms production was
only 427 million rubles as compared with the planned 611 million;
57
GARF, 8418/10/31, 131 (n.d. [November? 1935]). For Polikarpov, see vol. 3,
p. 252.
58
GARF, 8418/10/31, 39–57, dated October 28 (addressed to Stalin, Kaganovich,
Voroshilov, Ordzhonikidze and Mezhlauk).
59
GARF, 8418/10/31, 59–65.
60
GARF, 8418/10/31, 10.
61
GARF, 8418/10/31, 7–9.
62
RGASPI, 17/162/19, 8, 21, dated December 9 and 28.
63
GARF, 8418/28/8, 12–20 (dated January 8, 1936).
208 1935 in Retrospect
this was even slightly less than in the previous year.64 Nevertheless, the
STO decree claimed that ‘in view of the capacity, technology and
preparedness of the aircraft industry, the USSR is already at the
present time capable of becoming the best in the world’.
In contrast to the aviation industry, the tank industry, producing
the second major twentieth-century weapon, was relatively successful,
as the following table shows:

Number of tanks ordered and actually supplied, 1934–35 (units)

1934 order 1934 supplied 1935 order 1935 supplied

BT 1100 1105 650 500
T-26 1380 1426 1200 1200
T-37 950 851 1100 1104
T-28 50 50 30 32
T-35 - - 10 7
Sources: 1934: RGAE, 4372/91/2110, 11 (dated January 11, 1935).
1935: RGAE, 4372/91/2512, 72 (dated January 10, 1936).
These reports were prepared by the army, and are therefore likely not to
exaggerate the achievement of industry.

Actual orders for tanks in 1935 amounted to 448 million rubles as

compared with the initial plan of 348 million and the revised plan of
475 million rubles.65 The industry mainly continued to produce
existing models.66 The principal lag was in the production of BTs,
due to the struggle, so far unsuccessful, to adapt BT-7 so that it could
be equipped with a more advanced gun.
The more traditional armaments industry, producing small arms,
artillery and ammunition, was supported by a number of large factories,
established before the revolution and during the first world war. But it
was faced with considerable difficulties in 1935 owing to the decision to

64
Harrison and Davies (1997), 387.
65
For the initial plan, see GARF, 8418/28/5, 214–216, dated December 20, 1934
(these figures are in 1934 prices); for the revised plan and the results, see Harrison
and Davies (1997), Table 12.
66
A decree of the Defence Commission stated that 10 experimental models had
been manufactured and a further five were to be produced. To this end it transferred
NATI from GUTAP to be the direct responsibility of Narkomtyazhprom, and
attached the Kirov experimental factory to NATI (GARF, 8418/28/6, 230–232.
dated June 19, 1935).
 Armaments Production 209
combine rapid expansion with a revolutionary modernisation of the
armaments industry. After largely unsuccessful efforts to improve the
production process in the previous two years, at the beginning of 1935
Voroshilov and Ordzhonikidze agreed that in the course of 1935 ‘the
backward, semi-artisan method of work’ would be replaced by ‘the
contemporary method of mass production’. A firm programme was
approved for the transfer of the 67 main armaments factories in the
course of 1935 to new sets of drawings (Type ‘B’ specifications). This
would facilitate the compatibility of parts between different weapons
and factories and the wider use of state standards; and it would reduce
the dependence of the industries on highly skilled and experienced
workers.67 This vast programme soon got into trouble. By September 5
only 29 out of 139 items in the artillery and ammunitions industries had
been transferred to Type ‘B’ specifications, and these not completely.68
The industry urgently demanded that the transfer should be delayed;
otherwise factories would have to temporarily cease production.69 The
military objected. On behalf of Narkomoborony, Gamarnik trium-
phantly sent Molotov a copy of a telegram he had acquired in which
the head of the armaments industry illegitimately instructed a factory
director to violate the planned transfer to Type ‘B’ specifications:

The main programme must be fulfilled... If you don’t prepare Type

‘B’, use drawings of current production.70

Failures in the ammunition industry gave rise to particularly bitter

complaints from the military. Production of the simplest item, rifle
cartridges, more than trebled, and exceeded the plan adopted at the
end of 1934,71 but production of bombs drastically declined and
production of shells increased by only 4.9 per cent. In September, in

67
This programme is discussed in RGVA, 4/14/1298, 140–144 (report from Efimov,
deputy head of armament of the Red Army, to Voroshilov, dated September 9, 1935),
4/14/1315, 198–208 (report from Pavlunovskii to Voroshilov, November 4, 1935).
68
RGVA, 4/14/1298, 142 (memorandum by Efimov to Voroshilov, September 9,
1935).
69
RGVA, 4/14/1298, 147 (M. Kaganovich, deputy people’s commissar for heavy
industry, to Molotov, September 9, 1935).
70
RGVA, 4/14/1298, 149 (Pavlunovskii to Premudrov in Molotovo, August 12–13,
1935); for Gamarnik’s letters of October 1935 see ibid. 148, 150.
71
For the output figures, see Harrison and Davies (1997), Table A2; for the plan,
see GARF, 8418/28/5, 213–215 (dated December 20, 1934). 1934: 191,000; 1935
plan 600,000; 1935 actual 612,000.
210 1935 in Retrospect
a memorandum to Molotov, Tukhachevsky reported that shells were
of poor quality and that a high proportion had to be rejected, and
supported a report from the NKVD which cited informers who
alleged that the factories concerned were engaged in ‘direct
deception’.72 Then in his November 15 memorandum to Stalin he
complained that only one-sixth of the shell programme had been
fulfilled by the end of October, and that the production of explosives
similarly lagged, and criticised the defence commissar for failing to
discuss the problem.73 On the following day he addressed two mem-
oranda to Molotov, complaining that the production of both shells
and rifle bullets was far less than planned, and that the production
of artillery pieces had been concentrated largely on small-calibre
guns, and demanding that the question should be discussed at a
government meeting.74
The shell crisis was partly due to the shortage of explosives, for
which the chemical industry was responsible. On December 3,
Rataichak, head of Glavkhimprom, wrote an apologetic letter to
Stalin and Ordzhonikidze, immediately after Ordzhonikidze had
threatened that he and the other culprits would be expelled from the
party. Rataichak admitted that ‘having fulfilled the programme for
chemistry as a whole this year, we have failed with the programme
of the Military Chemical Trust as far as the provision of explosives
for shells is concerned’. The revised plan for the year was 5,900,000
shells, but by the end of November only 2,100,000 shells had been
completed. The work of Glavkhimprom and the trust had been bad,
but Narkomoborony had imposed tighter specifications for shells,
and this had led to a high percentage of spoiled production; because
‘we were unable to set up the technological process quickly’. He
requested that the imposition of the new technical conditions should
be delayed for two months. According to Rataichak, another prob-
lem had been that the machine-building factories had supplied only
2,250,000 shell cases by November 16, and the stock in hand had
been only 1,100,000 cases at the beginning of the year. Rataichak
admitted that he had wrongly concentrated his attention on nitro-
gen, mineral fertilisers, poisons and factories under construction, and
left the military industry to his deputy Syrtsov. He promised to spend

72
RGVA, 33989/2/220, 122–119 (dated September 2); the NKVD report, written
by deputy commissar Prokof ’ev, was dated August 9.
73
For this memorandum see p. 204 above.
74
RGVA, 33989/2/220, 229–227, 225–222.
 The Role of the Gulag 211
his entire time on the military industry in future, that 3,200,000–
3,300,000 shells would be produced in 1935, and that the programme
for the production of aircraft bombs would be carried out in full.75
This revised programme failed. Only 1,578,000 shells were pro-
duced in 1935, and only 154,000 bombs of all kinds as compared
with the programme of 254,000 for aircraft bombs. While the pro-
duction of small-calibre guns increased, the production of medium
and large-calibre guns declined drastically.
By the end of 1935 the USSR was only a short distance along the
road to the enormous investment and production effort required to
modernise and expand the armaments industry in face of the grow-
ing power of Japan and Germany. At the session of TsIK in January
1936, Tukhachevsky came as close as possible to a public statement
to this effect, asserting that ‘our military expenditure is a considera-
bly smaller proportion of the budget than in most states’, and that
‘from the point of view of the task of the practical organisation of
our defence effort this figure is really – modest and a minimum’.76

( D ) THE ROLE OF THE GULAG

At the beginning of 1935 L. I. Berenson, head of the financial

department of the NKVD, sent a memorandum to Yagoda point-
ing out that surplus labour was available in many Gulag camps, for
example: 10,000 in the Central Asian camp; about 3,000 in the
Karaganda camp; 2,000 in both the Svir’ and the Temnikov
camps.
According to Berenson, the camps had tried to deal with the result-
ing financial difficulties by sending surplus workers to contract work,
but this had not solved the problem. The Central Asian camp had sent
12,000 prisoners to 12 different agencies, including a timber combine
and a sovkhoz, but a considerable number of these agencies were
short of money, their payment for the work was greatly delayed and
in consequence the Gulag remained in a difficult financial position.
Berenson argued that the excessive supply of labour might increase,
and thus worsen the financial situation, and accordingly proposed that
labour should be supplied to agencies only in small units of less

75
RGASPI, new acquisitions.
76
EZh, January 16, 1936.
212 1935 in Retrospect
than 1,000 prisoners and that Narkomput’ or Narkomtyazhprom
should be requested to offer a large project to the NKVD to absorb
excessive labour. Yagoda read Berenson’s memorandum, and
instructed Berman, the head of the Gulag system, to prepare data
on the available amount of labour and labour surpluses.77
In practice, perhaps partly as a result of the availability of labour,
in the course of 1935 the NKVD took over a large number of new
projects:

January: the construction of a 180 km railway from Khabarovsk to

Komsomol’sk.78
June: on June 20, following the deliberations of a commission headed
by Ordzhonikidze, the Politburo ordered the construction of a
10,000-ton nickel plant at Noril’sk as ‘shock project’ to be completed
by a special camp in 1938, and transferred the responsibility for it
from the Northern Sea Route to Gulag.79
July 10: the decree of Sovnarkom and the central committee on the
reconstruction of Moscow (see p. 108 above) included the construc-
tion by the NKVD of a water station to transfer water from the
Volga to Moscow as a result of the completion of the Moscow–Volga
canal in 1937: it should provide 25 million vedra (buckets) (300 mil-
lion litres) in 1937 and 50 million vedra (600 million litres) in 1938.80
July 29: construction by the NKVD of a cellulose factory in the
Segezhsk combine for timber, paper and chemicals.81
September 14: the Politburo approved a decree in the name of
Sovnarkom and the central committee that hydro-units should be
constructed by prisoners near Uglich and Rybinsk. This would ena-
ble the Moscow–Volga canal to be approached by land from the
Volga, and ensure a depth of 2.3 metres in the Volga from Rybinsk
to Astrakhan (the present depth was 1.4–2.35 metres). The facility

77
TsAFSB, 3/2/454, 5–6.
78
GARF, 5446/1b/480, 31 (Sovnarkom decree, dated January 23).
79
RGASPI, 17/162/18, 20 (dated April 20), 17/162/18, 62, 66–67 (dated
June 20); GARF, 5446/1/481 (dated June 23); GARF, 5446/1b/480, 194. The
Ordzhonikidze commission included Yagoda and Berman. This was the first step in
the transfer of authority from the Northern Sea Route to NKVD.
80
RGASPI, 17/3/968, 52.
81
GARF, 5446/1b/482, 87 (Sovnarkom decree).
 The Role of the Gulag 213
was to be completed by 1939 and managed by Ya. D. Rapoport (at
present in charge of the BBK).82
October: Molotov and Kaganovich received a ciphered telegram from
Stalin and Voroshilov on October 22 proposing that the previously
independent Tsudotrans should be transferred to the NKVD. The
Politburo approved this proposal on the following day.83
A month later, on November 25, Yagoda and the new head of
Tsudotrans, in a memorandum to Stalin, strongly argued that the old
organisation had wrongly concentrated on the construction of local
roads rather than the major roads which were needed for defence
and other purposes.84
During the course of 1935 the NKVD also took charge of the
extensive programme for the construction of grain warehouses.

However, the NKVD recognised that it was not capable of man-

aging projects which required a range of technical skills. On October
8, Kosior and the secretary of the Far Eastern region proposed that
it should take over the construction of the iron and steel works in
Komsomol’sk, arguing that it could use the labour which would be
released from other NKVD projects in the region. But on October 9
Yagoda informed Molotov that the NKVD did not have the exper-
tise to prepare the project, which would have to be undertaken by
Narkomtyazhprom; and that the NKVD would need to be provided
with both the necessary experts and the capital equipment to carry
out the construction; Yagoda also claimed that it would need to
remove labour from other important Far-Eastern projects in order to
build the factory. Consequently Sovnarkom accepted a
Narkomtyazhprom proposal that the project should be postponed.85
An important development in 1935 was the adoption by the NKVD
of an elaborate series of orders providing for the remission of sen-
tences in return for good work, and for the introduction of piece work
for technically-qualified prisoners.86 On December 20, in tune with
the times, the NKVD adopted a further order ‘On applying improved
82
RGASPI, 17/3/971, 37, 39.
83
RGASPI, 17/163/1084, 163. For further details see p. 100 above.
84
Istoriya Stalinskogo Gulaga, iii (2004), 136–44.
85
See Istoriya Stalinskogo Gulaga, iii (2004), 135–6, 535.
86
See Istoriya Stalinskogo Gulaga, iii (2004), 126–32 (order of January 31), 132–3
(order of September 8).
214 1935 in Retrospect
norms for the remission of working days for prisoners of corrective
labour camps and colonies who work in a Stakhanovite fashion.’87
During 1935, the manpower at the disposal of the NKVD increased
substantially: the number of prisoners increased by 15.7 per cent in
camps and as much as 90.4 per cent in labour colonies (see Table 24);
the increase in colonies was presumably due to their transfer from the
commissariats of justice (see p. 24 above). Capital investment also
increased substantially, from 749 to 1,359 million rubles – excluding
Tsudotrans. For the time being the manpower of the NKVD was still
concentrated on the Moscow–Volga canal and BAM. Even in Dal’stroi,
although gold production increased, the main achievement in 1935 was
the building of roads which would enable the mining to take place.88

(E) THE TRIUMPH OF THE RAILWAYS89

Ever since the 1920s successive People’s Commissars had complained

bitterly that the railways were being required to work more inten-
sively than before the revolution, but with far less material support.90
In 1934 the anomaly began to be corrected, and investment increased
more rapidly than in industry (see p. 81 above). But at the beginning
of 1935 Narkomput’ still complained, in a trenchant memorandum
to Sovnarkom, that even in 1934 less rails had been supplied than in
1913 although the railways were carrying three times the pre-war
load, were constructing more new lines than in 1913, and were still
suffering from the worn-out track inherited from the first world war
and the civil war. The memorandum accepted the 1935 plan for the
rails to be allocated – 650,000 tons – but urgently demanded that the
allocation should be greatly increased in the following years.91
A further memorandum dated February 28, written after the sub-
stantial increase in railway investment in the January version of the
1935 plan (see p. 131 above), acknowledged that the monetary allo-
cation would be sufficient to cover the planned capital projects, but

87
Istoriya Stalinskogo Gulaga, iii (2004), 133–4.
88
For details see Shirokov (2000), 88–91.
89
These developments are discussed in more detail in Rees (1995), 106–32, and
Rees, ed. (1997), 217–25 (Rees).
90
See Carr and Davies (1969), 272, 819–20.
91
Zheleznodorozhnyi transport (1970), 257–9 (published from the archives, n.d. [early
1935]).
 The Triumph of the Railways 215
insisted that the physical allocation of materials and equipment was
insufficient. At this time of high priority to the railways, a Sovnarkom
decree soon agreed to increase the allocations.92
The importance of the railways was demonstrated to the Soviet
population by the appointment of Kaganovich, Stalin’s deputy in the
party, as People’s Commissar for the railways (see p. 100, n. 54 above).
Later in the year, at a reception for railway personnel on July 30, Stalin,
hailed by Kaganovich as ‘the engine driver of the locomotive of the
revolution’, declared that ‘railway transport is of decisive importance
for the existence and development of such a vast state as the Soviet
state’, and compared the role of the railways in the Soviet Union as a
great land power with the role of maritime transport for Britain as a sea
power. He called for an increase in the daily haul of wagons, which had
already risen from 56,000 to 73,000, to a fairly modest 75,000–80,000.93
The resources supplied to the railways in 1935 surpassed those in
any other inter-war year. More locomotives, freight wagons, rails and
sleepers were supplied than in any previous year since the revolution,
and many major items reached their pre-war peak (see Table 17).
This was also a peak year in the second five-year plan for the con-
struction of new railway lines. Substantial progress was also made in
the transfer from manual to automatic braking of goods wagons,
long a major aim of Narkomput’; the new wagons were all equipped
with automatic brakes.94 This massive expansion required the coop-
eration of many industries subordinate to Narkomtyazhprom, espe-
cially machine building, building materials and coal. It received
Ordzhonikidze’s personal endorsement. He declared at the VII con-
gress of soviets on January 31, 1935, that ‘the fulfilment of the Stalin
order (Stalinskii zakaz) for transport is a matter of honour for the
whole of heavy industry’.95

92
Zheleznodorozhnyi transport (1970), 260–2 (published from the archives).
93
The first version of his speech referred more boldly simply to ‘80,000’. For this
and other changes in the various versions of his speech see Nevezhin (2003), 92–110.
The final version was published in P, August 2, 1935.
94
For a heated discussion of the travails of brake manufacture, see RGAE,
4372/33/378, 181–186 (stenogram of meeting of Gosplan machine-building
department, February 27, 1935, attended by representatives of Gosplan,
Narkomput’, Glavvagonprom and the principal brake factory). So many of the
brakes so far manufactured, and of their connection hoses, were unaccounted for
that the NKVD was called in to investigate.
95
Ordzhonikidze, Izbrannye, ii (1957), 640.
216 1935 in Retrospect
Parallel with these increased resources, Kaganovich headed a very
vigorous campaign to shake up railway organisation and improve
productivity. In April, he strongly condemned the operations research
institute of Narkomput’, which had apparently claimed that a daily
loading of 50,000–60,000 wagons was the upper limit in view of the
state of the track and the availability of rolling stock. The ‘anti-Soviet
bourgeois limit theory’ became a major object of opprobrium in this
and later years, the equivalent of ‘planning on the bottleneck’ in plan-
ning as a whole (which had been subjected to obloquy since 1927).96
Kaganovich was soon able to claim that right was on his side. In
April, daily loading already reached 61,977 wagons, and by November
it had risen to 75,651, exceeding the lower limit of Stalin’s proposal.
Other indicators of railway performance also improved. By June
the average commercial speed of goods trains reached 15.5 km an
hour as compared with 14.9 in June 1934, and the average daily run
of goods wagons rose from 175 to 188 km.97 In July Kaganovich
called for an increase in speed to 19.4 km, and the average daily run
to 253 km, to be achieved by ‘forcing the boilers’.98
To reinforce the drive to increase effort and efficiency, on August 7
an order of Narkomput’ increased the basic pay of locomotive drivers
and their assistants by 10–20 per cent, and increased piece payments,
which were mainly paid on a per-kilometre basis. Similar increases
were provided for other railway workers, and for managers of railway
stations and repair points. Engine drivers who completed the year
without an accident were to be awarded an extra month’s pay; in the
first instance this would be given for completing August–December
1935 without an accident. At the same time overtime in excess of a
standard eight hours (or 192 hours a month) was forbidden.99
In September Kaganovich reported to Stalin, who was on vacation
in Sochi, that ‘the calm marsh has been stirred up’; ‘the managers
are compelled to improve because they are under pressure not only
from above, but from below from the engine driver and guards’.
96
In 1937 the young British research student Jacob Miller, later a founder of the
journal Soviet Studies, was fervently addressed about the triumph achieved in over-
coming the limit, in an interview he secured with a Gosplan official (personal com-
munication). For planning on the bottleneck, see Carr and Davies (1969), 794–9,
and vol. 3 of the present series, pp. 480–1.
97
Osnovnye pokazateli, January 1936, 80.
98
See Rees (1995), 120.
99
Zheleznodorozhnyi transport (1970), 261–8. The seven-hour day (‘which is not in fact
observed’, according to the order) was abolished.
 The Triumph of the Railways 217
Drivers had reported that ‘for the first time I have dinner with my fam-
ily at a definite time’. When one driver returned home the same day
after an eight-hour shift, ‘his wife guessed that the train must have been
cancelled and did not believe he had already been there and back’.100
Stakhanovite-like feats preceded Stakhanov’s own success on the
night of August 31. On July 1, a Donetsk engine driver, P. F. Krivonos,
increased the speed of his train to 31.9 km an hour. By December
the railway equivalent of Stakhanovism claimed 69,000
‘Krivonosites’.101
The speed-ups proposed by Kaganovich in July were not entirely
achieved. By October the average speed reached 18.4 km, and the
daily run 223 km; this was the 1935 peak.102
The greater strain placed on rolling stock and track by the more
intensive operations made it necessary to expand the Narkomput’
network of railway factories and workshops, and repair shops and
repair points. In 1935 as a whole the number of basic railway
employees increased by 11.2 per cent, but the number working in
railway factories and workshops increased by 15.8 per cent. By
December the gap was still wider.103
The Gosplan volume on the 1936 plan reported that, as a result
of all these exceptional efforts, in 1935 ‘railway transport climbed
steeply to the heights’. The freight plan had been exceeded by 6.9
per cent, and delays had been greatly reduced, and industries such
as iron and steel had been able to build up stocks of raw material.104
The freight carried by the railways increased by 25.5 per cent in
1935, from 205,700 to 258,100 million ton-km. By December 1935
the total stock of wagons was 12.2 per cent greater than in December
1934, and they were used more intensively.105
The huge increase in freight was achieved at the price of a decline
in passenger transport. This was deliberate policy. Restrictions oper-
ated from the beginning of the year, and on April 27 they were
strengthened by a secret decree of Sovnarkom and the party central
100
SKP, 554 (letter dated September 5).
101
See Rees (1995), 123, 130.
102
Osnovnye pokazateli, January 1936, 80.
103
Osnovnye pokazateli, January 1936, 162–3. The equivalent figures for December
were 9.7 and 17.6 per cent. These figures exclude local repair shops; if these were
included the gap would no doubt be wider.
104
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1936 (1936), 239, 242–3.
105
Osnovnye pokazateli, January 1936, 84. The average daily haul per wagon was
128.4 km, 9.3 per cent greater than in the previous year.
218 1935 in Retrospect
committee which bluntly stated that too many passengers were being
carried at the expense of freight, and that this was ‘harming the
national-economic interest of the country’. Passenger transport
should be reduced by 15–30 per cent in 1935, especially on the
major lines; official journeys should be cut by 30 per cent, and the
number of excursions by rail should also be reduced. From May 15
trains travelling 600–700 km or less should carry only one sleeping
car. Booking clerks should be inspected to prevent speculation.106
These savage cuts were not achieved. The number of long-distance
passengers was reduced from 37.6 to 36 million, but the average
length of long distance journeys slightly increased, so the number of
passenger-km on these journeys declined by only 2.1 per cent. The
restrictions were slightly more effective on suburban lines. The total
number of passengers on all types of journey declined from 945.2
million in 1934 to 919.1 million in 1935, and the average distance
travelled declined from 76 to 74 km, so in terms of passenger-km the
decline was 2.6 per cent. Trains were even more overcrowded. The
standard measure used, ‘the number of passengers carried per axle’,
increased from 8.1 to 8.4; the increase took place from June onwards,
when the effort to increase freight transport was intensified.107
The expansion of freight transport involved a large increase not only
in investment but also in the number of people working on the railways.
The number of manual and office workers in the basic labour force
increased by 12.8 per cent in 1935, while the number in the economy
as a whole increased by only 4.2 per cent. In consequence, the wage bill
increased by 35.6 per cent as compared with the plan of only 25.7 per
cent and the increase in the national wage bill of 27.7 per cent.108
These developments confronted Narkomput’ and the state budget
with considerable financial difficulties. In 1934, the state budget
already bore most of the burden of financing railway investment, but,
partly compensating for this, in the current operation of the railways
income (5,716 million rubles) exceeded expenditure (4,829 million) by
887 million rubles. The 1935 budget estimated that the net profit on
current operations would be reduced to 693 million rubles (income
6,554 and expenditure 5,861 million).109 In the outcome, income was

106
GARF, 5446/1/481, 17–18 (art. 789).
107
Osnovnye pokazateli, January 1936, 78.
108
For these figures see Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1935 (1935), 642–3, Narodno-
khozyaistvennyi plan 1936 (1936), 456–8 and Osnovnye pokazateli, January 1936, 138–9.
109
Otchet ... 1934 (1935).
 Internal Trade 219
67.3 million rubles less than planned and expenditure was 436.8
million rubles greater than planned, so the surplus on current opera-
tions amounted to only 189 million rubles. The shortfall in income
from passengers was 324 million, while the income from freight was
268 million greater than planned. The substantial increase in expend-
iture above the plan was a result of unplanned increases both in the
wage bill and in the cost of materials.110
The strain on the railways resulted in an increase in accidents.
The total number of ‘important accidents’ (known as Group I acci-
dents) increased from 64,000 in 1934 to 69,614 in 1935.111 Incomplete
monthly data indicate that accidents began to be more frequent than
in 1934 in May, and were double the 1934 level in August, September
and October.112 On January 7, 1936, an order signed by Kaganovich
conveniently changed the definitions of different types of accident,
so that according to TsUNKhU ‘as a result of the changes it has
become difficult to compare the present data with those of previous
years’.113 From April 1936 the confidential monthly bulletin of
TsUNKhU ceased to publish railway accident data altogether.

( F ) INTERNAL TRADE

(i) Retail trade and the rise of the market

The original draft plan for internal trade, drawn up several months
before the decision to abolish rationing, envisaged that retail trade,
including public catering, would amount to 76,200 million rubles in
1935 as compared with about 61,000 million in 1934. If the large
price reduction in commercial and rural trade proposed by Gosplan
were carried out, the 1935 figure would be reduced to 69,200

110
For details see Otchet ... 1935 (1937).
111
For 1934, see ZI, March 20, 1935. The 1935 figures are given in Osnovnye poka-
zateli, 1935, 123. The 1935 figure includes collisions (3,782), derailments (4,910),
disconnections and decouplings (26,657), breaking of axles (without derailment)
(332), breaking of rails when derailment occurred (199), ignoring signals or admitting
trains to sections already occupied by other trains (8,870), other (21,854).
112
Derived from data in Osnovnye pokazateli, March 1935, 98, April 1935, 88, May
1935, 58, July 1935, 60, August 1935, 69, September 1935, 91, October 1935, 92.
113
Osnovnye pokazateli, January 1936, 90.
220 1935 in Retrospect
million.114 The decision to abolish bread rationing authorised bread
prices intermediate between the old rationed price and the old
commercial prices, and involved a sharp increase in the average
price of bread. The 1935 plan was increased to 80,000 million
rubles (see p. 133 above).
In the upshot, total retail trade in 1935 amounted to 82,000
million rubles. The increased sale of grain products, including flour
and bread, was the main component of the increase, amounting to
8,400 out of the total increase of 15,000 million rubles in the sale of
food products.115 This was mainly due to the price increase.
The evidence about the increased consumption of flour, and of
bread made from flour, is contradictory. The annual grain–fodder
balances show a substantial increase. In the agricultural year July
1,1933–June 30, 1934, a period in which most flour and bread was
rationed throughout the year, 7.619 million tons of flour (including
flour used to make bread) were distributed. In 1934/35, which
included the first six months in which all flour and bread was sold
freely off the ration, the equivalent figure was 9.837 million tons, an
increase of 29 per cent. In 1935/36, in which grain was sold freely
off the ration for the whole twelve months, the equivalent figure was
11.83 million tons, a further increase of 20 per cent. So the total
increase between 1933/34 and 1935/36 amounted to as much as
55 per cent.116
However, the Narkomtorg data on flour and bread sales, which
we used in Khlevnyuk and Davies (1999), show a smaller increase.
According to these data, the ‘market fund’ of flour increased by
only 5.3 per cent, from 11.39 to 11.99 million tons. 117 The
increased sale of grain products, mainly in the form of bread,
was, however, according to the Narkomtorg data, particularly
large in the countryside, where bread and flour were previously
available from the state only to a relatively small minority of the
population.118
114
RGAE, 4372/133/122, 135–132 (dated July 18, 1934). The decree of July 29
proposed, however, that retail prices should decline by only 2,000–3,000 million
rubles, so the total planned trade would amount to 73,000–74,000 million (for this
decree see p. 118 above).
115
Sovetskaya torgovlya v 1935 (1936), 66.
116
Derived from data in RGAE, 4372/35/548.
117
Sovetskaya torgovlya v 1935 (1936), 46.
118
The ‘market fund’ of flour supplied to the countryside increased by 19 per
cent, while the urban increase was only 1.5 per cent (Sovetskaya torgovlya v 1935
 Internal Trade 221
This general picture of the situation in the countryside is partly
supported by the evidence from the peasant budgets. These indi-
cate that consumption in the first quarter of 1935 was actually less
than in the equivalent months of 1934, This is not surprising given
the chaos in rural supplies immediately after the abolition of
rationing (see pp. 142–7). But from the second quarter onwards
peasant consumption was consistently substantially higher than in
the previous year, but by a fairly small amount. In 1935 as a whole,
consumption per head was 7.1 per cent greater than in 1934, and
in the nine months after the chaos of January–March 1935, con-
sumption exceeded consumption in April–December 1934 by 10.9
per cent.
Peasant consumption of grain per day per head, 1934–35 (grams)

1934 1935
January–March 678 664
April–June 621 681
July–September 597 673
October–December 570 628
Whole year 617 662
Sources: derived from peasant budget data in RGAE, 1562/77/5a, 1562/80/1.

In general, retail trade as a whole increased more rapidly in the

countryside than in the towns, the main factor being the increase in
the sale of grain products.119

(1936), 53). Of seven other major items of food, supplies to the countryside increased
more rapidly than supplies to the towns in four cases (fats, vegetable oil, sugar and
salt) and less rapidly in three cases (meat, butter and tea).
119
Urban and rural retail state and cooperative trade, 1934–35 (million rubles at
current prices):

1934 1935 Percentage

increase
Urban 45690 58762 28.6
Rural 16125 22609 40.2
Total 61815 81371 31.6
71.2 per cent of the increase in rural trade was accounted for by the increase in the
sale of grain products.
(Sovetskaya torgovlya v 1935 (1936), 60–1).
222 1935 in Retrospect
Retail sales declined only for one major item of food and drink:
vodka. Sales amounted to 7,306 million rubles as against 7,339
million in 1934.120 In August 1935. the head of Glavspirt com-
plained that the retail price, 11 rubles per litre, was too high: it
could not compete with samogon (hooch), which was 60–65o proof
as compared with only 40o for legal vodka, and was available for
only 7 rubles. He therefore proposed to reduce the retail price to
8 rubles. This proposal was firmly rejected by Narkomfin, which
produced figures to show that sales would have to climb to unre-
alistic heights to compensate for the loss in revenue which the
price reduction would entail.121 It is not clear how far the relative
decline was due to lack of demand, and how far to the insufficient
supply.122
The partial collapse of public catering continued throughout the
year. Its turnover increased by a mere 2.3 per cent, measured in current
prices. The average price of a dish was 57 per cent higher than in 1934.
The number of dishes sold declined by as much as 35.7 per cent.123
In 1935 as a whole, retail prices increased substantially.
According to the Russian economist Malafeev, food prices as a
whole increased by 20.1 per cent.124 This is probably an underes-
timate. A comparison of the market fund in fixed prices in 1934
and 1935 with retail trade in current prices in the same years
indicates an increase in food prices by over 30 per cent. But as the
prices of industrial and other ‘non-food’ goods declined slightly,
retail prices as a whole rose by about 16 per cent, as the following
table shows:

120
Sovetskaya torgovlya v 1935 (1936), 66–7.
121
Memoranda of August 20, 1935 (A. Golinskii to Molotov) and September 16
(Narkomfin) (GARF, 5446/16a /120, 1–5).
122
Production amounted to 6,411,000 hectolitres in 1935, 2.5 per cent less than
in 1934 (Osnovnye pokazateli, 1935, 24–5). According to Sovetskaya torgovlya v 1935
(1936), 66–7, stocks of vodka in fact (contrary to the fears of Glavspirt) declined
from 630 to 613 million hectolitres in the course of 1935.
123

1934 1935
Turnover (million rubles) 7042 7206
Number of dishes (million) 10834 6907
Average price per dish (kopeks) 66.5 104.3
(Sovetskaya torgovlya v 1935 (1936), 120, 122. There was some increase in the meat
content of the average dish (ibid. 126).
124
See Malafeev (1964), 204.
 Internal Trade 223
Internal trade in 1934–35
(million rubles)125

1934 1935 % increase

A. Market fund
(1935 transfer prices)
Food products 39161 43026 9.9
Non-food products 14776 18089 20.4
Total 53957 61114 13.3
B. Retail trade Implied price
(current prices) increase
Food products 38495 55616 44.5 31.5
Non-food products 23320 27754 19.0 –1.2
Total 61815 82371 31.6 16.2

The main source of the increase was the rise in the general level
of bread and flour prices in June 1934 and at the beginning of 1935.
According to a Soviet calculation made in the 1930s, retail prices
declined as a result of the price changes in October 1935. Total retail
trade in food products in the year October 1, 1935, to September 30,
1936, amounted to 41,470 million rubles in prices prevailing before
October 1, 1935, but only 36,268 million rubles in the prices prevail-
ing from October 1, 1935. This amounted to a price reduction of
12.5 per cent, 7.2 percentage points of which was due to the reduc-
tion in bread prices. The calculation claimed that there was a net
reduction in the prices of sugar, confectionery and sausages, and a
net increase in the prices of meat, butter, vegetable oil, fish and her-
rings.126 But an estimate for the town of Ivanovo, while also showing
that retail prices declined after October 1, 1935, produced somewhat
different results. This calculated the trade turnover for food products

125
Sovetskaya torgovlya v 1935 godu (1936), 43, 66–7. ‘Retail trade: food products’
includes public catering. The implied price increase was obtained by the present
authors, by dividing the increase measured in current prices by the increase meas-
ured in 1935 transfer prices.
126
RGAE, 1562/151/42, 79–80, cited in Malafeev (1964), 201–2.
224 1935 in Retrospect
in April–June 1935 in both current prices and prices introduced on
October 1, 1935. While there was a net decline in prices of 5.1 per
cent, this was solely due to a fall in the prices of bread products by
12.6 per cent. The net increase in the prices of the commodities
freed from rationing on October 1 was 8.2 per cent; the price of
meat and meat products more than doubled.127
The supply of grain products from the state was supplemented by
sales on the kolkhoz market by collective farmers and by kolkhozy. In
1935 these sales substantially increased: the total in terms of grain
was estimated at 1,002,000 tons as compared with 710,000 in 1934.128
The market prices for grain products fell irregularly but persistently
throughout 1935; on average they were estimated at 57.6 per cent of
the 1934 level.129 As early as June a Narkomfin report noted in the
case of grain and vodka that prices for free sale in the socialised sector
were higher than the prices on the kolkhoz market;130 this was prob-
ably exceptional at this time. A report prepared in Narkomvnutorg
after the new harvest noted that the ‘huge rift’ between market
(bazaar) and state prices was being closed. According to the report,
there was now entirely enough bread in the shops, and, in contrast to
previous years, market prices had continued to fall at the beginning
of the 1935 grain delivery campaign; in a number of districts bazaar
prices were now lower than state prices.131 This report is confirmed
by the data available from different towns about the prices for flour
on the kolkhoz market; on the whole prices continued to fall even
during the period of the grain deliveries, when kolkhoz trade in grain
products was illegal (see Khlevnyuk and Davies (1999), Table 10). All
this is clear evidence that the supply of grain products in state and
cooperative shops had substantially improved.
For food products as a whole, prices on the kolkhoz market
declined by about 25 per cent in 1935.132 The amount of food sold
substantially increased in physical terms; so in terms of current
prices sales increased by 3.6 per cent.133
127
Plan, no. 20, 1935, 38, cited in revised form by Malafeev (1964), 202–3.
128
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan na 1936 godu (1936), 432–3. For much higher figures
for both years see Table 4 (b).
129
Sovetskaya torgovlya v 1935 godu (1936), 157–8.
130
RGAE, 7733/13/184, 28–29 (probably completed on June 7).
131
RGAE, 7971/2/8, 152–56.
132
According to data in Sovetskaya torgovlya v 1935 godu (1936), 157, kolkhoz market
prices for 25 food products in 75 towns declined by 24.7 per cent – vegetable prices
by 35.2, meat and dairy prices by 22.8 per cent. In December 1935 kolkhoz market
prices had fallen by 29.7 per cent as compared with December 1934.
133
For the data in physical terms see Khlevnyuk and Davies (1999), 599.
 Internal Trade 225
Narkomvnutorg embarked on a determined effort to further the
interests of the consumer. Veitser insisted that trade managers must
abandon their ‘dependents’ psychology’, and seek actively to
influence those who supplied them with goods.134 The trading
organisations must influence industrial production, which required
‘the legitimation of the holiness of the contract, which no-one must
violate’. Contracts must be enforced through the courts. At the same
time, independent sources of production must be encouraged: arti-
sans must be supplied with more raw materials, and their production
must be directed towards the market. Planning must be ‘narrowed
still further’ by increasing the role of the market: ‘perhaps we will
buy 50% of confectionery by contract and plan to get 50% on the
market’.135 At the same time the trading organisations must educate
the tastes of the consumer.136
The fundamental changes which would ensue were sketched out
in enthusiastic terms in documents preserved in the Narkomvnutorg
files. According to one report, the unified prices after the abolition
of rationing meant that ‘trade systems … engage in a broad emula-
tion (sorevnovanie) between each other in the struggle for the con-
sumer’, and the kolkhoz market was also ‘a serious competitor for all
state and cooperative trading systems’. Sales agencies and trade cen-
tres must ‘systematically study the demand of the population and the
market conditions (kon”yunktura) of particular districts, the seasonal
fluctuations and the shifts in demand’. The trading system should
‘pay close attention to the availability of central and local supplies
and the level of bazaar prices’.137 Another report optimistically con-
cluded that ‘a number of concepts associated with the rationing
period have been passing into history, including ‘acquire (dostat’ )’,
‘they give us (dayut)’, ‘get (poluchit’ ) and ‘swap (vymenit’ )’. The ruble
was becoming the basic incentive.138
The dual policy pursued by Narkomvnutorg was both contradic-
tory and complementary. It used its powers to impose higher stand-
ards and closer correspondence of supply with consumer demand,
putting pressure on both industry and its own trading organisations.
At the same time it sought to widen the role of the market, which
would increasingly ensure that appropriate goods were available in
the right quantities: this of course required that prices should be at
134
See Hessler (2004), 218.
135
RGAE, 7971/2/236, 190–182 (speech dated August 26, 1935).
136
See Fitzpatrick, ed. (2000), 194 (Hessler).
137
RGAE, 7971/2/8, 165–174 (unsigned, n.d. [summer 1935?]).
138
RGAE, 7971/2/8, 159 (unsigned, n.d. [ June–July 1935]).
226 1935 in Retrospect
a level to balance supply and demand. Prices in socialised trade were
fixed by the state, but Narkomvnutorg sought to make them more
flexible.
In spite of improvements in the availability of most products, the
food market remained imperfect. At the end of 1935, Gosplan com-
plained that ‘choice in the shops is still poor, and does not correspond
to the growing requirements of the Soviet consumer’.139 The situa-
tion was worse in the smaller towns and in the countryside. A corre-
spondent from Belorussia complained that ‘the towns are saturated
with sugar, while in a very high proportion of rural cooperatives sugar
is in short supply or not available at all’.140 On the other hand, exam-
ples were already appearing of consumers no longer simply accepting
what was available: one of Veitser’s deputies complained that huge
quantities of an unwrapped boiled sweet remained unsold.141
The situation was usually far worse with industrial consumer goods;
their retail prices were fixed substantially lower than demand, and
there was no rival legal free market on which they were readily avail-
able. They were still distributed by a largely-informal rationing system.
In spite of these efforts to introduce more flexibility into retail
trade, the sources of the supply to state and cooperative trading
organisations remained largely centralised. Over 90 per cent of the
supplies to state trading organisations and 78 per cent of the supplies
to consumer cooperatives were obtained from state industry, the
remainder from artisan cooperatives and from the trading
organisations’ own farms and allotments.142
An internal memorandum of Narkomvnutorg lambasted continu-
ing corruption:

There is still a large number of violations of Soviet price policy, of

cases of deception of the consumer, embezzlement and theft, espe-
cially in rural cooperation, while the struggle against speculation on
kolkhoz markets is clearly insufficient.143

139
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1936 (1936), 45.
140
EZh, September 4, 1935 (A. Perovskii).
141
See Gromow (2003), 92–3. See also the example of vodka, p. 148, n. 56 above.
142
Of total retail trade in 1935, amounting to 71,244 million rubles (excluding
public catering), 61, 859 were supplied by state industry, 2,045 by artisan and invalid
cooperatives, 3,788 from the trading organisations ‘own economy’, the remainder
(3,552) from other sources (Sovetskaya torgovlya v 1935 godu (1936), 105).
143
RGAE, 7971/2/8, 196 (unsigned, n.d. [second half of 1935].
 Internal Trade 227
The number of cases brought against officials in the main trading
agencies of Narkomvnutorg increased from 40,677 in 1934 to 53,538
in 1935.144

(ii) Reform of the trade network

Following its establishment in 1934, Narkomvnutorg acquired pow-

ers crucial for the transformation of Soviet trade, with Stalin’s
support. In a letter to Zhdanov dated September 6, 1934, he wrote:

First, the canteens must be transferred to Narkomvnutorg (this must be

stated clearly). Secondly, consumer cooperation (which is not a state
organisation) should be subordinated to Narkomvnutorg (which is a
state organisation) over prices and also the rules and norms of trade.145

Three further crucial functions were included in the structure of the

commissariat approved by Sovnarkom on September 11, 1934.146
First, the Committee of Commodity Funds (KTF) (see vol. 4, p. 205)
attached to STO was abolished, and its functions transferred to
Narkomvnutorg, especially to its department of price control. This
department was responsible for retail prices, though its major deci-
sions had to be endorsed by STO or Sovnarkom. Secondly, a depart-
ment of kolkhoz trade and bazaars supervised the kolkhoz market.
Thirdly, a State Trade Inspectorate was established on the basis of
the price inspectorate of Narkomfin, which was transferred to
Narkomvnutorg. A further decree on the Inspectorate stated that its
functions included the supervision of retail prices and of sanitary con-
ditions in trade premises. It included agencies at district level and
above, and had the right, if the law was violated, to impose fines of up
to 250 rubles or initiate prosecutions.147 A clause in the draft decree
giving the Inspectorate the right to verify the weight and dimensions
144
Sovetskaya torgovlya v 1935 godu (1936), 215. The listed offenders included every
type of staff working in the trade network. The most numerous categories were
‘heads of trade enterprises’ and ‘sales persons’. For unexplained reasons, the num-
ber prosecuted in the former category decreased from 22,086 in 1934 to 12,828 in
1935, while the number in the latter group increased from 4,586 to 23,590.
145
RGASPI, 558/11/730, 17, 18–20, published in Bol’shaya tsenzura (2005), 340–1.
146
SZ, 1934, art. 375; for further details see Neiman (1935), 310. Numerous other
departments and administrations formed part of Narkomvnutorg.
147
SZ, 1934, art. 412 (dated October 19).
228 1935 in Retrospect
of goods was resisted by Molotov but reinserted on Veitser’s
insistence.148 The Inspectorate was extremely active throughout 1935.
In November 1934 Veitser made a further attempt, this time unsuc-
cessfully, to widen the functions of Narkomvnutorg. He raised with
the Politburo a proposal that his commissariat should take over the
management of decentralised agricultural collections from Komzag.
The Politburo established a commission on this question, and the
minutes of the preliminary meetings of the commission make it clear
that this was not merely a bureaucratic proposal to augment the pow-
ers of the commissariat. Addressing the meeting, Veitser explained:

Our thinking is that Komzag must concern itself when the collection
of a product has the character of a tax, while what is intended to be
commodity turnover should be our responsibility.

On behalf of Komzag Kleiner strongly objected that this transfer

would greatly harm the centralised collections, because Komzag
would lose its present right to forbid decentralised collections when
centralised collections were going badly. Zhdanov, in the chair, sup-
ported Kleiner. Addressing Veitser directly, he insisted that his
proposal would give too much independence to the kolkhozy:
There is one thing you do not understand. The main problem is that you
will defend the interests of the kolkhozy against the towns, trade will dic-
tate this to you …The main lever to control the price of every commodity
and food product is that these goods are in the hands of the state.149
Veitser was an enterprising and enthusiastic commissar, and in
1935 made large strides towards the modernisation and marketisa-
tion of retail trade. On May 16, 1935, Sovnarkom agreed to trans-
form the wages system in Soviet trade. Henceforth the wage bill was
to be calculated as a definite percentage of trade turnover, and an
increased proportion of the individual wage was to be based on sales
actually achieved. In addition, the role of bonuses was to be

148
See Rees, ed. (1997). 199–200 (Barnett). However, Veitser’s proposal to include
verification of the ‘appropriate quality’ of goods did not appear in the decree.
149
RGASPI, 77/1/418, 1–9 (dated November 21, 1934), published in Stalinskoe
Politburo (1998), 50–5. Zhdanov was the Politburo member responsible for the
department for planning finance and trade of the party central committee (see ibid.
141–142, dated June 4, 1934). Narkomvnutorg was already responsible for all the
state collections of fruit and vegetables.
 Internal Trade 229
enhanced, and the gap between skilled and unskilled in the wage
scale was widened.150
A prominent feature of the activity of Narkomvnutorg in 1935
was its extension of the practice, initiated by Mikoyan in Narkomsnab
in 1933, of establishing large model shops on Western lines, display-
ing a greater range of goods and providing better services. These
were in charge of two special agencies of the commissariat,
Soyuzprodmag and Soyuzunivermag:

Number of specialised shops151

January 1, January 1, January 1,
1934 1935 1936
Soyuzprodmag 63 213 422
Soyuzunivermag 2 8 14

Soyuzprodmag was responsible for the chain of specialised bakeries

(bakaleyi ) and food stores (Gastronoms), and Soyuzunivermag for the
department stores selling consumer goods. Although the number of
these specialised stores doubled in 1935, they still amounted to only
0.2 per cent of the total number of retail trade outlets, and were
responsible for only 4.5 per cent of retail turnover, as compared with
2.5 per cent in 1934.152 In addition, a large number of relatively
well-equipped bread shops were opened when bread rationing was
abolished.153
The new shops were usually located in the large towns, which also
absorbed a disproportionate share of retail trade in general. The ten
towns and one industrial district (the Donbass) classified as ‘most
important’ were supplied, depending on the product, with between
34.5 and 75.7 per cent of the total sales of the key food products.
Moscow and Leningrad were particularly well-favoured, receiving in
most cases well over half of these products. Yet the population of these
eleven ‘most important’ locations amounted to only about 30 per cent

150
See Neiman (1935), 347.
151
Sovetskaya torgovlya v 1935 (1936), 134–5.
152
Sovetskaya torgovlya v 1935 (1936), 62, 134–5.
153
See Fitzpatrick, ed. (2000), 186–7 (Hessler).
230 1935 in Retrospect
of the urban and 7.5 per cent of the total population; the equivalent
figures for Moscow and Leningrad alone were 14.2 and 4.1 per cent.154
Even at the end of 1935 most shops remained old-fashioned, with
old equipment, and were staffed by sales assistants accustomed to hand-
ing out rations and scarce goods from a position of effortless superiority.
According to the major trade census, taken on April 15, 1935, only 4.2
per cent of the 277,800 sales assistants had completed secondary edu-
cation; a further 25.2 per cent had received some kind of ‘special train-
ing’. Even among the 67,000 ‘leading staff ’ working in Soviet internal
trade, only 14.2 per cent had completed secondary education.155
In the countryside, retail trade was conducted in very small units.
There were 135,542 trading enterprises in total. Their staff amounted
to only 219,505, and a mere 149,558 of these worked directly in the
shops, 1.04 per shop. At the heart of rural trade were the 90,798
village cooperatives (sel’po) in the Tsentrosoyuz consumer cooperative
system; their staff amounted to 140,598, of which 94,427 worked
directly in the shops.156 Naturally the turnover of these shops was
154
Sales of main food products in eleven ‘most important’ towns, October–
December 1935 (tons):

Moscow All Total Moscow and All eleven

and eleven retail Leningrad: towns
Leningrad towns sales percentage of percentage
total of total
Butter 7641 11708 19146 39.9 61.2
Vegetable oil 2656 4295 9005 29.5 47.7
Margarine 900 2417 4711 19.1 51.3
Sugar 19629 35859 83176 23.6 43.1
Meat 16677 25751 34005 43.0 75.7
Meat products 14165 19976 33493 42.2 59.6
Fish 12218 21172 60871 20.1 34.5
Herrings 7409 14029 29596 25.0 47.4
Source: calculated from data in Osnovnye pokazateli, 1935, 232–5.
Note: These figures do not include bread or other grain products. The towns were
Moscow, Leningrad, Baku, Kiev, Dnepropetrovsk, Khar’kov, Gor’kii, Ivanovo,
Sverdlovsk, Chelyabinsk and ‘the Donbass’. Their population, except the Donbass, on
January 1, 1935, is given in Trud (1936), 4; we have assumed the urban population of
the Donbass is about 1.8 million. The population of Moscow and Leningrad amounted
to 6,382,000, and of all ten towns plus Donbass to about 12 million. We have assumed
an urban population of about 45 million and a total population of 159 million.
155
Sovetskaya torgovlya v 1935 (1936), 153, reporting the results of the census.
156
Vsesoyuznaya torgovaya perepis’ 1935g, i (1935), 6–9. In addition there were 13,908
stalls and booths (palatki) with a total staff of 14,993.
 Internal Trade 231
also small. Each sel’po had an average turnover of 17,100 rubles in
January–March 1935, and each shop or stall of 15,200 rubles, This
compares with an urban turnover in the same period of 135,900
rubles per shop and 27,300 per stall or booth.157
Before the end of the year a major reform further strengthened
the role of Narkomvnutorg by restricting Tsentrosoyuz and the con-
sumer cooperatives to rural trade. A Sovnarkom decree dated
September 29 instructed Tsentrosoyuz that all its urban shops and
stalls, except those in small towns, were to be transferred to
Narkomvnutorg, and all its public catering establishments were to be
transferred either to Narkomvnutorg or to the factories and other
establishments to which they were attached.158 By the end of the
year, 16,048 shops and 5,024 stalls had been transferred, increasing
the total number of shops and stalls under Narkomvnutorg by 88 per
cent.159 Tsentrosoyuz also relinquished over 10,000 urban canteens,
restaurants and snack bars.160 The transfer was not smooth. Many
former cooperative shops in the towns remained boarded up for
months.161 A further decision, effective from October 1, 1935, trans-
ferred the extensive retail networks of both the military and the
NKVD from Tsentrosoyuz to Narkomvnutorg.162
A further decree on September 29, ‘On the Work of Consumer
Cooperatives in the Countryside’, was promulgated by Sovnarkom
and the party central committee on Stalin’s initiative.163 The decree
sharply criticised the ‘major faults’ of the cooperatives:

The network of rural shops and sel’po is organised into units which
are too small. Industrial consumer goods such as clothing, footwear,
textiles, etc. are divided out among tiny little shops (lavchenki ) and are
157
Vsesoyuznaya torgovaya perepis’ 1935g, i (1935), 6.
158
SZ, 1935, art. 428. The retail trading organisations serving the military and the
Narkomvnudel troops were also to be transferred from the cooperative system to
Narkomvnutorg (SZ, 1935, art. 462, dated October 17, and art. 534, dated
December 9.
159
Estimated from data in Sovetskaya torgovlya v 1935 (1936), 136–7.
160
Sovetskaya torgovlya v 1935 (1936), 148–9. Of these 1,017 were transferred to
Narkomvnutorg, the rest to other organisations.
161
See Hessler (2004), 208.
162
This was a joint decision of Tsentrosoyuz and Narkomvnutorg (see Istoricheskii
arkhiv, 1, 2006, 176).
163
SZ, 1935, art. 427. The decree was approved by the Politburo on September
25 (RGASPI, 17/3/971, 150–154). For Stalin’s intitiative, see the resolution of the
Commission of Soviet Control reported in EZh, May 30, 1936.
232 1935 in Retrospect
unable to provide the product mix needed by the consumer. Moreover,
in many sel’po there is a shortage of salt, soap, sugar, tobacco, and
other daily necessities, many sel’po exist only on paper.

Moreover, bribery and malfeasance were widespread, and many small

stores worked at a loss. The decree ruled that small village stores with
inadequate turnover were to be closed, and in sparsely-populated dis-
tricts a single district cooperative should replace the village stores. At the
same time, 5,000 large rural shops should be opened at a district level in
addition to the 4,000 which already existed. Wages for the heads of vil-
lage stores were to be increased by 25–33 per cent; the heads of village
stores with higher turnovers received the largest percentage increase.
The wage bill for those working in the stores, following the decree of
May 14, should be allocated as a percentage of trade turnover.
As a result of the decree, about 17,000 of the 117,500 rural co-
operative stores and about 600 of the 5,500 stalls were closed by the
end of the year.164 During October–December, 1,410 of the planned
district rural shops were opened, and the number increased to 3,000
in the next few months.165
These reforms exemplified one of the persistent paradoxes confront-
ing the Soviet leadership. Economies of scale were achieved by cen-
tralisation and by reducing the size of the trading unit. But this conflicted
with the efforts to encourage competition within the socialist sector.
Instead of competing state and cooperative shops, all urban retail trade,
with the important exception of kolkhoz trade in basic food, was now
managed by Narkomvnutorg, which had to organise competition
between its own organisations. And the economy drive meant that peas-
ants in remoter rural areas had to travel much further in order to obtain
food and consumer goods from the socialised sector. The total number
of rural trading organisations had declined to 153,533 on January 1,
1936, a smaller number than three years previously.166

(G) FOREIGN TRADE AND THE BALANCE OF PAYMENTS

(i) Foreign trade

The year1935 was the third in which a positive balance of trade was
achieved. But the volume of foreign trade continued to decline: it
164
Sovetskaya torgovlya v 1935 (1936), 138–9.
165
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1936 (1936), EZh, May 3, 1936.
166
Sovetskaya torgovlya v 1935 (1936), 138–9.
 Foreign Trade and the Balance of Payments 233
was well under half that of the late 1920s and early 1930s, and less
than a quarter of the pre-revolutionary level.
In the initial 1935 plan of Narkomvneshtorg approved by the Foreign
Currency Commission (VK – Valyutnaya komissiya), exports amounted to
351 million gold rubles. This level of export was taken for granted in
the discussions which followed, but some major items were challenged.
Gosplan proposed that petrol exports should be cut from 1,085,000 to
900,000 tons, because otherwise the petrol remaining for use by the
greatly increased number of lorries would be insufficient.167
In the outcome, exports were somewhat greater than planned,
amounting to 367 million rubles, largely because prices were higher
than expected.168 But the amount remained 12 per cent lower than in
the previous year. Exports declined for a number of major items. The
export of oil still amounted to 13.8 per cent of production in spite of
the growing demands for this extremely scarce commodity, but this was
22 per cent less than in 1934. On the other hand, following the good
harvest, grain export, drastically reduced in 1934 (see p. 57 above), was
almost restored to the 1933 level.169 But, with the world price of grain
still extremely low, grain and grain products provided only 11 per cent
of all exports by value, while timber and fur continued to be mainstays
of export, accounting for 33.2 per cent of the total.
The situation with imports was more complicated. Planned imports
amounted to only 156 million rubles, a mere 44 per cent of exports;
the surplus on the balance of trade was therefore planned to be
195 million rubles, slightly higher than in 1934.170 Gosplan proposed
that rubber import should be increased from 37,000 to 41,000 tons,
because internal supplies of synthetic rubber would be over 30 per
cent less than the planned increase in tyre production. It also proposed
that additional leather should be imported for the boot and shoe
industry. Gosplan neatly reduced the proposed level of import prices
so that the total value of exports would remain virtually unchanged.171

167
GARF, 5446/27/102, 17–16, dated January 15, 1935 (memorandum from I.
Ginzburg, head of the Gosplan foreign trade sector, to Kuibyshev, Chubar’ and
Mezhlauk). In the event only 658,000 tons were exported.
168
For details see GARF, 5446/26/64, 114–113 (memorandum from Svanidze to
Chubar’, n.d. [1936]).
169
On June 17 the Politburo resolved to export one million tons of grain by the
end of 1935 (RGASPI, 17/162/18, 70), but on September 19 increased this to 1.6
million tons (RGASPI, 17/162/18, 146). Actual export was 1,558,000 tons.
170
See GARF, 8418/3/11, 1 (VK minutes dated January 8).
171
GARF, 5446/27/102, 17–16, dated January 15, 1935. In fact rubber imports
amounted to 38,300 tons.
234 1935 in Retrospect
During the course of 1935 many successful claims were made for
additional imports. These included:

equipment for the ZiS and GAZ automobile works and the
Chelyabinsk tractor factory:172
additional imports of scarce industrial materials, including ball
bearings;173
an American refrigerator for the Lenin mausoleum and substantial
American equipment for the Palace of the Soviets.174

In the new atmosphere it was no longer assumed that consumer goods

should be automatically treated as of low priority; additional imports
included modern printing machines, equipment for the glass industry,
and Charlie Chaplin’s Modern Times, the famous film satirising capitalist
speed-up.175 And in June, in order to balance the state budget, both
additional imports and cuts in exports of consumer goods were author-
ised, amounting in all to 3.4 million gold rubles (see pp. 152–3 above).
Simultaneously, many successful claims were made by both the
military and Narkomtyazhprom for increased imports for the arma-
ments industries. On March 19 STO authorised, on behalf of the
Commission of Defence, the import of six Gnom and Ron aircraft
engines.176 A STO decree of May 22 ordered substantial additional
imports of non-ferrous metals valued at 2.76 million gold rubles.177
Then, following Tupolev’s extensive visit to the USA, orders listed in
a decree of August 26 included a Glenn-Martin hydroplane,
Hispano-Suiza aeroengines and ten aircraft machine guns.178
Some of these additional orders were not completed and paid for
until the following year. But imports amounted to 241 million rubles,
55 per cent larger than the plan. The additional imports were largely
financed by the additional foreign currency available from the credits

172
GARF, 5446/1/480, 145 (art. 404/50ss, dated March 11), 205–206 (art.
597/85ss, dated April 5); GARF, 5446/1/481, 78–80 (art. 956/149s, dated May 21).
173
GARF, 5446/1/482, 156 (art.1762/284s, dated August 10).
174
GARF, 5446/1/481, 81 (art. 962/150ss, dated April 22), 7–14 (art. 780, dated
April 26), GARF, 5446/1/482, 179 (art. 1832/302ss, dated August 19). The last two
references both refer to the Palace of the Soviets.
175
GARF, 5446/1/483 (art. 2201, dated September 29), 121 (art. 2395/395ss,
dated October 26), 101 (art. 2271/376ss, dated October 8).
176
GARF, 8418/28/6, 56–57; the cost was 155,000 gold rubles.
177
GARF, 8418/28/6, 181–191.
178
GARF, 8418/28/7, 85–86. For Tupolev’s visit, see p. 205.
 Foreign Trade and the Balance of Payments 235
of 200 million Marks and 250 million crowns agreed with Germany
and Czecho-Slovakia, which began to be utilised in 1935 (see p. 92
above).179 But the continuous pressure for greater imports naturally
worried the foreign trade officials.

(ii) The balance of payments

As a result of three years of a positive balance of trade, in 1935 the

USSR succeeded in covering its obligations on its foreign debt, and
achieved a positive balance of payments for the first time in the
1930s. On June 3, 1936, Pravda publicly announced in bold type:

The achievement by the USSR of a positive balance of payments is

the culminating point of the development of the foreign trade of the
Soviet Union in recent years.180

In celebration of this achievement, and as part of the tentative Soviet

preparation to restore the ruble as an international currency. Pravda
quite exceptionally published the following table in million rubles,
showing a surplus of 34 million rubles (estimated at $30 million):181

Income Expenditure
1. From sale of exports 404 1. Cash payments for 193
(f.o.b.) imports (c.i.f.)
2. Receipts from 17 2. Budget expenditure in 13
transport and foreign currencyc
insurancea
3. Non-commercial 14 3. Interest on loans and 20
transfersb credits
4. Receipts from tourism 7 4. Technical assistance; 5
and from expenditure erection work
by foreign citizens
(continued on next page)
179
The availability of previously unused credits explains the difference between
the export and import figures in the table below and in Table 20, and apparently
amounted to some 85 million gold rubles (see BP, cxxix (1936), 70–1).
180
The article, ‘The Balance of Payments of the USSR’, is signed by ‘N. Stepanov’.
181
The table is given in the new nominal exchange rate of 3 French francs per
ruble; we have converted it into the exchange rate prevailing in 1935 by dividing the
figures in Pravda by 4.45.
236 1935 in Retrospect

5. Other receipts 37
6. Gold sales 12
Total on current account 491 Total on current 231
account
Surplus on current 260
account
Changes in credit
Repayment of import 156
credits
Repayment of bank 70
credits
Total repayments 226
Net increase in foreign currency reserves of Gosbank of 34
USSR in 1935
Notes [summarised from original article]:
a
Includes payments for maritime transport, servicing of foreign ships in Soviet ports.
b
Presumably includes remittances from abroad.
c
Maintenance of representatives of USSR abroad.

This achievement had required not only a positive balance of

foreign trade but also the imposition of restrictions on the loss of
invisibles. On the expenditure side, the amount of interest and repay-
ments was dictated by the need of the Soviet Union to maintain its
international image as a sound debtor. Expenditure on technical
assistance was kept extremely low, following the decisions not to
renew contracts with foreign engineers and to strictly limit contracts
with foreign firms. In July1935 the Politburo also decided to drasti-
cally limit expenditure on the Soviet foreign trade apparatus abroad.
The overseas staff of Narkomvneshtorg (financed from item 2 on the
expenditure side) was cut from 2,299 to 1,232, and the retail trade
operations in petrol and fur in the United Kingdom were closed
down.182
Foreign currency in addition to export earnings was largely
obtained through Torgsin, responsible for trade in foreign currency
within the USSR (see p. 237 below). By 1935 the authorities had
already decided to cease Torgsin operations at the beginning of
1936, but in 1935 they still amounted to some 10 per cent of all
receipts in foreign exchange.
The other sources of foreign currency were income from trans-
port, mainly maritime, and from gold exports, which were recorded

182
RGASPI, 17/162/18, 83 (dated July 10); these figures exclude trade in the East.
 Labour and Labour Productivity 237
separately from other exports. In earlier years maritime trade mainly
used foreign vessels and was an additional burden on the balance of
payments, but by the end of 1935 the tonnage of the Soviet mer-
chant fleet was 50 per cent greater than in 1913, and it carried all
exports and some 40 per cent of imports.183 Substantial foreign cur-
rency had previously been received from the sale of gold. But in
1935, although gold production increased, sales abroad were very
small. The Pravda report on the balance of payments explained that
this was a deliberate decision. It referred back to Stalin’s statement
at the XVI party congress in 1930 that ‘we need more solid reserves
of all kinds’, including grain, commodities and foreign currency; and
concluded with only a slight exaggeration:

In 1935 foreign trade did not require the export of gold to achieve
its positive balance of payments. Moreover, the whole production
of gold, and the gold collected by Torgsin, remained within the
country.184

(H) LABOUR AND LABOUR PRODUCTIVITY

The much slower growth of the non-agricultural labour force, char-

acteristic of the previous two years, continued in 1935. As in 1934,
it increased by 1.1 million persons, 5.8 per cent. The most rapid
expansion was in trade (12.6 per cent) and on the railways (11.6 per
cent). Employment in large-scale industry increased by 8.2 per cent.
Within industry, the most rapid increases were in food, drink and
tobacco (13.5 per cent) and in the vast machine-building and metal-
working sector (MBMW) (16.1 per cent). These two branches
accounted for two-thirds of the increase in employment in industry.
The increase in trade and in the food industries reflected the greater
attention to the consumer and the improvement in agricultural sup-
plies to the consumer industries. The additional work force in
MBMW manned the new and expanded factories which were
brought rapidly into use at this time. In contrast, employment in the
extractive industries – coal, oil and iron ore – and in the iron and
steel industry remained constant or declined slightly. In these

183
See BP, cxxviii (1935), citing Vneshnyaya torgovlya, 5–6 (1935).
184
P, June 3, 1936.
238 1935 in Retrospect
industries the increase in production was due to the more intensive
use of equipment.185
Employment in the building industry declined substantially. On
October 1, the high point of the building season, 2,377,000 workers
were employed in building, 10.1 per cent less than on the same date
in 1934, and 17.8 per cent less than on the same date in 1932.186 The
number employed in public catering, hard-hit by the abolition of
rationing (see pp. 142–3 above) declined by 13 per cent.
Labour turnover in industry had reached a peak in 1931, when the
number of workers leaving industry amounted to 137 per cent of the
total labour force. Turnover fell slightly in 1932, and much more
rapidly in 1933.and 1934. In 1934 it declined to 95.7 per cent, and in
1935 to 86.1 per cent. This figure, though still high by the standards
of more industrialised countries, was unprecedentedly low for Soviet
times: the lowest previous figure was 89.1 per cent in 1925.187 There
were great differences between industries. Turnover declined particu-
larly rapidly in MBMW, where it had always been relatively low, and
in the food industries, where it had always been relatively high owing
to the high percentage of seasonal labour. It increased slightly in the
coal and iron and steel industries, which were under most pressure to
increase productivity. In building, where employment was largely sea-
sonal, turnover had always been high. In 1931 it reached a peak of
306 per cent (see vol. 4, p. 543). In 1934 it declined sharply to 225.3
per cent, and in 1935 it increased slightly to 235.1 per cent. Departures
in the building industry reached a peak in January of each year (24.5
per cent in January 1935), and were lowest in the summer months,
but even in August 1935 they still amounted to 16.9 per cent.188
On the railways a trained labour force had already been firmly
established before the war, and turnover was relatively low. In 1935
it increased from 45.6 to 48.1 per cent, no doubt as a result of the
extreme pressure on the work force to achieve better performance.189

185
For employment by industry, see Trud (1936), 92. These figures are for
January 1 of each year while those on employment by major sector are for average
annual employment.
186
RGAE, 1562/10/468, 12 (n.d. [1937]).
187
Trud (1936), 95. These figures include all departures, including ‘reduction in the
labour force’, enlistment in the armed forces, quitting for further training, dismissals
for indiscipline (including absenteeism) and (the most substantial item) resigning at
one’s own wish.
188
Trud (1936), 249.
189
Trud (1936), 284.
 Labour and Labour Productivity 239
While the number employed in industry increased by 8.2 per
cent, labour productivity increased by 13 per cent as compared
with 11 per cent in 1934. Thus some two-thirds of the increase in
output can be attributed to the growth in productivity. The most
rapid increase was in Narkomtyazhprom (19.1 per cent). The only
major Narkomtyazhprom industries in which the increase was less
than 15 per cent were oil extraction (0.9 per cent) and oil refining
(1.3 per cent).190 The increase was also small in Narkomlegprom
(2.8 per cent), where the cotton shortage had reduced production
in the first nine months of 1935.
The greater increase in productivity than in 1934 was entirely due
to exceptionally rapid progress in October–December, after the
launching of the Stakhanov movement. In this quarter productivity
normally increased more rapidly than in the previous nine months,
owing to the effort to achieve the annual plan by the end of the year.
But in 1935 the increase was exceptionally high in all the
Narkomtyazhprom industries for which comparable data have been
available. In Narkomtyazhprom as a whole, the increase was 13.4
per cent as compared with July–September 1935, and 9.8 per cent
as compared with October–December 1934. The increase in pro-
ductivity was particularly large in the coal industry, the birthplace of
the Stakhanov movement: in October–December 1934 productivity
in the industry had hardly increased at all.191
Technical improvements played an important part in the increase
in productivity, reflected in the increase in electric power per worker
by 14.6 per cent in 1935.192 The growth in productivity was also
sustained by the relentless propaganda and other pressure in every
industry to produce more per shift, intensified by the Stakhanov
movement. In official reports, great emphasis was also placed on the
results of the reform in the wage system. According to Gosplan, in
the course of 1935 progressive piece rates were widely introduced in
a considerable number of industries, and in agriculture, building and
transport, sharply increasing the personal material interest of
employees in increasing labour productivity.193 In the copper mines
and refining factories of the Urals, progressive piece rates were

190
Tyazhelaya promyshlennost’ (1935), 183–4.
191
Davies and Khlevnyuk (2002), 892–3.
192
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1936 (1936), 283.
193
RGAE, 4372/34/580, 16 (report of the labour department on the results of
1935, n.d. [1936?]).
240 1935 in Retrospect
introduced in the spring of 1934 for workers, and in a modified form
for engineers and technicians, following the report of a central com-
mittee brigade headed by Pyatakov. According to Gosplan, the large
increase in productivity which resulted led to the introduction of the
system in further branches of the non-ferrous metals industry by an
order of June 1, 1935. The payment of engineers and technicians by
results was also introduced, via piece rates, progressive piece rates
and bonuses, following the example of the experiment in the
Makeevka works.194
This is not the whole story. In the coal industry, the percentage of
workers paid by progressive piece rates did not increase in the course
of 1935, but it was only in October–December that the very rapid
growth of labour productivity occurred.195 An important factor
encouraging increased productivity during the first wave of
Stakhanovism was undoubtedly the decision not to increase output
norms (see pp. 180–1 above), which meant that very large sums
could be earned for production in excess of the norm.

( I ) COSTS AND PRICES

The reduction of costs had always formed part of the official eco-
nomic programme. With the continuous increase in investment, cost
reduction was necessary for financial stability. Without cost reduction
either retail prices would have to be increased, or goods would become
more scarce. The drive for financial stability began in 1933, and cost
reduction was taken much more seriously. In 1935 the assessment of
cost reduction in real terms was complicated by the large increase in
the prices of agricultural raw materials, and in wages, consequent
upon the abolition of bread rationing. These changes meant that
costs would inevitably increase substantially, particularly in the food
and light industries. In both the January–March and April–June
quarters of 1935 costs were planned in most cases to increase even
more rapidly than in the year as a whole, but in three of the four

194
RGAE, 4372/34/580, 12–13.
195
The percentage of coal miners paid by progressive piece rates was 32.1 in
March, 32.0 in June, 31.8 in September and 32.7 per cent in December (Tyazhelaya
promyshlennost’ (1935), 234).
 Costs and Prices 241
industrial commissariats they were planned to decline in the second
and third quarters as a result of improvement in comparative costs.196
No systematic data on cost reduction were included in the confi-
dential Gosplan reports for the first months of the year. In view of
the importance now attached to costs, in August Molotov requested
TsUNKhU to report on the situation, and Kraval’, its new director,
replied with an informative 13-page memorandum on the results of
the first six months. The memorandum made a valiant attempt to
sort out what it described as ‘two factors operating in different direc-
tions: on the one hand the substantial increase in output per worker,
on the other hand the very considerable increase in the prices of
some kinds of raw material and fuel, and the increase in wages’.197
Costs in industry as a whole in January–June were 20.9 per cent
higher than the average annual costs in 1934.
Kraval’ did not attempt to estimate a cost figure for industry as a
whole from which price changes had been eliminated. In the rela-
tively simple case of heavy industry, where changes in input prices
played a minor role, costs had increased by 2.4 per cent (this was less
than planned), but if price and wage increases were eliminated, they
had fallen by 4.8 per cent.198 Kraval’ showed that the iron and steel
industry was again the hero of the hour: here costs had declined in
both old and new works, owing both to the more intensive use of
plant and the more efficient use of fuel and ore.199
196
Planned cost increases in 1935 as compared with average annual costs in 1934
(per cent):

Narkomtyazhprom Narkomlegprom Narkompishcheprom Narkomles

Whole yeara 3.0 51.6 53.1 13.0
January–Marcha 5.5 52.3 83.0 10.0
April–Juneb 3.0 53.6 58.5 12.0
c
July–September 2.0 54.0 42.0 9.5
a
GARF, 5446/1/95, 122–134 (art. 64, dated January 11).
b
GARF, 5446/1/99, 342–343 (art. 514, dated March 26).
c
GARF, 5446/1/103 (art. 1267, dated June 22).
197
GARF, 5446/82/39, 168–156, dated September 14. The memorandum was
heavily marked throughout by Molotov.
198
Narkomtyazhprom later reported that in January–March costs had risen by
5.1 per cent and in April–June by 1.2 per cent, in each case an improvement on the plan.
199
Narkomtyazhprom later reported that in January–March costs had risen by
1 per cent and in April–June they had fallen by 1.2 per cent, in each case an improve-
ment on the plan (Tyazhelaya promyshlennost’ 1935 (1936).
242 1935 in Retrospect
As usual, costs were affected unfavourably by unplanned increases
in wages. In 1935 the total wage bill, planned to increase from 44,009
to 49,825 million rubles, in fact reached 56,200 million, 12.8 per
cent greater than planned.200 This was partly due to a small above-
plan increase in the number employed, but mainly a result of the
increase of the average wage from 1,853 rubles in 1934 to 2,272
rubles (+22.6 per cent) instead of the 2,046 rubles planned.201
This unplanned increase in money wages was partly compensated
by the above-plan increase in productivity. Overall, however, the aver-
age industrial wage, including the bread supplement, increased by
26.2 per cent, while productivity increased by only 12–13 per cent.202
In construction the number employed declined much more
than planned (see p. 238 above), but the average wage, instead of
declining by the planned 3.8 per cent, increased by 21.1 per cent.
In consequence the wage bill did not decline as planned, but increased
by 3.5 per cent.203
In spite of the unplanned rise in wages, the costs operation in
industry was quite successful. According to TsUNKhU estimates, cost
increases in industry corresponded quite closely to the plan (per cent):

Planned increase Actual increase

Narkomtyazhprom 3.0 0.0–0.4
Narkomlegprom 51.6 55.0–64.6
Narkompishcheprom 53.1 50
Narkomles 13.0 12.0–14.0
All all-Union industry 21.4 18.0
Sources: For plan, see p. 241, n. 196 above. For actual, see Osnovnye pokazateli, March
1936, 103.
Note: the lower actual figure is commercial cost, the higher factory cost.

The increase in the delivery prices for agricultural raw materials was
more important in increasing costs than the bread supplement, even
200
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1936 (1936), 458–9. These figures refer to the whole
employed labour force, including wage earnings in sovkhozy and other agricultural
occupations, which are excluded from Table 18.
201
For the plan see Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1935 (1935), 641.
202
RGAE, 4372/34/580, 21. If the wage supplement is excluded, the average
wage rose by only 13 per cent, equal to the rise in productivity.
203
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1935 (1935), 642–3 (for the plan); Narodno-
khozyaistvennyi plan 1936 (1936), 458–9. In these calculations, we have compared the
average wage in 1935 with the actual average wage in 1934, not with the signifi-
cantly lower wage anticipated when the 1935 plan was compiled.
 Costs and Prices 243
in Narkomtyazhprom, where the cost of agricultural raw materials
was less significant.
In construction the planned reduction in costs by 15 per cent was
not achieved. In the uncertain world of the measurement of build-
ing costs, estimates varied considerably. At the builders’ conference
in December 1935, Mezhlauk stated that they fell by 1–1.25 per
cent.204 The report on the results of the 1935 budget gave ‘a maxi-
mum of 3 per cent’.205 Later calculations by TsUNKhU even more
optimistically gave the reduction as 4.2 per cent.206 The two main
components of building costs were building materials and labour:
TsUNKhU claimed that the cost of the former had increased by
3 per cent, while the cost of labour had declined by seven per cent,
because productivity had risen by 31.1 per cent while the average
wage increased by only 22.1 per cent. Although these calculations
were very rough, they indicate that the rise in building costs, con-
tinuous since 1930, had for the time being been halted and perhaps
reversed.
During the last quarter of 1935 a small cloud had gathered. To
encourage the Stakhanov movement, norms were not increased (see
pp. 180–1 above), and, with progressive piece rates playing an
increasing role, overfulfilment of the plan led to a disproportionate
increase in wage costs. Gosplan explained the contradictory trends:

Although the rate of increase of the wages of progressivniki [those paid

by progressive piece rates] … exceeds the rate of growth of their
output, nevertheless some savings are achieved in the wages paid to
auxiliary workers, and even more savings in overheads per unit of
production. For the most part the savings exceed the additional
expenditure on the wages of progressivniki.207

The evidence belied this optimism. While the old norms remained
in force, wage costs tended to rise more than productivity. In
Narkomtyazhprom, production costs in general declined in the sec-
ond and third quarters, partly owing to the improved wage–produc-
tivity ratio, partly owing to economies in the use of fuel and
materials, and to the improved use of capital. In the fourth quarter,

204
Soveshchanie (1936), 11.
205
Otchet ... 1935 (1937), 155.
206
RGAE, 1562/10/357, 2–4 (n.d. [1937]).
207
RGAE, 4372/34/580, 22.
 Percentage change in factory cost in main branches of heavy industry, 1935*
244

(1934 average = 100)

January– April– July– October– All 1935

March June September December 1935 excluding price
changes and
bread addition
All Narkomtyazh-prom +5.1 +1.2 –2.2 –1.8 +0.4 –7.4
Power (Glavenergo) –2.2 –1.4 –0.5 –7.3 –3.1 –5.9
Coal +14.5 +9.9 +8.3 +11.4 +11.0 –0.6
Oil extraction +21.1 +19.3 +22.5 +21.1 +21.0 +16.8
Oil processing –0.7 –1.2 +0.4 –0.5 –2.2
Iron and steel +0.6 –0.7 –13.4 –14.0 –8.7 –12.0
Iron ore +12.2 –0.6 –13.4 –14.0 –8.7 –7.3
Coke (including coking chemistry +1.2 –3.6 –7.1 –0.7 –2.5 –4.7
Non-ferrous metal mining (Glavtsvetmet) +3.1 –1.4 –0.9 +1.9 +0.6 –3.1
Non-ferrous metal processing +8.9 +5.9 +4.0 +2.8 +5.1 –3.9
(Glavtsvetmetotrabotka)
Aluminium –3.6 –3.4 –16.1 –16.7 –10.5 –12.8
Machine building and metalworking –2.1 –5.3 –8.3 –10.1 –6.7 –11.3
Chemicals +15.8 +9.8 +6.1 +9.6 +10.2 –6.0
Cement (Soyuztsement) +8.3 –5.2 –8.4 –0.5 –2.6 –6.9
* Source: Tyazhelaya promyshlennost’ 1935 (1936), 270–2. The original table includes data for nine other branches of heavy industry, and for
sub-branches.
 The State Budget 245
costs again increased. The increase was particularly pronounced in
the coal-mining, iron ore, coke, chemical and cement industries. In
coal mining, where the Stakhanov movement was most advanced
and progressive piece rates were more prevalent, costs rose in 10 of
the 11 mining trusts in the Donbass, though they continued to decline
in the Kuzbass. In the iron and steel industry, the rapid fall in costs
which had resulted from the efficiency campaign virtually ceased.
Costs rose in all branches of the industry except that responsible for
special steels. The pattern varied from factory to factory. Costs
increased in 13 of the largest works, and continued to decline in
14.208 The increase in costs in Narkomtyazhprom was, however, less
than that proposed in the quarterly plan.209

( J ) THE STATE BUDGET

The price changes and cost increases profoundly affected the struc-
ture of the state budget. The large increase in the retail price of
bread, with delivery prices paid to agriculture remaining largely
unchanged, had the result that the tax on grain yielded 20,729
million rubles, as compared with 8,129 million in 1934, and
amounted to 39.7 instead of 21.6 per cent of all revenue.210 The
yield of the traditional taxes on alcohol, oil and tobacco, 30.3 per
cent of revenue in 1934, increased slightly in absolute terms, but
their share of the budget declined to 23.3 per cent. The tax on grain,
now the main source of revenue, yielded less than the 24,000 million
rubles planned at the beginning of the year, partly because the price
of bread was reduced on October 1, and partly because the sale of
bread and flour was somewhat less than anticipated. The gap was
covered by the additional tax on other food products as a result of
the abolition of all food rationing on the same date.211
The total increase in budgetary revenue in 1935 amounted to
17,678 million rubles, 35.8 per cent. As much as 71.2 per cent of this
was obtained by the tax on grain, and nearly all the remainder from
208
Tyazhelaya promyshlennost’ 1935 (1936).
209
The quarterly plan stated that costs in Narkomtyazhprom were to be one per
cent less in October–December 1935 than in 1934 (GARF, 5446/1/171, 242, 286
– art. 2170, dated September 26). In fact the reduction was 1.8 per cent.
210
The tax in 1934 consisted of 4,574 million rubles turnover tax and 3,555
million from commercial trade (see Otchet … 1934 (1935), 161).
211
See Khlevnyuk and Davies (1999), 591, 600.
246 1935 in Retrospect
tax increases on other foods, especially sugar, fats and meat, and also
on tobacco.212
While the increase in revenue was fairly straightforward, the equal
increase in budget expenditure was more complicated. It consisted
partly of a nominal increase due to the bread supplement, and the
rise in the delivery prices for agricultural raw materials. But it was
also due to an increase in the wages of additional manual and office
workers employed by budget-financed institutions, and in the other
additional resources allocated to budget institutions. With the data
available, it is impossible to estimate accurately the division between
nominal and real increases in expenditure, but it obviously varied
between different sectors of the economy:

Percentage increase in budget expenditure, 1934–35, by sector of

the economy1
National economy 26.2
of which:
Industry 18.6
Transport and communications 46.9
Social and cultural 53.3
Allocation to local budgets 77.2
Defence 63.1
NKVD 55.2
Total 40.6
1
Otchet … 1935 (1937), 133.
The most important item, expenditure on the national economy,
increased less rapidly than the rest of the budget, primarily because
a larger part of its expenditure was in unchanged prices. Unlike the
retail price of food, the transfer and wholesale prices which industry
received for its production were not changed. Nevertheless, the large
subsidies to coal, iron and steel, and other basic industrial products
increased with the rise in production. Separate figures for subsidies
are not available; they form part of ‘financing of working capital’
and ‘operational expenditures’.213 Allocations to heavy industry for
212
For details, see Otchet … 1935 (1937), 162–3. The tax on vodka and on light
industry declined, but these other increases covered the loss.
213
In June 1935, Gosplan estimated that the total gap between the transfer prices
and cost for the whole economy was ‘about 5,000 million rubles’, 2,000–2,500 of
which it attributed to industry. Subsidies on coal, peat, coke and ore were estimated
 The State Budget 247
these two purposes increased from 4,762 to 6,648 million rubles in
1935. In spite of the efforts of the iron and steel industry to renounce
subsidies, the allocation for working capital to Glavmetall, the largest
single item, amounted to 1,584 million rubles, and the allocation to
coal was 1,136 million.214
Capital investment, the other major sub-item under the heading
‘National economy’ did not increase in 1935. This was partly
because investment in real terms increased much less than planned
(building costs declined far less than planned), and partly because a
higher proportion of investment was financed by non-budgetary
sources.
The increase in expenditure on Narkomoborony, like that on the
national economy, was partly a real increase in expenditure on
armaments, and partly due to the increased pay of servicemen, and
the increased costs of the food and other goods purchased by the
armed forces.215
By far the largest part of the expenditure on education, health
and other social and cultural services, and of the allocation to local
budgets, consisted of wages, and of stipends to students. The
increase was partly due to the bread supplement, but the wages of
medical personnel were also increased by the decree of March 4,
1935, According to the report on the 1935 budget, the allocation to
local budgets, planned at 8,977 million rubles, included 704 million
for the bread supplement and 260 million for the increased wages
of medical staff. But the most important factor in the increased
expenditure was the increase in the number of personnel in social
and cultural services.
Although the state budget was nominally in surplus, as usual the
credits advanced by the banks increased without appearing in the
budget. As a result, the amount of currency in circulation, planned
to remain stable in 1935, rose by 25.5 per cent, from 7,734 to 9,710
million rubles. This was a reflection of increased economic activity
and of the price changes consequent upon the abolition of food

at 1,222 million and subsidies to ferrous and non-ferrous metals at 534 million
(RGAE, 4372/33/548, 2–4, dated June 17, 1935). When the price reform was
undertaken, these proved to be considerable underestimates.
214
Otchet … 1934 (1935), 74, Otchet … 1935 (1937), 58–9. A breakdown by industry
is not available for 1934.
215
In 1935 Narkomoborony was required to pay normal prices rather than
subsidised prices for some of the inputs it purchased, such as oil.
248 1935 in Retrospect
rationing rather than due to the unnecessary surrender by the banks
to the demands of economic organisations (see Mar’yasin’s
memorandum, pp. 131–2 above).
The abolition of rationing was achieved without a general cur-
rency reform, in contrast to the other two occasions when rationing
was abolished: after the civil war (1922–24) and after the second
world war (1946–47). This appears to be due to both objective and
subjective factors. During the first five-year plan the inflation was not
so great as in 1914–22 and 1941–47; and in 1934–35 the economy
was in a much more healthy state. The contrast between these three
occasions deserves further investigation.

(K) THE ATTEMPTS AT FINANCIAL REFORM

At the beginning of 1935 Mar’yasin sent a series of secret memo-

randa on the financial system to Stalin and Molotov, or to Molotov
alone. In view of the failure of past attempts at general economic
reform, by Birbraer and others, he indicated his general view about
the changes needed in the system with caution, and expressed his
proposals in terms of the needs of the financial system rather than a
proposal to reform the economic system as a whole.216
From the 1920s until the collapse of the Soviet system in 1991,
grants classified as part of the budget were fairly firmly under central
control, and short-term credit was the mechanism through which ‘soft
money’ was made available to the economy. The Politburo attempted
to curb short-term credit by imposing strict controls on currency issue.
When successful, these controls limited the issue of credit; but in prac-
tice currency issues almost always exceeded the plan. Outstanding
credit increased rapidly. Gregory and Tikhonov have shown that
‘throughout the 1930s there would be bursts of rapid growth of arrears
[failure of enterprises to pay their debts], followed by clearing opera-
tions to reduce their magnitude’.217 Soon after Mar’yasin took over the
bank, the Soviet control commission, in a memorandum to Stalin and
Molotov, complained that ‘huge debts of economic agencies are wide-
spread in all branches of the economy’. The bank had proved

216
For Birbraer’s reforms, see vol. 4, pp. 225–8, 342–7, and SR, lxii (1984), 201–
23 (Davies).
217
Journal of Economic History, 60 (2000), 1032–3.
 The Attempts at Financial Reform 249
incapable of preventing these debts, and in particular it had failed to
‘effectively use its right to penalise the offenders by selling-off their
goods’.218
Mar’yasin, in the first of his memoranda, dated January 2, 1935,
blamed the existing payments system for the accumulation of bad
debts. The rules were that the branch of the bank concerned provided
credit to the supplying organisation for the goods it had despatched,
but only for a period of 48 hours (plus the time taken for the transfer
of the documents), after which the purchasing agency was required to
accept the goods (or reject them, which rarely happened), and to pay
for them, almost invariably before they had reached the purchaser. To
enable the payment, another branch of the bank, located near the
purchaser, issued credit to the purchaser. Mar’yasin complained:

The supplier may send broken glass, rusty razors, or suits with short
sleeves – the accounts will be paid within 48 hours after the account
is received.

Mar’yasin proposed that instead all credit issues should be handled

by the bank which dealt with the wholesale supplier, and the credits
should be advanced to the supplier, who would recoup them from the
purchaser. Automatic payment after 48 hours would be replaced by
fixing the date on which payment was due according to the type of
good and the location of the supplier and purchaser. If the purchaser
failed to pay on time, the bank would collect the payment compulso-
rily through the courts. The great advantage of this arrangement,
according to Mar’yasin, was that the suppliers would themselves be
materially interested in the ability of the purchaser to pay, and would
therefore seek to supply marketable goods. At the same time the sup-
plier would have ‘some degree of choice between different purchasers’,
and could switch goods to the more prompt payers.219
Three months later, on March 31, in a further memorandum to
Molotov, he frankly described the arrangements he proposed as
‘commercial credit’ from supplier to purchaser, describing the provi-
sion of credit direct from the bank to the purchaser as ‘the reverse
side of the rationing of consumption’. The new system would
encourage ‘local trading initiative and local industry’ as well as
218
GARF, 5446/71/11, 70–67 (dated July 21, 1934, signed by Antipov and
Sulkovskii).
219
GARF, 5446/27/98, 32–21.
250 1935 in Retrospect
compelling suppliers to be concerned that their goods were market-
able. An accompanying draft decree stated that the wholesale suppli-
ers would charge 4 per cent interest on the credit they supplied to the
purchaser, and even described this credit as a veksel’, the traditional
word for ‘promissory note’ or ‘bill of exchange’, used in the 1920s
and in tsarist Russia – but it added that the proposed veksel’ could not
be transferred to a third party. Purchasing organisations which did
not pay on time would be declared ‘insolvent’ (neplatezhesposobnyi ).220
On the basis of these proposals about the credit system, Mar’yasin
also advocated far-reaching changes in the budgetary system. In a
further memorandum he made a general criticism of the turnover tax
(this was really a sales or purchase tax varying by the type of product,
disguised as a tax on turnover). He pointed out that the tax, which in
1935 was planned to amount to as much as 80 per cent of budgetary
revenue, in fact consisted of an amalgam of various types of tax,
including not only a tax on turnover, but also excises and deductions
from profits. The reform establishing the turnover tax in September
1930 had been publicly lauded as the crowning glory of the planned
financial system, but Mar’yasin now castigated it as ‘harmful’. It
deprived enterprises of a profit incentive: some industries paid thou-
sands of millions to the budget and then received tens of millions in
subsidies. The tax made prices less flexible, because of the risk that
price changes (brought about through changes in the rate of turnover
tax) would reduce budgetary revenue. Mar’yasin therefore proposed
that excises should be introduced for tobacco, vodka, kerosene,
matches, sugar, salt, galoshes and bread. Except for bread, this collec-
tion of goods corresponded to those bearing excises before the revolu-
tion and / or in the 1920s (the tax on textiles did not exist before the
war). He proposed that the tax on bread (which now provided far
more revenue than any other good) should be ‘temporary’.221
Mar’yasin’s provocative proposal to revive major features of the tax
system of the 1920s was not taken further. According to the report of
an eye-witness, at a meeting of the Economic Officials’ Club (for-
merly the Red Directors’ Club) Grin’ko, the People’s Commissar for
Finance, acknowledged the political reason for rejecting it:

if turnover tax is imposed at the retail stage, this means all the sales
people and staff in retail trade will know the amount of tax, and will
220
GARF, 5446/71/11, 25–18.
221
GARF, 5446/26/66/ 474–370 (no date [March? 1935]).
 The Attempts at Financial Reform 251
provide enemy social groups (elementy) with a weapon against us.
These enemy groups will begin to say that ‘we are trading in taxes
and not goods’.222
Mar’yasin’s proposals to introduce commercial credit and vekseli
were also dropped. A Soviet handbook on trade, published two years
after Mar’yasin had been dismissed and executed, excoriated the
‘Trotskyite bandits in the leadership of the State Bank who demanded
the restoration of commercial credit’ and stated that ‘the party and
government decisively rebuffed this infamous proposal’.223 But
Mar’yasin’s less radical proposals were embodied in a major
Sovnarkom decree ‘On Changing the System of Crediting Trade
Turnover’, promulgated on June 4, 1936. This decree also strength-
ened the right of the bank to prevent purchasers who defaulted on
payments from selling their goods, and if necessary to remove credit
facilities from them altogether.224
Grin’ko, as befitted his office, took a more conservative approach
to reform than Mar’yasin.225 But the need for additional budgetary
revenue led him to make quite radical proposals. For good or ill, he
222
RGASPI, 56/1/771, 142–147 (report by a financial supervisor from the party
control commission). This remark was followed by ‘unhealthy laughter’. The meet-
ing, held on November 13, 1935, was attended by several hundred managers,
accountants and lawyers, both party members and non-members. The British war-
time purchase tax was similarly included in the price without the retailer stating the
amount. Alexander Baykov claimed that it was modelled on the Soviet turnover tax
(personal communication).
Surprisingly, in spite of this condemnation of commercial credit, the debate
resumed in 1940–41. Zverev, appointed People’s Commissar for Finance from
January 1938, reports in his autobiography that towards the end of 1940 the State
Bank, now headed by Bulganin, proposed to Sovnarkom that the credit system
should be thoroughly revised, and that in particular commercial credit and the veksel’
should be introduced. The reform was strongly opposed by Narkomfin, but the
discussion ‘occupied the leading state agencies for many months’. Eventually, at the
beginning of 1941 the proposals were brought to a sitting of the bureau of
Sovnarkom attended by Stalin. He strongly criticised the proposals: ‘he was particu-
larly surprised by the proposal to introduce credit vekseli … Won’t we soon get to the
point that someone will want to establish a stock exchange?’ The proposal was
forthwith dropped. Zverev (1973), 181–6. A proposal that trade turnover should be
financed by bank credit, though opposed by Zverev, was carried by a majority.
223
Lifits and Rubinshtein, eds (1939), 566 (sent to press December 9, 1939).
224
SZ, 1936, art. 278.
225
In 1935 Narkomfin and the State Bank (which was nominally subordinate to
Narkomfin) engaged in a bitter battle about demarcation rights, and both Grin’ko
and Mar’yasin sought Stalin’s support. At the same time, on a number of occasions
252 1935 in Retrospect
strongly criticised the substantial subsidies received by the industrial
commissariats to keep down the rents of housing under their con-
trol.226 Together with Mar’yasin, he put continuous pressure on
industry to increase the supply of food and industrial consumer
goods, so as to increase tax revenue and reduce consumer demand.227
For the same reason, Grin’ko also called for a substantial increase in
activities classified as ‘non-commodity operations’, specifically listing
taxi services, dry cleaning, laundries, hairdressers, baths and hotels:

All these are in short supply, and by expanding them we could both
satisfy the requirements of the population and receive large additional
revenues.228

(L) THE ADVANCE OF AGRICULTURE

(i) The continued spread of collectivisation

Throughout 1935, as in previous years, the authorities sought to

increase the number of households collectivised by applying pressure
to the remaining individual peasants to join the kolkhozy. Some peas-
ant households, categorised as ‘kulaks and anti-Soviet element’ were
exiled, in January–June 1935 some 13,000 households.229 But the
measures affecting individual peasants as a whole were more impor-
tant. The amount of grain to be delivered by individual peasant
households was increased.230 The annual agricultural tax was imposed
on them with considerable ferocity. As chairman of TsIK, Kalinin
was sent a huge number of complaints about the excessive amounts
of tax, reaching 200–300 complaints a day, far more than previously,
and 20–40 petitioners a day arrived at Kalinin’s office, often carrying
with them 20–30 complaints from other peasants, or complaints from
all the individual peasants of their settlement. The tax imposed in the

they joined together on a number of matters of common interest. Theirs might be

described as a Blair–Brown relationship.
226
RGASPI, 82/2/771, 1–6 (dated July 25, 1934).
227
See, for example, their joint memorandum dated May 29, 1936 (RGASPI,
82/2/772, 21–27).
228
RGASPI, 82/2/772, 46–55 (dated July 17, 1936).
229
TSD, iv (2002), 550–1 (NKVD memorandum dated July 15, 1935).
230
SZ, 1935, art. 91 (March 3, 1935); Tsd, iv (2002), 476–7 (Kleiner to Stalin and
Molotov, dated April 25, 1935).
 The Advance of Agriculture 253
cases cited was so enormous that a peasant household could not pos-
sibly pay it.231 In 1935 as a whole, the percentage of collectivised
households increased from 81.7 to 87.7 per cent (see Table 28).
As in previous years, during this process, some individual peasants
were moving into kolkhozy, and others were taking up urban occupa-
tions, while simultaneously some collective farmers (usually male)
were moving to the towns seasonally or permanently. These move-
ments were of course primarily but not entirely taking place in the
industrial areas, particularly Leningrad and the Central Industrial
regions such as Ivanovo. This resulted in some striking anomalies.
The kolkhozy from which collective farmers moved to the towns
resented the loss of their labour, especially when the peasants moved
spontaneously rather than as part of an agreement between the kolk-
hoz and an urban organisation. Contrary to the legal provisions, the
chair of the kolkhoz often expelled them from the kolkhoz and
refused to let their families remain as members. These decisions were
resisted by the authorities. At the non-Black Earth conference in
December 1935 ( see pp. 257–8 below), Zhdanov insisted:
Expulsion from the kolkhozy involves a considerable number of col-
lective farmers, including those moving as a result of otkhodnichestvo
[seasonal work in the towns]. It is clear from the reports and com-
munications made here that a very large percentage of those leaving
the kolkhozy are moving to the towns and industry. The families of
those going to the towns to work are expelled, and this is absolutely
wrong, because the districts of the non-Black Earth zone are now
and undoubtedly in the future will continue to supply the labour
force for our industry. To close the way out for collective farmers who
want to go to this work, as many of our kolkhoz chairmen and local
officials are doing, is a most reactionary measure. It must not be for-
gotten that our industrial centres and most of our Soviet enterprises
received their labour because it left the countryside.232

(ii) The rapid growth of agriculture

In 1934, as we have seen (see pp. 82–3 above), the harvest was lower
than in 1933. Nevertheless, some 3 million tons more grain were
231
TSD, iv (2002), 560–5 (report dated August 7, 1935, from P. Savel’ev, deputy
head of the secretariat of VTsIK of the RSFSR, to Kalinin).
232
TSD, iv (2002), 660 (dated December 7, 1935).
254 1935 in Retrospect
collected in grain deliveries and zakupki than in the previous year.
This placed a further considerable strain on the state’s relation with
the peasants. But, coupled with the substantial reduction in grain
exports by about 1.5 million tons, the increased grain provided the
state with the cushion it needed to safely handle the abolition of
bread rationing, and it also enabled an additional 3.4 million tons to
be set aside at the end of the agricultural year as state stocks. This
meant that total state stocks on July 1, 1935, amounted to 6.38 mil-
lion tons, as compared with 1.997 million tons two years previously.
The economy was well on the way to achieving the substantial
reserves of grain which Stalin had been vainly seeking since 1929.
Following this success in handling the 1934 harvest, 1935 was per-
haps the most successful year in the development of agriculture in the
1930s. Both the sowings and harvesting of grain were carried out
timely and efficiently (see p. 156 above). When on December 15,
1935, Bryukhanov reported realistically to Stalin and Molotov on the
results of the 1934 harvest (see p. 93 above), he was also able to make
an estimate along similar lines of the 1935 harvest, which had of
course by this time been completely harvested. Bryukhanov pointed
out that various estimates had been made of the grain yield. Osinsky’s
harvest evaluation committee TsGK, of which Bryukhanov was dep-
uty head, had estimated the ‘normal economic yield’, the yield on the
root minus technically-unavoidable losses, at 8.4 tsentners per hec-
tare, Kleiner’s committee for grain collections Komzag gave 8.6 tsent-
ners. Chernov, People’s Commissar for Agriculture, stated as recently
as December 3 that the yield had reached as much as 9 tsentners,
arguing that the mass threshings had shown that TsGK had consider-
ably underestimated the yield.233 Bryukhanov claimed that Chernov
had not made it clear whether his figure was for the yield on the root
or for the ‘normal-economic yield’. Pointing out that Kleiner and
Osinsky had both given figures for the normal economic yield,
Bryukhanov rather boldly argued that this yield was unrealistic and
should be abandoned: only the yield on the root and the actual gross
harvest should be estimated. According to Bryukhanov, the yield on
the root was 9.1 tsentners, giving a harvest of 94 million tons, but the
actual yield was only 7.7 tsentners, giving a harvest of 80 million tons
as compared with 76.5 million tons in 1934.
Yakovlev, in charge of agriculture in the central committee, had
already rejected this estimate as ‘a crude distortion of the facts’ and ‘a
233
For Chernov’s report sent to the central committee and Sovnarkom, see TSD,
iv (2002), 638–9.
 The Advance of Agriculture 255
slander on the USSR’, and Stalin, addressing a conference of com-
bine-harvester operators on December 1, had already stated that the
harvest would be ‘more than 5³ million puds (90 million tons)’.234 On
December 16, the day after Bryukhanov submitted his memorandum
to Stalin and Molotov, the Politburo condemned the method used by
the TsGK as ‘incorrect and unscientific, arbitrarily reducing the yield
per hectare and the figure for the gross harvest’. The yield used for
calculating the harvest should be ‘the actual yield per hectare taking
into account losses in the economy and expenditure in the fields’.235 At
first the harvest was estimated officially at the very high figure of 94.6
million tons.236 But in May 1936 the Politburo reduced the estimate of
the yield in 1935 to 8.7 tsentners and the 1935 gross harvest was stated
to have been just over 90 million tons when the plans for 1937 were
drawn up.237 In the grain–fodder balance this figure was made com-
patible with reality by the usual practice of including a ‘disjuncture’.
This time it was 10.9 million tons, reducing the total harvest to 79
million tons, roughly the figure proposed by Bryukhanov in December
1935. Thus both the official figures and the more accurate figures
proposed by Bryukhanov agreed that the 1935 harvest was very sub-
stantial. It was somewhat greater than the previous record harvest of
1930, which we have estimated at approximately 77 million tons.
Nearly all the other sectors of agriculture were equally successful.
The number of livestock increased particularly rapidly. Between
January 1, 1935, and January 1, 1936, the number of cattle increased
by 18 per cent, of sheep by 20 per cent, and of pigs by as much as 51
per cent. The number of horses had declined in every year since 1929,
but in 1936 the number increased by 4 per cent, though there were still
only half as many as in 1929. The number of both socialised and non-
socialised animals increased; considerably more than half of all ani-
mals were owned by collective farmers and individual peasants. Only
in the case of horses did ownership by individual peasants decline, from
20 to 12 per cent of the total, owing to the collectivisation during 1935
of a substantial number of individual peasants (see Table 28).
On August 31, 1935, Kaganovich reported to Stalin the conclu-
sions of the Politburo meeting held on the same day, which dealt with
the progress of the main industrial crops.238 In a detailed discussion

234
Stalin, Soch,, xiv (1997), 93–9.
235
RGASPI, 17/3/973, 2.
236
RGAE, 4372/34/417a, 52–64.
237
RGASPI, 17/3/977 (April 29, 1936); RGAE, 4372/35/467, 85–86.
238
SKP, 543–4.
256 1935 in Retrospect
about the sugar-beet harvest, at which Kosior from Ukraine had been
present, ‘everyone agreed that the yield is 25–30 per cent higher than
last year, i.e. approximately 120–125 tsentners per hectare’:

Everything depends on the quality of the harvest. The prospects now

are unprecedented, because the grain collections in Ukraine will be
completed by September 5, so that labour and transport will be freed
[for the sugar-beet harvest].

Kaganovich also reported that the situation with cotton was ‘not
bad’. Reports from Uzbekistan indicated a yield of 10.5 tsentners as
compared with 8.2 tsentners in the previous year, though yields in
the new cotton areas of Ukraine and North Caucasus were only 5–6
tsentners. A few days later, on September 5, Molotov and Kaganovich
reported to Stalin with a detailed regional breakdown that the cotton
collections were planned at 1.515 million tons, 29 per cent greater
than the 1.176 million tons collected in 1934 – in terms of cotton
fibre this was 30.058 million puds (492,000 tons).239
In the upshot, when the harvest was completed, 1935 saw a sub-
stantial increase in the production of major food and industrial
crops: sugar beet by 42 per cent, potatoes by 24 per cent, cotton by
42 per cent. In each case this expansion was due to the rise in yield
rather than sown area. However, the production of flax increased
only slightly, and the production of sunflower seed and vegetables
declined (see Table 30). According to official statistics, gross agricul-
tural production increased by 12.3 per cent in 1935, more rapidly
than in any other year in the 1930s except 1937.
The good grain harvest of 1935 provided the state with the oppor-
tunity to increase the collections. This was not achieved without dif-
ficulty. The good harvest was not universal. On August 16 Kaganovich
had reported to Stalin, who by this time was already on leave, that the
harvest in some Odessa districts was poor, and that the regional party
secretary had asked for a reduction in their grain collections by
12 million puds (197,000 tons), and requested a small seed loan for
the autumn sowings. Three days later Stalin replied with unusual
amiability ‘I consider the proposals to be minimal; I propose they
should be accepted.’240 On August 21 a similar proposal from
Khataevich for the Dnepropetrovsk region was accepted by Stalin on
239
SKP, 553.
240
SKP, 523–4, 527.
 The Advance of Agriculture 257
the following day.241 But he was not always so ready to agree to local
proposals. On August 22 Kaganovich and Molotov reported to Stalin
that the Ukrainians were asking for the right to use the 6 million puds
(98,000 tons) remaining in the reserve of their collections plan to offer
relief to any Ukrainian kolkhozy which were in difficulties; Kaganovich
and Molotov supported this proposal on the grounds that Ukraine
had already completed 70 per cent of its annual collections plan
(excluding the milling levy), but Stalin replied on the following day:

I propose to concede to the Ukrainians not completely but in part,

i.e. to give them half of the reserve, and keep the other half for the
state, on condition that they do not request any seed or other grain
assistance. Tell the Ukrainians that with their record harvest it would
be good to also have a conscience and not to turn themselves into
beggars. I insist on my proposal.242

He added a few days later:

You must put pressure on the grain collections and for [the reduction
of] loans. Particularly put pressure on the Ukrainians, who have been
corrupted by our concessions, and on Omsk and other East[ern]
regions. Send Kleiner to Omsk region and someone else to Bashkiria,
and put on the pressure.243

Some other areas suffered from bad weather and a poor harvest.
On October 11 Molotov and Kaganovich informed Stalin that they
had been visited by Eikhe, who had reported that the dry hot winds
in July had affected the whole south-west of the West Siberian region,
involving kolkhozy which occupied 45 per cent of the sown area of
the region, reducing the grain harvest by 1.26 million tons. He had
asked for a reduction in their grain deliveries and the postponement
of the repayment of their seed loans.244 A substantial part of the
non-Black Earth regions was also affected by poor weather. At a
conference in the central committee after the harvest, K. I. Nikolaeva,
party secretary of the Ivanovo region, reported that in her region ‘it

241
SKP, 529.
242
SKP, 529–30, 532.
243
SKP, 531. On August 28 Kaganovich reported to Stalin that his proposals had
been carried out (SKP, 538–9).
244
TSD, iv (2002), 613. This telegram is not included in SKP.
258 1935 in Retrospect
was an extremely difficult year as compared with last year’ – the
weather was ‘repulsive’. Summing up the conference, Zhdanov
reported the ‘low yield’ of grain and flax in the non-Black Earth as
a whole, but also attributed it to poor crop rotation, poor use of
equipment and failure to apply the kolkhoz Statute properly.245
However, the harvest and the collections in the key grain areas
were basically trouble-free. On September 5, the same day that
Molotov and Kaganovich wrote to Stalin about the successful cotton
crop, Kaganovich reported to him ‘The grain collection business is
going well for us. What we achieved with grain this year is really
a great victory for the party – a victory for your line, cde. Stalin!’246
A month later Poskrebyshev informed Stalin that on October 15
total grain received in the USSR amounted to 23.9 million tons as
compared with 19.7 million tons on October 15, 1934.247
In spite of, or perhaps because of, this success the authorities had
already decided to resume the effort to obtain additional grain, as in
1934 (see pp. 67–8 above), by means of zakupki (purchases). Molotov
and Kaganovich had already reported to Stalin on September 4 that
Komzag had proposed to obtain 150 million puds (2.46 million tons)
as compared with the 209 million (3.42 million tons) obtained from
the 1934 harvest. Molotov and Kaganovich made the counter-
proposal that the 1935 plan should be 200 million puds (3.28 million
tons), with the cautious proviso that ‘if there are difficulties in some
regions this figure could be corrected during the zakupki’.248 Stalin
replied on the same day firmly rejecting this caution, and linking his
view with the need to build up substantial grain stocks:
The plan of grain zakupki which you propose is insufficient. In my
opinion we need to purchase a minimum of 250–300 million puds
(4.10–4.91 million tons), Bear in mind that we will not have a good
harvest every year. We must have 400–500 million puds (6.6 – 8.2
million tons) of untouchable transitional stocks (sic), if we want to
secure ourselves against a bad harvest or external complications. The
present nepfondy (untouchable funds) will not do this, as they are
current and not permanent stocks.249
245
TSD, iv (2002), 645, 660–1. The conference was held December 5–7, and was
attended by Stalin and other leaders.
246
SKP, 554.
247
TSD, iv (2002), 615 (telegram dated October 18).
248
SKP, 548–9.
249
SKP, 549.
 The Advance of Agriculture 259
Stalin was evidently confused, as the stock of 6.38 million tons accu-
mulated by July 1, 1935, certainly included 3 or 4 million tons not
needed for current purposes. At all events, on September 5 the
Politburo resolved that the zakupki plan should amount to 300 million
puds, the higher of Stalin’s figures,250 and a few days later the break-
down of this figure by region was agreed, and also that the first
instalment of 75 million puds should be obtained in September.251
It soon emerged that the high plan for zakupki had run into diffi-
culties. On September 28 Stalin wrote to Kaganovich and Molotov:
‘Since almost all regions are asking for the plan for grain zakupki
to be reduced, the plan should be reduced to 240 million puds
(3.93 million tons).’252 A few days later on October 3 Kaganovich
and Molotov, accepting Stalin’s proposal to reduce the zakupki plan,
sent him proposals for appropriate cuts to be made in the regional
zakupki plans. They also proposed that the plan for October should
be 100 million puds plus 45 million puds arrears from September,
145 million puds (2.38 million tons).253 Stalin replied on the same
day with a more detailed comment on the problems of the zakupki:
From talks with workers on the spot (praktiki ) I have learned that the
zakupki of grain often do not take place after the distribution of incomes
to collective farmers but before the distribution, leading to a reduction
in the payments for labour days. Thus in a whole number of cases the
amount received in kind for the labour days is reduced so this looks like
(compulsory) grain deliveries. This makes the work of our organisations
easier, but at the expense of harming the interests of our policy in the
countryside... This negative consequence is one of the reasons why
I recommended the reduction of the grain zakupki plan which I had
proposed. It follows from this that the centre of gravity of the zakupki
should be moved to the end of October, November and December,
when the income has already been distributed to the collective farmers
and every kolkhoz household will sell to the state more or less voluntar-
ily the grain it possesses, as an act of trade rather than of compulsion.
I therefore propose that the plan for October should be kept down to
100–120 million puds, including the arrears for September.254
250
RGASPI, 17/3/971, 16.
251
SKP, 560–1 (Molotov and Kaganovich to Stalin) and Politburo decision
RGASPI, 17/3/971, 25–6 (both dated September 10).
252
SKP, 592.
253
SKP, 597–8.
254
SKP, 599.
260 1935 in Retrospect
The reduction in the planned zakupki was not very substantial, and a
vigorous campaign to secure the zakupki continued during the next
few months. On October 10, evidently ignorant of the correspond-
ence between Stalin and his colleagues, Mironov, head of the eco-
nomic department of the NKVD, sent a directive to the heads of the
regional economic department of the NKVD which still assumed
that the zakupki plan was 300 million puds, instructing them to han-
dle the zakupki in the same way as the compulsory deliveries. The
measures they took should include cleansing ‘class-alien, hostile and
criminal elements’ from the department of Narkomtorg responsible
for obtaining the zakupki, and preventing attempts to sell poor-quality
grain to the state; they should report progress to the central eco-
nomic department of NKVD three times a month. The reports
should list guilty officials and state what punishments had been used
against them. We do not know how far the strictness of the NKVD
or Stalin’s more moderate approach prevailed in practice. But even-
tually 218 million puds (3.6 million tons) were collected, an amount
half-way between Kaganovich and Molotov’s original proposal of
200 million puds and Stalin’s reduced plan of 240 million, and far
below the plan of 300 million puds at first approved by the Politburo
and still included in the NKVD directive of October 10.
The leadership, strongly encouraged by Stalin, in these months
discussed the grain problems in terms of the need to build up per-
manent grain stocks. On September 27,1935, Kaganovich and
Molotov had already reported to Stalin that ‘today we discussed the
grain fund’, and presented to him the following figures (the original
is given in puds):

According to Komzag the total amount of grain available in the period

July 1, 1935, to June 30, 1936, is 35.2 million tons, consisting of
6.6 million tons in hand on July 1, 1935;
23.5 million tons grain collections from the 1935 harvest;
4.9 million tons in the warehouses of Zagotzerno from zakupki.255
Last year we had a total of 28.7 million tons,
So in the current year we have roughly 6.6 million tons more.
As part of the grain in hand on July 1 [1935] we had [special] funds
amounting to 3.3 million tons.
We think it is expedient to increase the funds to 8.2 million tons. If
the amount of grain expended is 1.6 million tons more than last year,
255
This is the original higher plan of 300 million puds.
 The Advance of Agriculture 261
Zagotzerno will have an additional 3.3 million tons in hand for
current needs,
Please inform us of your opinion.256

Stalin replied to this not very clear telegram on the following day,
drawing attention to a further complication:

Your [telegram] 115 is not entirely comprehensible. We do not need

grain in general for the grain fund but primarily food grain. It is not
clear how much food grain is proposed for the grain fund. Also we do
not need any kind of funds, but an absolutely untouchable grain
fund, transferred unchanged from year to year with the grain renewed
every year. You are referring to grain funds in general. These ambi-
guities must be eliminated so that there should not be confusion in
future.

Stalin went on to point out that the zakupki were to be reduced to

3.9 million tons and that an additional amount must be set aside for
export, with the consequence that ‘I think we could restrict the abso-
lutely untouchable grain fund this year to 350 million puds (5.7 million
tons), on condition that three quarters of this should be food grains.’257
After some exchange of views, this led on October 7 to the
approval by the Politburo of the ‘Untouchable Grain-Fodder Fund’
(the Nepfond ), endorsed two days later by a decree of Sovnarkom.258
The Fund was to be formed and maintained by the Committee of
Reserves, and used only with the permission of Sovnarkom. This
Fund was to include the Mobfond and the Special Defence Fund in
the Far East. In 1935/36 it was to amount to 350 million puds (5.7
million tons), including 265 million puds (4.34 million tons) of food
grains [as Stalin had stipulated], 16 million puds (0.26 million tons)
of groats and 69 million puds (1.13 million tons) of fodder grains.
Komzag was to be responsible for supplying the grain to the
Committee of Reserves annually, including arrangements for the
renewal of the grain. The initial 350 million puds was to be made
available by January 1, 1936. The decree specified the location of
the grain: (i) 60 million puds to an area from Southern Ukraine to

256
SKP, 592.
257
SKP, 592–3.
258
RGASPI, 17/162/18, 173, 191–192 (art. 56); GARF, 5446/1/ 483, 97 (art.
2265/372ss).
262 1935 in Retrospect
Karelia; this [located in the western border regions] was the ‘mobi-
lisation part of the Fund’; (ii) 60 million puds to the Far Eastern, East
Siberian and Krasnoyarsk regions. These precise location of these
two stockpiles was to be determined by Narkomoborony. The
remaining 230 million puds was to be located in the central regions:
Moscow, Kalinin, Kursk, Voronezh, Khar’kov, Ivanovo, Saratov,
Kuibyshev and Gor’kii. The grain ‘towns (gorodki)’ and milling com-
bines in the East were to be transferred from Komzag to the
Committee of Reserves. The larger grain stores previously managed
by the Mobfond were to be transferred to the Committee of Reserves,
and the remainder with a capacity of 500,000 puds or less were to
be supervised by the Committee of Reserves but managed by
Zagotzerno. By January 1, 1937, the NKVD was to construct grain
gorodki with a capacity of 300 million puds (4.9 million tons). In addi-
tion to the ‘absolutely untouchable Fund’ of 350 million puds, the
Committee of Reserves was to see that current food stocks amount-
ing to a minimum of 30 million puds were to be established in the
Leningrad, Sverdlovsk and Northern regions and in Central Asia
and the Transcaucasus.
In the outcome, the total grain collected by the state from the
1935 harvest was the record amount of 29.599 million tons, of which
3.566 million tons was zakupki. This was 2.6 million tons greater than
in 1934/35, and as much as 5.9 million tons greater than in 1933/34.
The amount issued as seed and fodder loans was less than in either
of the previous two years, but grain exports, severely restricted in
1934/35, amounted to 1.7 million tons. Nevertheless, this meant that
a substantial amount of additional grain was available for the Nepfond.
On July 1, 1936, total grain stocks amounted to a record 9.423
million tons, 3.0 million tons more than on July 1, 1935, sufficient to
supply both the 350 million puds (5.7 million tons) of the October
1935 decree and a very large margin of 3.7 million tons for transi-
tional stocks.259 These stocks, long striven for unsuccessfully, would
soon save the USSR from another disastrous famine.
While behind the scenes considerable attention was devoted to
deficiencies to be corrected, as at the non-Black Earth conference of
December 5–7, publicly the year 1935 ended with displays of enthu-
siasm about the success of agriculture. A conference of
259
We have not had access to the materials of the Committee of Reserves which
should show how much of the total stock of grain was allocated to the Nepfond
itself on July 1, 1936.
 The Advance of Agriculture 263
combine-harvester operators opened on December 1 and was fol-
lowed on December 4 by a conference of leading collective farmers
of Tadzhikistan and Turkmenistan. Both conferences were addressed
by Stalin.260 At the combine-harvester conference, he praised the
rapid development of the production of combine harvesters and the
successful training of the operators, and argued that the growth of
the urban population, the increase in the number of producers of
cotton and other industrial crops who could no longer grow their
own grain, of the size of the population generally, and of the amount
of grain fodder needed by livestock, all meant that the grain harvest
should increase from the present 5,500 million puds (90 million tons)
to 7,000–8,000 million puds (115–131 million tons) within three or
four years, and that this could partly be obtained by the large
reduction of losses which combine harvesters would make possible.
The combine-harvester conference also provided Stalin with an
opportunity to announce a dramatic if temporary reconciliation
between the regime and the descendants of the kulaks. According to
the report in Pravda, at the conference A. G. Til’ba, a delegate from
Bashkiria, explained that he was the son of a kulak who had been
exiled in 1930. Til’ba had worked successively in a kolkhoz and in
house-building, and since 1933 had been trained and worked as both
a tractor and a combine-harvester driver. In 1935 he had proved to
be the best combine-harvester driver in the USSR, and though his
local organisation had not sent him to the conference Yakovlev had
invited him:

Although I am the son of a kulak, I will honestly struggle for the

cause of the workers and for the building of socialism. (Applause.)

Stalin intervened:

The son is not responsible for the father (Syn za ottsa ne otvechaet).

Til’ba then went up to the platform and shook hands with all the
members of the conference presidium.261
This incident was widely publicised in the press.

260
Stalin, Soch., xiv (Moscow, 1997), 93–9, 100–1.
261
P, December 4, 1935.
 CHAPTER NINE

THE AMBITIOUS 1936 PLAN

(A) STALIN OVERRULES MOLOTOV: THE JULY 1935

DIRECTIVES

The discussions about the plan for 1936 were launched in July 1935,
at a time when the successful results of the first six months of 1935
were already available. Gosplan and Narkomfin again advocated an
extremely cautious investment plan. On July 19, 1935, Mezhlauk
proposed that investment in 1936 should amount to only 17,700
million rubles, a reduction of 25 per cent as compared with the
revised plan for 1935! In his memorandum to Stalin and Chubar’
(who was responsible for Sovnarkom during Molotov’s vacation)
Mezhlauk stated that this level of investment would make it possible
to achieve a budget surplus of 2,000 million rubles, and to set aside
a reserve of about 10,000 million rubles for price reduction. Mezhlauk
justified his proposal by reference to central committee policy:

The policy of further increasing real wages and gradually reducing

unified [retail] prices, which has been firmly established by the cen-
tral committee … requires a reserve of approximately 8000 million
rubles for price reduction.1

The proposed drastic cut in investment was a high price to pay for
price reduction. Gosplan’s caution at this time requires further
study.
In Molotov’s absence, Stalin dominated the ensuing discussions. A
revised version of Mezhlauk’s memorandum, proposing an invest-
ment plan of 19 milliard (thousand million) rubles, was considered
on July 21 at what Mezhlauk described in a later memorandum as a
‘conference in the party central committee’. This was evidently not
a formal session of the Politburo (if it had been, Mezhlauk would
have named it as such), but a meeting in Stalin’s office. Stalin’s
appointments diary records that on July 21 at various times between

1
GARF, 5446/26/66, 266. We have not so far found a decision of the Politburo
or Sovnarkom requiring a specific reduction of retail prices in 1936.

264
 Stalin Overrules Molotov, July 1935 265
3 p.m. and 5 p.m. the following persons were in his office: Voroshilov,
Tukhachevsky, Efimov (head of the Artillery Administration of the
Red Army), Egorov (chief of the General Staff ), Ordzhonikidze,
Chubar’, Kalinin, Mikoyan, Andreev, Mezhlauk, Yezhov and
Kaganovich. The Politburo members remained until 5 p.m.; the
military representatives left at 4.15; and Mezhlauk left at 4.45. If the
investment plan was discussed with the military present except for
the last thirty minutes, the discussion lasted 1 hour 20 minutes; if
they were not present, it lasted only about half-an-hour.2 Even the
longer time was insufficient for a serious discussion of the investment
plan. Stalin’s opinion must have been formed in advance under the
influence of the various government departments.
Following the meeting of July 21, Stalin wrote to Molotov refer-
ring to Mezhlauk’s proposal and describing the outcome of the
meeting:

Even with the most economical approach it would not work, especially
if we bear in mind the point that the People’s Commissariat of Defence
must be fully satisfied in all circumstances. I proposed the figure of 22
milliard rubles – Mezhlauk and Chubar’ have been instructed to make
the allocations (propose them) on the basis of 22 milliard.

Stalin informed Molotov that, with the new total, Narkomtyazhprom

would receive 6.5–6.7 milliard (instead of the 6 milliard proposed by
Gosplan) and Narkomput’ 3.5 milliard instead of 3. But this did not
content the commissariats; Ordzhonikidze demanded 9 milliard,
Kaganovich 4.5 and so on. Stalin was evidently ready for further
concessions which would increase the investment plan:

We shall see. There are some things which we must not cut: the
People’s Commissariat for Defence; the repair of rail track and roll-
ing stock plus the payment for new wagons and locomotives
(Narkomput’); the building of schools (the People’s Commissariat of
Education); re-equipment (technical) (light industry); paper and cel-
lulose factories (the timber industry); and certain very necessary
enterprises (coal, oil, open-hearth furnaces, rolling mills, viscose fac-
tories, power stations, chemistry) (Narkomtyazhprom). This makes it
more difficult. We shall see.3
2
See the entries for July 21.
3
Pis’ma (1996), 249–50.
266 The Ambitious 1936 Plan
Four days later, on July 25, Molotov replied to Stalin, and was clearly
anxious to prevent a further increase in the investment plan. He insisted
that ‘it is possible and necessary’ to keep to the figure of 22 milliard:

I consider it extremely undesirable to increase the construction pro-

gramme above 22 milliard rubles. I am guided in this by the desire to
strengthen the ruble and also to reduce the cost of construction.4

Meanwhile, Mezhlauk, in a further memorandum to Stalin and

Chubar’, dated July 26, set out the new allocations on the basis of
the 22 milliard total. Mezhlauk, obviously responding to the atti-
tude of Stalin and the other members of the Politburo, admitted
that the figure of 22 milliard would create great difficulties for
Narkomtyazhprom and for light industry (the latter, for example,
needed 1,400–1,500 million instead of the planned 1,050 million).
He nevertheless insisted that an increase in the total above 22 milliard
would be ‘extremely difficult for financial reasons’:

I consider that in these circumstances it would be desirable to confine

the discussion to a possible small increase in investment for
Narkomtyazhprom and Narkomlegprom, devoting most attention to
a reduction in the cost of construction … by at least 15–20 per cent.

Mezhlauk proposed that the food industry, the artisan cooperatives,

education, health and the municipal economy should all be required
to find any increase in investment from their own internal resources.
For this purpose the government should issue a special decree per-
mitting economic organisations to use their resources more freely,
including accumulation for investment purposes outside the plan
(vneplanovye nakopleniya). Mezhlauk criticised the existing arrangements,
in which paving the streets, erecting street lamps, purchasing minor
equipment, and minor building repair, all had to be included in the
investment limits approved by the government. He estimated that the
removal of these restrictions could yield a further 900 million rubles.5
These proposals were rejected by the Politburo, though this rejection
proved temporary (see p. 269 below). On July 28 a full Politburo
meeting was attended by 75 people, including not only orthodox
central committee members but also Bukharin, Osinsky and
4
RGASPI, 558/11/769, 159–160.
5
GARF, 5446/26/66, 264–266.
 Stalin Overrules Molotov, July 1935 267
Sokol’nikov. The ‘directives on compiling the control figures for
1936’ were the first item on the agenda, and the topic was addressed
by Mezhlauk and Chubar’, by the leaders of the major departments
of state, including Ordzhonikidze, Kaganovich and Mikoyan, and
by Kviring and G. Smirnov from Gosplan and Kraval’ from
TsUNKhU. The Politburo resolved to increase the 1936 investment
plan to 27.3 milliard rubles, with the proviso that construction costs
would be reduced by 8 per cent, thus reducing the actual financial
grant to 25.1 milliard rubles.6 The allocation to all the major sectors
was increased, including education, health, municipal economy and
the light, food and local industries as well as Narkomtyazhprom and
the People’s Commissariat for Defence (see Table 16). Stalin was
evidently the moving force in this decision. On the day of the
Politburo meeting he wrote to Molotov:
22mld was not enough, and, as can be seen, could not be enough.
The increase in school building (+760 mil), light industry, timber,
food industry and local industry (+900 mln rub and more), in defence
(+1mld 100mln), in health, on the Moscow canal project and other
items (over 400 mil r) determined the physiognomy and size of the
control figures for 1936. I do not complain, because everything that
increases the production of consumer goods for the mass market
must be given more emphasis from year to year. Without this it is not
possible to advance at present.7
Molotov had no alternative but to accept this fait accompli. In the
final letter in this sequence, written to Stalin on August 2, he
grudgingly indicated his acquiescent reluctance:
I would have preferred a smaller amount of capital construction, but
I think that we shall cope if we put our shoulders to the wheel ( ponatu-
zhivshis’ ) even with the approved plan of 25 mld r. The possibility of
increasing industrial production by 23–22% favours this outcome.
He added – again putting aspiration ahead of realism – that it was
also essential to place great emphasis on the reduction of construc-
tion costs.8 For the moment Stalin took Molotov’s warnings into
account. On August 7 the Politburo rejected a proposal from
6
RGASPI, 17/3/969, 1, 31–36. The Politburo decision was promulgated as an
unpublished Sovnarkom decree on the same day (GARF, 5446/1/482, 92).
7
Pis’ma (1996), 251.
8
RGASPI, 558/11/769., 162–163.
268 The Ambitious 1936 Plan
Narkomzem that its investment plan for 1936 should be increased to
1,700 million rubles.9
The decree of July 28 also listed plans in physical terms for the
production of 66 industrial products, often divided into sub-groups.
It increased the planned increase in industrial production in Union
and local industry as a whole to 22.5–23.5 per cent; Gosplan had
proposed 25.3 per cent. The decree did not contain detailed figures
about other aspects of the economy, and said nothing about the
productivity of labour, the growth of the labour force, or industrial
costs. The level of investment and its distribution was treated as the
key set of figures in planning economic growth.

(B) THE ADOPTION OF THE PLAN, DECEMBER

1935–JANUARY 193610

In spite of the sharp dispute, the 1936 investment plan as approved on

July 28, 1935, could not be described as exceptionally ambitious – it
was only 16.6 per cent larger than the revised 1935 investment plan
approved in the same month. But this was by no means the end of the
matter. Further major increases were made in the plan in December
1935. The December revision continued to reflect the multiple criteria
advanced by Stalin to justify a higher level of investment. It was essen-
tial to increase expenditure on defence. But it was also essential to
increase expenditure which would improve the standard of life of the
population: on consumer industries, education and health (and on
agriculture, expenditure on which was increased, though this was not
specifically mentioned by Stalin). The revised plan, which also included
substantially increased investment in the prestigious Moscow–Volga
canal, was now 31,635 million rubles, 31.6 per cent higher than
investment in 1935.11
9
RGASPI, 17/163/1072, 166–167.
10
The approved 1936 plan was dealt with in various decrees in December 1935
and January 1936; the coverage differed, but only minor changes were made in the
figures. Decrees not published: RGASPI, 17/3/973, 43–45 (directives of central
party committee and Sovnarkom for 1936 plan, approved by Politburo December
4, 1935) and 60–63 (directives of central party committee and Sovnarkom on 1936
plan for capital investment, approved December 9); GARF, 5446/1/110, art. 85,
172–350 (Sovnarkom decree on 1936 plan, dated January 16, 1936). Published
decrees: SZ, 1936, art. 32 (decree of TsIK session, dated January 14); PKh, 2, 1936,
257–87 (‘basic indicators’ of 1936 plan, sent to press January 19).
11
RGASPI, 17/3/973, 60–63, dated December 9. The slightly revised plan,
approved by TsIK on January 14, set the figure at 32,635 million rubles.
 The Adoption of the Plan 269
This was a major shift. Mikoyan, in his report to the central com-
mittee plenum in December 1935, cited Stalin’s famous speech of
January 1933, in which he called for a shift from the ‘passion of new
construction’ to the ‘passion of assimilation’. Mikoyan drew attention to
a passage a couple of lines further on in Stalin’s speech:

Only on this basis [assimilation] can we secure in, say, the second
half of the second five-year plan, a new powerful jump forward both
in the sphere of construction and in the sphere of production.12

Describing this statement as displaying ‘prophetic genius’, Mikoyan

pointed out that the increase planned in capital investment in 1936
meant that ‘now we, the whole country, have taken, as our Stalin
said, a new powerful jump’.13
Further possibilities for the expansion of investment had already
been provided by a Sovnarkom decree of September 19, 1935, tak-
ing further the suggestion made by Mezhlauk in the previous July
(see p. 266 above).14 It provided that ‘small-scale building and repair
work, and the acquisition of small equipment and tools’ could be car-
ried out in addition to the investment plan. This vneplanovyi expenditure
(expenditure outside the plan) was to be financed from profits received
in excess of the plan, and where appropriate from the enterprise Fund
for the Improvement of the Wellbeing of the Workers (FUBR). Ceilings
were imposed on these expenditures, varying from 200 rubles in the
case of equipment and tools to 10,000 rubles for a trading enterprise or
large railway station, and as much as one million rubles for insured
property destroyed by a natural disaster. All investment by kolkhozy,
irrespective of its source, was also now classified as ‘outside the plan’.
The plan for industrial production approved in December 1935
and January 1936 was more modest than the investment plan. It
proposed an increase of 23 per cent in 1936, approximately the same
figure as in the previous July.15 Against the background of the
Stakhanov movement, this fell far short of the huge increase in pro-
duction anticipated by Stalin and Molotov. The leaders evidently

12
Stalin, Soch., xiii, 186.
13
P, December 27, 1935.
14
SZ, 1935, art. 417.
15
As the expected production in 1935 was higher than had been anticipated, this
was a higher figure in real terms, and the production plans in physical terms were
about 10 per cent higher than in the July directives.
270 The Ambitious 1936 Plan
hoped that the experience of the first weeks and months of 1936
would enable them to increase the production plan.
The production plan was, however, strongly influenced by the
Stakhanov movement in one important respect: its emphasis on the
role of labour productivity, planned to rise by as much as 20 per cent,
providing as much as 87 per cent of the increase in production.16
The number of workers in industry would rise by only 4.3 per cent.17
The plan took account of the decision of the December plenum
of the party central committee to increase output norms throughout
industry (see pp. 181–2 above), and on this basis estimated that the
average wage would rise by only 10.2 per cent, less than half the
increase in output. This, together with other economies, would ena-
ble industrial costs to be reduced by 6.2 per cent as compared with
the average level in 1935.18
Behind the scenes, jointly with the published decisions about the
state budget and costs, the usual secret negotiations about the credit
and currency plans took place against the background of the consid-
erable rise of currency issue in the fourth quarter of 1935 (see p. 191
above). The quixotic attempt at the beginning of 1935 to prohibit
further currency issues (see p. 134 above) was abandoned. The 1936
currency plan proposed a more realistic net increase: 1,300 million
rubles, 13.4 per cent.19
Both the investment and the production plans of 1936 embodied
major changes in the distribution of resources, taking further the
change in direction which had begun in 1934. Table 14 sets out the
changes in investment as compared with the previous two years,
Consumption, social services and defence were relatively favoured at
the expense of producer goods. Investment in the main sectors of the
economy was planned to increase as follows (in per cent) as compared
with the expected level in 1935:20

All industry of which 17.7

producer goods (means of production) 9.5
consumer goods (means of consumption) 55.0

16
SZ, 1936, art. 32 (January 14).
17
The increase was planned at 301,000 as compared with 426,000 in 1935 (PKh,
2, 1936, 260).
18
SZ, 1936, art. 32 (dated January 14).
19
RGASPI, 17/162/19, 15 (art. 179, dated December 15, 1935).
20
PKh, 2, 1936, 258–9.
 The Adoption of the Plan 271
Agriculture –20.721
Transport 35.0
Communications 58.9
Trade 25.0
Cultural-welfare and administration 96.0
Whole economy 36.8

The planned increase in investment in consumer goods was

unprecedented; it was to rise from 18.7 per cent of all investment in
industry in 1935 to 23.7 per cent in 1936.
Investment was planned to increase even more rapidly in social
and cultural services than in consumer goods. The planned percent-
age increase as compared with 1935 was as follows22:

Urban and industrial housing 58.8

Municipal (including Moscow Metro) 32.5
Education 132.4
Health 62.8
All four above 60.4
The production plans for 1936 favoured consumption to an even
greater extent. For the first time in the annual plans of the 1930s the
production of consumer goods (Group B production) was planned to
increase more rapidly than that of producer goods (Group A), by
23.7 as against 22.6 per cent. (The second five-year plan itself already
foresaw a more rapid increase in Group B.) The increase in light
industry production was to be particularly rapid.23 The directives for
the annual plan also emphasised:

Bearing in mind the considerable role of groups with high earnings –

workers, collective farmers and engineering and technical personnel –
the industrial commissariats should ensure the increased production of
high-quality mass consumer goods.

21
The decline in investment in agriculture was due to the decision to reduce invest-
ment in sovkhozy. Investment by kolkhozy, which did not form part of the state plan,
increased in 1936.
22
PKh, 2, 1936, 258–9. These figures include social and cultural investment by
industry and other branches of the economy, which are excluded from ‘cultural-
welfare and administration’ in the previous table.
23
PKh, 2, 1936.
272 The Ambitious 1936 Plan
These included bicycles, motor cycles, gramophones and records,
radios, watches, pianos and furniture, the production of which had
been resumed slowly in the previous two years.24

Both defence investment and current expenditure on defence were

planned to increase even more rapidly than expenditure related to
consumption.25 The planned increase in 1936, nearly 90 per cent,
was extremely high. Investment in Narkomoborony was planned to
be more than double that in 1935, and investment in the armaments
industries to increase by nearly 50 per cent:

Defence investment, 1935 (preliminary) and 1936 (plan)

1935 1936 Percentage

(preliminary) (plan) increase
Investment by Narkomoborony 11861 24002 102.4
Defence investment by 12903 19184 48.7
Narkomtyazhprom etc.a
Investment by Narkomvnudel 2585 8356 226.4
Total 2734 5153 88.5
Sources:
1
See Harrison and Davies (1997), 380.
2
RGASPI, 17/3/973, 62–63, dated December 9, 1935.
3
RGAE, 4372/91/2761, 133–122, dated November 14, 1935. Actual expenditure
in 1935 amounted to only 900 million rubles.
4
GARF, 5446/502/40, 139–141 (Sovnarkom decree, dated February 8, 1936).
5
RGASPI,17/3/969, 33–34 (dated July 28, 1935). This is the planned figure;
preliminary results for 1935 have not been traced. It includes: Narkomvnudel
100; Dal’stroi 133; Osoaviakhim 5; Anti-aircraft defence 10; Noril’sk 10.
6
RGASPI, 17/3/973, 62–63. NKVD 150; Dal’stroi 200; anti-aircraft 10;
Osoaviakhim 5; Noril’sk 50; Committee of Reserves 420.
Note:
a
Does not include investment of defence significance in civilian industries and
factories, including in Narkomtyazhprom civilian factories.

Current expenditure on defence, for the maintenance of the

armed forces and the cost of armaments ordered by Narkomoborony,

24
RGASPI, 17/3/973, 44 (dated December 4, 1935).
25
Although defence expenditure was now more frankly recorded in the budget,
investment in the defence sector was still not shown in complete form even in con-
fidential files.
 The Adoption of the Plan 273
was planned to increase at a similar pace. The budget for
Narkomoborony, excluding investment, was planned to rise by 82.7
per cent, from 6,988 to 12,769 million rubles.26
Armaments orders were hotly disputed. In current prices
Narkomoborony claimed 7,735 million rubles, but this figure was cut
to 5,412 million.27 This reduced figure was still double the prelimi-
nary fulfilment for 1935, compensating for the shortfall in that year.
All these planned increases measured in current prices were higher
than the increase in real terms, but even allowing for this the increase
in real terms was extremely high.28
The squeeze on investment in producer goods resulting
from the priority to consumption and defence meant that the
Narkomtyazhprom investment allocation was slightly reduced, from
8,535 to 8,500 million rubles. This total included the substantial
increase in investment in the armaments industries, so the allocation
to civilian heavy industry was substantially reduced. Within the
lower total, allocations to non-ferrous metals were increased by 60
per cent and to oil by 40 per cent.29 Allocations to other important
industries were drastically reduced. An article in the industrial
newspaper ‘New Developments in Capital Construction’ claimed
that ‘we can successfully develop a number of industries with less
investment than was planned earlier’.30 The iron and steel industry
was particularly affected. An article in the planning journal published
in conjunction with the 1936 plan frankly stated:

The overfulfilment of the production plans for pig iron, and crude
and rolled steel was achieved in spite of the reduction of the role of
capital investment in every year of the five-year plan in comparison
with the targets of the second five-year plan.

26
Derived from Harrison and Davies (1997), 380.
27
See Harrison and Davies (1997), 391.
28
Of the increase of 3,147 million rubles in maintenance, only 129 million rubles
was estimated to be due to the increase in the price of food and fodder
following the abolition of rationing (see Harrison and Davies (1997), 401, note 66);
and the increase in the prices of military equipment was estimated by Gosplan at
8.6 per cent – the chief of the General Staff gave higher figures (see ibid. 379).
29
See G. Knyaz’kov in ZI, August 30, 1936. As a proportion of all Narkomtyazhprom
investment, non-ferrous metals increased from 7.9 per cent in 1934 to 11 per cent
in 1936 (plan), oil from 9.8 to 13.2 per cent.
30
ZI, Augusr 30, 1936 (G. Knyaz’kov). The author implausibly attributed this to
the success of the Stakhanov movement.
274 The Ambitious 1936 Plan
The article acknowledged that this reduction in investment would
continue. In 1936 there would be ‘further reduction of investment
in iron and steel (1,050 million rubles in comparison with 1,549
in 1935)’. Nevertheless, the production targets for 1937 set in the
five-year plan would already be achieved in 1936.31

In the first few months of 1936 the investment plan continued to

‘jump forward’. Further additions, mainly defence-related, were
made to the 1936 investment plan, so that by the end of May 1936
it was 46 per cent larger than actual investment in 1935. The pub-
lished version of the 1936 plan, prepared by Gosplan and with a
preface by Mezhlauk, made a virtue of the investment expansion
imposed on Gosplan from above. A year previously, the 1935 plan
had stated that the ‘stabilisation of the volume of finance for con-
struction in comparison with 1934 corresponds to the tasks of 1935:
the further strengthening of the ruble, the development of trade and
the reduction of prices’.32 But the 1936 plan proclaimed that ‘capital
investment in 1936 alone amounts to 50% of total investment in the
first three years of the second five-year plan’; ‘1936 is a year of the
tremendous growth of construction’.33

31
PKh, 2, 1936, 140 (A. Notkin and N. Tsagolov).
32
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1935 (1935), 301.
33
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1936 (2nd edn, 1936), 269, 280.
 CHAPTER TEN

THE POLITICAL CONTEXT OF ECONOMIC

CHANGE, 1936

On March 1, 1936, Stalin, in his interview with the American jour-

nalist Roy Howard, remarked that ‘it is difficult to say’ whether the
Japanese or the German regions were the greater source of the war
danger: ‘at present the Far Eastern source is the more active, but it is
possible that the centre of the danger will move to Europe’.1 This
tentative prediction was dramatically fulfilled within a few days,
when Germany on March 7 seized the Rhineland in violation of the
Versailles treaty and the Locarno Pact. This threatening action at
last led the French to ratify the Franco-Soviet Pact. And on May 3
the victory of the Popular Front in the French elections also strength-
ened Litvinov’s case for collective security. However, the British
remained hostile to any effort to curb Germany. On March 17 Lord
Cranborne, under-secretary of state for foreign affairs, privately
urged: ‘Give Germany a free hand, as far as her and our League
obligations permit, further East.’2 When the League of Nations dis-
cussed the occupation of the Rhineland, Litvinov alone supported
sanctions against Germany.
The Soviet Union nevertheless attempted to keep the door ajar for
some rapprochement with Germany. Publicly Molotov, in an inter-
view with Chastenet, editor of Le Temps, declared that ‘the main
direction determining the foreign policy of the Soviet government
holds that an improvement of relations between Germany and the
USSR is possible’.3 At this time Germany, in spite of the unremitting
political hostility of the Nazis to the Soviet system, continued to
explore the possibility of increasing its foreign trade credit to the
USSR. Soviet counsels on this question were divided. Pyatakov, on
behalf of Narkomtyazhprom, eagerly prepared to visit Berlin in pur-
suit of negotiations for a further loan.4 But, following the German
occupation of the Rhineland, the Soviet Union temporarily broke
off trade negotiations. Litvinov continued to strenuously oppose an
1
I, March 5, 1936, Stalin, Soch., xiv, 105.
2
See Haslam (1984), 97.
3
I, March 24, 1936.
4
Krestinsky to Surits, January11, 1936 – DVP, xix (1974), 25; Haslam (1984), 96.

275
276 The Political Context of Economic Change, 1936
extension of economic relations with Germany, arguing that this
would play into Hitler’s hands.5 In the course of 1936 negotiations
continued intermittently, driven partly by German need for raw
materials, partly by Soviet eagerness to obtain new military devices
from Germany.6 On October 26 the Politburo decided that no fur-
ther negotiations should take place about a larger German credit;
instead the USSR should place orders for a reduced list of military
items within the existing credit.7 But this decision did not prove to be
final.
Meanwhile the threat of war greatly increased with the rebellion
of Franco against the Spanish republican government, launched on
July 17–18. By the end of the month Italy and Germany were already
supplying arms to the rebels.8 After a brief attempt to supply arms
to the republicans, Blum, the French Prime Minister, gave way to
pressure from his allies in the Popular Front and the supply ceased.9
During August France and Britain sponsored a Non-Intervention
agreement, which was signed by France, Britain, Germany, Italy, the
Soviet Union and other powers. It was entirely ineffective. The Soviet
Union responded to the intervention of the fascist powers by sending
military experts to Spain, and on September 6 Stalin authorised the
despatch ‘as quickly as possible’ of 50 bombers, 20,000 rifles and
other military material to Spain via Mexico, together with airmen to
train the Spanish crews.10 The first batch of military material arrived
on September 17.11
In the Far East Soviet relations with Japan temporarily improved
with the appointment of Hirota as Prime Minister in March after the
failure of a right-wing revolt. Hirota declared soon after taking office
‘While I am Prime Minister there will be no war.’12 But any hopes
for an easement of Soviet–Japanese relations were shattered by the
signature of the Anti-Comintern Pact between Germany and Japan
on November 25, preceded by a separate agreement between
Germany and Italy on October 21.13
5
Litvinov to Surits, April 19, 1936 – foreign policy archives, cit.VI, 5, 1991, 149.
6
See VI, 5, 1991, 149.
7
RGASPI, 17/162/20, art. 133.
8
See Haslam (1984), 107.
9
See Haslam (1984), 107.
10
Stalin to Kaganovich, SKP, 666.
11
See Haslam (1984), 109–11.
12
EZh, March 26, 1936.
13
See Haslam (1984), 121.
 The Political Context of Economic Change, 1936 277
Three days after the signature of the Anti-Comintern pact,
Litvinov in a powerful address to the VIII Congress of Soviets
denounced the pact as a cover for a secret agreement which strength-
ened fascist aggression in both East and West, and called upon the
peace-loving democratic peoples to respond.14 But Britain continued
its appeasement of Germany, and France belied the hopes raised by
the victory of the Popular Front by also seeking an accommodation
with Germany.15
Throughout the year the war danger was emphasised in the Soviet
press even more strongly than before. On the occasion of the X
Komsomol Congress in April, Pravda published the greetings of the
Congress to the Red Army, and an editorial ‘Young Soviet Patriots’
emphasised the role young people would play ‘when the threatening
hour comes’.16 Warnings about the looming danger of war gathered
pace after the Franco rebellion. On July 29 Pravda carried a full page
about the Soviet artillery. The theme of the war danger was taken up
throughout the press. In the course of one week, the economic news-
paper published articles on the danger of fascism, on financial prep-
arations for war in capitalist countries, particularly Germany and
Japan, and on the links of German fascism with the Spanish events.17
It also reported a rally of 120,000 people in Moscow which ‘extended
a hand of assistance to the Spanish people’.18
The threatening international situation had led the Soviet govern-
ment as early as July 1935 to decide to double capital construction
by Narkomoborony in 1936, while investment as a whole was planned
at that time to increase by only 7 per cent.19 By the end of 1935 the
authorities agreed to increase both investment and current expendi-
ture for defence purposes in 1936 to more than 80 per cent above the
1935 level. These planned increases measured in current prices were
higher than the increase in real terms, but even allowing for inflation
the planned increase in real terms was extremely high.
In the course of 1936 all the main items of defence expenditure
were increased by further ad hoc decisions. Eventually the budget
allocations to Narkomoborony for both capital construction and

14
DVP, xix (1974), 717–19.
15
See Haslam (1984), 123–5.
16
P, April 16, 1936.
17
EZh, 1, 4, and 6, 1936.
18
EZh, August 4, 1936.
19
GARF, 5446/1/482, 92 (art. 1632/254s, dated July 28).
278 The Political Context of Economic Change, 1936
military equipment were more than double the level actually achieved
in 1935.20
In the first few weeks of 1936 the Politburo launched a series of
measures to strengthen the defence of the Far East. On January 11
a far-reaching decision provided for the construction in the Far
Eastern Region of roads, petrol stations, aircraft and artillery repair
bases, and shipbuilding facilities.21 A further decision set out a four-
year programme for the construction in the Far East and Eastern
Siberia of oil storage units, and for the expansion of the Khabarovsk
oil refinery to enable it to produce aircraft fuel.22 On February 20 the
lion’s share of an expanded budget for the construction of strategic
roads was allocated to the Far East Military District.23
These measures were part of the continued policy of strengthen-
ing the frontier regions. On March 23 the NKVD was allocated
additional investment for frontier defence.24 At the same time the
earlier policy continued (see p. 97 above) of clearing the frontiers
from what were considered untrustworthy social and ethnic groups.
A Politburo decision dated February 9 enabled the NKVD to exile
from the frontier districts of the Far East ‘up to’ 1,500 persons who
had been expelled from the party.25 On April 28 the Politburo
adopted a resolution to transfer 15,000 Polish and German house-
holds from Ukraine to Kazakhstan.26 Between June and September
a total of 69,283 people were relocated.27 None of the regions bor-
dering on foreign countries was exempt. On December 16 a Politburo
decision ordered the ‘cleansing’ of the frontier areas of Azerbaijan;
kulak families who had returned from exile, former policemen,
elders, mullahs and others were to be sent to distant areas. A further
clause instructed the authorities, gradually in the course of 1937, not
to renew the residence permits of 2,500 Iranian subjects living in
Azerbaijan.28

20
See Harrison and Davies (1997), 380.
21
RGASPI, 17/162/19, 27–29 (art. 182).
22
RGASPI, 17/162/19, 73–75, 93–97 (art. 80), dated February 18.
23
RGASPI, 17/162/19, 81–82 (art. 208). The Far East was allocated 180 out of
a total of 313 million rubles.
24
RGASPI, 17/162/19, 124 (art. 108).
25
Lubyanka (1922–1936) (2003), 723.
26
RGASPI, 17/162/19, 159, 174–176 (art. 57).
27
GARF, 9479/1/36, 23.
28
RGASPI, 17/162/19, 131–132 (art. 374).
 The Political Context of Economic Change, 1936 279
Severe restrictions were imposed on political immigrants living in
the USSR. The most important decision, aiming at their extensive
control and removal, was unprepossessingly entitled ‘Measures to
Protect the USSR from Penetration by Spying, Terrorist and
Diversionist Gangs’. It closed down the special facilities afforded to
MOPR and the Communist International to manage the immigra-
tion to the USSR of political refugees. In future, clandestine crossing
points should be controlled only by army intelligence, should be
known to only two persons and should frequently change. All politi-
cal immigrants at present in the USSR were to be examined by a
small commission which would decide who should be deported from
the USSR, who should be sent back abroad for illegal work, and who
should remain in the USSR. Political emigrants remaining in the
USSR should include only those subject to the death sentence or
long prison sentences abroad, and sick persons incapable of working
in the revolutionary underground. This secret Politburo decision
asserted that some of the political immigrants were ‘direct agents of
the intelligence and police agencies of capitalist states’.29 By July 1,
5,678 political immigrants had been registered, and ‘compromising
materials’ were allegedly found about 2,210 of them.30 At the end of
1936 the sweeping arrests of Polish communists in exile began, and
soon led to the collapse of the Polish party.31 These developments in
turn implicated prominent Soviet officials of Polish origin, including
I. S. Unshlikht, a central figure since the civil war in the Red Army
and later in military industry.
The increased allocation of resources to defence was accompa-
nied by the further centralisation of Soviet administration. Further
institutions and functions were transferred from civilian control to
the NKVD. The NKVD took over the functions of the long-
established All-Union Resettlement Committee, which had continued
the pre-revolutionary voluntary resettlement of peasants from labour-
surplus to under-populated areas.32 Several new committees and
commissariats were established under Sovnarkom to take over func-
tions previously controlled by the republics or by the commissariats.

29
RGASPI, 17/162/19, 79, 98–100 (art. 190), dated February 28.
30
Lubyanka (1922–1936) (2003), 823, n.171.
31
See Svobodnaya mysl’, 3, 1998, 56 (Ye. E. Gorbunov).
32
SZ 1936, art. 322 (decree of TsIK and Sovnarkom, dated July 10). On June 26
Glavmerves, responsible for weights and measures, was also transferred to the
NKVD.
280 The Political Context of Economic Change, 1936
On January 17 an All-Union Committee for the Arts attached to
Sovnarkom managed the cultural activities previously administered
by republican People’s Commissariats of Education; these included
theatre, the visual arts, architecture and museums.33 On May 21 an
All-Union Committee for Higher Education attached to Sovnarkom
was established to coordinate the activity of the commissariats and
other government departments; these continued, however, to admin-
ister the higher education establishments themselves.34 On July 20
two major new all-Union commissariats – for health and justice –
took over important functions from their republican equivalents: the
new Narkomyust was to ‘unify all civil and criminal law’.35 On
November 14 a Chief Administration for Hydro-Meteorological
Services attached to Sovnarkom undertook functions previously
managed by Narkomzem. The decree stated that this was ‘in accord-
ance with the growing interests of the economy and the defence of
the country’; the new administration would ‘exercise centralised
leadership via subordinate local agencies’.36
With economic administration, the changes were more ambiguous.
On January 19 a Committee for Industrial Cooperatives and Artisan
Industry attached to Sovnarkom was established, consisting of key
officials from the relevant government departments and responsible
for coordinating the numerous scattered enterprises.37 On August 31
the so-called ‘convention bureaux’, responsible for coordinating
‘decentralised purchases’ of non-grain products, which had been
established in 1932 at the time of ‘neo-Nep’, were abolished; their
functions were absorbed by Komzag and its plenipotentiaries, and
their Nep-sounding name vanished into history.38 These measures
placed more authority in the hands of the Politburo and the Sovnarkom

33
SZ 1936, art. 40 (decree of TsIK and Sovnarkom). On May 17 the committee
took over children’s theatres and the puppet theatre (see Maksimenkov (1997), 71).
34
SZ 1936, art. 250 (decree of TsIK and Sovnarkom). The new committee
absorbed the activities of the committee on higher technical education. The All-
Union Attestation Commission ( VAK), established on November 24, was made
responsible for confirming the award of all higher decrees; it continued to trouble
higher education establishments in the post-Soviet era.
35
SZ 1936, arts. 337 and 338 (decrees of TsIK and Sovnarkom). The procuracies
and investigating agencies of the republican Narkomyusty were transferred to the
Procuracy of the USSR.
36
SZ 1936, art. 449 (decree of TsIK and Sovnarkom).
37
SZ 1936, art. 53.
38
SZ 1936, art. 408.
 The Political Context of Economic Change, 1936 281
machinery. But 1936 was also a year in which efforts were at their
maximum to establish market and quasi-market relations which would
strengthen the influence of consumers on production. On October 19
People’s Commissariats for the Light, Food and Timber Industries,
and for Grain and Livestock Sovkhozy, were established in the Russian
Republic; the existing All-Union Commissariats were accordingly
transformed into Union-Republic Commissariats.39
In the political sphere, particularly in the first few months, 1936
was also an ambiguous year. Together with the measures against
ethnic minorities living in the frontier areas and foreigners generally
(see p. 278 above), from the beginning of 1936 stronger measures
were also adopted against former oppositionists, particularly ex-
Trotskyites. On February 9 the NKVD sent a directive to its local
agencies instructing them that the Trotskyite–Zinoviev underground
should be completely eliminated.40 On February 27 the Politburo
ruled that an archive about Trotsky which had been recently discov-
ered in the USSR, together with other documents about him, should
be examined by Yezhov with the aim of exposing ‘counter-revolu-
tionary Trotskyite double-dealers’; those arrested should be ques-
tioned jointly by the NKVD and Yezhov (Yezhov was still formally a
party official, but had been placed at the centre of cases dealing with
alleged counter-revolutionary activities).41 On May 20 a further
Politburo decision noted the ‘unceasing counter-revolutionary activ-
ity of Trotskyites in exile, and of those expelled from the party’.
Trotskyites had so far lived in relatively favourable conditions as
compared with other exiles. Now over 600 of them were to be trans-
ferred to ‘remote concentration camps’ for periods of 3–5 years, and
the same penalty was to be imposed on ex-Trotskyites at present liv-
ing in 15 listed major cities who had ‘manifested hostile activity’.
The cases of Trotskyites under arrest who were found to have
engaged in terrorism were to be transferred to the Supreme Court,
and they were to be sentenced to death by shooting.42 By the middle
of 1936 about five thousand oppositionists had been arrested; the
number increased to 23,279 by the end of the year.43

39
SZ, 1936, art. 631 (decree of TsIK).
40
Reabilitatsiya (1991), 216.
41
RGASPI, 17/162/19, 78 (art. 155).
42
RGASPI, 17/162/19, 172 (art. 244).
43
Khaustov and Samuelson (2009), 93. In 1934 only 631 Trotskyites and
Zinovievites had been arrested.
282 The Political Context of Economic Change, 1936
Supporters of Zinoviev and Kamenev were similarly accused of
counter-revolutionary activity. On January 11 a memorandum from
Yagoda and Vyshinsky to Stalin listed 41 Zinovievites, and gave a
detailed account of their alleged activities. In some cases of alleged
terrorist plots, not involving former party members, the death pen-
alty was unhesitatingly applied. Stalin wrote on a memorandum
about an alleged plot to assassinate Zhdanov ‘I propose shoot all
three.’44
However, in the first months of 1936 some circumspection was
also exercised. Thus on January 31 the Politburo resolved that the
death penalty should not be applied in relation to the leaders of the
41 Zinovievites.45 This circumspection was one aspect of the great
incongruity of 1936, already a feature of 1935. On the one hand,
the drive towards eliminating all potential hostility to the regime –
and all deviation from its policies – accelerated, culminating in the
terror of 1937–38. On the other hand, this was a year of an
attempted grand reconciliation within society, symbolised by the
highly publicised adoption of the new Constitution in December.
Soviet society was presented as both socialist and democratic. In his
interview with Roy Howard on March 1, Stalin even foresaw ‘elec-
tion contests’ and ‘very lively election campaigns’.46 This was of
course partly an effort to present the USSR as a worthy member of
the hoped-for alliance with the Western democracies against the
menace of fascism. But it was also a bizarre and self-contradictory
attempt to unify Soviet society.
A series of practical steps continued the relative moderation of
1934–35, particularly during the first six months of 1936. First
and foremost, the authorities sought to demonstrate that there was
now an honourable place in Soviet society for former alleged ene-
mies, providing they were loyal to the regime in word and deed. In
Narkomtyazhprom Ordzhonikidze’s belief in the usefulness of the
non-party specialists for the moment prevailed. On February 4,
the Politburo granted an amnesty to nine of the principal defend-
ants in the Promparty trial of 1930, including Ramzin and
Larichev, announcing their ‘complete repentance’ and ‘their

44
Lubyanka (1932–1936) (2003), 714–15 (January 7, 1936). Similarly, on a proposal
to execute three organisers of an alleged terrorist group plotting to kill Stalin, Stalin
simply wrote one word za (in favour): Lubyanka (1932–1936) (2003), 741–2 (March 16).
45
RGASPI, 17/162/19, 40 (art. 343).
46
P, March 3, 1936.
 The Political Context of Economic Change, 1936 283
conscientious accomplishment of major state tasks’. The decree
stated that this measure was supported by Narkomtyazhprom
(where they worked).47 A few months later, on August 22, while the
Zinoviev–Kamenev trial was in progress, the sentence on the chief
energy engineer of Magnitogorsk was cancelled.48 Such decisions
were not confined to Narkomtyazhprom. In the same month all
political and civil rights were restored to four specialists in the food
industry.49
In this spirit further measures continued to conciliate peasants
who had been expelled from their villages or otherwise punished in
the early 1930s. On January 16, the Politburo resolved that sentences
imposed on peasants on the basis of the decree of August 7, 1932,
should be re-examined; by July 1936 in 97,000 of the 115,000 cases
examined the sentences were ruled to have been incorrect.50 On
May 20 the Politburo resolved that cases should be re-examined by
the Procuracy and the Supreme Court when appeals had been
rejected from collective farmers in the Ivanovo, Leningrad and
North Caucasus regions.51
A further example of continued moderation was the extension of
the policy of treating the children of expropriated kulaks as inde-
pendent of their parents (see p. 26 above); this policy now also
applied to the children of citizens who had been expelled from
Leningrad after the murder of Kirov. On February 28 the Politburo
decided that the exile of students and others engaged in useful work
who had been expelled from Leningrad with their parents should be
cancelled and that they should have the right to live anywhere in the
USSR.52 A further decision, dated April 20, permitted the depend-
ents of persons expelled from ‘regime locations’ (i.e. locations requir-
ing an internal passport) to be transferred to other members of the
family still living in these locations.53 Even as late as September the
Politburo confirmed that persons expelled from Leningrad who had

47
SZ, 1936, art. 92. Ramzin invented the ‘once-through boiler’.
48
SZ, 1936, art. 391 (decree of TsIK).
49
SZ, 1936, art. 390 (decree of TsIK, dated August 1).
50
See Khlevnyuk (1996), 150–1.
51
RGASPI, 17/3/971, 32–33.
52
See Khlevnyuk (1996), 154 and RGASPI, 17/3/976, 17 (dated April 20).
53
RGASPI, 17/3/976, 17; the members of the family must be either students or
engaged in socially useful work.
284 The Political Context of Economic Change, 1936
not been accused of specific crimes should retain their voting and
pension rights.54
The practice of dismissing socially suspect employees, widespread
in earlier years, was significantly moderated in 1936. In April and
May, trade union officials in a series of memoranda complained that
dismissals were undertaken arbitrarily, and secured the simplification
of the method of dealing with complaints. The secretary of the
Moscow trade unions argued that ‘concealment of social origin by
incorrectly completing a questionnaire, if there has been a long
period of conscientious work, could involve a penalty such as a rep-
rimand; dismissal is not obligatory’, and the head of the wages
department of AUCCTU insisted that ‘children of those deprived
of the vote, and similar categories of citizens, cannot be dismissed
because of their social origin, if their own rights are not restricted
and they are exemplary workers’.55 The Soviet Control Commission,
meeting May 22–26, 1936, resolved that the dismissal of, or failure
to appoint, people ‘because of their social origins, past convictions,
the conviction of their parents or relatives, etc.’ should cease. A
Pravda editorial commented that with the completion of the con-
struction of a socialist society such practices had ‘lost their
significance’.56
The effort to attract the support of the Cossacks (see p. 105 above)
continued. On April 20 TsIK, ‘bearing in mind the devotion of the
Cossacks to Soviet power’, removed all restrictions on Cossack ser-
vice in the Red Army, except for those on whom court sentences had
been imposed.57
All these decisions were announced publicly.
But perhaps the most striking indication that in some respects the
policy of reconciliation was – for the moment – continuing was the
decision in April to permit Bukharin, together with Adoratsky and
others, to travel to Paris in an attempt to purchase some manuscripts
by Karl Marx.58 It was on this occasion that the famous conversation
took place between Bukharin and Nicolaevsky, the best-known
Menshevik in exile.

54
RGASPI, 17/3/980, 9.
55
GARF, 5451/20/172, 1–20, 29–31.
56
P, May 30, 1936.
57
SZ, 1936, art. 198.
58
RGASPI, 17/162/19, 128, 137–138 (dated April 19).
 The Political Context of Economic Change, 1936 285
This easing of repression during the spring and summer of 1936
is, however, far less than half the story. Dark clouds hovered over and
increasingly dominated the political scene. During May and June, as
a result of familiar methods of interrogation, former supporters of
the Leningrad and Left oppositions provided testimony to the NKVD
of the existence and influence of a joint Trotskyite–Zinovievite
conspiracy.
Following these developments behind the scenes, a major change
in policy soon became clear. The death of Maksim Gorky on June
18 assisted the move to greater repression. Gorky had played a
significant part in defending the position of old revolutionaries and
others, though his influence had been declining for some time. On
July 6 an article by Bukharin praising the democratic features of
the new constitution was published in Izvestiya, but nothing further
by him appeared in the press.59 Then in the last week of July both
Kamenev and Zinoviev were successfully pressured into admitting
the existence of a centre which planned terrorist activities, and on
this basis the central party committee on July 29 circulated a long
secret letter to party organisations down to the district level which
provided detailed testimony about the existence of a united
Trotskyite–Zinovievite centre controlled by Trotsky.60 Following
the central committee letter, the danger of sabotage was again
emphasised in the press. Thus an editorial in the industrial news-
paper revived the call for ‘watchfulness’, declaring that without it
the ‘Trotsky–Zinoviev swine’ would organise the ‘breakdown of
the economy of an enterprise’, citing the Aviation Institute in
Rybinsk.61 The trial of Zinoviev, Kamenev and 14 others followed
on August 19–24.
The extent of the repressions in 1936 exhibited the ambiguity
characteristic of many aspects of the political situation. On the one
hand, the assessment by the NKVD of the danger of social unrest
among disaffected sections of the population became much more
optimistic, as was indicated in an important report by Yagoda to
Sovnarkom in March.62 He declared that the police had made

59
He continued formally as editor until he was replaced on January 16, 1937
(RGASPI, 17/3/983, art. 131). He appeared on the platform in Red Square on
November 7 at Stalin’s invitation.
60
The text of the letter is published in Reabilitatsiya (1991), 196–210.
61
ZI, August 9, 1936.
62
See D. Shearer in Cahiers du Monde russe, vol. 42, no. 2–4 (2001), 506.
286 The Political Context of Economic Change, 1936
significant advances towards securing social order and reducing
criminality, and even boasted that there were fewer murders in the
whole of the USSR in 1935 than in the city of Chicago! Yagoda’s
relative optimism about the social situation was reflected in his far-
reaching legislation ameliorating the conditions in the Gulag (see
pp. 345–6 below). The number of executions continued to decline,
and the number of arrests by the NKVD fell substantially. The death
rate among those confined in camps also continued to decline. On
the other hand, the total number of sentences following arrests by
the NKVD somewhat increased; this was probably a result of the
large number of cases held over from the previous period.

1935 1936 Per cent increase

(+)
or decrease (–)
Arrests 193083 131168 –32.1
Sentencesa: including 267064 274688 +2.6
Death sentences 1229 1118 –9.0
Sentences to camps and prison 185836 219436 +18.1
Sentences to exile 33599 23719 –29.4
Note: a Includes sentences by military collegia.
Data on the number of sentences by the civil courts in the Russian republic also
show a decline as compared with 1935. The total number of sentences by these
courts declined from 982,713 to 771,463, the lowest since 1925. Within this total
the number of sentences to imprisonment for one year or more declined from
344,932 to 229,428.63

The total number of persons in NKVD camps declined during

1936 from 839,000 to 821,000 (see Table 24), largely because of the
substantial increase in the number of persons released from camps.
The number of persons in special settlements also declined, from
1,017,000 to 917,000 (see Table 24), because fewer persons were
exiled to the settlements.
The major modification of Soviet ideology, launched in 1934,
revising the assessment of the past, was taken much further in 1936.
On January 27 Pravda published a resolution of the party central
committee and Sovnarkom which explicitly attacked for the first time
‘the so-called “historical school of Pokrovsky”’, and its baleful

63
Dugin (1990), 59; see also Zvyagintsev and Orlov (2001), 530–1.
 The Political Context of Economic Change, 1936 287
influence on history textbooks. This was immediately followed by
articles from Bukharin and others vigorously condemning Pokrovsky
(who had died from natural causes in 1932). The authors stressed the
progressive role of the formation of the Russian state and of Peter
the Great’s reforms, which Pokrovsky had disputed.64 ‘Know and
Love the History of Your Motherland’, Pravda proclaimed shortly
afterwards.65 Bukharin himself had already been criticised by Pravda
for his article in Izvestiya which claimed that the Bolsheviks had been
needed ‘to create “the shock brigade of the world proletariat” out of
an amorphous mass in a country where oblomovshchina was the
most universal feature of their character, where the nation of
Oblomovs predominated’.66
Later in the year, Demyan Bedny’s play ‘Heroes’ (Bogatyri ) was
condemned by the Politburo for depicting Prince Vladimir as hold-
ing a drunken party after his baptism at the time of the conversion
of Kievan Rus’ to Christianity in 988.67 The revision of the approach
to history was far-reaching. The Politburo decision on Bogatyri con-
demned its ‘anti-historical contemptuous depiction of the conversion
of Rus’ to Christianity, which in reality was a positive step’, bringing
the Slav peoples closer to ‘peoples of a higher culture’.68
In July, Academician N. N. Luzin, a leading mathematician, was
strongly criticised in Pravda for his lack of patriotism. In particular he
was condemned for publishing papers in foreign journals before they
had appeared in the Soviet Union: he had displayed a ‘lackey-like
servility to everything marked with a foreign stamp’.69 These charges,
a precursor of the treatment of other scientists during the post-war
anti-cosmopolitan campaign, were followed by resolutions critical of
Luzin from both a commission of the Academy of Sciences estab-
lished to consider the charges against him and from the Academy
presidium. The presidium threatened that he might be deprived of

64
I, January 27, 1936 (Bukharin), P, February 1, 1936 ( V. Bystryanskii).
65
P, March 7, 1936; see also Platt and Brandenberger (2006), 150 (Perrie).
66
I, January 21, 1936; P, February 10, 1936. He withdrew the expression ’nation
of Oblomovs’ in I, February 14, 1936. Oblomov was the nobleman and small land-
lord who spent his time lying on a couch and dreaming in Goncharov’s novel
‘Oblomov’ of 1859.
67
RGASPI, 17/3/202, 80 (November 14, 1936); P, November 14 and 15, 1936
(Kerzhentsev). Kerzhentsev was appointed head of the Committee for the Arts in
January 1936.
68
RGASPI, 17/3//202, 80 (dated November 14, 1936).
69
P, July 3, 9, 1936.
288 The Political Context of Economic Change, 1936
his title of Academician, but no further action followed.70 Publication
of Soviet papers in foreign journals diminished, but continued, in the
pre-war years after 1936.71 Towards the end of the year, in what was
now a standard expression of Soviet patriotism, the director of the
Hermitage called for ‘the rooting out of cases of contempt for the
heroic past of the people’.72
The new history was to be conveyed to the population – and par-
ticularly to young people – in simple concepts and with a strong
message. In January the party central committee and Sovnarkom
established a commission on Soviet history textbooks chaired by
Zhdanov; and a few weeks later TsIK and Sovnarkom announced a
competition – with generous money awards – for the best textbook
for 10–12 year olds on the history of the USSR ‘with short refer-
ences to general history’. It should include the main dates and indi-
viduals, and should be ‘specific and historically justified ... clear,
interesting and fully comprehensible’, and should include a glossary
of difficult and foreign words.73
Another step in the direction of simplifying and standardising
education was taken, following a discussion in the Politburo, by a
further commission headed by Zhdanov, which was instructed to
prepare a decree directed towards the elimination of ‘pedology’ in
Soviet education.74 ‘Pedology’, long established in pre-revolutionary
Russia and very popular in the United States, made extensive use of
intelligence tests and tests of ability in order to place children in
schools and classes at appropriate levels. The decree, issued in the
name of the central committee, was approved by the Politburo on
July 4, and fiercely criticised pedology as a channel for control of
education separate from normal pedagogy, and consisting in the
main of ‘pseudo-scientific experiments and carrying out among
pupils and their parents an endless number of investigations in the
form of senseless and harmful questionnaires and tests’, as a reuslt
of which an increasing number of children had been assigned to
special schools, usually of indifferent quality. Pedology was brought
to an end, and most children were returned from the special schools

70
P, July 14, August 6, 1936.
71
See SR, 49 (1990), 90–108 (A. E. Levin). The Luzin case is discussed in detail,
using Academy of Science archives, in VAN, 4, 1989, 102–13 (A. P. Yushkevich).
72
P, November 16, 1936.
73
SZ 1936, art. 45 (January 26), art. 111 (March 3).
74
RGASPI, 17/3/978, 2 (item IV of Politburo session of June 27).
 The Political Context of Economic Change, 1936 289
to normal schools.75 This was a major further step towards the stand-
ardisation of education, following the condemnation in 1931 of the
project method and other forms of experimental teaching (see vol. 4
of this series, pp. 77–8).
More or less simultaneously, following an intensive discussion in
the press, on June 27 the Politburo approved the famous decree
which abolished abortion (abortion had been made legal in November
1920), and sought to strengthen the family and the role of the mother.
The decree provided additional payments to mothers, imposed
severe penalties on fathers separated from their family who failed to
pay alimony, and planned a rapid increase in the number of places
in creches and kindergartens.76
All these measures formed part of an attempt to establish a revised
ideology in every walk of life which would provide the education and
culture of a new, Soviet, type of human being. On January 28, 1936,
the day after Stalin, Molotov, Zhdanov and Mikoyan attended
Shostakovich’s opera ‘Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk Province’, Pravda
published its notorious article condemning the opera, which had
been widely praised when it appeared in 1935. According to Pravda,
its music was ‘dissonant’, and it presented a ‘predatory market
woman’ as a victim of society.77 Stalin did not merely condemn Lady
Macbeth. He had previously watched I. I. Dzerzhinskii’s opera Quiet
Flows the Don (Tikhii Don), based on Sholokhov’s novel, and publicly
praised its ‘considerable ideological and political value’.78 The head
of the Committee on the Arts, Kerzhentsev, a veteran Bolshevik
administrator, embarked unsuccessfully on an effort to create a Soviet
socialist opera by the close cooperation of composers and the party
leadership.79 He also played an active part in the switch in the visual

75
Decree ‘Pedological Distortions in the System of People’s Commissariats of
Education’: RGASPI, 17/3/979, 70–73.
76
RGASPI, 17/3/978, 1 (item 1 on Politburo agenda), 80–86 (decree of TsIK and
Sovnarkom). The issue was first discussed at the Politburo on March 9 (RGASPI,
17/3/975 (item IV of Politbuto session). For a translation of the decree and exten-
sive excerpts from the preceding press discussion see Schlesinger (1949), 251–79.
77
On this episode see Maksimenkov (1997), and Fitzpatrick (1992). Stalin and
Molotov had attended the opera on January 26.
78
See Maksimenkov (1997), 67.
79
See Maksimenkov (1997), 116–21. The director of the Bolshoi Theatre,
Golovanov, and its artistic director, were replaced by more amenable figures. By
an irony of fate, Golovanov was restored to his post a decade later, this time as a
supporter of classical opera against modernist experimentation.
290 The Political Context of Economic Change, 1936
arts from modernist experimentation to a socialist realism based on
but nearly always markedly inferior to traditional styles. In May 1936
in a memorandum to Stalin and Molotov he condemned ‘formalism
and naturalism’, citing as examples from Moscow galleries works by
Tatlin, Kandinskii, Malevich and others: such works should be trans-
ferred to a ‘special building closed to the mass spectator’.80 This
approach to the arts prevailed throughout the rest of Soviet history.
The restoration of the traditions of the past was associated with
pressure on all the Soviet arts to present heroes from the past and
present who provided reliable examples of exemplary human con-
duct for the present generation. A striking example in practice was
provided by the non-stop flight in July from Moscow to the Far East
of Chkalov, Baidakov and Belyaev. On August 13 at a reception for
them Stalin praised their ability to combine ‘boldness and courage
with knowledge and the ability to utilise the latest advances of tech-
nology’, and on the same day three islands were named after them.81
In the country at large, the celebratory activities familiar in the
previous couple of years were continued. In Moscow on May 1,
‘decorative lights illuminate the streets and there is music
everywhere’.82 For the population at large the standard of living con-
tinued to improve slightly, for both peasants and industrial workers,
owing to the improved agricultural production in the agricultural
year 1935/36, and the continued increase in the production of
industrial consumer goods. But there was a sharp change in the food
situation in the last few months of the year, as the effect of the bad
harvest of 1936 began to be felt. Bread shortages were frequently
reported. According to a watchman in Tyumen’ woodworking fac-
tory, for example, ‘People stand in line for six to eight hours a day.’83
In the countryside the areas which had suffered drought began to
experience a shortage of grain.84 And throughout the year, the scar-
city of industrial consumer goods continued, owing to the failure to
carry out retail price increases similar to the food price increases
after the abolition of rationing.

80
See Malsimenkov (1997), 227–9.
81
P, August 14, 1936; SZ 1936, art. 389 (decree of TsIK dated August 13).
82
Garros et al., eds (1995), 169 (Shtange).
83
Garros et al., eds (1995), 130 (Arzhilovsky, an ex-peasant recently released from
a camp).
84
See the NKVD report on grain shortages in Orenburg kolkhozy, dated November
28, 1936, in TSD, iv (2002), 900–904.
 The Political Context of Economic Change, 1936 291
By the end of the year the alarming external events of 1936 – the
occupation of the Rhineland, the rebellion in Spain, and the anti-
Comintern Pact, together with the failure of Litvinov’s drive for col-
lective security – led Soviet spokesmen to stress even more than at
the beginning of the year that the Soviet Union must and could rely
on its own strength in a dangerous world. Voroshilov, addressing the
Military Council of Narkomoborony on October 19, 1936, frankly
declared that ‘both Japan and Germany, especially Germany, have
recently put it across to the whole world that they are preparing for
war with world Bolshevism and primarily with its source – Moscow’:

War is approaching with dizzy speed, and war is resisted only by the
Soviet Union – by ourselves and our glorious Workers’ and Peasants’
Red Army.85

The very ambitious plans for the increase in defence expenditure in

1936 were not fully realised. But the increase was very substantial. In
terms of current prices, total budget expenditure on defence
increased by 82 per cent; and within this total the outlays of
Narkomoborony on maintenance and other non-capital expendi-
tures increased by 77 per cent, reaching 88 per cent of the planned
figure, while Narkomoborony expenditure on capital investment
increased as much as 112 per cent, investment in the armaments
industries by 62 per cent. As a result, total investment in defence
increased from 8.1 to 11.9 per cent of all capital investment.86 Figures
85
Voennyi sovet okt. 1936 (2009), 419.
86
(million rubles)

1935 1936 1936

actual plan actual
Defence expenditure recorded in state budget 8174 14858
Investment
By Narkomoborony 1186 2428 2518
By Narkomtyazhproma 905 1467
Non-investment expenditure
Narkomoborony maintenance 4762 8180 7782
Narkomoborony military equipment 2226 5914 4558
Source: see Harrison and Davies (1997).
Note: a Covers only expenditure of Narkomtyazhprom (Narkomoboronprom),
excluding investment by other government departments.
292 The Political Context of Economic Change, 1936
in current prices overestimate the growth of expenditure. Current
prices of maintenance increased as a result of the price changes
consequent upon the abolition of consumer rationing, and current
prices of defence investment increased as a result of the abolition of
some subsidies to the defence sector. But they reflect the growing role
of defence in the economy: state budget expenditure on defence
increased from 11.1 to 16.1 per cent of all budget expenditure.
While more moderate policies continued to prevail in industry
until the end of August (see pp. 282–3 above), on July 14, the first
major action was undertaken which began to spread the repressions
to the centre of economic power. Mar’yasin was dismissed from his
post as head of Gosbank.87 This dismissal, reported quietly in the
press, for a short time seemed to have been due to a disagreement on
one or more of the recent contentious financial issues: the size of the
currency issue, conversion of the state loans, or the price reform.88
But, following reports of inefficiencies in the bank, some weeks after
Mar’yasin’s dismissal the Zinoviev–Kamenev trial took place, At the
trial both Mar’yasin’s associate Arkus, until recently a deputy direc-
tor of Gosbank, and the head of the Industrial Bank, Tumanov, were
condemned for supplying money to the conspiracy.89 A few days
after the trial a sensational account of a meeting of the Gosbank
party group appeared in the economic newspaper.90 This denounced
Arkus, as a ‘counter-revolutionary who stole money from the socialist
87
SZ, 1936, ii, art. 230. The same decree replaced him by S. L. Kruglikov.
Kruglikov, an old Bolshevik like Mar’yasin, became a party member in 1918, and
after holding various party posts during the civil war, worked in Vesenkha from
December 1920. He studied economics at the Institute of Red Professors in 1925–
29, and held senior posts in Vesenkha and Narkomtyazhprom from 1931 until his
new appointment. Mar’yasin was appointed as head of the Trade, Financial and
Planning Department of the central committee in place of Bauman, who was trans-
ferred to the post of head of the Science Department of the central committee
(RGASPI, 17/3/969, 34 – art. 151). But three days later, on July 17, Mar’yasin’s
appointment was rescinded, and he was ‘placed at the disposal of the central com-
mittee’ (RGASPI, 17/3/969, 41 – art. 161).
88
Behind the scenes the party central control commission, in a report dated March
31, 1936, had already condemned Mar’yasin’s issue of currency in excess of the
approved ceiling at the end of 1935 (see pp. 190–2 above), as ‘a most crude violation
of state discipline by the leadership of the bank’ (GARF, 5446/26/73, 6–4).
89
Yezhov and Kaganovich to Stalin, August 20, 1936: SKP, 637.
90
‘On the Corrupt Liberals and Double Dealers from Gosbank’; EZh, August 28,
1936. For an earlier report on Gosbank inefficiency, see K. Arsen’ev, ‘Why is
Gosbank Silent?, EZh, July 20, 1936, which strongly reproves the board of the bank
for failing to use loans to encourage the mass production of consumer goods.
 The Political Context of Economic Change, 1936 293
state in order to finance the terrorist bandit group of Trotskyites and
Zinovievites’, and condemned the party group for supporting him
during the exchange of party cards in 1935.91 The author of the
newspaper article reported that the meeting of the party group held
to discuss a critical resolution from the Moscow party lasted four
days, August 17–20, but failed to expel two associates of Arkus until
the last day. The crucial point in the report was its criticism of the
conduct of Mar’yasin, who was evidently summoned back to
Gosbank to attend the meeting:

Cde. Mar’yasin spoke at the meeting. However, he did not find

appropriate words to fully recognise his guilt, to recognise the fact
that, as he was closely associated with and warmly connected with
Arkus, that it was his lack of vigilance more than anyone else’s, which
was blunted, that he bears full responsibility for the atmosphere of
lack of control which surrounded Arkus, a traitor and an agent of the
counter-revolutionary Trotskyite–Zinovievite gang.92

Mar’yasin was arrested on December 23, 1936, and sentenced to

death on September 10, 1937.
Meanwhile, compromising evidence had been collected against
Pyatakov since July. He was arrested on September 12, and simulta-
neously dismissed from his post in Narkomtyazhprom.93 In terms of
practical leadership Pyatakov was by far the most important person,
apart from Ordzhonikidze, both in Vesenkha and in its successor
Narkomtyazhprom; he had been first deputy chairman since July
1934. This dramatic act was not reported in the press, but soon
became widely known among economic officials.
Pyatakov’s arrest was followed eleven days later by an event fortu-
nate for those anxious to find evidence of a terrorist plot: an explosion
in the Kemerovo coal mine in Siberia, in which ten miners were

91
This report, and the events it describes, were evidently a reaction to the attack
on Arkus, and on Tumanov, head of Prombank, on the same grounds, by Reingold
in his evidence presented for the Zinoviev–Kamenev trial (see SKP, 637 – Kaganovich
to Stalin, August 20).
92
EZh, August 28, 1936. The principal charge against Arkus in this report was that
he had met Kamenev in 1932; Arkus explained this as a ‘casual, holiday’ occasion.
93
Testimony implicating Pyatakov as ‘leader of the Ukrainian terrorist centre’ had
been obtained from one of those arrested during the preparations for the Zinoviev–
Kamenev trial (see SKP, 681, Kaganovich to Stalin, August 17).
294 The Political Context of Economic Change, 1936
killed.94 Two days later, on September 25, Yezhov replaced Yagoda as
head of the NKVD, and in due course Kemerovo became the pretext
for a well-publicised trial of a ‘counter-revolutionary Trotskyite
wrecking group’, opened in Novosibirsk on November 20.95
The Kemerovo trial was the most prominent event in the harry-
ing and persecution of economic officials in the last weeks of 1936.
Of the 823 senior officials holding posts on the nomenclature of
Narkomtyazhprom, 11 were dismissed in the spring and summer
of 1936, but as many as 44 in the last weeks of the year.96 Among
the victims were Rataichak, head of the chemical industry, Glebov-
Avilov, director of Rostsel’mash, and S. M. Frankfurt, the famous
leader of the Kuzbass construction.97 Narkomtyazhprom was not
the only commissariat to be affected.98 Yu. A. Lifshits, prominent
scourge of the ‘limit theory’, was dismissed from the deputy chair-
manship of Narkomput’ and arrested. By the end of 1936
bewilderment and fear were widespread among economic officials.

In public the year ended with the adoption of the new Soviet con-
stitution, accompanied by enormous publicity and supported by
praise for the new flourishing of democracy and freedom. But
simultaneously the year ended with an event about which nothing
was known publicly until after the collapse of the USSR. In
December 1936 at a plenum of the party central committee
Bukharin and Rykov were accused of the basest treachery. Stalin,
evidently dissatisfied because they continued to insist on their inno-
cence, proposed that a decision about their case should be post-
poned to the following plenum.99 The Soviet political scene had
strikingly changed as compared with a year earlier. The December

94
This event and its consequences are carefully analysed in W. Z. Goldman (2007),
Terror and Democracy in the Age of Stalin, 97–104.
95
On November 16 the Politburo ruled that the trial was to be conducted by the
Supreme Court on circuit, headed by the notorious Ulrikh, and that all the accused,
including a German citizen, were to be sentenced to death (RGASPI, 17/162/20,
art. 231).
96
Khlevnyuk (1993), 87–8. Nine of the 11 and 34 of the 44 were arrested.
97
For Glebov-Avilov and Frankfurt, see index to vol. 4.
98
Lobov, People’s Commissar of the Timber Industry, was dismissed, though at
the time this was presented as due to the failure of the industry rather than to his
treachery.
99
For this plenum, see Izvestiya TsK, 7, 1989, and Getty and Naumov, eds (1999),
300–30.
 The Political Context of Economic Change, 1936 295
1935 plenum was quite fully reported, celebrating the triumph of
Stakhanovism, and almost nothing was said about the continued
existence of internal enemies. This calm public atmosphere contin-
ued to prevail in January 1936, when TsIK met to consider the
annual economic plan and state budget. But by December 1936 the
Soviet Union was about to enter upon the darkest two years of its
history.
 CHAPTER ELEVEN

1936: ‘THE STAKHANOVITE YEAR’

The extremely rapid development of industry in 1936 was equalled

only by its performance in the mid- and late-1920s. Growth in the
1920s largely depended on restoration of pre-revolutionary capital.
In the mid-1930s it also largely resulted from the use of existing
capital – the bringing into use and partial completion of the vast
investments undertaken in the first five-year plan. In 1934–36, the
rate of growth of industry increased annually, and reached its pre-
war peak in 1936. This success was celebrated by the publication of
an unprecedented number of informative economic surveys, month
by month and quarter by quarter. These reports, largely written by
economists already highly regarded in the 1920s, were remarkable
for a degree of frankness which had temporarily disappeared in the
early 1930s, and was not to be resumed until after Stalin’s death.

(A) THE ADVANCE ACCELERATES, JANUARY–JUNE 1936

Normally, a temporary decline took place in the January–March

quarter, due partly to the winter conditions and partly to a lull fol-
lowing the intense efforts to achieve the annual plan, a universal
feature of the final quarter of every year. In January–March 1936,
however, large-scale production actually exceeded the level of
October–December 1935 by 1.4 per cent, even though the launch-
ing of the Stakhanov movement in that quarter had resulted in a
particularly rapid growth of production. This remarkable result
meant that production was 32.1 per cent greater than in January–
March 1935,1 and exceeded the quarterly plan by 3–5 per cent.2
In January–March 1936 Narkomtyazhprom industry was more
successful than industry as a whole: gross production was 6.1 per cent

1
EZh. January 22, 1936.
2
Estimated from data in quarterly plan (RGASPI, 17/3/974, dated December
30, 1935), which stated that the plan for the first quarter amounted to 23.5–24
per cent of the annual plan for Union and local industry (these and later figures
excluded cooperative industry, but this was a very small proportion of the total).

296
 The Advance Accelerates 297
greater than in October–December 1935.3 Narkomtyazhprom
reached or exceeded the plan in many major industries, including
electric power, oil, iron and steel and non-ferrous metals, and chemi-
cals and cement. Oil and non-ferrous metals had lagged behind the
plan in previous years. The machine-building and metalworking sec-
tor also increased rapidly. The most alarming lag was in coal, which
had pioneered the Stakhanovite movement in the previous quarter: in
January–March 1936 coal production was 5.9 per cent less than in the
previous quarter (see pp. 324–6 below).4 The growth of industry as a
whole was also restricted by the poor performance of the timber and
light industries.
The April–June quarter, allowing for seasonal factors, was even
more successful. The quarterly plan for Union and local industry
proposed that production should increase by as much as 35 per cent
as compared with the same period of 1935, far exceeding the rate of
growth stipulated in the annual plan.5 But even the ambitious quar-
terly plan was exceeded: production reached 36.3 per cent above the
April–June 1935 level. The production of consumer goods increased
much more rapidly than in the first quarter, almost equalling the rate
of growth of producer goods.6
The detailed reports in physical terms in the bulletins of Gosplan
showed that this growth was general throughout nearly the whole of
industry. For 107 items listed, only 18 declined in the first six months
of 1936 as compared with the first six months of 1935, and 39
increased by 30 per cent or more.7
This rapid growth largely depended on increases in labour pro-
ductivity. In the five months January–May, labour productivity
increased by 25.9 per cent as compared with the same months of
1935, and the industrial labour force by only 7.3 per cent.8
The performance of the railways was also impressive, clearly a
result of the massive investment in rolling stock and freight in 1934

3
P, April 15, 1936 (M. Tsaguriya).
4
For production in physical terms, see Operativnaya svodka: A. Proizvodstvo 1936
(1937); for machine-building and metalworking, see Osnovnye pokazateli, January and
January–June 1937, 3.
5
RGASPI, 17/3/975. 65–66, 197–207 (dated March 7).
6
Producer goods: 37.5 per cent of April–June 1935, consumer goods 34.5 per cent
(all large-scale industry, EZh, January 22, 1937).
7
See Davies (2006), 17.
8
P, July 27, 1936 (Mendel’son). In January–March the equivalent figures were
25.1 and 7.1 per cent (P, May 26, 1936 (Mendel’son)).
298 1936: ‘The Stakhanovite Year’
and especially in 1935, together with the efficiency drive which cul-
minated in the Stakhanov movement in the last three months of
1935 (see p. 217 above). In January–June 1936 the average daily
loading of freight exceeded the January–June 1935 average by 36
per cent, and the average number of wagons loaded per day reached
89,900 in June. This was unprecedented. The distance covered per
goods train per day and the average speed of goods trains also
increased substantially.9
The growth of productivity partly depended on changes in wage
arrangements following the conference on Stakhanovism in the previ-
ous November. During the first months of 1936 the norms of output
were successfully increased. These changes and their consequences
for wages and costs are discussed below (pp. 353–4 and 358).
At the micro-level, Stakhanovism undoubtedly led to significant
improvements in various industrial practices. But the advantages were
partly or wholly cancelled out by the decline in the regularity with
which supplies were available, and in production planning generally.
There was an immediate increase in industrial accidents. Vyshinsky,
Chief Procurator of the USSR, addressed a letter to Stalin and
Chubar’ pointing out that in the first three months of 1936 accidents
in the coal and iron and steel industries were substantially higher than
in the same months of 1935. He proposed the establishment of a
government commission to study the problem.10 In June 1936 the
well-known industrialist S. P. Birman complained that accidents and
damage to furnaces had increased in April–May as a result of the
‘drive for quantity’ and the bad treatment of equipment.11 The
Utopian hopes of Stalin, Molotov and Ordzhonikidze that produc-
tion would double within a couple of years were gainsaid by experience
even before the purges disrupted the industrial economy.
Surprisingly, in view of the disastrous harvest which followed later
in 1936, in the first six months of 1936 the agricultural situation also
seemed favourable. These months were the last six months of the
agricultural year July 1935 to June 1936, in which the harvest had

9
Osnovnye pokazateli, July 1936, 68, 72–4. See also Rees (1995), 156. The number
of wagons is measured in 2-axle units.
10
GARF, 8131/37/72, 237–239 (no date). Accidents in the coal industry of the
Donbass increased from 28,390 to 31,864 (deaths increased from 235 to 261); acci-
dents in the iron and steel industry of the Donbass and Dnepropetrovsk increased
from 7,167 to 7,799.
11
Sovet pri narodnom (1936).
 The Advance Accelerates 299
been good. In the autumn of 1935 the weather was at first warmer
than usual, and the warmer weather then continued until October
1935 which made a longer sowing period possible. Eventually the
autumn sowings for the 1936 harvest took place earlier than in the
previous two years and were somewhat larger (see Table 25).
The results of the spring sowings in 1936 were much more con-
tradictory. At first the prospects seemed promising. The first sowings
up to the end of March were higher than in the previous three years.
In a memorandum prepared by Mezhlauk dated April 10, 1936, he
exaggeratedly stated that ‘most districts of the USSR are approach-
ing the completion of the spring sowing’. He pointed out that by
March 31 98 per cent of the planned repair of tractors had been
carried out in the People’s Commissariat of Agriculture (Narkomzem),
and 99 per cent in the People’s Commissariat for State Farms.12 But
the colder temperatures in April delayed the sowings and hindered
the early establishment of the grain. Throughout April, until the last
five days, sowings were less than they had been in the previous two
years, and the gap was closed only by very high levels of sowing from
the last few days of April onwards (see Table 25). This was not neces-
sarily a disadvantage. In 1933 the spring sowings had been even
more delayed, but a good harvest was achieved. In 1936 the leaders
maintained that the improved quality of landworking, together with
greater mechanisation, would compensate for any delays. Some con-
firmation of this was provided by a memorandum to Vyshinsky from
the agricultural department of the RSFSR procuracy, which reported
that if the data for 1936 about prosecutions connected with the
spring sowing were compared with the previous year ‘a sharp
reduction is very obvious’:

In 1935 the number found guilty in cases connected with the spring
sowing in the RSFSR (excluding the autonomous republics) was
44,188 (sentences put into force).
This year up to June 1 the people’s courts found 7,218 guilty
(excluding the autonomous republics) (sentences put into force).

The figures for those found guilty in 1934 had been even higher.13
The only exception in 1936 was West Siberia. But bad weather in
some other areas undoubtedly had harmful results. In Stavropol’ and
12
GARF, 5446/29/48, 11.
13
TSD iv (2002), 811–17 (prepared early August 1936).
300 1936: ‘The Stakhanovite Year’
other districts of the North Caucasus the dry winds (sukhovei ) were
protracted. According to telegrams from the North Caucasus NKVD,
substantial autumn 1935 sowings were ruined and had to be resown:

On May 14 and 15 the winds blew with their earlier strength. There
was no rain. The quantity of sown area which was destroyed increased
in recent days ... In the districts most suffering from the winds 50 to
70 per cent of the autumn sowings were destroyed.14

On the other hand, some reports from regional and republican

sections of the NKVD attributed delays in sowing, and poor quality
of sowing, to faults that could have been avoided. In Ukraine in
some cases tractors were not repaired in time or supplied with fuel,
horses were undernourished and peasants failed to work intensively
enough.15
The favourable position in agriculture after the 1935 harvest, and
on the retail market generally, was reflected in the continual decline
in prices on the kolkhoz market. The summary index numbers from
the surveys carried out in 95 towns for 32 food products sold on the
urban kolkhoz markets in June 1936 are as follows (June 1935 =
100)16:

All 32 goods 80.6

5 grain products 71.7
4 fodder products 99.3
Potatoes 59.5
4 vegetables 99.1
Vegetable oil 79.1
17 livestock and dairy products 80.7

With capital investment, as usual, the position was more compli-

cated. The main building season was of course in the summer and
14
Sovetskaya derevnya, iv (2012), 262–4 (telegrams of May 19, 1936, and later).
15
Sovetskaya derevnya, iv (2012), 252–6 (report of Ukrainian NKVD dated April 5).
16
Osnovnye pokazateli, June 1936, 271 (preliminary figures). Similar results appear
from the specific prices given for 13 products in urban kolkhoz markets in 13 towns
(ibid. 279–86). Most sales were of meat and dairy products (according to the data for
28 towns, 69.3 per cent of total sales in April–June 1935 and 71,4 per cent in April–
June 1936); sales of grain products were quite small (5 per cent of total sales in
April–June 1935 and 2.5 per cent in April–June 1936). Total sales in April–June
1936 were 29.3 per cent greater than in April–June 1935 (ibid. 256, 271).
 The Advance Accelerates 301
autumn; investment in January–June almost always amounted to no
more than 30–40 per cent of annual investment. In 1936 investment
got off to a particularly slow start, partly as a result of new regula-
tions adopted at the beginning of the year which tightened up the
requirements for the plans and estimates needed before investment
in a project was authorised.17 Even so, for the projects for which
returns were available, investment by July 1, 1936, was reported at
32.9 per cent of the ambitious annual plan. This may be compared
with the 37.4 per cent of the more modest 1935 annual plan which
had been achieved by July 1, 1935. If these partial returns are repre-
sentative, the increase in investment in the first six months of 1936
as compared with the same period of 1935 amounted in terms of
current prices to about 24 per cent.18 As in 1935 as a whole, the sup-
ply of building materials and capital equipment substantially
increased, and these resources were used with a reduced number of
building workers.19
The financial results in the first six months of 1936 were also on
the whole favourable. But the Politburo continued to be concerned
about the level of inflation. On April 29, 1936, it decided to cut
budgetary expenditure by reducing the interest on mass loans from
the population from 8–10 to only 4 per cent, and to extend the length
of the loans from 10 to 20 years; all previous loans were to be con-
verted to these less favourable terms.20 Stalin, anxious about the
indignation which these measures would arouse among the 50 million
loan holders, decided to report the matter to the plenum of the party
central committee before a public announcement. His brief statement
to the plenum on June 3 was quite frank:

This is a serious matter, comrades, which cannot be postponed. It is

a result of the need for money. As you are well aware, we spend an
alarming amount of money on things which cannot be delayed.
Expenditure is growing at a rapid rate. Much money has been spent,
and is being spent, on such matters as building schools, teachers’ pay,

17
See Davies and Khlevnyuk (2002), 882–4.
18
Osnovnye pokazateli, July 1935, 84, and July 1936, 101.
19
See Osnovnye pokazateli, June 1936, 14–15, and December 1936, 209.
20
RGASPI, 17/162/19, 160–161 (art. 75). The decision was not promulgated
as a decree of TsIK and Sovnarkom until July 1 (SZ, 1936, art, 329: see also
art. 331 – supplementary Sovnarkom decree of same date).
302 1936: ‘The Stakhanovite Year’
urban improvement, irrigation and afforestation of a number of
parts of the country, and constructing canals.
Money is being spent on defence, and even more will be spent in
future. Defence must be developed as required, both in quality and
especially in quantity. We do not yet have a navy, and a new one must
be established. This is a very serious and expensive matter.
Then it must be borne in mind that in 1937 we will begin a mass
reduction of the prices of food products and consumer goods. A
commission is working under cde. Molotov … There is already a
target of reducing prices by 10, 20 and in some cases 30%. This
circumstance will also increase the tension on our state budget.
That is the situation, comrades.21

On May 29, in the course of these proceedings, Grin’ko and

Mar’yasin sent a joint memorandum to Stalin and Molotov warning
that currency issue was exceeding the plan in the April–June quarter,
and calling on the government departments concerned with internal
trade to increase supplies to the population in order to absorb the
excess cash in circulation.22
However, on July 16 Grin’ko, in a further memorandum to Stalin,
was more optimistic. He estimated that in 1936 as a whole the plans
for both budgetary revenue and budgetary expenditure would be
exceeded; he reported that the currency issue planned for the year
would take place in full, but did not suggest that the issue would
exceed the plan.23 Then on August 23 Narkomfin sent a further
memorandum to Kaganovich and Chubar’ which reported an unu-
sually healthy state of public finance. Its figures showed that the
growth of currency issue in January–June 1936 was less rapid than
in the same period of 1935. The authors of the memorandum esti-
mated that the annual currency plan would not be exceeded.24 This
would have been a most unusual achievement … (for the plan actu-
ally adopted for October–December 1936 and the results for 1936,
see pp. 314–16 below).

21
RGASPI, 17/2/572, 34ob, 35.
22
GARF, 5446/28/9, 138–41.
23
GARF, 5446/26/61, 275–268.
24
GARF, 5446/26/64, 142–138, and supplementary memorandum on l. 148.
This is the archival file which also contains Kviring’s memorandum of August 22
(see pp. 311–12 below).
 Stakhanovism and the Economy 303
(B) STAKHANOVISM AND THE ECONOMY,
JANUARY–AUGUST 1936: THE CAMPAIGN AGAINST
SABOTAGE TEMPORARILY WITHDRAWN

During these months of economic expansion, dramatic changes took

place in the extent to which class enemies were blamed for present
economic difficulties. In these months several industries were per-
forming badly, particularly the coal industry (see pp. 324–6 below).
At the end of 1935 and in the first weeks of 1936 such defects were
treated as a failure of the Stakhanov movement due in large part to
sabotage by class enemies.25 Early in 1936 the weak spots in Soviet
industry were thoroughly investigated. In February and March the
party control commission, which was headed by Yezhov, inspected
the Sverdlovsk region in the Urals, with particular attention to the
failure of the plan for copper smelting, coal and timber. Following
this investigation, officials of the industrial department of the central
committee reported to Andreev, its head, that the defects were due
not only to accidents and hold-ups but also to the ‘unjustified repres-
sion of engineering and technical personnel’.26 Then on March 20
the situation in the region was discussed by the Orgburo of the cen-
tral committee, with the participation of Ordzhonikidze, Andreev
and Yezhov. Ordzhonikidze made only one brief remark on sabo-
tage: ‘any attempts to sabotage the Stakhanov movement will be
punished most decisively by the party’. The rest of his speech, which
occupies eleven pages in the archives, was devoted to criticism in
friendly terms of the conservatism of technical personnel, and of the
complacency which had followed the previous successes. Yezhov and
Andreev, who became two of the most vicious enforcers of the Great
Purge under instructions from Stalin, made no reference whatsoever
to sabotage, wrecking or class enemies in their speeches; nor did the
resolution of the Orgburo.27
These developments all took place behind the scenes. Then on
June 2, 1936, Pravda published a speech by Postyshev in which he
criticised Ukrainian officials for unjustified repressions, and on June
7 the newspaper published an editorial entitled ‘Lesson of the
Donbass (Urok Donbassa)’. This attributed the failure of the coal plan

25
See Davies and Khlevnyuk (2002), 882–4.
26
For these developments see ibid., 884–5.
27
For these proceedings, see RGASPI, 17/114/741, 103–113 (Ordzhonikidze),
114–115 (Andreev), 116–117 (Andreev), 53–56 (resolution).
304 1936: ‘The Stakhanovite Year’
not to wrecking but to excessive record breaking conducted for show
and to the unjustified persecution of engineers and technicians.
Ordzhonikidze was not the only member of the Politburo to reject
the view that sabotage was widespread. In April Kaganovich had
taken a similar line in relation to the railways, and at a conference on
July 30, a day after the secret central committee letter on the treach-
ery of Zinoviev and Kamenev, he declared that there were few ene-
mies on the railways, and that repression was not the way forward.28
The new deal for the managers and engineers continued even dur-
ing and after the Zinoviev–Kamenev trial. After the trial, on August
31, a central committee directive was sent to regional party secretaries
which read as follows:

Recently, in a number of party organisations, responsible officials

appointed by the central committee, and in particular directors of
enterprises, have been dismissed from their posts and expelled from
the party without the knowledge and agreement of the central com-
mittee. In this connection the central committee must make it clear
that such actions by local party organisations are incorrect.

The directive insisted that all such cases must be referred to the cen-
tral committee with supporting material.29
The directive was prepared in draft by Kaganovich and Yezhov,
and sent to Stalin on vacation by ciphered telegram on August 29.
The telegram to Stalin stated that the directive had been prepared
‘in conformity with your wishes’, so evidently Stalin had been per-
suaded – for the moment – that further repression of senior manag-
ers was unwise. The same telegram to Stalin included a draft
Politburo decision prepared by Kaganovich and Yezhov which criti-
cised Izvestiya for publishing an item entitled ‘An Exposed Enemy’.
This reported that the party organisation of the ‘Magnezit’ factory,
Chelyabinsk region, had expelled the director of the factory from the
party for assisting and protecting Dreitser, who had been executed
as a Trotskyite terrorist. The draft Politburo decision proposed that
the decision of the Magnezit party should be annulled, that the
Chelyabinsk newspaper which published this decision without check-
ing it should be reproved, that the Chelyabinsk correspondent of
Izvestiya should be dismissed for supplying Izvestiya with information
28
See Rees (1995), 140–1, 148. For the central committee letter, see below.
29
APRF, 3/22/150, 129.
 The Council of Narkomtyazhprom 305
from the local press which he had not checked, and that Izvestiya
should publish the proposed Politburo decision and a statement from
the editors of the newspaper that the offending item should not have
been published.30 On the following day, August 30, Stalin approved
this draft, and on August 31 it was adopted by the Politburo.31 On
September 1 it was published in the press.

(C) THE COUNCIL OF NARKOMTYAZHPROM,

JUNE 25–29, 1936

The June Council was the last major meeting of Narkomtyazhprom

before the death of Ordzhonikidze, and the last public hard-hitting
and fairly frank discussion of industrial faults and successes until the
industrial conference called by Bulganin in July 1955.32 It was almost
entirely free of accusations of sabotage, wrecking and treachery. In his
concluding address Ordzhonikidze openly defended the specialists:

Many of the engineers and managers who have spoken here have
recognised that so far they have not taken the lead [ in the Stakhanov
movement]. Why? Various explanations have been given. To give the
explanation that engineering and technical personnel are saboteurs is
nonsense. What saboteurs are these? In the 19 years of Soviet power
we have educated engineers and technicians in our schools and
higher education establishments, we have produced over 100 thou-
sand engineers and the same number of technicians. If all of them,
and the old engineers whom we have re-educated, turned out to be
saboteurs in 1936, congratulate yourself on such a success. What
saboteurs are these? They are not saboteurs, but good people, our
sons, our brothers and our comrades, wholly and fully in favour of
Soviet power. They will die at the front for Soviet power if that’s
needed. (Stormy and prolonged applause.)33

This line was also taken by other speakers at the Council. The
head of the coal trust Stalinugol’, A. M. Khachatur’yants, declared

30
RGASPI, 558/11/93, 135–136; 81/3/101, 77–79. The original item appeared
in Izvestiya on August 29, so Kaganovich was quick off the mark.
31
RGASPI, 558/11/93, 126; 17/3/980, 79.
32
For this conference see SS, vii (1956), 308–31 (Davies).
33
ZI, July 5, 1936.
306 1936: ‘The Stakhanovite Year’
that the main cause of the failure of its production plan was that ‘the
command staff does not work intensively as a result of the accusa-
tions which are indiscriminately made against them ... Instead of
thinking about what innovations to make ... the engineers, fearing to
be placed in the position of saboteurs or conservatives, do everything
by the letter of the law’.34 In a major speech Pyatakov, still at this
time Ordzhonikidze’s first deputy, emphasised that ‘they are our engi-
neers, the flesh and blood of our working class ... The same with the
old engineers. I think I am not mistaken when I say that at the pre-
sent time the overwhelming majority of the old engineers are strid-
ing along in friendly comradeship with the mass of the working
class.’ According to Pyatakov, if the engineers had not kept up with
the Stakhanov movement so far, the explanation was that they had
been trained in the technology of capitalist society, and now needed
to master socialist technology, in which the more advanced workers
were ahead of the engineers.35 M. I. Ul’yanova, Lenin’s sister, respon-
sible for promoting inventions by rank-and-file workers, complained
about the treatment of five workers who had been dismissed ‘for
wrecking’; this charge had made it impossible for them to find jobs
elsewhere. (Eventually they were found innocent, and the pay they
had lost was restored.)36
The Council heard reports from senior industrial officials, direc-
tors of major factories and leading Stakhanovites. The contrast
between the most successful and the lagging industries was particu-
larly striking. Ordzhonikidze spoke of ‘the fine traditions of our met-
allurgists, who at every conference, at every meeting of the Council,
do not let each other rest, criticise each other, compete with each
other, and acting together rise to the leading place in heavy industry.
(Applause.)’ The machine-building industry was in a similar favoura-
ble position. Great attention was also devoted to the lagging indus-
tries, especially coal, oil and non-ferrous metals. M. M. Kaganovich,
recently put in charge of the rapidly expanding aircraft industry,
gave a lengthy report claiming that the aircraft industry was the tech-
nically most advanced and complex industry, and that Soviet record
flights had brought great prestige to the Soviet Union. He claimed
that ‘there is no country in Europe, or in America, where aircraft
factories as large as in the Soviet Union’. At the same time, in the
34
ZI, June 28, 1936.
35
ZI, June 30, 1936.
36
ZI, July 4, 1936.
 The Council of Narkomtyazhprom 307
spirit of the meeting, he strongly criticised the weaknesses in the
industry: it had as many faults as in machine building as a whole, and
aircraft designers until recently had tended to be isolated from
practical technology and the factories.37
The general message of the Council was that present successes
must be followed by a continuing further upsurge. According to
Pyatakov:

We must not in any way, not for a single second, say that the most
important things have already been done, and that all that has to be
done is to carry out corrections and improvements.
On the contrary I consider that what is most important in the
transition of industry up to the level of socialist labour productivity
is still ahead of us, that we are still at the very beginning of advancing
to this level.

The first section of Ordzhonikidze’s address on the final day was

appropriately entitled ‘Do Not Settle Down with what has Already
Been Achieved’, and he stressed what had been a major theme of the
meeting: the need to recognise that Soviet industry still had a long way
to go before it caught up with the advanced capitalist countries. In the
section of his speech entitled ‘On the Slogan “Catch up and Overtake”’,
he strongly criticised speakers who had suggested that in important
respects Soviet industry had already reached United States’ levels. D.
Kovalev, director of the Karabash copper-smelting factory, claimed
that ‘our factory can compete with the best enrichment factories in
America’, but Ordzhonikidze indignantly replied that copper yields in
the United States were far higher than in the Karabash factory:

Comrade Kovalev is working twice as badly as America ... Where did

this dream that you have already overtaken America come from?
(Laughter)
Comrade Kovalev, if you want to overtake America, you must
study it first, so as to exceed the level you reached previously, without
believing that you are already overtaking America.38

Other speakers equally emphasised that overtaking the United

States – and capitalist countries generally – was a huge task.
37
ZI, June 30, 1936.
38
ZI, June 30, July 5, 1936.
308 1936: ‘The Stakhanovite Year’
A. Pudalov, head of the technical council of Narkomtyazhprom,
firmly pointed out:

The capitalist countries are not waiting – and will not wait – for us to
catch up. They are moving ahead; they are mastering an increasing
number of technical issues.

He contrasted conservative Soviet machine-building factories with

the factories in Western Europe, where, he claimed, the designer of
new machines was placed at the centre of factory development, and
factory laboratories played a key role.39
The crucial problem looming over plans for the further growth of
industry was of course the extremely limited availability of invest-
ment for major heavy industries. Increasing resources were allocated
to education, the light and food industries, and to defence. Typically,
Zavenyagin, director of the Magnitogorsk works, complained that
his works had not received the 17 million rubles planned for its devel-
opment, and that ‘this is paralysing our work; we cannot buy any-
thing, and lack the barest necessities’.40 Ordzhonikidze dealt with
such complaints by praising a machine-tool factory which had agreed
to fulfil its programme without the investment which it had been
allocated: ‘this is excellent, to produce more machine tools with the
same equipment, and using the same factory floor space; they don’t
press for more investment, like very many managements are inclined
to do’. Pudalov drew attention to the ‘colossal reserves’ available due
to the under-utilisation of existing machines, and contemptuously
commented that in these circumstances ‘no one will give them the
right to speak about increasing investment in machine building’.
The meeting accordingly devoted most of its attention to secur-
ing increased production with the existing capacity. Following the
decisions at the end of 1935 on increasing norms, delegates at the
Council reported that the increased output norms adopted by most
heavy industries were being successfully fulfilled by the majority of
workers. In adopting new output norms, each industry had also
revised its estimate of the capacity of existing equipment and plant.
Gurevich, head of Glavmetal, pointed out that his industry, which
had produced 31,300 tons of crude steel a day in 1935, was
39
ZI, June 28, 1936 (A. Pudalov). He cited the Khar’kov tractor factory as a suc-
cessful exception.
40
ZI, July 3, 1936.
 The Council of Narkomtyazhprom 309
scheduled in the 1936 plan to increase this to 43,400 tons. However,
the industry had now revised its plans to as much as 50,000 tons a
day. This new figure had not yet been achieved – but should itself
be seen as a step towards further progress. The full production
capacity of the industry, revised in view of the experience of the
Stakhanov movement, was now estimated at 69,000 tons a day.
Similarly Rataichak, head of Glavkhim, explained that the capacity
for producing artificial fertilisers from existing plant had previously
been estimated at 1.1 million tons, but it was now planned to reach
2 million tons, and in 1937 could reach the five-year plan target
without additional plant.41
In the course of 1936 in a number of industries the anticipated
increase in production was achieved. But rapid expansion which
depended on already existing capacity carried a price. In several
industries the substantial growth at the end of 1935 and the begin-
ning of 1936 had been achieved by delaying or skimping repairs.
The Council was told that in the iron and steel industry, for example,
production declined in April and May, partly because repairs had
not been sufficient, and partly because the adaptation of the furnaces
to more intensive production had not been properly prepared – in
one case American practice was adopted without the necessary
tests.42 At ZiM, the two leading Stakhanovites complained that they
had been unable to maintain the productivity they had previously
achieved. According to A. Busygin, insufficient metal was supplied
and his hammer was not properly repaired, while A. Faustov reported
that his hammer was not powerful enough. The technical director of
ZiM explained that factory efforts had been concentrated on prepa-
ration for the production of the new M-1 engine, and as a result the
new large repair shop had not been completed. The head of the
forging shop in which Busygin worked insisted that the situation was
better than that described by Busygin, but his own evidence revealed
that the main problem was insufficient capacity. He acknowledged
that he had been unable to stop the hammer while repairs took place
because of the urgent need to produce gears; the stock of gears was
not sufficient to tide them over while the repair took place.43

41
ZI, July 5, 1936.
42
See S. Birman (director of the Petrovskii iron and steel works), and A. Gurevich
(head of Glavmetal), ZI, July 3, June 28, 1936.
43
ZI, July 5, 1936; A. Ivanov was the technical director and B. Sokolinskii the head
of the forging shop.
310 1936: ‘The Stakhanovite Year’
In spite of these deficiencies, most industries resumed the growth
in production from June onwards. How far this pace could be main-
tained without major investment in new plant was a matter for the
future.

(D) MILD DECELERATION, JULY–DECEMBER 1936

A particularly optimistic quarterly plan for July–September was con-

fidently approved on June 9. While the Politburo decisions on the
previous two quarterly plans had been expressed in the form of
‘directives’ for the compilation of the plan, on June 9 the Politburo
firmly approved the plan as a decree of the party central committee
and Sovnarkom. Even more ambitiously than in the previous quar-
ter, it decided that the production of Union and local industry should
exceed the July–September 1935 level by as much as 42 per cent, far
above the annual plan target of 23 per cent.44 However, it singled out
four branches of heavy industry which must receive special attention
because their results for January–June had been ‘clearly unsatisfac-
tory’. Coal production had declined ever since February. Oil had
failed to reach the plan, but oil consumption had nevertheless been
excessive, and must be reduced by one-eighth in the July–September
quarter. The production of first-grade rails had also lagged, and
must be increased so that 75 per cent of the annual plan was fulfilled
by September 30. The production of mass consumer goods by heavy
industry had been ‘completely unsatisfactory’. The decree also
strongly criticised the performance of the timber industry. and
rejected the draft quarterly plan for light industry, which proposed a
temporary reduction in production.
It soon became clear that it would be extremely difficult to fulfil
this ambitious plan. Reports on the performance of heavy industry
during July noted that labour productivity had increased less rapidly
than in the previous six months, and that industrial production,
which normally declined slightly in July each year, had fallen much
more rapidly in July 1936.45 The production of key items was sub-
stantially lower than in June. These included not only the persistent
delinquents coal and oil, but also crude and rolled steel, and machine
44
RGASPI, 17/3/978, 132–150.
45
Producer goods’ output declined by 12 per cent in July 1936 but only 2 per cent
in July 1935 (Osnovnye pokazateli, June and January–June 1973, 3).
 Mild Deceleration 311
building and metalworking.46 A further report suggested that ‘the
extreme heat (zhara) which seized a large part of the USSR on the
last days of July and the beginning of August could perhaps to some
extent have reduced labour productivity’.47
The situation improved in August and particularly in September,
when large-scale industrial production exceeded the June level by
9.5 per cent. The production of both producer and consumer goods
increased.48 Production of coal rose slightly for the first time since
February, but production of oil continued to decline. In the quarter
as a whole production slightly exceeded the April–June level.49 But
the increase as compared with July–September 1935, 33.2 per cent,
while exceeding the annual plan, was less than in the previous two
quarters and far less than proposed in the quarterly plan.50
Meanwhile, the preparation of the quarterly plan for October–
December was under way. The immediate context was the poor per-
formance in July. On August 22, Kviring, deputy head of Gosplan,
sent a memorandum to Kaganovich and Chubar’ (deputising for
Stalin and Molotov) attaching a draft central committee and
Sovnarkom decree on the plan. In the memorandum he pointed out
that the plans for railway transport and internal trade were being suc-
cessfully fulfilled, but strongly criticised the performance of industry:

Fulfilment of the national-economic plan in the third quarter of this

year is unsatisfactory for a number of the most important industries.
In total, the output of the USSR People’s Commissariats and the
People’s Commissariats for Local Industry in July ... declined in
comparison with the production level in June by 5.3 per cent.

The draft decree proposed that the production of Union and local
industry in October–December should increase by 17.3 per cent as
compared with the plan for July–September; Kviring emphasised that

46
ZI, August 5, 14, 1936.
47
ZI, August 16, 1936.
48
Monthly industrial production as compared with the previous month was as
follows: July –9.5 per cent; August +7.3; September +12.8 (Osnovnye pokazateli, June
and January–June 1936, 3). The results for July–September were reported and dis-
cussed in ZI, October 5, November 15, 1936, and in EZh, October 22, 1936
(Kronrod).
49
EZh, January 22, 1937.
50
Ibid.
312 1936: ‘The Stakhanovite Year’
this would enable annual production to amount to 109 per cent of
the 1936 plan.51
This presentation by Gosplan to the political authorities carefully
refrained from mentioning that the plan for industry involved some
deceleration in the rate of growth as compared with the first nine
months of 1936. The proposed increase of 17.3 per cent was much
lower than the actual increase of 28.4 per cent achieved in October–
December 1935. If achieved it would have resulted in industrial pro-
duction which exceeded the October–December quarter of 1935 by
approximately 31 per cent.52
The draft plan submitted by Kviring also proposed that capital
investment in the quarter should amount to 7,574.6 million rubles.
This figure, which was presented without comment, amounted to
only 21.6 per cent of the annual plan. In view of the lag of invest-
ment in the first nine months, it implicitly recognised that the annual
investment plan would not be achieved.
The draft decree of August 22 was duly reviewed by the
Politburo, and their conclusions were reported to Stalin by
Kaganovich on September 2.53 Kaganovich’s telegram to Stalin
stated that ‘we discussed the question of the national-economic
plan for the fourth quarter with the People’s Commissariats’, and
listed the key planned figures. Most of these, including the plan for
industrial production, were the same as in Kviring’s memorandum.
The railway and retail trade plans were reduced slightly.54 The
only important change was an increase in the capital investment
plan for the quarter, from 7574.6 million rubles in Kviring’s docu-
ment to 7,909 million rubles. This amounted to 22.6 per cent of
the annual plan, so was only a partial correction to the shortfall in
the previous nine months.55
Stalin accepted the plan without comment, including the figure
for capital investment. All these figures, and the text accompanying
them, were incorporated in a Politburo resolution on the following

51
For the memorandum and draft plan, see GARF, 5446/26/64, 133–122.
52
We have assumed that cooperative industry production in October–December
1935 was about 1,200 million rubles.
53
SKP, 658–9.
54
The number of goods wagons per day was planned at 91,000 instead of 92,000;
freight carried at 131 instead of 136 million tons; and retail trade at 28,000 instead
of 28,500 million rubles.
55
SKP, 658–9.
 Mild Deceleration 313
day, September 3.56 Kaganovich’s telegram contained a typing error:
retail trade was given as 28 million rubles instead of the 28.5 milliard
(thousand million) rubles in the Kviring document. The error was
not noticed by Stalin and found its way into the Politburo resolution.
This correspondence with Kaganovich is strong evidence that Stalin,
preoccupied by the struggle against alleged enemies, was not seriously
concerned with the plan at this time.
The failure to fulfil the investment plan was confirmed by a mem-
orandum from Mezhlauk on behalf of Gosplan to Sovnarkom on
October 17. He pointed out that the investment plan had now
reached 36,100 million rubles as compared with the plan of 32,400
approved by TsIK at the beginning of the year, and 60 per cent greater
than the actual fulfilment in 1935. But only 47.2 per cent of this
increased plan had been carried out in the first eight months of 1936,
as compared with 54.8 per cent in the first eight months of 1935, and
the 70 per cent which would be achieved ‘if construction followed its
normal course’.57
The relatively modest production plan for the fourth quarter also
proved very difficult to achieve. Normally industrial production
increased in each of the three months October, November and
December, even though November was a short month.58 In October
production increased by 7.4 per cent. A survey of the month in the
industrial newspaper showed that production increased in nearly all
Narkomtyazhprom industries. Even the usually lagging industries
increased production, coal by 6.9 per cent and oil by 5 per cent
(though both industries failed to reach their monthly plan).59 But in
November the production of heavy industry, and industrial produc-
tion as a whole, increased only slightly. All the major branches of
heavy industry increased less rapidly than in October, and produc-
tion declined in a number of important industries, including oil
drilling, copper and many items of machine building. The produc-
tion of iron and steel, most unusually, remained at the level of
October.60

56
RGASPI, 17/3/981, 8, 97–111.
57
GARF, 5446/20/62, 170.
58
The November 7–8 holiday and the 30-day month reduced the number of days
by 10 per cent.
59
ZI, November 4, 1936.
60
See ZI, December 5, 1936. The production of vehicles, goods wagons, combine
harvesters, machine tools and ball bearings declined.
314 1936: ‘The Stakhanovite Year’
At the beginning of December, an editorial in the industrial newspa-
per ‘The Last Month of the Year’, criticised the growth of coal produc-
tion as ‘completely insufficient’, but on the whole remained optimistic:

It can be affirmed that in the year as a whole the plan will be fulfilled
106–106.5 per cent. By the new year heavy industry will also compete
its second five-year plan.61

This conclusion, though it proved true, was based on the success-

ful growth in the first nine months of the year, and particularly in the
first six months. In December, industrial production as a whole
declined by 4.3 per cent. In the fourth quarter as a whole, production
was only 24.8 per cent greater than in the fourth quarter of 1935, as
against the planned increase of 31 per cent, and the quarterly plan
to increase production by 17.3 per cent above the level of the third
quarter was not achieved.62 And on the railways, the number of
wagons loaded per day was only 11 per cent greater than in October–
December 1935, and was lower in absolute terms than in both
April–June and July–September 1936.63
During the last quarter of 1936 a great deal of attention was devoted
to the currency. On June 29 the Politburo had authorised the net issue
of currency amounting to 500 million rubles in July–September.64
Actual issue was successfully kept to this limit (see Table 21). The
planned issue for October–December was also fixed at 500 million
rubles, which would have meant that issue had kept within the annual

61
ZI, December 9, 1936.
62
The monthly percentage changes as compared with the previous month were as
follows:

October November December

Means of production 2.6 –1.1 –2.9
Means of consumption 4.1 0.7 –8.3
All large-scale industry 7.4 0.8 –4.3
Source: Osnovnye pokazateli, June and January–June 1937, 3.
63
Osnovnye pokazateli, December 1936, 130. The average daily number of goods
wagons declined from 92,000 in September 1936 to 86,500 in October, 84,000 in
November and 80,400 in December (Osnovnye pokazateli, November and January–
November 1937, viii).
64
RGASPI, 17/162/20, 2.
 Mild Deceleration 315
plan of 1,300 million rubles.65 This proved far more difficult to achieve.
On October 28 the Politburo agreed to issue temporarily a further 400
million rubles to cover payments for agricultural deliveries and to
ensure that workers were fully paid their wages before the November
holidays, but insisted that this sum must be returned well before the
end of the year.66 A week later, on November 5, it authorised the issue
of a further 100 million rubles on the same strict conditions.67
However, in the course of November it became abundantly clear
that it would be impossible to return these extra currency issues by
the end of the year. In order to reduce the accumulation of cash in
the hands of the population, the authorities decided to issue addi-
tional supplies of bread in the fourth quarter in spite of the bad
harvest. In October–December the sale of flour to the bakeries and
the population amounted to 3,390,000 tons, slightly greater than the
plan and more than in any previous quarter.68 But although this deci-
sion was to cause considerable difficulties in the first six months of
1937, it did not solve the currency problem.
On December 5 Grin’ko and Kruglikov (who replaced Mar’yasin
as head of Gosbank) addressed a frank memorandum to Stalin and
Molotov.69 They stated that ‘the income and expenditure of Gosbank
in the 4th quarter have shaped up so that Gosbank does not have suf-
ficient money to pay out wages without interruption and satisfy the
other requirements of the economy’. They gave five reasons for this:

(1) the increase in the cotton collections had increased payments by

800–900 million rubles above the plan;
(2) in the first fifty days of the quarter wage payments had exceeded
the plan by 470 million rubles: wages were supposed to be
11 per cent greater than the plan for July–September, and in fact
were 20 per cent greater;
(3) savings bank deposits were about 100 million rubles less than
planned;

65
RGASPI, 17/162/20, 83 (dated September 27).
66
RGASPI, 17/162/20, 112.
67
RGASPI, 17/162/20, 115 (dated November 5).
68
The amounts of flour sold (thousand tons) were January–March 2,934; April–
June 3,203; July–September 3,500; October–December 3,590: total for year 13,227,
12.9 per cent more than in 1935 (Osnovnye pokazateli, December 1936, 258–9).
69
GARF, 5446/16a/412, 3–5. Molotov forwarded the memorandum to the deputy
chairs of Sovnarkom, Rudzutak and Chubar’.
316 1936: ‘The Stakhanovite Year’
(4) various unexpected payments included sovkhoz wage arrears of
50 million rubles and 100 million rubles for aid to mothers with
many children;
(5) the only additional income was 700–750 million rubles from the
additional bread sales – and Narkomlegprom had failed to sup-
ply commodities for trade in October to the value of 250 million
rubles in retail prices.

Grin’ko and Kruglikov accordingly requested that 300 million

rubles’ non-returnable currency issue should be permitted in
October–December, in addition to the 500 million rubles already
agreed, 800 million rubles in all.
On December 10 the Politburo accepted part of this claim, so that
non-returnable issues in October–December would amount to 700
rather than the original plan of 500 million rubles.70 But financial
reality soon outdistanced the Politburo decision: net issue in October–
December in fact amounted to 782 million rubles (see Table 21).

(E) THE FAILURE OF THE 1936 HARVEST

When the plans for 1936 were drawn up in the autumn of 1935, it
was envisaged that grain production would increase from 90.1
million tons in 1935 to 103.8 million in 1936 (of course these official
figures assume the usual exaggerated estimates of the size of the
harvests), primarily as a result of the increase in yield from 9.4 to
10.2 tsentners per hectare.71 In mid-July 1936, the plans for grain
delivery to the state were approved by the Politburo on the assump-
tion that a good harvest would be achieved (million puds):

(1) Deliveries by kolkhozy (735.2) and individual peasants (18.7) =

753.8; Payments in kind to MTS: 478.0; 72
(2) Return of grain loans by kolkhozy (155.9) and sovkhozy (8.6) =
164.5;73
(3) Milling levy 87.9.74
70
RGASPI, 17/162/20, 130.
71
RGAE, 4372/34/417a, 64, 4372/35/467, 85–86.
72
RGASPI, 17/3/979, 90–92 (dated July 11).
73
RGASPI, 17/3/979, 30–31 (dated July 13).
74
RGASPI, 17/3/979, 44 (dated July 18).
 The Failure of the Harvest 317
The total, which does not include deliveries by sovkhozy or zakupki,
amounted to 1484.2 million puds, or 24.3 million tons. This quite high
figure obviously assumed that in spite of the difficulties with the spring
sowing (see pp. 299–300 above) the planned harvest would be achieved.
Reports of the bad effect of dry winds and drought on the harvest
began to appear soon after harvesting began. According to the
NKVD report from the Voronezh region on July 20:

the delayed spring, the sukhovei at the beginning of the harvest, the
insignificant precipitation during May and June, and its uneven dis-
tribution in the region, created unfavourable conditions for the initial
and further development of the spring crops ... The dry weather and
strong winds in the period from June 20 to July 6 disrupted the
normal growth of the spring crops in many districts of the region.

As a result, the estimate for the yield of spring wheat, 7 tsentners a

hectare on June 15, declined to 6 tsentners on July 1.75 A month later,
NKVD reports from the Stalingrad and Kursk regions noted similar
developments. In the Stalingrad region

in several districts ... in connection with the low yield of grain, par-
ticularly from the spring sowings, unhealthy attitudes appeared among
some of the collective farmers; in some districts there were tendencies
to depart on unofficial otkhodnichestvo to the towns, and these tenden-
cies also existed in districts where the grain yield was more favourable.

Collective farmers, particularly women, failed to turn up for work in

the kolkhoz, arguing that it was better to work on their own plots as
75
Sovetskaya derevnya, iv (2012), 278–80; report of the Voronezh NKVD dated July
20, referring to the situation up to July 15. These reports, located in the KGB
archive, are published extensively in Sovetskaya derevnya. They typically give accurate
accounts of the agricultural situation plus a strong emphasis, as with nearly all
NKVD documents, on alleged ‘counter-revolutionary’ activities. They were nor-
mally sent to Stalin’s and Molotov’s secretaries, to the central committee secretaries
(at this time Yezhov, Kaganovich, Andreev and Mezhlauk), and to the head of the
agricultural department of the central committee (Yakovlev). Thus Mezhlauk, who
was head of Gosplan, received them, but as they were classified as secret or top
secret it is not clear how far he was able to pass on the information in them to his
Gosplan staff. In addition internal NKVD reports were sent by the regional NKVDs
to Molchalov as head of the secret political department of the NKVD, and deal
primarily withdisruption and disorder in the kolkhozy and in the countryside. These
have been extensively published in TSD.
318 1936: ‘The Stakhanovite Year’
the collective grain would fail anyway. There were cases where col-
lective farmers bought up loaves and dried them as rusks, and this
practice continued until advances of grain were issued for work in
the collective fields. In the Kursk region, as a result of ‘the unfavour-
able meteorological conditions this year, and also the effect of the
unsatisfactory spring sowing in a number of districts, the grain yield
in some districts was lower than last year’; in consequence collective
farmers left to work in sovkhozy or in factories.76 An NKVD report
from the North Caucasus dated September 4 noted that

as a result of the lengthy sukhovei in May and June in the Stavropol’

area and in a number of the former Kuban’ districts, considerable
damage to the autumn and spring sowings has been observed; in
many kolkhozy up to 50% of the whole sown area has perished ... In
some former Kuban’ districts at the beginning of harvesting the grain
yield was estimated at 4–7 tsentners per hectare; but as a result of the
large losses permitted during the harvesting the yield was even lower.

In some kolkhozy not enough grain was grown even to meet the
grain deliveries and repayment of the grain loans, and so they would
need seed and food loans. Moreover, the drought in the spring and
summer threatened the survival of livestock, which was the main
branch of farming in a number of districts.77
In spite of such unfavourable reports, Gosplan engaged in a com-
plicated manoeuvre in which, while reducing the harvest evaluations
for previous years, it increased the plan of grain production in 1936
from 103.8 to 104.8 million tons.78 At this time Stalin displayed con-
siderable complacency about the agricultural situation. He received a
message from Kaganovich and Molotov proposing that high officials
should be sent to regions where the grain collections were lagging, and
that Pravda and Izvestiya should criticise these regions more strongly.
But in a reply dated September 5 he objected to these proposals:

I think the grain procurements are going pretty well. We cannot

demand that the pace keep increasing if there is a drought on the

76
Sovetskaya derevnya, iv (2012), 292–3, reports dated August 13 with data relating to
August 8.
77
Sovetskaya derevnya, iv (2012), 300–5 (report relating to the situation up to
September 1).
78
RGAE, 4372/35/467, 86.
 The Failure of the Harvest 319
Volga and the harvest in Siberia is a full 20 days behind last year due
to climatic conditions. We will collect the grain in Siberia, but it will
be late. I consider the directive to newspapers that they criticise the
regions ‘more strongly’ to be tactically wrong, since such criticism will
only benefit the fascists’ agitation about ‘famine’ in the USSR. We
should not get nervous and give in to Kleiner’s screaming. We will
collect the grain in any case. We may collect a tiny bit less than last
year, but we don’t even need any more. We can just send people, but
there is no reason to raise a clamour in the press.79

Stalin was on vacation from August 14 to October 25 and, as usual,

was consulted by Kaganovich about all the proposed changes in the
grain plans. The record shows that the letter of September 5 reflects
his calm attitude to the harvest difficulties. It is tempting to conclude
that he had in mind the large grain reserves which had been accu-
mulated, though they were not mentioned in the correspondence. In
passing on the regional proposals and their own proposal to Stalin,
Kaganovich and Molotov explained to him the reasons for the pro-
posals, and their effect on the regional grain deliveries plan. Appendix
A to chapter 12 summarises the correspondence. Stalin replied to 14
proposals, but suggested a change on only four occasions, and on
three of these proposed a greater concession to the regions than that
proposed by Kaganovich and Molotov.
Stalin’s attitude to the zakupki was less tolerant than his comments
on the normal grain collections. On October 5 Kaganovich and
Molotov proposed a zakupki plan, divided by regions, amounting to
173.2 million puds (as compared with 218 million in 1935). Stalin
replied on the same day seeking an increase for eight RSFSR regions
and Ukraine, as follows: Ukraine 5, Azov 1.5, North Caucasus 1,
Kuibyshev 1, West Siberia 1.5, Stalingrad, Moscow, Orenburg and
Crimea .5 each. The total addition amounted to 12 million puds,
giving a zakupki plan of 185.2 in all (3.03 million tons).
Throughout the autumn the reports from the regional NKVDs
and other local authorities about the harvest and the situation in the
countryside were unambiguously pessimistic. A large number of
regions were affected. In the Kursk region, in a number of kolkhozy
collective farmers left independently to work in sovkhozy or on build-
ing sites. The grain shortage also affected the situation in the towns,
even though they were provided with earmarked supplies. ‘In towns,
79
SKP, 661.
320 1936: ‘The Stakhanovite Year’
district centres and in Kursk itself the sale of grain was disrupted’,
resulting in queues for bread in the shops and ‘unhealthy attitudes
among sections of the manual and office workers’.80 In Voronezh
region, the poor harvest meant that many kolkhozy could pay their
members very little per labour-day worked, and in a number of dis-
tricts the kolkhozy could not fulfil their obligations to the state and
lacked seed for the 1937 spring sowing. This report, like others, noted
that lack of fodder meant that collective farmers had to sell off their
personal livestock.81 In the Yaroslavl’ region, ‘in a number of kolk-
hozy in districts which were investigated the food situation is very
tense’.82 In the North Caucasus, in many districts the grain situation
was worse than expected, the crop of maize and sunflower had com-
pletely failed, and vegetables and cucurbits had also been affected.
Food assistance was essential:

Some of the collective farmers in the districts affected by drought,

especially those with many children, have no grain stocks and acquire
grain either by barter or by purchasing loaves in shops.83

West Siberia was one of the few regions in the Russian republic which
reported a ‘generally very good harvest’, but even here a group of
districts was affected by drought and needed food and fodder help.84
Through all these troubles the authorities struggled desperately to
obtain grain deliveries and grain payments for the MTS. Stalin on
vacation received regular telegrams from his assistant Dvinsky on the
state collections. The last of these reported that by October 20 1,319
million puds (21.6 million tons) had been received as compared with
1,476 million puds (24.2 million tons) on the same date in 1935.85
Eventually, 23.5 million tons were received in 1936/37, as compared
with 26.0 in the previous year.

80
NKVD report of October 10, referring to situation on October 5: TSD, iv
(2002), 844–8.
81
NKVD report of October 13, referring to situation on October 10: TSD, iv
(2002), 850–3.
82
NKVD report of October 15, referring to situation on October 10: TSD, iv
(2002), 856–7.
83
NKVD report of November 22, referring to situation on November 16: TSD, iv
(2002), 886–90.
84
TSD, iv (2002), 857–8, 862.
85
TSD, iv (2002), 858 (telegram dated October 23). He received similar reports on
August 23, September 13 and 23 and October 2.
 CHAPTER TWELVE

THE SUCCESSFUL OUTCOME OF 1936

As we have seen, 1936 was a transitional year both politically and

economically. The appointment of Yezhov as People’s Commissar of
Internal Affairs following the Zinoviev–Kamenev trial ushered in a
period of vicious repression coupled with economic difficulties. The
last three months of 1936 saw a sharp deceleration in the growth of
the economy. But the year as a whole was a great economic success.
The bad harvest of 1936 was due to the weather, not to any internal
difficulties, and its consequences took effect only in 1937.

(A) INDUSTRIAL PRODUCTION

On January 3, 1937, Ordzhonikidze, in an enthusiastic but fairly

frank communiqué (raport) published in the newspapers, and
addressed to Stalin and Molotov, reported that as early as December
14 the annual plan for heavy industry, including the defence industry,
had already been fulfilled. He estimated that by the end of 1936
production in Narkomtyazhprom industries would have increased by
34.1 per cent as compared with the planned 26.0 per cent. In the first
eleven months of the year output per worker had increased by 26.5
per cent, exceeding the planned 23 per cent. Costs in the first nine
months of the year had, however, been reduced by only 5.6 per cent
as compared with the annual plan of 8 per cent. Other weaknesses
included the lag of the coal, oil mining and non-ferrous metals
industries behind the plan, and the failure of ‘some’ defence factories
to reach their plan.1
Three days later the commissariat issued an elaborate report on
results in physical terms.2 It extolled the ‘tremendous victories’ dis-
played in its columns. In the machine-building industry for example,
10 per cent more tractors had been produced than planned, and the
production of ball bearings, though slightly less than planned, had
increased by 75 per cent, ‘not a bad result’. It also drew attention to

1
ZI, January 3, 1937, accompanied by a commentary by L. Volodin.
2
Summarised in ZI, January 6, 1937.

321
322 The Successful Outcome of 1936
failures. Transport engineering (the great success of the previous
year) had been ‘a backward sector throughout the whole of 1936’.
But no complacency was permitted, On January 20, 1937, a stern
editorial in Pravda entitled ‘The Backwardness of Non-Ferrous
Metallurgy is Intolerable’ made it clear that heavy industry had no
grounds for complacency:

In the past year alone the smelting of these metals has increased by
more than one third. But nevertheless this is small, extremely small.
We are a great and mighty power, and this is the fifth year in which
the volume of our industrial production has been the largest in
Europe. But in copper smelting we are in the fifth place, in zinc pro-
duction in the fourth place, and in lead in the sixth place. This no
longer suits us, comrades industrialists!

The editorial excoriates ‘some directors’ of copper factories who

complained that their plan was ‘very tense’: they should ‘work, not
whinge’.3
In further communiqués, considerable achievements were claimed
for Narkomlegprom of the RSFSR by Ukhanov and for retail trade
turnover (including public catering, a lagging sector) by Veitser.4
Although these results were impressive, many industries had lagged
behind the second five-year plan, and henceforth the optimistic aim
of achieving the second plan, like the first, in only four years was less
frequently mentioned.
The successful outcome of 1936 was also proclaimed by Gosplan
in an article, ‘The Most Important Results of the Stakhanovite Year’,
published in the economic newspaper on New Year’s day 1937.5 The
article claimed that the growth of industrial production had been
more rapid than in the previous three years and that the increase in
1936 had been 80 per cent greater than total industrial production in
1913. It particularly praised Narkomtyazhprom, which by exceeding
its plan for labour productivity had compensated for the underfulfil-
ment in the other industrial commissariats. A few weeks later, on the
anniversary of the foundation of the Red Army, Rukhimovich, head
of the new People’s Commissariat of the Defence Industry, warned
in an article in Pravda that the fascist powers, armed with the latest
3
P, January 20, 1937; the last phrase is a quotation from Stalin.
4
ZI, January 4, 1937.
5
EZh, January 1, 1937 (E. Kviring, deputy head of Gosplan).
 Industrial Production 323
technology, were preparing to wage total war against the Soviet
Union; all industry had been mobilised so that it could launch a
lightning blow within 24 hours. He optimistically claimed that these
plans did not take into accoount the Achilles’ heel of the fascist
powers – ‘the class contradictions of capitalist society will inevitably
grow sharper’. The Soviet Union, which had built up its civilian
heavy industry, would be able to carry the war into enemy territory.6
In 1936 the production of consumer goods, measured in 1926/27
prices, increased by 27.2 per cent, exceeding the annual plan by
5.8 per cent. Both the light and food industries exceeded their plan.
Light industry production increased by 30.8 per cent, somewhat
more rapidly than the food industry.7 The production of cotton
textiles, which constituted nearly one-third of all light industry pro-
duction, increased by 29.6 per cent, and the production of boots
and shoes by over 49 per cent.8 These increases measured in value
terms were, as usual, somewhat greater than the increases in physi-
cal terms, but even in physical terms, which presumed no improve-
ment in quality or in the complexity of production, the rates of
increase were very high: 23.9 per cent for cotton textiles, 37.3 per
cent for leather footwear (see Table 6). In the food industry, the
production of meat and meat products expanded particularly
rapidly (see Table 7).
During 1936 the production of both the commissariats for local
industry and the industrial cooperatives also expanded rapidly; most
of their output consisted of consumer goods. In 1936 local industry
supplied 43 per cent of the output of light industry, and its light
industry production increased by 26 per cent.9 The production of
the industrial cooperatives increased by as much as 41.8 per cent.10
Heavy industry also made considerable progress in producing con-
sumer goods, from a rather low level. Total production of mass con-
sumer goods by heavy industry increased by 71.7 per cent, and
included 486,000 bicycles (+65.8 per cent), 445,000 sewing machines
(+19.6 per cent) and 4,385 tons of metal utensils (+258.7 per cent).11

6
P, February 23, 1937.
7
Osnovnye pokazateli, December 1936, xxxii.
8
Osnovnye pokazateli, December 1936, 8–9.
9
Osnovnye pokazateli, December 1936, 4–5.
10
Osnovnye pokazateli, December 1936, 8–9.
11
Osnovnye pokazateli, December 1936, xxxvii.
324 The Successful Outcome of 1936
(B) THE CRISIS IN THE COAL INDUSTRY

The coal industry was the most important exception in the rapid
progress of industry. In 1936 as a whole, coal production increased
from 109.6 to 126.8 million tons, or by 15.7 per cent, but the indus-
try failed to maintain the progress it had achieved when the Stakhanov
movement was launched in the fourth quarter of 1935. In the first
six months of the year, production declined from 359,000 tons per
day in December 1935 to 320,000 tons in June 1936. Production
rose in the second half of the year, but even in December it was
5,000 tons per day lower than in December 1935.
This poor result was at first attributed to sabotage and conserva-
tism, but already by the spring of 1936 better counsels prevailed –
for a few months. In the summer of 1936 reports and articles by
senior industrial figures showed that a principal cause of the coal
failures should be sought in labour problems. A decline in the labour
force was combined with lower productivity. The total number
employed in the industry fell from 300,000 in 1935 to 256,000 on
August 1, 1936. The decline was particularly severe at the coal face,
where the number working fell from 99,000 in 1935 to 79,000 on
August 1, 1936, accelerating the trend which could already be
observed in the first three years of the five-year plan.12 Output per
worker also declined, from 21.2 tons per month in October–
December 1935 to 20.6 tons in April 1936.13 In his speech to the
Council of Narkomtyazhprom, Ordzhonikidze commented that
‘these were sad results’; and even admitted that they had been accom-
panied by a questioning of the Stakhanov movement and, during
February and March, by its ‘intensive elimination’.14
A major reason for workers’ decisions to leave the coal face was
the effect of the increase in norms in the early part of the year. The
management in the mines had accepted an increase of 24–25 per cent,
already difficult for the average worker to achieve, but Glavugol’ revised
this to as much as 31 per cent.15 In consequence of the failure of the
average worker to reach this figure, wages declined in February and

12
ZI, September 11, 1936 (unsigned article).
13
ZI, June 27, 1836 (Bazhanov’s report to the Council of Narkomtyazhprom).
14
ZI, July 5, 1936.
15
ZI, June 28,1936 (A. Khachatyurants, Stalinugol’).
 The Crisis in the Coal Industry 325
March.16 Workers were already demoralised by the decision of
Glavugol’, contrary to the collective agreement, to charge workers
rather than the enterprises for the cost of municipal services, water
and electricity.17 Moreover, as a result of the inadequate preparation
of the introduction of the new norms, ‘many accidents’ resulted.18
According to senior figures in the industry, coal machinery had been
allowed to deteriorate, or even develop serious faults, so that its pro-
ductivity was lower than it should have been.19 The editor of a local
newspaper in a mining area summed up the effect of all these
deficiencies on the miners:

Some workers move to the countryside, including workers graded

‘excellent’, and shock workers, leaving behind the disorder and stu-
pidity prevailing in a number of mines.20

As an immediate step to overcome the labour shortage at the coal

face, early in July Ordzhonikidze ordered that 10,000 workers should
be transferred from the surface to the coal face.21 In the course of
September, 7,000 were transferred, and were granted their old rate
of pay for a month even if they failed to reach the norm.22 But the
industrial newspaper pointed out that even by the beginning of
October many of those transferred had already returned to the
surface.23
The senior mining specialist, Academician A. Terpigorev, insisted
that ‘only the replacement of labour-intensive manual operation by
machinery will enable an increase in the general productivity of the
workers’.24 Ordzhonikidze himself acknowledged that ‘we must not
delay in the question of mechanisation’.25 In the course of 1936 the

16
ZI, June 28, 1936 (Bazhanov). Pyatakov also referred to the decline in wages in
his address to the Council (ZI, June 30, 1936).
17
ZI, June 28, 1936 (M. Smirnov, Karaganda).
18
ZI, June 30, 1936 (M. Stroilov, chief engineer, Kuzbass).
19
PKh, 8, 1936, 28, 30 (Academician A. Terpigorev); ZI, June 28, 1936
(M. Smirnov).
20
ZI, June 30, 1936 (I. S. Kaplan, from the newspaper ‘Kadievskii proletarii’).
21
See ZI, September 11, 1936 (unsigned article).
22
ZI, October 4, 1936 (Bazhanov).
23
ZI, October 4, 1936 (editorial comment).
24
PKh, 8, 1936, 22.
25
ZI. July 5, 1936.
326 The Successful Outcome of 1936
supply of coal machinery was substantially increased.26 But, as we
have seen, existing machinery was badly treated, and the increase did
not prove sufficient to enable an immediate increase in production.

(C) THE ARMAMENTS INDUSTRY

The armaments industry, in some difficulty in 1935, in 1936 pre-

sented a sharp contrast with the coal industry. In 1936 an unprece-
dented increase in the production of armaments accompanied the
increase in investment in the industry and in the armed forces, and
the growth in the size of the armed forces (see pp. 95–6, 291–2, 340
above). The figures for the production of armaments vary consider-
ably. The lowest estimate is that total production of the armaments
industry, including its civilian production, measured in 1926/27
prices, increased by 53.3 per cent (see Harrison and Davies (1997),
383), but we do not have the figure for purely military production,
which probably increased as a proportion of the total production of
the armaments industry. A higher figure, an increase by as much as 105
per cent, was recorded for armaments purchased by the armed forces,
measured in current prices. This somewhat overestimates the
increase, as some price inflation took place (some subsidies to the
cost of armaments were abolished in 1936). The extent of
the inflation is not clear from the information available. In November
1936 the chief of the General Staff complained that ‘there is no
military item for which we have not had a price increase by 10, 20, 30
or more per cent’ during the year.27 One official document, however,
put the increase in armament prices at only 8.6 per cent in 1936,
while another stated that in the spring and summer of 1936 prices
of the military production of Narkomtyazhprom increased by 14 per
cent.28 But even the Harrison number-of-weapons index increased
by 60 per cent, and this index does not reflect the improvement in
quality and sophistication of weapons. This was the most dramatic
development since the growth in armaments in 1931–32, following
the threat from Japan. In 1936 armaments production was more
than twice as great as in the final year of the first five-year plan four
years earlier.
26
See RGAE, 7297/28/313, 13, 20–21.
27
RGVA, 4/14/1626, 15 (Egorov to Voroshilov, November 3, 1936).
28
Simonov (1996), 93, citing GARF, 8418/11/7, 83.
 The Armaments Industry 327
The year 1936 was a golden one for the aircraft industry. At the
beginning of the year, on January 8, STO, while criticising ‘insuffi-
cient attention to quality’, claimed with some justification that ‘in
view of its strength, technical equipment and preparedness, it is
already fully possible that the industry will become the first in the
world’; by the beginning of 1937 the quality of its main aircraft and
engines ‘should at the very least not be lower than the best European
and American models’.29 In the outcome, aircraft production in
1936, measured in current prices, was two-and-a-half times as great
as in 1935, increasing from 19.2 to 24.1 per cent of all armaments
production. The number of aircraft produced increased by ‘only’ 44
per cent, but this figure conceals a major improvement in the type of
aircraft. The production of the most advanced fighter, the I-16, a
monoplane which replaced the I-15 biplane, increased by 70 per
cent, from 531 to 906. According to the principal Russian authority,
who was by no means uncritical of the industry, ‘in 1936 the air
forces of other countries did not yet produce an analogous fighter’.30
The technical advance in the production of bombers was equally
significant. The giant TB-3 four-engine all-metal bomber was com-
pletely redesigned by Tupolev’s team, and equipped with a more
powerful engine. In 1936 it achieved several international records.31
Production increased by 53 per cent. An even more important devel-
opment in 1936 was the successful batch production of the high-
speed SB, also designed by Tupolev. The efforts to begin batch
production of the SB in 1935 had failed. But in 1936 the SB was
produced from the beginning of the year. It was equipped with two
M100 engines, Soviet adaptations of a French engine on licence
from the firm Hispano-Suiza. The SB achieved a range of 1,250
kilometres and a speed of over 400 km per hour.32 In 1936 there was
also a large increase in the production of training aircraft, and it was
the peak year for the production of civil aircraft (see Table 4). The
number of aero-engines produced, which had declined in 1935,
increased by 53 per cent, primarily as a result of the successful
launching of two new factories into mass production in Perm and

29
Data from Rodionov (see Bibliography).
30
Samoletostroenie, i (1992), 157 (K.Yu. Kosminkov).
31
See Nemecek (1986), 127–8.
32
Ibid. 146–8; Samoletostroenie, i (1992), 238.
328 The Successful Outcome of 1936
Voronezh.33 A report about aircraft R and D from M. Kaganovich
to Molotov, dated March 11, 1937, claimed that the speed of most
aircraft had been increased and their fuel consumption reduced.34
The air force had been clamouring for these developments, and
when the 1936 plan was prepared Voroshilov even complained that
it was too modest. But the air force was somewhat overwhelmed by
this huge expansion. On October 15, 1936, Alksnis, the head of the
air force, reporting to the military council of Narkomoborony,
emphasised the importance of ‘the supply of new hardware (materi-
alnaya chast’ ) – aircraft and engines, and their armaments and equip-
ment’. The new aircraft required ‘much greater knowledge and
culture in their management, maintenance and exploitation’. The
SB flew at twice the speed of its predecessors, and ‘the pilot’s cabin
contains three times as many instruments and comtrols’. In conse-
quence all the airmen concerned were spending 2–4 months in mas-
tering the new technology.35 Voroshilov, in his concluding speech at
the council four days later, also stressed the impact on the air force
of the sudden supply of large numbers of more advanced aircraft:

This year our air force has been re-equipped with new hardware.
Our airmen have been confronted by hardware of which they had
no conception, and had to master it as they went along. They had to
learn not only to master the new hardware but to use it in battle. In
the main our airmen have mastered it, but only in the main.
A tremendous amount of work on a large scale lies ahead.36

These favourable developments did not take place without a great

deal of fierce argument behind the scenes. During the year, the
industry, in spite of the opposition of the air force, launched an
ambitious scheme, apparently on the initiative of Tupolev, to join
together the efforts of the rival design bureaux to design and manu-
facture an aircraft which would combine long-distance reconnais-
sance with a light bomber. Substantial design resources were involved,
but without success. Later commentators concluded that as a result
the production of an adequate aircraft to support the ground forces

33
Samoletostroenie, i (1992), 428–9. The construction of these factories began in
1931.
34
Stanovlenie (2011), 619–23.
35
Voennyi sovet okt. 1936 (2009), 209.
36
Voennyi sovet okt. 1936 (2009), 427.
 The Armaments Industry 329
was delayed by two years.37 Tupolev at this time was at the height of
his powers: on January 6 he was appointed first deputy head and
chief engineer of the Chief Administration of the Aircraft Industry
while remaining chief designer of TsAGI. He was not without his
enemies. At the end of the year, on December 11, Khakhan’yan, the
member of the powerful control commission who was responsible
for overlooking the aircraft industry, issued a series of strong attacks
on his leadership, claiming that he blocked the work of other design-
ers and that his aircraft designs were of poor quality, and questioning
his continuation in his post.38
The tank industry also made major strides forward in 1936. The
number of tanks produced increased by 29 per cent, but this figure
does not reflect the major improvements in the type of tank.
Measured in current prices, military orders of tanks and vehicles
increased by 109 per cent. The light tank T-26, based originally on
the Vickers 6-ton model, had been produced in large numbers since
1932, and continued to be mass produced at the ‘Bolshevik’ factory
in Leningrad throughout the 1930s. Throughout the 1930s a huge
number of major and minor additions and improvements were
made, and were reflected in the increase of its weight by 1936 to over
nine tons. The number of new T-26 tanks equipped with radio also
increased annually, and in 1936 amounted to 63 per cent of the
total. Simultaneously batch production began of the other main light
tank, the BT (bystrokhodnyi tank – fast tank). The BT had been
designed and manufactured since 1932 at the Khar’kov Loco Works
(KhPZ) on the basis of the US Christie tank. The BT was equipped
with both caterpillar tracks and wheels, and when the tracks were
removed it could travel much faster over land.The version produced
in large numbers in 1936 was the BT-7, a much-improved model,
equipped with an M-17 aero-engine made at the Rybinsk factory,
and with both a cannon and a machine gun.39 The BTs were heavier
than the T-26s: the BT-7 weighed 14 tons. The BT-7 was strongly
supported by the military. At the military council in October 1936,
Khalepskii, head of armaments in the Red Army, declared that

37
Perov and Rastrenin, i (2001) 27–9.
38
See Rodionov, and Mukhin (2006), 208–9, citing GARF, 8419/11/80, 11.
Mukhin wrongly claims that Tupolev had already been arrested at this time, but in
fact he was not arrested until October 21, 1937, and seems to have been in favour
with Stalin until then.
39
Svirin (2005), ch. 8.
330 The Successful Outcome of 1936
‘it would be expedient to provide brigades which are now equipped
with the T-26 with a more rapid machine in addition, like the BT-5
or BT-7, for example, which would increase the mobility of the
reconnaisance sections of mechanised brigades’. This tank would be
used by the officer in charge of the brigade.40 At the same council
the head of staff in the Transcaucasus reported that in the moun-
tains the BT-7 could manage an incline of 35o at 19 km an hour
while the T-26 could only manage 20o at 12 km an hour, and the
head of staff in Belorussia complained that tank brigades equipped
with T-26 tanks were ‘insufficiently manoeuvrable ... I raise the
question of re-equipping T-26 mechanised brigades with BT-7s’.41
Another important development was the partial replacement of
T-37 small tanks with the newer T-38s. Both T-37s and T-38s were
amphibious one-man tanks based on a Vickers-Carden Lloyd model,
and like the T-26 were made at the ‘Bolshevik’ factory. Both were
equipped with GAZ-AA 40 hp engines. The T-38 incorporated a
number of modifications.42
Throughout the 1930s only a small number of medium and heavy
tanks were produced, but their numbers also substantially increased
in 1936. The most important was the medium T-28 tracked tank,
weighing 28 tons. It was armed with a 76.2 mm (three-inch) gun, as
well as machine guns. It carried a crew of six, and could reach a
speed of 37 km an hour.
Unlike the aircraft industry, which seemed to be moving from tri-
umph to triumph on the international scene, the tank industry was
already haunted by the shadow of foreign successes. In May 1936
the prominent Soviet designer S. A. Ginzburg reported that ‘at the
present the best foreign tanks are overtaking ours in every respect
except their armament’ – Czech, Japanese and French tanks were
already being made with greater mobility and stronger armour plat-
ing.43 The problem of the poor armour plating of Soviet tanks
increasingly confronted the industry, reaching its culmination in the
disasters of June and July 1941.
The more traditional defence industries also performed excep-
tionally well in 1936. In current prices, artillery orders increased by

40
Voennyi sovet okt. 1936 (2009), 140–1.
41
Voennyi sovet okt. 1936 (2009), 154, 201.
42
Baryatinskii (2007), 48–50.
43
Svirin (2005), ch. 8.
 The Capital Investment Campaign 331
96 per cent. The number of artillery pieces rose rapidly.44 The mili-
tary had been engaged for some years in preparing new guns. The
traditional divisional gun was the 76 mm gun of 1902, redesigned in
1930. On June 14, 1935, three versions of a new 76 mm gun,
designed by V. G. Grabin, were considered. The one which became
known as the F-22 was approved for batch production, which began
in 1936. The ammunition industry also developed rapidly in 1936,
from its previous low level. The plan for cartridges was exceeded; five
times as many special-purpose cartridges were produced as in the
previous year, as well as three times as many aircraft bombs and
three-and-a-half times as many shells.45
Orders for naval shipbuilding and naval aircraft increased by 69 per
cent in terms of current prices, and – exceptionally – ships entering
the navy, measured in tons, increased more rapidly – by as much as
113 per cent! Two-thirds of this increase was due to the commissioning
of as many as 46 submarines. Muklevich, in a report to Stalin, Molotov
and others, dated January 7, 1937, on behalf of the navy, often a
severe critic of the industry which supplied them, enthusiastically
praised the work of both shipyards and their suppliers.46

(D) THE CAPITAL INVESTMENT CAMPAIGN

A major attempt to modernise the building industry was launched by

the Conference on Questions of Construction held in the Central Committee of
the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks). This took place between
December 10 and 14, 1935, a few days before the plenum of the
central committee which discussed Stakhanovism. It was attended by
350 prominent managers of large-scale building projects and of the
building materials industries. Nine members of the Politburo took
part, including Stalin, who was present on the last day. It heard

44
While small-calibre guns increased by only 9 per cent, the production of the
much more costly medium guns increased by 55 per cent, and large-calibre guns,
produced in small numbers, by as much as 92 per cent.
45
Stanovlenie (2011), 577–81 (report by K. F. Martinovich to Voroshilov dated
January 1, 1937).
46
Stanovlenie (2011), 586–96. These figures, if considered on an annual basis, are
unreliable. Owing to the long construction period, annual fluctuations in comple-
tion varied greatly: in 1937 orders in terms of current prices increased by 11 per
cent but the ships entering service measured in tons were only 22 per cent of the
1936 level.
332 The Successful Outcome of 1936
reports from Mezhlauk, head of Gosplan, and S. Z. Ginzburg, head
of Glavstroiprom (the Chief Administration of the Building Industry
of Narkomtyazhprom). Molotov summed up the proceedings, and
the conference was addressed by 45 speakers, including Ordzhonikidze,
Kaganovich, Mikoyan and Khrushchev.47
The conference was held only eight months before the Zinoviev–
Kamenev trial, the first major public trial of the ‘Great Purge’, but
it was almost free from attacks on the former oppositionists. Molotov
criticised ‘1928 views on industrialisation’, but without mentioning
Bukharin by name, and Khrushchev made a brief conventional
attack on ‘the Trotsky-Zinoviev opposition and the right-wing oppor-
tunists’, but did not castigate them as class enemies.
Following the conference, two major decrees were promulgated on
February 11, 1936. The decree of Sovnarkom and the party central
committee, ‘On the Improvement of Construction Activities and the
Reduction in Construction Costs’, which was already being drafted
during the conference, was approved by the Politburo by poll.48
Simultaneously, the Council of Labour and Defence adopted a sup-
plementary decree ‘On the Reduction of the Cost of Production of
Building Materials and Components’.49 The decrees were primarily
concerned with industrial building. They resolved that building
organisations should be established for the coal, hydro-power, ther-
mal electric power, iron and steel and oil industries, and that in each
industry these should be supplemented by specialist building organi-
sations for heating, sewage and water. Building materials should also
be manufactured by specialised trusts, though these would often
work for the major industrial building organisations. In all these
activities contracts between the client and the builder would replace
direct labour. On each site a ‘general contractor’ would be responsi-
ble for the work as a whole, itself signing contracts with the specialised
trusts.
Both decrees strongly emphasised the importance of mechanisa-
tion. Some progress had already been made with the replacement of
manual labour by machines. The total number of excavators had
increased from 700 to 1,000 in 1935, and of cranes from 310 to 330.50

47
The conference was widely publicised in the daily press, and the verbatim report
was published as Soveshchanie (1936).
48
Published in SZ, 1936, art. 70.
49
Published in EZh, 14 February 1936.
50
Soveshchanie (1936), 20 (Mezhlauk).
 The Capital Investment Campaign 333
The Sovnarkom and central committee decree required that ‘up to 60
per cent’ of earth work should be mechanised in 1936, and set similar
targets for quarries and for the transport and production of their
output.
The decrees paid much attention to the need for economy. Under
the influence of Stakhanovism, labour productivity in construction
was planned to increase by ‘at least 30 per cent’ in 1936. To encour-
age this, following the example of industrial production, the output
norms for workers in the industry should be substantially raised, so
that the wages received per unit of output would be reduced. The
provision of finance would be tightened up. While financial arrange-
ments would be more flexible as a result of providing each building
organisation with its own working capital, the role of banks in con-
trolling expenditure would sharply increase. According to the decree:
‘Payment should be made in accordance with invoices based on
acceptance certificates (akty priemki ) for the work carried out, approved
by the client.’ The invoices should be prepared on the basis of the
prices fixed in the cost estimate attached to the technical project, and
reduced by the planned reduction in building costs.
With these reforms, the authorities hoped to secure the long-
anticipated reduction in the cost of investment. In August 1935 the
government agreed to reduce costs in 1936 ‘by at least 8 per cent
in comparison with the estimate costs of 1935’.51 The decree of
February 11, 1936, proposed that pure building costs should be
reduced by at least 14.5 per cent as compared with the estimate costs
of 1935 and that all investment costs (including the cost of capital
equipment) should be reduced by at least 11 per cent.
Mechanisation was the heart of the programme. In 1936 the sup-
ply of excavators and other machinery again increased.52 Some pri-
ority sites even reported a surfeit of machines. According to the
engineer responsible for the second phase of the main ball-bearing
factory 1-GPZ, his site was ‘saturated’ with machinery, almost reach-
ing the United States’ level.53 But generally machines were still in
short supply. The industrial newspaper published a long list of items
of equipment not yet received.54 Even the 1-GPZ site lacked small
machines and spare parts. And the available machines were often of

51
EZh, August 28, 1935 (STO sitting of August 23).
52
See Osnovnye pokazateli, December 1936, 20–1.
53
ZI, September 21, 1936 (K. Myagkov).
54
ZI, October 24, 1936 (A. Berezin).
334 The Successful Outcome of 1936
poor quality and used inefficiently.55 In consequence the amount of
soil moved per day by Soviet excavators was only one-third of that
moved by United States’ excavators of the same capacity.56
Mechanisation was to be accompanied by the replacement of
temporary and seasonal manual labour by a skilled permanent
labour force. By 1936 wages in Glavstroiprom were only 5 per cent
lower than in large-scale industry, and could be supplemented by
private work in the evenings. In Glavstroiprom a quarter of the
workers now remained at the same site for more than two years. But
this was a step on a long road. Only a quarter of the workers had
received specialised training, and when workers left a site they still
tended to move into industry rather than to other building sites.57 At
the Voroshilovgrad loco works most builders spent only one or two
years at the site, and were poorly-educated youngsters. Plasterers,
glaziers and erection workers were scarce.58 In building as a whole,
labour turnover failed to decline in 1936, and some increase took
place in absence without due cause.59 In spite of these deficiencies.
output per worker continued to increase substantially, and more rap-
idly than wages.60 Although the amount of building work (‘pure con-
struction’) substantially increased, the labour force slightly declined,
from 2,268,400 to 2,182,000.61
The decrees of February 1936 on the building industry recognised
that the success of the capital investment plan depended on a sub-
stantial increase in the supply of building materials. The STO decree
of February 11 allocated 644 million rubles to the building materials’
industry, and called for the use of ‘advanced industrial methods’ in
their production. A total of 56 large quarries should be mechanised,
and large brickyards should be established which would work all the
year round instead of seasonally. In Moscow, Leningrad,

55
See, for example, ZI, October 10, 1936 (A. Berezin): concrete mixers newly
produced at factory No. 67 were ‘very unsatisfactory’ and switches on hand-held
electric saws lasted only one day.
56
ZI, September 21, 1936 (B. Ronin).
57
ZI, October 11, 1936 (V. Ratkov).
58
ZI, October 16, 1936 (G. Rymolov).
59
The number of workers leaving increased from 235 to 241 per cent a year, and
registered absence without due cause increased from 1.87 to 2.42 days per year
(GARF, 1562/10/468, 15, 14, dated 1937).
60
Output per man day increased by 22.6 per cent, wages per man day by 19.2
per cent (GARF, 1562/10/357, 2–4 [1937]).
61
GARF, 1562/10/468, 11 (1937).
 The Capital Investment Campaign 335
Dnepropetrovsk and Sverdlovsk central factories should manufac-
ture finished concrete, and in Moscow and Leningrad reinforced-
concrete factories should be completed or re-equipped.62 In April a
conference on local building materials chaired by Chubar’ declared
that the results in January–March had been ‘extremely unsatisfac-
tory’, especially in the case of brick.63 Following the conference, a
further STO decree called for increased brick production by the
People’s Commissariats of Local Industry and the industrial coop-
eratives.64 In July, an investigation of the local brick industry by the
central party control commission again found ‘very poor’ results, and
reproved two key officials for adopting a plan for April–June which
was too modest.65 These cries of woe gave the impression that little
had been achieved; and certainly the ambitious programme to mod-
ernise the building materials’ industry made little progress. But a
TsUNKhU report on the first six months of the year, while strongly
criticising the industry for failing to achieve its plan, announced very
large increases in production.66 Production continued to increase in
the remainder of the year. In 1936 as a whole the production of
bricks was 40 per cent, of cement 30.8 per cent and of window glass
25.9 per cent greater than in 1935.67
Least successful was the timber industry: production of rough tim-
ber increased by only 17 per cent. A report on the production of
building components from timber described the ‘extremely tense
position for raw materials’.68 The average daily number of wagons
of building materials made from timber carried by the railways
increased by only 11.4 per cent in 1936, while the equivalent figure
for mineral building materials was as high as 73.3 per cent.69 The
Powell index estimates that the total production of building materials
increased by 34.9 per cent. This was the most rapid increase for any
year in the 1930s, and the pre-war peak (the 1936 level was not
reached again until 1949).
However, the poor quality of building materials was strongly
emphasised. Chubar’ praised the brick industry for exceeding its
62
See EZh, February 14, 1936.
63
P, April 16, 1936.
64
P, July 14, 1936 (citing decree dated May 9).
65
P, July 14, 1936.
66
ZI, August 27, 1936.
67
Promyshlennost’ (1957), 291, 277, 312.
68
ZI, October 20, 1936 (S. Nakhmarson).
69
Osnovnye pokazateli, December 1936, xxvi.
336 The Successful Outcome of 1936
plan but stressed that the increase of 60.4 per cent achieved in 1936
had not been accompanied by an improvement in quality.70 The
industrial newspaper claimed that ‘brickyards responsible for millions
of bricks produce nothing but wastage (brak)’. The permitted maxi-
mum tension on a brick had been reduced from 15 to 6.6 kilograms
since the mid-1920s, so that wall thickness had to be substantially
increased.71
During 1936 the drive to replace direct labour by contracts
between clients and building organisations progressed in a wide
range of industries. The most comprehensive developments took
place in Glavstroiprom, where specialised building trusts were estab-
lished responsible for earth work (Soyuzekskavator), electrical instal-
lations (Stroielektro) and housing (Zhilstroi).72 But elsewhere in
industry direct labour arrangements were still widespread. In the
Dnepropetrovsk region ‘work by contract did not increase’ and
80–85 per cent of building jobs in industry and transport and com-
munications were still conducted by direct labour, including such
major undertakings as the enlargement of the major iron and steel
works in the region.73
The switch to the contract system involved the adoption of
stronger regulation of the approval of projects. From 1936 the esti-
mate for a project was to be firmly based on the technical project,
which was described as ‘the only document for determining the cost
of construction’. Approval was beset with difficulties. Some 157 of
the 254 projects financed by the Moscow regional office of Prombank
were sent back as inadequate.74 A meeting of Sovnarkom in October
concluded that the estimates on which contracts were based were
generally of poor quality, and instructed Grin’ko to prepare proposals
for improvement.75
The difficulties of the switch to the new system, coupled with the
increase in the number of contracts, reinforced the seasonal delays
at the beginning of the year usual in the building industry, and
according to one commentator ‘transferred the centre of gravity of
70
ZI, February 15, 1937.
71
ZI, February 17, 1937.
72
EZh, October 4, 1936 (E. Gol’dberg). 38 per cent of the total Glavstroiprom
contract programme was undertaken by the specialised organisations (1,000 out of
2,600 million rubles).
73
EZh, September 20, 1936 (S. Gorelik and A. Bogdanenko).
74
EZh, September 29, 1936.
75
ZI, October 12, 1936.
 The Capital Investment Campaign 337
construction work to the second half of the year’.76 Even in
Glavstroiprom only 65.9 per cent of the annual plan was completed
in the first nine months of the year.77 Moreover, these figures exag-
gerated what had been achieved. In Glavenergo power stations with
a capacity of 602,000 kW were due to be completed in 1936, but by
the end of September only 100,000 kW had been installed.78
In view of their failure to spend all their financial allocation, the
spending commissariats wanted to continue the allocation after the
end of the calendar year. In December a draft decree of Sovnarkom
proposed, however, that the grants for 1936 should not be continued
after December 31. A most unusual revolt occurred. The minutes
record that Ordzhonikidze registered his objection to the proposal,
and Kaganovivh, Lyubimov and Rozengol’ts abstained. The decree
was nevertheless promulgated on December 28.79
The outcome of the capital investment plan for 1936 was reported
in the press quite cautiously, as it was obvious that the ambitious
programme to increase investment by 50 per cent had not been
achieved. Ginzburg claimed that Glavstroiprom itself had achieved
the target of increasing the capital investment for which it was
responsible by about 50 per cent, largely as a result of the increase
of building machinery. Nevertheless, he described this merely as the
‘first advances’ in turning a backward sector into large-scale industry,
and emphasised the perfidious role of wrecking by the ‘Pyatakov
gang’.80 At first no figures for investment appeared in the press.
Eventually the 1937 plan, published in March 1937, stated that
investment as a whole in 1936 amounted to 31,750 million rubles in
current prices. This was a mere 16.9 per cent greater that the stand-
ard figure for 1935. But later sources, and data in the archives, state
that investment including the new category ‘extra-limit expenditure’
amounted to 35,500 as compared with 27,200 in 1935, an increase
of 30.5 per cent.81 This seems a fairly realistic figure. It roughly coin-
cides with the Powell indicator for ‘pure construction’, which shows
76
ZI, October 4, 1936 (E. Gol’dberg).
77
ZI, November 12, 1936 (Narkomtyazhprom order). For Narkomtyazhprom as a
whole, the percentage was only 59.6.
78
ZI, October 16, 1936; the delay was attributed to the failure of suppliers to
deliver turbogenerators.
79
GARF, 5446/1/122a, 458–459 (art. 8/187).
80
ZI, February 11, 1936.
81
Granovskii and Markus (1940), 43; RGAE, 1562/1/1039 [1937], 243; GARF,
1562/11/20, 3 [1938 or 1939].
338 The Successful Outcome of 1936
an increase of 34.9 per cent (see Table13), greater than the increases
in 1934 and 1935.82 Later archive data fairly consistently show an
increase of 30 per cent.83
In spite of the large increase in investment, it proved as difficult as
in the previous year to cater for the rival priorities facing the econ-
omy: defence, consumption and the continued growth of basic
industry. Construction by Narkomoborony increased by as much as
112.3 per cent, and investment in the armaments’ industries by 62.1
per cent (see Table 8).84 Simultaneously investment in the food, light
and local industries increased by 48.1 per cent and in internal trade
by 59.8 per cent. Other services for the consumer received smaller
increases. Investment in the commissariats of education and health
increased by 28 per cent. And in spite of the publicity for the housing
programme, investment, which had increased by one-third in the
previous year, increased hardly at all in 1936.85 Investment by the
state in agriculture increased by a modest 16.1 per cent, partly
because of the drastic cut in investment in sovkhozy, whose perfor-
mance had failed to justify the huge grants they had received in
previous years.
The defence and consumer sectors together received increases in
investment amounting to 4,241 million rubles, more than half the
total increase in investment. This meant that transport and the basic
industries had to be content with much smaller increases. Investment
in transport increased by only 14.2 per cent, less than half the rate
of increase of investment as a whole. In 1935 top priority was given
to investment in the railways, but in 1936 investment increased by
only 10.1 per cent, and postal and other communications also
received only a small increase. However, within the transport sector
investment in the main roads, the northern sea route and the civil air

82
The other main component of investment, equipment and erection work, which
comprises about one-third of all investment, increased less rapidly than ‘pure con-
struction’ in 1936; according to data in the archives, excluding extra-limit expendi-
ture, in 1936 pure construction increased by 21.2 per cent, and expenditure on
equipment and erection by only 8 per cent (GARF, 1562/10/469, 1 [1937]).
83
For the slight increase in investment costs in 1936, see Table 12.
84
Investment in the NKVD increased by 45.5 per cent, and much of this was
defence-related (including factory no. 62, Dal’stroi and the Baikal–Amur railway);
but we do not know how this expenditure was classified in the investment data.
85
Total investment in housing, including investment in housing attached to the
commissariats, was 2,974 million rubles as compared with 2,918 million rubles in
1935.
 The Capital Investment Campaign 339
fleet, all obviously strongly defence-related, increased much more
rapidly.86
In spite of the valiant efforts of Ordzhonikidze and his colleagues,
Narkomtyazhprom, as in the previous years of the second five-year
plan, received far smaller increases than nearly all the rest of the
economy. Excluding the armaments’ industries, investment in heavy
industry increased by a mere 7.4 per cent. Investment in priority
industries within Narkomtyazhprom nevertheless increased substan-
tially. Investment in non-ferrous metals increased by 30.6 per cent,
and for the first time equalled investment in iron and steel (in 1933
it had had been only 42.8 per cent of iron and steel investment).
Copper, nickel and zinc received the most rapid increases.87
Investment in chemicals increased by 27.3 per cent, primarily as a
result of a large allocation to the defence-related nitrogen industry.
Allocations to the oil industry increased by 32.2 per cent. Building
and building materials also received substantial increases in their
allocations: the investment in Glavstroiprom and in the cement
industry more than doubled. But other industries were cut back. As
in previous years, the allocation to the iron and steel industry was
reduced, in 1936 by as much as 25.6 per cent. Within the iron and
steel group, only special steels received a small increase in their allo-
cation. Surprisingly, in view of the difficulties in the coal industry,
investment in Glavugol’ was reduced by 26.2 per cent: investment in
the coal industry had been greater than investment in oil in 1933, but
now it was less than half of the oil investment.
Very sharp changes also took place in the machine-building indus-
tries. The largest expansion was in the vehicle industry, where invest-
ment almost doubled. The two major factories – the Stalin works
(ZiS) in Moscow, which produced cars, and the Gor’kii auto works
(GAZ), which produced lorries – received over 90 per cent of the
allocation to Glavavtoprom.88 These two factories alone received the
equivalent of four-fifths of the total allocation to the coal industry.
With the effort to switch from wheeled to caterpillar tractors invest-
ment in the tractor industry also increased. In contrast, swingeing
cuts were made in the allocations to other branches of heavy engi-
neering. The allocations to the Uralmashzavod and Novo-Kramatorsk
plants, the pride and joy of the machine-building industry in the first
86
See RGAE, 1562/10/468, 5, 6 (1937).
87
RGAE, 1562/10/582a, 8 (January 31, 1939).
88
RGAE, 1562/10/582a, 61.
340 The Successful Outcome of 1936
half of the 1930s, were reduced by one-third, and investment in
transport engineering, which had been given top priority in 1935,
was also sharply reduced.89
The contrast between the priority and non-priority sectors was
striking. Defence and the consumer sector, which accounted for
38.5 per cent of total investment, received 52 per cent of the
increase in investment. But the transport and heavy industry sec-
tors, which between them accounted for 44.7 per cent of all invest-
ment, received only 24.4 per cent of the increase. Sharp changes
were also made within sectors. Although priority was given to the
consumer, allocations to public catering were reduced and the allo-
cation to housing stagnated.90 Although heavy industry received
only a small increase in its allocation, as we have seen, several of its
sectors received large increases. The pressure of events and policies
meant that the simple arrangement that key branches of heavy
industry were always favoured in the distribution of investment,
characteristic of the first years of Soviet industrialisation, had now
been abandoned.
In 1935, for the first time in the 1930s, the value of projects com-
pleted had equalled that of investment. In the hope of continuing
this progress, in April 1936 a Sovnarkom decree listed new factories,
power stations and mines valued at 9,000 million rubles to be com-
pleted by Narkomtyazhprom by the end of the year.91 In October, a
meeting of Sovnarkom addressed by senior politicians and officials
from the industrial and transport commissariats resolved that they
should concentrate their efforts in the remainder of the year on com-
pleting work at major sites.92 A few weeks later the industrial news-
paper reported that many completions had been achieved, but cited
cement and electric power capacity as still lagging.93
In the outcome, work completed in 1936 exceeded the 1935 figure
by 3,486 million rubles. But investment had increased more rapidly,
so a gap between investment and completions again appeared,
amounting to 4,724 million rubles, equal to 13.3 per cent of 1936
investment. Not surprisingly, the gap was widest in Group A indus-
tries and in transport, but information is not available to enable us to

89
RGAE, 1562/10/582a, 13.
90
For similar changes within the armaments’ industries, see pp. 326–31 above.
91
EZh, April 18, 1936.
92
ZI, October 18, 1936.
93
ZI, December 4, 1936.
 Expansion of the Gulag 341
estimate how far the wider gap was due to the launching of new
projects. In transport, the lag was particularly great in water trans-
port, due to investment in major new canals which were still under
construction.94 The gap was particularly large in the case of the
NKVD. Investment amounted to 2,694 million rubles, but projects
completed only to 1,423 million. Most of the gap was explained by
the large investments in major projects not yet completed, including
the Baikal–Amur railway, factory no. 83, the main roads administration
and Dal’stroi.95

(E) EXPANSION OF THE GULAG

The substantial programme of capital construction for which the

NKVD was responsible by 1935 was taken further in 1936. On
January 15 an Administration for Special Construction was estab-
lished within the NKVD following the decision that it should con-
struct the major new grain storage facilities for the Committee of
Reserves.96 On March 4 Tsudotrans, which had been transferred to
the NKVD in the previous year, was reorganised by a Sovnarkom
decree into GUSHOSDOR, the Central Administration for Major
Roads. Blagonravov, who had long been associated with the security
services, was transferred from Narkomput’ to head the new organi-
sation.97 These two organisations, together with the Moscow–Volga
canal, which was nearing completion, absorbed a considerable
amount of NKVD capital investment98:

1936
Grain stores 388
GUSHOSDOR 816
Moscow–Volga canal 720

On February 2, the NKVD was also made responsible for construct-

ing two further railway lines.99

94
See the tables in RGAE, 1562/10/531a, 70–71 [1938].
95
RGAE, 1562/10/582a, 6.
96
Svobodnaya mysl’, 2, 2000, 112 (Kokurin and Petrov).
97
Ibid. 113.
98
GARF, 5446/20a/461, 1.
99
GARF, 9414/1/2947, 72, 75.
342 The Successful Outcome of 1936
As a result of these developments capital investment by the NKVD
increased from 1,852 million rubles in 1935 to 2,690 milllions in
1936, an increase of 45 per cent, rising from 6.8 to 7.5 per cent of
all investment (see Table 8).100 The three items listed above alone
accounted for over 70 per cent of NKVD investment in 1936.
Industrial enterprises managed by the NKVD also on the whole
operated successfully. Gold production by Dal’stroi increased from
14.5 tons in 1935 to over 30 tons in 1936, and in both years the plan
was exceeded.101 In the Ukhta-Pechora camp, production of coal
and oil, as yet in small quantities, increased substantially.102 On July
10, 1936, an NKVD order praised the managers of the Temnikov
timber camp for overfulfilling their plans: ‘they accomplished the
great task of supplying Moscow with firewood and providing timber
for major Soviet building sites’.103
Industrial production still, however, occupied only a minor part of
NKVD activity, which was concentrated on the large-scale building
projects. In October 1936, according to Gulag data, 1,095,000 pris-
oners in camps and colonies were engaged in economic activity,
divided as follows (thousands):

138.7 (12.7 per cent): road building (GUSHOSDOR);

598.7 (54.7 per cent): major NKVD projects, including Dal’stroi,
the grain stores, the Moscow–Volga canal, the Baikal–Amur
railway (BAM), the White-Sea Baltic combine, Volgostroi,
the Ukhta-Pechora camp, Noril’stroi and various railways;
117.2 (10.7 per cent) working for projects in other government
departments, particularly Narkomtyazhprom and Narkomles,
including the Magnitogorsk combine and the Chelyabinsk
tractor factory.

100
According to alternative figures, investment in the NKVD including allocations
by other government departments amounted to 1,700 million rubles in 1935, and in
November 1936 was expected to amount to 3,380 million rubles in estimate prices
of 1935 (GARF, 5446/20a/461, 1); however, these high figures was evidently not
achieved in practice.
101
Production figures for 1936 vary from 32.5 to 33.4 tons: Khlusov (1998), 76;
Shirokov (2000), 103.
102
GARF, 9414/1/2947, 51.
103
GARF, 9401/12/94, 53–54.
 Expansion of the Gulag 343
The remaining 22 per cent of prisoners were engaged in agricul-
ture and in industrial production, mainly to maintain the
camps, and in minor building projects.104

These results were obtained with a somewhat smaller camp popu-

lation than in the previous year. The population of the camps and
colonies declined from 1,296,500 to 1,196,400 in the course of 1936
(see Table 24), largely a consequence of various amnesties and the
early release from the Gulag of shock workers, invalids and old peo-
ple: 369,544 were released from the camps as compared with 211,035
in 1935 (these figures do not include the colonies). The number of
special settlers also declined, from 1,017,000 to 917,000 (see Table 24).
As a result of the stability of the number of prisoners and the gen-
eral improvement in the economy, the conditions of prisoners some-
what improved and the number of deaths and illnesses continued to
decline. The camp administration was anxious to improve labour
productivity in view of the stability of the labour force and the con-
siderable increase in the tasks imposed on the Gulag. NKVD inter-
nal documents devoted a great deal of attention to financial and
labour discipline, and to the health of the camp population.
The need to meet construction and production targets led to a
relaxation of the very close control previously imposed on the camps.
The practice of allowing prisoners to be transferred freely from
camp to camp became widespread (so-called transfer without a con-
voy – raskonvoirovanie). Such arrangements prevailed in the Ukhta-
Pechora camp,105 in some Far Eastern camps,106 on the White-Sea
Baltic combine,107 and even with the work carried out on the
Moscow–Volga canal near Moscow.108 This enabled the administra-
tion to make many savings: they needed less of the scarce staff which
managed the convoys, and were able to reduce greatly the time spent
on mustering the prisoners and checking their numbers.
A standard provision of the camp regime which was frequently
violated was the instruction that prisoners sentenced for political
reasons could not take on administrative functions. These were usu-
ally the most skilled and best-educated prisoners, and could act as a

104
TsAFSB, 3/3/520, 9–11.
105
GARF, 9414/4/11, 135.
106
GARF, 8131/27/111, 8.
107
See Cahiers du monde Russe, vol. 43 (2002), 161–2 (N. Baron).
108
GARF, 9489/2/35, 47, 9489/2/76, 6.
344 The Successful Outcome of 1936
support for the camp administration in managing production. The
report on the Ukhta-Pechora camp, written at the end of 1937 when
a tight regime in the camps was being reimposed, even claimed:

During the celebration of the 20th anniversary of the establishment

of the Vecheka-OGPU-NKVD [in December 1937] all the non-
prisoner personnel were admitted to the prisoner zone, because a
celebratory session was arranged in the prisoners’ club. After the
session the prisoners – spies and diversionists – danced with the wives
of the officers responsible for militarised security ...109

The introduction of this more flexible regime was also made possible
because most of the camps were in remote areas, away from daily
supervision by the centre. The centre in any case tended to ignore
violations of the regulations if economic plans were successfully
carried out.
The practice of reducing the length of sentences in return for
good work was widespread. On January 31, 1935, a ‘temporary
Statute on cuts (zachety) in working days’ unified these arrangements
in two categories:

(1) a reduction of the sentence by four days for three days’ successful
work, applied in the case of prisoners who had previously been
manual or office workers, collective farmers, peasants or artisans
who did not employ labour, and also had electoral rights;
(2) a reduction of five days for four days’ work for the remainder of
the population including people deprived of the vote, former
traders, kulaks and people working for the church or other
religions.

Further privileges were offered to shock workers, while political

prisoners were allowed smaller reductions.110
These arrangements provided a strong incentive for hard work
and offered a prospect for the future which made it easier to bear the
hardships of the camps. The more unusual system of so-called ‘colo-
nisation (kolonizatsiya)’ also made life in the camps more tolerable.
This was the practice of early release from the camp on condition

109
GARF, 9414/4/11, 139.
110
GARF, 9401/12/98, 32–37.
 Expansion of the Gulag 345
that the prisoner continued to live and work in the camp region, usu-
ally accompanied by his family. Settlements of this kind were estab-
lished, for example, near BAM, the White-Sea Baltic combine and
the Ukhta-Pechora camp. From the point of view of the state these
arrangements helped to settle large unpopulated areas and to provide
a more permanent labour force for key projects.
Perhaps the most remarkable development in 1936 was the issue
of a very long order by Yagoda ‘On Measures to Improve the Work
of Corrective Labour Camps’ dated April 2 and remaining nomi-
nally in force until May 15, 1938.111 It was sent to a large number of
Gulag officials, including the managers, deputy managers and assis-
tants of all the camps. Camp managers were instructed to ensure
that within two months the order was read out at general meetings
of all prisoners and discussed and analysed point by point. It was
based on a survey carried out by Berman at the Volga and other
camps which had revealed major defects. It listed 34 specific points
concerned with poor camp conditions and faults in the production
system, and proposed 24 measures to be adopted to deal with them,
13 concerned with the welfare (byt) of the prisoners and 11 with the
arrangements at work. Here we summarise some examples of the
listed defects:

(2) infestation by insects due to lack of baths, etc.;

(3) floors not regularly washed in the barracks, which were not
clean or warm enough; clothes were washed badly and not
ironed with a hot iron, hot water was not provided in the
barracks or at work, and medical facilities were inadequate;
(4) insufficient kitchens and stalls, so that prisoners after ten hours’;
work have to queue for 1–2 hours for food or to buy tobacco;
(5) managers fail to inspect the issue of food, so that there are
numerous complaints from prisoners of poor treatment;
(12) insufficient effort to deal with slackers and to provide proper
training;
(15) skilled and specialist prisoners not allocated to their proper
work;

111
This order is published in full in Svobodnaya mysl’, 2, (2000), 113–17 (Kokurin
and Petrov).
346 The Successful Outcome of 1936
(21) insufficient care and attention to prisoners and their complaints,
so that their letters, parcels and money are delivered very late
and sometimes do not arrive at all;
(34) ‘the most serious fault’ of camp managers and their staff is their
failure to visit the barracks often enough, and to talk to shock
workers so as to find the faults in camp welfare and in produc-
tion; ‘prisoners do not know many of their “high-up” manag-
ers, do not see them either in production or in the barracks, and
above all do not see quick and realistic measures, understood by
every prisoner, to overcome the faults’.

This order thus provided a programme for the radical improve-

ment of the forced-labour system, and should be considered together
with Yagoda’s proclamation at the same time that social order in
Soviet society at large had become much more stable (see pp. 285–6
above). We do not know how far the order of April 2 was put into
practice in the next few months. But with the appointment of Yezhov
in September, the relatively stable and improved regime of 1935–36
soon gave way to worsening welfare for the prisoners and bleaker
conditions in their work.

( F ) INTERNAL TRADE AND CONSUMPTION

The increased production of consumer goods (see p. 323 above)

formed the basis for the rapid expansion of internal trade. Retail
trade turnover in 1936, including public catering, was planned at
100,000 million rubles, and in fact amounted to 106,800 million.
Retail trade as a whole increased by 27.2 per cent; and rural trade
increased more rapidly than urban trade (see Table 19). The rate of
increase of retail trade turnover was more rapid than in any other
year of the five-year plan except 1935, when the very large increase
was partly due to the abolition of rationing, which resulted in a
substantial increase in food prices.
During 1936 determined efforts were intensified to bring consum-
ers into active participation in and influence on trade. Veitser insisted
that Stakhanovism must be adapted to the interests of the consumer:
Stakhanovism should not be primarily based on gross sales and
labour productivity, because ‘this might elicit negative results from
 Internal Trade and Consumption 347
the point of view of servicing the Soviet consumer’.112 This theme
was taken up by a Pravda editorial, which declared that ‘honest work
and Stakhanovite labour in trade consists of genuine concern for
consumers and the rapid satisfaction of their demands’.113 Many
trade exhibitions in which consumers actively participated took place
in Moscow, including an exhibition of toys attended by some 130,000
people. New specialised stores were opened for the elite, such as the
crystal store which stocked over 100 types of glass.114 A decree of
March 7, borrowing from Western practice, introduced trade marks
on a voluntary basis, in order to ‘increase the responsibility of
production enterprises for quality’, and ‘enable consumers to choose’.115
Numerous decisions sought to use propaganda, administrative
powers and economic incentives to increase the production of con-
sumer goods and the efficiency of trade. On February 8 the Council
of Labour and Defence resolved ‘to discuss with the newspapers
Pravda and Izvestiya the need to increase the criticism in the press of
the work of the trade agencies and its treatment of the faults in
trade, particularly in the case of goods which are not in short
supply’.116 Propaganda was accompanied by practical measures. A
lengthy decree of Sovnarkom planned to increase the production of
consumer goods by the artisan cooperatives by 29.5 per cent in 1936,
and to establish thousands of new repair shops.117 A further decree
instructed Narkomtyazhprom to establish a minimum of 20 large
workshops to produce consumer goods from the by-products of
heavy industry.118 The facilities of kolkhoz markets were to be
improved by transferring their management from the commissariats
of municipal economy to the local agencies of Narkomtorg, which
were to provide additional buildings and equipment. Elaborate
requirements to support the markets were imposed on local soviets.
Gosplan was instructed to include the necessary capital investment
in republican and regional plans.119 With effect from July 1, 1936,

112
See Randall (2008), 91.
113
P, September 26, 1936.
114
See Randall (2008), 62, 138.
115
SZ, art. 113 (decree of TsIK and Sovnarkom). Cooperative artels and volun-
tary organisations were permitted to participate, as well as state enterprises.
116
GARF, 5446/1/122b, 20 (handwritten).
117
SZ, 1936, art. 68, dated January 17, 1936.
118
SZ, 1936, art. 324, dated July 7.
119
SZ, 1936, art. 65, dated February 4.
348 The Successful Outcome of 1936
the practice was revived from the 1920s that trading agencies placed
quarterly orders in advance with industry, covering 60 per cent of
the production of mass industrial consumer goods.120 Narkomvnutorg
and its local agencies acquired the right to check that industrial sales
depots were despatching both the quantity and quality of goods stip-
ulated in the plan, and they were instructed, together with the
regional authorities, to ensure that ‘goods in daily use’, including
sugar, salt, soap, makhorka and matches, were available, and to
prosecute those who were responsible for interruptions in supply.121
The central authorities also attempted to expand the agencies
responsible for the transfer of goods from producer to retailer. On
April 16 a decree of the Council of Labour and Defence instructed
the industrial commissariats to increase the number of their whole-
sale sales bases from 1,141 to 1,895 in the course of 1936, following
a scheme prepared by Narkomvnutorg.122 In the same month a draft
decree of Sovnarkom provided for the establishment of regional
‘state offices for intermediate trade (torgovoe posrednichestvo)’ to assist
the coordination of supply and demand between all the industrial
and trading organisations within the region by publishing informa-
tion bulletins on supply and demand and acting as contractors
between producers and retailers.123
In other respects, however, as in other sectors of the economy, 1936
was an ambiguous year. As a result of the reorganisation of retail
trade by the decree of September 29, 1935 (see p. 231 above), involv-
ing the withdrawal of Tsentrosoyuz from urban trade, the number of
urban shops declined from 73,600 to 72,500, and the consolidation
of the rural trading network resulted in a decline in the number of
rural shops and stalls. In total the number of trading units in the
USSR declined from 286,000 to 269,000. There was a sharp switch
from cooperative to state trade. The number of trading units man-
aged by Narkomtorg almost doubled, while the number managed by
Tsentrosoyuz declined by 30 per cent (see Tables 19(a) and (b)).
In the spring of 1936 the Commission on Soviet Control under-
took an investigation of Tsentrosoyuz and the retail cooperatives in
order to establish how far the reform of September 1935 had been
successful in improving rural trade. On May 30, 1936, the

120
SZ, 1936, art. 68, dated February 15.
121
SZ, 1936, art. 105, STO decree dated February 17.
122
SZ, 1936, art. 202.
123
GARF, 5446/1/115, 148–150.
 Internal Trade and Consumption 349
commission reported that the plan for January–March 1936 had
been exceeded, but that many rural shops were unable to satisfy the
demand for essential industrial consumer goods such as tobacco, salt
and matches; children’s goods, musical instruments and stationery
were also in short supply. The commission complained that trading
agencies often still engaged in ‘the mechanical allocation of goods
instead of trade’.124
The relatively low prices of industrial consumer goods meant that
shortages were endemic. Queues were frequent, and goods pur-
chased in state shops were often illegally resold on the market at
higher prices. Citizens of small towns, and peasants, travelled to the
major cities searching for goods. On June 26, on Stalin’s initiative,
the Politburo established a commission chaired by Chubar’ to con-
sider the prevalence of queues and ‘speculation’ in Moscow,
Leningrad, Kiev and Minsk.125 A week later Grin’ko wrote to
Molotov proposing that the retail prices of industrial consumer
goods should be increased, and this proposal was incorporated in the
proposals of the commission when it reported to the Politburo on
July 14.126 On July 19, the Politburo decided to allocate additional
supplies to Moscow, Leningrad, Kiev and Minsk, and to concentrate
the sale of scarce goods in a relatively small number of shops, in
which the prices of textiles and footwear were increased by 25–30
per cent. The amount of textiles and footwear to be sold per person
was restricted. The decision also instructed the NKVD to exile up to
5,000 speculators from the four towns.127 By the beginning of
September 4,003 persons had been sentenced by NKVD troiki in the
four towns, and in 25 regions an additional 1,635 persons were
sentenced by the courts.128
The food situation was much more favourable, at least in the first
months of the year. In the year as a whole both the elite and the ordi-
nary consumer in town and country enjoyed an improved standard of

124
SZ, 1936, art. 177; the decree was approved by Sovnarkom.
125
RGASPI, 17/163/1108/14 (art. ii).
126
GARF, 5446/18a/309, 264–268.
127
RGASPI, 17/3/979, 2 (item V on the agenda), 49–55; the decision was adopted
as a decree of the central committee and Sovnarkom; an appendix gave an extensive
list of old and new prices. A curiosity of the decision was that the commission had
proposed that ‘the total number of shops selling textiles and footwear is reduced’
while the decree stated that ‘Narkomvnutorg is required to extend the number of
shops selling high-quality goods (textiles and footwear)’! (our italics).
128
GARF, 8131/37/73, 19; Hagenloh (2009), 220–2.
350 The Successful Outcome of 1936
living. In the early part of the year many foods were available in
ample quantities. In some cases – rare in Soviet history – the abun-
dance of supply led to the reduction of retail prices. On June 9
Molotov reported to the Politburo that ‘the sale of butter, especially
the higher grades (“Ektra”, “Higher Grade”) is very unsatisfactory; by
June 1 only 45 per cent of the April– June plan has been sold’.129 In
consequence the prices of these grades were lowered by one or two
rubles per kilogram (5–10 per cent).130 But there are also clear indica-
tions, confirmed by memoirs, that as the year progressed food short-
ages, which had greatly declined in 1935, tended to increase. In 1934
and 1935, with the increased supply of food through socialised trade,
the prices on the kolkhoz market had greatly, and fairly steadily,
declined. In 1936 kolkhoz prices were still lower than in the previous
year. But, as a result of the poor 1936 harvest, the gap narrowed. In
January kolkhoz market prices were 29.3 per cent lower than
in January1935, but in November only 7.3 per cent lower than in
November 1935.131 A comprehensive figure for December is not
available, but the gap relative to the previous year was certainly
narrower.132 Although the supply of bread to the population increased
in the last quarter of 1936, shortages began to develop. In a memo-
randum to Stalin and Molotov Veitser pointed out that the decree of
March 19, 1935, limiting the amount of bread which could be stored
by an individual to 32 kilograms, had not been enforced in 1936, and
speculative purchases of grain were taking place in a number of
regions. In response to this memorandum, Vyshinsky stated that he
and Krylenko had already sent a circular to Yezhov for his endorse-
ment enforcing measures against excessive bread purchases, and that

129
See Stalinskoe Politbyuro (1995), 38.
130
RGASPI, 17/3/978, 41 (Politburo resolution of June 11).
131
Urban kolkhoz market prices in 1936 as a percentage of prices in the same
month in 1935:
January 70.7; February 73.3; March 75.3; April 74.9; May 75.4; June 81.0; July
83.7; August 82.5; September 81.4; October 84.0; November 92.7.
These figures are for between 74 and 99 towns, depending on the month, and for
32 food products (but only 25 in January–March, and grain products are excluded
for July–December, when trade in grain products was illegal) (Osnovnye pokazateli,
November 1936, 248).
132
Data for prices on December 25, 1936, as compared with December 25, 1935,
for 13 major towns and nine food products show price increases for 52 observations,
no change for 17 and price reductions for 40 observations (Osnovnye pokazateli,
December 1936, 282–5).
 Foreign Trade 351
he had already issued ‘exhaustive instructions’ at the request of local
procurators.133
While the food and light industries developed rapidly, other con-
sumer sectors were much less successful. Public catering continued
to stagnate, and the supply of new housing amounted to only 33.8
per cent of the plan. In spite of the public enthusiasm for the Moscow
reconstruction plan, Moscow, which was planned to receive nearly
one-third of new housing space, in fact received only 21 per cent,
while in contrast Berezniki, Gor’kii, Gorlovka and Kemerovo
achieved more than two-thirds of their plan.134

(G) FOREIGN TRADE

The pressures on the foreign trade balance were particularly acute in

1936. In its decision of November 9, 1935, the Politburo correctly
expected that exports would continue to decline, and hence reduced
the normal import plan for 1936 to 120 million rubles as compared
with 143 million rubles in 1935 (this figure excluded imports resulting
from the German loan and the Czecho-Slovak and British credits).135
The plan evidently met with considerable resistance from the com-
missariats requiring imports, and a month later it was increased to
130–135 million rubles, the details to be settled by the VK (Foreign
Currency Commission).136 In the final plan, approved on January 16,
1936, the import figure was set at 136.1 million rubles. Within this
total, the import of capital equipment was planned at 31.9 million, as
compared with a lower figure previously approved by the VK.137
However, expenditure from the German credit in 1936, valued at 46
million rubles, would almost double the purchase of equipment. Half
of this increase was allocated to Narkomtyazhprom, and would be
mainly used for the armaments industry.

133
GARF, 8131/37/73, 246, 248–250; Veitser’s memorandum was dated
December 21; Vyshinsky’s memorandum was dated December 23, and he claimed
that this memorandum to Yezhov had been sent on December 20.
134
Osnovnye pokazateli, December 1936, 299.
135
GARF, 5446/1/483, 137 (art. 2462/406ss).
136
GARF, 5446/1/483, 157 (art. 2604/428ss, dated December 4).
137
GARF, 5446/1/485, 22–105. This very bulky document was presumably sup-
plied to Sovnarkom by the VK. The Politburo approved an outline of the plan on
January 14 (RGASPI, 17/162/19, 29). For the lower plan for equipment import,
approved by VK on January 3, see GARF, 8422/3/9, 5–7 (art. 5).
352 The Successful Outcome of 1936
In the course of 1936 the pressure from the defence sector on
imports considerably increased. The Politburo frequently gave per-
mission for ad hoc purchases for defence purposes. Here are some
characteristic examples:

January 20: delegation sent abroad to purchase inverted air-cooled

engines (RGASPI, 17/162/19, 35–6);
March 17: specific aircraft and engines to be purchased from USA,
France and UK, with tools; staff to be sent to USA for technical
assistance (ibid. 120–1);
April 10: licences and technical assistance approved for aircraft
obtained from USA and UK (ibid. 134);
September 9: purchases for defence investment to be made from UK
valued at £4.8 million; reserve of £0.5 million to be spent on arms
if permitted (RGASPI, 17/162/20, 71–2);
November 2: contracts approved for ship turbines with Brown, Camel
Laird and Parsons and for technical assistance with destroyers with
Jarrow (ibid. 114);
December 28: import approved of two-seater Seversky fighter with
Wright cyclone engines, plus licences and technical assistance (ibid.
127).

Some other urgent requirements also increased the import bill. In

particular, the Chelyabinsk tractors were being converted to the use
of diesel fuel with great difficulty, and in May 1936 the Politburo
authorised the expenditure of the accumulated import quotas of the
factory and allocated an additional quota.138
In the outcome, imports, instead of declining, substantially
increased in 1936, and the proportion of imports devoted to machin-
ery and related items increased from 18.0 per cent of the total in
1935 to 36.1 per cent in 1936 (see Table 20). But exports continued
to decline, as expected. As a result of the bad harvest, the export of
grain drastically declined, and the sale of oil, coal and timber also
declined. For the first time since 1931, imports nearly equalled
exports, and the positive balance of payments was much smaller
than in 1935 in spite of the new loans and credits from abroad (see
Table 20).

138
RGASPI, 17/162/19, 183 (art. 44, dated May 23); GARF, 5446/1/486, 171
(art. 908/147ss, dated May 23), 186 (art. 935/153ss, dated May 23).
 Labour and Labour Productivity 353
( H ) LABOUR AND LABOUR PRODUCTIVITY

The trends in employment characteristic of the previous two years

continued in 1936. The total non-agricultural employed labour
force increased by only 1.3 million persons, 6.0 per cent. The num-
ber employed declined in building, and remained constant on the
railways. The largest absolute increase was in industry – 675,000 –
but this increase of 7.4 per cent was in relative terms somewhat
lower than in the previous year. The most rapidly expanding sectors
were those serving the consumer – trade (12.0 per cent), education
(13.7 per cent) and health (21.8 per cent, the most rapidly expand-
ing sector). Between them these three sectors accounted for an
increase of 613,000 manual and office workers, nearly half the total
increase.
Within industry MCMB (metal-cutting and machine building),
which included armaments, again expanded rapidly, but more slowly
than in the previous year (11.2 per cent), and food, drink and tobacco,
which had increased very rapidly in 1935, now increased only at the
average rate. In a number of industries, including electric power,
coal and iron ore, the number of workers declined: this was the first
year of the second five-year plan in which this happened. The huge
growth in industrial production in 1936 was very largely a result of
the increase in output per worker. The increase in output per worker
in heavy industry was unprecedented: it amounted to as much as
24.9 per cent, and accounted for 80 per cent of the increase in pro-
duction. The increases in output per worker were lower in the light
and food industry (20.9 and 15.6 per cent), but still accounted for
two-thirds of the increase in the production of light industry and
about 58 per cent of the increase in the food industry.
The increases in productivity in 1936 were closely associated with
the decision at the December 1935 plenum of the central committee
to increase output norms substantially. The time table laid down in
the resolution varied according to the industrial commissariat. In all
industries the revision of equipment norms was to be completed by
the end of 1936. Narkomtyazhprom was ‘to begin the revision of
output norms in the direction of some increase’ at the beginning of
1936; in the other commissariats the norms were to be revised
somewhat later.139

139
P, December 26, 1935.
354 The Successful Outcome of 1936
The changes in norms in the course of 1936 are carefully exam-
ined by Benvenuti, Siegelbaum and Filtzer. The new norms began to
be introduced from March 1 in the coal industry and in the iron and
steel industry of the centre and south, and in April in the engineer-
ing industries. The increases were substantial. In Narkomtyazhprom,
the increase ranged between 10 and 55 per cent, depending on the
industry.140 But the increases were so arranged in most industries so
that the majority of workers soon exceeded their norms. In iron and
steel, for example, they were fixed at the level of the average annual
output in December 1935.141 According to a sample survey, by
October 1936 only 11.8 per cent of piece workers in the iron and
steel industry and 14.2 per cent in MCMB had not reached their
norms, but in the light and sawn-timber industries the percentage
was much higher: 45.5 per cent in cotton textiles and 31.4 per cent
in sawn timber.142
The record increase in labour productivity in 1936 was accompa-
nied by some deterioration in labour discipline. Labour turnover, as
measured by the percentage of workers leaving or dismissed from
their jobs in the course of a year, had declined sharply in 1933,
1934 and 1935, but in 1936 it increased slightly from 86.1 to 87.6
per cent. In Narkomtyazhprom, the percentage leaving increased
from 70.0 to 72.8 per cent.143 A survey disclosed that the turnover
was mainly due to a minority of workers. ‘Up to 75 per cent’ of
workers remained in the same enterprise, but the remaining 25 per
cent changed their job an average of four times during the year.144
The level of absenteeism also increased during the year. A report
from Kaminsky, People’s Commissar for Health, stated that while
days off for sickness and injuries had greatly declined in 1933–35,
they had increased in January–September 1936. While this was
mainly due to an influenza epidemic, the number of accidents had
increased for a variety of reasons, including the overloading of the

140
See Filtzer (1986), 184.
141
For details, see RGAE, 4372/34/579, 121–5 ([May] 1936).
142
Osnovnye pokazateli, December 1936, 283. The survey covered several hundreds
of thousands of workers in the heavy industries and several tens of thousands in the
other industries.
143
Tyazhelaya promyshlennost’ 1936 (1937), 229–31. The increase was particularly
large in the coal industry: from 95.6 to 110 per cent. In iron and steel turnover
increased from 69.2 to 72.0, and in MCMW from 54.8 to 57.6 per cent.
144
See Industrializatsiya 1933–1937 (1970), 491 (a Gosplan report dated May 20,
1937).
 Costs and Finance 355
factory area, the lack of special clothing, inadequate lighting and
badly maintained ventilation, compounded by the poor quality of
factory inspection.145 There was an increase not only in justified
absence but also in absence without due cause, which rose in
Narkomtyazhprom from 0.75 to 0.98 days per worker.146 In July,
Polonskii, a secretary of the AUCCTU, reported to Lyubimov the
‘extremely poor conditions of work’ in the textile factories. Poor
ventilation had led to a number of serious illnesses and had resulted
in ‘a mass of justified complaints about poor conditions of work’
from both male and female textile workers in the Ivanovo region
(the centre of the disturbances in the spring of 1932).147 The inten-
sification of labour in the Stakhanovite year had its downside.

( I ) COSTS AND FINANCE

To an even greater extent than in the previous year, in 1936 changes

in costs were particularly difficult to measure owing to the changes
in prices of inputs. In 1936, a major reform was carried out of the
transfer prices (otpusknye tesny), which were charged to purchasers.
Since 1928, costs had increased more or less continuously, particu-
larly in heavy industry, but purchasers had been protected by keep-
ing transfer prices fixed and paying subsidies to industry. Early in
1936, shortly after the approval of the 1936 plan, a major reform
of transfer prices was discussed extensively in Gosplan and
Narkomtyazhprom.148 On March 2, 1936, a Sovnarkom decree
was issued entitled ‘The Introduction of New Transfer Prices
(otpusknye tseny) for the Output of the Heavy and Timber Industries
and of New Charges for Freight Carried by Railway and Water
Transport’. The decree explained that these measures were being
introduced to

145
GARF, 5446/22/538, 24–28 (report to Molotov and Shvernik dated February
28, 1937).
146
Tyazhelaya promyshlennost’ 1936 (1937), 232. These figures exclude seasonal
industries.
147
GARF, 5451/20/232, 1.
148
See, for example, the Narkomtyazhprom memorandum to Sovnarkom dated
February 3, 1936, which complained that the Gosplan draft decree ‘prepared in the
course of several days’ was ‘extremely inaccurate’ (published in Istoriya tsenoobrazo-
vaniya 1929-iyun’ 1041 (1973), 333–5).
356 The Successful Outcome of 1936
strengthen economic accounting (khozyaistvennyi raschet), to establish a
correct relationship between different branches of industrial produc-
tion and rail and water transport, and to abolish budget subsidies
which are no longer necessary in most branches of the economy as a
result of the successes achieved in the mastering of new technology.149

The decree was applied by a Narkomtyazhprom order of March 28,

signed by Rukhimovich, which insisted that directors of enterprises
and heads of building sites must ‘without exceptions’ use the new
prices from April 1.150
The dramatic results of the decree are shown in Table 23 (b). The
increase amounted to 45.6 per cent in heavy industry as a whole, and
varied from a mere 6.5 per cent for the machine-tool industry, where
the costs were high in 1928 and had been relatively reduced by the
mass production of the 1930s, to 98.2 per cent for coal and 141.8
per cent for coking chemicals, traditional industries in which costs
had greatly increased. For some traditional industries, it emerged
that the new prices did not fully cover costs and some subsidies were
already necessary.151 Freight charges on the railways had been
increased by a similar amount: 41 per cent.
The decree instructed that the new prices should be introduced by
April 1, 1936. Later in the year Gosplan reported to Sovnarkom that
the effect of the reform in 1936 was to increase costs in industry by
6.7 per cent instead of reducing them by 6.2 per cent as originally
planned, an overall increase of 12.9 per cent. In absolute terms, the
cost increase in the economy as a whole, including the increase in
freight charges as well as prices, would amount to 2,553 million
rubles, of which 1,745 million rubles would be in Narkomtyazhprom
itself and 372 million rubles in Narkomput’.152
In 1936, as in 1935, the statistics distinguished between changes in
commercial cost, which included the effect of price increases, and
adjusted costs changes, due solely to ‘intra-production factors’. The

149
Sovnarkom decree no. 406, reprinted in Istoriya tsenoobrazovaniya 1929-iyun’ 1941
(1973), 742–81.
150
RGAE, 7297/1/132, 57, 57ob (order no. 557).
151
Gosplan reported on May 29, 1937, that in 1937 the transfer prices adopted in
1936 incorporated losses in 1937 of 16.9 per cent in the case of peat, 0.14 per cent
for non-ferrous metals, and 6.2 per cent for coal; the losses for coal amounted to
174 million rubles (reprinted in Istoriya tsenoobrazovaniya 1929-iyun’ 1941 (1973), 151).
152
Memorandum dated August 4, 1936, reprinted in Istoriya tsenoobrazovaniya 1929-
iyun’ 1941 (1973), 139–41.
 Costs and Finance 357
results for 1936 show that the effect of the price changes in heavy
industry was to increase costs by 11.7 per cent (5.0 + 6.7 per cent):

1936 plan 1936 plan 1936 actual 1936 actual

including excluding including excluding
price price price price
changes changes changes changes
Narkomtyazhprom +3.1 –8.0 +5.0 –6.7
Narkomlegprom +5.0 –5.0 +7.0 –3.2
Narkompishcheprom +4.9 –5.0 +6.0 3.4
Source: GARF, 5446/26/74, 36–30 (report from Mezhlauk and Chubar’ dated
January 31, 1937). Preliminary figures.

It will be seen that actual costs excluding the effect of price changes
declined, but not quite to the extent planned. Later figures for
Narkomtyazhprom show a slightly smaller decline in costs, and as in
1935 a considerable variation between different industries. Commercial
costs rose most sharply in industries dependent on the supply of raw
materials, which increased greatly in price; increases in both commercial
and adjusted costs were low in the machine-building industry.

Costs including Costs excluding

price changes price changes
All Narkomtyazhprom +4.5 –6.1
Glavelektro –7.6 –5, 3
Coal +3.0 +1.8
Iron and steel +25.2 –6.2
Iron ore –7.7 –10.5
Oil extraction +19.1 +15.8
Coke and coking chemical +37.8 –1.7
Glavtsvetmet +11.6 –0.1
MCMW –1.2 –10.5
Basic chemical +3.1 –12.4
Soyuztsement +1.9 –8.1
Soyuztorf –11.2 –11.8
Source: Tyazhelaya promyshlennost’ 1936 (1937), 237.
358 The Successful Outcome of 1936
A major factor in cost reduction was the extent to which productiv-
ity increased more rapidly than wages per worker. There were sharp
differences between industries. In Narkomtyazhprom and
Narkomlegprom, productivity increased more rapidly than wages, but
the reverse was true in Narkompishcheprom, Narkomles and the com-
missariats of local industry. Industry was overwhelmingly dominated
by Narkomtyazhprom and Narkomlegprom, which accounted for
4,637,000 of the 7,400,000 persons employed in large-scale industry,
62.8 per cent. Within heavy industry, the productivity : wage ratio var-
ied greatly between industries. The average wage per worker increased
more rapidly than productivity in coal, oil extraction, coking chemicals
and non-ferrous metals extraction, but less rapidly in other industries:

Increase in output Increase in average wage

per worker (per cent) per worker (percent)
All Narkomtyazhprom 26.1 23.2
District power stations 43.0 21.2
Coal 16.0 19.7
Oil extraction 0.8 19.4
Oil processing 29.3 28.8
Iron and steel 25.2 23.5
Iron ore 30.8 23.9
Coking chemical 16.2 19.0
Non-ferrous metals 19.4 22.7
(extraction)
MCMW 23.1 22.0
Chemicals 23.7 23.3
Source: Tyazhelaya promyshlennost’ 1936 (1937), 149–50, 187–206.

The reductions in costs eased the pressure on the state budget and
on currency issue. But budgetary expenditure in 1936 considerably
exceeded the plan. The achievement of adequate budgetary revenue
required constant effort, and involved the enforcement of quite dras-
tic measures, including the decision to maintain the supply of flour to
bakeries and to the population in spite of the very poor harvest. In
the calendar year as a whole, the sale of flour amounted to 13,227,000
tons, and was greater in the fourth quarter than in any of the previous
quarters.153 Peasant grain stocks in the USSR as a whole were
153
Osnovnye pokazateli, December 1936, 258–9.
 The Agricultural Crisis and its Solution 359
estimated to have declined from 82.7 kilograms per peasant on
December 31, 1935, to 61.7 kilograms on the same date in 1936.
In 1936 as a whole, currency issue exceeded the plan, amounting
to 1,546 million rubles as compared with the planned 1,300 million
But the rate of increase, 15.5 per cent, was less than in 1935 (25.5
per cent), when the price increases resulting from the abolition of
rationing put exceptional pressure on the currency.

( J ) THE AGRICULTURAL CRISIS AND ITS SOLUTION

The regional NKVDs and other authorities made numerous attempts

to estimate the extent to which the grain yield was lower than in the
previous year. For example, on October 13, 1936, the Voronezh
NKVD reported that in various districts the yield had varied between
3.8 and 4.4 tsentners as compared with 9.1 in 1935.154 At the end of
October a report from West Siberia listed 14 districts in which the
harvest had been very poor, giving yields between 4 and a mere 0.9
tsentners.155 In the North Caucasus, in the eleven districts in which
the harvest had been worst, about half the winter wheat had per-
ished, and in those areas where some grain had been grown the yield
was only 3 tsentners.156 In the Ivanovo region, in the worst-hit areas
the yield had been only a little above 2 tsentners.157
While the regional NKVD agencies were submitting these pessi-
mistic reports, TsGK (the Central State Commission for assessing the
harvest), managed by Osinsky, and MGK (its local inter-district
agencies), were collecting materials which led to a similar result.158
Data for 45 ‘inter-districts’ were collected for October 1, 1936, and
aggregating these, the national yield amounted to 6.8 tsentners per
hectare and the sown area to 99.2 million hectares, giving a harvest
estimate of 67.6 million tons.159 The political authorities naturally
considered that this was far too pessimistic, and TsGK was required
to re-examine it. TsGK convened a meeting for November 5, 1936,
with the task of making a final assessment of the harvest. Three days

154
TSD, iv (2002), 851.
155
TSD, iv (2002), 863.
156
TSD, iv (2002), 887–8 (report as of November 16).
157
TSD, iv (2002), 891 (report as of November 20).
158
For the establishment of TsGK, see vol. 5 of this series, pp. 243–4.
159
GARF, 7589/1/109, 1–45.
360 The Successful Outcome of 1936
before the meeting, on November 2, Osinsky sent a memorandum to
Molotov informing him of its likely consequences.160 He reported
that they had concluded that the yield was 8.7 tsentners a hectare
and the production was 5,500 million puds (90.1 million tons).
According to Osinsky, there were three reasons for making this
increase. First, the data on mass threshings received by the kolkhozy
on October 1 gave an indicator of not 6.8 but 7.2 tsentners per hec-
tare. Secondly, this was based on incomplete data, and needed to be
adjusted upwards to 7.4 tsentners to reflect the whole area of the
USSR. Thirdly, according to Osinsky, an additional 1.5 tsentners per
hectare needed to be added to account for losses in harvesting, and
to allow for grain consumed by livestock grazing in the grain fields.
The total therefore came to 8.7 tsentners per hectare.
This was a considerable concession to an optimistic view, and it is
not surprising that the meeting did not settle the matter, and discus-
sions dragged on throughout November. A further meeting on
November 28, 1936, reached a more realistic evaluation: 7.6 tsentners
per hectare and a production of 4,738 million puds (77.6 million
tons). Osinsky sent a note to Stalin and the Politburo with this evalu-
ation on December 7, 1936. He explained that the initial evaluation
was 5.9 tsenters per hectare, and an upwards correction of 1.7
tsenters per hectare had been added. The Osinsky note was addressed
to Stalin and does not appear to have been sent to Molotov. Molotov
eventually got to hear about it, and on January 13, 1937, his assistant
Moiseev telephoned Osinsky’s deputy Bryukhanov with an urgent
request for a copy of the papers. These were duly dispatched, with a
note from Bryukhanov stating that in the period since these materials
had been sent to the Politburo there had been protests from eight
regions demanding that their harvest evaluations be further
reduced.161
The revised TsGK estimate was of course objectively too high.
But it did not satisfy the Politburo, which, on March 21, 1937,
approved a draft Sovnarkom decree closing down TsGK

160
See GARF, 5466/82/53, 42–39, ‘Spravka dlya tov. V.M. Molotov’. The docu-
ment is correctly dated November 2, 1936, but the year has been mistakenly changed
to 1937 and it has been wrongly filed under this year.
161
GARF, 5466/82/53, 51. The requests were from Gor’kii region for ‘a signifi-
cant reduction’, and for the following reductions for the other regions: East Siberia
0.5 tsentners, the Tatar ASSR 0.7 tsentners, Leningrad region 1 tsentner, Karelia
ASSR 1.2, Bashkir ASSR 0.9, Western region 1.1 and the German Volga ASSR 0.5.
 The Agricultural Crisis and its Solution 361
altogether.162 It is difficult to determine how far this decision was
aimed at obtaining grain estimates acceptable to the authorities and
how far it was part of the general drive against ‘enemies’ which was
now well under way. The decree rather ingenuously stated that
TsGK was being closed down at the request of a number of regional
agencies which felt that TsGK ‘had already fulfilled its purpose in a
period when the agencies of Narkomzem and TsUNKhU were
weak’; its further existence could not be justified. The decree stated
that in future there was to be a division in responsibility for making
harvest evaluations. The determination of the average level of yield
and the gross grain production (the crucial issue in grain statistics)
was to be transferred to TsUNKhU. The evaluation of the size of the
sown area was to be the responsibility of Narkomzem. In order to
decide the MTS payment in kind, kolkhozy would be placed in a
particular group of grain yield by district commissions consisting of
the head of the district soviet executive committee, the plenipotenti-
ary of Komzag, the head of the district agricultural department and
the director of the MTS, with the participation of the kolkhoz con-
cerned. A clear indication that Osinsky was in disgrace appeared in
the last clause of the decree, which effectively excluded him from the
commission that would determine what to do with the staff of TsGK:
this consisted of Osinsky’s enemies and rivals: Yakovlev (in the chair),
Demchenko, Kraval’ and Kleiner.
Nearly five months after this decree, on August 5, 1937, I. D.
Vermenichev, who had replaced Kraval’ as head of TsUNKhU after
the latter’s arrest on May 31, 1937, sent a report to Stalin with a pre-
liminary estimate of the 1937 harvest. He included a table on grain
production by regions which showed the 1936 harvest as 77.6 million
tons, exactly the figure which Osinsky had proposed in December
1936.163 When the grain–fodder balance for 1936/37 was compiled
later, it also included a harvest of 77.4 million tons, but set out the
usual nevyazka, this time of 11.9 million tons, so the implicit harvest
was 77.4 – 11.9 or 65.5 million tons.164 Our own estimate is that the
1936 harvest was approximately 56 million tons; this figure was
quietly included in a Soviet statistical handbook published in 1987.165

162
For the text of this decision, see TSD, v, i (2004), 186–7. The Sovnarkom
decree was approved on March 25 (GARF, 7589/1/117, 83).
163
TSD, v, i (2004), 287–93.
164
RGAE, 1562/2/435, 13.
165
See Davies, Harrison and Wheatcroft, eds (1994), 286–8.
362 The Successful Outcome of 1936
In his memorandum to Stalin on August 5, 1937, Vermenichev
also included an estimate of the regional distribution of the 1936
harvest. He stated that ‘the harvest was good in the south and in
western Siberia, but in the Volga regions, in the Orenburg and
Chelyabinsk regions, in the Bashkir and Tatar ASSRs, and in the
non-Black Earth zone, the yield was considerably reduced (3–4
tsentners in the east, 7 in the non-Black Earth zone)’. Other sources
show that in Ukraine grain production on official estimates amounted
to as much as 22.1 million tons, with a yield of 11.8 tsentners a hec-
tare, as compared with 17.7 million tons and 9.2 million tsentners in
1935.166 The contrast with the famine year 1932/33, when the
Ukrainian grain harvest was only 14.5 million tons, is very striking.
Simultaneously with these discussions of the size of the 1936 har-
vest, in January–June 1937 the regional NKVDs and other authori-
ties continued to report, as they had in the second half of 1936, the
continuing and worsening food situation in the countryside and to a
lesser extent in the towns. Although these difficulties occurred in
1937, after the main period covered in this volume, it is obviously
sensible to discuss them in connection with the 1936 harvest.
Here are some examples of food problems in the first months of
1937 following the 1936 harvest. In Orenburg region ( January 3), ‘a
considerable number of households are experiencing food difficul-
ties’, and some households have no grain whatsoever.167 In the North
Caucasus ( January 15), in spite of a grain food loan in November
1936, serious food difficulties had now returned; the district hospital
had no spare beds for those sick with hunger.168 On January 16,
Komzag reported that representatives from regions with a poor har-
vest were travelling to regions with a good harvest to buy grain at
bazaars, and ruled that this was illegitimate.169 On January 27, an
Orenburg report, even more alarming than the report of January 3,
stated that many kolkhozy had used up all the grain, and others were
coming to an end of their stocks, so that the peasants were having to
survive on potatoes, beetroot and other vegetables.170 In Kuibyshev
region ( January 29), many children were invalids as a result of food

166
TsDAGOU, 1/1/502, 28 (material for XIII Ukrainian party congress, May–
June 1937).
167
Sovetskaya derevnya, iv (2012), 383.
168
TSD, v, i (2004), 117.
169
TSD, v, i (2004), 118–20.
170
Sovetskaya derevnya, iv (2012), 401–3.
 The Agricultural Crisis and its Solution 363
shortage, and teachers and local rural staff also lacked food.171 In
Voronezh region (February 2) cases were occurring of swelling up
and a few deaths from hunger.172 In Leningrad region (February 5),
a mass movement was taking place of collective farmers moving in
from outside Leningrad.173 By March 13, a further report from
Kuibyshev region stated that food difficulties were now occurring in
60 out of its 87 districts and in seven districts 40 deaths from famine
had taken place. In one village the spread of malaria resulting from
food shortages had led to 27 deaths, mainly among individual peas-
ants, and in this area food had not been supplied from the grain loan
to the district even though it was only 12 kilometres from the district
centre.174 In Saratov region (March 27) a 25-year-old collective
farmer had attempted to hang himself because he could not get
food.175 And so on.
These reports also noted that the flour supplies to the urban areas
had often failed to keep pace with demand. In Leningrad region
(February 5) huge queues for bread formed in workers’ settlements.176
In Gor’ky region (February 17), queues gathered from 6 or 7 a.m.177
On March 3 a report from state security stated that in eight regions
and ASSRs crowds were assembling at railway stations in search of
bread, and that this threatened the spread of epidemics; cases of
typhus fever had already appeared.178 On March 28 Stalin and
Molotov sent telegrams to Ukraine, the Azov-Black Sea region, and
the Saratov region urging them to stabilise the grain trade, using all
the grain allocated to the region and employing all their resources,
not leaving things to Narkomtorg.179 In the Sverdlovsk region (March
31) large queues for bread appeared in Perm and other towns. In
Perm crowds of 1,000 to 1,500 people sometimes gathered, begin-
ning to assemble at 2–3 a.m.180 In Kuibyshev region (April 19) in one
district a crowd of 200 had attacked a bakery, broken down the
doors and taken 150 kilograms of bread rolls. In another Kuibyshev

171
Sovetskaya derevnya, iv (2012), 408–10.
172
Sovetskaya derevnya, iv (2012), 413.
173
Sovetskaya derevnya, iv (2012), 413–14.
174
Sovetskaya derevnya, iv (2012), 429–30.
175
TSD, v, i (2004), 195–6.
176
Sovetskaya derevnya, iv (2012), 413–14.
177
Sovetskaya derevnya, iv (2012), 421.
178
TSD, v, i (2004), 162–9.
179
TSD, v, i (2004), 202–3.
180
Sovetskaya derevnya, iv (2012), 439–40.
364 The Successful Outcome of 1936
district the deputy director of the MTS got one of his guard to fire
at the crowd. Children left school to beg for bread, and in general
there was ‘great dissatisfaction, scandals and fights’.181 Reports of
urban bread shortages continued to appear until the new harvest. A
telegram from Yakovlev to Stalin as late as July 21 reported that in
Belorussia large queues for bread had appeared in ‘all towns and
district centres’.182 But by this time the new harvest of 1937 had
begun to come in, and shortages began to disappear.
The grain problem affected even Ukraine, where the harvest had
been successful. The stripping away of grain from Ukraine meant
that the Politburo had to issue a seed loan of 75, 000 tons on January
14 and further seed loans to Odessa and Donetsk regions on March
29 (see Appendix B). But the food situation in Ukraine, as in nearly
all the rest of the country, remained precarious. As early as November
1, 1936, restrictions were introduced on the sale of flour.183 During
the next few months the monthly retail supply of grain was reduced:
in March 1937 only 177,000 tons of flour were issued as compared
with 190,000 in December 1936.184 As a result, an unofficial ration-
ing system was introduced, to the great dissatisfaction of those not
afforded priority.185 As in urban areas elsewhere in the USSR, the
situation did not improve until the new harvest.
The monthly mortality data prepared by TsUNKhU clearly
showed the seriousness of the situation. As early as July and August
1936 mortality was 50–60 per cent greater than in the same months
of 1935, with the increase being greater in the countryside than in
the towns.186 By July 1937, with the advent of the new harvest, the
difficulties were over.
181
TSD, v, i (2004), 235.
182
TSD, v, i (2004), 272–3.
183
TsDAGOU, 1/20/7164, 103.
184
TsDAGOU, 1/20/7164, 26, 38, 48.
185
TsDAGOU , 1/20/7164,4, 35.
186
Number of deaths. July and August 1935–37 (thousands):

Total Urban Rural

July 1935 167 48 121
July 1936 273 67 206
July 1937 204 67 138
August 1935 208 47 161
August 1936 316 72 244
August 1937 230 62 168
 The Agricultural Crisis and its Solution 365
Although the food difficulties after the 1936 harvest were very con-
siderable, they bore no comparison with the consequences of the 1932
harvest. In the first six months of 1933, millions of peasants died of
hunger. In the same period of 1936 and 1937, although the 1936
harvest was almost certainly as poor as that of 1932, deaths from
hunger and malnutrition were far less. How did this come about?
There were two main reasons. First, the grain collections were less
than had originally been planned, and so the pressure on the peasants
was less than in 1932/33. The state in the course of a long series of
decisions reduced the plans for the most affected areas. These
relaxations were normally imposed by decisions at a regional level
endorsed by the Politburo. For the region concerned, it reduced the
grain delivery plans, and the plans for the so-called taxation in kind
exacted for use of the MTS services. It also permitted the region to
allow kolkhozy to delay the repayment of past grain loans they had
received, and to cancel others. But even the reduced plans were
underfulfilled. It was shown in Chapter 11 that 2.5 million tons less
grain was collected as compulsory deliveries than in the previous year.
In the early months of 1937, the authorities also sought to collect
in zakupki as planned. On February 16 the Politburo ruled that with
effect from February 1 the regional authorities could retain 20 per cent
of the zakupki collected in by Zagotzerno, ‘using this deduction to sell
grain to the population at state prices’,187 But eventually only 2 mil-
lion tons were collected, as compared with 3.57 million in 1935/36.
So the total grain collections amounted to only 25.5 million tons,
4 million tons less than the 29.6 million collected in the previous year.
The second factor in avoiding mass starvation, in addition to
reducing the grain collections, was the issue by the state of grain
loans to the regions, which the region divided up among their dis-
tricts. These loans came either directly from the so-called transitional
grain stocks held by Komzag, or were transferred to Komzag from
the nepfond held by the Committee of Reserves.188 While Stalin was
on leave in 1936, only three cases were recorded of the issuing of
187
TSD, v, i (2004), 143.
188
On two occasions the authorities transferred large amounts of grain from the
Committee of Reserves to Komzag. On June 22, 1936, the Politburo transferred
50 million puds of wheat, 20 of rye and 20 of other grains, 100 million puds (1.64
million tons), to be used where required; these were supposed to be returned in
June and July from the 1936 harvest (RGASPI, 17/162/19, 19). On May 4, 1937,
it transferred 50 million puds of rye and wheat (819,000 tons) to be returned in
August and September from the 1937 harvest (RGASPI, 17/162/21, 33).
366 The Successful Outcome of 1936
grain loans (to Kirov region on August 21, to North Caucasus on
August 27, and to Gor’ky region on October 9) (see Appendix A).
But, as is shown in Appendix B, in the course of the agricultural year
1936/37 no fewer than 120 decisions to provide grain loans were
taken by the Politburo. The Politburo was forced by the grain short-
ages to issue loans against its will. On January 20 it ruled that no
further requests for seed, food and fodder loans should henceforth be
submitted to Sovnarkom or the central committee.189 But within four
weeks such loans began again to be issued (see Appendix B). As in all
other years, seed loans predominated: the arrangements for grain
collections had the curious result that so much grain was taken by the
state that sowing could be carried out only by reissuing the grain
already collected in, sometimes to different regions, but often to the
region from which the grain had been collected.
The most important grain issues were of course those made avail-
able for food. These amounted in 1936/37 to 633,000 tons, 399,000
in October–December 1936, 102,000 in January–March 1937, and
132,000 in April–July. Most of these decisions were taken in April–
July, though the average amount issued by each decision was smaller
than earlier in the year. Of the 65 decisions to issue food loans, no
fewer than 41 were approved in April–July.
In total, as is shown in Appendix B, grain loans amounting to
3.989 million tons were issued, including 2.724 million tons of seed
loans, 633,000 tons of food loans, and 377,000 tons of fodder loans.
This compares with grain loans amounting to 1.761 million tons in
1934/35 and 1.511 million tons in 1935/36. As compared with
1935/36, the grain deficit in 1936/37 amounted to over 6 million
tons (an additional 4 million tons from the deficit in the grain collec-
tions, and additional grain loans amounting to over 2 million tons).
The most striking difference between the situation in 1936/37 and
in all previous years since 1932/33 is that the grain deficit was met
by drawing down the state grain stocks. Even in the famine year
1932/33, the very low grain stocks were apparently increased during
the year, and in the three following years state stocks were built up
from just under 2 million to the huge figure of 9.4 million on July 1,
1936. But in 1936/37, state stocks were reduced by nearly 4 million
tons, from 9.45 to 5.45 million tons. It is no exaggeration to claim
that the availability of these stocks, and the decision to draw on them

189
See TSD, v, i (2004), 120.
 The Agricultural Crisis and its Solution 367
so drastically, was crucial in avoiding a famine which could well have
resulted in the deaths of as many millions of peasants as in 1933.
The poor grain harvest naturally resulted in serious difficulties to
livestock farming. The regional NKVD and other reports frequently
noted that the shortage of fodder had led to the sale of some ani-
mals, particularly those individually owned by collective farmers.
Thus the report of the Kirov region NKVD, referring to the situation
on January 11, 1937, stated:

In a number of districts ... as a result of the partial harvest failure and

the consequent shortage of fodder for animals, the discarding and
death of animals was so considerable that it became a real threat not
merely to the fulfilment of the livestock plan but even led to the
reduction in the number of livestock and working animals.

Horses had become unfit for work and thousands of animals had
died.190
The annual census of livestock on February 1, 1937, presented by
TsUNKhU to Stalin and Molotov, showed clearly the effect of the
bad harvest on this important sector of agriculture:191

Percentage increase or decrease in number of livestock, 1934–36

1934 1935 1936

Horses: all year –2.8 +3.9 +2.2
January–June +1.9 +6.3 +7.3
July–December –4.6 –2.3 –4.5
Cattle: all year +15.9 +18.2 +3.4
January–June +26.5 +26.7 +23.3
July–December –8.4 –6.6 –16.1
Sheep and goats: all year +11.7 +22.4 +7.7
January–June +42.3 +49.7 +47.6
July–December –21.5 –18.3 –27.1
Pigs: all year +48.8 +51.3 –21.9
January–June +51.7 +31.7 +17.6
July–December –1.9 +14.9 –33.5
190
Sovetskaya derevnya, iv (2012), 394–6. Typically, this report also blamed the short-
age of fodder onto inefficiency.
191
The following data are all taken from the report from Kraval’, head of
TsUNKhU, to Stalin and Molotov, sent on April 14, 1937 (TSD, v, i (2004), 218–30).
368 The Successful Outcome of 1936
The table shows the healthy development of the livestock sector in
1934 and 1935, following the enormous decline in 1929–33. Even
the number of horses increased in 1935, in spite of the fact that they
were being gradually replaced by mechanical power. The seasonal
pattern was of course that the number of animals increased in the
first half of every year, partly because of the birth of new animals
early in the year, and then declined in the autumn and early winter,
when animals were slaughtered for food, for sale, or for supply to the
state as compulsory deliveries. Even in 1936, in spite of the bad
harvest, the number of animals continued to grow in the year as a
whole (except in the case of pigs), but at a much slower pace. The
slower pace was entirely due to the rapid decline in the second half
of the year following the bad harvest. The TsUNKhU report set this
out clearly:

The most important factor exerting a negative influence on the

development of livestock in the USSR was that the harvest of grain
and fodder crops was smaller than in the previous year in a number
of regions, mainly in the northern and Volga zones.
The particularly rapid decline in the case of pigs was because their
survival depended on both fodder and potatoes, the harvest of which
was also very poor in 1936, accompanied by the spread of diseases.
The livestock census also showed that the animals worst affected
were those owned by individual peasants, which declined precipitately,
by sovkhozy, and by individual collective farmers. while the number
of socialised animals in the kolkhozy still increased substantially.192

The TsUNKhU report devoted a great deal of space to the alleged

inefficiency of the local authorities and of the farm units in handling
the available fodder.193 The report also made an important practical
suggestion: that as much attention should be devoted each year to

192
See table in the TsUNKhU report, p. 222.
193
Although the major repressions of 1937–38 were now well under way in the
USSR as a whole, the report contained only a couple of lines on ‘wrecking’, merely
commenting that the faults were ‘connected with wrecking in the livestock sector
and bad management bordering on wrecking’. The TsUNKhU report was sent to
Stalin and Molotov in April 1937. The series of purges which eliminated all the
main actors in agriculture in the party and the state, and many of the minor actors,
did not begin seriously until June 11, 1937, with the arrest of F. A. Tsil’ko, a long-
established deputy head of Narkomzem: 70 leading agricultural officials were
arrested in the next ten days.
 The Agricultural Crisis and its Solution 369
the establishment of stocks of crude fodder (as distinct from fodder
grains) as the stocks of grain seed. This was ‘in order to avoid the
situation in which in years of poor harvest in a number of areas
because of the lack of crude fodder the straw roofs of sheds and
other buildings of the collective farmers are used by the kolkhozy’.
The premature slaughter of livestock led to a sudden rapid growth
in 1937 of the amount of meat on sale; the increase was most rapid
in the sales by collective farmers of their individually-owned
animals.194
In other sectors of agriculture, which did not depend on the grain
and potato harvest, the results were much more favourable. The cot-
ton crop in 1936 was greeted in the press with great enthusiasm. On
November 15, Pravda reported that the harvest and the collections of
the cotton crop were a month ahead of schedule, amounting to
1.878 million tons. Eventually the crop amounted to 2.39 million
tons, 39.8 per cent greater than in 1935 and the largest crop so far
ever achieved. The sugar-beet harvest was also the largest so far,
amounting to 16.83 million tons, 3.8 per cent greater than in 1935
(see Table 30).

194
RGAE, 1562/83/39, 18–27.
 APPENDIX A

Communications between Stalin and Moscow on grain questions, 1936

Region Proposal from Proposal from Decision by

region Moscow (usually Stalin
Kaganovich and
Molotov)
August 18 Moscow Reduce Reduce Reduce by 8
collections deliveries by million
by 9.5 6.8 million puds
million puds puds
August 18 Chelyabinsk Reduce Reduce by 5.81 Reduce by
collections million puds 8.5
by 13.774 million
million puds puds
August 21 Kazakhstan Reduce Reduce by 3.575 Agreed
deliveries by million puds
5.65 million
puds
August 21 Kirov Postpone Postpone Agreed
collections deliveries by
by 6 million 2.5 million,
puds; reduce MTS
provide seed payment in
loan of 0.5 kind by 0.5
million puds million,
provide seed
loan in rye of
0.3 million
August 21 Gor’kii Reduce Reduce by Agreed
deliveries by 1 million
1.5 million
August 27 Kursk Reduce Reduce Agreed
deliveries by deliveries by
3 million, 3 million,
MTS MTS
payment payment by
in kind by 3 million
6 million

370
 Appendix A 371
Appendix A (Continued )

Region Proposal from Proposal from Decision by

region Moscow (usually Stalin
Kaganovich and
Molotov)
August 27 North Provide seed Seed loan 1.385; Agreed
Caucasus loan 1.76 refuse food
million, and fodder
food and loan
fodder loan
0.3 million
September 5 Azov-Black Provide seed, 5 million, issuing Agreed
Sea fodder and 0.5 for seed
partly food now, the rest
loan of 5 after maize
million delivery plan
fulfilled
September 11 Bashkir Reduce grain Reduce Agreed, but
deliveries by deliveries by give
additional 5.133 payment in
11.5 million, million, reject kind
MTS reduction of reduction of
payment in payment in 3 million1
kind by kind
additional
3.4 million
September 12 Stalingrad Reduce Reduce by 12 Agreed
collections million,
by 15.388 including
million reduction of
payment
in kind by
6 million
(‘claims are
exaggerated’)
September 30 Voronezh Postpone Postpone Agreed
deliveries of deliveries of
4 million 2 million,
puds, reduce reduce
payment payment
in kind by in kind
7 million, 7 million,
postpone postpone
debt on past 1 million of
(Continued overleaf )
372 Appendix A
Appendix A (Continued )

Region Proposal from Proposal from Decision by

region Moscow (usually Stalin
Kaganovich and
Molotov)
payment in debt on
kind by 3.47 payment in
million, and kind and 1.2
debt on seed million of
loan by 1.5 debt on seed
million loan (12
(15.97 in all) million in all)
October 2 Kursk Reduce Reduce by 5.9 Agreed
collections (payment in
by 8.897 kind 3.7,
million deliveries 1,
(deliveries postpone
by 2 million, debt on past
payment in payment in
kind 4.762, kind 1,
postpone postpone
debt on past debt on past
payment in loans 0.2)
kind 1.762,
postpone
debt on past
loans by 0.5)
October 9 Sverdlovsk Reduce Reduce by 7.8 Harvest was
collections (deliveries 2, good,
by 10.5 payment in claims
million kind 4, poorly
(deliveries postpone grounded –
by 3.8 payment in give
million, kind 0.8, maximum
payment in postpone reduction of
kind 4.5, debt on past 5 million
postpone loans 1)
payment in
kind 1,
postpone
debt on past
loans by 1.2)
October 9 Bashkir Reduce Reduce Agreed
deliveries by deliveries by
6 million, 5 million,
postpone postpone
 Appendix A 373
Appendix A (Continued )

Region Proposal from Proposal from Decision by

region Moscow (usually Stalin
Kaganovich and
Molotov)
payment in payment in
kind and kind 0.7 and
payment in payment in
kind debt kind debt 0.3,
1.445, postpone
postpone debt on loan
debt on 0.6
loan 0.6
October 9 Saratov Reduce Reduce by 4 Agreed
collections (postpone
by 6.6 deliveries 1,
million reduce
(deliveries payment in
by 1.8 kind 2,
million, postpone
deliveries by payment in
sovkhozy 1, kind 1,
payment in postpone
kind 2.5, debt on past
postpone loans 1)
payment in
kind 1.3)
October 9 Kirov Reduce Postpone Agreed
collections deliveries 1.5,
by 5 million reduce
(deliveries payment in
by 2.5 kind 2
million,
payment in
kind 2.5)
October 9 Gor’kii Reduce Postpone Agreed
deliveries by deliveries by
0.18, reduce 0.18, reduce
payment in payment in
kind by kind 1.5,
1.77, provide 3
provide million rubles
grain loan loan.
of 4.158, Postpone
return to grain loan to

(Continued overleaf )
374 Appendix A
Appendix A (Continued )

Region Proposal from Proposal from Decision by

region Moscow (usually Stalin
Kaganovich and
Molotov)
kolkhozy first quarter
0.6 million of 1937,
overpaid, agreeing in
provide advance to
monetary issue 0.6
loan of million loan
3 million to kolkhozy
rubles to
assist
kolkhozy
October 24 North Reduce Reduce No reply
Caucasus collections collections by recorded
by 6.283 3.2 million (departed
million (postpone for
(postpone deliveries by Moscow)
deliveries by 0.5 million,
1.315 reduce
million, payment in
reduce kind 2,
payment in postpone
kind 3.135, payment in
postpone kind 0.5,
payment in postpone
kind 1.233, debt on past
postpone payment in
debt on past kind 0.2)
payment in
kind 0.6)
October 24 Chelyabinsk Reduce Reduce No reply
collections collections by recorded
by 13.893 9.8 million (departed
million (reduce for
(reduce deliveries 0.1, Moscow)
deliveries reduce
0.25, reduce taxation in
taxation in kind 4.2,
kind 7.343, reduce
reduce sovkhoz
sovkhoz collections
collections 5.5)
6.3)

Source: SKP.
Note: 1 Proposes this on September 12 because Stalingrad region given reduction of
payment in kind (see following entry).
 APPENDIX B

Grain Loans by the State from the 1936 Harvest (million puds unless otherwise stated)

Region Seed Food Fodder Source

1
August 3, 1936 Voronezh RGASPI,
17/162/20,
37
August 3 Bashkiria2 1.5 162/20, 37
rye
August 5 Kuibyshev 1.18 162/20, 38
August 10 Far East Army 15 th. tons 162/20,44
(0.92 million puds)
from KR

375
August 10 Far East Army 40 th. tons from 162/20, 44
current resource
(2.44 m puds)
August 10 Orenburg 1 162/20, 45
rye
August 12 Western 1 162/20, 46
August 22 Kirov 0.3 162/20, 57
rye
August 28 Tatar 3.5 th. tons 162/20, 61–62
rye3
(0.214 m puds)
(Continued overleaf )
 Appendix B (Continued )
376

Region Seed Food Fodder Source

August 28 N Caucasus 1.385 RGASPI,
17/3/980,
71
September 5 Azov-Black Sea 54 162/20, 69
September 7 Krasnoyarsk 5.1 th. tons 162/20, 70
rye (0.311 m puds)
September 11 Kursk 6 th. tons 162/20, 75
rye (0.366 m
puds),
4 th. tons
winter wheat
(0.244 m puds)
October 28 Kursk 18 4 2 162/20,112
Appendix B

November 21 Tatar 6 0.25 162/20, 122–

123
November 28 Orenburg 8 1 0.75 162/20, 128
December 17 Chelyabinsk 13.5 3 2.5
W Siberia 5.5 0.5
Moscow 7 2.5 1.5
Kazakhstan 8
Saratov 12.5 4 3 162/20, 132,
Omsk 6.5 0.3 0.8 149–151
Sverdlovsk 6
Kirov and Udmurtia 6.97 2 1
December 19 Voronezh 11 1.5 1.5 162/20, 134
December 28 Stalingrad 6 0.3 0.3
Kalinin 1.2 0.3
Gor’kii 2.35 1.2 0.8 162/20, 154–
Kursk 8 3.4 155
E Siberia 1.9 0.1
Total August– IN ALL 182.78 127.92 24.35 17.51
December 1936 (including 13
(m puds) not attributed to
single heading)
Total August– IN ALL 2994 2095 399 287
December 1936 (including 213
(th. tons) not attributed to
single heading)
January 2, 1937 Kursk 1.5 0.6 2.5 162/20, 157
January 14 Ukraine 4.6 162/20, 161
January 19 Georgia 1.05 th. tons (.064 17/3/983, 31
Appendix B

m puds)
January 20 Leningrad 1.6 1
Azov-B Sea 1
North and Komi 1.2 0.3
Sverdlovsk 0.2
Yaroslavl’ 1.5
Uzbekistan 0.61 162/20, 163–
Kazakhstan 0.5 165
Tatar 1
Kirgizia 0.24
Ivanovo 1
Kirov 0.24
January 20 Narkomsovkhozov 13 17/3/983, 37,
377

53
(Continued overleaf )
 Appendix B (Continued )
378

Region Seed Food Fodder Source

January 20 Narkomzem 1 17/3/983, 37,
53
February 7 Kirov Stalin and Molotov TSD, iv (2002),
permitted obkom to 137
use 0.6 m puds of
food loan for seed
February 9 Far East 20 th. tons from grain 162/ 20, 178
in stock in Far East (Blyukher and
(1.221 m puds) Krutov
proposal to
buy grain
abroad
rejected)
Appendix B

February 16 Narkompishcheprom 22 th. tons 17/3/983, 82

sovkhozy (1.343 m
puds)
February 16 Krasnoyarsk 0.5 17/3/983, 83
March 11 Ivanovo 2 th. tons (0.022 m 17/3/984, 22
puds)
March 11 Narkomsovkhozov 2.5 17/3/984, 23
March 11 Saratov 4 th. tons hay 17/3/984, 23
(0.244 m puds)
March 11 Western 5 th. tons hay 17/3/984, 24
(0.305 m puds)
March 13 Tatar 0.7 0.156 oats (exchange 17/3/984, 30
for millet and rye)
March 16 Kuibyshev 0.5 17/3/984, 34
March 17 Stalingrad 0.2 17/3/984, 36
March 21 Tatar 3 th. tons (0.183 m
puds)
Yaroslavl’ 0.7
North 0.25
Sverdlovsk 1.02 17/3/985,
Voronezh 0.72 15–16
Azov-B. Sea 0.2 concentrated
fodder
Ivanovo 0.3 0.3 and provide
0.3 for sale
Krasnoyarsk 0.6
March 29 Ukraine 0.725 17/3/985, 22
Total January– IN ALL 46.09 34.41 6.24 3.94
March 1937 (m (including 1.5 (excluding hay)
puds) not attributed to
single heading)
Appendix B

Total January– IN ALL 752 560 102 65

March 1937 (including 25
(th. tons) not attributed to
single heading)
April 1 Kalinin 0.1 17/3/985, 31
April 1 Marii 5 th. tons (0.305 m 17/3/985, 31
puds)
April 2 Azov-B.Sea 0.3 th. tons 17/3/985, 33
khleshchevitsa
(0.018 m puds)
0.4 th. tons millet
(0.024 m puds)
April 4 Udmurtia 0.1 17/3/985, 36
379

April 5 Voronezh 1 0.5 17/3/985, 38

(Continued overleaf )
 Appendix B (Continued )
380

Region Seed Food Fodder Source

April 7 Moscow 0.5 1 17/3/985, 38
April 7 Western 0.2 17/3/985, 38
April 9 Moscow 0.5 oats 17/3/986, 5
April 9 Kirov6 0.5 17/3/986, 6
April 9 Ukraine 0.5 rye7 0.3 17/3/986, 6

April 13 Omsk 0.1 17/3/986, 12

April 13 Sverdlovsk 0.2 0.3 17/3/986, 12
April 14 Yaroslavl’ 5 th. tons rye (0.305 m 17/3/986, 14
puds)
April 21 Azov-B.Sea 0.3 17/3/987, 9
April 24 Azov-B. Sea 1.8 th. tons 17/3/987, 12
(0.110 m puds)
Appendix B

April 24 Stalingrad 2 th. tons (0.122 m 17/3/987, 12

puds)
April 27 North 4.437 th. tons8 17/3/987, 18
(0.271 m puds)
April 27 Dnepropetrovsk 1.2 th. tons millet 17/3/987, 18
for resowing
(0.073 m puds)
April 29 Narkomsovkhozov 2.36 th. tons 17/3/987, 22
(0.144 m puds)
May 4 Tatar 1.5 th. tons (0.092 m 17/3/987, 23
puds)
May 4 Donetsk 10 th. tons 17/3/987, 26
(0.611 m puds)
May 10 Voronezh 0.23 for resowing 0.5 17/3/987, 35
May 10 Chelyabinsk 0.0589 17/3/987, 35
May 10 Kursk 1 th. tons (0.061 m 17/3/987, 36
puds)10
May 10 Krasnoyarsk 2 th. tons (0.122 m 2 th. tons (0.122 m 17/3/987, 36
puds)11 puds)12
May 10 Gor’kii 3 th. tons (0.183 m 17/3/987, 36
puds)
May 13 Stalingrad 1 th. tons (0.061 m puds) 17/3/987, 55
May 17 Azov- B.Sea 0.1 for needy kolkhozy 17/3/987, 65
May 17 Kuibyshev 0.2 17/3/987, 65
May 17 Mordovia 0.35 th. tons millet 1 th. tons (0.061 m puds) 0.5 th. tons (0.030 m 17/3/987, 66
(0.021 m puds) puds)
May 21 Kirov 0.5 17/3/987, 69
May 21 Omsk 0.1 17/3/987, 81
June 1 Kalinin 0.25 17/3/987,
102–104
June 1 Ivanovo 0.02 grechikha 0.1 0.05 17/3/987,
Appendix B

107–109
June 1 Leningrad 0.025 oats or 0.18 0.1 17/3/987,
barley for 109–111
resowing13
June 2 Sverdlovsk 4 th. tons (0.244 m 4 th. tons (0.244 m puds) 17/3/987, 113
puds)
June 2 Voronezh 0.3 17/3/987, 113
June 5 Northern 0.12 17/3/987, 200
June 5 Mariiskaya 0.1 17/3/987, 206
June 5 Gor’ky 0.2 17/3/987, 212
June 5 Kirov 0.5 17/3/987, 215
June 5 Chuvash 0.2 plus 1 th. tons for 17/3/987, 218
sale (0.073 m puds)
381

June 11 Mordovia 0.2 17/3/987, 221

(Continued overleaf )
 Appendix B (Continued )
382

Region Seed Food Fodder Source

June 11 Udmurtia 0.22 17/3/987, 227
June 13 Orenburg ? 17/3/987,
June 15 Stalingrad ? 17/3/987,
June 19 Saratov 1 th. tons (0.061 m puds) 17/3/988,
July 1 Omsk 0.05 17/3/989, 19
July 1 Voronezh 0.2 17/3/989, 19
July 5 Tatar 0.2 17/3/989, 31
July 5 Chelyabinsk 0.1 17/3/989, 32
July 5 Kazakhstan 0.1 17/3/989, 33
July 5 Sverdlovsk 0.3 rye14 0.2 17/3/989, 96
July 5 Komi 0.035 17/3/989, 100
July 14 Orenburg 0.03 from new harvest 17/3/989, 51
July 14 Bashkir 0.2 17/3/989, 120
Appendix B

Total April–July IN ALL 14.828 4.201 8.088 1.502

1937 (m puds) (including
1.135 not
attributed to
single heading)
Total April–July IN ALL 243 69 132 25
1937 (th. tons) (including 18
not attributed to
single heading)
TOTAL in m 243.70 166.53 38.68 22.95
puds
TOTAL in th. 3989 2724 633 377
tons
General note: These figures are roughly confirmed by the annual grain–fodder balance for 1936/37. This shows seed loans and assistance
amounting to 2,818 thousand tons, and food and fodder loans jointly as 1,034 thousand tons, a total of 3,870 thousand tons.
The Politburo decisions about grain are recorded in a more confusing fashion than in earlier years. In earlier years, all
decisions were recorded in puds except grain exports, which were recorded in tons. In 1936/37 many decisions were recorded
in tons; we have not managed to distinguish a logical pattern about this.
There was also a change in the middle of the year in the level at which decisions were adopted. In previous years, all
decisions about grain loans and related matters formed part of the top-secret ‘special papers’, which were circulated only to a
limited number of Politburo members (RGASPI, 17/162). These decisions were carefully concealed from regional parties
who were not affected by them. It will be seen from the above that this was the practice until the end of 1936. In January 1937
some decisions were taken as part of the more-generally circulated but still secret decisions (RGASPI, 17/3). From February
16 onwards all grain decisions were recorded as secret but not top-secret. This may be because, as Appendix A shows, the
inner group of Politbuto members accepted them more or less automatically; effectively they were the responsibility of
Kleiner and Chernov. But trust in Kleiner and Chernov did not last long; the accusations of conspiracy against them, which
resulted in their execution, will be discussed in vol. 7.
1
Notes: All requests for seed loan for autumn sowing rejected.
2
In exchange for other crops.
3
1500 of this is in exchange from other crops.
Appendix B

4
0.5 for autumn sowing to be issued at once; remainder after maize delivery plan completed.
5
All other requests refused.
6
Rejected as ‘not serious’: claim for 5.5 million puds of seed, food and fodder
7
Plus sell them extra 5 th. tons in April.
8
3.347 of this from reduction of exchange of crops.
9
To be sold to needy individual peasants and collective farmers without tax.
10
For Ukrainian settlers.
11
From deduction to region from zakupki.
12
Sell at state prices with loan of 1 million rubles.
13
Due to hurricane.
14
For western districts lacking good seed.
383
 CONCLUSIONS

The three years 1934–36 were the years of the most rapid expansion
during the second five-year plan. This was also a period of relative
political moderation, in spite of the dramatic murder of Kirov which
took place at the end of 1934.
The XVII party congress at the beginning of 1934 launched an
effort, endorsed by Stalin, to combine peaceful relations within the
party with the recognition by Stalin’s former opponents and critics
that his policies had been correct and had greatly advanced the cause
of socialism. At the congress Kaganovich stated ‘we are in more
normal times’, and Kirov declared that ‘the basic difficulties are
behind us’. Such former oppositionists as Bukharin and
Preobrazhensky declared their support for the leadership, and
Preobrazhensky was readmitted to the party. The congress strongly
emphasised the radical improvement in the standard of living which
would now take place, and the forthcoming growth of education and
the health services. Stalin insisted on the importance of the growing
collaboration between the USSR and France, and the improved rela-
tions with the USA and Poland.
Political developments during the next three years were compli-
cated and contradictory. The growing threat of war increasingly
influenced the decisions of the Soviet authorities. An important
moment in these developments was the publication in Pravda on
March 31, 1935, of Tukhachevsky’s vigorous attack on German
‘revanchist aggressive policies’, endorsed and edited by Stalin (see
p. 91 above). Strong measures were taken to defend the frontier dis-
tricts militarily and by substantial transfers of the Soviet population.
A year later the outbreak of the Spanish civil war greatly increased
international tension and tension within the Soviet Union. With the
Kamenev–Zinoviev trial in July–August 1936 and the appointment
of Yezhov as head of the NKVD in September 1936, Soviet politics
emtered a new and much darker stage.
But throughout these three years the economy grew at a remark-
able rate. In 1933, according to official figures, industrial production
had increased by only 5.5 per cent, and in 1937 by 11.2 per cent, but
in each of the years 1934–36 it increased between 19 and 29 per
cent. The reasons for the slow increase in 1933 were discussed in

384
 Conclusions 385
volume 4 of this series; the decline in the rate of growth in 1937 will
be discussed in volume 7.1
The economic objective of the second five-year plan was to
strengthen further the industrial might of the Soviet Union by
expanding the ‘Group A’ producer goods’ industries, while at the
same time greatly increasing the supply of food and consumer goods
from the ‘Group B’ industries after their lag during the first five-year
plan and dramatic deterioration during the crisis and famine of
1932–33. To enable the standard of living to double or treble during
1933–37, Group B industries were planned to increase by 18.5 per cent
a year, and Group A by 14.5 per cent.
The plan nominally covered the years 1933–37, but it was effec-
tively launched a year late when it was approved by the XVII party
congress. The years 1934–36 were an important and perhaps deci-
sive stage in Soviet development. Industry, consolidating and assimi-
lating the huge investments undertaken during the first plan, roughly
doubled in size. According to Soviet statistics, output increased by
121 per cent in the five years between 1932 and 1937, while Western
estimates of the increase range between 62 and 116 per cent.2 Group
A industry increased more rapidly than Group B industry, reversing
the proportions proposed in the plan: according to Soviet figures,
Group A increased by 139 per cent, while Group B approximately
doubled. The slower expansion of Group B than planned resulted
partly from the diversion of investment to other sectors of the econ-
omy and partly from the failure of agriculture to increase its supply
of foodstuffs and industrial raw materials as much as planned. The
increase in agricultural production was nevertheless very substantial.
The accumulation of grain stocks enabled the economy to survive
the very poor harvest of 1936 without a serious famine, and even in
1936 the harvest of sugar beet, cotton and flax was greater than in
1913. But the livestock sector, after its collapse in the early 1930s,
failed to recover to the level it had reached in 1928, and the supply
to industry of meat and dairy products, and of wool, leather and

1
This chapter includes some results for 1937, although this year will be examined
in detail in vol. 7. Data comparing the beginning and end of the five-year plan (1932
and 1937) are fairly consistently available, while comparisons of 1932 and 1936 are
sometimes not available.
2
See Davies, Harrison and Wheatcroft, eds (1994), 292–3.
386 Conclusions
other raw materials was far less than stipulated in the second five-
year plan.3
Transport, especially railway transport, expanded rapidly. Priority
was given to freight: freight carried by the railways increased by 91
per cent between 1932 and 1936, and by 110 per cent by 1937, while
railway passenger transport declined by 8.8 per cent between 1932
and 1936, and increased by a mere 8.6 per cent by 1937.4
No second five-year plan was ever approved for the defence sector.
During these years, and especially in 1936 and 1937, with the
increasing threat from the fascist powers, both the armaments’ indus-
tries, classified as part of Group A industry, and the armed forces,
financed through Narkomoborony, commanded an increasing share
of industrial and other resources. The production of the armaments
industries reached 237 per cent of 1932 by 1936, and more than
trebled between 1932 and 1937, increasing from about 12 to about
18 per cent of all Group A production.5
Expenditure on the maintenance of the armed services also
increased rapidly during the second five-year plan. In current prices
it increased by as much as 388 per cent by 1936 and 554 per cent by
1937. Much of the increase resulted from increases in pay and in the
cost of food, clothing and oil purchased by the armed forces. But it
was also a real increase: the number of servicemen more than
doubled, from 693,000 to 1,683,000 in 1937, a far more rapid

3
For details see ibid. 285–9.
4
Measured in ton-km of freight, and passenger km; the number of passengers
carried increased by 18.7 per cent by 1937, as compared with the planned 35.5
per cent.
5

1932 1936 1937

1 1
All production of armaments industries 2795 6620 97592
All Group A production3 23143 50915 55254
Armaments industries as percent of all Group A 12.1 13.0 17.7
These figures are in million rubles at 1926/27 prices.

Sources: 1 RGAE, 4372/91/2112, 118–116 (dated May 20, 1937).

2
RGAE, 4372/92/265. 1 (dated July 13, 1940).
3
RGAE, 1562/529/2383, 2–5 (1948?).
Note: These figures include civilian production by the armaments industries,
which declined as a proportion of production in these industries from 1936
onwards. But they do not include armaments production by civilian industry.
 Conclusions 387
increase than that in non-agricultural employment as a whole, and
their standard of living improved.
The expansion of all these sectors rested to a large extent on the
availability of investment. Between 1932 and 1937, investment
measured in current prices increased by 77 per cent; the increase was
over 96 per cent between 1932 and 1936 (investment declined in
1937). Measurement by the Powell index shows an increase of 81 per
cent by 1936 and 57.8 per cent by 1937 (see Table 13). This is con-
sistent with other Western estimates, which indicate that national
income as a whole increased by 56.4 per cent by 1937, while con-
struction remained a constant proportion of national income.6
During these years major changes took place in the distribution of
investment between the different sectors of the economy. Between
1933 and both 1936 and 1937 investment in Narkomtyazhprom
declined from 41 to 29 per cent of all investment. If the armaments
industries are excluded, investment in Narkomtyazhprom fell to 24
per cent in 1936 and 22 per cent in 1937. Heavy industry’s share of
all investment was no higher than in the late 1920s.7 In contrast,
investment in the food and consumer goods industries (including
internal trade) between 1932 and 1937 increased from 7.9 to 9.0 per
cent of all investment, on education and health from 2.3 to 4.8, and
in transport from 11.6 to 13.1 per cent. Investment by the state in
agriculture declined from 12.2 to 8.6 per cent, primarily owing to the
great reduction in investment in the state farms following their poor
performance. The proportions of the different sectors were roughly
the same in 1936 as in 1937, except that agriculture received 10.3
per cent of state investment.
Within the civilian sector of Narkomtyazhprom there were major
changes in the priority in investment afforded to different industries.
Measured in current prices, the allocation to the non-ferrous metals
industries in 1933–7 exceeded the five-year plan by 17.4 per cent, and
within this total there were great variations between sub-industries.
Investment in rare metals exceeded the plan by 34.7 per cent and in
nickel and tin by as much as 215 per cent. Investment in non-ferrous
metals was slightly less in 1937 than in 1936. The allocations to the
coal and oil industries approximately equalled the plan in terms of
current prices in 1936 and 1937, which means that in real terms it
was substantially less than planned. The poor relatives of heavy
6
See Davies, Harrison and Wheatcroft, eds (1994), Tables 1 and 4.
7
In 1929 the percentage was 23.4.
388 Conclusions
industry were iron and steel and chemicals, which were allocated
respectively only 90.5 and 86.9 per cent of the planned amount.8
In spite of the reduction of investment in the iron and steel indus-
try, it succeeded in achieving its production plan. This was largely a
result of bringing into operation the substantial investment in plant
undertaken during the first five-year plan. Investment in iron and
steel declined annually throughout the five-year plan. These low allo-
cations meant that few new furnaces and rolling mills were under
construction by the end of the plan, and the production of iron and
steel stagnated in the immediate pre-war years. In contrast, although
they received allocations greater than planned, the non-ferrous met-
als industries, which with the exception of copper were industries
new to the Soviet Union, failed to reach their planned capacity and
did not achieve their production plan. But these industries had
already partly completed new investment by 1937, and this was
available for further expansion. The oil industry, however, failed in
all respects. As a result of low investment in drilling and prospecting
in the early 1930s, following the rapid expansion of production,
throughout the second five-year plan production expanded very
8

Capital investment in selected branches of heavy industry, 1933–37

(million rubles at current prices)

1933– 1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1933–37 1933–37

37 actual actual as
five-year per cent of
plan plan
Non-ferrous 3429 583 682 777 1016 965 4023 117.4
metalsa
Coalb 2936 594 665 653 482 542 2936 100.0
Oilc 4230 525 832 856 1131 907 4250 100.5
Iron and 6959 1368 1480 1389 1033 804 6074 87.3
steeld
Chemical 2931 388 499 488 621 551 2548 86.9
industry
Source: RGAE, 1562/10/582a, 7 (dated January 31, 1939).
Notes: These figures relate to enterprises in the relevant chief administrations as
classified in 1937.
a
For details of sub-industries, see p. 339 above.
b
Glavugol’.
c
Glavneftedobycha,Glavneftepererabotka and Glavneftesbyt.
d
GUMP, Glavspetsstal’ and Glavtrubostal’.
 Conclusions 389
slowly. Oil investment rose rapidly after a slow start: in 1933 it was
less than investment in coal, but by 1936 it was more than twice as
high. But this substantial increase did not overcome the production
lag; production continued to develop very slowly after 1937.
The most substantial increase in investment was in the defence
sector, both as a proportion of all investment and in absolute terms.
Investment in the armaments industries increased from 9.1 per
cent of all investment in Narkomtyazhprom in 1934 to 14.5 per
cent in 1936 and 23.7 per cent in 1937. 9 Investment by
Narkomoborony in airfields, barracks and other facilities almost
doubled, so total investment in the defence sector rose from 7.7 per
cent in 1935 to 11.3 per cent of all investment in 1936, and 12.9
per cent in 1937.10
The measurement of capital investment was somewhat unreliable,
because it was normally based on reports of the input into invest-
ment, and covered only some 60–70 per cent of investment.
Measurement of the outcome of investment was even more prob-
lematic. The Soviet authorities published figures for capital stock,
and annual figures for its increase (known as ‘introduction into oper-
ation’ (vvod v deistvie)). These figures are difficult to interpret. Capital
stock was valued at its price at the time it was introduced into opera-
tion, and in view of the continuing increase in costs is therefore
undervalued in terms of the current prices at which new additions to
9
Investment in the armaments industries increased from 761 to 2,200 million
rubles (see n. 00 below), while investment in Narkomtyazhprom as a whole (includ-
ing armaments) increased from 8,196 to 9,266 million rubles (see Table 8).
10

Capital investment in the defence sector, 1934–37

(million rubles at current prices)

1934 1935 1936 1937

In armaments industries 761 9051 14671 22002
By Narkomoborony3 717 1186 2518 1936
Total in defence sector 1478 2091 3985 4136
All Soviet investment4 23540 27157 35311 32029
Defence sector as per cent of 6.3 7.7 11.3 12.9
all investment
Sources: 1 RGAE, 4372/91/3217, 315 (dated May 20, 1937).
2
RGAE, 4372/91/218, 7 (dated February 5, 1939).
3
See Harrison and Davies (1997), 380.
4
See Table 8 below.
390 Conclusions
stock are valued. However, both investment and stock figures provide
a reasonable indication of the change in the volume of investment
and capital stock over short periods of time (such as the second five-
year plan).11 The following table shows the relationship between
investment and introduction into operation:

Capital investment and increase in capital stock, 1933–37

(million rubles in current prices)

Plan 1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 Actual Percentage

1933– (prelim- 1933–37 fulfilment
37 inary) 1933–37
Investment: 120083 18053 23540 27157 35311 33852 137913 114.8
total
Introduction 132030 15897 20275 25548 29793 23323 120336 91.1
into
operation:
total
Investment: 62497 9890 11868 13024 15939 14446 65197 104.5
industry
Introduction 69050 8418 10647 12902 13258 11050 56275 81.5
into
operation:
industry
Source: RGAE, 4372/92/101, 77, 80 (May 11, 1938).

The second five-year plan intended to accelerate the increase in cap-

ital stock, so that it would substantially exceed the annual invest-
ment. In practice, while the introduction of capital into operation
increased in each year in 1934–36, it was exceeded by the amount of
new investment, and in 1937 it declined absolutely. The Gosplan
preliminary report on the results of the second five-year plan
acknowledged that ‘the plan for introduction of investment into
operation approved by the XVII party congress has not been carried
out in full; however, the extent of the underfulfilment cannot be
established at present’.12
Information available on the increase of capacity in several indus-
tries, assembled by Zaleski, provides an indication of the growth in

11
For a devastating memorandum to Andreev, ‘On capital stock and capital invest-
ment’, dated December 8, 1938, signed by Cherkasskii, see RGASPI, 17/120/283,
197–200. This report was prepared to show the unreliability and dishonesty of the
old management of TsUNKhU, and exaggerated the undoubted defects.
12
RGAE, 4372/92/101, 286 (1938).
 Conclusions 391
capital stock during the five-year plan. In every case except sugar
refining, the capacity installed was less than planned:

Actual increase in Planned increase in

production capacity production capacity
during second five-year during second five-year
plan (percentage) plan (percentage)
Power stations 72.8 132.1
Blast furnaces 50.9 112.5
Open-hearth 53.5 95.8
furnaces
Rolling mills 128.6 171.4
Sugar refineries 52.3 41.5
Source: derived from Zaleski (1980), 256–7.

The programme for the construction of education facilities was rea-

sonably successful. But in spite of much effort and publicity the amount
of new housing constructed was small. Investment in housing, meas-
ured in current prices, exceeded the five-year plan, but the amount of
new housing constructed reached only 42 per cent of the plan. Housing
costs, planned at 179r per m2, rose by 1937 to 784r, and averaged
468r over 1933–37 as a whole.13 The amount constructed only slightly
exceeded the amount constructed during the first five-year plan.14
Housing: investment (million rubles) and area brought into
operation (living space in million m2)

1933–37 1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1933–37

plan actual
Investment 11480 1737 2194 2918 2974 2746 12569
Area 64.0 7.2 6.0 4.6 5.5 3.5 26.8
brought
into
operation
Source: RGAE, 1562/1/1039, 79–77 (1938?).
Note: In post-war statistics, housing was shown in terms of total space built (including
hallways, etc.). In these terms the area brought into operation in 1933–37
amounted to 38.3 m2. New housing in 1939 amounted to 6.0 million m2.
Figures for 1938 and 1940 have not been traced.

13
Esimated from data in table below.
14
The amount constructed during the first five-year plan amounted to 22.3 million
m2 (Itogi pervogo (1933)), 186.
392 Conclusions
This was a qualitatively new period in Soviet industrialisation.
During the first five-year plan economic development had been
‘extensive’, in the sense that it relied on the expansion of the urban
labour force. With the huge influx of labour, primarily migrating
from the countryside, the average length of employment halved, and
the proportion of young workers greatly increased (see vol. 4, pp.
443–5). Output per worker in industry had probably declined, and it
declined very considerably in the building industry (see vol. 4, p. 468).
During the second five-year plan the non-agricultural labour force
increased much more slowly. The labour force increased by 24.2 per
cent in industry, and 16.6 per cent on the railways, and actually
declined by 27 per cent in capital construction (see Table18). But
production increased much more rapidly. In industry the increase
was at least 62 per cent, and it may have doubled; construction
increased by about 58 per cent, and rail traffic approximately dou-
bled. So labour productivity (output per worker) substantially
increased. According to official figures it rose by 82 per cent in indus-
try, 83 per cent in construction and 48 per cent in railway trans-
port.15 For the railways and construction, these figures are
approximately correct. The most careful Western estimate for
industry by Hodgman shows a productivity increase of 65 per cent.
The increase in productivity was due partly to the more intensive
use and better organisation of labour. The Stakhanov movement was
a striking example of the encouragement of harder work through a
mixture of economic incentives and exhortation. But as we have seen
(p. 298 above) the positive effect of Stakhanovism as such was primar-
ily confined to a leap forward in the fourth quarter of 1935. The
longer-term improvement in productivity resulted from other factors.
The quality of the labour force improved. The average length of the
period in which the average worker had been employed in industry
increased: in 1932 only one-third of all workers had been employed
for five years or more; by 1937 this had increased to over 50 per cent.16
The longer work experience was accompanied by the improvement of
skills. Many workers were trained on the job, and acquired the ‘techni-
cal minimum’ launched by the December 1935 party plenum.
According to Soviet estimates in May 1937, by the end of the year
three-quarters of the workers in industry and transport would have

15
Vypolnenie vtorogo (1939), 70, 73.
16
Davies, Harrison and Wheatcroft, eds (1994), 97.
 Conclusions 393
reached the standard of the technical minimum.17 Some 1.4 million
of the approximately 5 million new workers in the second five-year
plan had been trained at factory schools.18 At the higher level, the
number of students in technical schools and their equivalent increased
by 19.2 per cent and the number in higher education by 8.2 per cent
in 1932–7.19 These improvements should not be exaggerated. In 1937
a clear majority of the labour force were ex-peasants who had migrated
from the countryside in the previous ten years, and most workers had
received only four years’ formal school education. Professional and
semi-professional personnel were still a small minority.
Two industries were particularly affected by labour problems: coal
and timber. Although wages in the coal industry were relatively high,
and a minority of workers could obtain very high wages as
Stakhanovites, labour shortage was endemic, especially at the coal
face. The number of workers in the industry increased by about
7 per cent in 1933, but remained constant between 1933 and 1937,
while in industry as a whole it increased by one-third. While a cadre
of skilled miners was established by 1937, the proportion of unskilled
workers, and their rate of turnover, remained very high. The timber
industry had relied on peasant labour and horses for a large part of
its production: both the decline in the number of horses and collec-
tivisation adversely affected the traditional arrangements. The indus-
try suffered from a chronic labour shortage, which remained in spite
of the extensive use of both material incentives and coercion.
Mechanisation played an important part in the increase in labour
productivity, especially in industries such as mining where manual
labour had predominated.20 The number of kilowatt hours of energy
used per worker in industry was estimated to have increased by 88.7
per cent in 1932–37.21 The more efficient use of fuel and materials
also increased productivity.
A major factor in the growth of labour productivity and of pro-
duction was the more efficient use of capital. Within a few months
of the belated approval and publication of the five-year plan in

17
Industrialisatiya 1933–1937 (1971), 603.
18
Davies, Harrison and Wheatcroft, eds (1994), 102; Vypolnenie vtorogo (1939), 61.
19
Vypolnenie vtorogo (1939), 121.
20
In coal cutting mechanisation increased from 65.4 per cent in 1932 to 89.6 per
cent in 1937, in haulage from the coal face (otkatka) from 15.0 to 47.6 per cent
(Vypolnenie vtorogo (1939), 89).
21
Vypolnenie vtorogo (1939), 88.
394 Conclusions
November 1934, investment decisions, particularly in heavy industry,
had to be drastically modified because insufficient investment was
available to support all the projects listed in the plan. In spite of the
cancellation and delay of many of their projects, some major indus-
tries, including electric power, iron and steel, vehicles and machine
tools, nevertheless approximately reached the production plan for
1937 approved in the five-year plan, and nearly reached it in 1936.
This was largely because the available capital was used much more
efficiently. The cuts in planned investment were directed towards
those projects which were not scheduled to come into operation until
1937 or later years. As a result, in several industries, notably iron and
steel, and vehicles, production failed to increase in the remaining
years before the German invasion.
In other heavy industries, including coal, oil and several branches
of machine building, the failure to supply the investment planned
was a major factor in their failure to reach the production target; in
the coal industry labour shortages exacerbated the situation.
On the railways, the situation was similar to that in the successful
heavy industries. As a result of inadequate investment, the number
of new railway lines constructed, and locomotives and goods wagons
supplied, was far less than planned. But the speed of goods trains,
the daily distance covered by locomotives and goods wagons and the
average weight of a goods train substantially increased, in each case
exceeding the planned indicators. Freight transported exceeded the
plan in spite of the restriction of investment.
A striking feature of these three years was that the expansion of the
economy (excluding agriculture) accelerated. Both the rate of growth
of industrial production and the productivity of labour (output per
worker) increased annually in 1934–36:
Total industrial production22
(thousand million rubles at 1926/27 prices)

1933 1934 1935 1936

Total production 45724 54477 66763 85839
Annual increase 19.1 22.6 28.7
in per cent
22
RGAE, 1562/329/2383, 2 [1948?].
 Conclusions 395
Percentage increase in productivity of labour23

1934 1935 1936

Industry 10.7 15.6 21.8
NKPS (railways) 2.5 6.0 24.0
Although the development of the economy in 1934–36 was on the
whole outstandingly successful, it would be wrong to conclude that
this progress depended on consistent and regular planning methods.
First, smooth planning was combined with mobilisation campaigns,
the most important of which was the Stakhanov movement, particu-
larly in its early stages. Secondly, the financial provisions set out in
the second five-year plan were swept aside in several important
respects. The five-year plan assumed that rationing would continue
beyond 1937, and would be abolished by gradually reducing the
prices of food and consumer goods until supply and demand on the
retail market were in balance. In practice, Stalin’s sudden decision to
end bread rationing at the end of 1934 meant that retail prices of
bread were suddenly increased and the same process was applied to
other food a year later (see pp. 121–9 and 173–6 above). Thirdly, in
each year the original proposal for capital investment was low, but
was overruled in favour of a much higher plan which was generally
carried out (data in thousand million rubles):

Initial plan Approved plan Revised plan Achieved

1934 September December 1933
1933
21 25 24
1935 July 1934 February 1935 July 1935
18 21 25 27
1936 July 1935 December 1935 May 1936
18 32 35 36
Fourthly, Gosplan generally sought to reduce prices every year;
but its annual plans submitted to the government were in practice
overruled. Thus in July 1935 Gosplan proposed that capital

23
Published from Gosplan archives in Industrializtsiya 1933–1937 (1971), 338–9,
dated May 1937.
396 Conclusions
investment in 1936 should amount to only 17,700 million rubles and
that prices should be reduced by 10,000 million rubles. But by
December 1935 the investment plan for 1936 had been increased to
31,600 million rubles and the plan to reduce prices substantially had
been dropped (see pp. 268–74 above).
This did not of course mean that the central authorities paid little
attention to the role of costs and prices. A determined effort was
made throughout these years to reduce costs, and, except for the
dramatic changes due to the abolition of food rationing in 1934–35,
cost reductions and productivity increases were a major aspect of
these years, a striking contrast to developments in the early 1930s.
 TABLES

All figures are in metric tons (tonnes)

Table 1. Number of workers and gross production by industry, 1933 and 1937

Annual average number of Gross production in

workers (thousands) 1926/27 prices
(million rubles)
1933 1937 1933 1937
a
I Power stations 65 98 855 1909
II Fuel extraction 536 568 1522 2547
including coal 402 405 839 1475
III Iron ore 36 31 95 176
IV Manganese ore 7 9 15 37
V Mining-chemical 12 18 47 139
VI Non-ore extraction 11 15 50 64
VII Timber extraction and 913 940 1660 2238
floating
VIII Fuel processing 38 49 1250 2108
IX Chemical 160 210 1519 4156
X Building materialsb 319 441 740 1815
XI Glass 63 105 260 774
XII China and porcelain 29 41 137 273
XIII Iron and steel 237 332 1616 3998
XIV Non-ferrous metals 112 155 501 1437
XV Metalworking 2047 2990 11283 28594
Including machine buildingc 1764 2524 9487 2391
XVI Abrasive tar and 5 9 59 184
coal-graphite products
XVII Rubber and asbestos 46 70 616 1450
XVIII Woodworking 455 631 1739 3441
XIX Matches 14 13 51 73
XX Paper 45 47 302 584
XXI Textiles 930 1216 6049 10559
including cotton textiles 448 571 3302 5216
knitwear 139 201 700 1422
XXII Tailoring 315 481 2139 3541
XXIII Leather, fur and 324 476 1364 3677
footwear
XXIV Fats, soaps and 19 23 336 750
perfumes
XXV Food, drink and tobacco 924 1238 9766 17513

(Continued overleaf )

397
398 TABLES
Table 1. (Continued )

Annual average number of Gross production in

workers (thousands) 1926/27 prices
(million rubles)
XXVI Salt 7 6 24 34
XXVII Printing 86 124 414 858
XXVIII Other industries 127 226 818 2580

Source: RGAE, 1562/329/4145 (1951?), 11–59.

Notes: a Including network and substations.
b
including extraction of materials for building and the silicate-ceramic
industry.
c
Including repair factories and shops.
 Table 2. Industrial production and employment, 1928, 1932–40
(gross production in million 1926/27 prices; employment in thousands of average-annual employed)

1928 1932 1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1938 1939 1940
All production1 21433 48343 45724 54477 66782 85929 95572 106834 123915 138479
Per cent increase 5.5 19.1 22.6 28.7 11.2 11.8 16.0 11.8
Large-scale production1 16833 38843 42030 50477 62137 80929 90166 100602 116128 123460
Per cent increase 8.2 20.1 23.1 30.2 11.4 11.6 15.4 6.3
Number employed: all 8000 7823 8158 8786 9466 10112 10357
industry2
Per cent increase –2.2 4.3 7.7 7.7 6.8 2.4
Number of workers: all 6007 6006 6438 6954 7447 7924 8031
industry2
TABLES

Per cent increase 0.0 7.2 8.0 7.1 6.4 1.4

Number of workers: 3821 7071 7075 7515 8278 8872 9079 9150 9284 9787
large-scale industry3
Per cent increase 0.1 6.2 10.2 7.2 2.3 0.8 1.5 5.4

Sources: 1 RGAE, 1562/329/4145, 3 (1951?).

2
RGAE, 4372/36/871, 34ob, 35 (1939?) Excludes cooperative artels and collective farmers working in kolkhoz enterprises, and
auxiliary industrial enterprises in non-industrial commissariats. Including auxiliary industrial enterprises, in 1938 amounts to
8,474.
3
RGAE, 1562/329/4145, 10 (1951?). Includes cooperative artels and collective farmers working in kolkhoz enterprises.
399
 Table 3. Production of capital goods in physical terms
400

1928 1932 1933 1934 1935 1936 1937

Electricity (th. million kWh) 5.0 13.5 16.4 21.0 25.3 32.8 36.2
Coal (m. tons) 35.5 64.4 76.3 94.2 109.6 126.8 128.0
Crude oil (m. tons) 11.6 21.4 21.5 21.2 25.2 27.4 28.5
Pig iron (m. tons) 3.3 6.2 7.1 10.4 12.5 14.4 14.5
Crude steel (m. tons 4.3 5.9 6.9 9.7 12.6 16.4 17.7
Rolled steel (m. tons) 3.4 4.4 5.1 7.0 9.4 12.5 13.1
High-quality steel (m. tons)1 0.09 0.68 0.89 1.25 1.57 2.06 2.39
Copper (th. tons) 30.0 45.0 44.3 53.22 76.02 100.8 97.5
Aluminium (th. tons)3 0 0 0 14.5 25 37.7
Cement (m. tons) 1.85 3.48 2.71 3.54 4.49 5.87 5.45
Bricks (millions) 2790 4900 3822 4972 5959 8345 8666
Mineral fertilisers (m. tons) 0.14 0.92 1.03 1.40 2.32 2.84 3.24
Sulphuric acid (m. tons) 0.21 0.55 0.63 0.78 0.99 1.20 1.37
Locomotives (standard units) 478 828 941 1257 1795 1566 1582
TABLES

Goods wagons–Narkomput’ type (thousands) 2-axle units4 13.8 19.2 17.2 26.7 85.3 67.3 58.80
Equipment for metal industries (th. tons) 0 6.9 18.4
Ball and roller bearings (millions) 0 2.0 7.0 13.4 19.3 33.9 40.1
Generators (th. kW) 75 1085 587 5995 7545 561
Electric motors (th. kW) 259 1658 1385 16515 1653 1833
Tracrors (th. 15-h.p. units) 1.8 50.8 79.9 118.1 155.5 173.2 66.5
Lorries (thousands) 0.7 23.7 39.1 54.6 76.9 131.5 180.3

Sources: Except where otherwise stated, from appropriate sections of Promyshlennost’ (1957).
1
See Clark (1956), 20.
2
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan (1936), 121–2.
3
RGAE, 1562/329/2383, 13; Narkhozplan 1936 (1936), 191–2.
4
Zheleznodorozhnyi transport (1970), 414.
5
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan 1937 (1937), 70–1.
 TABLES 401
Table 4. Production of aircraft, 1933–41

1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1938 1939 1940 1941

Fighters
I-5 321 350
I-15 74 288 2
I-15b 1104 1304
I-16 50 531 906 1887 1175 1835 2710 356
I-153 1016 2362 64
Other 39 96 20 49 185 100
TOTAL 360 570 839 957 2072 2370 4150 5072 420
Bombers
TB3 307 139 74 115 23 1
KR6/KR6A 222 48
SB 268 926 1427 1778 2195 337
DB3/DB3F 45 399 959 1106 717
Yak4/BB22 138 62
Other 50 20 31 2 1 6
TOTAL 357 381 122 414 996 1827 2737 3439 1137
Reconnaisance 1572 1911 836 1139 818 479 523 69 4
Training 1381 1100 327 968 1937 2695 2675 1071 1899
Passenger, etc. 423 491 397 798 210 310 251 125
TOTAL all 4093 4453 2521 4276 6033 7690 10336 9776 3460
aircraft

Source: Derived from Samoletostroenie, i (1992), chs 3, 4, 5 and 7.

402 TABLES
Table 5. Production of tanks, 1933–41

1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1938 1939 1940 1941

Minitanks
T27 919 14
Small tanks
T37/37A 138 953 1140 410
T38 1046 216 158
T40 41 2068
Light tanks
T26etc 1405 1449 1378 1313 550 1054 1399 1601 102

BT2 224
BT5 781 1103
BT7 2 500 1061 788 1217 1397 1
BT7M 2 4 5 779

T50 50
Medium tanks
T28 41 51 32 101 46 100 140 13
T34 2 115 3014
Heavy tanks
T35 1 10 7 15 10 11 6
KV 243 1358

TOTAL 3509 3582 3057 3948 1610 2386 3107 2793 6592

Source: Derived from Mel’tyukhov (2002), 511–36.

 Table 6. Light industry

(a) Production of industrial consumer goods in physical terms, 1928, 1932–40 (thousand tons unless otherwise stated)

1913 1928 1932 1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1937

five-year plan
Cotton fibre 223 208 395 717
Cotton yarn 271 324 355 533
Cotton fabrics (million linear metres) 2582 2678 2694 2732 2733 2640 3270 5100 3448
Cotton threads (million katushki) 417 473 699 892
Woollen yarn 47 50 71 77
Woollen fabrics (million linear metres) 103 87 89 86 78 84 102 220 108
Linen yarn 53 62 55 98
Linen fabrics (million linear metres) 120 174 134 141 162 216 295 600 285
Raw silk (tons) 380 397 837 1624
TABLES

Silk fabrics (million metres) 43 9.6 22 26 31 38 52 59

Socks and stockings (million pairs) 68 208 251 323 341 359 725 409
Underwear (million items) 6.9 27.3 36 54 63 66 16 112
Outerwear (million items) 1.4 11.7 17.2 22.4 26.0 35.9 45
Leather footwear (million pairs) 60 58 87 90 85 104 143 180 183
Window glass (million m2) 24 34 30 30 50 70 88 79

Source: Promyshlennost’ (1957), 312, 323, 328, 343, 354, except 1937 plan: Vtoroi (1934) (i), 431, 461.
Note: The second five-year plan gives much lower figures for production in 1932 by Narkomlegprom only of socks and stockings (154.3
million pairs) and underwear (16.3 million units). The plan for 1937 is also for Narkomlegprom only.
403
404 TABLES
(b) Number of manual workers employed in light industry, 1933 and 1937
(thousands)

1933 1937

Large-scale Small-scale Total Large-scale Small-scale Total

Textiles 823 107 930 1099 117 1216
including: cotton 443 1 444 555 12 567
texiles
Knitwear 101 36 137 150 51 201
Tailoring 282 33 315 392 89 481
Leather and fur 263 61 324 342 134 476
goods,
footwear
including footwear 178 44 222 231 109 340
Glassware 63 .3 63.3 103 2 105
China and 24 6 30 34 7 31
earthenware
Musical 9.5 1 10.5 26.9 2.8 29.7
instruments
Stationery, etc 14.2 .8 15 24 1.8 25.8
Toys 8.9 0.8 9.7 22.4 4.1 26.5
Craftware and 5.3 0.9 6.2 10.1 2.4 12.5
jewellery
Total 1492.9 210.8 1703.7 2053.4 360.1 2403.5

Source: Industrializatsiya, 1933–1937 (1971), 382–94 (1938 census of industry).

Note: Includes Categories XXI–XXIII, XXVIII–XXXI.
 TABLES 405
Table 7. Production of major food items in physical terms, 1928, 1932–40
(thousand tons unless otherwise stated)

1928 1932 1933 1934 1935 1936 1937

Raw sugar 1283 828 995 1404 2032 1998 2421
Granulated sugar 656 438 349 487 719 1060 1032
Meata 678 596 527 649 787 995 1002
Fish 840 1333 1303 1547 1520 1631 1609
Dairy productsb, c 1900 1900 3500 3800 4200 5100 5000
of which: Butterd 82 72 124 138 159 189 185
Vegetable oild 448 490 321 422 492 503 529
Preserved foods 125 692 619 722 808 1002 982
(million
standard tins)
Confectionery 99 511 429 522 586 764 878
Macaroni 47 185 149 181 185 262 264
products
Raw alcohol 23.3 36.5 38.8 47.2 60.7 69.5 76.7
(million
decalitres)
Vodka and vodka 55.5 72.0 89.7
products (m
decalitres)
Beer (m 39.1 42.1 89.6
decalitres)
Cigarettes (th. 49.5 57.9 89.2
million)
Makhorka (m 3.2 3.3 5.3
boxes)
Soap (40% fat 311 357 495
equivalent)

Source: Promyshlennost’ (1957), 371–405.

Notes: a Industrial production; does not includes meat from domestic slaughter of
animals.
b
In milk equivalent.
c
Excludes production by households and by kolkhozy.
d
Industrial production; excludes production by households.
406 TABLES
Table 8A. Capital investment, 1933–37
(million rubles at current prices)

1933 1934 1935 1936 1937

Narkomtyazhprom 7420 8396 9042 10099 9266
Narkomlegprom 513 620 713 1133 1233
Narkompishcheprom 919 924 1082 1546 1368
Narkomles 409 462 608 790 786
Narkommestpromy 0 471 574 830 552
Narkomvnutorg 0 171 214 350 363
Narkomvneshtorg 94 110 59 40 17
Komzag 194 307 357 369 255
GUKFPR 14 24 48 269a 202a
Narkomzemb 1530 1963 2320 3050 2209
Narkomsovkhozy 848 923 807 579 535
Narkomput’ 2107 3037 4147 4602 4217
Narkomvodc 486 727 975 1249 982
GUSMP 14 41 79 137 146
Tsudotransd 376 609 562 575 595
GUGVF 116 183 162 221 196
Narkomsvyaz’ 184 282 304 330 263
Tsentrosoyuz 415 512 145 259 271
Cooperativese 200 262 302 447 474
Narkomprosyf 234 355 752 896 746
Narkomzdravyf 173 324 357 525 805
Ispolkomy including 395 503 756 550 2303
housing cooperatives
Narkomkhozyg 562 1121 1161 1585
Other 850 1213 1631 4877 4245
Total 18053 23540 27157 35311 32029
included in aboveh:
Narkomoborony 620 717 1186 2518 1936
Armaments industries 604 761 905 1467 2200
NKVD 790 1284 1852 2690 2643

Notes: For Notes see Table 8B.

 TABLES 407
Table 8B. Capital investment, 1933–37
(per cent of total in Table 8A)

1933 1934 1935 1936 1937

Narkomvodc 2.69 3.09 3.59 3.54 3.07
GUSMP 0.08 0.17 0.29 0.39 0.46
Tsudotransd 2.08 2.59 2.07 1.63 1.86
GUGVF 0.64 0.78 0.60 0.63 0.61
Narkomsvyaz’ 1.02 1.20 1.12 0.93 0.82
Tsentrosoyuz 2.30 2.18 0.53 0.73 0.85
Cooperativese 1.11 1.11 1.11 1.27 1.48
Narkomprosyf 1.30 1.51 2.77 2.54 2.33
Narkomzdravyf 0.96 1.38 1.31 1.49 2.51
Narkomkhozyg 3.11 4.76 4.28 4.49 7.19
Narkomtyazhprom 41.10 35.67 33.30 28.60 28.93
Narkomlegprom 2.84 2.63 2.63 3.21 3.85
Narkompishcheprom 5.09 3.93 3.98 4.38 4.27
Narkomles 2.27 1.96 2.24 2.24 2.45
Narkommestpromy 0.00 2.00 2.11 2.35 1.72
Narkomvnutorg 0.00 0.73 0.79 0.99 1.13
Narkomvneshtorg 0.52 0.47 0.22 0.11 0.05
Komzag 1.07 1.30 1.31 1.05 0.80
GUKFPR 0.08 0.10 0.18 0.76 0.63
Narkomzemb 8.48 8.34 8.54 8.64 6.90
Narkomsovkhozy 4.70 3.92 2.97 1.64 1.67
Narkomput’ 11.67 12.90 15.27 13.03 13.17
Ispolkomy including 2.19 2.14 2.78 1.56
housing cooperatives
Other 4.71 5.15 6.01 13.81 13.25
Total 100.00 100.00 100.00 100.00 100.00

Notes to Tables A and B: General Note: the figures for 1933–37 include not only capital
investment which formed part of the main state plan, but also
earmarked (tselevye), ‘outside-the-limit’ (vnelimitnye) and ‘outside-
the-plan’ investment. This expenditure, which did not form
part of the main state plan, increased sharply in 1936 and
1937.
a
Komitet po delam isskustv (Committee for the Arts).
b
Includes state allocations to collective farms.
c
Includes Moscow–Volga canal.
d
Renamed Gussoshdor and transferred to NKVD in October
1935.
e
Includes artisan cooperatives of Vsekopromsovet, invalid
cooperatives, fishery collective farms and integrated
cooperatives.
f
Includes establishments of TsIK and Sovnarkom.
(Continued overleaf )
408 TABLES
g
Includes establishments of TsIK and Sovnarkom, municipal
electricity and Moscow Metro.
h
Narkomoborony is probably included in ‘other’ in full, but
the NKVD figures show the situation as it stood at the end of
1937, after various projects had been transferred from civilian
departments to the NKVD. They therefore include projects
which are also included as part of the expenditure of different
civilian departments.
Sources: Except where otherwise stated, 1933–36: RGAE, 1562/10/
468, 5 (1937). 1937: RGAE, 1562/10/502a, 27 (1938?).
Narkomoborony: see Harrison and Davies (1997), 381.
NKVD: RGAE, 1562/10/582a, 6.

Table 9. Capital investment in selected branches of heavy industry, 1933–37

(million rubles at current prices)

1933–37 1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1933–37 1933–37

five-year actual actual as per
plan cent of plan
Non-ferrous 3429 583 682 777 1016 965 4023 117.4
metalsa
Coalb 2936 594 665 653 482 542 2936 100.0
Oilc 4230 525 832 856 1131 907 4250 100.5
Iron and 6959 1368 1480 1389 1033 804 6074 87.3
steeld
Chemical 2931 388 499 488 621 551 2548 86.9
industry

Source: RGAE, 1562/10/582a, 7 (dated January 31, 1939).

Notes: These figures relate to enterprises in the relevant chief administrations as
classified in 1937.
b
Glavugol’.
c
Glavneftedobycha, Glavneftepererabotka and Glavneftesbyt.
d
GUMP, Glavspetsstal’ and Glavtrubostal’.
 TABLES 409
Table 10. Capital investment and increase in capital stock, 1933–37
(million rubles in current prices)

Plan 1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 Actual Percentage

1933–37 (preliminary) 1933–37 fulfilment
1933–37
Investment: 120083 18053 23540 27157 35311 33852 137913 114.8
total
Introduction 132030 15897 20275 25548 29793 23323 120336 91.1
into
operation:
total
Investment: 62497 9890 11868 13024 15939 14446 65197 104.5
industry
Introduction 69050 8418 10647 12902 13258 11050 56275 81.5
into
operation:
industry

Source: RGAE, 4372/92/101, 77, 80 (May 11, 1938).

Table 11. Housing:

Capital investment (million rubles) and area brought into operation
(living space in million m2), 1933–37

1933–37 1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1933–37

plan actual
Investment 11480 1737 2194 2918 2974 2746 12569
Area brought 64.0 7.2 6.0 4.6 5.5 3.5 26.8
into
operation

Source: RGAE, 1562/1/1039, 79–77 (1938?).

Note: In post-war statistics, housing was shown in terms of total space built
(including hallways, etc.). In these terms the area brought into operation in
1933–37 amounted to 38.3 m2. New housing in 1939 amounted to 6.0 million
m2. Figures for 1938 and 1940 have not been traced.
410 TABLES
Table 12. Investment and construction costs, 1933–37

(a) Index of investment costs at current prices

(1932 =100)

1933 1934 1935 1936 1937

Building 104.3 103.4 99.6 100.9 105.3
Equipment 103.3 100.2 98.3 103.0 101.0
All investment 104.0 102.4 99.5 101.7 103.9

Source: RGAE, 4372/92/101, 73–76 (‘Explanatory memorandum on the estimates

of the results of the II five-year plan’, May 11, 1938, unsigned).
Note: We have calculated the index for ‘All investment’ using the ratios of building
and equipment given in this memorandum. The memorandum assumes that
the ratio in 1937 was the same as in 1936.

(b) Index of costs of ‘pure building’ by type of expenditure

(1932 = 100)

Total Building Labour Overheads Administration and Other

costs materials on labour maintenance

Total Wages Output

per man day
1933 103.3 107.2 90.7 96.6 106.5 123.1 98.7 110.8
1934 105.2 111.0 95.2 113.1 118.7 137.5 82.4 110.9
1935 100.5 114.3 88.6 138.1 165.9 122.7 74.7 94.1
1936 101.0 129.4 86.1 164.6 191.1 98.4 65.1 81.5
1937a 105.4 133.8 95.5 176.0 183.5 91.6 73.5 71.7
1937b 105.6 136.5 209.1 121.1 69.5 58.5

Source: RGAE, 4372/92/101 (May 11, 1938), except 1937b: Industrializatsiya ... 1933–
1937 (1970), 240–1 dated December 16, 1938.
Notes: The index of total costs differs slightly from the index in table (a); it was
estimated separately by the TsUNKhU officials.
a
Preliminary figures.
b
Final figures.
 TABLES 411
Table 13. The Powell index of Soviet construction, 1928–40
(1927/28 =100; measured in 1937 prices)

1927/28 100
1929 124
1930 161
1931 174
1932 173
1933 156
1934 188
1935 232
1936 313
1937 273
1938 269
1939 275
1940 275

Source: Calculated from data in Powell (1959).

Table 14. Increase in investment as compared with previous year, 1934–36

(million rubles at current prices)

1934 1935 1936

Amount of Percent Amount of Percent Amount of Percent

net increase increase net increase increase net increase increase
above 1933 above 1933 above 1934 above 1934 above 1935 above 1935

1. Consumer 91 6.5 256 17.1 1141 48.1

industriesa
2. Social and 939 68.8 718 31.2 528 15.4
cultural servicesb
3. Transportc 1172 43.3 1337 34.5 883 14.2
4. Defenced 254 20.8 613 41.5 1694 90.6
5. Other (net 1930 29.1 458 3.6 3748
increase)
Total 4386 32.2 3382 15.3 8154 30.0
Total includes 494 62.5 568 44.2 842 45.5
NKVD

Sources: Derived from data in Table 8A; for NKVD investment, which appears under
various heads in the above table, see RGAE, 1562/10/582a, 6 (table
compiled by NKVD dated January 28, 1939).
Notes: a Narkompishcheprom (previously Narkomsnab) and Narkomlegprom.
b
People’s Commissariats of Education, Health and Municipal Services, and
soviet executive committees and housing.
c
Narkomput’, Narkomvod, Northern Sea Route and civil aviation.
d
Narkomoborony (construction) and investment in armaments industries.
412 TABLES
Table 15. Main changes in the distribution of investment, 1935–36

(a) The economy as a whole

1935 investment 1936 increase in Percentage

(million rubles) investment (million increase
rubles)
1(a) Narkomoborony1. 1186 1332 112.3
(b) Defence industries2 905 562 62.1
Total defence-related 2091 1894 90.6
2(a) Consumer industries 2369 1140 48.1
(b) Internal trade 661 395 59.8
(c) Education and health 1109 310 28.0
(d) Agriculture 3127 502 16.1
Total consumer sector 7266 2347 32.3
3. Transport 6231 883 14.2
4. Narkomtyazhprom 8137 495 7.4
(excluding defence
industries)
5. Other 3432 2505a 72.9a
Total 27157 8154 30.5
(NKVD)3 (1852) (842) (45.5)

Sources: Except where otherwise stated, derived from RGAE, 1562/10/468, 5 (1937).
1
See Harrison and Davies (1997), 380.
2
RGAE, 4372/91/3217, 115 (dated May 20, 1937).
3
RGAE, 1562/10/582a, 6 (dated January 28, 1939).
Note: a This large increase includes an unexplained residual of 1,919 million
rubles.This may partly be the increase in investment in the NKVD, and/or
‘extra-limit’ investment which has not been allocated to particular branches
of the economy.
 TABLES 413
(b) Narkomtyazhprom
(excluding defence industries)

1935 1936 increase Percentage

(million or decrease in increase (+)
rubles) investment or decrease
(million rubles) (–) in
investment

Industries with increases in 1936

Oil1,a 856 275 +32.2
Non-ferrous metals1 777 239 +30.6
Chemicals1 488 133 +27.3
Building materials1 94 35 +37.2
Building industry (Glavstroiprom)1 81 117 +144.4
Auto industry (Glavavtoprom)2 197 191 +96.5
Tractor industry (Glavtraktor)2 99 24 +24.2
Agricultural machinery2 (Glavselmash) 21 30 +142.9
Total with increases 2613 1044 +40.0
Industries with decreases in 1936
Coal (Glavugol’)1 653 171 –26.2
Iron and steel1,.b 1389 356 –25.6
Heavy engineering3 299 56 –18.7
Transport engineering (Glavtransmash)2 185 66 –35.7
Total with decreases 2526 649 –25.7

Net increase in all above industries +395

Net increase in all Narkomtyazhprom +495

(excluding defence industries)

Sources: Consistent data for the whole of Narkomtyazhprom are not available, and
these figures have been drawn from several separate tables for different
commissariats and glavki formed during 1936-9 from Narkomtyazhprom,
the division of which began in December 1936 with the establishment of
Narkomoborony. Tables from which figures derived are collected in RGAE,
1562/10/582a, on following folios:
1
l. 7 (dated January 31, 1939).
2
l. 4 (dated May 14, 1939) (handwritten).
3
l. 14 [1939].
Notes: a Includes extraction, refining and sales.
b
Includes special steels and pipes.
414 TABLES
Table 16. The capital investment plan for 1936: the rival estimates
(million rubles at current prices)

1935 Plan 1935 1935 1935 1935 1935 1936

(July 1935) 9.vii 21.vii. 26.vii. 28.vii. 9.xii. 29.v.

Narkomtyazhprom 8420 5500 6000 6600 8000 8500 10005

Narkomlegprom 666 900 1050 1250 1250 1372
Narkompishcheprom 644 800 900 1130 1178
Narkomymestprom 495 345 700 930 1078
Narkomles 517 400 450 650 900 899
Narkomzem 1502 1100 1200 1400 2202 2192
Narkomput’ 4068 3000 3000 3650 4100 4809 5487
Narkomoborony 1105 2245 2400 2400
Education 361 1000 1100 1100
Other 5675 4660 6841 8394

Total 23453 17700 19000 22000 27341 31615 35053

Sources: 1935 plan: as given in GARF, 5446/26/66, 263 (July 26, 1935).
19.vii.35: GARF, 5446/26-4/9, 254–255, 247.
21.vii.35: Pis’ma (1996), 249–50.
26.vii.35: GARF, 5446/26/66, 263.
28.vii.35: RGASPI, 17/3/969, 1, 31–36.
9.xii.35: RGASPI, 17/3/973, 43–46, 60–63; GARF, 5446/57/38, 171–172.
29.v.36: RGAE, 4372/34/130, 145–146 (memorandum from Kviring,
deputy head of Gosplan, to Molotov).
Note: ‘Other’ was calculated by the present author.
 TABLES 415
Table 17. Machine building

(a) Number of products of the machine-building industry, 1913, 1932, 1937 and 1947

1913 1932 1937 1947

Steam boilers, turbines and combustion engines 5 7 9 9
Electrical engineering 3 14 14 14
Machine tools 7 19 24 25
Equipment for coal and ore industry 4 9 11 13
Equipment for peat industry 0 4 6 10
Equipment for metallurgical industry 2 4 4 4
Equipment for glass industry 0 1 4 4
Equipment for timber and woodworking industry 5 10 12 12
Equipment for paper industry 0 1 2 2
Equipment for textile, knitwear and tailoring industry 1 12 15 15
Equipment for leather and footwear industry 1 4 16 18
Equipment for printing industry 0 3 8 9
Tractors 0 2 2 2
Railway engineering 6 12 13 13
Automobiles 0 4 6 6
Ballbearings 0 1 2 2
Equipment for building and road work 0 9 10 10
Lifting and hauling equipment 1 5 5 5
Pumps and compressors 6 6 7 7
Municipal equipment 2 2 2 2
Electric and oxy-acetylene welding 0 4 6 6
Tooling and abrasives 6 6 6 6
Communications 5 9 9 9
Cables 17 17 17 17
Calculators and typewriters 0 3 5 5
Weights and measures 4 4 5 5
Cinema equipment 0 4 4 5
Culture and welfare 4 11 11 12
Total 79 187 235 247

Source: Calculated by the author from data in RGAE, 1562/329/2383, 16–39

(1948?).
Note: The table is intended to show those industries which were new and those
which had an established history. It does not of course reflect the relative
importance of each industry. The tractor industry is represented by only two
products, caterpillar and wheeled tractors, but was responsible for 27.6 per
cent of gross production of machinery; the machine-tool industry, together
with tooling and abrasives, is represented by 31 producers, but was responsible
for only 6.7 per cent of production (data for 1936 in 1926/27 prices –
RGASPI, 85/29/342, 1r.
A few products were not manufactured in 1947, either because they were
superseded or because production had been ceased temporarily in wartime
and had not been resumed by 1947.
(Continued overleaf )
416 TABLES
The large category ‘agricultural engineering’ has been omitted from the
above tables in view of the fundamental change in its structure. In 1913 it
consisted of production for peasant industry, and in 1932 and 1937 the
industry increasingly shifted to the production of attachments for tractors and
of machines such as combine harvesters; the earlier products were gradually
superseded. The products in the industry changed as follows:

1913 1932 1937 Total

9 41 43 52

(b) Capital investment in machine building by industry served, 1933–39

(million rubles at current prices)

1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1938 1939

Electric power 74 88 62 66 93 108 129
Machine tools 41 57 70 80 52 99 131
Total equipment 245 294 269 239 223 302 394
including
Equipment for metallurgical (133) (143) (100) (82) (80) (101) (155)
industry
Equipment for other industries (110) (151) (169) (157) (143) (201) (239)
Agricultural engineering 11 15 21 38 22 29 42
Tractors 114 30 36 59 22 29 42
Vehicles 61 79 167 369 277 249 246
Transport 186 375 597 378 232 166 185
Shipbuilding 20 19 27 61 72 108 99
Medium engineering 134 162 123 151 209 293 279
Armaments 565 840 935 1074 1416 2292 3306
(Narkomoboronprom)
Other 38 33 43 54 98 64 136
Total 1489 1992 2350 2569 2716 3739 4989
Total less Narkomoboronprom 924 1152 1415 1495 1300 1437 1683
 TABLES 417
(c) Capital investment in machine building during first and second five-year plan
(October 1, 1928 – December 31, 1932 and 1933–37)

First five-year plan Second five-year plan

Amount Percentage of Amount Percentage of

total excluding total excluding
Narkomoboronprom Narkomoboronprom
Electric power 274 10.2 382 6.1
Machine tools 109 4.1 300 4.8
Equipment for (279) (10.4) (537) (8.6)
metallurgical industry
Equipment for food, textile (112) (4.2) (345) (5.5)
and light industries
Equipment for other (195) (7.2) (388) (6.2))
industries
Total equipment 586 21.8 1270 20.2
Agricultural engineering 239 8.9 107 1.7
Tractors 308 11.4 317 5.0
Vehicles 397 14.6 953 15.2
Transport 431 16.0 1766 28.1
Shipbuilding 19 0.7 198 3.2
Medium engineering 224 8.3 780 12.4
Armaments 1211 4839
(Narkomoboronprom)
Other 103 4.0 205 4.2
Total 3901 11117

Total less 2690 100.0 6278 100.0

Narkomoboronprom

Source of Tables (b) and (c): RGAE, 1562/10/1003b, 6–9 (1940?).

(d) Moorsteen on civilian machine-building production (million rubles at 1937
prices)

1932 1933 1936 1937

Amount Per cent Amount Per cent

Electrical equipment 315 271 9.2 282 285 4.9
Machine tools 177 200 6.8 357 489 8.4
Equipment for 38 67 2.3 223 234 4.0
metallurgical
industry
Agricultural machines 424 348 11.8 508 807 13.8
Tractors 191 317 10.8 660 758 13.0
Automotive vehicles 249 443 15.0 849 1234 21.1
Railroad rolling stock 567 586 19.9 1039 994 17.0
Pumps and compressors 133 121 4.1 153 148 2.5
Lifting and hauling 162 145 4.9 115 110 1.9
equipment
Other 321 449 15.2 803 793 13.6
Total 2577 2947 100.0 4989 5852 100.0
Source: Moorsteen (1962), 310–11.
418 TABLES
(e) Production of metal-cutting machine tools in physical terms
by type of machine tool (units)

1928 1932 1937 1940

Lathes (tokarnye) 830 7145 15202 11523
Turret lathes (revol’vernye) – 512 1806 2088
Autos and semi-autos (avtomaty i poluavtomaty) – – 894 2039
Milling machines (frezernye) 53 1068 3243 3701
Gear-cutting (zuboobravatyvayushchie) – – 397 543
Boring (rastochnye) – 67 131 124
Planing (prodol’no-strogal’nye) 146 233 303 173
Shaping (poperechno-strogal’nye) 35 833 3172 2048
Slotting (dolbezhnye) 35 46 250 158
Broaching (protyazhnye) – – 44 68
Grinding (shlifoval’nye) 3 254 1839 2094
Tool-and-cutter grinding (zatochnye) 15 221 2045 4268
Vertical drilling (vertikal’no-sverlil’nye) 546 6838 12235 15251
Radial drilling (radial’no-sverlil’nye) – – 585 610
Special (spetsial’nye, spetsilizirovannye i agregatnye) 962 6688
Other 315 2503 5365 7061
Total 1978 19720 48473 58437

Source: Promyshlennost’ (1957), 208–9.

 TABLES 419
Table 18. Employed population, 1928, 1932–36

(a) Number of employed persons (manual and office workers) (thousands)

1928 1932 1933 1934 1935A 1935B 1936

a a a a a
Industry 3504 6729 6557 6879 7466 9002 9677
Construction 723 3126 2361 2618 2206 2268 2112
Rail transport 971 1527 1474 1603 1789 1506 1495
Water transport 104 196 189 222 245 167 180
Posts and 95 224 258 295 334 326 340
communications
Trade 532 1411 1375 1465 1650 1606 1798
Education 789 1347 1463 1569 1725 1759 2000
Health 399 647 681 739 809 827 1007
Agriculture 1676 2858 2819 3094 2974 2967 2720
Other 2806 4878 5148 5197 5572 4289 4425
Total 11599 22943 22325 23681 24770 24717 25774
Total excluding 9923 20085 19506 20587 21796 21750 23054
agriculture

Sources: 1928–1935A: Trud (1936), 10–11.

1935B and 1936: PKh, 3, 1937, 222–48.
The differences between 1935A and 1935B are due to reclassification.
Note: a Includes socialised small-scale industry.

(b) Average annual wage in current prices (rubles)

1928 1932 1933 1934 1935A 1935B 1936

Large-scale industry 870 1473 1662 1927 2375 2285 2715
Small-scale industry 637 1251 1486 1520 1680
Construction 996 1509 1641 2042 2497 2539 2884
Rail transport 859 1496 1637 1930 2311 2311 2864
Water transport 904 1509 1709 2103 2533 2689 3000
Posts and communications 776 1333 1450 1571 1944 1954 2050
Trade 783 1351 1343 1483 1851 1874 2265
Education 678 1633 1765 1941 2328 2356 3432
Health 639 1248 1413 1545 2249 2160 2348
Agriculturea 313 940 1082 1287 1574 1853 1853
Totalb 763 1427 1566 1858 2280 2355 2270

Sources: 1928–1935A: Trud (1936), 12–13.

1935B and 1936: PKh, 3, 1937, 222–48.
Notes: a Includes forest economy and fisheries.
b
For whole employed population, including sectors not listed and
agriculture.
420 TABLES
Table 19. Internal trade

(a) Number of urban and rural trading units, 1934–39

(thousands; January 1 of each year)

1934 1935 1936 1937 1938 1939

Urban
Shops 70.3 73.6 72.5 72.8 74.3 80.4
Stalls 42.4 40.6 42.7 48.3 58.7 65.8
Total 112.6 114.8 115.2 121.0 133.0 146.2
Rural
Shops 152.5 157.0 140.6 151.5 161.8 170.7
Stalls 20.3 15.0 13.0 17.0 32.6 36.0
Total 162.7 172.1 153.5 168.4 194.4 206.6
All
Shops 222.7 230.6 213.0 224.2 236.1 251.0
Stalls 62.6 55.6 55.7 65.2 91.3 101.8
Total 285.4 286.2 268.7 289.5 327.4 352.8

(b) Number of trading units by type of organisation,1934–39

(thousands; January 1 of each year)

1934 1935 1936 1937 1938 1939

State trade
Narkomtorg 25.3 27.9 54.1 60.0 73.3 70.3
Industrial Narkoms 17.0 17.9 21.8 33.5 45.1 30.2
Prodsnabya and Orsy 35.8 37.1 36.7 29.5 21.7 20.5
Other 25.1 26.1 27.1 21.5 13.9 27.3
Total 103.2 108.9 139.7 144.5 154.1 148.3
Cooperatives
Tsentrosoyuz 161.1 158.2 110.0 124.0 152.3 182.0
Other cooperatives 21.1 19.1 19.0 20.9 21.0 22.5
Total 182.2 177.3 129.0 145.0 173.3 204.5
All trading units 285.4 286.2 268.7 289.5 327.4 352.8

Source: Tables (a) and (b): Torgovlya za 1938 (1939), 43.

 TABLES 421
(c) Retail trade turnover, 1932–38
(million rubles at current prices)

1932 1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1938

Socialised
trade
Urban
Retail trade 23388 29448 39349 52381 67568 78155 87123
Public 4184 5701 6341 6381 7050 8453 11088
cateringa
Total urban 27572 35149 45690 58762 74618 86607 98210
Rural
Retail trade 12117 13954 15423 22125 31169 37631 40199
Public 668 686 702 825 974 1705 1582
cateringa
Total rural 12785 14640 16125 22950 32143 39336 41781
All
Retail trade 35504 43403 54772 74506 98737 115785 127322
Public 4852 6387 7043 7206 8024 10158 12670
cateringa
Total 40357 49789 61815 81712 106761 125943 139991
socialised
trade
Total retail 48884 61589 75815 96212 122368 143293
trade
Includes 7500 11800 14000 14500 15607 17800
Kolkhoz
trade

Source: Socialised trade: 1932: Sovetskaya torgovlya v 1935 (1936), 59; 1933–38: Torgovlya
za 1938 (1939), 9.
Kolkhoz trade: RGAE, 4372/92/101, 230 (dated May 11, 1938).
Note: a Dining rooms, restaurants and cafės.
 422

Table 20. Foreign trade

(a) Exports, 1933–40 (thousand tons)

1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1938 1939 1940

I From farming etc.
1 Products for food
TABLES

Grain 1684 769 1517 321 1277 2054 277 1155

Other 101 66 41 27 47 5 4 5
Total products for food 1785 835 1558 348 1326 2059 281 1160
2 Products not for food
Timber 6284 6486 6774 6042 5106 3232 1724 1020
Fur 4 3 3 3 2 2 1 1
Other 600 647 483 257 182 251 155 329
Total products not for food 6888 7136 7260 6302 5290 3485 1880 1350
Total from farming etc. 8673 7971 8818 6650 6616 5544 2161 2510
II Consumption goods
3 Food, drink and tobacco 472 449 397 501 444 538 311 262
4 Industrial consumer goods 50 54 47 40 42 35 17 22
Total consumption goods 522 503 444 541 490 573 328 284
III Producer goods
5 Machinery and equipment 4 8 14 17 29 34 13 16
6 Mining and products
Oil 4930 4316 3368 2666 1930 1388 474 874
Coal and anthracite 1818 2211 2251 1876 1314 428 182 31
Ores and concentrates 1224 1209 974 764 1352 453 467 330
Iron and steel 47 152 381 784 246 74 14 60
Non-ferrous metals 5 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Other 347 268 240 178 204 148 47 110
Total mining and metals 8371 8156 7214 6268 5046 2492 1184 1405
7 Chemicals, fertilisers and rubber 242 611 540 622 722 853 626 357
8 Building materials and components 103 90 160 106 90 49 10 52
Total producer goods 8720 8865 7928 7013 5887 3428 1833 1830
Total exports 17917 17340 17190 14204 12989 9545 4327 4625
TABLES
423
424 TABLES
(b) Imports, 1933–40 (thousand tons)

1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1938 1939 1940

I From farming etc.
1 Products for food 104 141 161 146 118 265 292 222
2 Products not for food 113 125 186 147 154 139 95 200
Total from farming etc. 217 266 347 293 272 404 387 422
II Consumption goods
3 Food, drink and tobacco 61 135 122 126 106 126 38 89
4 Industrial consumer goods 1 1 1 2 1 1 1 3
Total consumption goods 62 136 123 128 107 127 39 92
III Producer goods
5 Machinery and equipment
For: Metalworking 57 15 18 51 41 50 51 32
Power, electrical 30 15 8 17 11 11 10 14
engineering
Mining, iron and steel, oil 37 11 2 10 4 5 6 8
Lifting and handling 15 0 1 1 3 0 0 1
Food and light industry 6 0 1 8 5 0 0 0
Chemicals, timber and 26 7 6 22 28 11 6 11
othera
Instruments, ballbearings, 7 5 4 6 5 6 2 2
etc.
Tractors, agricultural 3 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
machines
Ships 20 12 30 23 27 35 35 34
Other means of transport 13 2 2 1 0 1 0 0
Total machinery and 214 68 73 139 113 120 112 102
equipment
6 Mining and metals
Iron and steel 616 401 391 285 221 146 60 126
Non-ferrous metals 51 52 82 96 138 160 75 113
Other 24 37 8 64 176 160 93 3496
Total mining and metals 691 490 481 445 535 466 228 3735b
7 Chemicals, fertilisers and 41 61 49 41 39 37 34 24
Rubber
8 Building materials and 12 4 186 108 238 1 0 11
components
Total producer goods 958 623 789 733 925 624 374 3872
Total imports 1236 1025 1259 1155 1304 1155 800 4387

Source: Tables (a) and (b): Vneshnyaya torgovlya (1960).

 (c) Production and import of certain commodities, 1932 and 1937 (thousand tons unless otherwise stated)

1932 1937

A B Import as per cent of A B Import as per cent of

Production Import total consumption (A+B) Production Import total consumption (A+B)
1 Greatly reduced import
Zinc 13.7 10.6 43.7 81.5 2.9 3.4
Aluminium 0.9 10.4 92.0 38.4 2.5 6.1
Sectional steel 1232 331 21.2 2928 30 1.0
Steam boilers (th. m2) 163.3 85.5 34.3 168.1 3.4 2.0
Transformers (th. kW) 3426 4000 53.7 2745 40 1.4
2 Reduced import
Wolfram ore 0.2 3.0 93.7 1.7 2.2 77.1
Generators (th. h.p.) 1164 1716 59.6 808 429 34.7
TABLES

Metalcutting machine tools (th. units) 18.1 15.6 46.3 32.2 4.0 11.0
Diesels (th. h.p.) 95.8 39.0 27.2 260 18 5.7
Tea 0.6 15.9 96.4 6.5 15.2 70.0
3 Increased import
Copper 38.1 12.0 23.9 92.4 65.3a 41.4
Lead 18.7 33.8 64.4 62.5 42.4 40.5
Nickel 0 4.0 100 2.7 9.1b 77.1
Molybdenum concentrate 0.01 0.8 99.6 0.15 3.6 96.0
Tin 0 3.9 100 0.4 12.5 97.0
Rubber and art. rubber 0.1 30.7 99.8 70.6 31.0 30.5
Wool (fine and semi-coarse) 3.2 6.9 68.3 15.4 11.8 43.4

Source: RGAE, 4372/92/159, 14–11 (April 29, 1938) (rearranged by the present author).
425

Notes: a Original plan 30 (GARF, 8422/3/9, 311, dated November 21, 1936), revised to 45 on January 19, 1937 (GARF, 8422/3/10, 8–10).
b
Original plan 7 (GARF, 8422/3/9, 311, dated November 21, 1936), revised to 9.5 on January 19, 1937 (GARF, 8422/3/10, 8–10).
426 TABLES
(d) Imports by type of commodity, 1932–38 (percentage of total import)

1932 1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1938

Machinery, precision 50.1 38.1 22.1 18.0 36.1 25.3 32.3
tools, electrical
equipment
Iron and steel 17.9 22.7 18.6 15.7 9.8 9.0 7.7
Non-ferrous metals 4.6 6.8 9.2 11.0 11.6 20.4 18.1
Wool and woollen 3.4 6.2 5.7 6.4 5.0 6.4 5.3
goods
Rubber and latex 1.1 1.8 7.1 5.9 4.5 5.8 3.6
Tea 1.1 1.6 2.8 2.8 1.7 2.1 5.4
Other 19.1 22.8 34.5 42.0 21.3 32.6 32.3
Total 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0

Source: Estimated from data in Baykov (1946), appendix table VI.

 (e) Exports and imports, 1913–40
(current world prices and constant 1927/28 world prices, million rubles)

1913 1927/28 1930 1931 1932 1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1938 1939 1940
Current world prices
(‘gold rubles’)
Exports 1506 782 1036 811 575 470 418 367 310 376 293 133 306
Imports 1375 946 1059 1105 704 348 232 241 309 292 313 214 313
Trade balance +131 –164 –22 –294 –129 +121 +186 +126 +2 +85 –20 –81 +7
1927/28 constant
TABLES

world prices
Exports 2443 782 1508 1654 1293 1257 1189 1065 844 881 787
Imports 1998 946 1151 1366 1001 619 558 625 636 582 647

Sources: Current world prices: Vneshnyaya torgovlya (1960). Prices for 1936–40 are given in 1950 rubles; we have converted these into ‘gold
rubles’ by dividing them by 3.4851 (see ibid. 9). 1927/28 constant world prices: Dohan’s estimate in SR, xxxv (1976), 606–8.
427
428 TABLES
Table 21. Currency in circulation, 1929–37 (million rubles)

January 1, 1928 1747 April 1, 1936 9397

January 1, 1933 8413 July 1, 1936 9994
April 1, 1933 7332 October 1, 1936 10490
July 1, 1933 6825 January 1, 1937 11256
October 1, 1933 6893 April 1, 1937 11267
January 1, 1934 6862 July 1, 1937 11964
April 1, 1934 6701 October 1, 1937 12909
July 1, 1934 7040 January 1, 1938 13582
October 1, 1934 7765 April 1, 1938 13978
January 1, 1935 7734 July 1, 1938 15477
April 1, 1935 7879 October 1. 1938 16319
July 1, 1935 8467 January 1, 1939 17216
October 1, 1935 9030 April 1, 1939 16572
January 1, 1936 9710 July 1, 1939 18176
October 1, 1939 20548
January 1, 1940 22214
January 1, 1941 22103
June 1, 1941 18415

The annual change in currency in circulation was therefore:

1933 –19.4 per cent; 1934 +12.7 per cent; 1935 +25.5; 1936 +15.9;
1937 +20.7; 1938 +26.8; 1939 +29.0; 1940 –0.5.
Source: Po stranitsam arkhivnykh fondov, ii (2007), 40–2.

Table 22. State budget: plan and fulfilment, 1933–40 (million current rubles)

Revenue Expenditure ‘Surplus’

Plan Actual Plan Actual Plan Actual

1933 35011 40153 33231 35666 1780 4487
1934 48879 50816 47308 48307 1571 2509
1935 65901 67428 65401 66391 500 1037
1936 78715 83760 78715 81827 0 1933
1937 98070 96572 97120 93921 950 2651
1938 132638 127481 131138 124039 1500 3442
1939 156038 156014 155488 153299 550 2715
1940 183955 180241 179913 174351 4042 5890

Sources: Otchet ... 1933 (1935); Otchet ... 1934 (1935); Otchet ... 1936 (1937); Otchet ...
1937 (1938). For reports on the years 1938–40 see Industrializatsiya 1938–1941
(1973), 21–41.
 TABLES 429
Table 23. Prices

(a) Retail price index, 1932–37

(1932 =100)

1933 1934 1935 1936 1937A 1937B 1937C

State and cooperative trade
1. Food products 147.9 189.1 184.4
2. Industrial products 94.0 102.6 111.6
3. All products 128.1 152.6 141.8 145.0 146.4a
Kolkhoz market prices 55.3 62.3 62.0 62.3
All trade 128.6 125.6b

Sources: 1932–36 and 1937A: derived from data in RGAE, 4372/92/159, 53–50
(report to Voznesensky dated May 5, 1938).
1937B: derived from data in RGAE, 4372/92/159. 71–69, 61(report to
Voznesensky by M. Bogolepov and (illegible), dated April 29, 1938).
1937C: GARF, 1562/12/2095, 8–11 (report of trade turnover
department of TsUNKhU dated March 1939), published in Istoriya
tsenoobrazovaniya 1929–iyun’ 1941 (1973), 780–1.
a
Notes: Urban state prices.
b
Includes public catering; excluding public catering is 123.2.
General note: Source B lists two figures for retail trade in 1932, in 1932 prices: 46.0 and
40.4 milliard rubles. The former figure evidently includes kolkhoz trade
(excluding cattle), 5.6 milliard rubles in 1932. The author calculates
retail trade in 1937 for all goods in 1932 prices, excluding kolkhoz trade,
as 85.2 milliard rubles. It may be calculated from the data on kolkhoz
trade in RGAE, 4372/92/101, 134 (dated May 11, 1938) that kolkhoz
trade in 1937, excluding cattle, amounted to 23.1 milliard rubles in 1932
prices. So all state and kolkhoz trade amounted to 108.3 milliard rubles
in 1932 prices, as compared with 139.3 milliard rubles at current prices.
This gives an index of 139.2/108.3 = 128.6. This is comparable with the
index of 110.7 for all trade (1933 =100) given in Source A.
430 TABLES
(b) Change in transfer prices in Narkomtyazhprom, April 1, 1936

Planned output Planned output in Percentage

in 1936 1936 at increased increase in
(million rubles prices (million rubles prices
at current prices) at current prices)
Coal 1161 2301 98.2
Peat 146 226 54.3
Iron and steel 2240 4043 80.5
Iron and manganese ore 159 277 73.0
Coking chemical 441 1062 141.8
Fire-resistant materials 121 230 89.7
Mineral raw materials 65 102 56.1
Non-ferrous mining 333 528 58.7
(Glavtsvetmet)
Non-ferrous processing 465 590 22.7
(Glavtsvetmetotrabotka)
Chemicals 544 827 52.0
(Glavkhimprom)
Organic chemicals 414 557 34.6
(Glavorgkhim)
Synthetic rubber 273 354 29.7
Cement 131 260 93.9
Locomotives 330 392 18.7
Railway wagons 772 947 22.7
Machine tools 515 546 6.5
(Glavstankoprom)
Medium engineering 219 250 14.3
(Glavsredmash)
Agricultural engineering 1046 1193 13.9
(Glavselmash)
Other 2764 2989 8.1
Total 12139 17674 45.6

Source: GARF, 5446/1/112, 285–292 (decree 406, dated March 2, 1936), published
in Istoriya tsenoobrazovaniya 1929-iyun’ 1941 (1973), 74–9.
 TABLES 431
(c) Increase in prices paid by industry, 1932–37

Increase in million rubles Index for 1937

(1937:1932) (1932 = 100)
1. Agricultural raw materials sold to:
(a) Narkomlegprom 4520 362
(b) Narkompishcheprom 5420 230
Sub-total 9940 307
2. Industrial raw materials, fuel and power;
plus rail charges
(a) Narkomtyazhprom:
comparable output (85 per cent of
8433b
total)
all output (estimate) 9921b 178
(b) Food and light industrya 1700 n.a.
Sub-total 11621c n.a.
Total 21561 235

Source: RGAE, 4372/92/93, 7 (dated May 31, 1938).

Notes: a Includes increased price of textiles.
b
Includes recalculation of imports at higher Soviet internal prices.
c
Includes increased rail charges of 890 million rubles.
432 TABLES
Table 24. The Gulag economy

(a) Number of prisoners in camps and colonies,1934–40

(thousands on January 1 of each year)

Camps Of which ‘counter- Colonies Total

revolutionaries’
1934 510 135 510
1935 725 118 240 966
1936 839 106 457 1296
1937 821 105 375 1196
1938 996 185 885 1882
1939 1317 454 355 1672
1940 1344 445 316 1666

Source: SI, 6, 1991, 11 (Zemskov).

(b) Number of special settlers, 1934–40 (thousands on January 1 of each year)

1934 1073
1935 974
1936 1017
1937 917
1938 878
1939 939
1940 998

Source: SI, 11, 1990, 6 (Zemskov).

Table 25. Agricultural operations

(a) Winter sowings (thousand hectares), 1933–35

(sowings for harvesting in following year)

1933 1934 1935

August 15 1078 1614 1497
September 1 11764 15518 14967
September 15 20516 26143 27689
October 1 27054 31884 33301
October 15 31739 34553 35546
All 37190 36986 37417
 TABLES 433
(b) Spring sowings (thousand hectares), 1933–36

1933 1934 1935 1936

March 15 344 1470 2310 4008
April 1 1897 8191 6646 9,639
April 15 10363 17111 22278 13927
May 1 25320 36229 50079 34711
May 10 42498 56946 68718 62161
May 15 53075 67207 76330 73002
June 1 78864 88256 89104 88216
June 15 90653 94342 91219 91075
All 90860 94068 94335 94780

Source: Osnovnye pokazateli, May 1937, 61; totals from Osnovnye pokazateli, June and
January–June 1937, 31.

(c) Harvested area threshed, 1931–36

1931 1932 1933 1934 1935 1936

August 1 2313 2267 9678 8939 18340
August 15 13698 7959 12487 25490 23603 37512
September 1 28072 19431 26412 40248 41563 54844
September 15 36846 31580 41827 51511 54673 65788
October 1 46433 39045 53105 59692 63514 73400
After October 1 16316 38425 27602 20755 20057
All 62749 77470 80707 80447 83571 77301

Sources: RGAE, 4372/32/617a, 5; Selkhoz SSSR za 1935g (1936), 382, 1389.

Table 26. Grain collections, 1933/34–1936/37

(thousand tons)

1933/34 1934/35 1935/36 1936/37

Collectionsa 23247 23319 26033 23514
Zakupki 414 3587 3566 2002
Total 23661 26908 29599 25516

Source: RGAE, 4372/35/548, 11–21.

Note: a Includes compulsory deliveries (obyazatel’nye postavki), collections in kind for
MTS, milling levy, return of grain loans.
 434

Table 27. State grain stocks, 1930–41

1930 1931 1932 1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1938 1939 1940 1941
January 1 7838 8728 9095 8499 ? 15613 21227 18676 17515 17849 15718 20454
July 1 2084 2332 1360 1997 2988 6382 9423a 5453 7750 6074 5084 6362

Sources: January1: RGAE, 8040/9/360, 34–37.

TABLES

July 1: RGAE, 4372/35/548, 6.11.15–24.

Most figures are available in both sources.
Note: a Given as 9399 in GARF, 5446/22/129, 3.
 TABLES 435
Table 28. Number and percentage of collectivised households, 1933–39
(July 1 of each year)

Number of collectivised Total number of Percentage of

households (thousands) households (thousands) collectivised households
1933 15220 23013 66.1
1934 (January 1) 15717 22013 71.4
1935 17734 20834 89.1
1936 18448 20380 90.5
1937 18500 20497 90.3
1938 18848 20158 93.5
1939 19341 20232 95.6

Sources: 1933 and1934: Sots. str., 1935, 317.

1935: Sots. str., 1936, 278–9.
1938 and 1939: Vypolnenie plana po sel’skomu khozyaistvu na 1 oktyabrya 1939
(1939), 18–19.

Table 29. Machine-tractor stations and kolkhoz agriculture, 1933–39

(at beginning of year)

Number Number of Number of Percent of Number of Percent of kolkhox

of tractors in horse-power kolkhoz combine grain and sunflower
MTS MTS in MTS area sown harvesters seed harvested by
(thousands) (thousands) using MTS (thousands) combine harvesters
1933 2445 74.8 1077 49.3 2.2 0.1
1934 2916 123.2 1758 58.7 10.4 0.5
1935 3533 177.3 2754 63.9 15.2 1.7
1936 4375 254.7 4282 72.4 29.3 6.9
1937 5000 328.5 5856 82.8 65.0 20.1
1938 5818 365.8 6679 91.2 104.8 32.8
1939 6358 394.0 7437 93.3 127.2 39.9

Source: MTS v vtoroi pyatiletke (1939), 11.

436 TABLES
Table 30. Agricultural crops apart from grain, 1933–37

1933 1934 1935 1936 1937

Raw cotton (million tons) 1.31 1.18 1.71 2.39 2.58
Sugar beet (million tons) 8.99 11.36 16.21 16.83 21.84
Flax (thousand tons) 548 533 551 530 570
Potatoes (million tons) 49.25 57.33 69.74 60.3 65.63

Source: See Zaleski (1980), 556–7.

Table 31. Number of cattle by social sector, 1928, 1934–38

(thousands; January of each year)

Total Sovkhozy Kolkhozy Collective Individual Other Urban

etc farmers peasants rural personnel
1928 70541 180 152 762 69418 29
1934 33529 4242 8359 12575 7468 885
1935 38869 4314 10329 15966 5452 1729 1029
1936 45961 4547 13442 21238 2537 2822 1375
1937 47492 4294 14489 22251 1418 3601 1414
1938 50920 3697 14794 25111 1472 4211 1614

Source:Vypolnenie plana narodnogo khozyaistva 1938 (1939), 90.

 GLOSSARY OF TERMS AND
ABBREVIATIONS USED IN TEXT

aktiv activists [politically-active members of a

community]
art. article (stat’ya)
ASSR Avtonomnaya Sovetskaya Sotsialisticheskaya
Respublika (Autonomous Soviet Socialist
Republic)
B Bol’shevik
BAM Baikalo-Amurskii Magistral’ (Baikal–Amur
Railway)
BBK Belomorsko-Baltiiskii Kanal (White Sea-Baltic)
or Kombinat (Combine)
BDFA British Documents on Foreign Affairs
BP Byulleten’ ekonomicheskogo kabineta prof. S. N.
Prokopovicha
brigada (pl. brigady) brigade [form of labour organization in a
factory or kolkhoz]
CC Central Committee [of Communist Party]
(Tsentral’nyi Komitet)
CCC Central Control Commission [of Communist
Party] (Tsentral’naya kontrol’naya
komissiya – TsKK) [ joint staff with Rabkrin]
cde. comrade
Chekist Operative of the ‘Cheka’ (Chrezvychainaya
komissiya) (Extraordinary Commission
[political police])
chistoe stroitel’stvo pure building (cost of building work exclusive
of equipment and erection costs)
chistka purge
ChTZ Chelyabinskii traktornyi zavod (Chelyabinsk
tractor factory)
commercial trade kommercheskaya torgovlya [state trade at
prices above normal level]
Cooperatives includes artisan and timber cooperatives, and
cooperatives for invalids

437
438 Glossary

Dal’stroi Gosudarstvennyi trest po dorozhnomu i pro-

myshlennomu stroitel’stvu v raione verkhnei
Kolymy (State Trust for Road and Industrial
Construction in the area of the Upper
Kolyma) [Far Eastern Construction]
Donbass Donetskii ugol’nyi bassein (Donetsk coal basin)
DVP Dokumenty vneshnei politiki (series of books)
EAS Europe-Asia Studies (formerly Soviet Studies)
Eksportkhleb (State Grain Exporting Agency)
element (Russian word) social group, sometimes
pejorative
EZh Ekonomicheskaya zhizn’
gigantomania A policy of pursuing larger and larger units
Glavalyuminii Glavnoe upravlenie alyuminevoi promyshlen-
nostis NKTP SSSR (Chief Administration
of the Aluminium Industry of NKTP
USSR)
Glavaviaprom Glavnoe upravlenie aviatsionnoi promyshlen-
nosti NKTP/Narkomoboronprom SSSR
(Chief Administration of the Aircraft Industry
of NKTP/Narkomoboronprom USSR)
Glavkhimprom Glavnoe upravlenie khimicheskoi promyshlen-
nosti NKTP SSSR (Chief Administration of
the Chemical Industry of NKTP USSR)
Glavmed’ Glavnoe upravlenie mednoi promyshlennosti
NKTP SSSR (Chief Administration of the
Copper Industry of NKTP USSR)
Glavmetall Glavnoe upravlenie metallicheskoi promysh-
lennosti (Chief Administration of the Metal
Industry)
Glavnikel’olovo Glavnoe upravlenie po nikelyu i olovu NKTP
SSSR (Chief Administration for Nickel and
Tin of NKTP USSR)
Glavorgkhimprom Glavnoe upravlenie organicheskoi khimich-
eskoi promyshlennosti NKTP SSSR (Chief
Administration of the Organic Chemical
Industry of NKTP USSR)
Glavredmet Glavnoe upravlenie po redkim metallam
NKTP SSSR (Chief Administration for
Rare Metals of NKTP USSR)
 Glossary 439

Glavsel’mash Glavnoe upravlenie sel’skokhozyaistven-

nogo mashinostroeniya i obozostroeniya
NKTP SSSR (Chief Administration of
Agricultural machinery and Horse-
drawn Equipment of NKTP USSR)
Glavsredmash Glavnoe upravlenie srednego mashinos-
troeniya NKTP SSSR (Chief Adminis-
tartion of Medium Engineering of
NKTP USSR)
Glavstankoprom Glavnoe upravlenie stankoinstrumen-
tal’noi promyshlennosti NKTP SSSR
(Chief Administration of the Machine-
Tool and Tooling Industry of NKTP
USSR)
Glavstroiprom Glavnoe upravlenie stroitel’noi promysh-
lennosti NKTP SSSR (Chief Adminis-
tration of the Building Industry of
NKTP USSR)
Glavtsinkosvinets Glavnoe upravlenie tsinkovoi i svintsevoi
promyshlennosti NKTP SSSR (Chief
Administration of the Zinc and Lead
Industry of NKTP USSR)
Glavtsvetmet Glavnoe upravlenie po dobyche tsvetnykh
metallov NKTP SSSR (Chief Adminis-
tration for the Mining of Non-ferrous
Metals of NKTP USSR)
Glavtsvetmetobrabotka (Chief Administration for the Processing
of Non-ferrous Metals of NKTP USSR)
Glavugol’ Glavnoe upravlenie ugol’noi promyshlen-
nosti NKTP SSSR (Chief Adminis-
tration of the Coal Industry of NKTP
USSR)
Glavvagonprom Glavnoe upravlenie vagonnoi promyshlen-
nosti NKTP SSSR (Chief Adminis-
tration of the Railway Wagon Industry
of NKTP USSR)
Glavvoenprom Glavnoe upravlenie voennoi promyshlen-
nosti NKTP SSSR (Chief
Administration of the Military Industry
of NKTP USSR)
440 Glossary

Glavzoloto Glavnoe upravlenie zolotoplatinovoi promysh-

lennosti NKTP SSSR (Chief Administration
of the Gold and Platinum Industry of NKTP
USSR)
gorodok settlement (often refers to large grain store)
Gosfond gosudarstvennyi fond (state fund) [reserves]
Gosplan Gosudarstvennaya planovaya komissiya (State
Planning Commission)
GPU Gosudarstvennoe Politicheskoe Upravlenie
(State Political Administration [Before 1924
all Political Police, thereafter a regional sec-
tion of OGPU])
Group A industry capital goods (producer goods)
Group B industry consumer goods (including industrially-
processed food products)
GUGVF Glavnoe upravlenie grazhdanskogo vozdush-
nogo flota (Chief Administration of Civil Air
Force)
GUKFPR Glavnoe upravlenie kinofoto promyshlennosti
(Chief Administration of Cinema and
Photography Industry)
Gulag Glavnoe upravlenie lagerei OGPU/NKVD
SSSR (Chief Administration of [Labour]
Camps of OGPU/NKVD USSR)
GUMP Glavnoe upravlenie metallurgicheskoi promysh-
lennosti NKTP SSSR (Chief Administration
of the Metallurgical Industry of NKTP USSR)
GUSHOSSDOR Glavnoe upravlenie shosseinykh dorog (Chief
Administration of Main Roads)
GUSMP Glavnoe upravlenie severnogo morskogo puti
(Chief Administration of Northern Sea Route)
GUTAP Glavnoe upravlenie traktornoi i avtomobil’noi
promyshlennosti NKTP SSSR (Chief
Administration of Tractor and Automobile
Industry of NKTP USSR)
GVMU Glavnoe voenno-mobilizatsionnoe upravlenie
NKTP SSSR (Chief Military-Mobilisation
Administration of NKTP USSR) [responsible
for military industry except aircraft and tanks]
 Glossary 441

I Izvestiya
IS Istoricheskie issledovanye
ISG Istoriya Stalinskogo Gulaga
Ispolkomy (committees of (local) soviets)
IZ Istoricheskie zapiski
khlebnaya nadbavka grain supplement [additional wage paid for
increase in bread prices]
khozraschet cost accounting
kolkhoz kollektivnoe khozyaistvo (collective farm)
kolkhoznyi rynok collective-farm market
kolkhozsoyuz Soyuz sel’skokhozyaistvennykh kollektivov
(union of agricultural collectives)
Kolkhoztsentr Vsesoyuznyi soyuz sel’skokhozyaistvennykh
kollektivov (All-Union Union of Agri-
cultural Collectives)
Komsomol Kommunisticheskii soyuz molodezhi
(Communist League of Youth)
Komzag Komitet po zagotovkam sel’skokhozyais-
tvennykh produktov (Committee for the
collection of agricultural products [under
STO and then SNK])
kon”yunktura market conditions
koopkhozy auxiliary farms in the retail cooperatives
kopek 1/100 ruble
kos’ba reaping
KPSS v rez. Kommunisticheskaya partiya Sovetskogo Soyuza v
rezolyutsiakh (book)
KTF Komitet tovarnykh fondov (Committee for
Supply of Commodities [includes price
control]) [until August 1934]
Kuzbass Kuznetskii bassein (Kuznetsk basin)
limit (Russian word) ceiling
MCMB machine-building and metalworking
mestnichestvo localism [favouring local interests]
mobfond mobilizatsionnyi fond (mobilisation stocks or
reserves)
MOPR Mezhdunarodnaya organizatsiya pomoshchi
revolyutioneram (International Organi-
sation of Assistance to Revolutionaries)
442 Glossary

MORP Mezhdunarodnoe ob”edinenie revolyutsion-

nykh pisatelei (International Association
of Revolutionary Writers)
MTS Mashino-traktornaya stantsiya (Machine-
Tractor Station)
n., n.a., n.d. note, not available, no date
nachsostav nachal’stvuyushchii sostav (commanding
staff)
Narkomfin Narodnyi komissariat finansov (Peoples’
Commissariat of Finance)
Narkomindel Narodnyi komissariat inostrannykh del
(People’s Commissariat of Foreign Affairs)
Narkomkhozy Narodnye komissariaty kommunal’noi
ekonomiki (People’s Commissariats of
Municipal Economy)
Narkomlegprom Narodnyi komissariat legkoi promyshlen-
nosti (People’s Commissariat of Light
Industry)
Narkomles Narodnyi komissariat lesnoi promyshlennosti
(People’s Commissariat of Timber Industry)
Narkommestpromy Narodnye komissariaty mestnoi promyshlen-
nosti (People’s Commissariats of Local
Industry)
Narkomoboronprom Narodnyi komissariat oboronnoi promysh-
lennosti (People’s Commissariat of
Defence Industry)
Narkomoborony Narodnyi komissariat oborony (People’s
Commissariat of Defence) [formerly
NarkomVMD]
Narkompishcheprom Narodnyi komissariat pishchevoi promysh-
lennosti (People’s Commissariat of Food
Industry)
Narkomprod Narodnyi komissariat prodovol’stviya
(Peoples’ Commissariat of Food)
Narkomprosy Narodnye komissariaty prosveshcheniya
(People’s Commissariats of Education)
Narkomput’ Narodnyi komissariat putei soobsheniya
(People’s Commissariat of Ways of
Communication (= Transport, mainly
railways))
 Glossary 443

Narkomsnab Narodnyi komissariat snabzheniya (People’s

Commissariat of Supplies)
Narkomsovkhozov Narodnyi komissariat zernovykh i zhivotnovo-
dcheskikh sovkhozov (People’s Commissariat
of grain and livestock State Farms)
Narkomsvyaz’ Narodnyi komissariat svyazei (People’s
Commissariat of Communications (= posts
and telegraph)
Narkomtorg Narodnyi komissariat torgovli (People’s
Commissariat of Trade)
Narkomtrud Narodnyi komissariat truda (People’s
Commissariat of Labour)
Narkomtyazhprom Narodnyi komissariat tyazheloi promyshlen-
nosti (NKTP) (People’s Commissariat of
Heavy Industry)
NarkomVMD Narodnyi komissariat voenno-morskikh del
(People’s Commissariat of Military and
Naval Affairs (renamed as Narkomoborony)
Narkomvneshtorg Narodnyi komissariat vneshnei torgovli
(People’s Commissariat for Foreign Trade)
Narkomvnutorg Narodnyi komissariat vnutrennei torgovli
(People’s Commissariat of Internal Trade)
Narkomvod Narodnyi komissariat vodnogo khozyaistva
(People’s Commissariat of Water Transport)
Narkomzdrav Narodnyi komissariat zdravookhraneniya
RSFSR/SSSR(People’s Commissariat of
Health of the RSFSR/USSR)
Narkomzem Narodnyi komissariat zemledeliya SSSR
(People’s Commissariat of Agriculture of
USSR)
naryady production instructions
naturoplata payment in kind [for MTS services]
NEP Novaya ekonomicheskaya politika (New
Economic Policy)
nepfond neprikosnovennyi fond (untouchable fond) [of
foodstuffs, reserves]
nevyazka disjuncture [gap between grain harvest
estimate and individual components of the
harvest]
NKTP see Narkomtyazhprom
444 Glossary

NKVD Narodnyi komissariat vnutrennikhh del (People’s

Commissariat of Internal Affairs)
normirovshchik rate fixer
OA Otechestvennyi arkhiv
obmolot’ba threshing
Obshchepit Obshchestvennoe pitanie (Public Catering
Administration)
obyazatel’naya compulsory delivery
postavka
OGPU Ob”edinennoe gosudarstvennoe politicheskoe
upravlenie (Unified State Political Adminis-
tration [Political Police])
OI Otechestvennaya istoriya
orgnabor organizovannyi nabor (organised recruitment [of
peasants for work in industry, etc.])
Orsy Otdely rabochego snabzheniya (Departments of
Workers’ Supply [shops selling consumer goods
in factories, etc.])
OSO osoboe soveshchanie (Special Conference [of
NKVD])
Osoaviakhim Obshchestvo sodeistviya oborone, aviatsionnomu i
khimicheskomu stroitel’stvu (Society to support
defence, aviation and chemical construction)
osobye papki special files
otkhod, ‘going away’ to seasonal work outside one’s own
otkhodnichestvo village or district
P Pravda
pasport technical specification of piece of equipment
peregib excesses
PKh Planovoe khozyaistvo
politotdely politicheskiye otdely (political departments)
posevnye svodki sown area reports
prodsnaby food supply organisations
progressivnik worker paid by progressive piece rates
pud 0.01638 tons1
pusk completion of investment project
Rabkrin Narodnyi komissariat raboche-krest’yanskoi ins-
pektsii (People’s Commissariat of Workers’ and
Peasants’ Inspection) [ joint staff with CCC]
raspredotdel department for the allocation of personnel
1
Metric tons are used throughout this study.
 Glossary 445

rastsenka rate for the job

razverstka centralised quota
samogon hooch
samotek spontaneous flow
Sel.khoz. 1935 Sel’skoe khozyaistvo SSSR: ezhegodnik 1935
(book)
SI Sotsial’nye issledovaniya
skirdovanie binding and stacking the reaped crop
SKP Stalin i Kaganovich: perepiska (book)
smychka alliance [between town and country]
SNK see Sovnarkom
sorevnovanie emulation
Sots. str. Sotsialisticheskoe stroitel’stvo SSSR (books)
sovkhoz sovetskoe khozyaistvo (Soviet [i.e. state]
farm)
Sovnarkom (SNK) Sovet narodnykh komissarov (Council of
People’s Commissars)
Soyuzkhleb Vsesoyuznoe ob”edinenie khlebnoi pro-
myshlennosti (All-Union Corporation
for Grain Industry [Grain collection
agency of Narkomsnab])
Soyuzsakhar Vsesoyuznoe ob”edinenie sakharnoi pro-
myshlennosti (All-Union Corporation
for Sugar Industry [Sugar collection
agency of Narkomsnab])
Soyuzzagotplodovoshch Vsesoyuznoe ob”edinenie plodnoi i
ovoshchnoi promyshlennosti (All-
Union Corporation for Fruit and
Vegetables)
SP VSNKh Sbornik postanovlenii i prikazov (VSNKh)
SPR Spravochnik partiinogo rabotnika (series of
books)
SR Slavic Review
SS Soviet Studies (later Europe-Asia Studies)
ST Sovetskaya torgovlya
stanitsa (large) village or settlement in North
Caucasus State Political Administration
[Political Police]
STO Sovet Truda i Oborony (Council of
Labour and Defence [Economic sub-
committee of Sovnarkom])
446 Glossary

strakhovka insurance [safety margin]

SU Sobranie uzakonenii
sukhovei dry scorching winds that produced drought
supryagi informal work teams
SV Sotsialisticheskii vestnik
SZ Sobranie zakonov
SZe Sotsialisticheskoe zemledelie
tekhnikum technical college
TNB Tekhniko-normirovochnoe byuro (depart-
ment in factory fixing wage rates, etc.)
tovarnye fermy commodity units [farms], usually livestock
tovarnyi khleb commodity or marketed grain
TOZ Tovarishchestvo po sovmestnoi obrabotke
zemli (Association for Mutual Working of
Land) [Collective farm with lowest form
of socialisation]
Traktorotsentr Vsesoyuznyi tsentr mashino-traktornykh
stantsii (All-Union Centre of Machine-
Tractor Stations)
troika committee or group of three persons
TSD Tragediya sovetskoi derevni (series of books)
Tsentroplodovoshch’ Vsesoyuzni tsentr Sel’skokhozyaistvennoi
kooperatsii po kontraktatsii, zagotovke i
pererabotke plodov i ovoshchei (All Union
Centre for Agricultural Cooperatives for
the Contracting, Collection and Processing
of Fruit and Vegetables)
Tsentrosoyuz Vsesoyuznyi tsentral’nyi soyuz potrebitel’skikh
obshchestv (All-Union Central Union of
Consumers’ [Cooperative] Societies)
TsGK Tsentral’naya gosudarstvennaya komissiya
po opredeleniyu urozhainosti i razmerov
valovogo sbora zernovykh kul’tur (Central
State Commission for Determining Yields
and the Size of the Gross Harvest of Grain
Crops [of SNK])
TsIK Tsentral’nyi Ispolnitel’nyi Komitet (Central
Executive Committee [of Soviets of USSR]
Tsudotrans Tsentral’noe upravlenie dorozhnogo trans-
porta (Chief Administration of Road
Transport)
 Glossary 447

TsUNKhU Tsentral’noe upravlenie narodnokhozyaist-

vennogo ucheta (Central Administration
of National-Economic Records [statisti-
cal agency, formed in December 1931,
attached to Gosplan])
Turksib Turkestano-Sibirskaya zheleznaya doroga
(Turkestan-Siberian Railway)
uchastki parcels [of land]
Univermag department store
Uralmashzavod Ural’skii mashinostroitel’nyi zavod (Urals
machine-building factory)
usad’ba household plot
VATO Vsesoyuznoe ob”edinenie avto-traktornoi
promyshlennosti (All-Union Corporation
of Automobile and Tractor Industry)
veksel’ bill of exchange
Vesenkha (VSNKh) Vysshii sovet narodnogo khozyaistva
(Supreme Council of National Economy)
VI Voprosy istorii
VIK Voprosy istorii KPSS
VKP(b) Vsesoyuznaya Kommunisticheskaya Partiya
(bol’shevikov) (All-Union Communist
Party (of Bolsheviks))
VMN Vysshaya mera nakazaniya (highest degree
of punishment) [the death penalty]
vnederevenskii oborot extra-rural marketings
Vneshtorg see Narkomvneshtorg
VSNKh see Vesenkha
vydvizhenets promoted worker
zagotovka [state] collection (usually of agricultural
products)
zagotpunkt zagotovitel’nyi punkt (collection point)
Zagotskot Vsesoyuznoe ob”edinenie po zagotovke
skota (All-Union Corporation for the
[state] Collection of Livestock)
Zagotzerno Vsesoyuznoe ob”edinenie po zagotovke
zernovykh, bobovykh, krupyanykh,
maslichnykh i furazhnykh kul’tur (All-
Union Corporation for the Collection of
Grain, Beans, Groats, Oil-seeds and
Fodder)
448 Glossary

zagraditel’nye detachments to prevent grain reaching the market

otryady
zakaz state order
zakupki purchases (state purchases of grain and other agri-
cultural products)
Zaporozhstal’ (Ukrainian Zaporizhstal’) Zaporozhe steel works
Zernotrest Gosudarstvennoe ob”edinenie zernovykh sovetskikh
khozyaistv (State Corporation for Grain State
Farms) [of Narkomzem]
zhatva drying and ripening the reaped grain
ZI Za industrializatsiyu
ZiM Zavod imeni Molotova (Molotov lorry factory,
Gor’kii) [formerly GAZ]
ZiS Zavod imeni Stalina (Stalin motor-car factory,
Moscow)
Zone poyas (Russian)
ZRKy zakrytye rabochie kooperativy (closed workers’
cooperatives [mainly supply food and meals].
zven’ya links [sub-units below brigade]
 BIBLIOGRAPHY

Letters used as abbreviations for items in the bibliography are listed

on pp. 437–48. All other books are referred to in the text footnotes
either by their author of editor, or by an abbreviated title (always
including the first word or syllable) when there is no author or editor,
and by date of publication.
Place of publication is Moscow or Moscow-Leningrad, unless oth-
erwise stated.
Only items referred to in the text are included in the bibliography.

SECTION 1 ARCHIVES, THESES AND OTHER

UNPUBLISHED MATERIALS

Russian and Ukrainian archives

(Referred to in footnotes by name of archive, followed by fond/

opis’/delo, list)
Arkhivy prezidenta Rossiiskoi Federatsii (APRF)
fond 3
Rossiiski gosudarstvennyi arkhiv ekonomiki (RGAE, formerly
TsGANKh)

fond 1562 Tsentral’noe statisticheskoe upravlenie (TsSU) [includ-

ing TsUNkU]
fond 4372 Gosudarstvennyi planovyi komitet SSSR (Gosplan
SSSR)
fond 6759
fond 7297
fond 7637
fond 7971
fond 7733
fond 8040 Ministerstvo khleboproduktov SSSR [includes Komzag]
Gosudarstvennyi arkhiv Rossiiskoi Federatsii (GARF, formerly
TsGAOR)
fond 5446 Sovet Narodnykh Komissarov SSSR

449
450 Bibliography
fond 7589 Tsentral’naya gosudarstvennaya komissiya po opredele-
niyu urozhainosti i razmerov valovogo sbora zernovykh
kul’tur pri SNK SSSR
fond 8131 Prokuratura SSSR
fond 8418 Komitet oborony pri SNK SSSR
fond 8422 Valyutnyi komitet pri SNK SSSR
fond 9401 Ministerstvo vnutrennikh del SSSR
fond 9414 Glavnoe upravlenie mest zaklyucheniya (GUMZ) MVD
SSSR
fond 9489 Upravlenie stroitel’stva kanala ‘Moskva-Volga’, upravle-
nie Stalinskoi vodoprovodnoi stantsii NKVD SSSR

Rossiiskii gosudarstvennyi arkhiv sotsial’no-politicheskoi istorii

(RGASPI, formerly RTsKhIDNI)

fond 17 Tsentral’nyi komitet KPSS (TsK KPSS)

fond 56
fond 59
fond 73
fond 77
fond 79
fond 81
fond 82
fond 558
Rossiiskii gosudarstvennyi voennyi arkiv (RGVA)
fond 2
fond 4
fond 33987
fond 33989
fond 40438

Tsentral’nyi arkhiv Federal’noi sluzhby bezopasnosti Rossiiskoi

Federatsii (TsAFSB)
fond 3
Tsentral’myi derzhavnii arkhiv gromads’kikh ob”ednan’ Ukrainy
(TsDAGOU)

fond 1
 Bibliography 451
Unpublished theses and papers

Benvenuti, F., ‘Stakhanovism and Stalinism, 1934–8’, unpublished

CREES Discussion Papers SIPS No. 30, Centre for Russian and East
European Studies, University of Birmingham (1989)
Cooper, J. M., ‘The Development of the Soviet Machine
Tool Industry, 1917–1941’ (Ph.D. thesis, CREES (Centre for
Russian and East European Studies), University of Birmingham,
1975)
Dodge, N. T., ‘Trends in Labor Productivity in the Soviet Tractor
Industry: A Case Study in Industrial Development’ (Ph.D. disser-
tation, Harvard University, 1960)
Dohan, M. R., ‘Soviet Foreign Trade in the NEP Economy and
the Soviet Industrialization Strategy’ (Ph.D. dissertation, MIT,
1969)
Ilić, M., ‘The Development of the Soviet Timber Industry, 1926–
1940’ (M.Phil. thesis, CREES, University of Birmingham, 1986)
Powell, R. P., ‘A Materials-Input Index of Soviet Construction,
Revised amd Extended’, unpublished RAND Research
Memorandum RM-2454 (Santa Monica, 1959)

SECTION 2 NEWSPAPERS, JOURNALS AND OTHER

PERIODICAL PUBLICATIONS

Byulleten’ ekonomicheskogo kabineta prof. Prokopovicha (Prague)

Byulleten’ finansovo-ekonomicheskogo zakonodatel’stva
Byulleten’ Oppozitsii (bol’shevikov-lenintsev) (Berlin to 1932, Paris from
1933)
Cahiers du monde russe et soviétique (Paris)
Europe-Asia Studies (previously Soviet Studies)
Istochnik
Istoricheskie zapiski
Istoricheskii arkhiv
Itogi po tovarooborotu
Itogi vypolneniya narodno-khozyaistvennogo plana po torgovle
Izvestiya TsK
Journal of Economic History
Krasnaya zvezda
Kratkie itogi vypolneniya narodno-khozyaistvennogo plana
Osnovnye pokazateli raboty promyshlennosti NKTP
452 Bibliography
Osnovnye pokazateli vypolneniya narodno-khozyaistvennogo plana
Otechestvennyie arkhivy
Plan
Planovoe khozyaistvo
Slavic Review
Sotsialisticheskii vestnik (Paris)
Sotsial’nye issledovaniya
Soviet Studies (later Europe-Asia Studies)
Svobodnaya mysl’
Tovarooborot SSSR
Vestnik Akademii Nauk SSSR
Voprosy istorii

SECTION 3 BOOKS, ETC., IN RUSSIAN AND UKRAINIAN

Baryatinskii, M., Sovetskie tanki v boyu ot T-26 do IS-2 (2007)

Bol’shaya tsenzura: pisateli i zhurnalisty v strane sovetov, 1917–1956: doku-
menty, ed. Maksimenko (2005)
Chkalova, V. V., Valerii Chkalov: dokumental’naya-publitsisticheskaya povest’
(2004)
D’yachenko, V. P., Finansy i kredit SSSR (1938)
Dikhtyar, G. A., Sovetskaya torgovlya v period postroeniya sotsializma (1961)
Dokumenty vneshnei politiki SSSR, xvii (1971), xviii (1973), xix (1974),
xx (1976)
Dugin, A. N., Govoryat arkhivy: neizvestnye stranitsy GULAGa (1990)
Glavnyi voennyi sovet RKKA 13 mart 1938g. – 20 iyun’ 1941: dokumenty i
materialy (2004)
Granovskii, E. L. and Markus, B. L., Ekonomika sotsialisticheskoi promy-
shlennosti (1940)
Gulag: ekonomika prinuditel’nogo truda (2005)
I. V. Stalin: istoricheskaya ideologiya v SSSR v 1920–1950-e gody: sbornik
dokumentov i materialov, i, 1920–1930-e gody (Sankt-Peterburg, 2006)
Industrializatsiya SSSR: dokumenty i materialy, 1933–1937gg. (1971)
Industrializatsiya SSSR: dokumenty i materialy, 1938–1941gg. (1973)
Istoriya Stalinskogo Gulaga: konets 1920–kh – pervaya polovina 1950–kh
godov, iii
Ekonomika Gulaga, ed. O. V. Khlevnyuk (2004), v, Spetspereselentsy v
SSSR, ed. T. V. Tsarevskaya-Dyakina (2004)
Istoriya tsenoobrazovaniya 1929-iyun’ 1941 (1973) and 1941–1955 (1975)
 Bibliography 453
Ivnitskii, N. A., Sud’ba raskulachennykh v SSSR (2004)
Khaustov, V. and Samuel’son, L., Stalin, NKVD i repressii 1936–1938
gg. (2009)
Khlevnyuk, O. V., Politbyuro: mekhanizm politicheskoi vlasti v 1930-e gody
(1996)
Khlevnyuk, O., Khozyain: Stalin i utverzhdenie Stalinskoi diktatury (2010)
Khlevnyuk, O., Stalin i Ordzhonikidze: konflikty v Politbyuro v 30-e gody
(1993)
Khlusov, M. I., ed., Ekonomika Gulaga i ee rol’ v razvitii strany 1930-e gody
(1998)
Koldanov, V. Ya., Ocherki istorii sovetskogo lesnogo khozyaistva (1992)
Kommunisticheskaya partiya Sovetskogo Soyuza v rezolyutsiakh i resheniyakh
s”ezdov, konferentsii i plenumov TsK, iii, 1930–1954 (1954)
Kondrashev, A. A., Tsenoobrazovanie v promyshlennosti SSSR (1956)
Lar’kov, S. and Romanenko, F., ‘Vragi naroda’ za polyarnym krugom (2nd
edn, 2010)
Lesnaya promyshlennost’ SSSR, 1917–1957, i–iii, ed. V. A. Popov (1957)
Lesnaya promyshlennost’ SSSR: statisticheskii sbornik (1957)
Levon Mirzoyan: sbornik dokumentov i materialov (Alma-Aty, 2001)
Lifits M. M. and Rubinshtein, G. L., eds, Ekonomika i planirovanie sov-
etskoi torgovli (1939)
Lubyanka: Stalin i VChK-OGPU-GPU-NKVD: dokumenty, i (2003), yanvar’
1922 – dekabr’ 1936 goda (2003)
Maksimenkov, L., Sumbur vmesto muzyki: Sovetskaya kul’turnaya revolyut-
siya 1936–1938 (1997)
Makurov, V. G. and Filatov, A. T., compilers, Sovetskaya lesnaya ekono-
mika Moskva – Sever 1917–1941 gg.: Sbornik dokumentov i materialov
(Petrozavodsk, 2005)
Malafeev, A. N., Istoriya tsenoobrazovaniya v SSSR, 1917–1963 gg. (1964)
Man’kov, A. G., Dnevniki tridtsatikh godov (St Petersburg, 2001)
Mel’tyukhov, M. I., Upushchennyi shans Stalina: Sovetskii Soyuz i bor’ba za
Evropu1939–1941gg. (dokumenty, fakty, suzhdeniya) (2002)
Mikoyan, A. I., Tak bylo: razmyshleniya o minuvshem (1999)
Moskva-Berlin, Politika i diplomatiya Kremlya 1920–1941: sbornik dokumen-
tov, iii (1933–1941) (2011)
MTS v vtoroi pyatiletke (1939)
Mukhin, M. Yu., Aviapromyshlennost’ SSSR v 1921–1941 godakh (2006)
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan na 1936 god (1936)
Narodno-khozyaistvennyi plan Soyuza SSSR na 1937 god (1937)
Narodno-khozyaistyvennyi plan na 1935 god (2nd edn, 1935)
454 Bibliography
Neiman, G. Ya., Vnutrennyaya torgovlya SSSR (1935)
Nevezhin,V. A., Zastol’nye rechi Stalina: dokumenty i materialy (2003)
Operativnaya svodka: A. Proizvidstvo 1936 (1937)
Ordzhonikidze, G. K., Stat’i i rechi, ii, 1926–1937gg. (1957)
Osokina, E. A., Za fasadom ‘Stalinskogo izobiliya’: raspredelenie i rynok v
snabzhenii naseleniya v gody industrializatsii, 1927–1941 (1998)
Osokina, E. A., Zoloto dlya industrializatsii (2009)
Otchet Narodnogo komissariata finansov SSSR ob ispolnenii edinogo gosudarst-
vennogo byudzheta Soyuza Sovetskikh Sotsialisticheskikh Respublik za 1934g.
(1935)
Otchet Narodnogo komissariata finansov SSSR ob ispolnenii gosudarstvennogo
byudzheta SSSR za 1935g. (1937)
Otchet Narodnogo komissariatoa finansov SSSR ob ispolnenii gosudarstvennogo
byudzheta SSSR za 1937g. (1938)
Otchet Narodnogo komissariatoa finansov SSSR ob ispolnenii gosudarstvennogo
byudzheta SSSR za 1936g. (1938)
Perov, V. I. and Rastrenin, O. V., Shturmovshchiki krasnoi armii, i (2001).
Pervoe Vsesoyuznoe soveshchanie rabochikh i rabotnits – stakhanovtsev 14–17
noyabrya 1935: stenograficheskii otchet (1935)
Pis’ma I.V. Stalina V. M. Molotovu, 1925–1936 gg.: sbornik dokumentov., ed.
L. Kosheleva et al. (1996)
Po stranitsam arkhivnykh fondov Tsentral’nogo Banka Rossiiskoi Federatsii,
i (2006), ii (2007)
Politbyuro i krest’yanstvo: vysylka, spetsposelenie, 1930–1940, i (2006),
ii (2006)
Promyshlennost’ SSSR: statisticheskii sbornik (1957)
Reabilitatsiya, kak eto bylo. DokumentyPrezidiuma KPSS i drugie materialy,
i (2000), ii (2003), iii (2004)
Reabilitatsiya: politicheskie protsessy 30–50-kh godov (1991)
Reinberg, S. A., Ekonomika, organizatsiya i tekhnika vneshnei torgovli lesom
(1939)
Repressii protiv polyakov i pol’skikh grazhdan (1997)
Rodionov: for this collection of material on the aircraft industry see
http://warwick.ac.uk/aviaprom/
Rybalkin,Yu, Operatsiya “X”: Sovetskaya voennaya pomoshch’ respublikanskoi
Ispanii (1936–1939) (2000)
Safronov, V. P., SSSR, SShA i Yaponskaya agressiya na Dal’nem Vostoke i
Tikhom Okeane, 1931–1945 gg. (2001)
Samoletostroenie v SSSR, 1917–1945 gg., i (1992)
Samuel’son, L., Tankograd: sekrety russkogo tyla, 1917–1953 (2010)
 Bibliography 455
Sbornik zakonodatel’nykh aktov o trude (1956)
Schast’e literatury’: gosudarstvo i pisateli, 1925–1938: dokumenty, ed.
D. L. Babichenko (1997)
Sel’skoe khozaistvo SSSR: ezhegodnik 1935 (1936)
Shevlyakov, A. S., Politotdely MTS i Sovkhozov: Chrezvychainye partiino-
gosudarstyvennye organy upravleniya v sel’skom khozyaistve Zapadnoi Sibiri v
1930-e gody (Omsk, 2000)
Shikheeva-Gaister, I. A., Deti vragov naroda: semeinaya khronika vremen
kul’ta lichnosti, 1925–1953 (2012)
Shirokov, A. I., Dal’stroi: predistoriya i pervoe desyatiletie (Magadan, 2000)
Simonov, N. S., Voenno-promyshlennyi kompleks v 1920–1930-e gody: tempy
ekonomicheskogo rosta. struktura, organizatsiya proizvodstva i upravlenie (1996)
Sistema ispravitel’no-trudovykh lagerei v SSSR, 1923–1960: spravochnik
(1998), ed. M. B. Smirnov
Sladkovskii, M., Istoriya torgovo-ekonomicheskikh otnoshenii SSSR i
Kitaem,1917–1974 (1997)
Slavin, S. N., Oruzhie pobedy (2005)
Slavinskii, B. N., SSSR i Yaponiya – na puti k voine: diplomaticheskaya
istoriya, 1937–1945 gg. (1999)
Slavinskii, B. N., Vneshnyaya politika SSSR na Dal’nom Vostoke, 1945–
1986 (1988)
Soveshchanie po voprosam stroitel’stva v TsK VKP(b) (1936)
Sovet pri narodnom komissare tyazheloi promyshlennosti SSSR, 25–29 iyunya
1936 g.: stenograficheskii otchet (1936).
Sovetskaya derevnya glazami VChK-OGPU-NKVD, 1918–1939: dokumenty i
materialy, iv, 1935–1939 (2012)
Sovetskaya torgovlya (1935 [?1936])
Sovetskaya torgovlya v 1935 godu: statisticheskii ezhegodnik (1936)
Sovetskoe rukovodstvo: perepiska, 1928–1941 (1999)
Sovetskoe voenno-promyshlennoe proizvodstvo (1918–1926): sbornik dokumen-
tov (2005)
Stalin i Kaganovich: perepiska, 1931–1936 gg. compiled by O. V. Khlevnyuk,
R. U. Devis (R. W. Davies), A. P. Kosheleva, E. A. Ris (E. A. Rees)
and L. A. Rogovaya (2001)
Stalin, I. V., Sochineniya, i–xiii (Moscow), xiv (Stanford, 1967), xiv
(Moscow, 1997), xiv (unpublished, Moscow)
Stalinizm v sovetskoi provintsii: 1937–1938gg.: massovaya operatsiya na osnove
prikaza No 00447 (2009)
Stalinskoe Politbyuro v 1930-e gody, ed. O. V. Khlevnyuk, A. V. Kvashonkin,
A. P. Kosheleva and L. A. Rogovaya (1995)
456 Bibliography
Stanovlenie oboronno-promyshlennogo kompleksa SSSR(1927–1937): sbornik
dokumentov, iii, ii, 1933–1937 (2011)
Stenogrammy zasedanii Politbyuro TsK RKP(b) – VKP(b) 1923–1938 gg.,
iii (1923–1938 gg.), ed. L. P. Kosheleva, L. A. Rogovaya and
O. V. Khlevnyuk (2007)
Stepanov, A. S., Razvitie sovetskoi aviatsii v predvoennyi period (1938 god –
pervaya polovina 1941 god)
Striliver, I. L., Khazanov, S.A. and Yampol’skii, L. S., Khlebooborot i
standarty (1935)
Svirin, M., Bronevoi shchit Stalina: istoriya sovetskogo tanka 1937–1943
(Yauza, 2006)
Svirin, M., Bronya krepka: istoriya sovetskogo tanka 1919–1937 (Yauza,
2005)
Torgovlya Soyuza SSSR za 1938 god: statisticheskii ezhegodnik (1939)
Tragediya sovetskoi derevni: Kollektivizatsiya i raskulachivanie, Dokumenty i
materialy, 1927–1939, iv. 1934–1936 (2002), v, 1937–1939, i, 1937
(2004)
Trud v SSSR: statisticheskii sbornik (1936)
Tyazhelaya promyshlennost’ (natural’nye pokazateli), 1935
Tyazhelaya promyshlennost’ za 1935 god (1936)
Tyazhelaya promyshlennost’ za 1936 god (1937)
VKP v rezolyutsiakh, ii (1954)
VKP(b), Komintern i Kitai: dokumenty, v, 1937–mai 1943 (2007)
VKP(b), Komintern i Yaponiya, 1917–1941 (2001)
Vneshnyaya torgovlya SSSR: statisticheskii sbornik, 1918–1940 (1960)
Voennyi sovet pri narodnom komissare oborony SSSR oktyabr’ 1936: dokumenty
i materialy (2009)
Vsesoyuznaya torgovaya perepis’ 1935 g., i (1935)
Vtoroi pyatiletnii plan razvitiya narodnogo khozyaistva SSSR 1933–1937, i–ii
(1934)
Vtoroi Vsesoyuznyi s”ezd kolkhoznikov-udarnikov: stenograficheskii otchet (1935)
Vypolnenie plana narodnogo khozyaistva 1938 (1939)
Vypolnenie plana po sel’skomu khozyaustvu na 1 oktyabrya 1939 (1939)
XVII [Semnadtsatyi] s”ezd Vsesoyuznoi kommunisticheskoi partii (b) 26 yan-
varya–10 fevralya 1934 g.: stenograficheskii otchet (1934)
XVIII [Vosemnadtsatyi] s’’ezd vsesoyuznoi kommunistickeskoi partii (b) 10–21
marta 1939 g.: stenograficheskii otchet (1939)
Yunge (Junge), M., Bordyugov, G. and Binner, R., Vertikal’ bol’shogo
terrora: istoriya operatsii po prikazu No 00447 (2008)
Zemskov, V. N., Spetsposelentsy v SSSR, 1930–1960 (2005)
 Bibliography 457
Zheleznodorozhnyi transport v gody industrializatsii SSSR (1926–1941)
(1970)
Zverev, A. G., Zapiski Ministra (1973)
Zvyagintsev, A. G. and Orlov, Yu. G., Prigovororennye vremenem: Rossiiskie
i sovetskie prokurory XX vek, 1937–1953 (2001)

SECTION 4 BOOKS, ETC., IN OTHER LANGUAGES

Andreev-Khomiakov, Bitter Waters: Life and Work in Stalin’s Russia

(Boulder, Col., 1987)
Barker, G. R., ‘Soviet Labour’, Bulletins on Soviet Economic Development,
series 2, no. 6 (1951) (University of Birmingham, UK)
Baykov, A., Soviet Foreign Trade (Princeton, New Jersey, 1946)
Benvenuti, F., Fuoco sui sabatori!: Stachanovismo e organizazione industriale
in Urss, 1934–1938 (Rome, 1988)
Bergson, A., The Structure of Soviet Wages: A Study in Socialist Economics
(Cambridge, Mass., 1944)
Blandon, P. Soviet Forest Industries (Boulder, Col., 1983)
Bullard, R., Inside Stalin’s Russia: The Diaries of Reader Bullard, 1930–
1934 (Chadbury, 2000)
Carr, E. H., The Bolshevik Revolution, 1917–1923, i (London, 1958)
Carr, E. H., The Twilight of Comintern, 1930–1935 (London and
New York, 1980)
Carr, E. H. and Davies, R. W., Foundations of a Planned Economy, 1926–
1929, i–ii (London, 1969)
Clark, M. G., The Economics of Soviet Steel (Cambridge, Mass., 1956)
Davies, R.W., ‘The Soviet Economy and the Launching of the Great
Terror’, in Stalin’s Terror Revisited, ed. M. Ilic (2006), 11–37
Davies, R. W., Harrison, M. and Wheatcroft, S. G., eds, The Economic
Transformation of the Soviet Union, 1913–1945 (Cambridge, 1994)
Davies, R. W. and Khlevniuk, O., ‘Stakhanovism and the Soviet
Economy’, EAS, 56 (2002), 867–903
Davies, S., Popular Opinion in Stalin’s Russia: Terror, Propaganda and
Dissent, 1924–1941 (Cambridge, 1997)
Diary of Georgi Dimitrov, 1933–1949, The, ed. I. Banac (New Haven,
Conn. and London, 2003)
Dohan, M., Slavic Review, vol. xxxv (1976)
Filtzer, D., Soviet Workers and Stalinist Industrialization: The Formation of
Modern Soviet Production Relations. 1928–1941 (London, 1986)
458 Bibliography
Fitzpatrick, S., ed., Stalinism: New Directions (London and New York,
2000)
Fitzpatrick, S., Everyday Stalinism: Ordinary Life in Extraordinary Times:
Soviet Russia in the 1930s (Oxford, 1999)
Fitzpatrick, S., The Cultural Front: Power and Culture in Revolutionary
Russia (Ithaca and London, 1992)
Garros, V., et al., eds, Intimacy and Terror (New York, 1995)
Getty, J. A. and Manning, R. T., eds, Stalinist Terror: New Perspectives
(Cambridge, 1993)
Getty, J. A. and Naumov, O. V., The Road to Terror: Stalin and the Self-
Destruction of the Bolsheviks, 1932–1939 (Newhaven, Conn., 1999)
Gromow, J. Caviar with Champagne: Common Luxury and the Ideals of a
Good Life in Stalin’s Russia (Oxford, 2005)
Hagenloh, P., Stalin’s Police: Public Order and Mass Repression in the USSR,
1926–1941 (Washington and Baltimore, 2009)
Harris, J., ed. The Anatomy of Terror: Political Violence under Stalin
(Oxford, 2013)
Harrison, M. and Davies, R. W. ‘The Soviet Military-Economic
Effort during the Second Five-Year Plan’, EAS, 49 (1997), 369–406
Haslam, J., The Soviet Union and the Struggle for Collective Security in Europe,
1933–39 (Basingstoke and New York, 1984)
Haslam, J., The Soviet Union and the Threat from the East, 1933–41
(Basingstoke and New York, 1992)
Hessler, J., A Social History of Soviet Trade: Policy, Retail Practice, and
Consumption (Princeton, New Jersey, 2004)
H. G. Wells’ Interview with Stalin (London, 1950)
Hoffmann, D. L., Stalinist Values: The Cultural Norms of Soviet Modernity,
1917–1941 (Ithaca and London, 2003)
Hubbard, L., Soviet Trade and Distribution (London, 1938)
Ilić, M., ed., Stalin’s Terror Revisited (Basingstoke and New York,
2006)
Jansen, M. and Petrov, N., Stalin’s Loyal Executioner: People’s Commissar
Nikolai Ezhov, 1895–1940 (Stanford, Cal., 2002)
Keith, A. B., ed., Speeches and Documents on International Affairs, 1918–
1937, i, ii (London, 1938)
Khlevniuk, O., In Stalin’s Shadow: The Career of ‘Sergo’ Ordzhonikidze
(New York, 1995)
Khlevniuk, O., The History of the Gulag: From Collectivization to the Great
Terror (New Haven, Conn., 2004)
Khlevnyuk, O. and Davies, R. W., ‘The End of Rationing in the
Soviet Union, 1934–1935’, EAS, 51 (1999)
 Bibliography 459
Khrushchev, N. S., Khrushchev Remembers (London, 1971)
Kojevnikov, A. B., Stalin’s Great Science: The Times and Adventures of Soviet
Physicists (Imperial College, London, 2004)
League of Nations, Balances of Payments 1935 (Geneva, 1936)
Lenoe, M. E., The Kirov Murder and Soviet History (New Haven, Conn.
and London, 2010)
Martin, T., The Affirmative Action Empire: Nations and Nationalism in the
Soviet Union, 1923–1929 (Ithaca, 2001)
Miller, R. F., One Hundred Thousand Tractors: The MTS and the Development
of Controls in Soviet Agriculture (Cambridge, Mass., 1970)
Moorsteen, R. Prices and Production of Machinery in the USSR, 1928–
1958 (Cambridge, Mass., 1962)
Moorsteen, R. and Powell, R. The Soviet Capital Stock, 1928–1962
(Homewood, Illinois, 1966)
Moscow: General Plan for the Reconstruction of the City (Moscow, 1935)
Nemecek, V., The History of Soviet Aircraft from 1918 (London, 1986)
Platt, K. M. F. and Brandenberger, D., eds, Epic Revisionism: Russian
History and Literature as Stalinist Propaganda (University of Wisconsin,
2006)
Pollock, E., Conversations with Stalin on Questions of Political Economy,
Working Paper No. 33, International Cold War History Project
(Washington, DC, 2001)
Pons, S. and Romano, A. eds, Russia in the Age of Wars, 1914–1945
(Milan, 2000)
Priestland, D., Stalinism and the Politics of Mobilization: Ideas, Power and
Terror in Inter-War Russia (Oxford, 2007)
Randall, A. F., The Soviet Dream World of Retail Trade and Consumption in
the 1930s (Basingstoke and New York, 2008)
Rees, E. A., Stalinism and Soviet Rail Transport, 1928–41 (London and
Basingstoke, 1995)
Rees, E. A., ed., Centre–Local Relations in the Stalinist State, 1928–1941
(Basingstoke and New York, 2002)
Rees, E. A., ed., Decision-Making in the Stalinist Command Economy,
1932–37 (Basingstoke and New York, 1997)
Rees, E. A., ed., The Nature of Stalin’s Dictatorship: the Politburo, 1924–
1953 (Basingstoke and New York, 2004)
Report of Court Proceedings in the Case of the Anti-Soviet Trotskyite Centre,
January 23–30 1937, in re Y. L. Pyatakov, K. B. Radek ... Verbatim Report
(Moscow, 1937)
Schlesinger, R., The Family in the USSR: Documents and Readings
(London, 1949)
460 Bibliography
Shearer, D. R., Policing Stalin’s Socialism: Repression and Social Order in the
Soviet Union, 1924–1953 (New Haven, Conn. and London, 2009)
Siegelbaum, L. H., Stakhanovism and the Politics of Productivity in the
USSR, 1935–1941 (Cambridge, 1988)
Simon, Sir E. D., Lady Simon, Robson, W. A, and Jewkes, J. Moscow
in the Making: Four English Experts Investigate (London, 1937)
Social Dimensions of Soviet Industrialization, ed. W. G. Rosenberg and
L. H. Siegelbaum (Bloomington, Indiana, 1993)
Societe. des Nations, Balances des Paiements 1936 (Geneva, 1937)
Solomon, P. H., jr, Soviet Criminal Justice under Stalin (Cambridge, 1996)
Stites, R., Russian Popular Culture: Entertainment and Society since 1900
(Cambridge, 1992)
The Lost Politburo Transcripts: From Collective Rule to Stalin’s Dictatorship,
ed. P. R. Gregory and N. Naimark (New Haven, Conn. and
London, 2008)
Tucker, R., Stalin in Power: The Revolution from Above, 1928–1941
(New York, 1990)
Watson, D., Molotov: A Biography (Basingstoke and New York, 2005)
Zaleski, E., Stalinist Planning for Economic Growth, 1933–1952
(Basingstoke, 1980)
 NAME INDEX

Achilles (heel) 323 Bolotin, Z. 65n

Adoratsky, V.V. 284 Borilin, B.S. 46n
Agranov, Ya.S. 104 Borshchevskii 70n
Akulov, I.A. 23–4, 29n, 52, 100–1, 112 Brandenberger, D. 287n, 459
Alksnis, Ya.I. 328 Bryukhanov, N.P. 57, 82, 83, 254–5, 360
Andreev, A.A. 112, 122, 162, 170–1, 265, Bubnov, A.S. 21n
303, 317n, 390n Budennyi, S.M. 96
Antipov, N.K. 112n, 191–2, 249n Bukharin, N.I. 7–8, 17, 25, 27, 29, 34, 35,
Antyukhin 72n 104n, 127, 154, 266, 284–5, 287, 294,
Arkus, G. 149n, 292–3 332, 384
Arsen’ev, K. 293n Bulganin, N.A. 251n, 305
Artukhov 167n Bullard, R. 16n, 19n, 30n, 457
Arzhilovsky 290n Busygin, A.Kh. 180, 182, 309
Bazhanov 324–5
Babel, I.E. 17 Bystryanskii, V. 287n
Baidakov 290
Baldwin, S. 90 Carr, E.H. 214n, 216n, 457
Barbusse, Henri 113 Chaplin, Charlie 234
Barnett, V. 61n, 228n Chastenet, J. 275
Baron, N. 343n Cherkasskii 390n
Baryatinskii, M. 330n, 452 Chernov, M.A. 29, 66, 123n, 154, 254, 383
Bauman, N.E. 292n Chiang-Kai-shek 15
Baykov, A. 251n, 426, 457 Chkalov, V.P. 108, 207, 290, 452
Bedny, Demyan 287 Chkalova, V.V. 21n, 108n, 452
Beethoven, L. 110 Chubar’, V.Ya. 18n, 59, 61n, 112, 170,
Belenko, V.V. 43n 201, 233n, 264–7, 298, 302, 311, 315n,
Belyaev 290 335, 349, 357
Benvenuti, F. 167, 169n, 172, 181n, 354, Clark, M.G. 118n, 400n, 457
451, 457 Coates, A. 16
Berenson, L.I. 211–12 Cranborne, Lord 275
Berezin, A. 71, 206–7, 333–4
Bergson, A. 128n, 457 Daladier, E. 92
Beria, L.P. 113 Davies, R.W. 32n, 39n, 41n, 48n, 55, 60,
Berman, M.D. 212, 345 63n, 75n, 77–8, 95n, 113–14, 123n,
Berzin, E.P. 79 127, 133, 145, 149, 195n, 204n, 208–9,
Bessonov 92n 214n, 216n, 220, 224, 239n, 245n,
Birbraer, M.I. 248, 248n 248n, 272–3, 278n, 291n, 297n, 301n,
Birman, S.P. 163, 298, 309n 303n, 305n, 326, 361n, 385n, 387n,
Blagonravov, G.I. 341 389n, 392–3, 408, 412, 455, 457–8
Blomberg 93n Davies, S. 54n, 143n, 169n, 457
Blum 276 Demchenko 361
Blyukher 96, 378 Dimitrov, G. 15–16, 92, 457
Boev, I.V. 201n Dohan, M.R. 427n, 451, 457
Bogdanenko, A. 336n Dreitser 304
Bogolepov, M. 429n Dugin 286n, 452

461
462 Name Index
Dullin, S. 15n Gregory, P.R. 248, 460
Dvinsky, D.A. 66, 68, 320 Grin’ko, G.F. 29, 49, 59–61, 95n, 122n,
Dyukhanov 166 134, 134n, 147, 151–2, 180, 189–191,
Dzerzhinsky, F.E. 71, 100, 110, 118 250–2, 302, 315–16, 336, 349
Gromow 226n, 458
Eden, A. 90–1, 93–4 Gudov, I.I. 180
Efimov 209n, 265 Gurevich, A. 40, 70, 167, 308–9
Egorov, A.I. 96, 265, 326n
Ehrenburg, I.G. 17 Hagenloh, P. 349n, 458
Eikhe, R.I. 32n, 84, 257 Harris, J. 458
Eliseev 64 Harrison, M. 41, 48n, 77–8, 95n, 113n,
Engels, F. 22–3 204n, 208–9, 272–3, 278n, 291n, 326,
Epshtein 21n 361n, 385n, 387n, 389n, 392–3, 408,
Erman, V. 78n 412, 457–8
Ezhov 458 Haslam J. 15n, 91n, 275–7, 458
Hellbeck, J. 111n
Faustov, A. 309 Hessler, J. 29n, 225n, 229n, 231n, 458
Filtzer, D. 162n, 169n, 171n, 354, 457 Hirota, K. 276
Fitzpatrick, S. 20n, 111n, 225n, 229n, Hitler, A. 7–8, 90, 93, 276
285n, 458 Hoare, Sir Samuel 94
Florinsky 30 Howard, R. 275, 282
Franco 276, 277
Frankfurt, S.M. 294 Ilić, M. 32n, 451, 457–8
Frunze, M.I. 17, 110 Ivanov, A. 309n

Gaister, A.I. 3, 4 Jansen, M. 112n, 458

Gamarnik, Ya.B. 77n, 209 Jewkes 107n, 460
Garros, V. 110–11, 290n, 458
Gerzenshtein, A. 137n Kaganovich, L.M. 5–6, 17n, 21–5, 29–30,
Getty, J.A. 99–100, 169n, 294n, 458 32, 34, 65–8, 89, 94–6, 100n, 104,
Ginzburg, A.M. 139n, 178, 232n 109n, 111–13, 121, 123, 129n, 144,
Ginzburg, S.A. 330 163–5, 167n, 170, 173–8, 185, 195n,
Ginzburg, S.Z. 71–2, 332, 337 207, 213, 215–17, 219, 255–60, 265,
Giorgione 45 267, 276n, 292–3, 302, 304–5, 311–13,
Glebov-Avilov, N. 294 317–19, 332, 337, 370–4, 384, 445, 455
Godunov, Boris 110 Kaganovich, M.M. 69, 207, 209n, 306, 328
Goering, Herbert 93n Kalinin, M.I. 99–100, 122n, 155,
Goering, Hermann 93n 252–3, 265
Gol’dberg, E. 336–7 Kalmanovich, M.I. 28n
Goldman, N. 294n Kamenev, L.B. 27, 98–9, 282, 285,
Golendo 40n 293n, 304
Golinskii, A. 222n Kaminsky, G.N. 40, 354
Golovanov 289n Kandelaki, D.V. 16n, 92–3
Goncharov, I.A. 287n Kandinskii, V.V. 290
Gorbunov, Ye.E. 279n Kaplan, I.S. 325n
Gorelik, S.S. 336n Karakhan, L.M. 15
Gorky, M. 17, 110, 285 Keith, A.B. 91n, 93n, 458
Grabin, V.G. 331 Kerzhentsev 287n, 289
Granovskii, E.L. 337n, 452 Khachatur’yants, A.M. 305
 Name Index 463
Khakhan’yan, G.D. 206–7, 329 Lobov 202, 294n
Khalepskii 329 Lominadze, V.V. 7, 8, 98
Khataevich 57, 256 Lominadze-Syrtsov 8
Khaustov 281n, 453 Luk’yanov, S.S. 104
Khlevniuk, / Khlevnyuk, O.V. 8, 25n, Lunacharsky, A.V. 29
29n, 32n, 55, 63n, 75n, 97–101n, Luzin, N.N. 287–8
103–4, 112–13, 123n, 127, 133, 145, Lyubchenko, P.P. 18
149, 169n, 172n, 220, 224, 239n, 245n, Lyubimov, D. 12, 61, 194, 337, 355
283n, 294n, 301n, 303n, 452–3, 455–8
Khlusov, M.I. 342n, 453 Macbeth, Lady 16, 289
Khrushchev, N.S. 332, 459 Maisky, I.M. 19n
Kirov, S.M. 5, 9, 15, 23n, 29–30, 36, 98, Maksimenkov, L. 30n, 280n, 289n, 453
110, 112, 127, 143, 154, 283, 384, 459 Malafeev, A.N. 43n, 62n, 132–3n,
Kleiner, I.M. 29, 66, 68n, 122–3, 145, 222–4, 453
228, 252n, 254, 257, 319, 361, 383 Malevich 290
Knyaz’kov, G. 273n Malraux, A. 17
Kokurin, A.I. 341n, 345n Manaenkov, I.P. 71
Korolev 163, 205, 207 Mandel’shtam, O.E. 17, 111
Kosior, S.V. 57, 87, 89, 213, 256 Mann, Heinrich 17
Kosminkov, K.Yu. 327n Mann, Thomas 17
Kos’yachenko, G. 144n Manning, R.T. 169n, 458
Kotonin 72 Markevich, A.M. 29
Kovalev, D. 307 Markus, B.L. 42n, 337n, 452
Kraval’, I.A. 50n, 112, 204n, 241, 267, Martin, T. 18n, 459
361, 367n Marx, Karl 284n
Krestinsky 275n Mar’yasin, L.E. 28, 51–2, 59–66, 134,
Krivonos, P.F. 164, 180, 217 151–2, 180, 186, 188–92, 248–52,
Kronrod 311n 292–3, 302, 315
Kruglikov, S.L. 292n, 315, 316 Martinovich, K.F. 331n
Krylenko, N.V. 24, 26n, 350 Medvedev 164
Kuibyshev, V.V. 2–3, 13, 21n, 28–9, 32–4, Mekhlis, L.Z. 33, 33n, 35n
39–40n, 47–8, 50n, 57–8, 63n, 65n, Mel’tyukhov, M.I. 402, 453
80, 84, 110, 112, 115, 122n, 154, Mendel’son 297n
233 Mezhlauk, V.I. 1–3, 28, 40n, 42–3, 46n,
Kviring, E.I. 121n, 136–7, 267, 302n, 50n, 82, 122n, 130n, 151n, 186, 189,
311–13, 322, 414 196, 197, 204, 207n, 233n, 243,
264–7, 269, 274, 299, 313, 317n, 332,
Larichev, V.A. 282 357
Lauer, G.B. 3–4, 42 Mikoyan, A.I. 5n, 10, 12–13, 29, 52n, 61,
Laval, P. 91, 94 112, 147, 153, 170n, 182n, 203, 229,
Lebed’, D.Z. 102 265, 267, 269, 289, 332, 453
Lenin 1, 22, 110, 306 Miller, J. 89n, 216n
Lenoe, M.E. 5n, 36n, 459 Miller, R.F. 459
Levin, A.E. 288n Mironov 77n, 260
Levin, R. 59n Mirzoyan, L.I. 18n, 109n, 453
Lifits 251n, 453 Mitkevich 70, 71
Lifshits, Yu.A. 294 Mitlin 72n
Litvinov, M.M. 15–16, 90, 91–4, Moiseev 360
275–7, 291 Molchalov 317n
464 Name Index
Molotov, V.M. 1, 3, 11, 13, 14, 24n, Petrovskii, G.I. 99n
39–40, 42, 48–50, 53n, 57–63, 65n, 67, Petrovsky, P.G. 27
77n, 80, 82, 84, 87, 94–5n, 100, 111, Pilnyak, B.A. 16
115, 122–4, 126, 128–9, 145–9, 151–2, Platt, K.M.F. 287n, 459
158, 168, 170, 173–5, 185, 188–9, 196, Podlubnyi 111n
201, 204–7, 209–10, 213, 222n, 228, Pokrovsky, M.N. 22, 286–7
241, 248–9, 252, 254, 255–60, 264–7, Polikarpov, N.N. 206 –7
269, 275, 289–90, 298, 302, 311, 315, Polonskii, V.I. 355
317–19, 321, 328, 331–2, 349–50, 355, Pons, S. 15n, 459
360, 363, 367–8, 370–4, 378, 414, 448, Popov, V.A. 453
454, 460 Popov, V.P. 25n
Moorsteen, R. 194n, 417, 459 Poskrebyshev, A.N. 258
Mukhin, M.Yu. 329, 453 Postyshev, P.P. 6, 86, 124, 303
Muklevich, R.A. 331 Potemkin, L.A. 110n
Myagkov, K. 333n Powell, R.P. 194n, 335, 337, 387, 411,
451, 459
Nakhaev 32 Premudrov 209n
Nakhmarson, S. 335n Preobrazhensky, E.A. 7–8, 384
Neiman, G.Ya. 227n, 229n, 454 Priestland, D. 104n, 459
Nemecek, V. 327n, 459 Prokof ’ev, S.S. 62n, 210n
Nevezhin, V.A. 49n, 157n, 215n, 454 Prokopovich 437n, 451
Nicolaevsky, B.I. 284 Pudalov, A.D. 308
Nikolaev 36, 37 Pyatakov, Yu.L. 12–13, 28, 70, 78n, 165,
Nikolaeva, K.I. 124, 257 181, 240, 275, 293, 306–7, 325n,
Notkin, A. 274 337, 459

Oblomov 287, 287n Radek, K.B. 9, 17, 104n, 459

Ordzhonikidze, G.K. 12–13, 28, 30, 35, Rakovsky, Kh.G. 27
38, 40–1, 48, 68–70, 73, 76–7, 82, 93, Ramzin 282–3
113, 131, 157, 163–70, 172, 193, 201, Randall, A.F. 347n, 459
207, 209, 210, 212, 215, 265, 267, 282, Rapoport, Ya.D. 213
293, 298, 303–8, 321, 324–5, 332, 337, Rastrenin, O.V. 329n, 454
339, 453–4, 458 Rataichak, S.A. 70, 181, 210, 294, 309
Orlov, Yu.G. 286n, 457 Razumov 124, 125n, 126, 127n
Osinskii, V.V. 33–4, 84, 111–12, 130n, Rees, E.A. 32n, 61n, 81–2n, 164–5n,
254, 266, 359–61 167n, 172n, 199n, 202n, 214n,
Osokina, E.A. 144n, 145n, 454 216–17n, 228n, 298n, 304n, 455, 459
Reingold 293n
Passos, Dos 17 Rimmel 143n
Pasternak, B.L. 17 Rodionov 327n, 329n, 454
Pavlunovskii, I.P. 209n Romano, A. 15n, 459
Pearce, Brian 22n Ronin, B 334n
Perov, V.I. 329n, 454 Roosevelt, T. 35, 36
Perovskii, A. 226n Rozengol’ts, A.P. 337
Perrie, M.P. 287n Rubinshtein 251n, 453
Peter the Great 287 Rudzutak, Ya.E. 41n, 61n, 102, 315n
Petropavlovskii 3 Rukhimovich, M.L. 137n, 201n, 328, 358
Petrov, N.V. 112n, 241n, 345, 458 Ryabinin, E.M. 88
 Name Index 465
Rykov, A.I. 9, 294 275–6, 282, 285, 289–90, 292–4, 296,
Rymolov, G. 334n 298, 301–5, 311–13, 315, 317–22, 329,
Ryndin 172 331, 349–50, 360–5, 367–8, 370, 374n,
Ryutin, M.N. 27 378, 384, 395, 445, 452–60
Stalin-Kaganovich 165
Safronov, V.P. 91n, 454 Stepanov, N. 235n
Samarin 184n Stetsky, A.I. 21n, 34–5
Sarkis (Sarkisov), S.A. 165–6 Strilever, I.L. 68n
Sats, Natalya 29n Stroilov, M. 325n
Savel’ev, P. 253n Surits 92, 92n, 275–6
Schacht, H.H.G. 16n, 92–3 Svirin, M. 329–30, 456
Shearer, D.R. 27n, 285n, 460 Syrtsov, S.I. 8, 210
Sherwood, Anderson 17 Syrtsov-Lominadze 98n
Shikheeva-Gaister, A.S. 455
Shirokov, A.I. 214n, 342n, 455 Tatlin, V.E. 290
Shleifer, I.O. 71n Tel’nykh 164, 166
Shlyapnikov, A.G. 99 Terpigorev, A.M. 325
Shmidt, Ya.P. 20 Thorez, M. 92
Sholokhov, M.A. 289 Thurston, R. 169n
Shostakovich, D.D. 16, 289 Tikhonov 248
Shtange 290n Til’ba, A.G. 263
Shubakin 70n Tochinskii 168n
Shvernik 122–3, 355n Tomsky, M.P. 9
Siegelbaum, L.H. 160n, 165–6, 169n, Trotsky, L.D. 8, 144n, 285
177n, 180–1, 354, 460 Tsagolov, N. 274n
Simon, Lady 460 Tsaguriya, M.K. 297n
Simon, Sir Ernest, D. 107–8, 460 Tseitlin, G.P. 61
Simon, Sir John 93 Tsil’ko, F.A. 368n
Simonov, N.S. 326n, 455 Tucker, R. 17n, 110n, 113n, 460
Sulkovskii 249n Tukhachevsky, M.N. 47, 77n, 91, 96, 126,
Slavinskii, B.N. 15n, 91n, 455 204, 210–11, 265, 384
Smetanin, N.S. 180 Tumanov, M.G. 184, 292, 293n
Smirnov, G. 3, 40n, 47n, 121n, 267 Tupolev, A.N. 21, 205–7, 234, 327–9
Smirnov, M. 325n
Smirnov, M.B. 455 Uborevich, I.P. 47
Sokol’nikov 267 Uglanov, N.A. 27
Sokolinskii, B. 309n Ukhanov, K.V. 322
Solomon, P.H. junior 25n, 460 Ul’yanova, M.I. 306
Stakhanov, A.G. 160, 164–7, 178, 180, 182 Ulrikh, V.V. 294n
Stalin, I.V. 1–2, 4, 11, 13, 16–18, 20–4, Unshlikht, I.S. 279
27, 29–30, 32–7, 39–40, 48–52, 54,
59–63, 65–8, 70, 75, 80, 82, 84, 87–91, Vareikis, I.M. 88
93–6, 99–101, 103–5, 108–13, 115, Veinberg, G.D. 71n, 122n
121–7, 129, 145, 147, 151, 153–5, Veitser, I.Ya. 28–9, 52n, 122–3, 125,
157–8, 163–5, 167–70, 173–8, 181–2, 145–7, 185, 225–6, 228, 322, 346
185, 188, 190, 193–4, 196–7, 204, Vermenichev, I.D. 361, 362
206–7, 210, 213, 215–16, 227, 231, Vinogradova 180
237, 248, 251–2, 254–61, 263–9, Vittenberg 70n
466 Name Index
Vladimir, Prince 287 Yakovlev, Ya.A. 66, 154, 254, 263, 317,
Volodin, L. 321n 361, 364
Voronin 20 Yaroslavsky, E.M. 113
Voroshilov, K.E. 13, 31–2, 40n, 41, 47–9, Yenukidze 99–100, 112
77, 95–6, 100, 104, 170n, 207, 209, Yezhov, N.I. 28n, 100, 104, 112, 265, 281,
209n, 213, 265, 291, 326, 328, 292n, 294, 303–4, 317n, 321, 346,
331n 350–1, 384
Voznesensky, N.A. 33, 429 Yushkevich, A.P. 288n
Vyshinsky, A.Ya. 100, 104, 112, 170, 282,
298–9, 350–1 Zakovskii, L.M. 99n
Zaleski, E. 14n, 49n, 181n, 39–1,
Watson, D. 95n, 460 436n, 460
Webb, Beatrice 19 Zavenyagin, A.P. 308
Webb, Sidney 19 Zelenskii, I.A. 122n, 124
Wells, H.G. 35–6n, 458 Zemskov, V.N. 25–27n, 101n, 432n, 456
Wheatcroft, S.G. 361n, 385n, 387n, Zhdanov, A.A. 6, 17, 21n, 23n, 29–30, 34,
392–3, 457 104, 122n, 168n, 227–8, 253, 258, 282,
Williams, R. Vaughan 16 288–9
Zinoviev, G.E. 7, 9, 22, 27, 98, 282, 285,
Yagoda, G.G. 24–5, 80, 99n, 101n, 104, 304
112, 211–13, 282, 285–6, 294, Zorin, Z.E. 164, 165
345–6 Zverev, A.G. 251n, 457
Yakovlev, A.N. 36n Zvyagintsev, A.G. 286n, 457
 SUBJECT INDEX

1-GPZ (Moscow ball-bearing plant) 140, reconnaissance 49, 205, 328

333 trainers 205
3 per cent right 192 Aircraft industry 31, 39n, 158, 163,
Abortion 289 204–8, 306, 327, 329–30, 438, 454
Absenteeism 71, 74, 76, 238n, 354 chief engineer 207, 329
Abyssinia 94 investment 39n, 158, 205
Academy of Sciences 287, 288n Airforce 48, 96, 207, 327–8, 440
Acceptance certificates 333 Akulov, I.A. 23–4, 29n, 52, 100–1,
Accidents 82, 109n, 171, 219, 298, 298n, 112
303, 325, 354 Alimony 289
Government Commission 298 Alliance 93, 94, 282
industrial 298 Allotments 80, 106, 226
railway 32, 82, 219 All-union Attestation Commission (VAK)
Administration 9, 271, 271n, 279, 280, 280n
343 All-union Committee for Higher Education
Afforestation 302 280
Agricultural communes 11 All-union Committee for the Arts 280,
Agriculture 287n, 407
collections 58n, 153, 189, 228 All-union Resettlement Committee
household plots 11, 85, 86, 103 279
investment 271n, 347, 412 Aluminium 119, 198, 244, 400, 425,
livestock 11, 33, 34, 84–5, 106, 138, 438
155, 174, 188, 189, 195, 202–3, 225, American equipment 234
255, 263, 300, 318, 320, 360, 367–9, Ammunition 77, 208–9
385, 446–7 Ammunition industry 331
raw materials 52, 120, 127, 133, 138, Amnesty 103, 282
189, 195, 202–3, 225, 240, 242–3, Anarchist 29n
246, 386, 431 Andreev, A.A. 112, 122, 162, 170–1, 265,
tax 252 303, 317n, 390n
Aircraft Anglo-German Naval Agreement 93
airframes 206 Ankara 15
biplanes 205, 327 Anti-aircraft defence 272
bombers 49, 110, 205–6, 276, 327, Anti-Comintern Pact 276–7, 291
401 Anti-cosmopolitan campaign 287
designer 108, 205–6, 307, 329 Antifascist alliance 92, 293
disasters 165, 206 Anti-soviet activity 24, 97, 104, 216,
engines 205–7, 234, 327–8, 352 252, 459
factories 31, 306 Apprentices 73
fighters 49, 108, 110, 205–7, 327, 352, Architects Union fund 20
401 Archive 12, 20n, 32n, 67n, 92–3n,
fuel 278 103n, 123n, 124n, 206n, 214n, 215n,
imports 352 276n, 281, 288n, 303, 317n, 337–8,
Maksim Gorky 110 395n, 449
monoplanes 205–6, 327 Armaments 49, 77, 95, 113, 198, 203–5,
passenger 110, 206 209, 247, 272–3, 326–9, 386

467
468 Subject Index
Armaments industries 31, 38, 40–1, 48, Azov 319
50, 69, 70, 77–8, 95n, 113, 196n, Azov-Black Sea region 64, 363, 371,
200, 203–4, 208–9, 211, 234, 272–3, 376–7, 379–81
291, 326, 338–40, 351, 386–7, 389,
406, 411, 416–17 Bakal works 118
investment 38, 49, 76, 196n, 203, 205, Bakeries 124, 145, 149, 195, 203, 229,
211, 272, 326, 387, 389, 406, 411, 315, 358, 363
416–17 Baku 129n, 137, 230
Armed forces 41, 48–9, 77, 91, 95, Baku oil field 137
113, 129n, 207, 238n, 247, 272, Balance of payments 232, 235, 237, 352
326, 386 Balance of trade 232–3, 235
Armour plating 330 Ball bearings 234, 313n, 321, 333
Army 23, 29, 38, 41, 56, 88, 95–6, 100n, BAM – Baikal–Amur railway 79, 338n,
127n, 157, 196, 204, 208, 279 341–2, 437
Far Eastern 96 Banditry 100
First Cavalry 105 Bank credit 236, 251
French 91 Banks 36, 44, 248, 333
Red 28n, 49, 75n, 95–6, 100, 105, 157, Banque de France 93
209n, 265, 277, 279, 284, 291, 322, Barley 57, 381
329 Bashkir ASSR/Bashkiria 257, 263, 360,
Army and Navy Stores 19 362, 371–2, 375, 382
Arrests 5, 17, 25, 27, 30, 62, 87, 100–1, Baths 252, 345
103–4, 111, 279, 281, 286, 293–4, BBK see Belomorsko-baltiiskii kanal
329n, 361, 368n Beetroot 362
Artel’ – model statute 11 Belomorsko-baltiiskii kanal 79, 213, 437
Artemugol’ 164–5 Belorussia 18, 23n, 40, 97, 226, 330, 364
Artificial fertiliser 309 Berezin, A. 71, 206–7, 333–4
Artillery 32, 39n, 49, 208–10, 265, 277, Berezniki 351
330–1 Berlin 90, 92, 279, 451, 453
Artillery repair bases 278 Bicycles 67, 106, 109, 272, 323
Artisan cooperatives 74, 226, 266, 347, Bill of Exchange 250, 447
407, 437 Birman, S.P. 163, 298, 309n
Artisan shops 80 Birobidzhan 18
Artisan industry 124, 280 Birth certificates 98
Artisans 42n, 129n, 344 Black-Earth region 86, 88
Ashkhabad 146 Blast furnace see Furnaces
Assassination plot 36, 127 Blat 61
Assimilation 74, 269 Bol’shevik factory (Leningrad) 329–30
Astrakhan 212 Bol’shoi Theatre 289n
‘Attenuating curve’ 38–9 Bolsheviks 14, 18, 28–9, 98–9, 105, 113,
AUCCTU 284, 355 287, 289, 292n, 331, 447, 457, 458
Austria 91 Bombers 49, 119, 205–6, 276
Automobiles 74, 415 Bombs 209, 211, 331
Autumn sowings 155–6, 256, 299–300, 383 Bonuses 96n, 137n, 228, 240
Aviation 21, 48, 205, 411, 444 Boots and shoes 19, 67, 323
Aviation Day 205 Boris Goudunov 110
Aviation industry see Aircraft industry Borotbist 18
Aviation Institute, Rybinsk 285 Bourgeois theory etc. 10, 23n, 30, 33,
Azerbaijan 278 91–2, 163, 216
 Subject Index 469
Brakes see railways labour force 42, 76, 238
Bread 35, 43n, 59, 143–6, 175, 203, 220, labour productivity 392
229, 230, 250, 315–16, 350 Building materials 4, 19, 46, 59, 61, 67,
prices 54–5, 57–8, 63, 117, 123–7, 76, 80, 82, 108, 139–40, 179, 183, 193,
132–3, 142, 144, 173–6, 220, 223–4, 215, 243, 301, 331–2, 334–5, 339, 397,
245, 395 410, 413, 423–4
queues 145, 320, 363 Building projects 118, 331, 342–3
rationing 54n, 64–5, 106, 124–5, 128–9, Building technology 194
144–5 Building workers 139–40, 183, 194, 301
rationing – abolition 10, 63n, 66, 68, Bukharin, N.I. 7–8, 29, 34, 35, 104n, 127,
89, 106, 114, 121–4, 126, 130, 154, 266, 284–5, 287, 294, 332
132–4, 142–4, 156, 181, 220, 229, and Izvestiya 25, 27, 34, 41, 285, 287
240, 254, 395 and Paris 284
shortages 145, 149, 290, 350, 364 and Stalin 8, 34–5, 104, 154, 294, 384
supplement 127–9, 131, 140, 177, 185, and writers 17
242, 244, 246–7, 441 Butter 146, 174, 176, 185–7, 191, 221n,
Bribery 232 223, 230n, 350, 405
Brick laying 140
Bricks 195, 335–6, 400 Cadres 105, 157, 162
Brickyards 334, 336 Cafes 150
Brigades 137n, 154, 171, 287, 437, 448 Camps 24–6, 29, 78–9, 101, 129n, 211–12,
Britain 19, 22, 47, 91–2, 94, 161, 205, 214, 281, 286, 290, 342–6, 432, 440
215, 276–7 Central Asia 211
British Commonwealth 93 Karaganda 79, 211
British credits 351 population 26, 78–9, 343
Bryukhanov, N.P. 57, 82, 83, 254–5, 360 remission 213–14
Budget Svir 79, 211
1934 39n, 53 Temnikov 79, 211, 342
1935 116, 133–4, 153, 218, 243 Ukhta-Pechora 79
1936 264, 358 Canals 302, 341
defence 41, 95, 135, 211, 246, 272–3, see also Moscow–Volga canal;
277–8, 291–2 White Sea-Baltic Canal
expenditure 53, 60, 134, 151, 301–2, 358 Canteens 54, 143, 145, 174, 187, 194,
financed institutions 246 227, 231
republic 102 Capital
revenue 44, 46, 53, 55, 59–60, 63, working 246, 247, 333
65–6, 124, 132, 146–8, 151–3, 222, construction 48, 95, 113, 267, 273, 277,
245–6, 250–2, 302, 358, 428 341, 392
state 18, 39n, 44, 62, 75, 95n, 107, 109, equipment 162, 194, 213, 301, 333,
116, 128, 132–5, 148, 150–1, 218, 351
234–5, 245–8, 249–51, 270, 295, fixed 35n
302, 358, 428 goods 197, 202, 400, 440
subsidy 59, 356 goods industries 197, 202
Builders’ conference (December 1935) investment see Investment
178, 184, 194, 243 projects 46, 141, 160
Building costs 116, 139, 203n, 243, 247, 333 Cartage 86–7
Building industry 42, 46, 71, 76, 159, Cattle 84, 255, 367, 429, 436
183–4, 199, 238, 331–2, 334, 336, 392, Cellulose factory (Segezhsk combine,
413, 439 Petrozavodsk) 212
470 Subject Index
Cement 76n, 244–5, 297, 335, 339–40, Chubar’, V.Ya. 18n, 59, 61n, 112, 170, 201,
400, 430 233n, 264–7, 298, 302, 311, 315n, 335
Censorship 204 Church 344
Census Cinema 177
industry (1938) 404 Civil rights 26, 101, 103n, 283
livestock (1937) 34n, 84, 367–8 Civil air fleet 339
population (1937) 97 Civil War 28n, 214, 248, 279, 292n
trade (1935) 230 Civilian industries 39–40, 273, 323, 387,
Central Administration of Main and Hard 408, 417
Roads and Automobile Transport defence investment 38, 78n, 95n, 272n,
100 386
Central Asia 32–3, 84, 110, 173, 175, 185, Civilian production (in defence
194, 262 industry) 77, 204, 326, 386
Central Asian Bureau 32 Class 36, 110
Central Asian Economic Council 32 Class
Centralisation 6, 33, 232, 279 alien 98, 110, 172, 260
Chelyabinsk 66, 68, 230, 304, 362, 370, contradictions 323
374, 376, 380, 382 enemies 25, 97, 112, 171, 303, 332
Coal Trust 171 middle 16
Magnezit factory 304 working 36, 126, 168, 306
Tractor factory 200, 234, 342, 352, 437 Clocks and watches 106
Chelyuskin 20, 110 Closed shops etc. 10, 19n, 61–2, 147–8
Chemical industry 72, 181, 210, 294 Closed workers’ cooperatives (ZRKy) 62,
investment 339, 388, 413, 408 448
Chemicals 77, 179, 212, 244, 297, 358, Clothing 80, 106, 231, 386
388, 423–4, 430 special 355
coking 356, 358 Coal 45, 50, 79, 81n, 119, 137–8, 142,
Chernigov 28, 97n 159, 161, 163–4, 166, 171–2, 178–9,
Chernov, M.A. 29, 66, 123n, 154, 254, 383 200, 215, 237–8, 244, 246–7, 265, 293,
Chersonesus 146 297–8, 303, 306, 310–11, 313–14, 321,
Chief Administration for 324–6, 332, 342, 352–3, 356–8, 393–4,
Hydrometeorological Service 280 397, 400, 408, 413, 422, 430, 438–9
Chief Administration for the aircraft Coal industry 73–4, 119, 137–8, 161, 167,
industry 329, 438 200, 239–40, 298, 303, 324, 326, 339,
Chief administration of the chemical 354, 387–9, 393–4
industry 70, 438 investment 159, 338, 408
Chief administration of the organic machinery 325–6, 393, 415
chemical industry 438 Coal miners 160, 164, 180, 240, 245
Children 100–1, 104, 129, 143, 195, 288, Cocoa beans 152
316, 320, 349, 362, 364 Coke 69, 198, 244–6, 357
Children of kulaks 104, 283–4 Collections
Children’s homes 100n agricultural 58n, 153, 188–9, 228, 258,
Children’s theatre 29n, 280n 446–7
China (country) 7 cotton 84, 191, 256, 315, 369
China 397, 404 grain 57, 58, 66, 68, 87, 103, 113, 254,
Chinese Communism 15 256–8, 260, 318–20, 365–6, 370–4,
Chinese Eastern Railway 91 433, 441, 445
Christianity 287 Collective farm workers 7, 11, 20n, 34, 52,
Christmas tree 110, 415, 440 67, 84–7, 103, 106, 154–5, 195, 224,
 Subject Index 471
253, 255, 259, 263, 271, 283, 317–20, department of leading party agencies
344, 363, 367–9, 383, 399, 436 89, 112
Collective farmers – Second All-Union department for planning, finance and
Congress (Feb 1935) 103, 153–4 trade 228
Collective farms 42, 85, 157, 195, 407, department of propaganda and
441, 446 agitation 34
Collective leadership 6, 460 industrial department 303
Collective security 15, 91, 93–4, 275, science department 292
291, 458 secret department 66
Collectivisation 7, 9, 18, 35n, 86–8, 154, trade, finance and planning
252, 255, 393 department 292
Collectivised households 253, 435 Central committee plenums
Colonies 24, 26–7, 80, 101, 214, January 1933 1, 2, 138
342–3, 432 June 1934 57–8, 67–8
Colonisation 344 November 1934 89, 123–4, 126,
Combine harvester operators 255, 263 128
Combine harvesters 194n, 199–200, 263, June 1935 99
313n, 416, 435 December 1935 100, 162n, 164n,
Comintern 16, 91–2, 457 168, 171–2, 182, 269n–270, 295,
VII Congress 92, 108 331, 353, 392
Commercial trade 9, 43–4, 53, 55, 59–61, June 1936 100, 301
65, 116, 133, 151n, 153, 245n, 437 December 1936 294
Commissariat see People’s Commissariat Central Control Commission 2, 6,
Commission for Soviet Control 33, 199, 191–2, 437
231n, 248, 284, 348–9 district party organisations 89, 167
Commission of Defence 207–8, 234 regional party secretaries 167
Commission of Party Control 6, 27, 33, XVII conference ( January–February
77, 100, 112, 206, 251, 303, 335 1932) 158
Commission on Soviet History textbooks XVI congress ( June–July 1930) 237
288 XVII congress ( January–February 1934)
Committee for Industrial Cooperatives and 27, 38, 384–5, 390, 456
Artisan Industry 280 Orgburo 112, 303
Committee for the Arts 280, 287n, 407 see also Politburo
Committee of Reserves 95n, 112, 261–2, Competition 146, 232
272, 341, 365 Complacency 66, 303, 318, 322
Committee on Commodity Funds and Complaints 78, 89, 105, 121, 204, 209,
Control of Trade (KTF ) 52, 54n, 61, 252, 284, 308, 345–6, 355
64, 227 Concentration camps 281
Committee on Higher Technical Concrete 335
Education 280n Concrete mixers 334n
Committee to assist the Far North 109 Confectionery 60, 64, 106, 147, 151, 223,
Communications 246, 271, 336, 338, 415, 225, 405
419, 443 Congress of Soviets, seventh 82, 102–3,
Communist International see Comintern 131n, 163–4, 336
Communist Party Congress of Soviets, eighth 277
Central Committee Conservatism 69, 172, 303, 324
agricultural department 154, 254 Constitution 102–3, 282, 285, 294
department of culture and propaganda Construction costs 76, 139, 243, 266–7,
21 332, 336, 410
472 Subject Index
Construction industry 19, 34, 76, 118, production 42, 50, 133–4, 147, 332
120–1, 158, 266–7, 269, 273–4, 313, reductions 50, 74, 76, 108, 137, 139,
328, 331–2, 334, 337–8, 387, 392, 411, 193, 240–1, 243, 356–8, 396
438, 451 Cotton 32, 51, 84, 106, 120, 122, 127,
Central Committee conference 331 133, 138–9, 152, 173, 175–6, 180, 188,
and defence 48, 95, 113, 159, 196, 205, 191, 195, 203, 239, 256, 258, 263, 315,
210, 277–8, 338, 411 323, 354, 369, 385, 397, 403–4, 436
workers 132, 242, 333, 392, 419 Cotton textiles 51, 106, 120, 138–9, 152,
Consumers 10, 46, 51, 54, 59, 62, 123, 176, 180, 195, 203, 323, 354, 397
125–6, 144, 186–7, 195, 225–6, 231, Council of Labour and Defence (STO) 61,
237, 252, 281, 292, 338, 340, 346–7, 191, 332, 347–8, 445
349, 351, 353, 412 Counter revolution 24, 25, 112
Consumer cooperatives 67, 173n, 226, Counterrevolutionaries 292, 432
230–1, 331, 446 Counterrevolutionary activities 24, 26, 29,
Consumer durables 106 98, 169–72, 281–2, 293–4, 317n
Consumer goods 4, 12, 41–2, 51–2, 62, 79, Courts 24–6, 31, 37, 101, 170–1, 225,
138, 176, 202, 229, 232, 234, 267, 270–1, 249, 284, 286, 299, 349, 459
292n, 297, 302, 310, 302, 310–11, 323, special (military) collegia 24–5, 226–7
346–7, 385, 387, 395, 440, 444 Cows 155
industrial 9, 173, 179, 187, 203, 226, Crab 203
231, 252, 290, 348–9, 403, 422, 424 Credit 60, 78, 150–3, 188–9, 247–51
Consumer industries 194, 237, 268, bank 236, 247–51
411–12 commercial 249, 251
investment 194, 271, 338, 411–12 foreign 235–6, 351, 352
Consumption 9, 19, 34, 106, 122, 194, German 15–16, 92–4, 235, 275–6, 351
220–1, 249, 270–3, 314, 338, 346, 422, imports 234–6, 275, 352
424–5, 458–9 issue 188, 248–9
Contracts 44n, 78, 80, 202, 211, 225, 236, plan 59, 62, 116, 134–5, 148, 150–3,
332, 336, 352 188, 190–1, 275
Control figures 57, 114, 158, 267 short term 53, 75, 248
Convention bureaux 280 Crime 8, 27, 31, 171, 284
Convictions 284 Crimea 58, 67, 319
Cooperative sector 52 Criminal Code 171
Copper 15, 119, 198, 303, 307, 313, 322, Crop rotation 258
339, 388, 400, 425 Cucurbits 85, 320
Copper factories 307, 322 Culture 12, 16, 18, 21n, 110, 168, 287,
Copper industry 137, 438 289, 415, 460
Copper mines 239 Currency 1, 42, 44, 46, 55, 75, 247, 314,
Corrective labour 24 428
Corrective labour camp 24, 214, 345 foreign 44–5, 200, 233–7, 351
Corruption 226 issue 44, 51, 58–9, 60n, 63, 116, 133–5,
Cossacks 105, 284 148, 150–3, 188–92, 248, 270, 292,
Costs 302, 315–16, 358–9
building/construction 116, 139, 203n, reform 42, 248
240, 266–7, 332–3, 336, 338n, 410 Czechoslovakia 15, 91, 235, 330
commercial 242, 356–7 credits 351
factory 242, 244
increases 50, 108, 195, 240–3, 245, 247, Dairy produce 138–9, 146, 148, 175, 188,
350, 355–7, 386, 389, 391 203, 224n, 300, 385, 405
 Subject Index 473
Dal’stroi 78–9, 214, 272, 338n, 341–2, Donbass 129n, 138n, 160, 164–7, 174–5,
438, 455 177, 180, 201, 229–30, 245, 298,
Dancing 110 303, 438
Death penalty 23, 31–2, 84, 101, 170–1, Donetsk and region 164–5, 217, 380, 438
282, 447 Drought 54, 56–8, 290, 317–18, 320, 446
Deaths 25–6, 101, 145, 298n, 343, 363–5, Dry cleaning 252
367 Dzerzhinsky works (Dneproderzhinsk) 71
Debt 63, 248–9, 371–4
Defence 7, 17, 97, 159, 204, 213, 278, Earnings 42, 77n, 87–8, 155, 180, 242n,
280, 292, 338–9 271
appropriation 41 Earth work 140, 333, 336
budget see Budget Easter cake 110
commissariat 41, 77, 219, 265, 267, 442 Economic accounting 126–7, 356
see also Narkomoborony Economic Officials Club 250
industry commissariat 322, 442 Economic policy 9, 14, 160, 176, 443
see also Narkomoboronprom Economic reform 102, 248
Commission 207–8, 234 Education 12, 21, 76, 88, 96, 98, 104,
expenditure 77, 95, 113, 121n, 135, 106, 109, 159, 195, 247, 265–8, 271,
194, 272, 277, 291–2, 302, 308 288–9, 308, 353, 384, 387, 391, 393,
industries 159, 321, 330, 412–13 412, 414, 419
investment 38–40, 78, 95, 158, 194, investment 141, 159, 387, 412
196, 203, 211, 267–8, 270, 272–4, Efficiency 12, 81, 157, 160, 162, 193, 216,
277–9, 291–2, 338, 340, 352, 387, 245, 298, 347
389, 411–12 Eggs 60n, 146, 148, 188n
purchases abroad 352 Election contests 282
sector (Gosplan) 76, 78, 204, 272n, 292, Elections, local 54
338, 340, 352, 386, 389 Electoral rights 31, 344
testing sites 196 Electric power 142, 239, 297, 332, 340,
training grounds 196 353, 394, 416–17
Demobilised soldiers 42n Electric power equipment 131
Demon 110 Electric saws 334n
Denmark 20 Electricity industry 196, 200–1
Departments of Workers’ Supply (ORSy) Eliseev grocery store 64
62, 153, 444 Embezzlement 226
Destroyers 45n, 352 Émigré 13
Diesel engines 200, 425 Émigré Research unit, Prague 63, 197
Diesel fuel 352 Enakievo Iron and steel works 168n
Dining rooms 421 Enemy groups 251
Directors, factory 13, 70–1, 127, 143, 161, Engine drivers 82, 164, 216, 217
163, 167, 169, 184, 207, 209, 250, 294, Engineering 69, 131, 178, 196, 199–200,
204, 306–9, 322, 356 322, 339–40, 354, 415–17, 424, 430,
Dishes 142–3, 150, 174, 187, 222 439
Disorder 317, 325 Engineering – medium 416–17, 430, 439
Diversionary acts 170 Engineering and technical workers 68,
Diversionists 279, 344 106, 137, 169, 201
Dnepr works 198 Engineers 30, 36, 108, 160–3, 168–9,
Dnepropetrovsk 57, 87, 230n, 256, 298, 171–2, 180, 198, 236, 239–40, 304–6
335–6, 380 Enrichment factories 307
Doctors 19, 107 Enterprise fund 269
474 Subject Index
Enterprises 61, 69, 79–80, 121, 137, 141, Financial matters 9, 28, 42–3, 46, 53–68,
149, 162, 167, 194, 227, 230, 248, 250, 75, 115–16, 124, 130, 132, 150–3, 158,
253, 265. 269, 280, 285, 305, 325, 342, 180, 188–92, 218, 240, 247, 266–7,
347, 354, 356, 388, 399, 408 274, 292, 310–12, 316, 333, 337,
new 42, 141, 162 355–9, 386, 395
Epidemics 5n, 354, 363 Financial reform 248–52
Equipment use 72, 238, 258 Financial stability 180, 240
Ethnic groups/minorities 278, 281 Firewood 342
Europe 15, 35, 90–1, 108, 275, 306, 308, First World War 208, 214
322, 327, 458 Fish 173–5, 185–7, 203, 223, 223, 230,
Excavators 195, 199, 332–4 405, 407, 419
Exchange rate 235n ‘Five in four’ 168
Excise 250 Five year plan
Executions 5, 29, 32, 101, 286, 383 first 1, 12, 14, 39, 120, 167, 194–5, 248,
Exile 23–4, 26, 29, 31, 62, 97–9, 103–4, 296, 326, 385, 388, 391–2, 417
111, 144n, 252, 263, 278–9, 281, second 1–4, 10–14, 38–40, 71, 73, 108,
283–4, 286, 349 115–20, 143, 157–8, 160, 162,
Expenditure outside plan 269 167–8, 196, 215, 269, 271, 273–4,
Explosives 210 309, 314, 322, 324, 339, 346, 353,
Export earnings 45, 236 384–95, 403, 408, 417, 458
Exports 44–5, 122, 152–3, 233–7, 254, Fixed capital 35n
262, 351–2, 383, 422–3, 427 Flax 4, 122, 133, 188, 256, 258, 385, 436
Extralimit investment 337, 412n Fleet, merchant 237
Flour 55, 122–5, 127, 132–3, 139n,
Factories, new 118, 121, 195, 327, 340 142–6, 149, 151–2, 173, 175, 186, 202,
Factory directors 13, 169, 209 220, 223–4, 245, 315, 358, 363–4
Factory No. 21 206 Fodder 54, 83, 127, 131n, 140, 145, 188n,
Factory No. 22 206–7 220, 255, 261–3, 273n, 300, 320, 361,
Factory No. 26 206 366–9, 371, 375–6, 378–80, 382–3, 447
Factory, No. 37 49 Fodder loans 262, 366, 371, 383
Factory No. 62 338n Food 1, 23, 42, 46n, 62, 64, 77, 80, 106,
Factory No. 67 334n 108, 123, 129, 138, 143, 146, 148, 153,
Factory No. 83 341 160, 173, 175n, 179, 185–9, 220–4,
Factory No. 95 206 226, 228–9, 232, 237, 245–7, 252, 256,
Family 31, 42, 129, 143–4, 217, 283, 289, 261–2, 273, 290, 300, 302, 320, 345–6,
345, 459 349–50, 353, 362–6, 368, 375–6, 378,
Family budget 85, 106, 221 380, 382–3, 385–6, 395, 397, 405, 417,
Famine 1, 6, 16, 25–7, 51, 56, 262, 319, 422, 424, 429, 440, 442–4, 448
362, 363, 366–7, 385 and fodder grains 54
Far East 15, 45, 48, 54, 79–80, 90, 175, and fodder prices 273
213, 261–2, 275–6, 278, 290, 343, 438 grain 261, 422
Far North 79, 109 industry 4, 12, 28, 51–2, 73, 120, 133,
Fascist powers/countries 94, 205, 276, 142, 147, 163, 195–6, 202–3, 237–8,
322–3, 386 240, 266–7, 281, 283, 308, 323, 338,
Fats 106, 174, 221, 246, 397, 405 351, 353, 387, 431, 442
Faust 110 investment 4, 266, 338, 387
Felt boots 67, 309 loans 318, 362, 366, 371, 378
Fertilisers 210, 400, 423–4 preserved 139n, 148, 152, 203, 405
Film industry 136n processing 203
 Subject Index 475
rationing – abolition 65, 160, 173, 175–6, Fuel industry 131, 136–8, 201
185, 187, 193, 204, 245, 247–8, 396 Fund for the Improvement of the
stores 229 Well-being of the Workers
warehouses 177 (FUBR) 269
Footwear 51, 80, 106, 138–9, 180, 231, Fur 397, 404, 422
323, 349, 397, 403–4, 415 Furnaces 69–71, 118, 161, 163, 298,
Forced labour 26, 108, 346 309, 388
Foreign citizens 24, 235 blast 8, 42, 69, 71, 118n, 136, 142, 161,
Foreign credit 15–16, 93–4, 235–6, 351, 352 164, 391
Foreign currency 44–5, 200, 234–7 open hearth 70, 118n, 136, 142, 161,
Foreign Currency Commission (VK) 233, 265, 391
351 Furniture 272
Foreign debt 44, 235
Foreign engineers 236 Galleries, Moscow 290
Foreign experience 72, 160 Galoshes 250
Foreign journals 287–8 Gastronom 229
Foreign policy 22, 90, 276 GAZ automobile works 234, 339, 448
Foreign secretary (UK) 93–4, 275 Gears 309
Foreign ships 287–8 General contractor 332
Foreign technology 205, 330 General staff 96, 265, 273n, 326
Foreign trade 44–5, 153, 232–3, 235–7, Geography 21–2
275, 351, 422, 443, 451, 457 German fascism 93, 277
Foreign trade balance 45 German-Soviet relations 91–2
Foreign trade commission 44 German-Volga ASSR 360
Foreign trade contracts 44n Germany 8, 15–16, 18, 22, 29, 47, 90–1
Foreign travel 17, 31, 84 credit 93–4, 235, 275, 351
Foreigners 98, 281 foreign policy 90–2, 94, 204, 275–6, 384
Foremen 169 machinery 91, 161
Formalism 290 minister of economics 16n, 92
Former people 98–9, 111 Soviet trade representative in 29n
France 7, 91, 93–4, 276–7, 352, 384 trade with 92–3, 276
Franco-Soviet accord 91 Giorgione’s Judith 45
Franco-Soviet pact 91–2, 275 Glass 59, 139, 234, 347, 397, 404, 415
Franco-Soviet relations 15 Glass windows 355, 403
Freight 53, 62, 81, 119, 163, 215, 217–19, Glavalyuminii 438
297–8, 312, 355–6, 386, 394 Glavaviaprom 205, 438
Freight charges 134 Glavavtoprom 339, 413
Freight plan 53, 217 Glavenergo 244, 337
Freight wagons 163, 215 Glavkhimprom 70, 210, 430, 438
French communists 16, 113 Glavmed’ 438
French elections 275 Glavmerves 279
French technical assistance 45n, 327 Glavmetal 40, 247, 308–9, 438
Frontier areas 17 Glavmetall (Vesenkha) 28
Frontier defence 48, 95, 97, 278, 281 Glavnikolovo 438
Frontier security 24 Glavnoe upravlenie metallurgicheskoi
Fruit 52, 228n, 445–6 promyshlennosti 70n
Fuel 81–2, 166, 241, 243, 278, 300, 328, Glavorgkhim 430, 438
352, 393, 397, 431 Glavredmet 438
Fuel and power 4, 179, 200–1, 431 Glavsel’mash 430, 439
476 Subject Index
Glavspirt 222 fuel sector 119
Glavsredmash 430, 439 machine building department 215
Glavstankoinstrument 200n metals department 3
Glavstankoprom 430, 439 metallurgy department 117–18
Glavstroiprom 72n, 322, 334, 336–7, 339, trade sector 116, 233n
423, 439 transport department/sector 119, 120
Glavtsinkosvinets 439 Belorussian republic 40
Glavtsvetmet 439 head 28, 33
Glavtsvetmetotrabotka 244, 430, 439 and investment 1–3, 39, 42, 76, 117,
Glavugol’ 166, 324–5, 339, 388, 408, 439 119–20, 264–5, 267, 313, 347, 396,
Glavvagonprom 215n, 439 414
Glavvoenprom 203–4, 439 journal 47, 50
Glavzoloto 440 Grain
Glaziers 334 collections 57, 58, 66, 68, 87, 103, 113,
Goats 84, 155, 367 254, 256–8, 260, 318–20, 365–6,
Gold 26, 35, 44–5, 52, 79, 109, 127n, 159, 370–4, 433, 441, 445
214, 236–7, 342, 440 deficit 366
Gold rubles 153n, 233–5, 427 deliveries 58, 66–8, 121–2, 224, 254,
Goods 257, 259, 318–20, 371
consumer see Consumer goods exports 44, 122, 254, 262, 383
producer see Producer goods gorodki 262
rationed 9, 10, 43, 60, 116–17 harvest 56, 83, 121, 256–7, 263, 362,
shortages 19, 60, 230, 240, 349 367, 443
supply 11, 225, 249, 348 loan 58, 66, 68n, 257, 316, 318, 363,
Goods wagons 81, 199, 215–16, 312–14, 365–6, 372–3, 375, 383, 433
394, 400 mites 66
Gor’kii (Nizhnii-Novgorod) (town and procurements 318
region) 6, 62, 206, 230, 262, 351, products 133, 144, 186, 188, 220–1,
363, 366, 373, 377, 381 224, 230, 233, 300, 316, 318, 350
Gor’kii Automobile Works 162, 180, 339 reserves 319
Gorky street 64 stocks 56, 258, 260, 262, 320, 358,
Gorbunov aircraft factory (Moscow) 70 365–6, 385, 434
Gorlovka 351 stores 262, 341–2, 440
Gorlovka mine 167n warehouses 213
Gorodki 262 world price 233
Gosbank 28, 51, 59, 65, 126, 134–5, yield 11, 57, 156, 245, 254, 317–18,
148–51, 188–91, 236, 292–3, 315 359, 361
Gosplan 2, 3, 4, 14, 19, 38, 42, 45, 46, Grain–fodder balance 83, 220, 255, 361,
50–1, 56, 58, 63, 72–7, 81, 107, 383
114–15, 117, 120, 130, 136–7, 147, Grain–fodder untouchable fund 258,
158, 190, 196–8, 200–1, 204, 215–17, 261–2, 443
219, 226, 233, 239, 240–1, 243, 246, Gramophones 67, 106, 272
268, 273, 274, 297, 311–13, 317–18, Great Northern Sea Route 20, 109, 141,
322, 332, 354–6, 390, 440, 447 212, 338, 411, 440
departments Great Purge 303, 332
administration for planning fondy and Grin’ko, G.F. 29, 49, 61, 95n, 122n, 134,
trade 43n 134n, 147, 250, 252, 302, 315, 336, 349
defence sector 38, 41n, 77n, 204 and currency issue 60, 151, 190, 190n,
foreign trade sector 233n 302, 316
 Subject Index 477
and Gosbank 189–90, 251n conference September 1934 68
and Mar’yasin 151–2, 180, 189–91, investment 76, 140, 177, 194, 196,
251, 302 339–40, 387–8, 394, 408
and revenue 59, 252 see also individual industries
Groats 143, 145, 151, 261, 447 Hermitage 288
Group A 3, 12, 13, 49, 271, 340, 385–6, 440 Heroes (play) 287
Group B 3, 12–13, 40, 271, 385, 440 Herrings 174, 186, 191, 223, 230
investment 4, 39 Hides 51
Grozny oilfield 137 Higher education 19–21, 42n, 104–5, 107,
Gulag 440–1, 458 131, 280, 305, 293
economy 78–80, 101–2, 141, 211–14, Hispano-Suiza 234, 327
286, 341–6, 432, 452–3 History 21–3
labour 211, 343, 345 History textbooks 23n, 287–8
population 78, 342 Hitler 7–8, 90, 93, 276
system 80, 212 Homosexual relations 30
welfare of prisoners 286, 345 Hooch 222, 445
GUMP 70n, 188, 408, 440 Hooliganism 100
Guns 78, 210–11, 234, 330–1 Hops 152
GUSHOSDOR 341–2 Horse power 83–4, 435
GUTAP 200, 208, 440 Horses 84, 86, 155, 194n, 202, 255, 300,
GVMU (Glavnoe voenno-mobilizatsionnoe 367–8, 393
upravlenie) 77–8, 440 Hotels 20, 252
Household plots see Agriculture
Harvest Housing 12, 59, 71, 76, 106–7, 119, 137,
1930 255 141, 155, 159, 194–5, 252, 271, 336,
1932 83, 365 338, 340, 351, 391, 406–7, 409, 411
1933 1, 43, 51, 56, 83, 122, 299, 432 investment 107, 141, 159, 195, 338, 391
1934 56–7, 66–7, 82–3, 121–2, 174, urban 107, 195
202, 253–4, 258, 432 Hunger 56, 79, 362–3, 365
1935 149, 152, 155–7, 202, 224, 233, Hydro-meteorological service 280
2545, 258, 260, 262, 300, 316, Hydroplane 234
432 Hydropower 332
1936 290, 298–9, 315–21, 350, 352, Hydro-units 212
358–62, 365, 367–8, 372, 375, 382,
432 Illegal sales 62, 146
1937 361, 364–5 Illnesses 343, 355
see also under individual crops and regions Immigration 279
Harvest Evaluation Commission (TsGK) Imperialist powers 47
82–3, 112, 359–61 Imports 44–5, 92–3, 152–3, 233–5, 237,
Health 40, 109, 353, 419 351–2, 424, 426–7, 431
Health services 384 Income per head 106
investment 40, 76, 106–7, 195, 266–8, Indian earthquake 45n
271, 338, 387, 412, 440 Indiscipline 238
Heating 332 Industrial accidents 298
Heavy industry 4, 8, 28, 34, 39–40, 50, Industrial Bank see Prombank
70, 73–4, 78, 128, 137, 159, 165, 180, Industrial consumer goods 9, 173, 179,
191, 209, 215, 241, 244, 246, 273, 306, 187, 203, 226, 231, 252, 290, 348–9,
310, 313–14, 321–3, 347, 353, 355, 403, 422, 424
357–8, 443 Industrial cooperatives 115, 280, 323, 335
478 Subject Index
Industrial costs 116, 268, 270 1935 41, 95, 106–7, 115, 121, 131–2,
Industrial crops 124, 129n, 145, 191, 136, 139, 141, 157–9, 162, 176,
255–6, 263 182–5, 193–6, 247, 368, 275, 291,
Industrial employment 73 295, 301, 313, 327, 338, 340,
Industrial goods 46, 64–5, 173 387–90, 394, 406–12, 414, 416
Industrial labour force 297 1936 176, 264, 267–70, 272, 275, 277,
Industrial production 1, 3–4, 22–4, 39, 42, 291, 300–1, 312–13, 337–8, 340,
45–6, 49–50, 62, 73, 76, 115–16, 387–90, 395, 406–12, 414, 416
136–8, 158, 160, 178, 196–203, 225, 1937 4, 387–90, 406–10, 416
267–9, 320–4, 321–3, 333, 342–3, 353, 1938 46, 416
356, 384, 394, 399, 405, 419 1939 416
Industrialisation 1, 18, 34–5, 332, 340, 392 First five-year plan 194, 296, 385, 417
Industry 13–14, 16, 39, 42, 45–51, 69, 71, Second five-year plan 1–4, 12–14, 38–9,
73, 74, 76–7, 83, 86, 124, 133–4, 119, 157, 273–5, 387–90, 394–5,
136–7, 139, 156–8, 161, 171–2, 176–8, 406–9, 417
181, 184, 186, 193, 197–8, 202, 225–6, issues 1, 2, 78, 80, 116–17, 121, 265–6,
237–9, 241–2, 246, 252–3, 270–1, 292, 338, 414
296–7, 303, 307–8, 31–2, 334, 336–8, plan 39–40, 46n–49n, 58, 116–17,
353, 355–6, 385–6, 390, 392–3, 395, 119–20n, 131–2, 136, 140, 158–9,
397, 399, 404, 409, 419, 440, 444 162, 176–8, 183, 193, 264–9, 274,
see also individual industries 312–13, 334, 337, 394, 396, 414
all-union 134, 139, 197, 242 1933 38, 78, 81, 387–90, 406–11, 416–17
civilian 39, 95, 386 underspend 55, 178
cooperative 296, 312 Iranians 278
labour 71, 157, 237–8, 253, 270, 334, Iron and steel industry 42, 45, 50, 69–70,
336, 353, 392–3, 399, 419, 444 73, 75, 81, 117, 136, 139, 157, 159,
large scale 120, 237, 297n, 311, 314n, 161–3, 166–8, 178, 196, 198, 217,
334, 337, 358, 399, 404 237–8, 241, 244–7, 273–4, 297–8n,
Inefficiency 97, 292, 367–8 309, 313, 336, 339, 354, 357–8, 388,
Inflation 188, 248, 277, 301, 326 394, 397, 408, 413, 422, 424, 425, 430
Influenza 354 investment 159, 196, 413
Institute of Red Professors 28n, 292n Iron and steel plants:
Intelligence tests 288 Enakievo 168
Intelligentsia 19, 35 Komsomol’sk 213
Internal trade 28–9, 51–2, 132, 142–9, Petrovskii 163, 309
185, 219–27, 302, 311, 338, 346, 387, Stal’ 139
412, 420, 443 Stalinsk 31, 69
International Association of Revolutionary Iron ore 197, 237, 244–5, 353, 357–8, 397
Writers 17, 442 Irrigation 302
International situation 30, 203, 277, 384 Italy 90, 94, 276
see also individual countries Ivanovo region 40, 106, 123–4, 223, 230,
Invalids 226n, 343, 362, 407, 437 253, 257, 262, 283, 355, 359, 377–9, 381
Inventions 306 Izvestiya 128, 285, 287, 304–5, 318, 347
Investigating agencies 280n
Investment 4, 13–14, 45, 139–42, 178, 200, Japan 7–8, 31–2, 47, 90–1, 94, 211,
218, 240, 300–1, 308, 310, 331–41, 389 275–7, 291, 326, 330
1934 38–9, 41–2, 46–7, 49, 52, 55, 58, Jazz 16, 20
62, 76, 81, 114–15, 136, 184, 194–5, Jewish Autonomous region (Birobidzhan)
297, 387–90, 406–11, 416–17 18
 Subject Index 479
Jewish Bund 28 Kievan Rus’ 287
Jolly Fellows (film) 16 Kirov, S.M. 23n, 110, 459
Kadievka 166 and XVII party congress 5, 9, 384
Kadievskii proletarii (newspaper) 325 murder 15, 29–30, 36, 98, 112, 127,
Kaganovich, L.M. 5–6, 21n, 25, 29n–30n, 143, 154, 283, 384
65n, 100n, 104, 112, 163, 167n, 207, Kirov region 366–7, 370, 373, 375–8, 380–1
217, 267, 276n, 292n–3n, 302, 311, Kirov experimental factory (Leningrad)
313, 332, 384, 445, 455 208
and abolition of bread rationing 68, Kirov works Leningrad 167, 199–200
122–3, 129n, 144, 173–6, 185 Kislovodsk 99n, 165–6
and Abyssinia 94 Kitchens 345
and grain collection 66–8, 113, 258–60, Kleiner, I.M. 29, 29n, 68n, 122n, 123,
318–19 123n, 252n, 254, 361, 383
and harvest 256–60, 318–19, 370–4 and grain collections 66, 145, 257, 383
and investment 177–8, 265, 337 and Narkomvnutorg 228
and Molotov 24, 94–5, 115, 122, 170, and Stalin 145, 257, 319
173–5, 185, 213, 256–60, 318–19, Knitwear 139, 397, 404, 415
370–4 Kolkhoz 11, 26, 58, 67–8n, 82, 84–89,
and NKVD 213, 317n 103, 106n, 153–5, 202, 224, 228,
and politotdely 89 252–3, 257, 259, 263, 269, 271n, 290,
and railways 111, 164–5, 170, 195n, 316–20, 360–2, 365, 368–9, 374, 381,
215–27, 219, 304 399, 405, 435–7, 441, 456
and Stalin 17n, 22n–4n, 32, 34, 66–8, see also Collective farms; Collective farm
94–6, 104n, 109n, 113, 121–3, 165, workers
170, 173–5, 177–8, 213, 215–26, Kolkhoz market 10, 43, 63–4, 146, 148,
255–61, 312, 318–19, 370–4 176, 185, 188, 224–7, 300, 347, 350,
Kamenev, L.B. 429
and arrest 98–9, 282 prices 43, 64, 146, 148, 185, 188, 224,
and rehabilitation 7, 9, 27 350, 429
and trial 283, 285, 292–3n, 304, 321, 332 Kolkhoz model statute 103, 154–5, 258
Karabash copper smelting factory 307 Kolkhoz trade 52, 146, 150, 224, 227,
Karaganda 79, 211, 325 232, 421, 429
Karelia 97, 262, 360n Kolomna engineering works 71
Kazakhstan 18, 23, 66, 97, 155, 278, 370, Kolyma 45, 79, 438
376–7, 382 Komsomol 71, 441
Kazan’ University 28 Komsomol congress (April 1936) 277
Kemerovo 294, 351 Komsomol’sk 212–13
coal mine 293 Komzag 29, 55n, 123n, 136n, 177n, 228,
Kerosene 250 254, 260–2, 280, 361–2, 365, 406–7,
Khabarovsk 109, 212 441, 449
oil refinery 278 Kramatorsk factory 198
Khar’kov 17, 21, 28, 230, 262 ‘Krasnoe Sormovo’ shipbuilding factory
factory for radial drills and polishing 199
machines 199–200 Kraval’, I.A. 50n, 112, 204n, 241, 267,
locomotive works 329 361, 367n
tractor factory 200, 308 Kremlin 109
turbine and generator factory 70 Kremlin affair 99
Khozraschet 126, 198, 441 Krivonosites 165, 217
Kiev (city and region) 17, 88, 97, 230, 349 Kuban’ 318
480 Subject Index
Kuibyshev, V.V. 29n, 32, 33, 33n, 34, 48, Lebedev factory (Leningrad) 143
48n, 63n, 65n, 84, 84n, 110, 112, Lenenergo 72
112n, 115, 122n, 154, 233 Lenin Mausoleum 234
and five year plan 2, 13 Lenin, Order of 108, 202
and Gosplan 2–3, 13, 28, 39, 50n, 58 Leningrad 5, 19, 22, 54, 60, 72, 79, 88,
and harvest 57–8 97–9, 111, 129n, 143, 167–8, 174–5,
and investment 2–3, 39–40n, 47, 58, 80 180, 186–7, 199–200, 229–30, 253,
and Stalin 2, 21n, 115, 122n 262, 283, 285, 329, 334–5, 349, 360n,
Kuibyshev (town and region) 262, 319, 363, 377, 381, 449
362–3, 375, 378, 381 Leningrad power station 72
Kulaks 11, 26, 103, 252, 263, 278, 283, 344 Libraries 99
Kursk region 262, 317–20, 370, 372, Light industry 4, 12, 34, 40, 51, 61, 70n,
376–7, 381 74, 76, 120–1, 133, 138n, 163, 194–6,
Kuzbass 245, 294, 325, 441 203, 240, 246n, 265–7, 271, 281, 297,
Kuznetsk works 118 310, 323, 338, 351, 354, 403–4, 417,
Kviring, E.I. 121n, 136–7, 267, 302n, 424, 431, 442
311–13, 322, 414 investment 4, 40, 120, 338
Light bulbs 106
Labour 12, 34, 71, 74, 80, 100, 137, 139, Lights (kishki) 152
144n, 158, 160, 163, 165, 168, 202, Limits 161
211–13, 238–9n, 243, 253, 256, 279, Litfond 20n
324–5, 332, 334, 336, 344, 347, 355, Litvinov, M.M. 15, 15n, 16, 90, 94, 275,
392–3, 410, 437, 443, 457 276n, 277, 291
absenteeism 71n, 74, 78, 238n, 354 and collective security 15, 91, 291
camps and colonies 24, 29, 214, 345 and Germany 90–3, 275
days 67, 84–5, 359, 320 and Japan 90–1, 275
discipline 71, 74, 343, 354 Living conditions 18, 193
force 44, 72, 76, 131–2, 138, 202, 218, Living standards 12
237–8, 242n, 253, 268, 297, 324, Loans 34, 292
334, 343, 345, 353, 392–3 foreign 235, 275, 351–2, 372–4, 383
incomes 77 Gosbank 292
indiscipline 238 mass 153, 301
plan 42 see also Grain loans; Seed loans
productivity 43, 73–4, 115, 144, 162–3, Local authorities 6, 145, 319, 368
168–9, 173, 179–80, 184–5, 193–4, Local industry 52, 74, 124, 137, 142,
202, 237, 239–40, 268, 270, 297, 177n, 179n, 194, 196–7, 249, 267–8,
307, 310–11, 322, 333, 343, 346, 296–7, 310–11, 323, 335, 338, 358,
353–4, 392, 393–5 442
shortage 137, 325, 393–4 investment 52, 338
turnover 71, 74, 76, 137, 238, 334, 354 Localism 89, 441
Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk (opera) 16, 289 Locarno Pact 275
Latex 426 Locomotive drivers 165
Laundries 252 Locomotives 4, 81, 120, 164, 199, 215–16,
Law 227 265, 394, 400, 430
criminal 100, 280 Lorries 198–9, 233, 339, 400
Lead 322, 425, 439 Lugansk locomotive works 199
League of Nations 7, 15, 94, 275, 459
Leather 122, 138, 203, 233, 385, 397, Macaroni 145, 147, 151, 405
404, 415 Machine building 50, 161–3, 179, 194,
Leather footwear 51, 139, 323, 403 198, 200, 210, 215, 244, 297, 306–8,
 Subject Index 481
321, 339, 353, 357, 394, 397, 415–17, Mechanical power 83, 368
441, 447 Mechanisation 95, 138, 299, 325, 332–4,
Machine building factories 210, 308 393
Machine guns 78, 330 Medical institute ( Moscow) 111
aircraft 234 Medical staff 107
Machine tool factories 198, 308 wages 107, 247
Machine tool industry 356 Medium engineering 416–17, 430, 439
Machine tools 69, 163, 170, 200, 308, Merchant fleet 237
313n, 394, 415–18, 425, 430, 439, 451 Metal 4, 40, 82, 92, 197–8, 309, 322, 327,
Machine tractor stations 29, 58n, 68n, 83, 423–4
84, 88–9, 316, 320, 361, 364–5, 370–1, Metal utensils 323
433, 435, 442–3, 453, 455, 459 Metallurgical industry 131, 164n, 172n,
Magnezit factory, Chelyabinsk 304 200, 415–17, 440
Magnitogorsk factory 8, 98n, 283, 308, 342 Metals, rare 198, 387, 438, 408
Maikop oil trust 69 Metalworking 198, 237, 244, 297, 311,
Maintenance 70, 81, 95, 291, 328, 410 397, 424, 441
Maize 57, 320, 371, 383 Metro 107–9, 271
Makeevka works 240 Metropol’ Hotel 20
Makhorka 148, 348, 405 Mexico 276
Maksim Gorky (aircraft) 110 Mezhlauk, V.I. 28, 28n, 42, 50n, 207n,
Malfeasance 232 233n, 243, 265, 267, 269, 299, 317n,
Malnutrition 365 332, 332n, 357
Managers 68, 71, 154n, 166–7, 169, 172, and abolition of rationing 122n, 186
180, 216, 225, 251n, 304–5, 331, 342, and budget 264
345–6 and currency 151
Manual workers 20, 73, 106, 129n, 404 and five year plan 2–3
Market fund 46n, 55n, 66n, 186–7, 220, and harvest 82
222–3 and investment 1, 40n, 46n, 264, 266,
Mar’yasin, L.E. 28, 28n, 52, 59, 61, 66n, 269, 313
134, 180, 186, 191, 192, 248, 249–52, and planning 130n, 197, 204, 274
292, 292n, 293, 302, 315 and Stakhanov movement 196, 274
and abolition of rationing 64–5 and trade 43
and credit plan 134, 151 Mezhlauk commission 2
and currency issue 60, 151–2, 188–92, Mikoyan, A.I. 5n, 29, 29n, 52n, 61, 112,
292, 302 153, 170n, 182n, 229, 265, 267, 269,
and dismissal 292–3 289, 332, 453
and Grin’ko 59–60, 151–2, 180, 190–1, and food industry 10, 12–13, 29, 147,
251–2, 302 203
and Narkomfin 190, 251, 251n Military 47, 49, 76, 96, 303–4, 206, 209,
and financial reform 248–51 231, 234, 265, 278, 326, 329, 331, 458
and trade 51, 59–60, 64–6n, 151, 186, Military Chemical Trust 210
252 Military collegia 24–5, 286
and wages 63n, 180 Military Council (of Narkomoborony) 96,
Mass production 209, 292n, 327, 356 291, 328–9
Matches 250, 348–9, 397 Military equipment 41, 93, 273n, 276,
Material interest 239 278, 291
May day parade 49, 105, 108 Military expenditure 211
Meat 11, 35, 138–9, 146, 148–9, 152–3, Military industry 210–11, 279, 439, 440
173–7, 185–8, 191, 195, 203, 221–4, Military orders 41, 77, 329
230n, 246, 300n, 323, 369, 385, 405 Military production 77, 204, 210–11, 326
482 Subject Index
Military products 210 and trade 53n, 59, 148, 185, 228
see also Defence and wages 128
Militia 24, 95n Molotov arms factory (Perm’) 77n
Milk 147, 405 Molotovo 209n
Milling levy 68n, 257, 316, 433 Molybdenum 198, 425
Mills (grain) 124 MOPR 17n, 279, 441
Mines 119, 164, 180, 239, 324–5, 340 MORP 17, 442
Minsk 349 Mortality 364
Mobfond 261 Moscow 13, 15–16, 18n, 19, 21, 30, 33,
Modernisation 194n–5, 205, 209, 228 70, 90–3, 102, 107, 109–11, 206, 212,
Molotov, V.M. 42, 77n, 129n, 158, 201, 262, 291, 334–5, 339, 448
205, 298, 328, 332, 414, 448, 454, 460 and camps 79, 342–3
and 1934 plan 39–42, 48–50, 58 and Stalin 174
and abolition of rationing 122–4, 126, crime 62n, 100
128–9n, 145–7, 173, 350 General Plan for re/construction
and aircraft industry 158, 205–6, 209, of 108, 212, 351, 459
328 life and culture 17, 19, 20, 22, 29, 290
and budget 151–2 metro 107–9, 271, 408
and commercial trade 59–61n, 148, 173 opposition 32, 98
and currency 60, 62–3, 151, 188, 190, party organisations 7, 17, 88, 144, 293
302, 315 power complex 72
and defence 48, 95, 204, 209–10 privileged position 19n, 54n, 60, 64,
and financial reform 248–9 108, 129, 174, 186–7, 229–30n, 349,
and five year plan 3, 11, 13–14 351
and foreign policy 94, 275 trade 60n, 63–4, 106, 175, 186, 347, 349
and grain 65, 149, 252, 257–60, Moscow-Narva power station 72n
318–19, 363, 370–4 Moscow–Volga canal 79–80, 108–9, 212,
and harvest 65, 82, 87, 254–5, 360 214, 267–8, 341–3, 407
and industrial accidents 355 Moscow region 262, 319, 336, 370, 376
and investment 39, 58, 80, 115, 264–7, Mosenergo 72
414 Mothers 289, 316
and Kaganovich 24, 94–5, 115, 122, Motor cars 199
170, 173–5, 185, 213, 256–60, Motor cycles 272
318–19, 370–4 Motor industry 50
and NKVD 80, 213, 317n Motor tyres 40
and prices 60–1, 147, 173–5, 185, 302, MTS see Machine Tractor Stations
349–50 Murmansk 97
and productivity 168, 173 Museums 280
and sabotage 170 Musical instruments 349, 404
and speculation 61, 61n Mutual Assistance Pact 91
and Stakhanov movement 170, 196
and Stalin 1, 24n, 39, 49, 59–62, 65, Narkomfin 34, 44, 126, 134, 146–8,
67, 80, 82, 84, 94–5, 100, 111, 115, 189–90, 222, 224, 227, 251n, 264, 442
122, 126, 145, 147, 151, 168, 170, Narkomindel 30, 104, 442
173–4, 185, 188, 190, 196, 206–7, Narkhomkhozy 443
213, 248, 252, 254–7, 259–60, 264, Narkomlegprom 116n, 132, 134, 177n,
267, 269, 289n–90, 302, 311, 315, 184, 239, 241–2, 266, 281, 316, 322
321, 331, 350, 363, 367–8, (RSFSR), 357–8, 403, 406–7, 411, 414,
370–4, 378 431, 442
 Subject Index 483
Narkomles 116n, 134, 177n, 184, 202, 241n, Narkomvnudel 23, 202n, 231n, 272
242, 281, 342, 358, 406–7, 414, 442 Narkomvnutorg 28, 52, 64, 147, 224–29,
Narkommestprom 142, 179, 197, 311, 231–2, 348–9, 406–7, 443
323, 335, 358, 406–7, 442 and prices 147, 224, 226–7
Narkomoboronprom 291n, 416–17, 438, Narkomvod 443
442 Narkomvoendel 77, 96
Narkomoborony 17, 95, 113, 207, 209–10, Narkomyust 24, 80 (RSFSR), 214, 280
247, 262, 273, 277, 291, 338, 386, Narkomzdrav 280, 338, 411, 443
442–3 Narkomzem 29, 33, 155, 202n, 268, 280,
investment 78, 158, 196, 272, 291, 406, 299, 361, 368n, 378, 406–7, 414, 443
408, 411–14 NATI 208n
Military Council 291 Naturalism 290
new statute 96 Naval construction 48
Narkompishcheprom 28–9, 52, 116n, 134, Navy 96, 302, 331
142n, 177n, 241n–2, 281, 342, 358, Nazism 90
406–7, 414, 442 NEP 8, 35n, 114, 443
Narkompros 141, 265, 280, 289, 338, Nepfondy 258, 261–2, 365, 443
406–7, 411, 442 Nevyazka 83, 361, 443
Narkomput’ 28n, 82, 109, 112, 119–20n, New capacity 14, 141–2, 198, 201
131, 134, 184, 199, 202n, 212, 214–18, New Statesman and Nation 35
265, 294, 340–1, 356, 400, 407, 411, New Year Tree 110
414, 442 Nickel 140, 198, 212, 339, 387, 425, 438
Narkomsnab 28, 52, 229, 411, 443, 445 Nitrogen 210
Narkomsovkhozov 299 Nitrogen industry 339
Narkomsvyaz’ 443 NKVD 23–4, 95, 98, 210, 231, 279, 344,
Narkomtorg 29, 52, 148, 186, 220, 260, 450, 453, 455
347–8, 363, 420, 443 Departments:
Narkomtrud 443 administration for special construction
Narkomtyazhprom 13, 28, 49–50n, 68, 71, 341
82, 93, 116n, 128n, 130, 134, 136–8, Chief administration for corrective
157, 163, 165, 166, 169, 172, 177n, labour camps and labour settlements
179, 181, 184, 202n, 208n, 212–13, 24
215, 239, 241–3, 245, 275, 282–3, Chief administration for state security
292–4, 296, 313, 321–2, 324, 326, 332, 24
337n, 342, 347, 353–8, 430–1, 443 economic department 260
Chief military mobilisation financial department 211
administration 39, 41, 48 secret political department 317
Council June 1936 305–10 arrests 25, 62, 100–1, 103, 111, 286
Defence industries 39–41n, 48, 77, 159, budget expenditure 246, 272
206, 234, 272, 291n, 387, 389, building projects 108, 140, 212–13, 262,
406–7, 411–12 341–2
Investment 2, 39–41n, 48, 117, 119, and children 100–1
131n, 141n, 159, 178, 183–4n, 193, defence activities 272, 278
265–7, 272–4n, 339, 387, 389, disruption 317
406–7, 412–14 enterprises 342
Technical Council 308 exile 349
NarkomVMD 442–3 financial problems 211, 343
Narkomvneshtorg 29n, 233, 236, 406–7, frontiers 97, 278
443, 447 GUSHOSDOR 341, 407
484 Subject Index
NKVD – continued Noril’stroi 342
investment 140, 196, 214, 278, 338n, Norm setters 161–2
341–2, 406, 408, 411–12 Norms 13, 161–2, 180–1, 214, 227, 240,
and Komsomol’sk iron and steel 243, 325, 354
works 212–13 equipment 182n, 353
kulaks 252 experimental-statistical 162
labour 211, 214 increase 163, 171, 180, 182, 398, 324
lack of expertise 213 output 161–2, 164, 180–2, 240, 270,
large projects 212–13 298, 308, 333, 353
legal system 103, 112 planning 161
Luk’yanov affair 104 revision 162, 180–1, 353
and Noril’sk nickel plant 212 technical 160–2, 164, 182, 182n
North Caucasus 300 technically based 157, 163
and Northern Sea Route 212 North Caucasus 17, 23n, 86, 110, 256,
optimism 285 283, 300, 318–20, 359, 362, 366, 371,
pessimism 319, 359, 362 374, 376, 445
prisoners 26–7, 80 North-Eastern camp 78
and Procuracy 112 Northern regions 262
purge 100 Northern Sea Route 20, 109, 141, 212,
regional branches 359, 362 338, 411, 440
regional organisations 359, 362 November 7th 84, 285n, 313
registration 97 Novokramatorsk 339
remission of sentences 213–14 Novosibirsk 68, 146, 294
reports 77, 144, 145n, 210, 215, 290,
319–20, 359, 362, 367 Odessa 256, 364
settlements 102 OGPU 24–5, 30–1, 61–2n, 127n, 129n,
‘special conference’ 24, 444 344, 440, 444, 453, 455
and Stakhanovism 169, 171 Oil 45, 69, 74, 79, 92, 136–8, 142, 148,
and Stalin 104, 260 201, 233, 237, 245, 247n, 265, 273,
state security services 100 278, 297, 310, 313, 339, 342, 386,
troika 23–4, 84, 349, 446 388–9, 394, 400, 408, 413, 422, 424
Trotsky-Zinoviev 281, 285 exports 92, 233, 352
Tsudotrans 213, 341 extraction 50, 239, 244, 357–8
weather and harvest 300, 317–18, 320 processing 244, 358
welfare of prisoners 343 refining 74, 239, 278
Yagoda 294 Oil industry 50, 119, 137, 164n, 172, 196,
Yezhov 112, 368 201, 339, 388
Non-Black Earth Conference 253, 258, 262 investment 388–9, 413
Non-Black Earth Zone 253, 257–8, 262, 362 underperformance 136–7, 179, 201,
Non-commodity operations 252 297, 306, 310–11, 313, 321
Non-ferrous metals 50, 118, 196, 198, Old people (camps) 343
206, 234, 240, 244, 247n, 273, 297, Omsk 87, 257, 376, 380–2
306, 321–2, 339, 356, 358, 387–8, 397, Open hearth furnaces see Furnaces
408, 413, 422, 424, 426, 439 Opera 16, 289
Non-food products 46n, 187, 222, 272 Operational expenditure 246
Non-priority sectors 340 Opportunists 332
Non-stop flight 290 Opposition 171
Noril’sk nickel combine 140, 141n, 212, left 8, 285, 332
212, 272 Leningrad 285
 Subject Index 485
new 98 Party organisations 89, 98, 165, 285, 304
right 8 Moscow 144
workers’ 99 Party secretaries 66, 167, 304
Oppositionists 8, 9, 27, 98–9, 111–12, Passport
281, 332, 384 equipment 163
Optimum production capacity 160 people 27, 101, 283
Ordzhonikidze, G.K. 28, 40, 68, 70, 113, Pay 71, 96, 107, 129, 137, 143–4, 198,
131, 193, 201, 293, 298, 304–7, 321, 216, 240, 247, 301, 306, 315, 325
324–5, 332, 337, 339, 453–4, 458 Payment in kind 361, 370–4, 443
and aircraft industry 207 Peaceful production 204
and commissions 38, 41, 93, 212 Peasant households 9, 66, 86, 252–3
and defence 38, 41, 48, 77, 209–10 budgets 221
and five year plan 12, 13 consumption 221
and imports 35, 93 Peasant labour obligations 100
and investment 38, 40–1, 48, 265, Peasants 8, 9, 19–20, 42, 56, 58, 86, 88–9,
267, 308 100, 103, 110, 129n, 132, 138, 143–6,
and norms 157, 163 168, 193, 232, 252–4, 279, 283, 290–1,
and productivity 69, 73, 168 300, 344, 349, 358–9, 362, 365, 367,
and railways 82, 215 393, 416, 444
and sabotage 169–70, 172, 303–4 individual 7, 20n, 34, 57, 66–8, 86–8, 195,
and specialists 30, 282 252–3, 255, 316, 363, 368, 383, 436
and Stakhanov movement 164–6, Peat 246n, 356, 415, 430
170, 303 Pedology 288
Ordzhonikidze commission Penal system 26n
on expanding armaments 38, 41, 76 Pensioners 129n
on Noril’sk nickel plant 212 Penza 29n
on orders in Germany 93 People’s Commissar(iat) for agriculture
Orenburg 290, 319, 362, 375–6, 382 see Narkomzem
Orgnabor 42, 131, 444 People’s Commissar(iat) for Defence
Orgraspredotdel USSR 28 Industry see Narkomoboronprom
Osinskii, V.V. 33–4, 84, 111–12, 130n, People’s Commissar(iat) for education
254, 266, 359–61 (republican) see Narkompros
and criticism in Pravda 33 People’s Commissar(iat) for Finance,
and harvest 112n, 254, 359–61 see Narkomfin
Osoaviakhim 32, 272, 444 People’s Commissar(iat) for Food industry
Otkhodnichestvo 253, 317, 444 see Narkompishcheprom
Output per man day 334, 410 People’s Commissar(iat) for Foreign Affairs,
Output per unit of plant 69 see Narkomindel
Output per worker 42, 50, 70, 73, 115, People’s Commissar(iat) for Grain and
130–1, 133, 137–40, 160, 179, 202, Livestock State Farms,
241, 321, 324, 334, 353, 358, 392, 394 see Narkomsovkhozov
Overheads 243, 410 People’s Commissar(iat) for Health
see Narkomzdrav
Palace of the Soviets 21, 234 People’s Commissar(iat) for Internal Affairs
Paper 212, 232, 265, 397, 415 see Narkomvnudel
Paraffin 152 People’s Commissar(iat) for Justice RSFSR
Party congress see Communist Party see Narkomyust RSFSR
Party control commission 27, 77, 100, People’s Commissar(iat) for Justice
112, 251, 303, 335 see Narkomyust
486 Subject Index
People’s Commissar(iat) for Light Industry Politburo 1–4, 7–8, 13, 16n–18, 20,
see Narkomlegprom 22–34, 37, 41, 43–7, 49, 52–5, 57–8,
People’s Commissar(iat) for Local Industry 60, 62, 65, 67, 76, 79, 82–3, 91–7,
see Narkommestprom 99–101, 103–4, 109–10, 112–15,
People’s Commissar(iat) for Timber Industry 134–5, 140–1, 145, 147–9, 151–4, 158,
see Narkomles 165, 167, 170–1, 174, 176, 179,
People’s Commissar(iat) for Transport 188–91, 204–5, 212–13, 228, 231, 233,
see Narkomput’ 236, 248, 255, 259–61, 264–8, 276,
People’s Commissar(iat) for War 278–83, 287–9, 294, 301, 304–5, 310,
see Narkomvoendel 312–16, 331–2, 349–52, 360, 364–6,
Perm’ 77, 363 383, 456, 459–60
Persecution 82, 171, 294, 304 commissions 29–31, 33, 49, 93, 153,
Petrol 50, 75n, 179, 200, 233, 236, 278 212, 228, 288, 349
Petrovskii iron and steel works Political immigrants 279
(Dnepropetrovsk) 163n, 309 Political refugees 279
Photography 177, 440 Politotdely 88–9, 444, 455
Pianos 272 Popular Front 16, 92, 275–7
Piece work 137n, 213, 354 Population 7, 8, 33, 65, 97–8, 105–6, 123,
Pig iron 2, 69, 73, 75, 161, 163, 178, 197, 146, 175, 187, 215, 220, 225, 229–30,
273, 400 252, 263, 268, 285, 288, 290, 301–2,
Pigs 84, 255, 367–8 350, 358, 365, 384
Planning 28, 39, 51–2, 114, 125–6, 132, camp 26, 78–9, 102, 343–4
141n, 161, 169, 184, 196n, 199, 216, census (1937) 97
225, 268, 298, 395, 460 rural 149, 202
Plans urban 42, 107n, 143–4, 186, 193, 230n,
annual 263
1934 1, 14, 38–40, 42–4, 50, 52, 73, 76, working 12, 19, 419
114, 117 Post 338, 419, 443
1935 49n, 72, 74–6, 81n, 114–15, 118, Potatoes 84–6, 126, 186, 188, 256, 300,
120, 122, 124, 126, 130n, 133, 160, 362, 368–9, 436
188, 205, 207, 209n, 214, 220, 233, Power 4, 45, 73, 83, 131, 179, 200–1, 244,
242n, 258, 274, 414 424, 431
1936 107, 136, 158, 162, 165, 176n, electric 131, 142, 239, 297, 332, 340,
196, 217, 264–74, 291, 309, 312, 353, 394, 416–17
328, 336, 355, 357, 430 hydroelectric 332
1937 119, 337, 403 thermoelectric 332
see also Five year plan stations 72, 201, 265, 337, 340, 358,
Plasterers 334 391, 397
Platinum 26, 127n, 440 systems 73
Poisons 210 Praga restaurant (Moscow) 20
Poland 7, 93, 384 Prague 63, 197, 451
Police 10, 24n, 61, 129n, 278–9, 285, 437, Praktiki 259
440, 444–5, 458 Pravda 4, 17, 20, 23, 27, 33, 37n, 91, 99n,
Polish Communist Party 32, 279 109n, 111, 113, 154, 164, 166, 168–9,
Polish communists in exile 279 235, 237, 262, 277, 284, 286–7, 289,
Polish-German non-aggression pact 15 303, 318, 322, 347, 369, 384, 444
Polish households moved from Ukraine to Preserved foods 139, 148, 152, 405
Kazakhstan 278 Prices 9–10, 34, 52, 54, 61–2, 64–6, 77,
Polish Liberation Army 31–2 115–16, 120, 122–7, 133, 139, 141,
 Subject Index 487
146, 148, 152, 174–5, 177, 185–7, 204, unification 64
208, 222, 225, 227–8, 233, 240–7, unified 147–8, 152, 174, 224–5
250–1, 273n, 292, 323, 326, 333, 342, wholesale 46n, 187n, 246
349, 355–6, 386, 389, 394, 396–8, 427, world 153, 233, 427
429, 437, 441, 459 Printing machines 234
1926/27 77, 138n–9n, 177n, 204n, 323, Priority sectors 199, 344
326, 386n, 394, 397–9, 425n Prisoners
Prices in camps and colonies 26–7, 79–80,
bazaar 224–5 211–14, 342–6, 432
bread 54, 55, 58, 63, 122–4, 127–9, political 99, 344
133, 146, 173–6, 220, 223–4, 245, Prisons 80, 129
395, 441 Private trade 52–3
commercial 43–4, 54–5, 59–64, 126–7, Private work 334
146–8, 152–3, 174–5, 220 Procuracy 24–5, 104, 112, 283
current 41n, 46n, 76–7, 116, 141n, RSFSR – agricultural department 299
149–50, 187n, 193, 196n, 204, USSR 36, 280
221n–4, 273, 277, 291–2, 301, Procurator 23, 100, 103, 112, 145, 170,
326–7, 329–31, 337, 386, 388–91, 298, 351
406, 408–11, 414, 416, 419, 421, Producer goods 49, 270–1, 273, 297n,
429n–30 310n, 385, 422–4, 440
delivery 127, 133, 242, 245–6 Production
food 222, 273, 290, 302, 346, 395 capacity 160, 182n, 197, 309, 391
high/er 10, 43, 53, 60–2, 124–7, 143, costs 74, 243
146, 175, 185–6, 224, 264, 349 large-scale 296, 399
increases 61, 77, 95, 106, 117, 123, 132, targets 13–14, 115, 130, 274, 394
134, 137, 143–4, 150, 174, 187–8, Productivity 73
204, 220, 222–3, 233, 241, 290, 326, equipment 42, 161, 164, 168, 179, 201,
346, 349–50n, 430–1 238–9
internal 153n, 431n labour 73–4, 115, 162–3, 168, 173,
kolkhoz market 43, 146, 148, 164, 176, 179–80, 184–5, 193–4, 202, 237–40,
185, 188, 224, 300, 350, 429 242–3, 268, 270, 297–8, 307,
low 54, 61, 133, 148, 349 309–11, 322, 324–5, 333, 343, 346,
market 57, 86, 126, 144, 189, 224 353–4, 358, 392–6, 451, 460
‘normal’ 9, 43, 62, 147–8, 247n Productivity–wage ratio 243
planning 141n, 284n, 196n Profitability campaign 198
policy 34, 63, 147, 226 Profits 52, 151, 218, 250, 269
rationed 54, 57, 60–1, 65, 122, 125–7, Progressive piece rate 180, 239–40, 243,
129n, 142–3, 152, 174–5, 187, 220 245, 444
reductions 43n, 60, 63, 65, 116–17, Progressivniki 243, 444
126, 144, 147, 174–5, 219, 222–4, Prombank 184, 292–3n, 336
264, 274, 302, 395–6 Promisssory note 250
reform 247n, 292 Promparty 282
retail 43–4, 53, 65, 116–17, 127, 132, Propaganda 167, 239, 347, 457, 459
134, 142, 147, 150, 175, 186–7, 220, Provinces 61, 126
222–3, 226–7, 240, 245–6, 264, 290, Public catering 43n, 133, 142–3, 150, 187,
316, 349–50, 395, 429 219, 222, 223n, 226n, 231, 238, 322,
state 185, 224, 365, 383, 429 340, 346, 351, 421, 429, 444
subsidised 247n Public finance 62, 302
transfer 223, 246n, 355–6n, 430 Puppet theatre, Leningrad 111
488 Subject Index
Puppet theatres 280 wagons 4, 13, 81, 115, 120, 137, 163,
Purchase tax 250, 251n 183n, 199, 215–17, 265, 298,
Purchases 67, 258, 280, 350, 448 312n–314n, 335, 394, 400, 430, 439
Purge 29, 100, 298, 303, 350, 368, 437 workforce 81, 217, 237–8, 353, 392
Putilov works/factory (Leningrad) 71, 143 workshops 81n, 217
Pyatakov, Yu.L. 12–13, 28, 70, 78n, 165, Raskonvoirovanie 343
181, 240, 275, 293, 306–7, 325n, 337, Rataichak, S.A. 70, 181, 210, 294, 309
459 Ration cards 10, 124, 129, 173
and arrest 293, 293n, 337 Rationing 9–10, 43, 52, 58, 60–62, 64–5,
and five year plan 12–13 67, 116–17, 122–3, 125–7, 129–30,
and Stakhanov movement 165, 181, 142–3, 145, 147, 152, 173–4, 187, 220,
306 224–6, 249, 292, 364, 395, 458
abolition 10, 52, 62–5, 68, 95, 122–3,
Quality 49, 65, 71, 139n, 171, 197, 207, 126–7, 144, 147, 160, 174, 185,
210, 228, 256, 271, 288, 299, 302, 323, 187–8, 219, 221, 225, 238, 248, 273,
326–7, 336, 347–9, 392, 400 290, 346, 359
Quarries 195, 333–4 see also Bread rationing – abolition; Food
Queues 145–6, 320, 345, 349, 363–4 rationing – abolition
Reconciliation 9, 103, 154, 172, 190, 263,
Rabkrin 6, 437, 444 282, 284
Rails 81–2, 115, 214–15, 219n, 310 Record breaking 169, 304
Railways 4, 32, 59, 81, 82, 161, 167, 170, Records 21, 56, 73, 109, 140, 156, 164–7,
172, 195, 199, 212, 214–19, 269, 304, 169, 180, 182n, 255, 257, 262, 304,
312, 363, 395, 439, 442, 447 306, 327, 354
accidents 32, 82, 219 Red Army 28, 49, 75n, 95–6, 100, 105,
construction 79 157, 209n, 265, 277, 279, 284, 291,
engineering 131, 415 322, 329
freight 53, 81, 119, 139–40, 217 Red Directors’ Club 250
goods trains 216, 298, 394 Regime locations 283
income 218 Reichsbank 92
investment 40, 81, 119–20, 131, 157, Repair 70, 72–3, 81, 141n, 201, 216–17,
159, 194–6, 214, 218, 297, 338, 394 265–6, 269, 278, 299–300, 309, 347,
leadership 170, 215–16 398
locomotive drivers 165, 217 Repression 5, 6, 9, 25, 36, 98, 104, 285,
locomotives 4, 81, 120, 164, 199, 293, 303–4, 321, 368n, 458, 460
215–16, 265, 394, 400, 430 Research Institutes 161, 216
new lines 79, 215, 338, 341–2, 437 Reserve capacity 72–3
passengers 199, 217–19, 386 Resettlement committee 279
problems 40, 53, 81–2 Restaurants 20, 143, 150, 231, 421
repair 81, 217 Retail prices 43–4, 53, 65, 116–17, 127,
rolling stock 81, 120, 163, 199, 216–17, 132, 134, 142, 147, 150, 175, 186–7,
265, 297, 417 220n, 222–3, 226–7, 240, 245–6, 264,
Stakhanov movement 170, 217 290, 316, 349–50, 395, 429
subsidy 53, 59 Retail trade 10, 43, 46n, 116, 133, 142,
successes 82, 137, 157, 176, 183, 148–50, 153, 187, 219–23, 226, 228–30,
214–19, 297, 311, 386, 395 232, 236, 250, 312–13, 322, 346, 348,
wagon loads 82 421, 429, 459
wagon loads per day 81, 115, 183n, turnover 142, 322, 346, 421
298, 314 Retail turnover 229
 Subject Index 489
Revenue see Budget Sentences 23–7, 29, 30–1, 37, 97–9, 101,
Revolutionary Military Council 96 103, 149, 170–1, 213, 279, 281, 283–4,
Rifle cartridges/bullets 209–10 286, 293–4, 299, 343–4, 349
Rifles 276 see also Death sentence
Rightwing opportunists 332 ‘Serp i molot’ factory ( Moscow) 199
Road construction 49 Seven-hour day 69, 71, 216
Roads 49, 79, 100, 108, 213–14, 278, 338, Seversky fighter (USA) 352
341, 440 Sewage 332
Rolling mills 118, 136, 142, 265, 388, 391 Sewing machines 106, 323
Rolling stock 81n, 120, 163, 199, 216–17, Segezhsk combine (Petrozavodsk) 212
265, 297, 417 Sheep 84, 155, 255, 367
Romania 15 Shells 209–11, 331
Rostsel’mash (Rostov-on-Don) 199 Ship turbines 352
RSFSR 21n, 24, 26, 80, 101–2, 253n, Shipbuilding 77, 278, 331, 416–17
299, 319, 322, 443 Shock brigades 287
RSFSR – Sovnarkom 102 Shock workers 26, 153, 325, 343–4, 346
Rubber 152, 397, 423–6 Shoes 233, 323
imports 233 Shops 349, 420, 444
synthetic 233, 430 cooperative 19, 150, 224, 231–2
Rubber and Asbestos plant, Yaroslaval’ 40, rural 231–2, 348–9, 420
70 sales assistants 230
Rudzutak commission 41 state 107, 176, 349
Runways 206 Shortages 19, 120–1, 145, 149–50, 195,
Rusks 318 210, 232, 239, 290, 319, 349–50,
Russo-Baltic factory (Moscow) 206 363–4, 366–7
Rybinsk 212, 329 labour 137, 325, 393–4
Rybinsk Aviation Institute 285 oil 201
Rye 57, 365, 370, 375–6, 378, 380, 382 power 201
Rye bread 63, 127, 175 Shtab 96
Saar 90 Siberia 8, 29n, 31, 66–7, 79, 86, 97, 109,
Sabotage 24–5, 32, 103, 127, 169–72, 293, 319
285, 303–5, 324 Eastern 262, 278, 360n, 377
Saboteur 98, 169, 305–6 West(ern) 23n, 31n, 32n, 84, 97, 125,
Samogon 222, 445 257, 299, 319–20, 359, 362, 376
Saratov 66, 104, 140, 262, 363, 373, 376, Sickness 354
378, 382 Small arms 39, 208
Sausages 185, 191, 223 Soap 146–7, 191, 232, 348, 397, 405
School leavers 42n Sochi 39, 165n, 216
Schools 18–19, 21–22, 42n, 106, 106–7, Social and cultural investment 195, 271
141, 177, 195, 265, 267, 288–9, 301, Social and cultural services 106, 194–5,
305, 364, 393 246–7, 271, 411
Scientists 19, 287 Social origin 19–20, 105, 284
Secrecy 31, 123 Social services 270
Secret 31, 54, 58, 66, 93, 98–100, 102, 105, Socialised trade 43n, 226, 350, 421
114–15, 123n, 143, 172, 189–90, 217, Socialism in one country 8
248, 270, 277, 279, 285, 304, 317, 383 Socialist realism 290
Seed loans 256–7, 364, 366, 370–2, 383 Socially useful work 283n
Sel’po 230–2 Society of Former Political Prisoners and
‘Self-procurement’ 202 Exiles 99
490 Subject Index
Society of Old Bolsheviks 99 Specialists 103–4, 305, 345
Soviet organisations 89 Speculation 59, 61–2, 64, 86, 126, 218,
Soviet planning system 199 226, 349
Soviet trade 10, 52, 62, 64, 227–8, 458 Spies 23, 30–2, 104, 279, 344
Soviet-Japanese relations 276 Staff reduction 53
Sovkhozy 83–4, 86, 88, 211, 242n, 271n, Stationery 349, 404
281, 316–19, 338, 368, 373–4, 436 Stakhanov, A.G. 160, 164–7, 178, 180,
Sovnarkom 14, 19, 21, 39, 46–9, 53–4, 182
58–9, 61–3, 65, 68, 80, 82, 84, 95, 102, and feat 160, 164–66, 180
103–4, 110, 114, 120, 133–5, 147, Stakhanov movement 158, 160–5, 167,
149–51, 155, 177, 179, 188, 190, 171–2, 176, 181, 196, 198, 239, 243,
199–200, 213–14, 227–8, 251, 254, 245, 269–70, 273n, 296, 298, 303,
264, 268, 279–80, 285–6, 288, 313, 305–6, 309, 324, 392, 395
336, 340, 351, 355–6, 366, 407–8, 445 hostility to 303
decrees 18–19, 21, 26n, 30, 32, Stakhanovism 167–72, 178, 184, 193–4,
44n–45n, 48n, 52–5, 57, 62, 80, 103, 217, 240, 295, 298, 303, 331, 333, 346,
114–15, 127, 129n–30, 132, 148–9, 392, 451, 457, 460
151–2, 177n, 188, 212n, 215, 231, Stakhanovites 105, 165, 167–71, 180–2,
251, 267–9, 272, 310n, 337, 340–1, 184, 200, 214, 217, 296–8, 306, 309,
347–9, 355–6n, 360–1 347, 355, 393
and Central Committee decrees 21, 54, All-union conference 169
67, 97, 103, 108–9, 128, 145, 162, Stal’ steel combine 71, 139
174, 217, 231, 310–11, 332–3, 349 Stalin 61n, 65n, 105n, 110n, 147, 165n,
and TsIK decrees 14, 26n, 88n, 96–7, 259, 296, 445, 452–60
100, 103n, 149, 202, 279n–80n, 289, and 1934 plan 39, 115
310, 347 and 1935 Oct–Dec plan 311–12
leadership 18n, 58, 61, 112, 148, 264, and 1936 investment plan 264–6, 269
315 and 2nd five-year plan 4, 13, 158n
Sowing 56–7, 156, 254, 299–300, 366, and Abyssinia 94
432 and agriculture 11, 154, 157n, 255,
autumn 155–6, 256, 299–300, 383 317, 367–8n
spring 56–7, 156, 299, 317–18, 320, and aircraft industry 207, 210
433 and armaments 30, 206–7, 210, 329,
Soyuzekskavator 336 331
Soyuzprodmag 229 and armed forces 48–9
Soyuztorf 357 and army 95
Soyuztsement 244, 357 and assimilation 269
Soyuzunivermag 229 and Barbusse biography 113
Spain 276, 291 and Belorussia 18
Spanish Civil War 384 and Bol’shevik journal 22
Spare capacity 69 and bread prices 126–7, 173, 175
Spare parts 84, 383 and bread queues 364
Special crops 85 and bread rationing 54, 63n, 68, 121–5,
Special Defence Fund 261 129, 350, 395
Special military collegia 24–5, 286 and building industry conference 331
Special settlements 25–6, 102, 286 and building materials 59
Special settlers 25, 26n, 79, 101, 129n, and Bukharin 8, 34–5, 104, 154, 294, 384
343, 432 and cadres 105, 157, 163
Specialist – bourgeois 30 and Central Asia 32n
 Subject Index 491
and Central Committee 6 and grain collections 67–8, 258,
and Chelyuskin 20 319–20, 363, 365, 370–1
and Chkalov 108, 290 and grain loans 365, 371, 373
and chemical industry 210, 265 and grain question decisions 370–4
and close associates 113 and grain reserves 254, 260–1
and collectivisation 87 and grain stocks 258
and coal industry 265 and Grin’ko 61n, 302
and Commission on queues and and H.G.Wells 35–36n
speculation in Moscow 349 and harvest 67, 82, 254–7, 360–2
and communication with the people and heavy industry 196
168 and history 23
and complacency 318 and hooliganism 100
and conference of collective farmers of and household plots 154–5
Tadzhikistan and Turkmenistan and individual peasant 88n
263 and industrial accidents 298
and conference of combine harvester and industrial consumer goods
operators 255, 263 and industrial output 49–50n, 321
and Congress of collective-farm workers and industrialisation 35, 37
154 and industry 49–50n
and constitution 103n and information 290
and construction 331 and internal trade 51–2
and consumer 125 and international situation 7, 16, 91, 94,
and consumer cooperatives 153, 231 276, 384
and consumer goods 4 and investment 1, 40n, 80, 177–8, 194,
and Cossacks 105 264–9
and cotton 84, 256, 258 and iron and steel industry 2, 75
and credit 251n and Kaganovich see Kaganovich
and cult 113 and Kazakh SSR 109n
and culture 17, 111, 289–90 and Kirov’s murder 5, 36
and currency 60–2, 151, 188, 302 and kolkhoz market prices 10
and death penalty 170 and kolkhoz system 11, 67
and death plots 282 and Kraval’ 112
and decision making 113 and Kremlin affair 99
and defence 95–6, 265 and kulaks 11, 263
and dissidence 32 and light industry 194, 265
and Eden 90 and limits 164
and education 21 and Litvinov 93
and elections 282 and livestock 11, 367n
and Engels 22–3 and loans 301
and factory directors 13 and Luk’yanov affair 104
and finance 248 and Magnezit case 305
and Florinsky case 30 and Markevich case 29
and food prices 174–75 and Mayday 105
and food rationing 173 and metals industry 197
and franchise 103 and Molotov see Molotov
and Germany 91, 384 and Moscow 174
and Gosbank 126, 251n, 292n, 315 and Moscow–Volga canal 80, 109
and Gosplan 39 and Moscow metro 109
and grain campaign 66, 145 and Narkomfin 251n
492 Subject Index
Stalin – continued and Ukraine 257
and Narkomoborony statute 96 and untouchable fund 261
and Narkomput’ 265 and viscose factories 265
and Narkomtyazhprom 265 and war threat 91, 94, 204
and Narkomvnutorg 227 and writers 17, 111
and nationality policy 32 and XVII Party Congress 5–6, 384
and need for reserves 237 and Yagoda 101n, 112, 213
and NKVD 194 and zakupki 259–61, 319
and non-Black Earth conference 258n, and Zhdanov assassination plot 282
262 and Zinoviev 22, 112, 282, 293
and non-party Bolsheviks 105 and Zinoviev–Kamenev trial 293n
and norms 163, 181–2 and Zinovievites 112, 282
and OGPU 23 Stalin order (stalinskii zakaz) 215
and oil industry 265 Stalin vehicle works, Moscow (ZIS) 70, 91,
and open hearth furnaces 265 199, 234, 339, 448
and opera 289 Stalin’s son 66
and opposition 7–8, 27, 30, 32 Stalingrad (town and region) 66, 317, 319,
and optimism and overoptimism 15, 78, 371, 374, 377–8, 380–2
157–8, 193, 298 tractor factory 200
and Osinsky 33, 111, 360 Stalinsk iron and steel works 31
and output 168 Stalinugol’ 306, 324
and plan 311–12 State budget, see Budget
and politotdely 89 State Commission for Measuring the
and power stations 265 Harvest, see TsGK
and prisons 24n State harvest evaluation commission,
and purge 303 see TsGK
and railways 165, 167, 169, 265 State Trade Inspectorate 227
and Rataichak 210 Statistics 22, 33, 98, 111, 176, 256, 356,
and rationing 173 361, 385, 391, 409
and retail trade 313 Stavropol’ 299, 318
and rolling mills 265 Steam boilers 415, 425
and Roy Howard interview 275 Steel 118, 197, 425, 457
and repression 304 see also Iron and steel
and Rykov 294 crude 13, 70, 75, 178, 197n, 308, 400
and school building 265 electrosteel 197
and seed loans 256, 370 high quality 197, 400
and Spanish Civil War 276 rolled 2, 75, 178, 197n, 273, 310, 400
and special settlers 101 special 245, 339, 413
and Stakhanov movement 165, 167, Stock exchange 251
169 Stocks 51, 56, 64, 67, 76, 81, 147, 150–1,
and submarines 331 189, 217, 222n, 254, 258, 260, 262,
and sukhovei 257 320, 388, 362, 366, 369, 441
and timber industry 265 Strike 54
and trade 9, 125, 227 Stroielektro 336
and transport 215 Students 19, 20n, 105, 107, 110, 129n,
and Tsudotrans 213 216, 247, 283, 393
and TsUNKhU 111 Submarines 331
and Tukhachevsky 91n, 204 Subsidies 53, 59, 207, 246–7, 250, 252,
and Tupolev 322 292, 326, 355–6
 Subject Index 493
Sugar 59–60, 63–67, 106n, 126, 129, 149, Theatres 280
173–5, 185–86n, 191, 202, 221n, 223, children 29, 280n
226, 230, 232, 246, 250, 348, 391, puppet 111, 280
405, 445 Theft 27, 61, 86, 100, 226
Sugar beet 84, 174, 188, 191, 202, 256, from building sites 59
369, 385, 436 Timber 116, 139, 177, 183, 201–2, 212,
Sukhovei 300, 317–18, 446 303, 335, 354, 415, 424, 437
Sunflower seed 256, 320, 435 and camps 79, 211, 342
Supreme Court 24, 31, 281, 283–4 exports 45, 233, 352, 422
Sverdlovsk 77n, 110, 230, 262, 303, 335, Timber industry 74, 201, 265, 294n, 310,
363, 372, 376–7, 379–82 335, 393, 442, 451
Svir camp 70, 211 investment 177
Sweets 226 labour 202, 393, 397
Tadzhikia / Tadzhikistan 32, 263 Tin 387, 425, 438
Tank industry 49, 208, 329–30 Tobacco 29n, 122, 127, 133, 148, 152,
Tanks 49, 77n, 208, 329–30, 402, 440, 232, 237, 245–6, 250, 345, 349, 353,
452, 454, 456 397, 422, 424
armour plating Tokyo 27
foreign 330 Tomsky works 118
Tashkent Cotton textile combine 195 Torgsin 44n, 236–7
TASS 93 Total gross production 179
Tax 34, 44, 57, 60, 66–7, 153, 228, 245–6, Tourism 235
250–3, 365, 374, 383 Towns – ‘most important’ 229n
collectors 87 Toys 52, 347, 404
one-time 87–8 Tractor horsepower 83n
revenue 66, 252 Tractors 75, 136, 157n, 178, 194n,
Taxi services 252 199–200n, 263, 299–300, 321, 413,
Tea 152, 221, 425–6 415–17, 424, 435, 440, 447, 451, 459
Teachers 4, 107, 301, 363 caterpillar 200, 339
Technical assistance – foreign 45n, 108n, intertillage 200
201, 352 wheeled 200, 415
Technical coefficients 160–1 Trade 9, 28–9n, 43–4, 51–2, 58, 61, 63–4,
Technical colleges 104, 107, 446 76, 86, 116, 123, 125, 145, 148–9, 185,
Technical director 161, 309 188, 220, 223, 225, 227–8, 236–7, 251,
Technical Norming Bureau 161 259, 271, 274, 292, 316, 346–50n, 353,
Technical norms 160–2, 164, 182 363, 419, 429, 443
Technical plans 46 see also Foreign trade; Internal trade;
Technical project 159, 333, 336 Retail trade
Technical specifications 161, 444 census 1935 230
Technicians 162, 168, 172, 249, closed 147–8
304–5 commercial 9, 43–4, 53, 55, 60–1,
Technological conservatism 69 64–5, 116, 133, 151n, 153, 245, 437
Tekhnicums/Tekhnikums 19–21, 104, cooperative 9, 52, 150, 221n, 429
131n, 446 exhibitions 347
Temnikov camp 79, 211, 342 kolkhoz 52, 146, 150, 224, 227, 232,
Terrorism 98, 170, 281 421, 429
Textiles 51, 106, 120, 138–9n, 152, 176–7, network 10, 51, 62, 227
180, 203, 231, 250, 323, 349, 354–5, ‘normal’ 53, 64, 148
397, 404, 415, 417, 431` plan 51–2, 125, 146
494 Subject Index
Trade – continued TsIK 14, 18n, 24, 26, 31, 36, 39n, 88n,
private 52–3 94, 96–7, 99–103n, 105, 112, 130, 133,
rural 116–17, 219, 221n, 230, 346, 348 135, 149, 196, 202, 211, 252, 268n,
socialised 43n, 226, 350, 421 279n–281n, 283n–4, 288–90n, 295,
soviet 10, 52, 62, 64, 227–8, 458 301n, 313, 347n, 407–8, 446
state 10, 153, 185, 348, 420, 437 RSFSR 253
turnover 12, 44, 51–52n, 142, 147–8, Tsudotrans 213–14, 341, 406–7, 446
151, 153, 189, 223, 228, 232, 251, TsUNKhU 33, 46, 49–50n, 84–5, 105,
322, 346, 421, 429 111–12, 130, 142, 179, 219, 241–3,
urban 346, 348 267, 335, 361, 364, 367–8, 390n, 410,
Trade marks 347 429, 447
Trade Union All-Union Central Council Tukhachevsky, M.N. 77n, 96, 126, 210,
see AUCCTU 265, 384
Trade Union organisations 71, 123n, 143, and defence 47, 196, 204, 211, 265
172, 284 and Germany 91, 204, 384
Trading organisations Tula 29n
Training 19, 22, 25, 230, 238n, 263, 334, Tupolev, A.N. 21, 205–7, 234, 327–9
345, 401 Turbogenerators 337
Trains 165, 218–19n Turkestan-Siberian railway 447
goods 216, 298, 394 Turkmenistan/Turkmenia 32, 263
Traktorotsentr 29, 446 Turnover tax 44, 46, 55, 132–3, 151n,
Transcaucasia / Transcaucasus 32n, 113, 245n, 250–1
262, 330 Tverskaya 64
Transformers 425 Typhus 363
Transmission lines 201 Tyres 40, 70, 233
Transport 81–2, 119–20, 157, 172, 235, Tyumen’ woodworking factory 290
239, 246, 333, 340, 386, 393, 424
air 338 Ufalei 198
and NKVD 79, 100 Uglich 212
bottlenecks 131, 156, 194 Ukhto-Pechora trust 79
engineering 199, 322, 340, 413, 416–17 Ukraine 17–18, 23n, 28n, 56–8, 85n, 93,
investment 39–40, 46, 76, 120, 195, 97, 256–7, 261, 278, 293, 300, 319,
270–1, 338, 340–1 387, 411–13, 362–4, 377, 379–80, 448–9, 452
416–17 Communist Party 6, 18, 362, 86
maritime 215, 336, 338 Communist Party – Central Committee
road 338, 446 18
water 340–1, 355–6, 419, 443 Communist Party – XIII Party Congress
see also Railways; Roads 362
Transportnik 164 harvest 56–7, 85, 362
Trawlers 203 officials 27–9, 86, 303
Treason 24–5 Ukrainians 17–18, 257
Trials 30, 82, 98–9, 111–13, 282–3, 285, Ukrainisation 17–18
292–4, 304, 321, 332, 384 Underexpenditure 55, 178
Troika – Ogpu 84, 446 Union-republic commissariats 281
Trotskyist 17, 27–8, 111 United Front 16, 91–2
Trotskyite 22, 251, 281, 293–4, 304, 459 United States 35, 288
Trotskyite-Zinovievite 281, 285, 293 technical assistance 91, 108, 203, 205,
Tsentrosoyuz 230–1, 348, 406–7, 446 307, 333–4
TsGK 57, 82–3, 112n, 254–5, 359–61, 446 Univermag 64–5
closure 1936 360–1 Unplanned increases 219, 241–2
 Subject Index 495
Untouchable grain fodder fund 258, Voroshilovgrad loco works 334
261–2, 443 Vote 103
Untrustworthy ethnic groups 278 deprived of 284, 344
Uralmash / Uralmashzavod 30, 35, 198, Vychuga 180
339, 447 Vyshinsky, A.Ya. 100, 104, 112, 170, 282,
Urals 23, 66–7, 123, 172, 198, 201, 239, 298–9, 350–1
303
Urban population 42, 107n, 143–4, 1876, Wage supplement 127–9n, 242
193, 230n, 263 Wages 12, 19, 43, 125, 148, 166, 173, 177,
Uzbek party secretary 84 188, 202, 228–9, 232, 239, 242, 264,
Uzbekistan 32, 84, 256, 377 284, 315, 325, 333–4, 358, 393, 410,
419, 446, 457
Vegetable oil 60, 149, 185–6, 191, 221n, and abolition of rationing 122–4,
223, 230n, 300, 405 127–9, 133–4, 143–4, 175, 177
Vegetables 52, 84–7, 106n, 146, 188n, arrears 63, 107, 316
224n, 228n, 256, 300, 320, 362, 445–6 average 116, 133, 181, 184–5n, 242–3,
Vehicles 136, 178, 313n, 329, 339, 394, 270, 358
416–17 increase 54–5, 57, 65, 74, 81, 122–4,
Veitser, I.Ya. 28–9, 52n, 122n, 123, 125, 127–8, 133, 143, 175, 181, 184, 202,
145–7, 185, 225–6, 228, 322, 346 204, 240–3, 246–7, 264, 270, 358
and abolition of rationing 122n–3, and norm revision 181, 243, 298, 324,
125, 185 441, 446
and bread trade 145–6 and Stakhanovite movement 180–1,
and Narkomvnutorg 28, 228 298, 393
and prices 147 and wage bill 42, 180, 191, 218–19,
and shortages 146 232, 241–2
Veksel’ 250–1, 447 per man day 334n
Ventilation 355 per unit of output 76, 358
Versailles treaty 90, 93, 275 Wagons 4, 13, 81, 115, 120, 137, 163,
Vesenkha 28n, 292n–3, 447 183n, 199, 215–17, 265, 298, 335, 430,
Vickers-Carden-Lloyd tank 330 439
Vickers tank 329 goods 81, 199, 215–16, 312n–14n, 394,
Vilna 28n 400
Viscose factories 265 loads 82
Visual arts 280 loads per day 81, 115, 183n, 298, 314
Vodka 139, 148n, 222, 224, 226n, 246n, War
250, 405 Civil 28, 214, 248, 279, 292n
Volga 67, 212, 319 First World 208, 214
Lower 23n Second World 143, 248
regions 60, 66, 362, 368 Warsaw 27
Voluntary organisations 347n Washington 27
Voronezh 88, 111, 262, 317, 320, 328, Wastage (brak) 336
359, 363, 371, 375–6, 379, 380–2 Watches 67, 106, 272
Voroshilov, K.E. 31–2, 40n, 49, 96, 100, Water 212, 325, 332, 345
104, 170n, 209, 213, 265, 291, 326n Water transport 341, 355–6, 419, 443
and aircraft industry 47, 207, 328 Weapons 4, 77–8, 209, 326
and army 95n Weather 56–7, 155, 183, 257–8, 299, 317,
and five year plan 13 321
and investment 48, 265 Weights and measures 415
and military orders 41, 48–9, 77, 331n Welfare 12, 71, 159, 271, 415
496 Subject Index
West/ern Siberia 23n, 31n–2n, 84, 97, Writers – First All-Union Congress of Soviet
125, 257, 299, 319–20, 359, 362, 376 Writers 17, 110
Western democracies 103, 282 Writers Union 20
Western frontier 95, 97, 262
Western estimates 193, 385, 387, 392 Yagoda, G.G. 24, 80, 99n, 112, 212–13,
Western region 62, 360n, 375, 378, 380, 383 285, 286, 294
Whale boats 203 and camps and settlements 25, 101n
Wheat 57, 127, 317, 359, 365, 376 and forced labour 104, 211–13
White Sea-Baltic Canal or Kombinat and improved conditions 101n, 286,
(Combine) 79, 213, 342–3, 345, 437 345–6
Wholesale suppliers 249–50 Yaroslavl’ region 320, 377, 379–80
Wind 257, 300, 317, 446 Yaroslavl’ rubber and asbestos
Wolfram 198, 425 combine 40, 70
Women 42, 70, 84–5, 131, 143, 154, 167, Yezhov, N.I. 28, 100, 104, 112, 265, 292n,
317 303–4, 321, 346, 350, 384
Wool 51, 122, 385, 425–6 and counter-revolutionary activity 112,
Woollens 51, 106, 138–9, 148, 203, 403, 281, 317n
426 and NKVD 100, 112, 281, 294, 351
Workers 13, 16, 26, 45, 50, 62, 71, 72–3, and party purge 100
75, 106, 119, 129n, 131n, 137, 139–40, Yield 11, 57, 82–3, 136, 156, 174, 245,
153–4, 160, 179, 181, 183, 194, 198, 254–6, 258, 316–17, 359–62, 446
202n, 209, 211, 216, 238–40, 243, 259,
263, 269, 271, 284, 291, 306, 315, 320, Zagotovki 68n, 441, 446–7
325, 334, 353–5, 363, 392–3, 399, Zagotzerno 149, 260–2, 365, 447
447–8, 457 Zakupki 67–8, 122, 254, 258–62, 317,
see also Collective farm workers; 319, 365, 383, 433, 448
Department of Workers’ Supply; Zaporozhstal’ 118, 448
Labour; Output per worker Zavodstroi 184
and abolition of rationing 124–6, Zhdanov, A.A. 6, 17, 21n, 23n, 29–30, 34,
128–9, 143–4, 176 104, 122n, 168n, 227–8, 253, 258, 282,
building 139–40, 183, 194, 238, 301, 334 288–9
engineering and technical 137 Zheleznovodsk 165
industry 50, 75, 137, 139, 240, 270, Zhilstroi 336
353–5, 392–3, 397–8 ZIM automobile works (Gor’kii) 199, 309,
manual 20, 73, 106, 129n, 404 448
and norms 161–2, 164, 181–2, 308, Zinc 119, 322, 339, 425, 439
324, 333, 354 Zinoviev, G.E. 22, 27, 98, 281–2, 285,
skilled 36, 104, 126, 209, 229, 334, 343, 285, 332
345, 393 and rehabilitation 7, 9, 27
and Stakhanovite movement 168–9, and trial 283, 285, 292–3, 304, 321,
171, 180, 182, 184 332, 384
unskilled 128, 393 Zinovievite organisation etc. 37, 98, 112,
white-collar/office 20n, 73, 81, 106n–7, 154, 282, 293
129, 176, 246, 320 Zinoviev–Kamenev trial 283, 292–3, 304,
Working capital 246–7, 333 321, 332
Working day 137, 163, 214, 344 ZIS vehicle factory ( Moscow) 70, 91n,
Workshops 81n, 217, 347 199, 234, 339, 448
Wrecking 29, 33, 170–1, 294, 303–6, 337, Zones ( poyasy) 123, 127–8, 174, 253, 362,
368n 368, 448